"Okay, what do you think, sweetheart?"
Cameron looked up from where she was studying, sitting on the side of her bed with her foot keeping beat with the rhythm with the soft music in the back ground. Her blue eyes grew wide as she stared at her mother who stood in her doorway.
"You can't be thinking of going out like that!"
"Honey, it's a nude beach, of course I'm going like this." Clarissa preened a little more, running her hand down the side of her very naked svelte figure.
Cameron rolled her eyes, sliding the heavy chemistry book off her lap before standing up. "I meant your hair and your earrings, mom. You can't wear that style to the beach." She walked over, pulling the heavy pins out of her mother's bright red hair that was just starting to show a touch of gray, watching as the fiery locks cascaded down around her shoulders. Pushing a few of the pins back in, she changed the style to make it softer around her mother's face.
"And wear these earrings," she said, going to her case on her dresser and pulling a pair out small silver hoops out and watching as her mother slipped the heavy pearl earrings out of her small, shell like ears. "Now you look beautiful."
"Oh, honey, thank you. Why don't you get undressed and come with us? It's going to be a huge celebration, lots of drinking and dancing and fireworks after dark. They're going to have the bonfire again like they did last year, and a pig roast," Clarissa said, trying to interest her daughter in attending.
"You know I have to study, mom. I've got that chemistry exam and another one in biology. Besides, if you're going with Dan that means HE will be there." She couldn't help the bitterness that colored the word, or the sharpness in her voice when she thought of him. Dan Tayler, her mom's boyfriend of many, many years had a son by his first marriage.
That son, Dan Jr. or DJ as most people called him, would be going with them tonight. He was huge on the whole freedom of expression thing and spent many days at the nude beach that had opened on the far side of Rifle Lake, surprising the staid community of Rose City. The beach had been a huge controversy and many had tried to have it closed down. But it was on private land, and all the proper permits and licenses had been taken out by the owners, so those who'd complained were pretty much out of luck.
The people who frequented the beach were well mannered and family oriented, and they also brought revenue into the tiny town, so much so that many who'd been against the beach were now putting up with the stigma.
DJ though, grated on Cameron's nerves. He wasn't a geek, as a matter of fact, he was the furthest thing from geek. He was tall and well built with dark hair and lickable abs that sent many of the girls in town to swooning. Tanned and gorgeous, his dark skin made his amber colored eyes all that much more noticeable. And he was never seen without a girl or two in tow, usually more.
But Dan, her mom's boyfriend was a prince, sweet and loving, he showered Clarissa with affection that had been so lacking in her relationship with Cameron's father. Her mother seemed to glow when he was near and had even opened up to going to the nude beach, something that would have scandalized her father.
"Oh, honey, you always use that excuse. You could take some time off, come out with us and sit and eat some barbeque, get some sun. You're so pale." She reached out and ran her hands over Cameron's long red hair, her contribution to the girl's beauty.
"Not if I want to pass those exams. Besides, being premed takes up too much of my time." She sighed as she saw that stubborn look come into her mother's brown eyes, a look that meant she would argue until she got her way if Cameron didn't say something quick.
"Look, mom, I promise that I will go down and sit by the pool for an hour or so, and get some fresh air, okay? But I really want to do well in these classes, they are important." She watched as her mother walked to the mirror over her dressing table, checking out what Cameron had done to her hair as she thought through what she would say. Cameron could see the tiny fairy tattoo that her mother had gotten, Dan's idea, right above her shoulder blade.
"Don't let Dan talk you into getting anymore of those, mom. Next thing you know and he'll have you getting your nipples pierced."
Clarissa snorted, laughing at her daughter. "Tattoos are one thing, I refuse to have needles stuck though these," she said, trailing her fingers over her nipples.
"That's a good thing, you could get the hoops caught in your toes. That could be very painful." She blinked innocently at her mother then ducked as she turned and threw Cameron's hairbrush at her.
"That wasn't funny, young lady," Clarissa said, laughing despite herself. "And my boobs don't hang down like that, you wretched child."
"Oh, well, they don't yet anyways, but you know, mom, you are getting up there in years." She laughed harder as Clarissa spluttered, speechless. "I'm just kidding, mom. You still got it," she said, wiping tears from her eyes and coming up to hug her mother hard. It had felt very strange the first time she'd hugged her mother when she was nude, but now, Clarissa was just her mother and she was proud of her for doing something that she enjoyed like being a nudist. There was nothing overtly sexual about nudity. It was a baring of the soul, a lack of pretense that had drawn Clarissa into the lifestyle. Not getting to watch all the naked male asses parading around the hot sand.
Downstairs, the doorbell rang. "Oh, honey, will you get that. Tell Dan I'll be right down. I just need to slip on my cover up." She hurried out of Cameron's room and into her own.
Cameron skipped down the stairs and hurried though the house to the front door just as the bell rang again. She opened it and without really looking to see who it was, she stepped into his arms and wrapped hers around his neck. "Hi Dan," she said.
Strong arms wrapped around her, pulling her against a well built chest that was definitely not Dan's squishier one. She gasped and tried to pull back, only to hear DJ's voice above her head.
"You should greet me like this more often Cami. I kind of like it," he said without letting go of the curvaceous little bundle that pressed intimately against him.
Cameron took careful aim and put her tennis shoe clad foot down with precision on his bare foot, covered only by the flip flop strap. "Let me go, DJ, or I swear, I'll break it," she said, telling herself the butterflies that were doing aerobatics in her stomach were only there because she was angry.
Instead of letting loose, he tightened his arms and lifted, holding her against him as he stepped into the house, carefully kicking the door closed with his foot. He ignored her struggles and the amazing things that feeling her soft body against his were doing to him. Grimacing as her foot caught his shin, he managed to cart her into the living room that was just off the front hall and dropped her into the overstuffed couch.
"What, no kiss? No hello to your favorite soon-to-be stepbrother."
"I'd rather gargle with glass."
"Ouch," DJ said, smiling down at her and stepping quickly back as she reached out to kick him again. "Where's the love in that?"
"That's my point exactly. Mom was expecting Dan, not you." She turned around until she could get out of the couch feeling at a distinct disadvantage with him standing over her like that.
"Dad had to do a few things down at the store he could close it up. He asked me to come and get the two of you. So why aren't you undressed?"
"I'm not going. I have too much studying to do." She moved a few steps away and warily put her hand out as he followed her.
"Oh, come on. You look like you could use some fun in the sun." He reached out and pulled a lock of her hair out of the tidy ponytail she'd fastened earlier. "Besides, your mom is worried about you; she says you spend too much time with your nose in a book."
"And you spend too much time with yours in my business," she snapped, yanking her hair out of his fingers. "I have to study if I ever want to make it into a decent medical school. I don't have time to lollygag out at a nude beach with a group of giggling admirers hanging on my every word."
"From what I've seen, you don't even have one admirer hanging on anything of yours, Cami. And who the hell uses a word like lollygag?"
Cameron felt the scream building in her chest, wanting to be let loose while she punched his lights out. "I do," she said between gritted teeth. "I'm too busy trying to make something of myself to be hanging out with people like you who so happily live off daddy's money."
"Cameron!" Clarissa's shocked voice rang out.
Oh, shit, Cami thought. This conversation just really took a turn for the worse.
"Apologize to DJ, my lord, girl. I don't know what's gotten into you that you two can't be nice to each other." Clarissa stepped forward, a huge tote bag in one hand and a hamper of food in the other.
"I'm sorry I said what I thought, DJ," Cameron said, staring at him in shock as he started laughing.
"Talk about a non apology," he said, shaking his head. "It's okay, Clarissa. That's one thing I really like about Cami. She says what she means."
Cameron blinked in surprise at the compliment.
"Yes, sometimes it a very good trait, but others," she sighed as she looked at her only child. "Some days I think she'll be the death of me."
Cameron walked over and gave her mother a kiss. "But you love me anyway," she said.
"Someone has to," Clarissa said, pulling on Cami's long ponytail. "Now, I'll have my cell phone with me in case you need anything and I left some potato salad in the fridge for you. Lock the doors after we go, there's been that rash of burglaries in the neighborhood. And try to do something other than study, you're going to turn into a book if you keep it up the way you have."
