The Gathering Shadows

The crossing was rough. The Minch can get turbulent, and the ferry was an hour and a half late reaching Stornoway. We were all right, safe on the MacBrayne ferry, but I wondered about the yacht we saw briefly as we overtook it, disappearing completely into the troughs at times. Distinctive, with its junk rig, reefed right down. Mrs McLeod was waiting for us, and I blessed again the serendipity of telling my workmate where we were going.

"Oh aye, an' my mother lives in Stornoway. I'll tell her ye're coming," Hamish said. Next thing I knew we'd been invited to stay the night when we landed.

"Ye'll have to," said Hamish, "Ma'll be offended if ye don't."

The horizontal rain as we walked up the street to the little house was more than enough to convince me that accepting had been wise. The welcome from Mrs McLeod couldn't have been warmer, and we were soon outside a welcoming meal, toasting our toes before a peat fire, the first we'd seen. Conversation was relaxed, pleasantries exchanged, but we'd been travelling all day, we were tired, and we soon took to our bed, cosy under a thick, home-made comforter. Any plans we might have had for a little horizontal exercise were promptly scuppered as Julie fell asleep almost as soon as her head hit the pillow.

Next morning was bright, dry, sunny and our spirits lifted. Enquiries revealed that the bus we wanted left us time to explore and we wandered down to the harbour.

"Look, over there. Isn't that the yacht we passed." Julie pointed to a tiny vessel across the harbour. I doubt it was an inch longer than twenty-five feet. We wandered closer.

I drew Julie's attention to the port of registration. "He's a long way from home."

"Auckland, New Zealand. Wow. He

is

a long way from home."

"It could explain the junk rig. Someone told me it's popular with single-handers as it's easy to handle."

Julie grinned at me. "It needs to be, if he's come this far alone."

We couldn't see any sign of life, and we didn't want to disturb the yachtsman if he was sleeping, so we moved on. Stereotyping, I suppose, as we both assumed it was a man. It was getting near time now for the bus and we retrieved our rucksacks from Mrs McLeod, bade her a fond farewell, and took ourselves off.

It's pretty wild country on the road south from Stornoway, beautiful but wild. Habitations are few. I was regretting that we hadn't longer to spare, but the few days break from the office grind would have to do. I'd shown the bus driver the spot on the map where we wanted to be set down and he duly dropped us in the middle of nowhere. The main road would have been a mere byway back home, and the minor road which led off into the rocks and heather was little more than a strip of asphalt, barely wide enough for a car. Julie looked at it, then at me. She grinned.

"You sure know how to show a girl a good time," she said.

I grinned back at her. "Come on, there are a few miles yet, my love."

She arched her eyebrows at that, but we moved off together, spirits light, happy in the solitude. We'd gone almost a mile when the track I was looking for led off to the right and we ambled along for another mile or so before I called a halt. In summer, this far north, night comes late, very late, and I knew we'd no need to hurry to find somewhere to pitch the tent. We sat for a while.

I took Julie's hand. "Listen," I said.

We listened. A gurgle from the burn nearby, a cry from a bird, the buzz of insects. "What are we listening for?" Julie said.

"Man."

We listened again. Nothing but mother nature at rest and at peace with herself. Julie squeezed my fingers. "You are man. I am woman. The world is ours alone."

I laughed. "Yeah. Out here it seems that way. Come on, let's be on our way."

Another couple of miles and we could see the loch ahead of us. A mile or so further and we were walking alongside it. I began to look for somewhere to stop, and finally spied a tiny little meadow. It couldn't have been more than twelve feet by twenty, the grass cropped short by the sheep. The ground was stony, but I managed to get the tent pegs in without bending more than a couple. I threw the mats in and unrolled the double sleeping-bag. Heavier than a couple of good singles, but worth the few pounds for the benefits. I glanced at my watch. Ten in the evening, and barely twilight.

We spent some time just sitting and enjoying the peace, then stirred ourselves to prepare an evening meal of sorts. Nothing fancy and mostly freeze-dried, but in that place, then, it tasted sublime. A fish jumped in the loch nearby and Julie chuckled.

"What?" I said.

"We should have tried to catch one. Would have made a nice supper."

"True, but I've never been much of a fisherman."

"Never mind, then."

We sat for a while when we'd finished eating, watching the gathering shadows, the evening warm, until Julie suddenly stood. She reached for my hand and tugged me to my feet.

"What?" I said.

"Let's see if the loch is warm enough to swim in." She pulled at my hand, leading me towards the water. I laughed, and let her. At the loch's edge, she sat down on a rock and unlaced her hiking boots, removing them, rolling down her socks and pulling them off. We were wearing shorts and she took my hand for balance and stepped gingerly into the water. She stood for a moment and then came back to me. "Cold," she said, "but we've swum in colder water. If we're quick and keep moving it should be okay." She began to pull her light sweater over her head, dropping it beside me, undoing her shorts, dropping them, her hands going to her bra, loosening it, letting it slide down her arms to join her other clothes, then bending to push her panties down. She stood for a moment, naked, beautiful, nipples erect in the cooling air of the evening.

"Come on," she said, "get naked."

I had been standing, almost mesmerised, just watching her. It didn't matter how many times I saw it, she still entranced me. I smiled and quickly shed my own clothes. Hand in hand, we stepped gingerly into the cool waters of the loch. Julie was right, it was cold, but she was also right about us having swum in colder water and we moved forward until the water was lapping at her upper thighs and launched ourselves into flat dives, submerging, breaking the surface together, swimming hard to keep our circulation going. Julie's a strong swimmer, stronger than me, and we swam alongside each other for a couple of hundred yards.

"Far enough," she said, and we turned back towards our clothes. We stood as soon as the water was shallow enough and waded back. There was a patch of grass near our clothes, clipped short by the sheep. Julie took my hand and led me to it. She twined her arms around my neck and raised her lips for my kiss. Our bodies were still wet from the loch, her lips were cool but there was heat in her kiss and her tongue slipped out to play with mine, twining, sucking, teasing me.

Her hands were on my back now, pulling me into her and I felt the beginnings of an erection. Julie broke the kiss, laughing. "Oh, good, I thought he'd drowned."

"No way," I growled, cupping her ass cheeks in my hands and squeezing. She has a wonderful ass, Julie, firm with muscle, deliciously squeezable. I never get tired of touching it. Her hand was moving down my back now, squeezing my own ass, moving round until she could squeeze my stiffening prick, her fingers cool against my rising heat. Abruptly, I broke the kiss and lifted her, then lowered her to the springy turf, kneeling between her spread legs. I bent forward and kissed her, then lowered my head and kissed her throat, her shoulder, moving down into the cleft between her breasts, kissing, licking, twisting my head to let a trail of tiny kisses move up one peak to the crest, sucking on her nubbin, biting gently. She shuddered and I licked at her nipple and then renewed my trail of little kisses back into the valley and across to the other crest.

I let the kisses trail back into the valley and moved south into the curls just north of paradise, tugging gently with my teeth, making Julie giggle, then kissed my way on south, into the heat and aroma and wetness of her core, kissing her thighs and letting my kisses trail aimlessly over her mound, breathing deeply of that incredibly complex, rich aroma of the sexually-aroused woman. Unconsciously, Julie spread her legs further,drawing up her knees and letting them fall apart, opening herself to me.

I accepted her unspoken invitation and licked lightly at her labia, the creases at the top of her thighs, her cleft, wet and glistening with a mixture of her juices and my saliva, flattening my tongue and sweeping it up from the rose-brown pucker of her anus, to her clitoris, just beginning to peep from its folds. She made a sound that was half sigh, half moan and her fingers tightened in my hair as I pointed my tongue and speared it into her. I began to lick again, letting my tongue move almost aimlessly, but endeavouring to make sure that my lips, or tongue, or both kept touching, sucking, licking at her labia, savouring her clitoris, enjoying the pungency of her, the savoury-sweet flavour of her.

My movements quickened as her breathing did, until she was almost panting as my mouth moved over her sex, until, with a sweep up her cleft I fastened my lips onto her clitoris and she came, her belly rippling, her thighs clamping vice-like on my ears, a tight scream in her throat and her fingers tight in my hair as her climax washed over her. Gradually she stilled, but then I stabbed at her again with my tongue and another pulse ran through her, then another, until eventually, weakly, she pushed me away, saying, "no more, I can't take it!"

My prick was hard as steel now and I moved up over her body, pressing gently into her unresisting depths, moving in, in until my balls were against her ass. I paused for a moment, enjoying the heat and wetness of her, and then began to thrust and withdraw, thrust and withdraw. Her legs came up and her heels hooked behind my ass, urging me into her and I let my movements slowly quicken, let the excitement build in me, let the moment take me higher, higher, until with a wordless cry of triumph and passion I came, driving into her, my seed filling her in hot jets, jets which lessened as I slowed, until all I had left was the reflexive twitch which drove me into her as her inner muscles squeezed down on me.

We lay, panting, until Julie gently pushed me back. She stretched up and kissed me as I moved, then lay back, sweaty, beautiful, her hair wild about her head as I gently withdrew my limp and shrinking prick from within her.

"I love you," she said, her heart in her look.

"I love you," I said, bending to kiss her.

Julie smiled. "What time is it?"

I glanced at the sky before I looked at my watch. Still some light in it. I bent to see the dial, then laughed. "Ten past midnight," I said.

Julie said it before I could. "Happy anniversary, darling."

Thank you for reading this far. I thank pixiesjuice for her beautiful story, 'The Edge Of The World'. It brought back the vivid memories which inspired this partly autobiograohical, partly pure fantasy, story of mine. Please vote, and a comment would be nice, too.