Author's Note:
From the "Writing Prompts" list, prompt 63: "What do you mean? It's exciting!" and prompt 74: "You don't know you the way I do."
"Do we have enough cereal?" Betty wondered aloud, letting her gaze drift down the breakfast foods aisle as she wheeled by, draped over the handle of the grocery cart. She halted, puzzling over the shopping list, even though she knew she wouldn't find "cereal" there―it was one of the things they went through so quickly, she nearly always bought some when she was out. But then, she'd already gone out once this week.
Sweet Pea came up behind Betty, bending down to wrap long arms around her waist and fit himself to her. His chin settled on the top of her head.
"What does the list say?" he inquired. Betty smiled to herself.
"List says you need to stop eating breakfast twice a day."
Sweet Pea's cheek rubbed across her head and came down to press into her own.
"You shouldn't have made me read The Fellowship of the Ring. Second breakfast is fucking genius." He hastily kissed her cheek. She sighed. "I'm sure we're fine for cereal. If I combine the end of the bag of Froot Loops with the end of the Cap'n Crunch…"
"Ok, we're getting cereal," she stated, turning down the aisle while Sweet Pea peeled away from her.
"I was just explaining my brilliant plan to make it work!"
"It won't be enough," Betty argued, glaring at one of the grocery cart's wheels when it swung the wrong way and rattled.
"Sure it will. I'll pace myself." Sweet Pea jogged up alongside her. Betty glanced at him and noticed the way he was already staring lovingly at the colourful cereal boxes lining the shelf. She raised an eyebrow.
"You don't know you the way I do," she replied, contemplating an undented box of Froot Loops. She turned to Sweet Pea, making a brief study of him, standing there with his hands in his back pockets under florescent lights. He still looked gorgeous. "And when have you ever paced yourself in your life?" Betty asked with a laugh.
With a sneaky look in his eye, he approached, running his hands over her hips.
"We're in public," she reminded him, though she could feel her cheeks flushing.
"Not really," he pointed out. "Most people sleep in on Sunday, not race to the grocery store to be there when it opens."
"I didn't want to waste the whole d―"
He cut off her retort with a kiss that, for a long moment, did make Betty wish they'd spent that particular Sunday morning in bed, back at their apartment. When his fingers crept under the hem of her t-shirt, she broke the kiss, a little dizzy, and rotated in his arms to face the wall of options. She shivered when his hands smoothed higher.
"Which one would you like?" she asked, a little breathless. He cupped her breasts over her bra, squeezing one, then the other.
"I have to choose just one?"
Betty rolled her eyes. Hard. As if he'd sensed it, Sweet Pea pulled away, his sluggishness making his reluctance clear to her. A quick slap of her ass startled her as he moved away to deliberate over the cereal boxes.
"OOOH!" he practically shouted after a few seconds. "This one! It says it has a code inside that you can enter online and they'll send you a toy."
"A toy?" Betty asked, unimpressed. She leaned an elbow on the handle of the grocery cart.
"Yeah," he said seriously. Sweet Pea's back was to her as he stood, totally engrossed by his literature of choice: the back of a cereal box. "From the picture, it looks like a bobblehead or something."
"Sweet Pea," she complained, "that's stupid." Normally, Betty wasn't a whiner, but the longer they loitered in one spot, the faster the 7am wake up time was catching up with her. Before this detour, they'd been flying through the store, checking things off the list left and right. It was perfect having Sweet Pea along, as he could easily reach things from higher shelves. Though now it seemed she'd offended her helper; he was frowning at her.
"What do you mean? It's exciting!"
"Alright," she conceded, stretching a hand out for the box and watching her boyfriend's mouth open into a wide smile, "give it to me."
He handed the box over and raised his eyebrows at her, tucking a fallen strand from her sloppy early morning ponytail behind her ear.
"Damn, Betty," Sweet Pea chastised, "not here. We're in public!"
"Don't make me make you walk home," she warned, wheeling briskly away from him. Halfway down the aisle, she glanced back. Their eyes met. Betty lifted her feet onto the grocery cart's low bar just in time for Sweet Pea to race up, cover her hands with his on the handle, and jump on behind her, using his momentum to send them zooming.