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Dream glanced over in their direction, too. “Oh, OK. See you in a bit, then.”
I shot one more look in the direction of the whiskey boys.
“On second thought, how about I just stick around? Makes more sense than for me to leave and come back in a couple hours.”
Dream quickly nodded, as if she were having the same thoughts about the idiots next door.
“That’d be great. You can grab a beer, maybe even a hot dog if you’re feeling really crazy.”
“Hell, if I’m feeling really crazy I might have you do some body painting on me.”
She chuckled. “Careful, soldier – I might hold you to that one.” She waved one of her thin paint brushes in my direction, a sly, sensual smile on her lips.
I had a laugh at her words, my cock shifting a bit at the innuendo. But we didn’t have a chance to continue the conversation before her first customers arrived. Dream was friendly and warm, helping them into the chairs and pulling out some sample designs they could choose from. The boy went with a tiger, which I told him would’ve been my choice, and the girl went with a flower pattern.
By the time Dream was done with the kids, the market was damn near packed, a small line already formed in front of her tent. After grabbing a beer from a stand nearby, I ended up playing assistant, helping Dream with her brushes and paints. As the time flew by, as she painted like crazy, I couldn’t help but admire it all. Dream was as hard of a worker as they came, giving each customer careful attention as she focused entirely on her painting and fulfilling each request. Kids had their faces painted, college-aged girls left with intricate designs on their bodies, and a few dudes even came for tattoo style painting on their arms.
I sipped my beer and helped when I could, the sun slowly dipping closer and closer to the water. The sky soon filled with burning reds and oranges, the type of sunset you could only find in a place like Charmed Bay.
“And…done!” Dream dabbed the finishing touches of a unicorn design on her last customer, an adorable little girl. “What do you think?” Dream held up a small mirror to the girl’s face.
“It’s awesome!” she said. The girl threw her arms around Dream, pulling her close for a hug that Dream wasn’t expecting, but was happy to reciprocate. “Thank you so much!”
“Happy to do it!” Dream told her.
The girl scampered off to join her parents and that was that. The sun was nearly down, booth runners were taking down their goods, and the last few customers were making their way out. From the booth next to us the whiskey boys, seemingly as drunk as I expected, let out a pair of loud, obnoxious laughs.
“Alright,” Dream said. “Time to pack up. But…I kind of want to wait until those jackasses are gone first. How would you feel about going for a walk?”
I stood up, putting my hand on the small of my back and giving it a good crack, then setting down the nearly empty can of my second beer.
“A walk sounds pretty damn good,” I replied.
She smiled and we were off. We walked past the whiskey guys, who were passing back and forth one of their bottles and probably about twenty minutes away from getting a ticket for public intoxication. Thankfully, they were too wrapped up in their bullshit to pay much attention to us.
We made our way through the farmer’s market, eventually reaching a less packed section of the beach as we chatted, going over the fun of the evening. Before we knew it, we’d walked what had to have been a couple of miles.
“Thanks again for doing all that,” she said.
“Helping you with the stand? My pleasure.”
“Not just that – dealing with those assholes, too. I’m sure I would’ve been able to handle them on my own, but it was nice to know you had my back.”
“Hey, that’s what friends are for, right?”
She smiled, glancing over at me, and tucking her hair behind her ear.
“You know you don’t have to look out for me anymore,” she reminded me.
. “I’m going to be looking out for you whether you like it or not. I know damn well by this point that you’re the type who likes to fight her own battles, and that’s great. But you never have to go it alone if you don’t want to.”
I looked around, noticing that we’d made a curve along the beach toward a section where there weren’t any people. It was just us and the waves and the setting sun.
“Here,” she said, nodding to an overturned log on the sand. “Mind sitting for a minute?”
“Sure.”
We sat down and said nothing for a time as we watched the waves come in. It was damn nice, sitting there with her by my side.
