Beach Day

The words given to me were: beach, trees, tan, rain, Wednesday, green, prince, answer, find, king.

“Well, so much for that tan.” I sighed as my boyfriend and I packed up our beach gear and shivered in the sudden torrential rain.

“I guess that’s the answer to our question of ‘why is nobody else at the beach?’” He said as he shook the sand out of a towel. “Everyone’s clearly got a secret, superior weather app that they’re not telling us about.”

I laughed. “That’s probably exactly what it is. I just thought, because it was a Wednesday…” I trailed off, my disappointment at the change of plans suddenly tiring me out.

“Hey, don’t be bummed.” He smiled, gently punching my arm. “We’ve still got a whole day ahead of us.”

“Yeah, but we’re both sandy and cold.” I pointed out with a tired smile. “Only so much we can do. And I took a day off for this….” I grimaced.

“Cheer up.” He grabbed my shoulders and smiled at me. “Hey. I love you.”

“I love you too.” I smiled back. “Alright, yeah, I’ll try and cheer up.”

“Sweet! Now, I think we’ve got - holy shit!” He exclaimed, staring off into the land behind me.

“What? What is it?” I asked, whipping my head around as he let go of me and zoomed off into the trees.

“Babe!” I called out after him, abandoning our items to follow behind. “What did you see?”

“Hold on! One sec!” He said through the brush, crouched on the ground. “I found something!”

“What did you find?” I asked, having finally caught up to him.

“A friend!” He exclaimed gleefully as he spun around, holding a big green frog in his hands.

I started laughing. “Holy - babe.”

“Yeah?” He asked, grinning from ear to ear.

“You’re a dork.” I told him, grinning back.

“Well, duh. It’s my greatest trait.”

“It’s definitely up there.” I smiled, leaning in and pecking him on the cheek.

“You think I should kiss him?” He asked.

“What? No!”

“But I could be a prince!” He said, dramatically pouting.

“Yeah, a hospitalized prince.” I leaned in and kissed him again. “Come home with me, and I’ll make you feel like a king.” I told him.

“Oh, you do tempt me.” He sighed, crouching down before releasing the frog. “Go on, little guy, live your best life.”

I smiled and held my hand out to him. “Homeward bound?”

“Homeward bound.” He agreed as he took my hand. We walked to the car together, the rain being less troublesome now that I was smiling.

It was only after we had gotten into the car and buckled up that we both paused and looked at each other.

“We forgot our stuff on the beach.”