Free Consenting Adults by J. Lea López

as his
hand dropped back to the table.
    Deb finally joined them at the table, oblivious to the
tension of a moment ago.
    “Sorry about that, guys. Gary is taking the boys to the lake
for a little while and couldn't find Gregory's swim trunks. I swear, if the man
bothered to move something, life would be a little easier.”
    “The lake sounds really good right now,” Charlotte said. Her
cheeks burned. From the sun, of course.
    “Maybe you can come with us some time next week,” Deb said.
“The boys have been asking about you.”
    “I miss their little faces.” After seeing them and helping
care for them every day for more than two years, she was having cuteness
withdrawal since moving out of Deb's house earlier in the summer. She glanced
at her watch and sighed.
    “What? Oh, you don't have to leave right now, do you?” Deb
asked.
    “I have to get ready for work.”
    “Where's work?” Steven asked. She pretended not to hear.
    “I left my uniform in the dryer last night, so I’m going to
need to starch it to death.”
    “That's too bad. I wanted to ask you guys how you liked
working in small groups today.”
    “I got some great feedback,” Steven said, grinning.
    Deb looked at him, then Charlotte.
    “Apparently I’m trite.” He still smiled when he said it, but
she blushed anyway. God damn, she wished he'd stop making her do that.
    “Not you, the poem. Although you're getting there.”
    “Charlotte doesn't hold back when it comes to criticism,”
Deb said, smiling.
    “Oh come on, you say that like I get some pleasure from it.”
    “I said no such thing. But maybe it says something that
that's what you heard.” Deb winked and nudged Steven with her elbow.
    Maybe she was right. Charlotte shrugged it off and stood up.
    “Call me tomorrow,” Deb said. “There's something else I
wanted to talk to you about.”
    Charlotte stiffened. The air grew thick, as though the
humidity had doubled. She already knew what the something else was, and
she didn't want to discuss it any more.
    “I told my Aunt no. I’m not changing my mind.”
    “Honey, I just want you to understand — ”
    “No.” She angled her body more toward Deb, in an attempt to
remove Steven from her peripheral vision. “I have nothing to say to him and
want nothing to do with him. He has no legal standing over me anymore. I made
sure of that.”
    “I know. I get that.” Deb stood and embraced her briefly.
“Sorry I brought it up here. Just call me, okay?”
    “Okay.” She smoothed her shorts over her hips, more to iron
out her irritation than to rid herself of wrinkles. “Give the boys hugs and
kisses for me.”
    “Of course.”
    “See ya, Charlotte.” Steven's voice made her pause mid-turn
as she was leaving. She looked back over her shoulder. His smile worked some of
the tension out of her shoulders and she smiled back. He'd at least earned that
much.
    Chapter Two
     
    Two weeks after their first meeting, Steven once more found
himself walking next to Charlotte toward the campus creamery. Deb didn't have
to ask him twice to come along. He and Charlotte had ended up in the same small
group during workshop once again. He was halfway sorry she didn't have anything
nearly as biting to say about his writing this time. Despite his best efforts,
he had mostly positive things to say about hers. He'd urged her to submit the
story to some literary journals for publication, but she laughed him off.
Charlotte was still a mystery to him.
    She was the quiet girl who never said much, but always
looked like she had a lot to say; the girl who carried herself with a quiet
assertiveness that a man couldn’t help but find attractive, even if she’d
barely spoken to him. He was a little old for these kinds of crushes-from-afar,
but he couldn’t help himself. He’d caught himself more than once daydreaming
about her slender fingers and where he’d like to feel them, or her pouty lips
and what he hoped they might say to him. God, he was