My Single-versary (Happy Endings 0.50)

Following his example, I pull myself onto the board lengthwise on my belly. “I think this might give me a feel for napping in the sun. I’m down with that.”

A chilling spray hits my back. Caleb splashed me! I shriek and roll off the board. I pop up again, wiping water from my face. “Hey!”

“Still feel like napping?” he asks with a smirk.

“Not so much.” I shake my head, flicking him with water. “Might as well surf.”

His mouth widens into a grin. “That is music to my ears.”

For the millionth time, I fall off the board—gravity and the waves are conspiring against me. And for the million-and-first time, I haul myself back up onto it and lie on my belly.

I can just do this for a while. I’m good at this part. Or I can paddle to shore. I got the hang of paddling pretty quickly. Caleb says I’m A-plus at paddling. I tell him he’s an A-plus teacher.

And he is.

“Just keep doing it,” he says after five hundred wipeouts. And when I get myself back on the board: “That’s it. Just keep getting right back up. Eventually you’ll get the hang of it.”

“This is my final attempt,” I tell him, calling over the waves. “After this one, I’m going ashore.”

“You keep saying that,” he calls back. “But you keep getting back up. You’re doing great.”

The swell of a wave looms closer. I get ready, boosting myself to my feet, into position.

“That’s it,” Caleb says. “You’re doing it! You’re riding the wave!”

I am! I am totally upright and moving forward. I’m showing the ocean who’s boss!

Look who’s out of her comfort zone now.

I barely have the strength to drag my surfboard out of the water. As soon as I do, I fall to my knees in the soft sand and flop onto my back. A minute later, Caleb stands beside my prone body.

“I did it,” I pant. “I actually surfed for a full two seconds.”

“You did!”

“I told you that was my final attempt.”

“Technically, it was your first success.”

I shade my eyes so I can see his smile—no, his damn proud grin. “What did the trick for you?”

“Thinking that we would go shopping next if I got that one right.”

He laughs and shakes his head. “A deal is a deal.”

“I know where my talents lie.”

He holds out a hand to help me up. “So, come on. Impress me.”

We take Caleb’s Jeep downtown, where I get my second wind as soon as I’m in sight of the shops.

“Now,” I say, rubbing my hands together, “it’s my turn. Your lesson in shopping.” Caleb walks along the sidewalk beside me, a good sport but unenthusiastic. “What do you hate most about clothes?”

“Shopping for them.” His gaze turns heated as he looks at me. “Sometimes wearing them.”

“Hmm . . . I can see you’ll be a hard one.”

“Hard indeed.”

I bump him with my shoulder to get him to behave, but it brings home—again—how muscular he is, and it makes me imagine—again—what those arms would feel like around me.

This attraction has gone from temptation to nemesis.

Focus on something else, Skyler.

“Right. Well, to help ease you into the experience, you can watch me shop like a professional first.”

10

Caleb

The only thing I enjoy about shopping is Skyler’s gorgeous new sundress.

No. Her new sundress with a spectacular Skyler in it.

The rest is a haze of boutiques and dressing room doors that might as well revolve, she comes out and goes back in so many times. Everything looks nice on her, and then—whammo—she walks out in this sunshine-yellow dress that shows off her tanned shoulders and hints at her breasts and reveals those strong legs, and I can’t breathe.

Nor do I need to again, I’m convinced.

I can subsist off the view of this woman.

I’ve thought she was gorgeous from the moment I saw her on the dock, but getting to know her, watching her get up on the surfboard again and again? She’s breathtaking.

We grab dinner, and as we come out of Sunset Bob’s, Skyler says, “Thanks for dinner. Shopping makes me hungry.”

“Are you sure it wasn’t the surfing that made you hungry?” I ask.

“It was definitely the shopping.”

I chuckle, even though I knew she’d say that. “Have I mentioned you look spectacular in that sundress?”

“A few times.” She smiles. “But it’s nice to hear.” We start toward the Jeep, neither of us seeming in a hurry. “You know what’s spectacular?” she asks, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear and gesturing to the orange and pink sky flaming up above us. “That sunset.”

“Yeah. It never really gets old. Funny how it happens every day, and every day you can’t look away from it.”

“Do you want to go down to the beach and watch the sunset?” she asks, her voice soft. “Or is that against the rules?”

I scoff. “Watching the sunset is never against the rules. And in the Hawaii rule book, it’s a requirement.”