Sunshine Kisses

‘I’m really glad your handsome face is here,’ she said, looking up with a small grin.

‘Aw, you think I’m handsome?’ His eyes twinkled and it pulled on something in her chest as she reached up to flick his ear. He pulled her close again and she sank into his chest as he laughed against her hair. ‘I’m glad I’m here too, Sunshine.’

Chapter 3

invisible string – Taylor Swift

A

bby showered, changed, and swiped on a coat of red lipstick, but—entirely to spite her mother—did absolutely nothing to her eyes. She smoothed out her red dress where it clung to her waist before flaring lightly over her hips and settling above her knees. Her blonde curls, messy from a day tucked into a travel-appropriate bun, tumbled over her shoulders and she smiled as she assessed her reflection. Her mother would hate that too. Their battles over Abby’s hair went back almost two decades, with Susan begging her to use all manner of smoothing products and Abby insisting it looked better when it was roughed up a little.

‘Ready?’ Erik asked, stepping through the door joining their rooms.

‘Want to knock next time?’ Abby asked. ‘What if I was still half naked?’

A moment’s pause.

Then: ‘I should be so lucky.’

Erik’s tone was entirely deadpan, until a laugh escaped from him as Abby flipped him off with one hand, buckling her shoe with the other. When she finally looked up at him, her mouth went dry. He leaned lazily against the doorframe. A pale blue shirt stretched slightly across his shoulders, where small water droplets from his damp hair darkened the fabric. Hair that was now closer to its natural state than the neatly combed arrangement from earlier.

His styling routine had never been involved, exactly. Erik took his frustrations and anxieties out on his hair, causing it to stand in every direction imaginable. It was a look that somehow—inexplicably—he made work. She wondered idly what had caused that much tension so soon after his shower. Maybe he hadn’t been exaggerating the pressure from his mum. Well, if Nora was stressing him out, Abby was ready to be his buffer, like he would be hers.

All rational thought was swept from her mind when her eyes roved lower across his shirt, taking in the rolled sleeves and an actual honest to god vein running down his left forearm.

It was going to be a long week.

‘You okay?’

Abby started as Erik’s warm fingertips brushed the skin of her wrist. She’d become lost in thought as they walked to dinner. Trying desperately to distract herself from the reality of sitting down to dinner with her parents for the first time since Christmas, she’d been mentally running through the chapter she was working on. Flashes of the love interest’s impassioned speech were coming to her, but she was struggling to untangle his motivations. Still, he was acting particularly swoon-worthy. It made it difficult to focus.

Erik couldn’t know exactly where her head was at, but of course he understood the source of her nerves.

‘Hey,’ he murmured, pulling softly on her wrist. They slowed their pace as they approached the dining room. ‘I’m here, okay? I’ll be right next to you all through dinner. Ignore them. Just focus on me, Sunshine.’

Lips brushed lightly against her fingers. The action did not help to clear her brain.

‘Come on. Get through this with me, and we can get pissed at the bar after.’

A small smile tweaked Abby’s lips at the thought. Drunk Erik was a treat she rarely got to enjoy. The change wasn’t overt. He was already so affectionate and effusive when sober that he couldn’t tunnel much further into that. But she loved the way his shoulders and face loosened, tension melting away. His voice became lower, rougher. If she plied him with enough alcohol, he occasionally turned a little sloppy, finding his long limbs awkward and unwieldy. That was her favourite brand of inebriated Erik.

‘Deal.’

His hand ghosted over the small of her back as he ushered her through the dining room doorway. Heat radiated from it, pouring into her and steeling her for what was to come. As they walked the familiar path towards their parents, she kept her face impassive. In all the years they had visited this hotel for their anniversaries, they secured the same rooms and the same dinner table year after year. In an uncertain world, you could count on Nora and Peter, Susan and Andrew, and this table.

Abby bent to greet her father with a kiss on the cheek, and both Erik’s parents rose to envelop her in warm hugs. She did not miss the slight tightening of her mother’s eyes as she took in her appearance, clocking her unbrushed hair and mascara-free eyes. But as Susan was unlikely to openly criticise her appearance in public, Abby merely responded with an empty smile. It was replaced with an expression of genuine warmth directed at Erik as she slid into the seat he had pulled out for her.

Dinner was surprisingly pleasant.

Both sets of parents largely ignored their offspring in favour of entertaining each other, leaving Abby and Erik to discuss books, films, and the trashy reality show Sarah had got her hooked on.

‘So they just dump a bunch of people in a house? And you watch them go about their lives?’

‘No, they dump a bunch of extremely hot people in a house, and you watch them scheme and bitch and seduce and backstab each other. It’s America’s Next Top Model with less fashion and more sex. It’s The Apprentice if no one had any higher education and they all just gave into temptation.’

‘Right. And you enjoy this because?’

‘Because it is a wonderful feeling to be able to switch your brain off for an hour. You know when you do something and you can feel yourself losing brain power by the minute, but you don’t care because it’s fun?’