After a long sticky day in a steamy kitchen, I threw my towel over a branch, strode to the end of the dock, and dove naked into the crystal clear water of the spring fed lake. After the initial shock, I stroked into a steady free style rhythm. There's satisfaction in slicing cleanly through water. It's exercise without sweat, it's progress at your own pace to a goal, and it's joy in the solitude of sun, sky and water.
Solitude didn't have to mean loneliness. There could be joy in solitude; I kept telling myself. Some day I would believe it.
A quarter mile further, I rounded the dead tree in the water at the point and glimpsed my target, a pine covered island rising out of the center of the lake like an enchanted island in a magical lake in Celtic Britain. I would bask on my favorite sun-warmed rock taking a break before swimming back. Then I would be tired enough to fall asleep tonight. The near constant ache in my side would keep me awake if I wasn't exhausted. The dreams didn't help either.
I had dreamed it again. I heard that heavenly choir, the one where each voice carried one note, but the addition of all the voices made a steady drone punctuated by insect clicks and ratcheting noises. The last time I heard that choir I was laying in the cold dust of Afghanistan trying not to bleed to death before the helicopter came.
The lake was deep enough that searchers would never find my body if I drowned anywhere beyond a hundred yards from shore, and I embraced that danger. My life, by my own choice, had gotten too predictable. While swimming across a mini abyss wasn't much of a challenge, it gave me something to think about. I had been reading a book on Celtic lore, and a northern Michigan lake was close enough that I could imagine the people who lived in the lake.
A hundred yards from the island, the bottom came up and I was safe. I could still drown, but they'd have a body to bury. Twenty yards out I waded to shore squishing my toes through the marl soft bottom.
"Now I know who made all the tracks on this side of the island. For a while I thought it was big foot."
There she was, dressed in an orange one piece bathing suit standing on shore waiting for me with her fists planted on her nicely rounded hips. Was she my own personal lady in the lake? I could use some magical assistance. I wasn't stuck like a bug in amber, but I was having trouble moving on like a bug dragging too big a load? It still didn't sound right. I was going to have to work on that image.
My first thought was to cover myself, but then what the hell. The nudist resort on the lake wasn't a secret. Certainly the adolescent boys from the summer homes on the far side of the lake knew. They canoed or rowed boats across the motor free lake to catch glimpses of the naked women sunning on the shore.
She seemed familiar to me in the way that you get when you meet someone for the first time and yet there is a certain air about them. It could be their smile perhaps, or their sense of humor, or their way of carrying themselves that makes it seem like you've know them forever. Perhaps we were old souls recognizing each other from a past life. There was a bond at least on my part. Perhaps we had made love upon the shore of a lake before in a previous lifetime.
I continued my pace until I stopped about ten feet away from her at the edge of the water.
"Am I interrupting something? Let me catch my breath and I'll leave," I panted.
She shook her head. "It's only me, nude guy. I scull my one man around the lake earlier most days," she pointed at her tiny racing shell sitting on the beach, "but today, I got antsy and grabbed some exercise in the evening, too."
"Forgive me for my informal dress," I looked down at my lack of clothing, "had I seen anyone on the island, I would have turned around and swam back. You surprised me."
She grinned. "No need to apologize, naked dude. Had I been offended by your lack of dress, I could have warned you off while you were still in the water, besides," she gave me a thorough top to bottom scan, "on you it looks good."
"I'm Sean, and I work at the resort," I pointed over my shoulder at the resort hidden behind the point.
"I'm Vivian, but my friends call me Viv."
She held out her hand and gave me the firm handshake all rowers have.
She was a long, tall woman. She wore her auburn hair in a pixie cut. I couldn't decide if her wide smile and very full kissable lips were the best feature of her very expressive face or her wide set green eyes. Dimples appeared when she smiled. She also wore an engagement ring on her finger so I stopped my lustful inspection right there. I admired her long kissable neck. Again I shoved that thought out of my head, and admired her toned athletic body. Her tanned skin looked good next to the orange of her suit...
I stopped myself from lusting again. This was going to be harder than I thought. It had been a while, a long while.
What the hell? Why was I so attracted to her if all we were supposed to do was high five each other and move on? She was almost a married woman. I would not tempt a woman out of her solemn promise to her man. I'm a firm believer in 'what goes around, comes around."
"Would you mind if I sat? I'm a little out of breath."
"Where are my manners? We have several very nice chairs in the gazebo on the other side of the island. Have you been over there?"
I shook my head, and followed her up the hill through the pines to the other side concentrating every step of the way on not ogling her ass. The catch-22 of the situation was that I had to think about her ass as I concentrated on not ogling her ass.
"Do you own this island?" I asked.
"My father does, but he and his wife don't come out here much. They built the gazebo a couple of years ago, had a couple of bonfires, then forgot about it. His guests complained about having to row back from the island when they were drunk. He's been trying for years to get the lake changed to one where motors under ten horsepower can be used. Anyway, Dad asked me to keep an eye on the island while I row around the lake."
A puckish smile flickered across her face.
"It's a good thing I do. Now I know about the nature boy trespasser."
"Really, I can leave if you want me to."
"Relax, I'm razzing you," she turned to smile at me, "you clearly aren't here to vandalize anything. Are all naked men as skittish as you?"
"Of course I'm nervous. I don't want to be handcuffed and carted off to jail for indecent exposure. Mark Twain said, 'Clothes make the man. Naked people have little standing in society.'"
She looked at me with raised eyebrows; a hint of a smile graced her very kissable lips.
"You know that quote?" I asked.
She grinned. "I started out to be an English teacher. If it's by Mark Twain, I've read it."
"Did you know that Ben Franklin was a proponent of 'air baths'. He would wander around his house naked."
"You got me there. I believe it though. Old Ben was a randy dude."
She climbed up the stairs to the gazebo and sat in an Adirondack chair, and motioned me into another. The gazebo was large, and filled with rather expensive Adirondack chairs and other rattan furniture. It was screened in, and the screen door closed with a familiar slap known to anyone who has ever been to a lake house.
"Had I known that I'd have company, I'd have brought a towel, refreshments and a fig leaf." She eyed my groin. "A big fig leaf."
My cock surged. I was going to embarrass myself if she kept ogling me. A certain vulnerability crept over me. She had the textile advantage.
"Which house is yours?" I asked squinting out across the lake. Thinking about the starting line up for the '68' Detroit Tigers was not lessening my growing tumescence.
The view from the gazebo was magnificent. The picture windows from the houses reflected the fiery glow of the sunset behind us. If God had been a vacation home developer, this would have been the world he designed.
"It's the giant A-frame with the roof to basement picture windows." She pointed at the biggest, most expensive house on the lake. She bent forward as she pointed out the house giving me a decent view down the front of her suit.
"Wow. That's an amazing summer home."
She nodded. "Dad built it to entertain business associates. It's more like a hotel than a home. The lake is nice though, but I like my home better," a pensive look crossed her face.
