MB Saucy Side: Counting Freckles

Featuring Sally and Button

“One-hundred and seventeen,” you declare confidently.

Sally props herself up on the pillow, her hair in a messy bun atop her head. She rolls her eyes at you, although her giggle undermines her projected exasperation. “You did not count all the freckles on my face.”

“I did,” you affirm. “Last night, while you were sleeping.” Your thumb brushes against her left cheek, which you now know has thirty-eight freckles.

Her skin heats beneath your touch, her freckles all the more prominent due to the fact it’s so early in the morning that she’s yet to put on foundation. “Didn’t you have anything better to do than stare at my face?” she says. “You should know my features well enough by now.”

“I know your features by heart.”  You tilt her chin so that your lips can gently touch hers. “And now I know them every better.”

“You’re absurd,” Sally whispers before you silence her with another kiss.

Perhaps you are absurd. By the time Sally and you break apart, you’re also giddy and breathlessly blissful, and the comforter has been kicked onto the floor of your bedroom. You gaze into her hazel eyes, flecked with gold and greens. There, half-hidden by her eyelashes, is another, uncounted, freckle.

“One-hundred and eighteen,” you say.

Sally’s brow furrows as she tries to recall what you’d been conversing about before you’d kissed her senseless.

“Freckles,” you remind her.

Sally giggles again. Her arms wrap around you, her hands clasping together at the nape of your neck. She presses a light kiss onto the corner of your mouth.

“Absurd,” she reiterates. She kisses your cheek, your nose, and your eyelids. “Ridiculous, silly, foolish,” she adds with each kiss.

Unable to remain passive under her whisper-soft onslaught, your hands wrap around her waist and pull her closer. The next kiss is different from the ones that came before—this one is filled with crackling electricity and blazing fire and the culmination of years spent silently, foolishly, longing for each other.

Sally kisses you back the same way she does everything: unreservedly and with her whole heart. Her curls tumble loose from her bun, spilling down her shoulders like a waterfall of flame. You twine a stray red lock around your finger.

“I should count your curls next,” you tease.

Sally smacks your shoulder. “Less counting,” she demands. “More kissing.”

You oblige.

Eventually, you rise from the bed. “We have work in an hour,” you remind her regretfully.

Sally juts out her lower lip in a pout that you assume is her attempt at looking seductive. And to you, it is seductive, despite the expression also making it look like she has a pronounced underbite.

“We’re newlyweds,” she argues. “We can be late.”

You feign shock. “Mrs. Wiseman-Alavidze, what are you suggesting?”

“It’s Mrs. Alavidze-Wiseman,” Sally says tartly. “We agreed on our names being in alphabetical order.”

“Wiseman-Alavidze still sounds better, though.”

Sally chucks her pillow at you, which you manage to nimbly dodge. She throws your pillow as well. This one hits your head.

Once you both stop laughing, Sally grabs your wrist and pulls you back down onto the bed. She can be surprisingly strong when there’s something—someone—that she really wants.

“The Alavidze-Wiseman family is going to be late to work today,” she whispers. “Kim will just have to deal.”

You flip her over onto her back, eliciting a surprised squeal from Sally. “The Wiseman-Alavidze family will be calling in sick today,” you correct. “Because I have more freckles to count.”