Minnie knew how to swim. Her parents had forced all their children to swimming lessons from a young age. Out of all her siblings, she wasn’t the best or the worst, but she was still terrified of drowning. The sea was vast and deep, she didn’t want to die in it. She didn’t want sharks to eat her up, but she still allowed Nicholas to lead her into it and place her onto a surfboard.
They were sitting together on one, their legs dangling off the sides. He wrapped an arm around her waist, his hand was touching her bare skin. His touch sent sparks through her body. His fingers were large with small callouses, she didn’t know from what. His touch was gentle and careful. If he wanted he could wrap his other arm around her, if he wanted to, he could drop his head onto her shoulder and place kisses on her neck. She could imagine it, she wanted it.
“Don’t be scared.” Her breath hiked as he used his other arm to paddle them closer to shore. The skin-tight suit he was wearing was wet against her wet skin. He had hard muscle underneath it, she could feel it. He held her upright. His knees knocked against hers as the current tried to carry them out to sea. Would it truly be that bad if it did? She would be free of her parents. She would be free to do whatever she wanted, whomever she wanted.
“I want you to try and stand up on the board.”
She turned back to him, with big eyes. She was supposed to stand up on the board? She knew that’s what surfing entailed but she wasn’t sure if she was ready to do that. She didn’t want to move from how close they were, how intimate this position could seem.
“Oo-kay.” She stammered, she wanted to learn how to surf. Well there she was. She needed to try it, to just do it. Nothing was getting close to how she was feeling and how terrified she was. She was shaking as she placed her legs onto the board.
She didn’t want to think about the possibility of drowning, she could swim so could Nic. She wouldn’t fall and drown. He had her.
She shouldn’t have done this, she knew that the sea was dangerous, but she wanted to try new things. In her head, she could see her mother shaking her head. Telling her it’s silly white people things. She shook the thought away. Well, if they could do it. So, could she.
She squatted on her legs, he reached out to support her. His touch sparked her want to learn again. She wasn’t boy crazy but if anything was going to help her, she had to understand why surfing was so grand and great. And at that moment, it was because he liked it.
He released her, and she stood up. The sea stretched outward for kilometres, to the edge of her vision and all around her. It stretched and stretched. It felt as if she was a tiny rubber duck in the middle of a large bathtub, floating- not alone- but out away from civilisation.
She felt insignificant for a second, she was only a tiny speck compared to the sea, to the world to the universe. She turned and looked down at the man who was teaching her.
“Beautiful.” She said in awe.
“I know, I’m all natural.” He grinned, proud. “I don’t have to do anything to look this good.”
“Not you.” She rolled her eyes at him, if she were closer she would have smacked his arm. Lightly of course, in a playful way. “The sea, you idiot.”
“Ah, also natural. I don’t have to do much to it.” He kept the proud smile on his face, nodding in agreement.
“Can I surf now?” She asked, she was sure it was a stupid question.
“Not at all.” He shook his head, swinging his legs in the water.
“But we spent hours-” She looked down at him in confusion and shock. She hadn’t thought it would take that long to learn how to surf.
“Learning how to paddle, we haven’t really gotten to surfing yet.” He interrupted. He smirked up at her, she had a small frown in her face. “Now, don’t cry.”
“I wasn’t going to.” She pulled her thick lips into as thin of a line she could manage.
“It’s fine, I have lunch for us on the beach.” He shrugged, a warm smile had spread across his face and it made it harder for her not to look at him. There was something in the way he looked at her that made her anxious in a weird way.
“Are we going to continue after that?” She asked, sitting back down on the board. He was behind her once again, not as close as the first time but close enough.
“If it doesn’t start raining.” He answered, swinging his feet to push them closer to shore.
She didn’t argue much but let herself be led back to the beach. By his towel, he had left his backpack. Nothing had been stolen out of it, something she found odd but didn’t question. Inside were two Woolworths lunch bags, both white with dark blue isometric patterns on them. She was certain her mother had bought her one of those during high school.
“Here you go.” Nic handed her one, she took it. Inside were sandwiches, two of them, two store bought 500ml water bottles and a bottle of Coca-Cola.
“Thank you.” She smiled at him.
“You’re welcome.” He returned the smile, pulling out a sandwich from his own bag.
She noticed that inside his was nearly the same thing, except he had three sandwiches. She shook his head at him.
“What?” He asked, noticing her gaze.
“Why didn’t I also get three?” She questioned in response. He gave her a meek shrug.
“I’m sure a dead captive isn’t what you want.” He didn’t respond, and she didn’t press it any further, she wasn’t going to eat the second one anyway. She had a small appetite, she didn’t eat much.
They sat and ate in silence; the sandwiches were both ham and cheese on regular brown bread. Minnie didn’t eat both, only one and drank half of the coke alongside it.
“This is good.” She commented, taking another sip of her Coca-Cola.
“I made it all by myself.” He beamed, puffing out his chest in pride. She rolled her eyes at him. She noticed that it was becoming a constant reaction to him, but she couldn’t think of any other action to define how she felt. But it was not mean, the eye roll was accompanied by a small smile and happy eyes.
“Only thing you can make without burning the kitchen down?” She asked. She leaned back, her left arm supporting her. The wind picked up a little and soared before dipping off into nothing.
“Sadly, yes.” He admitted. She shook her head at him in mock disappointment. “You cook?”
“A little.” She turned back to him. He raised a perfectly shaped eyebrow in question. Did he do his eyebrows or were they always that good? How had she never noticed that before? “I took Consumers.” She nodded, “Most of the pracs were us cooking and baking.”
“That’s a subject at school?” He asked her, his perfect brows furrowed in question.
“Yeah, Consumer Studies covers a lot of the things that are part of business studies but aren’t really about business.” Minnie explained, zipping up the lunch bag.
“Like cooking and baking?” He also leaned back, supporting himself on his elbows. It placed him lower than her, so she dropped down to the same level, looking him in the eye.
“Yeah.” She nodded, pushing her braids off her shoulder.
“What else did you take? He questioned, she looked at him odd. His face had genuine interest and she found it odd. Typically, people didn’t care.
“Accounting and art.” She answered, her head turned towards the sea and its constant roar of waves.
“You did accounting?” He asked, a look of confusion etched on his face. As if he could never see her filling in numbers on a page. Or calculating the interest on loans and gross profits. It was boring but she did it because her parents had insisted she do a ‘proper’ subject.
“It was either that or science.” She shrugged, she lifted her legs, they blocked her view of the sea with brown skin.
“Why not science?” He quirked his right eyebrow, in question.
“Let’s just say, I’m not Einstein.” She cringed, imagining how bad she would have done if she did science. It was never something that she was good at, even at primary school. It was the subject she struggled at, for most people it was math but for her it was always science.
“I couldn’t tell.” He let out a small laugh. She had to fight the urge to lean over and hit him.
“Are you sure you don’t need any eye patch for your eye, captain?” She quirked her own eyebrows in question. “You can’t tell the difference between an old man with crazy hair and a black girl.”
It was his turn to roll his eyes.
“I can tell the difference.” He nodded at her.
“Prove it.” She dared him, a sure smirk spread over her face.
“One, Einstein is dead and you’re alive.” He said with confidence. She shook her head, fighting the urge to laugh.
“How sure are you on that one?” Minnie questioned, a small smile spread on her face.
“Two hundred percent.” He answered before he continued proving his point. “And two, Einstein could never look this beautiful.”
She felt her body heat up under his gaze. She let a small smile take over her lips, a sheepish and bashful one.
“And three, I’m not gay.” He stated. She quirked an eyebrow.
“You sure?” She asked, he nodded.
“Three hundred percent.” She wanted to tell him that percentages ended at a hundred but opted against it.
“I’ll have to take your word on that one.” She pushed up onto her feet, “Come, I wanna learn how to surf before the sunsets.”
“You should wait until your food-” Nic told her.
But she wasn’t listening. She had already run down to the shore, surfboard tucked under her arm. She turned to wave him on and he followed her down.
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