Lunch Date

Those bubbly white tree blossoms that stink "like ass" (as Desiree once remarked) have all blown away with the Amarillo wind. Once in a while as we sit on the patio for lunch, a gust will kick up some remaining petals and swirl them around until they land in our food or our hair. We'll swat them away, unconcerned until we realize we've bitten into one. They taste like ass, too. It is a quick way to lose your appetite.

The crossword is first business at this time of day. I have my copy, and Green Eyes has his. I start from the bottom of the list. He diligently works from the top. We meet somewhere in the middle and that's where we always start to peek at the other's answers. 

I nibble on my fries, and he hides a cigarette under the table. It's a non-smoking patio, but I don't mind. Somehow, I feel like his partner in crime just knowing about it. Rebels, we.

Usually we are accompanied by a couple of meat-heads and a milkman, but not today. This day it is only he and I and the breeze. 

I wonder what has he got for 24 across? He always knows the sports clues. I'm better with literature. Glancing across the table, I realize he's not really doing the crossword at all. He's concentrating on dividing polynomials with binomials. What's really shocking is he's getting the answers right.

It doesn't escape my notice that he's chosen variables that happen to be our first initials. I don't know why I reach for his hand, but as soon as I feel the warmth of his skin against mine, he turns my hand over and scribbles in my palm, "s+n=♥". It's  such a silly gesture, something that high school kids do, but it makes me smile. His eyes twinkle and the lines around his eyes crease in that way that makes him look so distinguished and handsome. I like his smile as much as his beautiful olive green eyes.

The wind kicks up. Flower petals and smoke eddy around us, and I wake with the undeniable feeling that this was the sexiest dream I've ever had.