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[noburden]

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[rosarianoath]

“Dramatic would be refusing to go to the beach at all,” he says, oddly charmed that she wants to hang onto him in public, and quite steadfast in his desire to neither swim nor wear a swimsuit. “Come now. Get some garment for yourself, and I’ll watch you swim.”

[noburden]

Stubborn.

"Will Joshua agree to go into the water with me, do you think?" Jill is certain her odds are good. Really, she's gauging whether Clive will make an issue of it. "I wouldn't want to go in alone."

There's always Dion, of course.

[rosarianoath]

“If he doesn’t get too engrossed in a book,” he says, dumb as rocks. “I’ll keep watch from the shore.”

[noburden]

Thank the heavens he's strong and handsome.

"I really have no choice but to go with Dion, do I?" She says with a laugh and a shake of her head. Far from a complaint.

[rosarianoath]

His eyebrows raise.

“And leave you without a strong swimmer? No.”

[noburden]

Her eyebrows raise in turn.

"Then come in the water with me," Jill says, and she hangs off his arm some. The next words already sound childish in her head before she says them aloud. Whatever. She cares not.

"I want to play with you."

[rosarianoath]

He looks down at her, naturally shifting to accommodate her weight. He does not think of her as childish. He thinks she’s beautiful, and he very much wants to play. He sighs. He relents:

“I’ll wade in with you, then.”

[noburden]

It would be impossible to hide the smile that blooms across her face.

"We'll have fun." Splashing water at Clive sounds like the most fun anyone could have at the beach, truly.

[rosarianoath]

“I’m sure we will,” he says, envisioning napping in the sand and maybe — just maybe — beating someone at some sport. “Go pick out a swimming costume, then.”

[noburden]

"For you, first?" It's not really a question, and she doesn't wait for an answer before leaning up on her toes to give Clive a quick kiss of joy.

[rosarianoath]

Her lips are nearly reason to give in, but he’ll never kiss her again if he’s cajoled into drowning at the beach.

“For you,” he says. “I can just wear shorter trousers.”

[noburden]

There goes Jill's dreams of seeing how he manages to his junk in some alarmingly small pieces of fabric. But she knows she's already gotten him to relent once. Twice is pushing it.

"Very well," she tells him, but she's still smiling. "You'll help me choose something flattering, then?"

[rosarianoath]

“Of course,” he says, more than happy to move the spotlight off him. Besides: his younger inner self is itching for an excuse to see her bared skin in some new context. “Lead me to wherever they sell these things.”

[noburden]

"I think I saw a shop this way," she says, taking him by the arm and leading him along. Not far in the distance is a bright store sign that reads SUN BUMS in bright teal and yellow, a neon sign depicting the sea and sun slapped onto the corner.

She pauses at the window, where mannequins wear barely anything at all. Her lips purse together. She is much more comfortable with her own nudity these days, but there's a time and a place. Random people on the beach don't need to know the curve of her ass and breasts--let alone people like Joshua or Dion. That is inappropriate.

"I am sure there are less revealing ones inside."

[rosarianoath]

Clive packhorses on, obediently following the tug of her arm, bags bobbing away at his calf. He looks upon the swimming costumes with mild amusement, pleased to have his mind occupied with imagining her in the display garments. It feels perverted in a way the clubs aren’t — inappropriate to fixate on by daylight, guilty in a way he’s well used to.

“Something longer, perhaps with a skirt,” he says, perhaps unhelpfully.

[noburden]

"Wouldn't that defeat the purpose?" Jill asks with a wry smile, pulling them inside. Much of what she sees registers as tiny, though all the bright colors and patterns make her think she might be overlooking a lot.

[rosarianoath]

“To swim?” he says. “It isn’t as though it’s the length of a ball gown…”

[noburden]

Jill laughs.

"I imagine I'll be in the water from the waist down. Little for anyone to see."

[rosarianoath]

He hums some sort of noncommittal agreement, and he uses the side of his hand to drag the bikinis on a nearby rack apart one by one. They all look tiny.

“It’s little for anyone to see whether it’s above or below,” he says, gesturing at the dangling triangles.

[noburden]

Jill feels her face want to heat up. Silly. Clive has seen plenty.

"What color do you think would look nice? I don't know if I'd be comfortable wearing any of these, but I could at least try one on..."

A little show.

[rosarianoath]

“Blue,” he says, without needing to think. She’s not leaving with any of them but he’ll stand on the other side of a change room door and contemplate it. “Red?”

He likes red.

[noburden]

Simple man. She loves him.

"We'll try one of each," she says. They're in no rush to get back. Either Joshua will be home, or he'll still be out. She picks through the racks for a matching set she thinks will fit her. Really, she has no idea.

[rosarianoath]

“We?” he replies, amused, following her down the aisle. “I can hold your bag…”

[noburden]

Jill lifts her brows at him, smile growing coy.

"Oh? You don't want to come in with me? There's room."

Not that she's scoped out this store previously, of course. Nor does she know the shopkeeper prefers to spend her time lounging in the backroom.

[rosarianoath]

“Is that allowed?” he asks dubiously, glancing around. When his gaze comes back to her, there’s a trace of slyness there: he knows what she’s doing, and he thinks he knows why, even if he’s too shy to admit it.