Kiss My Putt

by Tara Sivec

  Performing the same maneuver again, he pulls me against him and wraps our joined hands behind my back, tugging me up against him.

  “And so I could do this,” he says softly again, his free hand coming up to slide around the back of my neck and under my hair I left down and loose, tugging gently on the back of my neck to pull me up to his mouth, with the busyness of the street happening all around us.

  My hand comes up between us to press my palm against his chest, feeling the solid pounding of his heart as his tongue ever-so-gently parts my lips. He softly sweeps his tongue through my mouth, lazily swirling it around and languidly stroking it against mine, taking his time, making my knees weak and my toes curl. He worships my lips and my mouth like they’re delicate flowers. It’s the complete opposite of the manic, crazy, wide-open-mouth kissing we shared back in the shed, but it sets my body on fire just the same, until he’s ending the kiss with a few little pecks and nips to my lips before pulling away, and I’m whimpering at the loss of his mouth on mine.

  He’s tugging on my hand again, pulling me down the sidewalk once more, and I don’t even pay attention to where we’re going. I just let him blindly lead me wherever, wanting him to stop and kiss me like that again, and make my toes curl like that again, and make me wonder how in the hell I went my entire life without ever being kissed like that before.

  Palmer stops on the sidewalk once more, this time tugging my arm to pull me in front of him, letting go of my hand to grab onto both my hips to turn me around until my back is pressed into his front. I smile as I rest my head back on his warm, solid chest, realizing he pulled us to a stop right in front of the Dip and Twist, and we’re standing at the end of its usual long line this time of night on the island.

  He slides one arm around my waist, and I rest my hands on top of the corded muscles of his forearm arm locked securely over my stomach right under my breasts as he pulls me back more snuggly against him. I stare at the people in line in front of us, not even noticing who they are or what they’re conversations are about, when we take a small forward step together as one when the line moves a little bit. Palmer brings his free hand up behind my head to swipe my hair off one shoulder, and before the next person in line way up at the window can even start giving their order, and before I can brace myself, his head is dipping forward and his nose is nuzzling that spot right under my ear.

  Oh God… the nuzzling….

  I shiver against him as he holds my hair out of his way, rubbing the tip of his nose all along the side of my neck and then gently nibbling and kissing my bare shoulder, skating the tip of his tongue out every so often before kissing his way back up the side and pressing his mouth against my ear as we take another joint step forward in line.

  I still haven’t recovered from the mind-blowing orgasm Palmer gave me almost two hours ago, and just like that, I’m wet, needy, and want to rub myself all over him, ice cream customers be damned.

  “I absolutely brought you here to this street we’ve walked down a thousand times, so I could do all the things I’ve been dreaming about for… a long fucking time, Birdie,” he speaks softly against my ear, making my throat get tight and scratchy with emotion as he continues speaking, and we move up in line again. His arm is still locked tight around me, keeping the back of me plastered against the front of him, which is probably wise right about now, since I can feel him heavy and hard pressed right against my ass. “I wanted to hold your hand down Summersweet Lane, I wanted to kiss you in front of the arcade, and I wanted to have you in my arms while we ordered ice cream, because I finally can. I want to give you the world, Birdie. Everything you’ve ever wanted. But for tonight, I just wanted to kiss my girl in front of the arcade without worrying about her kicking me in the balls.”

  A weak laugh comes out of me as I sniffle and suck up the stupid emotions, turning in his arm so I can see his face. I slide my hands up his chest to rest my palms over his yummy pecs, because I finally can.

  “Don’t stop worrying about that ball kicking just yet. You seemed to have forgotten you just did some serious neck nuzzling in front of my mother.”

  Palmer just smiles down at me as he pushes me to walk backward, and I turn back around in his arm that I guess he’s just going to keep tightly around me, so we can both walk up to the window where my mother stands on the other side.

  Literally bouncing up and down, clapping her hands, and smiling so big at the two of us, she looks a little psychotic and kind of like The Joker.

  “You look swamped tonight, Laura. Need some help back there?” Palmer asks, resting his chin on top of my head, almost giving my mother a case of the vapors and making her swoon as her employees rush around behind her in the small building, making treats for customers.

  “Oh my God, no! You guys deserve a night to relax.” My mom laughs, waving her hand at him before clutching both hands together against her chest. “Uuuggghhh, my heart. Will you just look at the two of you? It’s about time you both pulled your heads out of your asses. So, you two want your usuals, and when are you going to start giving me beautiful grandbabies to spoil?”

  Palmer’s chest rumbles against my back as he laughs, and I just shake my head at her.

  Thankfully, my mom disappears from the window to go make Palmer’s hot fudge sundae with extra whipped cream, no nuts, and two cherries, and my Reese’s Cup flurry with extra Reese’s Cups and three healthy squirts of liquid peanut butter. Palmer finally lets go of his hold on me so we can both take our orders when my mom sets them on the counter with a bunch of napkins. Then she blows each of us a kiss, the grandbaby talk forgotten when she looks over my shoulder to the next person in the long line that formed after us.

  Palmer and I step around the side of the building and over to the only open picnic table, which is the bright yellow one. I only glare a little bit at the group of teenage girls sitting in the purple table in the back corner with our names carved into the top as I swing my leg over the bench and straddle it to face Palmer, pulling the short skirt of my dress between my thighs and covering the goods like a lady does in public. Palmer’s eyes flicker down to my bare legs straddling the bench, a dirty smile tipping up the corner of his mouth as he licks hot fudge off his spoon, making me shift a little in my seat when I see his tongue swirl around the white plastic.

  “Want to talk about that email now?” I ask, even though I really, really don’t want to talk about that email he sent me a text about earlier, but we should probably talk about something before I start humping this picnic table bench.

  “Oh, that’s right!” Palmer nods around a mouthful of ice cream and fudge.

  With my flurry in one hand and a spoonful of it in the other, I lean forward on the bench and kiss his bottom lip, sucking off a little bit of chocolate that was there before pulling back to stick my spoon in my mouth.

  Palmer just looks at me with his spoon halfway up to his mouth, dripping ice cream down into his plastic bowl as he stares at me with a look of awe on his face.

  “I can’t believe Birdie Bennett just kissed me at the Dip and Twist,” he whispers like a teenage boy gossiping to his friends.

  It makes me laugh, and it makes my heart do that weird constricting thing in my chest again, my laughter slowly dying away when I think about that email.

  “Anyway, the exciting email,” he continues, scooping another spoonful of his sundae into his mouth first. “You, my sexy and amazing sweet cheeks, are brilliant, and that ridiculous cat photo along with the press release you put out got some positive buzz going. The San Francisco Open wants me there in a little over a week, as long as you keep working your magic. Did you see where they said they’ve gotten a bunch of fan mail demanding my presence?”

  His smile is infectious, and I can’t help but return it, even though it feels like I’m dying a little inside as he continues, practically bouncing up and down in his seat.

  “They want to see more positive social media posts, and they want to speak to a few of my endorsements to see how the
y’re feeling, but if we brainstorm some more ideas the next few days, this just might work, and I might get to play some fucking pro golf sooner than we expected.”

  He’s so happy and excited it makes me feel like an asshole for how much my stomach dropped when I saw that email come through as I was warming up my shower water earlier. I should have screamed with happiness when I saw that someone was finally smart enough to realize the mistake they made by uninviting Palmer from so many tournaments. But I didn’t. My knees gave out, and I sat down on the edge of the bathtub, staring at that email until the bathroom filled up with steam and I couldn’t see the screen of my phone anymore. This is what we wanted. This is what I’ve been working my ass off for the last two weeks, and staying up late for, and researching everything there is to know about professional golf PR.

  But all I could think of when I looked at that email was that I’m working my ass off just so he can leave me again. So he can walk away without even asking me to go with him.

  I know it’s different this time, and I know we’re different this time compared to the last time he was on this island and walked away from me, but it doesn’t make me panic any less. It doesn’t make me stop worrying about the same thing I worried about back then and why I always stopped myself from telling him how I felt. Can I be enough for him? Does he even want more with me, or does he just want to keep what we have here on this island like a tropical fantasy, where it never leaves the shore or turns into something real, getting the best of both worlds while I continue to sit here and… wait?

  I know he has to leave. I get it, and I want him to go and do what he’s so amazing and talented at, but am I enough for him to come back to when he’s done? Is this island enough? He’s been all over the world. Why in the hell would he want to stay here when he could go anywhere? I just got him, and now he’s going to be taken away from me. We talked about how the first tournament he was still on the schedule for wasn’t for another seven months just the other day. In the back of my mind, I had that number flashing around, telling me I had plenty of time to prove to him that I’m worth it, and that we’re worth it, and screw sitting around here waiting for him to come home to me; I would go anywhere with him, if he’d only ask. For fifteen years, every time he left this island, I just wanted him to beg me to come with him. Just once. For him to just stop and look at me and say, “Birdie, I need you there with me.”

  But he never did. And now it looks like it’s happening all over again, him making plans to leave, while I sit around… waiting. Hoping I’m enough for him to come back to, hoping he doesn’t meet someone when he’s far away from me who’s there with him, in his world, rubbing elbows with his people, while small-town girl who’s never been anywhere or done anything significant with her life just… waits. This was always my relationship with Palmer for fifteen years, and of course I missed him, but it was fine, because it was all that we’d known.

  But now? Now that I know why nothing in my life has ever made sense or felt right before until the moment he kissed me out in the rain, and now that I know what it feels like to have bruises on my hips from the dig of his fingers and a soreness between my legs reminding me how much he needed me…. It’s not fine, and I’m not okay with only getting the crumbs of his attention, sprinkled around me sporadically when his hectic schedule will allow.

  “Just so you know, I’m going to expect a lot of sexual favors when you get that promotion.” He winks at me, scraping the bottom of his empty plastic bowl to get the last of the fudge, while my flurry remains half-eaten and melting in my hand, the few bites I already took starting to churn in my stomach.

  “You know I’m not doing this for that stupid promotion,” I tell him, sucking it up so I can get the rest of my words out without crying like a baby. “I don’t care about any of that. All I care about is getting you back out there, traveling on the pro circuit where your super-talented self is supposed to be.”

  Palmer sets his empty bowl on the picnic table then takes my flurry out of my hand and sets it next to the bowl. Scooting closer to me on the bench, he brings both his hands up to cup my face, leaning in to give me a gentle kiss before pulling back to rest his forehead against mine.

  “I know you’re not taking care of me and fixing things for me for the promotion. I was just kidding,” he says quietly. “And that’s not at all what—”

  “Cut out that hanky-panky nonsense in public. People are trying to enjoy their ice cream for God’s sake.”

  Whatever Palmer was about to say is cut off as we pull apart and both of us look up to find Murphy standing next to our bench, glaring at us as he sips a milkshake.

  “Nice to see you, Murph.” Palmer smiles at him, his hands dropping from my face to rest on top of my bare thighs.

  Murphy’s eyes glance down to where Palmer’s hands are, and he takes another slurping sip before growling a little, and then he pulls the straw out of his mouth to tip it and his cup toward Palmer.

  “See you listened to what I said that night on the beach, stopped being an idiot, and realized she had a thing for ya,” he says, making my eyes narrow as I look back and forth between the two men.

  “Excuse me. You two had a discussion about me without my knowledge?” I ask haughtily.

  “Excuse me,” Murphy fires right back just as indignantly. “You two disappeared from the golf outing with the winner of the two grand. I had to drive out and find the damn pin marker with the name on it in your cart in the middle of a storm and then listen to the sounds of two cats dying inside that damn shed until I could get out of there, pour bleach into my ears, and then have Tess light them on fire.”

  “Right then.” I nod, knowing my cheeks are as red as the picnic table across the aisle from us. “Splendid! We bid you ado, kind sir, until we meet again.”

  Why my mortification has suddenly turned me into a character in a historical novel is beyond me. Murphy just looks at me like an idiot, because I am, then shakes his head and walks away from us while Palmer chuckles softly at my mortification that the man who’s like a grandfather to me heard us having sex.

  Once he’s gone, Palmer grabs my hand and pulls me up from the bench, stopping long enough to give me a quick kiss before tossing our garbage in the can next to the table.

  “All right, let’s go get some dinner.”

  “I can’t believe you fed me dessert before dinner. It’s very scandalous,” I tell him with a smile, pushing that email out of my mind so I can just enjoy my first date with this man.

  “I know I’m not allowed to apologize anymore, but I still feel like you sucked it up very nicely today, so I thought you deserved your cookies first,” Palmer says, kissing the tip of my nose before grabbing my hand, lacing his fingers through mine, and pulling me out from under the picnic table area and toward the sidewalk.

  “I mean, technically you already gave me my cookies against that wall, ba-dum-tiss,” I joke, elbowing him in the ribs as we walk, and he groans and then chuckles at my lame joke. “Well, one cookie, if we’re really being technical. You must have been a little tired, huh? Not up for handing out more than one? Little stingy if you ask me.”

  Palmer is suddenly scooping me up until my feet leave the ground and I have to wrap my arms around his shoulders and hold on, squealing and laughing as he swats my ass and spins me around on the sidewalk.

  “Sweet cheeks, I’ve got dozens and dozens of cookies with your name all over them,” he whispers in my ear, making me tingle as he squeezes my ass one more time before setting me back down on my feet and grabbing my hands from around his shoulders to pull them down, lace his fingers through mine, and swing them back and forth between us.

  He looks away from me for a second to smile, nod, and exchange a few words with locals who say hello to him as they walk by us, and they also throw a smile and a greeting my way, making my damn chest get tight again. The same things happened when we first got into town and started walking down this street. No one even batted an eye that after fifteen years
of nothing but friendship, Palmer Campbell is suddenly smacking Birdie Bennett’s ass, and kissing her full on the mouth, and twirling her around, and holding her in his arms like he never wants to let her go in the middle of Summersweet Lane. Tourists don’t even pay attention to us. They take one look at Palmer and assume there’s no way he’d be here on this tiny island in the middle of nowhere, and go about their business thinking they just saw the perfect doppelgänger for Pal Campbell.

  No one bats an eye, because it’s perfect. It’s exactly how it was always supposed to be.

  “After dinner, you wanna sneak a couple of beers, get drunk behind the saltwater taffy place, and then let me touch your boobs?” Palmer asks, wagging his eyebrows up and down, and making me laugh at how ridiculous he is and how I was a complete fool for thinking all the times he left this island before hurt like a bitch.

  This time? It just might kill me.

  Letting go of one of his hands, I start walking toward The Barge, suddenly needing some greasy diner food to make me feel better, tugging him along with me as I look back at him over my shoulder, suck it up, and give Palmer a mischievous smile.

  “I might even let you stick it in my ass.”

  His feet stutter on the sidewalk, and he almost trips over them as he squeezes my hand harder to stop from falling.

  “For fuck’s sake, Birdie,” Palmer curses, glaring at me a little when I laugh and tug him up next to me. “You can’t say stuff like that to me without warning, man. I’m weak.”

  We both laugh. Palmer lets go of my hand to drape his arm over my shoulders. I slide my arm around his waist as we walk, and we do what we’ve done a thousand times before, but this time it’s perfect.