“Why don’t you meet us down there,” Georgeanne suggested, wanting to take advantage of the sunbreak while it lasted, before the skies clouded and became overcast.
“Sounds good. Do you need beach towels?”
Georgeanne had never been a Girl Scout but was usually prepared for anything and everything. She’d brought her own. After John left them, Lexie and Georgeanne changed. Lexie slipped into her pink and purple plaid two-piece swimsuit, then pulled her Don’t Mess With Texas T-shirt over her head. Georgeanne changed into a pair of orange and yellow tie-dyed drawstring shorts, a matching halter that left her abdomen bare, and because she felt a bit too exposed, she slipped her arms into a light cotton blouse. The yellow fabric fell past her behind and she left it unbuttoned. Both she and Lexie shoved their feet into Teva sandals, grabbed beach towels and sunscreen, then headed outside.
By the time John joined them on the beach, Lexie had found a broken sand dollar, half a shell, and a little crab claw. She put them in her pink pail
and crouched down beside Georgeanne to inspect a sea anemone stuck to one of many small rocks exposed by the low tide.
“Touch it,” Georgeanne told her. “It’s sticky.”
Lexie shook her head. “I know it’s sticky, but I don’t like to touch ‘em.”
“It won’t bite you,” John told her, casting a shadow over the two of them.
Georgeanne glanced up and slowly stood. John had shaved and changed into beige cargo shorts and an olive T-shirt. He looked clean and casual, but too rough and too sensuous to ever look completely respectable. “I think she’s afraid it will grab her finger and won’t let go.” Georgeanne said.
“No, I’m not,” Lexie objected, and shook her head again. She scrambled to her feet and pointed to Haystack Rock about a hundred feet away. “I want to go there.”
Together the three of them picked their way toward the huge formation. John helped Lexie jump from rock to rock, and when the terrain got a little rough for her short legs, he picked Lexie up and swung her up on his shoulders as effortlessly as if she weighed nothing.
Lexie grabbed the sides of John’s head, and her pail swung and hit him on his right cheek. “Mommy, I’m high!” she shrieked.
John and Georgeanne looked at each other and laughed. “Just what every mother longs to hear,” she said.
When their laughter died and was drowned out by the sound of waves, John’s smile remained. “I was beginning to think that you only wore dresses or skirts,” he said as he reached up to wrap his hands around Lexie’s ankles.
She wasn’t surprised he’d noticed. He was that kind of guy. “I don’t usually wear shorts or pants.”
“Why?”
Georgeanne didn’t really want to answer that question. Lexie, however, had no problem providing personal information. “Because she has a big bum.”
John looked up at Lexie, his eye squinted against the sun. “Really?”
Lexie nodded. “Yep. That’s what she says all the time.”
Georgeanne felt her face flush. “Let’s not discuss it.”
Reaching for the hem of her yellow shirt, John raised the back and tilted his head to the side for a better look. “It doesn’t look big,” he said as casually as if they were discussing the weather. “Looks pretty good to me.”
Georgeanne felt a little foolish for the ember of pleasure in the pit of her stomach. She batted his hand away and pulled the bottom of her shirt down. “Well, it is,” she said, then she stepped around John and walked ahead of him and Lexie. She remembered what had happened seven years ago when he’d turned her head with his smooth compliments. Every southern girl dreamed of being a beauty queen, and with very little effort, he’d made her feel like Miss Texas. She’d eagerly jumped in his bed. Now, as she walked around a medium-sized boulder, she reminded herself that while he could be charming, he could also get real nasty.
Once they reached the base of the rock, the three of them explored. John set Lexie back on her feet, and together they examined the usual variety of ocean life. The sky remained cloudless and the day beautiful.
Georgeanne watched John and Lexie together. She watched them discover orange and purple starfish, mussels, and more sticky anemone. She watched their dark heads bent over a tide pool and tried to bury her insecurities.
“It’s lost,” Lexie said as Georgeanne crouched down next to her beside the tide pool.
“What is?” she asked.
Lexie pointed to a little brown and black fish swimming beneath the surface of the clear, cold water. “It’s a baby and its mommy is gone.”
“I don’t think it’s a baby,” John told her. “I think it’s just a small fish.”
She shook her head. “No, John. It’s a baby, all right.”
“Well, once the tide comes back in, its mommy can come and get it,” Georgeanne assured her daughter, attempting to stop Lexie before she got too agitated. When it came to orphans, Lexie was known to get very emotional.