He laughed. "Great. So?" he said after a
moment, "Are you just going to stand there? You
didn't come all this way to watch me lie on a beach
blanket, did you?" he asked.
"Maybe. Don't forget my uncle and aunt don't
allow television in their house."
He threw back his head and roared with
laughter. Then he grew serious and gestured for me to
come to him. "It's very cozy on this blanket." I lowered myself to my knees and put my shoes
down before sitting on the blanket, close to the edge. He stared with a quizzical look on his face and
then he shook his head, still smiling. "Aren't you the
tease?" he said. "All right, I'll play hard to get, too."
He lay back on his hands to look up at the sky. "I'm not a tease."
"Of course you are. All girls are."
"Well, it's not true about me."
He turned over and braced his chin on his hand
to gaze at me. "Really? Well, why do you work so
hard at being beautiful if not to have boys look at you
longingly?"
"I don't work so hard at being beautiful." "I imagine you don't," he said nodding. "You
are what I would call a natural beauty. That's why all the cats in school are clawing at you. So," he said, sitting up again, "tell me about your life in
coalmineville. Leave a boyfriend crying in his beer
when you came to the Cape?"
"I'll bet. Well, his loss is my gain." He
snickered. "Come a little closer. I won't bite," he said.
"You want me to beg? Is that it?" he asked when I
didn't move.
"I don't want you to beg, no."
"So?"
I shifted on the blanket until I was beside him. "Now that's better. At least I can smell your