Rainbow vomit.
Right.
I stare at her mouth.
She sucks on the tip of the stick.
Licks it.
When she pops the candy out of her mouth, our eyes meet as she drags her tongue along the edge of it before holding it toward me, offering me some. “You want?”
Yes.
Yes, I really fucking want.
I lean in, close enough to smell the candy on her breath. “Poppy, are you flirting with me?”
Her gaze drops to my mouth. “Depends.”
“On what?”
“On whether or not you’re flirting back.”
I’m not.
But not because I don’t want to.
It’s just—I’m bad at it.
Flirting, I mean. Everything else…
Amazing.
Before I can say a word, she spins away, hair swinging, hips swaying, and I’m left standing there like a sucker, my brain somewhere between wanting to pin her against this candy counter and wondering if we’ve even looked for the damn piñata yet.
poppy
. . .
Itug Turner down the aisle, dodging inflatable aliens and oversized, floating balloons while the music overhead switches to a ukulele version of “Moana”.
We cannot for the life of us find the piñata we came for.
“It should be here,” he mutters, scanning the shelves stacked with piñatas. “Their website said they had one in stock.”
I squint at the wall of colorful paper animals. There’s a unicorn. A giant teacup. A dinosaur with googly eyes, which—in my opinion—everyone should have at their party.
“Yikes,” I say, plucking up a tiny mermaid stuffed doll with disturbingly realistic eyes off a nearby shelf. “If this thing came to life, it would murder us in our sleep.”
“Hell no.” Turner grabs it from my hand and stares into its plush face, frowning. “Why does she look like she wants to steal my soul?”
“Because she does.”
He shoves it back onto the shelf and steps back, frustrated. “Crap.”
“Maybe the lizard is somewhere else?” I suggest hopefully, grabbing his arm again and dragging him to the next one. But all we find are more random decorations and balloons, someof which are shaped like poop emojis, video game logos—and a dragon that looks like it’s seen better days.
Deflated.
