Like Warm Sun on Nekkid Bottoms (50 page)

Inside the shop, I felt feverish with loss and lunacy as thoughts of Ms. Nuckeby now began to obsess me more than ever. Somehow, still unable to let go of my fears and just race back to her, I vaguely wandered around the tiny store more-or-less looking for Mindie’s chocolates, but mostly just beating myself up with a mental stick.

Aggravating me all the more was the fact that there were far too many kinds of chocolate for such little a store. Decision making at this point was difficult at best, so I simply grumbled, picked up the smallest, least romantic box available, and stood staring at it, wondering if Ms. Nuckeby liked chocolates, and if she’d prefer eating them, rolling naked in them, or smashing them in my face.

Probably the latter.

As I stared blankly, unable to think or move, Morgan—in another part of the store—continued looking for anything that might even marginally be considered pants, or could in any way cover a man’s crotch unobtrusively. That’s when he noticed a comic book spin-rack in a corner.

“Hey!” he said. “Comics!”

Suddenly he was happier than I’d seen him at any point during the entire trip.

“Get some,” I said. “As many as you want. I’ll buy. You can hold them low, and when we’re back in the room, read them in your lap.”

“Yeah,” he agreed. “That’s a good idea.”

He went over to the rack and began spinning it, carefully checking grade, cover gloss, and spine-damage.

“Morgan! Just
grab
some! They don’t have to be in mint condition to hide your dick!”

“Oh, yeah. That’s true,” he said and pulled a bunch from the wire holders—making sure not to get duplicates—then noticed the regular racks nearby. “Hey. Can I get some magazines, too?”

“Sure. Whatever you want.”

I saw him grab Playboy, Perfect 10, and other breast-related glossies. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing.

“Morgan. You can go sit out on the street corner, and watch naked girls for
free
.”

He glanced at the door, then at the magazine, and finally back to me.

“Yeah,” he said, holding up some glossy porn, “but the girls in here aren’t
supposed
to be naked. That makes it—I don’t know—more fun somehow.”

I remembered Ms. Nuckeby’s comments about my erection on the beach, and I wondered if clothing actually did more to feed lust than nudity. If I were a scientist, that would be a great way to spend lots of government research money.

“All right,” I said, “whatever. Bring them here.”

I put my chocolates on the counter, and Morgan dropped his collection of magazines on top of them. A short, round woman with large, pendulous breasts glided over to us, rosy cheeked and perky. She seemed a genuinely happy person, and given my experience with Sophie, the receptionist, and the bellman, I supposed that’s what the hotel strove for in the hiring of their employees. A nametag stuck just below her collarbone, far above her dangling left nipple read ‘SANDY’.

“Will that be all?” she asked pleasantly. Her smile was sincere and quite catching.

“I think so. Can you put that on a room charge?”

“Of course!” she said, bouncing. Sandy must be
related
to Sophie. “You folks are in town for the Soiree, I imagine?”

“No. We’re here for…um…other reasons.”

“Oh. Well, you can still enjoy it anyway, as long as you’re in town, right?” She laughed and patted my hand sweetly as she took our things, and I found myself taking an immediate liking to her.

“There’s a dance and party tonight, you know,” she said, bouncing again, her voice lilting as she grinned at us, knowingly. “
Lots of pretty girls
.”

She glanced down at Morgan’s pet flea. “There’s even a few won’t mind a guy with a little one.”

Morgan gasped and moved a comic to cover his minimal groin. She hadn’t meant it as an insult, but for a man, it’s hard to take that kind of comment any other way.

“We also have the auction,” she said, “and that’s
always
a lot of fun. But you know about that already I imagine.”

“Actually, no, we don’t,” Morgan said, sounding hopeful. “What kind of auction? Like toys? Comics?”

“No,
people
,” she said. “It’s one of those charity things. Some of the locals and a few out-of-town regulars auction themselves off to the highest bidder, and they have to stay with the winner, and do whatever that person says throughout the rest of the weekend.”

“Oh, right,” I said, wincing, remembering painfully how I’d done that once myself. My sister finally bought me when no one else would. Seven bucks.

“Some of the out-of-towners even get up on stage for a laugh, and go for at
least
a few bucks. Especially if they’re cute.” She grinned at me with significance, and I worried that maybe she was bidding on me already.

“I don’t know if that kind of thing appeals to you,” she continued, “but it
is
for charity, and it can be a lot of fun. My kids are doing it this year, although I wish my oldest wouldn’t. It’s only going to stir up trouble. But she’s so headstrong, that one.”

I wondered if Sophie was the oldest, or if that might be one of Sandy’s other children, Biffy, Miffy, or Rex.

“Why’s it going to stir up trouble?” I asked.

“Because she’s pretty, and a lot of men like her, and one in particular is going to bid up the price until only
he
can afford her. Then he’ll make her miserable for two whole nights, and days.”

“So, why does she do it?” Somehow other people’s personal drama was always so fascinating when it took your mind off your own.

“Because she
knows
he’ll bid up the price, and she’s willing to suffer because she believes in the charity.”

“What’s the charity?”

“Dickens Home for Abandoned Children.”

“Ah. Sounds like a worthy cause. Very generous of her.”

“It is. She’s a wonderful girl, and I don’t want to see her suffer.”

“I understand,” I said, honestly. “I’m sorry.”

She smiled at me and patted my hand again. “Oh, it’s all right. I’m just being a nervous mother. It’s not like it’ll kill her. And anyway, I should probably feel more sorry for Washburne. She’ll make
him
suffer in the end. I told you, she’s headstrong.”

“Well, good for her.”

She looked at me, surprised. “Not many men like a strong-willed woman.”

“Their loss.”

“Well, aren’t
you
the rarity. That’ll be forty-seven fifty.”

I signed the receipt she laid before me, and she studied me rather intently. I added a small tip, and she gasped, delighted.

“Oh, that’s not necessary.”

“Nice people need to be rewarded,” I said. “That’s a rarity too.”

“Well, aren’t you the sweetest thing. Thank you.”

As she bagged up the goods, she continued to eye me, carefully. Perhaps the tip had been a mistake, and she had taken it as a flirt of some kind. I was so bad at this interpersonal, human-to-human communications stuff. She finished stuffing and handed me my things.

“You like girls?” she asked, clearly referencing the magazines.

“Um…those are his,” I said, annoyed. Then, startled, I threw in:
“But I do like girls!”
Realizing the tone of my first answer might be taken completely the wrong way.

“Oh, well that’s good. You in town for business?”

“No. Um…pleasure, of a sort.”

Morgan snorted. I pretended not to hear.

“But…” she said, seemingly struggling to get to something, “…you’re a businessman or something? I mean—you have that cleancut look about you, like you must have a
job
, right?”

“Um, yes. I have a job.”

“He’s
rich
,” Morgan said, once again proving how utterly useless he could be in almost any situation.

“Not
that
rich,” I said.

“Then you should go to the auction!” Sandy chimed. “I think you’ll get a kick out of it, and there really are an awful lot of pretty girls there.” She eyed me with purpose. “My daughter, for instance.”

Ah! So it wasn’t
her
she wanted me for, but Sophie. I glanced out through the glass wall toward the reception desk, where the child in question was bouncily helping other customers, and probably telling them aliens lived in her head.

“Well, you see, I really…”

“She’s
awfully
pretty,” Sandy pressed, overstressing the ‘awfully’ part, and not catching the linguistic contradiction, “and if you buy her, she has to stay with you the
whole weekend
. Those are the rules. Follow you wherever you go—the street-fair, the carnival, the fireworks. She could even show you around if you want. We have some very beautiful scenery here in Nikkid Bottoms. The Big Giant Heads. The Singing Caves. The Indian Village. The Druid Altars. The Hanging Gardens of Freilichtpark.
Very
unique. Very
romantic
.”

I could already imagine what was hanging in those Hanging Gardens, and the thought wasn’t terribly romantic to
me.

“I’ve seen some of it. And it
is
quite lovely, but…”

“Of course, tonight’s just a kind of a ‘get-to-know-you’ thing, so you don’t have to be naked, if that makes you uncomfortable.” She glanced at my ruined pants. “But by tomorrow, sunrise, nudity will be required everywhere in town. Would that bother you?”

Around her, and alien Sophie? Yes.

“Thanks,” I said. “You’re very sweet. But it’s really a moot point. We’ll be leaving—even before tonight, I’m afraid.”

“Oh,” she said, seeming genuinely disappointed. “Well. It’s our loss, isn’t it?” She handed me my freshly bagged smut. “And I suppose Washburne’s gain. I hope you at least enjoyed your stay.”

Morgan snorted again. I glared at him. Having the true size of his penis on display had made him unforgivably rude. I turned back to Sandy and smiled.

“I did enjoy my stay,” I told her. “Truly. Thank you.”

Heading for the door, I gave it some thought, and suddenly realized I hadn’t lied to her. I
had
enjoyed my stay—even the being chased with sticks and rocks, and being thrown out of the restaurant part. How was
that
possible? Was I a secret masochist? It’s possible as I was considering marrying Mindie.

But maybe it was because for the first time in my life, I realized, I had been pursuing something that made me happy and
living
. Doing things. Facing consequences.

I let my mind wander back through the day’s events, and it all came around to Ms. Nuckeby. She had thrilled every inch of me, and motivated me, even when things went wrong. I had never really been motivated before, in my young life, and it had all been exciting. Exhilarating.

Fun.

And in the midst of it all, I had learned that she was—truly—only interested in me, for me. While that may have left her tastes in question, it was nonetheless true. She was even willing to live with me and be poor. My fears really were all that had held me back, and she hadn’t become disheartened until I couldn’t find my way clear to either live off of her, or run around without pants.

What the hell was wrong with me?

I looked at the chocolates in my hand. And now I was going back upstairs to
Mindie?

I needed a shrink!

I looked around at Sandy, and she smiled again. She was a lovely person, and while I wasn’t interested in her, or her daughter, she seemed willing to accept me because she felt I might be good to Sophie. Might not Wisper’s parents be the same? And if not, wouldn’t it be worth
learning
how to feel good without clothes to have someone as magnificent, and caring, and beautiful as Wisper? I’d done it to annoy Mindie. Why not to show appreciation for Wisper?

My thoughts seized. What was to
learn?
I had
already
felt good without wearing clothes.

First, in the restaurant parking lot, the sensations were sensual and pleasant. Then on the beach with Wisper—that was, of course, beyond all description. Her appreciation of my nudity was—well, there were no words—and it was again only my ridiculous fears that had interfered. Even before I’d come to this place, while still at home, I preferred to swim in the nude rather than in a suit, and
here,
‘this is the one place no on
cares
if you’re naked’. If I had said it once, I’d said it a hundred times since arriving, and never once processed the words myself.

No one cared.

No one but Wisper.

Morgan had a point. I liked the way it felt. Enjoyed the sensations. Why couldn’t I manage it for as glorious a prize as her?

Because I liked the way it felt.

Like being chased with rocks and sticks, my life had been spent running and hiding from feelings of all kinds. If one never reached, one never missed, and thereby never suffered the pain of missing. Better to slog through life in an endlessly dull, unchallenged state than to fly, get too close to the sun, and suffer the fate of Icarus. No matter that you might get an island named after you.

And yet, even at that, I was constantly failing. In the eyes of a family who didn’t understand me, of a friend who wanted me to come back to our adolescence and be who I no longer was, of a fiancée who only wanted me for…

For what?

Why did Mindie want me if she didn’t really
‘want’
me? And why was I willing—even now—to live a life of endless rejection with her rather than acceptance with someone as intelligent, and discerning, and incredible as Wisper?

Especially when Wisper hadn’t rejected me.
I
had rejected
her
.

Because she felt too good, and I didn’t think I deserved her. Couldn’t come to terms with the fact that she wanted me, and
knew
she would eventually leave me so that—again, like Icarus—I’d end my days floating on an empty ocean of pain, surrounded by a gooey puddle of waxy feathers and pointless aspirations. A dull, unappreciated existence was far less frightening than losing something I might be emotionally unequipped to survive losing. Even now, the pain of missing Wisper was almost debilitating. Imagine if I had actually fallen in love with her.