Page 56 of Lucy Loves Him Not
“Not with magnet bait.” I shook the small magnet hanging off the pole to aid toddlers in their pursuit of magnetized fish.
“Should I try or will I just make the kids feel bad?” he asked in a hushed voice.
“Go for it.” I swung my arm toward the lake where one tiny tot was trying to crawl into “shwim.”
“Maybe the children can learn from me,” he said, cockily casting his pole.
Minutes passed.
He kept brushing the magnet bait over different brightly-colored fake fish to no avail. He moved the fishing pole around the lake to different spots. He tried flinging it toward the fish. Kids started snickering.
One kid who was catching fish after fish eventually offered to help Adam with his technique. “I’m fine, man. I think the magnet is broken,” Adam said to him, trying to retain some pride. He finally dropped the fishing pole back into the water and gave up.
A few parents shook their heads in judgment.
“It’s probably broken.” I patted his shoulder.
The kid who offered to help earlier grabbed Adam’s discarded pole and started fishing with it, a pole in each hand. “Seems fine to me,” he called after us.
We strolled toward the arts and crafts area in the back. We passed by kid-sized crafts tables, a competition display, and a dress-up closet until we discovered a small plexiglass room for finger painting.
There were big tubs of different colored paint hanging by the entrance where you could dunk your hands in and then finger paint on the four plexiglass walls.
Adam and I threw on the plain, oversized white tee shirts they offered us to protect our clothes, fitting snugly on our adult-sized bodies, especially his. We giggled, checking each other out in the snug shirts as we wandered into the room.
It was just the two of us in there for now. I dipped my hands in red and he dunked his in orange. The paint was thick and cold.
I started painting little fireworks across the clear wall and Adam started making handprints. I followed behind him and made one of his handprints into a turkey, then another into a bouquet. He turned around finally noticing, walking backwards to see what I’d turned his creations into. A smile of appreciation spread across his face.
“I like this brain,” he said as he hovered his hands near both sides of my head.
“No! Do not get orange paint on my hair!” I squealed, backing up against one of the clean walls.
“Fine.” He grinned over me, settling for placing a dripping hand against the wall on either side of my head. I looked up at him with both our chests rising and falling a beat apart. “Better?” he asked.
There was that itch to be closer to him. My chest against his chest. His lips against my lips. “Better,” I breathed.
He took a step closer. The heat of his arms was around me, his biceps brushing against my cheek as his warm scent overwhelmed me.
His head hung low, close to mine, a kiss away. My body arched from the wall, closing in against his.
“Mommy! I want to make hand turkeys, too!”a little girl shouted as she ran inside. Her mom gazed questioningly at Adam and me as she followed behind her daughter.
Adam and I broke apart. Both our cheeks were redder than the paint on the walls.
We washed our hands and returned our tee shirts, then awkwardly wandered over to the stuffed animal making table.
Not even a kid’s museum could put out the flicker of whatever was between us. I chewed on my lip nervously as we picked our fabric and patterns. I chose a black and white cow while Adam opted for a pink mouse. When he rummaged around some of the additional (and somewhat advanced) options to find a squeaker, I said, “Wow, getting carried away?”
He just winked.
Surrounded by crafting children and their parents, who didn’t seem to like how much space we two adults were taking at the craft table, I was still flushed over Adam and his paint-covered hands. And now his stupid, sexy wink, too.
His glasses adorably slid low on his nose as he carefully constructed his stuffed animal following each direction meticulously.
I sloppily threw some stuffing into my cow, watching his hands.Had I noticed his hands before?A visceral memory of them on my wet clothes during our water fight flashed through my mind.
This was not the time. I tried to focus on my cow. I haphazardly tried to sew it together.
