Brooke Habecker
Popsicles
from “Find Your Way Back”
It feels like it’s about a thousand degrees today, and cold drinks aren’t helping. I check my watch, decide I can knock off for the day, and go for a cold shower.
As I’m toweling off, I hear the phone ringing. Mike is at work tonight, so I wrap a towel around my waist and skip into my room to answer it.
“’Lo?”
“May I speak with Mickey, please?” It’s Becky.
“Hello, Becky; it’s me.”
“I’m going to the store to get a Popsicle because it’s hella-hot, and I wondered if I should stop by and get you on the way.”
“Sure,” I grin.
I throw on a tank top and some cutoff sweats and saunter downstairs. Pretty soon, Becky rounds the corner. We continue to the grocery store across the street. We stand before the freezer case debating. Finally, she chooses red and I choose green.
Becky pays and we unwrap the popsicles as we step back into the heat.
“Do you want to come over? At least you won’t be out in the sun,” I say.
“Okay.”
We cross the street again, walk upstairs, and I unlock the door and open it for her. She peers into the dim apartment.
“Are you gettin’ up some kind of babe den in here or something?”
“It’s hot. Lights make it hotter.”
“Is that your story?” she laughs.
“I’m stickin’ to it,” I say as she steps inside.
She playfully sticks out her tongue. It’s red, like her Popsicle. I take a bite of mine.
“What are you doing?” she asks me. “You’re eating it too fast!”
“Brain freeze is still freezing,” I point out.
She shakes her head. “You have to go slowly so it lasts,” she insists.
Her words create a picture in my mind that is going to fuel a very, very sweet fantasy later on.
I look at her Popsicle. “Well, you’re doing an excellent job.”
“I know,” she says, closing her lips around her Popsicle and giving it a pull.
I close my eyes as a shiver runs all the way from my scalp to my groin. “Jesus,” I whisper.
I vainly hope she didn’t hear that, but when I open my eyes, she is looking right at me with undisguised glee. Shit. I remember what Mike said months ago about blowjobs and purity. Her lips on that Popsicle suggest that she doesn’t need a whole lot of instruction in the BJ department, and her purity is definitely in question now.
She flops into my La-Z-Boy sideways, with her legs dangling over one arm. She looks at me without speaking while she finishes her Popsicle. Usually that would make me really uncomfortable, but instead I’m transfixed by her erotic disposition of the juice bar.
“’Kay, well, I gotta go,” she says when she’s done. “Is your trash under the sink?”
“I’ll take it,” I say, and she hands me the wooden stick. Her lips are stained bright red. I wonder what she’d taste like if I kissed her.
She’s looking at me again, and this time it does make me squirm because I get the feeling she knows what I’m thinking.
“Thanks for the Popsicle, Becks.”
“Not a problem, Mickey. Everyone needs a hot treat when it’s frozen outside. Oh…” She rolls her eyes at her deliberate mistake. “I mean the other way around.” She winks.
“Okay,” I say weakly, and she leaves.
I toss the Popsicle sticks in the kitchen trash and bend over the counter with my head on my arms. I take a dozen deep breaths, but I think the image of her blowing that Popsicle will be with me for the rest of my life.
I love the way she plays me. If she were my age, all my friends would love her. She’s sweet, she’s smart, she gets all the jokes, and Christ, is she hot.
I need another cold shower.
© 2009 Brooke Habecker