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She walks past me and gives me a little push as she goes. “No, it is not. Quit messing with me.”
I chuckle. I know women think I’m good-looking. I am messing with her.
But I’m also thinking…
About that confession I just overheard.
She finds me alluring. Exciting. Isn’t that what she said?
Maybe that kiss wasn’t as forgettable as she made it seem back at the restaurant.
She tried to plow straight past it with work talk, but it must have meant something to her if she holed up back here and talked to a turtle about it.
“I gotta know—why Chester?” I manage to catch up to her, even though now she’s walking fast.
Instead of stepping over the rope barrier, like I did, she carefully unclips it.
After we both pass through, she fastens it again. “I don’t have to tell you.”
“You don’t have to, but come on… why not? Humor me.”
“You are just like my friend Alexis, you know that? She always pries things out of me.”
“It seems like that’s what it takes. It’s either ask you a bunch of questions or wait for you to pass out again so I can catch you and sunbathe with you. You were sort of chatty when we were lying on that towel together.”
She turns to roll her eyes at me. “I was chatty because I didn't have enough blood flow to my brain. I felt like the ground was moving under me, and I was trapped there for ten minutes.”
“Okay, so now that you’re not trapped, you don’t want to talk to me?”
“That’s not it.”
“Well…? I’m just trying to be friendly here.”
“Fine. I called him Chester because he’s bald. Like my therapist. And I had to try to articulate my emotions because otherwise, they’d just be a mishmash inside me.”
“So… you’re pretending the sea turtle is your shrink.”
She narrows her eyes. “You’re making fun of me.”
We slow our pace. Up ahead, my nieces have tracked the lizard to a new location.
Ophelia spots me. “Uncle Jack, come see!”
“In a sec, Lia,” I call back. Then, I zero in on Hazel again. I feel my lip twitch, inching toward a smile.
It’s like that dark-red juice concoction I slurped down at the restaurant is finally delivering the ‘mood boost’ that the menu promised.
Or… it’s Hazel.
Standing here with her. Talking with her. Watching the way shifting light off the water plays across her features.
Yeah, it’s Hazel.
She’s making me feel good.
Happy.
Goofy.
