Anonymous snores lazily in the shade next to a bench on the grass between the beach and the road. He’s needed this day off after so long as his slave-wage job, and the beach is the perfect place to be. Most people would be at home, chatting, playing video games, or watching a crappy movie. Maybe getting high or drunk, but Anon preferred napping in the shade on the beach. He liked to take it slow, y’know?
“Hey.”
“...”
“Hey, wake up.”
“... Eh?”
“Who are you, and why are you lying on the grass?”
“Huh?”
“If you aren’t drunk or homeless, you should stand up. You look like a bum.”
The young man peers at the slightly younger woman sitting on the bench next to his napping spot. She looks back, seemingly annoyed at his very existence.
“Can I help you?” Anonymous asks.
“Yes, you can. Could you leave?”
“Eh? Who do you think you are? I’m taking a nap, I’m not bothering anyone.”
“You’re bothering me. Who takes a nap next to a bench anyway?”
“I didn’t want any sand in my shoes, and the tree gives good shade.” Anon points to the tree above them.
“If you want to take a nap, just go down to the beach. Who takes a nap next to a road?”
“Hey, the grass and trees are part of the beach in my opinion, so I can nap here if I want.”
The girl blows out a huff, “Head on the ground next to a bench? I bet you were trying to look up skirts, you pervert.”
Anonymous sits up tiredly, “Miss, you’re wearing a two piece. I’m already getting about as good a view of your tits and ass as I can without seeing you naked. Why would I be looking up skirts when there’s a beach full of women dressed just like you right there.” He throws his hand out, indicating the sand and waves.
The girl stares in wide-eyed shock. Looks like no one’s ever talked back to her before. She covers her chest with her arms, “Y-you are a pervert!”
“Whatever you say.” Anon reaches into the backpack sitting next to him, pulling out a generic soda. He offers it to the young woman.
“Here, sorry I offended you. Let’s say I woke up on the wrong side of the grass.”
The girl looks back and forth between the boy and the can. He gently shakes it, “C’mon, take it before I regret offering it.”
The girl takes the can with a look of mild distrust, “A can of artificially flavored sugar water does not make you a ‘good person.’”
“It’s the first step, though, right? I’m Anonymous.”
“Sugarcoat.”
‘Huh, ironic.’ The boy thinks as he takes a drink from a second can he took from his bag. He checks his watch. It’s only been thirty minutes since he laid down. ‘Probably better that I only had a short nap. Wouldn’t want to get my bag stolen… again.’ Which is why he kept his money in his right sock now. “So, what brings you to the beach?”
The girl glowers imperiously, “Idle chit-chat is the fastest way to prove that you have nothing interesting to say.”
“I’m trying to start a conversation.”
“It would be better if you didn’t.”
“Listen, ‘Sugar’, you woke me up, I think I’m owed a little kindness after you ruined my nap. An apology at least.”
“I don’t have anything to apologize for. If anybody should say anything it should be you. If I hadn’t woken you up everyone here would have thought you were a bum.”
“I doubt that.”
Sugarcoat huffs, “You’re still a creepy weirdo.”
“I thought it was pervert.”
“That too.”
“Rude.”
“Creep.”
“Sour.”
“Loser.”
“Cutie-pie.”
“W-w-w-w-w-what!” Guess she didn’t expect that one.
Anon laughs, “What, never heard a compliment before?”
“Creepy pervert.” Sugarcoat decides.
Anon finishes off his soda and stands up, “Well, it’s been nice talking to you, but I need to find somewhere else to finish my nap. Thanks for sharing.”
Sugarcoat looks… stricken for a second, but her confidence quickly returns. “Well, it looks like —in the end— you got me to talk. You know, weirding people out is not a good way to make them open up to you.”
“Worked, didn’t it?”
Sugarcoat puts on an offended look, but Anon can see right through her. He’d dealt with more than enough Karens at work to see through fake outrage.
Sugarcoat puffs up like a bird trying to look bigger. A cute bird at that. “You are a weirdo, a creep, and above all else, a pervert!”
Anon leans into the young woman’s space with a malevolent smile, “And you[/] are a silver tongued snake who doesn’t know when to shut up, but it’s cute —in an abrasive sort of way.”
Sugarcoat sits dumbly as Anon leans even closer, his breath fogging her glasses, “You don’t ‘sugarcoat’ things, do you?” Anon turns on a heel, scoops up his bag, and begins walking away, secure in his victory over the sharp tongued young woman.
“Wait!” Anon pauses at Sugarcoat’s yell, “You… you owe me thanks, and an apology for that little barb!”
“What? No I don’t!”
“Yes you do! I’ll scream! I’ll tell everyone on the beach you’re a pervert!”
“You wouldn’t.”
“HEY!” Girl’s got some lungs on her. Some of the people on the beach look over at the pair.
Anon quickly steps forward and pokes Sugarcoat’s tongue. The girl’s mouth clamping shut almost takes his finger off, but he gets away with all his digits. Anon smiles and waves at the beach goers who wave back.
Then he turns back to Sugarcoat, “I’m not apologizing for anything, you little shit, and if you insist on opening your big mouth I’m sure I can fill it with enough sand to build a sandcastle.”
“Hmph, fine then, I’ll just follow you until you apologize properly… perv.”
Anon throws his hand up and stalks away. Sugarcoat grabs her own bag and follows him.
She looks for all the world like a lost puppy following the first person to give her food.
“Listen, I don’t mind you following me, but you’re not getting your apology. I don’t have anything to apologize for! I said I was sorry about offending you or whatever, can’t you just let this go?”
“No. By the end of the day I will get my due thanks and a sincere apology out of you.”
“You wish.”
Sugarcoat snorts, “Rude, creepy, and a perv, someone needs to teach you manners.”
“Blow me.”
“Making me angry and comments like that isn’t going to get you any.”
Anon grins like a wolf tasting blood, “And if I made you happy?”
“I’m not putting it in my mouth. Who knows where it’s been?”
“Hey! I wash regularly, and it’s not like I stick my dick in dirt, or crazy.”
“Dressed like that?”
“It’s my day off! These are comfortable.” Anon indicates his ratty and threadbare shorts and t-shirt.
“Well, they certainly look like something.”
Anon spots the perfect spot for his nap to continue and walks away from the abrasive platinum haired girl. The new spot is a little hillock with a nice view of the beach. There’s a tree overlooking it which casts its shade on the one soft looking part of the rocky dirt.
“Here we go.” Anon yawns.
“It’s a reasonably good spot.”
“Finally, something we can agree on.” Anon opens his backpack, drawing out a large rolled up beach towel. “Well, if you don’t mind, I’ll—”
Sugarcoat is sitting on the only spot of soft and shaded ground.
Anon’s eye twitches, “Hey, get off of there.”
“I’m afraid I can’t do that, Anon. There are rocks everywhere else. Besides, you have a towel, just fold it up and use it as a cushion on one of the big rocks.” Sugarcoat waves imperiously at a rock large enough to sit on.
“No way, that’s the only spot with really good shade!”
“I’m afraid that you’ll just have to endure the sun… unless of course you wanted to apologize for calling me a snake and thank me for saving your dignity.”
Anon is having none of that. Cute girl or no he’s not bowing to her whims. At least, so long as she isn’t sucking his dick for it. That’s the kind of bowing he could get behind. Sugarcoat is blushing and staring at the man’s slightly sweaty chest. Anon takes notice, “What, never seen a man without a shirt?”
“Disrobing in front of a lady, truly your perversion knows no bounds.”
“That doesn’t answer the question though, does it?
“... I’ve never had a shirtless man so close to me…”
“Really? You’re literally at a beach.”
She scoffs, “I’m a student of Crystal Preparatory School, I’ll not sully myself with shirtless fools looking for a one night stand… I’m also barely eighteen, so when most guys see me and my friends they assume we’re too young for them. Which we are.” Sugarcoat glares at Anon.
“Hey, I’m only twenty, young lady. Don’t go giving me the stink eye.”
“Could have fooled me, with your attitude I thought you were some dirty old man, trying to worm his way into the panties of young girls.”
“Well Excu~se me, princess. I might not be a knight in shining armor, but I’m no vagabond who stalks about in the night either.” Anon says, putting on the kind of accent you might associate with a knight in a middle school play.
Sugarcoat… puts on that same accent, “Of course you’re no knight. More of a jester, really. A knight would have a more impressive body, at least.”
Anon waves his arms, indicating the beach, “Find me one guy that looks better than me. Pro tip, you can’t.”
Sugarcoat’s laugh is like a tinkling chime. She looks out at the beach but can’t really see very well. All the beach goers were pretty far away. She stands up to get a better view. “There!” She points, “Those guys are—”
Anon has managed, in the few short seconds after Sugarcoat stood, to lay down his towel, flop down upon it, and is now flipping her the bird with a smug smirk.
“Anonymous, you asshole!”
Anonymous snores loudly. That snore that your grandfather would do when he was playing with you as a toddler and he was pretending to be asleep so you could ‘wake him up.’
Sugarcoat looks around. She considers screaming again, but discards the idea, everyone was too far away and would probably ignore her unless she looked like she was in danger. She sits on the rock she pointed out to Anonymous, cursing that he hadn’t even left her the towel to use as a cushion.
‘Who does he think he is?’ Sugarcoat stews, ‘Teasing me, insulting me. I can’t just sit back and let this happen! I stood up to Cinch, and I handle Sunny and Sour’s passive-aggressive malarky like a pro! I’m not going to let some random hot boy do this to me!’
Sugarcoat looks down at Anonymous. He’s snoring, for real, and it’s loud and annoying. He’s pillowed his head on his left arm, his right hand sitting on his stomach, still giving her the finger, even in sleep. She was starting to get sweaty on her hot rock, a bead of the salty water slowly sliding down her neck.
Looking down at Anonymous’s sweaty shirt Sugarcoat has an idea. Using her hands Sugarcoat wipes the sweat from her body, paying special attention to her underboobs, then flicks the droplets down at Anon, sprinkling him with the hot, salty sweat.
“Agh! Jesus, what was that for?”
“You know,” Sugarcoat says, ignoring the question, “It really is hot today.”
“Did you just throw your sweat at me?”
“I thought you might appreciate it, considering what a pervert you are.”
“I ain’t no simp, woman.”
“Su~re you aren’t.”
Anon rolls his eyes, rolls over, and goes back to sleep. Sugarcoat goes back to being bored, playing in the sandy dirt with her toes. She thinks for a moment, then smiles, picking up the shirt now she begins to polish her glasses, being careful to refract the light into Anon’s eyes.
Anon tosses and turns but Sugarcoat is careful to keep up a steady stream of flashing light. He growls low in his throat and the noise sends a shiver up Sugarcoat’s spine, “What are you doing now?”
“My glasses are dirty. I have to clean them, or at least point them somewhere else. The light is bothering me and this is the only spot where I could clean them comfortably. I hope I’m not bothering you, this could take a while.” She’s practically whispering seductively.
Anon rolls away from Sugarcoat, right off the towel. Sugarcoat snaps it up before Anon realizes his mistake. By the time he rolls back over to glare at her she’s folded it up and parked her bottom atop in on the rock, smiling like a floofy white persion cat who just ate a prized goldfish.
“You give that back, missy.”
“Nope~, you have the nice, comfy dirt, and all I have is this hard rock. Clearly I need it more than you.”
Anon just huffs and tries to go back to sleep, but Sugarcoat’s stomach growling makes him pause. “Where are they?” Sugarcoat asks herself under her breath.
“Who?” of course Anon heard her.
“My friends, we were supposed to meet here at least half an hour ago.”
“Well, you should go look for them, shouldn’t you?”
Sugarcoat clearly doesn’t want to leave, which in her mind would be admitting defeat. Sugarcoat picks up her phone. Missed messages. The phone had been on silent this entire time. The messages were various excuses for not coming to the beach. No doubt only one or two of them actually had to do anything and everyone else just chickened out. Turns out social anxiety hits the popular kids too, who would have thought.
“They aren’t coming.” Sugarcoat’s voice is a monotone.
“Oh?”
“Other things came up.”
“Well, you could always head home.”
Sugarcoat looks down at her bag. While she had been looking for her phone she’d realised that she’d forgotten her wallet at home. “I also forgot my wallet.”
Anonymous blinks, “Then how did you get here.”
“Bus pass has its own pocket. Useful for when you forget your wallet places.”
“Except in this instance you would have had to bring your wallet if you wanted to get here.”
“So it would seem.”
“Well, then you should definitely head home. I guess this is goodbye, Sugarcoat, you’ve been the cutest pebble to have ever been lodged in my shoe.”
“Hey, if you’re going to keep calling me cute you should at least buy me lunch!”
“Oh come on! You’ve been nothing but annoying this entire time. Give me one good reason I should buy you lunch.”
Sugarcoat pouts, “I’m a cute girl with no money and I’m hungry.”
“Uh-huh… Any other reason? Maybe a valid one?”
Sugarcoat looks like she’s actually going to cry. Her eyes get watery, her bottom lip trembles. “H-how can you be so evil?” She covers her face, sobbing into her hands, “Is this what you want? Making me miserable, starving me to death?”
Anon hold up his hands, “Nonononono! I-I-I-I-”
“I’m sorry, Anonymous. Is that what you wanted to hear? I’m sorry!” Sugarcoat produces a whole three act play of tragedy right in front of the stammering young man. “Buah!”
“Please don’t cry!”
“Awuah!”
“Please stop!”
“Buahahaha~”
“Fine! I’ll buy you lunch, just please, stop!”
“You mean it?”
“Yes, woman!”
“Ok!” Curtain call and Sugarcoat puts away the waterworks like they’re set dressing.
Anon stares for a second, “You just played me, didn’t you?”
“I did.”
“And what’s to stop me from just walking away.”
“I’ll cry again.”
“I’ll know it’s fake.”
“You’ll still feel bad.”
Anon narrows his eyes at the delinquent girl. She rolls her eyes, “Fine, I’ll walk ahead of you and you can stare at my butt.”
Anon smirks, “Who’s the pervert again?”
Sugarcoat blushes a deep red, “You!” She begins stalking off, and Anon must admit that she has a very fine bottom.
After a moment she looks back and sees where Anon is looking. He makes eye contact with her, and winks. You can practically see the steam coming out of her ears as she faces forward and keeps marching.
Several minutes later the two are standing in a line at a food truck. Sugarcoat squints at the truck, “I was expecting something a little more… substantial.”
“Well, it’s the best I can afford. I wasn’t planning on buying for two.”
Sugarcoat raises an eyebrow, “You brought less than a twenty for lunch? Let me guess, dropped out?”
“Flunked, actually, it was easier that way.”
“Easier if you want to get stuck in a series of dead end jobs.”
“I’m not the first and I’ll not be the last to take this route.”
The pair reach the front of the line, “¿Qué tu quieres? Whachu' want?"
“Um…” Sugarcoat looks at the portly mexican man staring them down.
"What you want, chica? Linea's getting bigger."
“Oh! Well, I…”
Anon steps up, takes off his right shoe, and pulls out a couple bills. Sugarcoat raises an eyebrow at him, “Don’t get any ideas about ordering a ton, these are singles. Give us two of whatever this’ll get us.” Anon slides the bills over.
“Thas it?”
“Yeah.”
The man scoffs and rolls his eyes, “I’ll give you two tacos, little ones.”
Anon shrugs but Sugarcoat’s mouth pinches together at the man’s tone. Her hand darts into her bag, finding a little change at the bottom. She triumphantly smacks it down on the counter.
“Alright, Chica, what else you want.” The large man humors her.
“Um… that soda!” She points.
“Alright, alright.” The man places the soda on a tray along with the two small tacos, “Now get out of my line.” He waves them away.
As the pair sit down at their table Sugarcoat asks, “Are the cooks always so… abrasive?”
Anon shrugs, “It’s a pretty busy day, he’s probably just stressed.”
As the pair start eating, Sugarcoat looks surprised at the delicious taste of the taco.
“Never had truck food?”
Sugarcoat raises an eyebrow, “I prefer my restaurants to have health certificates.”
Anon rolls his eyes, “They have one, they just don’t need to flaunt it.”
“Could have fooled me, this taco looks like a crime scene.”
“You are still eating it.”
“I don’t have anything else. You know, I was supposed to be hanging out with my school friends. Creating memories, having a picnic. Instead, I’m sitting with a stranger, getting angrier by the minute, and eating greasy food that will no doubt clog every artery I have.” She sounds more sad than angry at her pronouncement.
Anon smiles down at her, “Sounds like my average Friday browsing the web.”
“You’re creepier when you enjoy my suffering.”
“Hey, you were enjoying mine earlier and turnabout is fair play. Don’t think I forgot that cute little smirk you had when you woke me up the first time, you little tyrant.”
Sugarcoat has no answer for that. The pair sit in silence for a moment before the pair reach for the soda bottle at the same time, their fingers caressing against one another. They both freeze for a second, before Anonymous retracts his hand.
“...”
“...”
“...”
“You have pretty hands.” Anon eventually says with a little smile.
“S-stop teasing me!”
“What, I can’t compliment you? We’re having lunch, aren’t we, it’s practically a date.”
Sugarcoat stares hard at Anon. Anon reaches forward, grabbing the bottle and taking a swig, before he pushes it across the table to Sugarcoat, who looks at it. She’d not seen a lot of anime, but she certainly knew what this was. Her cheeks heat and she takes a dainty sip.
As Anon returns from putting the tray away and throwing out the trash Sugarcoat asks, “Any ideas on what to do next?”
“Not really. All I wanted to do was take a nap, have lunch, and go home.”
“You could have just stayed home if all you wanted to do was that.”
“Hey, getting time for myself is hard, I’m not going to waste it staying home if there’s a beautiful beach I could nap on instead.”
“You weren’t even really on the beach.”
“Semantics.”
“Big word for a dropout.”
“At least I made a decision about my life. It was liberating.”
“Every time you open your mouth you make me more and more sure that it was the wrong decision you made.”
“Please. Let me guess, you’re the perfect cookie-cutter student. You’ll finish high school, go to college, get a degree, have a career, and then what? ‘Ruin’ it with a couple of kids? Or will you work yourself to death until menopause catches up with you and you’re forced to pick one of your employees to take over your business like you’re some aging medieval queen?”
"It's better than jumping from dead-end job to dead-end job until you hit retirement, your body falling apart from greasy food and regret.”
"It's better than jumping from dead-end job to dead-end job until you hit retirement, your body falling apart from greasy food and regret.”
"Maybe, but I came to the beach to relax, not to have a date with a psychologist." The continued use of the word ‘date’ brings back Sugarcoat’s blush. Anon thankfully doesn’t see it. "Well, anyway, since I have no ideas. Do you have one?"
"Hmmm..."
"Sugarcoat?"
"Hmm... Oh, yeah. Of course I do. My friends and I were planning to go to the arcades around here, maybe go to a bowling alley, or the zoo."
Anon raises his right leg and wiggles his shoe clad foot.
“Oh,” Sugarcoat says, “right.”
“At least you catch on quickly.”
A volley ball rolls to Sugarcoat’s feet. “Hm?” She looks down at it, then up to where it must have come from.
“Sorry, miss, could you pass the ball?” A man asks from over on the beach.
Anon picks up the ball, “Sure, hey, can we join?”
“Sure! The more the merrier!”
“What? Anon!” Sugarcoat protests.
“C’mon, it’ll be fun!” Anon drops his bag with the group’s other bags and strides out onto the sand.
“We just ate.”
“A good workout will burn it off.”
“You’ll get cramps!” Anonymous isn’t listening, instead chatting with the guys and girls who were bouncing the ball around. Sugarcoat sighs and follows him. The group was in the middle of a casual warm up, mostly just passing the ball around and over the net, by the time Sugarcoat has started to work up the slightest sweat everyone is ready to play the actual game.
The teams were Sugarcoat, Anon, and two others against the rest of the group, which was three girls and two boys. First to ten points is the winner. The game runs long. Even with the extra player the other team isn’t very good, though Anon is pretty weak in volleyball himself.
Anon’s also moving slower and even he should be, clearly suffering from eating and then bouncing around like an idiot trying to stop the other team from getting another point due to his fumbling. Sugarcoat, however, was doing fantastic, years of Tae Kwon Do and ballet leaving her flexible and fast. She dances between her partners, catching almost every ball that they miss. Her well trained legs let her jump high and farther when spiking.
But Anon really dragged them down, leaving the game sitting at a tie at nine points for almost ten full minutes. The ball goes straight for Anon’s feet, and for once the man, struggling not to puke, manages to bounce it up. Straight up over his head, before falling to one knee. “Ugh… Taco sama, I got too cock… I kneel.”
‘Freaking jobber.’ Sugarcoat thinks, then notices an opportunity. Dashing forward she plants one foot on the fool’s spine and launches herself high in the air, spiking the ball down at the prematurely celebrating enemy and seeing the ball hit the sand right in the center of the group.
Point and game! But Sugarcoats legs are coming out from underneath her. She tries to correct but it’s too late as she begins to fall, “Ah, help!”
Anon, a few seconds ago, got kicked right in the spine. Which, somehow, made him feel better, so when he looks up to see Sugarcoat above him and falling towards him he does the sane thing and holds his hands out to catch her. He does catch her, he catches her ass with his face. The two go down in a heap, Sugarcoat jumping up and spinning to see Anon on the ground. “Anon! Are you ok?” She asks with genuine concern. The rest of the group gathers around, “Anonymous?”
“Ugh, yeah, I’m fine.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. Yo—” Anon stops before he says ‘you landed ass first on my face.’ Sugarcoat cocks her head curiously. “You… landed on… the sand.”
Sugarcoat squints, “The sand?”
“Yes, the sand!”
“How? A fall from that high onto my bum would have hurt way more than that.”
“Well, uh, what I’m trying to say is that I caught you, but I dropped you… on the sand.”
“I...see.” The rest of the group cheers and a couple of the guys lift up Sugarcoat for her game winning and epic looking spike. Someone slaps Anon on the back, which brings back all the nausea he’d been feeling a moment ago. He sprints for the nearest garbage can where his lunch makes the acquaintance of a pile of plastic cups.
Several minutes later the pair are walking down the beach. “Would you keep your distance, please. Your breath is awful.”
“I really wasn’t expecting to throw up my lunch. I thought it would stay down."
"Playing sports right after a meal will do that to you. There’s a reason you aren’t supposed to swim for half an hour after eating."
"We won, that's what counts."
"It would count more if it didn't smell like taco vomit when you talk." Anon blows out in her direction. "Ugh! What are you? Twelve?" Sugarcoat shoves him away as Anon laughs. She tries to get further away from him, walking a little into the surf. Anon follows her.
“Hey, I know it’s bad, but you don’t have to flee into the ocean.”
Sugarcoat fakes like she’s feeling sick, clutching her stomach and bending over. Anon steps up to her as she bends further down to the waves lapping at her feet and collects come water in her hands. “Hey, are you sure you’re ok?” Sugarcoat quickly stands, tossing the handful of salty water into Anon’s mouth. “Puag! Buag! Bleh! What the Hell?"
"Sea water. Now your mouth smells like the sea."
"Bleh, I'd prefer if it smelled like fish."
"Don’t think I didn’t catch the innuendo, but you’ll have to keep dreaming."
"Well, if we’re already in the water..."
Anon takes Sugarcoat’s bag, jogs over to the dry sand, dropping both bags, and returning with an evil grin.
"What are you thinking now?"
He splashes Sugarcoat with some water.
"Water fight!"
"Hey! Stop being immature!"
"You started it!"
She splashes back. "Your breath smelled like butt. You started it!"
The pair splash each other, wading deeper into the waves. Sugarcoat swimming circles around the taller man. They dive, laugh, splash, and even play an impromptu game of Marco Polo. Eventually they make their way back to their bags, dripping wet. Anon smiles at the girl, “Now that was fun.”
“No need to state the obvious.” She tips her nose up.
“Would it kill you to say something nice?”
She smirks, “It was easy to splash you with water, and you breath no longer smells like rancid taco meat.”
“See? Was that so hard?”
Sugarcoat side eyes Anon, “Not as hard as you are.”
“What?” Anon looks down to see that he is most certainly not sporting a tent. Then he looks back up at Sugarcoat’s slightly blushing but still smug grin.
Anon’s face settles into a relaxed grin and picks up his towel, holding it out to Sugarcoat.
“Shouldn’t you use it first?”
"Nah. I went in with my clothes on. Actually, I wasn't expecting to go to the water today, but we were having fun, so..."
"I understand." She finishes quickly, and passes Anon the towel, who does his best to dry himself. "Well, any fun ideas left?" she asks.
"Actually, it's time I have to go. I have to work tomorrow, and I need all the shut eye I can get."
"Oh! Well, since you are leaving..." Sugarcoat looks over with this ‘come hither’ stare with some honest to goodness ‘fuck me’ eyes.
"I~ uh, don't think your family would like you following a random stranger home."
She grins, "I was thinking that I should wave you goodbye at the bus stop."
"Oh, how considerate."
The pair of you walk up to the bus stop, though it’s more of a transit hub. Anon finds the spot where his bus will pull in and the pair sit down on the provided bench. Neither of them speak. Sugarcoat spends the entire time scribbling something down on a sticky note with a purple sparkly gel pen. Anon thinks of a couple things to say, but instead just basks in the silence. A bus rounds the corner and pulls into the hub. “That’s your bus?” Sugarcoat asks.
“Yup.” Anon stands up, “So, Sugarcoat…” Sugarcoat looks up at the taller man, “I want to… thank you, and apologize for some of my earlier remarks. I’ve been teasing you all day, and thought you were a bit… mean earlier I’ve had a lot of fun hanging around with you. You made today much better than it would have been otherwise.” Sugarcoat’s eyes are wide and staring, “So… yeah, I guess I’m sorry you had to spend all day hanging out with this beach bum, but thanks for making my day so much better by doing so.” Anon turns, stepping onto the bus.
Sugarcoat scribbles furiously on her note for a second while Anon pays. “Wait!” Anon turns back to the silver haired cutie. She presses the sticky note into his hands. “Now you can go.”
“Really? Something you couldn’t say?”
Sugarcoat gives a little glare, then grins, steps up into the bus, and kisses Anon on the cheek before quickly stepping back off the bus, “Read it inside. You don’t want to get kicked off the bus and be late for work tomorrow, do you? Have a nice night, Anon.”
The bus driver, being a master of dramatic timing, chose that moment to close the doors and begin pulling away from the curb. “Which stop, buddy?”
Anon slowly turns, "Oh, just up to Sussex and Princeton." Anon sits in the back of the bus, looking down at the folded note. Then he opens it and reads:
Anonymous, meeting you was ~~the most~~ ~~annoying~~ ~~gross~~ ~~disturbing~~ an experience, and I feel ~~dumb~~ ~~silly~~ ~~enlightened~~ open minded about this maybe becoming something more, so I would like to ~~reunite~~ ~~meet you~~ see you ~~soon~~ again.
My number is 123-456-789 and she forgot to write the last digit.
Anon’s smile is wide. The note reads the way he imagines she thinks. Perhaps he’d call her, it wouldn’t be hard to brute force the number. Or, well, she said she was from Crystal Prep. Maybe he could find her another way. He works there, after all.
‘Sugarcoat.’ Anon sighs and leans back in his seat as the street lights begin to turn on in the fading sunlight. ‘What a nice chance meeting at the beach.’
