CHAPTER FIVE

One thing became clear about Bonnie right away. She was a leech.

She left me alone for an hour after lunch. During that hour I had time to read through the outline I had written and to pencil a lot of suggestions and ideas in the margins. Then Bonnie came bouncing up to the cabin, her breasts doing a jig with every step. She was waving a tennis racquet around.

"How about a game?" she wanted to know.

"I'm not much of a tennis player," I told her lamely.

"That's all right. Neither am I. But it's such wonderful fun."

I heaved a sigh. It was a bright and sunny afternoon, and I figured I had done all the work I was going to do on my book for the day. Two hours with the typewriter before lunch had left me pretty winded. I was going to have to get into shape slowly for writing the book.

So a game of tennis wouldn't be a bad idea. On the other hand, I was uneasy about getting myself further involved with Bonnie. And on the third hand, I had to admit that Bonnie was pretty good in the sack, and I might have some further fun with her.

"I don't have a tennis racquet," I said.

"Oh, we can borrow one. I think Ernie Bryan has a racquet he could lend you."

Shrugging, I let myself be led away. Ernie Bryan was one of the colonists that I hadn't yet met formally, but he had been pointed out to me. He was a family-style nudist, the father of the twelve-year-old girl I had seen doing calisthenics earlier.

The Bryan cabin was Number Four. Bonnie knocked and the little girl came out, flaunting her unformed breasts in my face without embarrassment.

Bonnie said, "Janey, is your father home?"

"Uh-huh. Come on inside."

We went in. The Family Bryan was there. Ernie was a tall, strapping fellow, around forty. He was hard at work repairing the electrical wiring in the cabin, while his wife Reena held the stool for him. Reena was a brunette of thirty-five, tanned all over and very nicely built, with high small breasts and a prettily tapering derriere. The remaining member of the Bryan family was Ernie Junior, who was five.

Of course, all of them were without a stitch of clothing.

Bonnie introduced me and borrowed the tennis racquet without much palaver, and off we went to the tennis courts. I was impressed with Ernie Bryan. It was one thing to be a nudist yourself; it was another to bring your wife and your pre-adolescent daughter and your small son to one of these places and let them run around in their skin too. It took the courage of your convictions to let strangers look upon your family's nakedness that way.

The tennis courts were down to the left of the waterfront area. There were two clay courts, with a third one somewhat further away. The isolated court was taken, I saw, and so was one of the two courts at hand. We moved out onto the vacant court, and Bonnie opened a can of balls and promptly let fly with a serve.

Now, I have played some pretty fair tennis in my life, but not recently. So it was that my first wild swing in return sent the ball flying far above Bonnie's head and over the wire fence for a home run. Bonnie turned, watching the ball go bouncing out onto the basketball court and come to rest there. The tennis court exit was on her side of the net, so she shouted, "I'll get it!" and sprinted off.

While I was waiting for her to get the ball and return, I glanced at the other court. The players there were the middle-aged man named Norman Keyes, and the pretty young redheaded waitress whose name I did not know. They seemed about an even match. Keyes obviously knew the technique of the game, but he was short of leg and short of breath, and so he was not particularly effective. The redhead, on the other hand, barely knew which way to hold her racquet, but she was lithe and agile, and her advantage of stamina cancelled out Keyes' advantage of skill and fairly well evened things out.

One thing that you can discover virtually for the first time in a nudist camp is the loveliness of the female musculature. A bathing suit leaves only the arms and legs and shoulders of a girl exposed, thus making it impossible for you to see the lovely way the muscles ripple along a girl's back when she serves a tennis ball, or the way her buttocks go tight when she bends to sock back a low one. Of course, the girl has to be reasonably athletic to begin with. But if she is, the sight of her rippling muscles adds an entire new dimension, a quite unexpected one, to sex appeal.

I watched that redhead while waiting for Bonnie, and an idea took shape.

The redhead was far from unattractive. She was perhaps twenty years old, and was about five feet in height, and was nicely built. Medium breasts, narrow waist, nice hips, excellent legs. And those lovely muscles rippling in her back and buttocks. What's more, she didn't seem to be spoken for—Keyes didn't appear to have any proprietary rights on her—and so I could assume she was available until I learned otherwise.

And, all things considered, I figured I would rather be mixed up with a nice, healthy chick like the waitress than with a passionate but whacked-up female like Bonnie. And the best way to get rid of Bonnie was to transfer my affections visibly to some other female.

Fast. Before Bonnie got the idea she owned me.

Bonnie came back with the tennis ball and started to go into a serve motion, but I was facing the wrong way, watching the neat way the redhead's high pointed breasts lifted as she brought the racquet around. Bonnie yelled out to me pretty annoyedly, and I returned my attention to her.

We volleyed for five or ten minutes, and then I turned to the pair on the other court and said, "Hey! How about a game of mixed doubles?"

Bonnie looked sour, but both Keyes and the redhead thought it was a fine idea. Keyes was down at the far end of the court, Bonnie's end, and so I maneuvered it that he and Bonnie would be partners, and the redhead and I. She came jogging over—bounce-bounce-bounce went the bosom, and as she came close I realized that what I had thought was a solid tan was actually a mass of extremely tight-packed freckles covering her entire body. She even had freckles on her breasts.

"Hi," I said. "My name's Al Fieldston."

"Harriet Cross," she said. She leaned on her racquet and caught her breath. She had been running around a lot in the game with Keyes, and her freckled skin was glossy with sweat, and I saw shiny little beadlets between her breasts.

Down at her end of the court, Bonnie was getting very very bleak-looking. I guess she figured out what was going to happen, and she didn't like it.

We volleyed back and forth for a while, getting the feel of a doubles match, and then we volleyed for serve. One, two, three over the net, and then Bonnie rammed one viciously past Harriet and they had the serve.

Harriet was something of a weak link on our side, as was Keyes over there. We began playing more and more seriously with each point. With Keyes serving, they got up to 30-love; we caught them; they went ahead, and finally took the first game.

They took the second game, too, and the third. But I got the hang of serving in the fourth and surprised them all by slapping a bunch of bullets down where they couldn't even reach them. We took the fifth game, too, and now the set stood 2-3, and it was taking on the aspects of a grudge match. Every time we made a point, I would pat Harriet affectionately on the shoulder, or sometimes a little lower. Bonnie was stewing. She knew she was being dumped in favor of the redhead.

In the sixth game something happened which might seem funny in the retelling, but which does not seem funny to me because of the strange consequences it was to have. The score stood at 30-all, Keyes was serving, and we were desperately trying to pick up the next couple of points and tie the set.

Harriet was playing in close to the net, and I was back near the base-line. Bonnie dropped a soft lob right in the middle. I came rushing in from the back of the court, determined to powder the ball right down Keyes' throat and put us one up.

But just as I brought my racquet around in a vicious swing, Harriet cut in front of me unexpectedly to take the ball. She banged it into the net—and at the same instant, unable to check my swing, I sent my racquet crashing with a loud crack! right into what would have been the seat of the redhead's pants, if she had happened to be wearing any pants.

She dropped her racquet and let out a little gasp of surprise and pain, and the force of the blow knocked her sprawling on her knees. There's always something funny about a swat in the pants, but I knew I had swung to kill, and I knew I had hurt her. As she kneeled there, I could actually see the imprint of my strings on her freckled buttocks. Her rear was up in the air facing me, and it looked like she'd been sitting on a hot waffle-iron.

I rushed over to her and helped her to her feet and muttered apologies, even though it had been mostly her fault. "Are you hurt?" I asked.

She turned. There were tears in her eyes, but she was smiling. "I'll be okay."

And I saw the expression on her face.

Remember the come-hither look that Sandra Richards gave me when I was at her folks' house for my interview? This was the same look raised to the fifth power. It was a sizzling look of pure desire. It was a look of hungry longing. Harriet was asking me with her eyes to throw her down on the rough clay and take her right there, on the spot.

It was one hell of a look.

I suppose my brain wasn't working too well, or I would have connected the intensity of that look with the intensity of the wallop I had given her. But I just didn't make the obvious connection, even when it was staring me in the face.

Instead I gently stroked her buttocks a couple of times, soothingly. The skin was like satin. I muttered some more apologies. By this time Bonnie and Keyes were coming around the net, looking worried.

Harriet picked up her racquet, brushed the dirt off her knees and the palms of her hands, and walked around a little bit. She wasn't badly hurt. My racquet had nipped her in the best-padded part of her body, and the only harm was the sudden stinging pain of impact. The waffle-iron effect was fading, though her rear still had a reddened, sore look about it.

She insisted she was okay, and we got the game going again. But the look she had given me bothered me. I told myself I had better slow down. This was only my first full day in the Sunland Health Colony, and already I had made passes at two girls, been laid by a third, and now was in the process of getting involved with a fourth. At this rate it was going to be a strenuous three months.

I couldn't keep my mind on the game, and Bonnie and Keyes easily polished us off for the final point and the set. They were all keen on playing another set, but I begged off. Harriet, too, didn't seem very enthusiastic. She was still sore in the rear, and wanted to dunk herself in the lake.

She started off toward the water. I began to follow her. Bonnie caught up with me. Now she looked a lot closer to forty than thirty.

"Let's play a game of singles," she said.

"I'd rather not. I'm not in shape for too much of this stuff."

"Besides which, you'd rather go swimming with Harriet than play tennis with me."

"Bonnie, look—"

"I am looking. I've seen you looking at that girl since we came down here. I saw the way you patted her fanny after you hit her."

"You've got no right to be jealous," I told her. "Harriet's a fine girl, and I like her."

"What about me?" It was practically a wail.

I didn't have to pretend to be annoyed. "We've had our little interlude, Bonnie. What did you think it was—the beginning of a grand romance?"

"We were so good together," she sobbed. The bulging eyes had the look of defeat.

"It was grand, Bonnie. But I'm not here to get entangled with anybody. I value my freedom. And I think it's best that I make things clear to you right now. Our little episode at lunchtime is not the prelude to a long affair."

"But I want you so much, Al!"

"You see? I don't want to be wanted. Let's be sophisticated, Bonnie. We can make love now and then, when we've got the craving. But let's not try to monopolize each other, shall we? Let's be free agents. Will you excuse me now? I'd like to go swimming."

I gave her Ernie Bryan's tennis racquet and left her standing there, looking dumfounded. I trotted down to the water. Harriet was already in, floating on her back. Nothing was above the water except her breasts and toes and nose. I dove in and came up near her.

"How's the backside?" I asked.

"I'm going to be black and blue tomorrow. Everyone will ask questions."

"So tell them," I said. She laughed. We swam out to the deep water together. We were bobbing out there, and suddenly she swam up against me, pressing her body against mine in the water. The sharp points of her breasts jabbed into my skin, and her legs wrapped themselves around my body, and she took my hands and put them on her buttocks and made me squeeze tight. Wrapped up like that, we sank below the water and hovered just beneath the surface until we started running out of breath. We separated and popped to the surface. She had a slit-eyed, excited look about her. I suppose what she wanted was to have me make love to her right there in the water. But the combination of the cold water and the bout with Bonnie only a few hours earlier, plus the fact that there were about a dozen swimmers less than a hundred yards away, left me in a state of inability to gratify her desire on the spot.

We laughed and swam in to shore, and sprawled out, dripping wet, on the grass near the basketball court. We talked for a while. She was twenty-two, she said—which made her a couple of years older than she looked—and she had just graduated from a nearby teacher's college. She was going to start teaching in the fall, and this was her vacation. She loved outdoor life, sports, camping, stuff like that.

"How'd you get interested in nudism?" I asked her.

She giggled. "I came here as a guest last year. A fellow I was dating was a member, and he talked me into coming up. At first I was so embarrassed I didn't know where to hide. But finally I got up enough nerve to take my clothes off and come out of the cabin. And after half an hour I discovered it doesn't really matter. I mean, we shouldn't have inhibitions about nakedness."

"No, we shouldn't."

"So I was up here a couple of weeks and really got to love the life. And this year I wanted to come back. I didn't have any money, so I applied for a job as a waitress. It's only a few hours' work a day, and all the rest of the time I'm free to use the facilities."

"What about the boyfriend?"

"Oh, I stopped seeing him a long time ago. He isn't a member of the colony any more, either." She smiled coquettishly. "Now tell me about yourself, Al."

So I told her, giving her the usual routine about the advertising rat-race and how I had come up here seeking rustic simplicity as a backdrop for writing my novel. She was impressed. We talked on and on, and then all of a sudden it was five in the afternoon and she had to hurry to the mess hall to get the tables set up for dinner.

I walked her part of the way back up front. She drew me off into a little sheltered nook near the mess hall and we kissed quickly. It had to be quick, because a public embrace violated the decency regulations of the camp, and she could get fired if anyone caught her and complained. But she thrust herself up against me, rubbing against me, thrusting her breasts into my not unwilling hands. We kissed briefly and then she was gone, running gracefully toward the mess hall like some wood sprite, with her shimmering red hair bobbing in the air as she ran.

I found that this time I had become somewhat aroused. I had to remain in the nook for a couple of moments while my excitement subsided and I became fit to go into public again.

I strolled back down the road that led from the mess hall to the cabins. The air was growing cooler, and I was wondering whether or not it would be necessary to dress for dinner.

I was just about to go back to my cabin when I heard a "Yoo-hoo, Al!" cry, and saw Joanie Baker come jogging toward me. I waited, watching the ever-fascinating action of her breasts as she ran.

She caught up. "I see you took my advice about Bonnie," she said.

"How do you know so fast?"

Joanie smiled. "Bonnie just complained to me about you. She said you offended her by engaging in an indecent action with Harriet Cross on the tennis court. If Bonnie's out to get your scalp so fast, it means you must have told her off."

"I did," I said. "But what about this complaint?"

"Oh, we never take Bonnie's complaints seriously. We know it's always a case of jealously. She says you were patting Harriet's bottom on the tennis court. Dr. Richards feels that there shouldn't be any public personal contact between the sexes here, and I agree with him. Were you actually doing what Bonnie said you were?"

I grinned. "Bonnie didn't tell you the full story. Harriet and I were playing mixed doubles and she got in the way of my racquet. I caught her on the rear end so hard I knocked her down. I thought she was hurt, and all I did was pick her up and pat her once or twice to take the sting out."

"The way Bonnie had it, you were all set to rape the girl on the court," Joanie said. "Well, naturally there won't be any action taken against you. I wish Dr. Richards would bring himself to throw Bonnie out. She causes more conflict around here every year, with her spites and jealousies—"

"She's a sick woman," I said solemnly. "Dr. Richards is being kind to her."

"Dr. Richards is kind to everybody. Too kind. Well, thank goodness he's coming up here tomorrow. I'm tired of being responsible for everything around here." She smiled cheerfully. "Better bring a sweater with you tonight at dinner time. It gets rather chilly here sometimes in June."

"Thanks," I said.

But she was already gone, striding from me in her long-legged masculine step. She looked like an Amazon, or a lady Viking, with her blonde hair and her magnificent animal body. Once again, I sighed. It was cruel and unusual torture for a girl as beautiful as Joanie to go striding around the place with all her glorious skin exposed, and for her to be as unapproachable as she was. What a waste, I thought. What a lousy waste of good womanflesh.

I headed back to my cabin to wait for the dinner gong.