Winter Jacket (17 page)

When Hunter
hopped down the concrete stairs and out into the sun, I promptly forgot any lingering anxieties.  She was wearing a pleated a-line skirt that fell just above her knees, revealing long, lean calves and just a hint of the defined thighs I knew existed beneath the garment.  It was a sunny Fall day, still early enough in the season that you didn’t need a jacket, so she’d paired the skirt with a fitted scoop-neck top with three-quarter length sleeves that showed off the fine bones of her wrists. 

Her smile grew as her ballet flats skipped along the sidewalk.  I couldn’t help my own smile and a warmth in my belly gr
ew that I knew wasn’t from the mild weather.  She hastened her step as she got closer and practically crashed into me.  I grabbed onto her hips to keep her from completely running me over. 

“Hi,” she breathed.  Her cheeks flushed and
those blue-grey eyes shifted in her skull as she searched my face.

“Hi,” I returned, equally breathless.

She bit her lower lip.  “Sorry I tackled you.”

When my fingers perceptibly dug into her hips, she raised her eyebrows and wet the cleft in her lower lip.  “Unless you don’t mind.”  Her voice had taken on an audibly lower register and I had to suppress a shudder.

“You look great.”

She ducked her head, looking bashful
now instead of aggressive.  “Thanks.  I wasn’t sure what to wear.  I probably tried on half of my wardrobe before deciding on this.  My roommate Sara thought it was hilarious.”

I let my gaze linger a little longer on her long limbs and slight curves.
“I’m sure you’d look good in a potato sack.”

I could feel her smile on me like the sun's rays.
I wanted to stand here a little longer and bask in the warmth of her grin, but we had a date to go on, and if I delayed any longer, we might never get to our destination.

+++++

"When you asked me about fish, this wasn't exactly what I had in mind."

The two of us stood, side-by-side, in front of a thousand-gallon tank at the local aquarium.  Because it was a weekend, there was a decent-sized crowd, but there weren’t so many people that you felt claustrophobic maneuvering through the dimly lit rooms.

“Do you not like it?” I worried out loud.

"I
love
aquariums. Except for ones that have giant animals in too-small tanks or ones that make the animals do tricks for entertainment."

"Duly noted," I said with a nod.

“So,” she said, giving me a mega-watt smile, “have you done your homework so you can impress me on your knowledge of sea animals?”

“I became a professor so I’d never have to do homework ever again.”

She stuck out her lower lip.  “Not even to impress
me
?”

I bit the inside of my cheek.  This gorgeous girl was
pouting and flirting with me; she kept introducing me to new sides of her personality, each one more adorable than the previous.  I shoved my hands into the back pockets of my jeans.  If I didn’t keep my hands busy I’d no doubt traumatize everyone at the aquarium.

“Well
,” she sighed dramatically, “I guess I should feel reassured by your lack of sea creature knowledge.  At least I know that you don’t bring
all
your women here in the hopes of wooing them by feeding penguins like you’re starring in your own personal romantic comedy.”

“You’re not a rom-com fan?”

“I prefer horror films.  The zombier, the better.”

I shook my head.
“I never would have guessed that about you.”

“Hence why you need to take me on
more dates,” she winked.

I truly did love aquariums and zoos and aviaries – anything with animals, really.  But
I was having a hard time today enjoying my surroundings because of Hunter’s proximity.  I'd gotten so used to running from my instincts when it came to her that I was honestly unsure of how to act around her. Our hands kept brushing as we walked from one display to the next. I wanted to grab a hold of her hand and have our fingers intertwine, but I worried that she might not be comfortable with PDAs or that it might be too presumptuous of me.

I tapped my finger against the thick aquarium glass.
"Why does that octopus have no legs?"

Hunter
stood slightly on her tiptoes to get a better view of what I was pointing at. "Because it's not an octopus; it's a cuttlefish."

I quirked an eyebrow. "You just made that up."

"I did no such thing. I know my cuttlefish," she said, face serious. "It's one of my favorite sea animals."

I stared a little longer at the strange aquatic creature.
I had never seen anything like it before. I had been to my share of aquariums, but not enough to be an encyclopedia of ocean animals. I could readily identify freshwater fish – my grandfather had loved fishing and took me often when I was little – but if its native habitat was the ocean, I was less knowledgeable.  

The cuttlefish
stared back at me with what I thought were two black, unblinking eyes.  Where there should have been tentacles was a squiggly mass of tissue that rapidly fluttered, making the animal look like one of those ghosts from Pac-Man. "Is this where you take all
your
women?” I lightly teased.

Hunter
pressed her palms flat against the aquarium glass and continued staring at the fish. "When I was little I wanted to be a marine biologist," she said. "My parents brought me to this aquarium all the time. I don't know if this is the same one, but they've always had a cuttlefish. I named him Sam."

"Why'd you stop wanting to be a marine biologist
?"

"I grew up." Her eyes never left the tank
, and I wondered if I'd broached a touchy subject. "Being a marine biologist is the kind of thing little kids want to be, like a dinosaur hunter or an astronaut or a princess. No one actually becomes what they wanted to be when they were five." She turned her head and looked at me. "Did you always want to be an English professor?"

I shook my head. "No.
I wanted to be a documentarian."

"When you were five
?"

I laughed. "No. I suppose back th
en I wanted to be a Muppeteer –you know, the people behind the movement and voices of the Muppets."

"That's adorable
,” she grinned, her deep-set dimples showing.  All this talk about cuttlefish had me wanting to cut our date short and just cuddle
her
.  “Will you put on a puppet show for me sometime?"

"Absolutely not
,” I snorted. “I've got a reputation to uphold."

"A reputation as what?"

"I don't know. An adult?"

Hunter
waved a dismissive hand. "Being an adult is overrated.”  She released a heavy sigh and straightened her shoulders. “Let's go see Olivia."

"Who's Olivia?"

She took my hand and tugged me in a new direction. The smile had returned to her face, and for that I was thankful. "The sea turtle, obviously."

+++++

I wasn’t disappointed.  Olivia was a treat.  We stood in front of the sea turtle’s tank longer than the others, in a kind of quiet contemplation, watching the animal gracefully glide and slice through the water.  The rest of the visit continued like that.  We’d make our way to one tank after the next and Hunter would educate me all about the animals living inside.  When I’d invited her on this date, I had no idea I’d be getting such an education.  Did you know the temperature of the egg determines the gender of some species of turtles?  I didn’t.  Hunter did.  

Hunter stopped abruptly in front of a tank of seahorses. 
"Do you mind if we sit for a minute? My feet are killing me."

"Of course.” I found us
an empty bench that faced a tank filled with translucent jellyfish.  I’d always been a little unnerved by jellyfish, but I could suffer through my aversion.

Hunter
let out a quiet groan as she sat down. "I knew I should have worn more practical shoes," she sighed.  “I haven’t broken these in yet.”

"They're
cute shoes, if it's any consolation," I said as I sat beside her.

"Tell that to my blisters." She slipped off one of her shoes and rubbed at her arch.

"I could do that for you," I said, trying not to sound too eager.

Apparently she didn't need to be asked twice.
Both shoes came off and her feet landed in my lap. Her feet, like the rest of her, were long and thin. I grabbed one of her feet and pressed my thumbs into her arch.

"If I start panting, I'm not to blame," she warned.

I smiled and continued applying pressure. I know some people are weird about feet, but not me. I certainly don't have a fetish, but I did feel envious towards women with perfect, proportionate feet. My own feet and toes better resembled a primate's.  In fact, my mom's nickname for me was Monkey Toes. She teased me I could hang from trees – yet another reason I didn't get along with her.

My grandma, however, took the high road.
She said I had special feet and, like a psychic reading tea leaves, told me the shape of my feet indicated I'd financially support my husband. She was a little off on the 'husband' part, but that prediction stuck with me.  Someone thought I would be a financial success. That message meant a lot to a kid with working-class roots. Neither of my parents had gone to college, and now, here I was, not just a college graduate; I had a PhD.

“Why do you keep doing that?”
she asked me.  Her face was serious as she inspected me.

“Doing what?” I honestly didn’t know what she was talking about.

“Every time someone walks by, you stop touching me.”

“Really?”
I had nothing against PDAs, but I suppose a part of me was still nervous about someone from school seeing us together. I didn’t think it had been noticeable though.

“When that fam
ily stood next to us by the leafy sea dragon tank, you dropped my hand.  When the custodian changed the garbage bag by the clownfish, you stopped touching my waist, and when that older couple smiled at us by the red-eared sliders, you removed your hand from the small of my back.”

I blinked once.   She’d apparently been keeping a journal.

Her face scrunched into a frown.  “Are you usually so closeted?”

“Whoa,” I said, dropping her feet.  “I’ve been Out for a decade.  I’m not in any kind of a closet.”

“Then are you embarrassed to be seen with me?”  She folded her arms across her chest.

“You’re gorgeous,
Hunter.  Why would I want to hide you?”

She shrugged and her gaze slid to the floor.  “Then why don’t you want people to know we’re here together?” 

She only looked up when I gently lifted her chin with my fingers.  “I’m sorry,” I apologized, sure to make meaningful eye contact.  “I guess I’m just nervous about someone from campus seeing us.  And maybe on some level I wasn’t sure how you felt about PDAs.”

Her lips twisted. “Next time you’re not sure how I feel about something, just ask.”  Her hand slid up my side and rested against
my cheek.  If I had been vigilant about it not looking like we were together before, that cautiousness left.  She leaned in and pressed her lips against mine, soft and tender.  When her tongue swabbed against my lower lip, I was lucky we were sitting down so my legs didn’t give out.  Instead, the sound of someone loudly clearing his or her throat snapped me out of the kiss.

“There’s children here,” a woman who looked to be in her
mid-40s said crossly.

A self-conscious
apology sprang to my lips, but Hunter had collected herself before I could.

“Are you the kissing police?” she challenged.  “Because I hope you’re going after that couple next.”
She pointed in the direction of a young, straight couple eagerly groping each other by the catfish.

The woman bristled and I saw her nostrils flare.  She made a noise in the back of her throat, but thankfully didn’t say anything else. 
Hunter watched the woman storm away, and I watched Hunter with curiosity.

“Are you sure you’ve never dated girls before?  You’re awfully good at this.”

Hunter’s gaze returned to me.  I could see some of that heated anger still in her eyes.  “Kissing?”

I couldn’t help laughing.  “That, too. But I meant facing off against t
he Purity Crusader over there,” I clarified.  “I’ve been with women who were too afraid to even hold my hand in public.”

“I don’t see it as a big deal,”
Hunter replied.  “It shouldn’t matter if a person is straight or gay or something in between.  If I want to show I care about someone, I shouldn’t have to hide it.”

“Lots of people would disagree with you,” I pointed out.

She set her jaw hard. “Those people are wrong.”