"I don't see why we're here, of all places..."

"Quit being such a- a yuppie in training! We're here to watch, mostly. You know. To remind ourselves."

"Of what, precisely?"

Opal glared and shoved an ice cream cone in her husband's direction. She bit viciously at her own, a dripping construction of mint chip and chocolate fudge, and sat down beside him with a surly thump.

Tyler sighed, pulling a handkerchief out of his pocket. He handed it to Opal without looking at her. "Here. You've got chocolate on your nose."

"You're impossible." She took the handkerchief anyway.

"Yup."

They sat in silence for a little longer, eating their ice cream. The park was crowded; it was a sunny Saturday in June, and everyone was out enjoying the weather. There were clusters of children playing soccer and making noise while parents chatted idly nearby; other couples, much younger and probably much more in love, wandered past holding hands; a group of rebellious teens sulked over contraband cigarettes in the shadows of the old playground. Tyler preferred the place when it was quieter, but there had once been a time when he would've been in the thick of things, making as much noise and as much trouble as possible.

Things changed. He stared bitterly at his ice cream- it was coffee, and he used to hate coffee. He'd somehow turned into his mother.

"Look." Opal leaned against him, bright and warm. He followed her gaze to a pair of girls across the path. They were laughing and leaning on each other, bare skin flashing in the sunlight. "They're in love. Do you see it?"

She still had chocolate on her nose, but he ignored that for the moment to examine the couple more closely. It was there- the way they touched each other, the way they smiled; equal parts shyness, joy, and simple lust. Not that lust ever made anything simple, but it was nice to see it not interfering with people's lives for a change.

"They don't quite realize it yet, but they will. Just wait for it..." Tyler shrugged and watched, feeling slightly voyeuristic. The girls settled down in the shade of a tree, still talking and smiling- and then the taller one leaned down to whisper something just as her friend turned her head to say something else, and their lips met in a clumsily choreographed kiss. They jerked apart, blushing furiously, eyes sparkling. The shorter one leapt up, pulling the other with her, saying something they both laughed at. They held hands as they walked back down the path, still laughing.

Opal leaned back against the bench with a satisfied smirk. "First kiss. Those are always the best, you know- the ones that mean the most."

"Is that what we came here to see? Other people in love?" The implication stung, though he knew he deserved it. "I know I've been busy lately but-"

"Shut up, Ty." She used his nickname derisively, impatiently. "And stop feeling guilty, because that's not the point of this. If I wanted you to feel guilty, I would've taken you somewhere else."

"So what was the point, since I seem to have missed it so completely? You'll have to forgive me if I don't see the big picture here, I'm a little slow sometimes." The sunlight was giving him a headache. Yes. That was the reason he was being so defensive, nothing else. Certainly not because she'd hit a nerve, and not because he had anything to feel guilty about.

Opal licked melted ice cream off her hand and gestured expansively at the park, splattering her hand even further. "Look at them. The children, the parents, the lovers- they're human. Real people. And sometimes I get tired of feeling like I'm not a real person, so this helps to remind me. We were like that once, Tyler. Things have changed, but they haven't changed that much." She turned to him and smiled a crooked smile. "I still love you, and I always will, no matter how much of an ass you are."

There was a lump in his throat that didn't really belong there. Definitely the ice cream's fault. "We're turning into our parents, you know."

"It's called growing up." She always had to be the mature one, didn't she?

"We should stop. Growing up, I mean."

Her eyes danced. "There's a swingset over there."

He looked at his ice cream cone. Most of it had melted onto his knees; he threw the remains into the trash beside the bench and stood. He'd never liked coffee much anyway. "Race you?"

"You're on." She was up and running before the words left her mouth, but he caught up with her easily anyway and swung her over his shoulder. He ignored her kicking and squealing as he carried her the rest of the way to the swings, his laughter lost in the bright noise of the summer day.
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Excuse me, I need to gag myself now. They're cute, though, if slightly dysfunctional.