Get Your Bikini

"Rose, get your bikini - we're going to the beach!"

It would have been far easier to avoid noticing my daughter's body...if my attention wasn't constantly being drawn to it.

"Look at her, cuddle-pot!" my daughter said excitedly, using my wife's hand to point. As if she needed to point - the bikini-clad teenager would have stood out in almost any crowd. The half-dozen families building sand castles provided zero competition.

"I see her, chicken licken."

"Doesn't she look great?"

My wife's eyes were shining with pride, and I realized what was happening. We never really get a chance to see ourselves, not really. Everyone is their own worst critic, and looking at your body through your own eyes means you're never going to truly appreciate what's there.

Especially, I suspect, if you're a teenage girl.

"She's beautiful, honey," I responded simply, and she patted my arm with joy.

Mary, for her part, seemed to be having a great time. She'd dropped our daughter's trademark slouch, and returned to her own familiar gait - shoulders back, chin held high.

She was wandering up and down the waves, and seemed to almost be feeding off the stares she was getting. As I mentioned, Rose's body was without comparison - her legs were long and toned, her stomach was flat, and her breasts were...well, they were larger than I'd been expecting. Not comically large, but certainly quite ample on her young teenage frame.

I was so glad I'd gotten off the night before. I started scanning the beach, trying to see if there were any black women in bikinis I could use to distract myself.

Before I could find anything, Mary's hand gripped my arm.

"They're here," she said excitedly.

Too excitedly.

"Who?"

She struck an innocent pose.

"Just, uh...just some of Rose's friends from school."

"Oh no," I muttered under my breath.

I'd never met the guy. I would have been quite happy to go the rest of my life without meeting him. But the moment I laid eyes on the boy, I recognized him.

Spike.

He was exactly my daughter's type. Piercings, tattoos...and who comes to the beach in a leather jacket? Somehow, he managed to avoid looking like he was about to melt.

Somehow, I was loathe to admit, he looked...cool.

I immediately hated him.

Judging by the daggers shooting from my wife's eyes, I guessed that the piece of arm candy draped over him was Lacey.

"I thought he had a game," I murmured to myself.

"They always come to the beach after the game," Rose responded, using my wife's arm to tug me forward. "Let's go."

"Wait, what?"

"Let's go. I want to see what's going to happen."

"Button-pants," I said softly, "isn't this...y'know, Roses business? Shouldn't we give her some privacy?"

"Oh! Oh, yeah."

My daughter fell back, the soft smirk never leaving Mary's lips.

"We can see everything from here anyway."

I nodded.

"He doesn't look like a football player to me."

Rose rolled my wife's eyes.

"He doesn't play football. Duh, Da-..."

She cut herself off, and quickly tried to recover.

"...aaaffodill. Daffodil. He just hangs around the game, and, uh..."

"Sells ****?" I quipped, and the look on my wife's face told me that I'd inadvertently guessed it.

Jesus. What had our daughter gotten into?

"Just pot," she quickly informed me, before going slightly red as she realized what she'd said.

"You're such a good Mom," I said, deciding to let her off the hook slightly. Not that she deserved it - dating a pot dealer? What the hell was she thinking?

I intertwined my fingers with hers and continued. "I don't know half of what goes on under our roof."

"That's my job," she replied thoughtfully. "To keep track of what's happening in...our daughter's life."

The 'confrontation' was short, and uneventful. Lacey tried to kick sand in Rose's eyes, and fell over in the process. My wife used our daughter's body to point and laugh - Spike sneeringly stayed out of it, and before long he'd taken his bimbo and left.

I suggested we go home, but I was immediately shot down. Apparently the real football players were coming, and "Mary" wanted to show our daughter off to them.

Something told me this was a bad idea, but I couldn't work out how to get everyone back in the car without drawing suspicion, and so I bit my tongue.

My instincts were right.

As soon as the football players arrived, my wife started showing off our daughter's body. She touched their arms, laughed at their jokes, and before long one of them had an arm around her.

Even from across the beach, I could tell she was enjoying the attention. Even from across the beach, I could tell she was getting far too much enjoyment out of the teens' lusty gazes.

"Isn't she popular?" Rose said dreamily, and that's when I realized I was the only one here who was going to stop what was happening.

"That's it!" I said, standing up. "We're going home!"