Every time Laura looked back at the summer of 2011, she smiled. Since moving to the northern reaches of the Midwest (Minnesota), she got into the habit of erasing the memories of dull winters and thinking of only the brilliant summers filled with days spent at the beach, swimsuits and ice cream.
Laura found it easy to make friends in school but once she decided to stay in the area for summer break, she realized she'd have to get out more to find other people to hang out with. A friend of hers mentioned that she had an uncle looking for young women to sell ice cream on the lakes. They pay wasn't good but it was supposed to be fun time you could make a killing in tips.
Laura was intrigued and went to meet this man, Jake, personally. He seemed relieved to see her. Laura was about 5'2'', thin, and pretty fit. She had long brunette hair and dark eyes and by all means was a pretty attractive young woman. Not a knock out, but certainly pretty.
Jake looked at her carefully.
"Not to be crude or anything," he said carefully, "but pretty young girls sell more ice cream than I do!"
Laura laughed and they shook hands.
Jake showed her the bike she'd be driving. It was a big heavy thing with an electric cooler attached to the front, but it was easy to drive on level ground. It had an umbrella and a little safe for her money. Just driving it around the store, Laura could already feel her calf muscles toning up.
Though she was nervous at first, Laura had a lot of fun selling ice cream for Jake that summer. She got to spend the majority of her day outside in a swimsuit, being ogled by plenty of boys on the beach. It was certainly a confidence boost. People liked her attitude, tipped her well and even invited her to parties in the evening even though she rarely went.
On one day, Laura was scheduled to ride her ice cream station out to a place called Hidden Beach. The beach wasn't exactly "hidden" anymore; the city had recently paved a parking lot near by, but it certainly wasn't as popular as many of the other beaches in the city. Laura liked this beach because it was always full of young people, mostly hipsters who lived in the area, many of them students at the university. The police rarely came by to check on things so there was more freedom: dogs running off leash, people drinking beer and whiskey out in the open. There was a fair amount of pot smoking in broad daylight. It was a lot of fun and people tended to buy a lot of her ice cream.
That day she just felt like she was looking good. One thing that helped her sell was not just baring skin, but looking stylish. That day she wore her hair up in curls on top of her head. She wrapped a little blue scarf around them, tied on top and painted her lips a bright red. She was going for a pin up look, which was popular that year on the beach. Her swimsuit matched: a solid navy blue bikini where the bottoms rose up almost to her belly button but were cut well and showed off her well-shaped bottom and showed off her tanned thighs and calves. The top of the bikini was a sort of wired bra that pushed her C-cup breasts up and gave them a very round, full appearance. She finished the look off with cherry red nail polish and a pair of mirrored Ray-Ban knockoffs.
The regular entrance to the beach was always packed with people so Laura took a lesser-known back alley. She must have been a little lost in her thoughts because she was halfway onto the sand before she realized the place was empty. Looking around she noticed that the main entrance was taped off.
"What the ..." she began.
"Hey!" someone shouted from across the sand.
Laura looked over in that direction. A man in red swim shorts was running toward her with a Frisbee in his hand.
"Hi..." she said when he was finally in earshot.
"I don't know if you realize it, but the beach is closed," he said, smirking.
"I figured... What's going on?" asked Laura.
"There's some kind of dangerous amoeba in the water. This lake's been closed. I suppose everyone's off to Lake Calhoun instead."
"Damn!" said Laura. It was going to be a lot of work to ride her contraption all the way to the next lake.
"You have places to be?"
"Well, yes. I'm supposed to be selling ice cream to the masses," she said with her own smirk.
"I'd like to buy some. It's still pretty hot out today, amoeba or not."
"Sure, you can have some, but what are you even doing out here?" she asked looking around again, noticing they were completely alone.
"My friend Sam and I were throwing Frisbee, which is easier to do when the beach is empty, but he got hungry and ran to get us some sandwiches and something to drink. I decided to stay and take in the tranquility."
As if on cue, a car alarm went off a block away, just behind the trees which surrounded the beach. They both laughed.
"Well, relative tranquility" he joked. "Say, what's your name?"
"I'm Laura. And you?" she asked as she pulled out the poster which listed the kinds of ice cream available.
"Hmm..." he said, rubbing his chin and inspecting the poster. "My name is Lawrence."
"Larry, huh?" Laura prodded, still perched on her bike seat.
He looked up at her quickly and shook his head, "I swear, no one calls me that. You'll have to call me Lawrence."
Laura laughed but also felt her face flush as he looked into her eyes with his mock-serious expression.
"I do apologize," she said.
"It's no problem," he said smiling again. He pulled a five-dollar bill out of a pocket in his red shorts and handed them to her.
"I will have a bomb pop and you, miss, can have whatever you'd like."
Laura smiled at him and took the bill.
"Normally that would be against the rules, but I don't think anyone's going to tell on me," she said.
Lawrence looked around the beach, faking a worried expression.
"Nope," he said, "only me."
Laura laughed and folded the bill into the safe. She hopped off the bike seat to open the cooler.
She pulled out a bomb-pop and handed it to Lawrence and grabbed herself cherry popsicle. She turned on the old tape deck that was strapped to the cooler thinking it'd be cute and a little ironic, just the two random people eating popsicles together on a beach listening to music. The entire tape was old big band classics, something to match her attire. Lawrence just raised his eyebrows silently then opened the wrapper on his treat. The sun was hot on their shoulders so Laura cranked her umbrella open and jumped up to sit on the cooler. This way they were face to face and out of the sun.
Laura took a good look at him. He was probably about 6 feet tall. He was tan enough for early summer. Though, he looked like he usually sported the typical Minnesota complexion for the rest of the year, which is relatively pale. He had dark brown hair, nearly black, cut stylishly: long on top but buzzed short on the sides. He was clean-shaven and pretty fit, but not like he worked out at the gym on a regular basis. Maybe he was a runner, thought Laura.
"So, Lawrence, what is it that you do?" she asked, crossing her legs at the knee and trying to look serious.
"I'm a grad student at the university. I'm studying computer science," he said and rolled his eyes.
"And I take it you love what you're doing," said Laura, laughing.
"Sure, but it's summer. I'm trying to distance myself from all of that for the next few months. Grad school is, well... It's hard! I'm doing my best to think only about Frisbee and drinking beer."
"Fair enough," said Laura.
"How about you, are you a student?" asked Lawrence, pulling a red handkerchief from his pocket and handing it to her. Laura took the handkerchief and dabbed her forehead with it not sure why he handed it to her.
"Well, yes, I'm going to be a sophomore at the U next semester. I'm studying biology... I think. I'm not from here, so I'm spending this summer taking classes and trying to meet people, I guess."
Laura tried to pass the handkerchief back to him but he shook his head and pointed his vaguely to own chest.
"No, you have a little ... something..." he said blushing but with a wide grin on his face.
Laura looked down at where her popsicle had dripped cherry-red juice down her breasts.
"Oh!" she said, quickly dabbing at the juice with the cloth.
"I for sure thought you would have noticed that," said Lawrence, laughing and shaking his head.
"It's just so hot out I guess," she said slightly embarrassed, trying to wipe the mess from her bathing suit.
"Yes, however, what is melting was once ice cream, so it should still be cold. Believe me, I'm a grad student, I know these things," said Lawrence still laughing.
Laura looked up at him smiling wryly.
"Then what's that," she exclaimed, pointing at him where blue juice was running down his chest. "It's hardly masculine to dribble popsicle juice down your chest. I'm a lady, so I can get away with it!"
They were both laughing now, barely able to catch their breath. Laura reached out and wiped the juice from Lawrence's chest. Lawrence snatched the kerchief away from her and wiped at some red drips on her knee. She tried to snatch it back from him but missed and had to hop of the cooler. She was about to begin chasing him but he stopped suddenly.
"Wait, there's a solution to this problem," he said while laughing. "We have to finish our popsicles. Then there'll be no more mess."
