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I am having such a good day. Such a good weeken.
This is some fine planet. How we managed to find it just when we were really ready for some serious R & R, I’ll never know. Our luck usually runs towards dead budongs, desert planets infested with bounty hunters, or jungles with bone-eating critters.
And here we are, on a tropical paradise. I could almost swear I was back on Earth. The sky is a little too purple, and so is the sea, but I can hear the waves crashing on the shore from the grass hut Aeryn and I rented for the vacation. There are no coconuts, but the building material resembles bamboo, and the roof is thatched with some kind of large, dry leaves.
I haven’t been this comfortable in, I don’t know how long. The only thing missing right now is…Aeryn.
Fortunately, our tropical paradise is more a temperate paradise – it’s not too hot for her. But it’s warm enough to want to dress down. I’ve been wearing shorts and some kind of loosely-woven shirts for a couple days. This morning after breakfast I finally talked Aeryn into buying some native clothing. But, she wouldn’t let me come along. She said she wanted to surprise me. More likely, she didn’t want me trying to get her into something hot pink or flowery….
So, I let her go on her own, and went out and sat by the sea for a while, pretending we were honeymooning in Hawaii, or maybe Tahiti.
She’s been gone long enough, though, that I’m getting bored. Hell, I’m even beginning to wonder what the others are doing, scattered around the planet. It’s the first time I’ve thought about them all weeken. I assume everyone’s fine. Pilot is keeping tabs on us from orbit, and I’m sure he’ll holler if there’s trouble.
Uh-oh, there’s the door…
* * * * * * *
I couldn’t help it, the wolf whistle just came out. Aeryn stopped in the doorway like a deer caught in headlights, still holding some kind of shopping bag in one hand and a shirt in the other.
“Woo-hoo! Look at you!” All right, it wasn’t very eloquent. But my brain just turns off when I look at Aer, okay? Especially dressed like that.
She was wearing a light blue, um, I don’t know, something like a bikini top, and a short skirt of the same fabric that wrapped around and tied at her waist. With her dark hair, and her blue-gray eyes, well, I definitely appreciated the effect.
Apparently I wasn’t making myself entirely clear, however, because she had a very dubious expression on her face. “Is it all right?” she asked, closing the door behind her and setting the bag down, awkwardly stuffing the shirt into it. I realized then that she must have worn the shirt as a cover-up all the way back here, only taking it off just outside the door. That’s my Aeryn.
God, I love this woman.
“You look BEAUTIFUL,” I breathed, adding, “not that you don’t ALWAYS look beautiful…. But this—” At that point I decided actions speak louder than words. I stepped across the room and put my hands on her waist. Did I mention I love the feel of her skin?
She grinned at me then, which only heightened the effect. “You like it?” she purred, knowing full well what that throaty voice did to me.
In answer, I leaned forward to nuzzle her neck and breathe in the smell of her hair. Mmmm-Mmmm good…
My hands slid around her back, enjoying the sensation of naked skin, and she wrapped her arms around me, pulling me closer.
I pulled my face out of her hair then, and went for her very willing mouth. Ah, the taste….
I stopped.
“Aeryn, Honey,” I asked cautiously. “What have you been eating?”
“What, don’t you like it?” she asked distractedly. “I thought it was rather good.”
“No, no, I like it,” I said. “It’s just, what is it?”
She pulled back and looked at me as if I had completely lost my mind. Of course, that wasn’t unusual. The look, I mean.
“Just some sweet,” she said. “I got it in a shop.”
“What shop?” I said, probably a little too intensely.
“John, what is it?”
“It’s chocolate, Aeryn. It tastes like CHOCOLATE!” I grabbed her hand. “Come on! Show me where you got it!”
“Settle down, John,” she laughed. “I thought you might like it, so I brought you some.”
She pulled a wrapped chunk of something from a pocket I hadn’t suspected that little skirt had….and almost succeeded in making me forget the sweet. My brain may have been screaming “Chocolate!” but my body was reminding me in no uncertain terms that it was AERYN who was standing there, inches from me, in that decidedly non-regulation outfit – holding the purported chocolate.
She knew it, too.
She held up the wrapped confection, saying with a wicked grin, “You want this?” Before I could say anything, she backed out of my reach. “Come and get it,” she said. I made a playful grab and she pulled her hand away. When she did, the bar….squished.
She stopped in surprise, and looked at the blob of gooey brown stuff that had oozed out onto her fingers.
Oh, man, it melted in your pocket like chocolate, too! “Come on, let me taste it,” I wheedled.
“All right, open your mouth,” she said, transferring the bulk of the still-wrapped bar to the other hand, and reaching for my face with chocolate-covered fingers….
Mmmmm, yes, chocolate, or so close, it made no never mind! Mmmmm, Aeryn! I grabbed her hand and carefully licked her fingers clean, feeling a shiver go through her body.
That gave me an idea. Maybe something showed in my face because she didn’t try to stop me when I took the wrapper full of melted “chocolate” from her and opened it up. I put a dab on her nose, and on her chin, and leaned in to lick it off.
When I was done, Aeryn kissed me and then laughed. “I can think of some other things to do with that,” she said.
“I bet you can,” I told her. “But it would be a shame to get chocolate on your nice, new clothes,” I grinned, trying to figure out how to untie her skirt with my one clean hand.
“Yours too,” she smirked, reaching for my shirt.
Oh, yeah. SUCH a good day….
