Climax of the Storm

Hands on hips, C.C. called, "The term

primitive campsite

really does describe this place. You didn't worry about camping alone?"

"The friends I used to ask always got too stoned to hike." Eng arranged pieces of tinder in the fire ring, frowned, started over. "I brought Spike when he was still alive. A beagle loose in the woods is the happiest creature in the world."

The pair had filled the hours of driving with a mix of conversation and equally agreeable silences. Even the weather, an extraordinarily hot day for this early in the season, failed to dent their good spirits. C.C. had invited herself to share Eng's three-day weekend based on a close friendship, her ongoing separation, and a recent impromptu necking session with him that she considered an audition.

As Eng futzed, she hunted for fossils among the flat slabs of slate at the foot of the low canyon wall. Sweat had soaked through the Cub Scout uniform shirt she wore as a top and she ached to be out of her clothes. No sooner had the thought occurred to her than Eng said in a TV announcer's voice, "Talk about a perfect day for nudity."

At any other time C.C. would have slapped back with sarcasm. Instead, she unbuttoned the shirt and stepped out of her shorts on her way across the campsite. "I was going to return your lucky Icelandic coin and forgot," she said. "It was sweet of you to loan it to me for my job interview."

"That object carries great power," Eng said. "I honestly did sneak it into the operating room for my surgery. Carrying it on my wedding day didn't work out, of course, but it brought three or four happy years. Three. Did I mention it was in my pants pocket when we conceived our daughter?"

"You conceived Mehdi wearing pants?" she said.

"My pants were around my ankles."

C.C. was feeling the car trip and went through her break-from-the-computer routine of bends and reaches. "I am trying to recall what brought you to nudism," Eng said.

"Nude didgeridoo meditation. Kyle asked me to go with him to a famous retreat center in California. One of his alternative healing classes. He wanted to clear his mind on the way—" pursed lips, a roll of the eyes "—and I drove him the four hours from the airport to this remote village of yurts and organic gardens overlooking the ocean. The central building was a sort of dining hall shaped like a lodge, with the center's hot springs further down a little road. Kyle spent his time improving as a shaman-healer-harmony engineer. That left me out. Fortunately, the retreat center culture encouraged people to connect. One morning, a cranial sacral teacher gathered this random group of women to eat breakfast and she asked me to sit down, too. I ended up hanging out with some of the people all week. Inez from Ohio swore by the Wednesday night didgeridoo meditation at the hot springs."

"That sounds like Kyle's sort of thing," Eng said.

"You will soon see the wrongness of your statement. I went alone because Kyle's class always stretched into the evening. In the locker room, every person was taking off their clothes. All right, I thought, asses out and bras off. We boiled in the tubs, except for one or two people getting massages on tables. Candlelight. Steam. Chimes. What you'd expect. Holistic Lifestyle Guy with a beard led us through breathing and relaxation. At a certain point, his assistants moved around the baths blowing a didgeridoo of healing at each guest. The woman assigned to my tub had dreadlocks and an oh-my-God

magnificent

yoga body. I sound flip—I don't mean to. Whatever happened in the baths, afterward I felt more relaxed and clear-headed than I had in years."

"If I know Kyle," Eng said, "he approved of your state of euphoria."

"You do not know Kyle."

Eng cleared his throat.

"My public nudity upset him," C.C. exclaimed. "Upset him. Because I

bared my body

. This body, Eng—" she slapped her behind "—but five years younger. I admit it didn't help that I mentioned the Teutonic thunder god who sat close in the tub. Other men saw me in the altogether. That was the problem."

She stopped to allow Eng to reply but he said, "I've learned my lesson about commenting."

"For once, though, Kyle's moodiness had no effect on me. My superhuman calm just, tink, deflected it away. Laying on my back in the dark, I loved the guy with more wild intensity than ever, even though his punk ass was as far away as possible on the edge of the bed. Meditation had turned loose the best C.C. Either mindfulness or the didgeridoo cleared out some of the negativity blocking love and patience and—blocking all my positive emotions."

"This experience sounds more powerful than my coin," Eng said.

"Unfortunately, it had a limit. I tried to connect with Kyle in the morning, non-sexually, but he marched out the door with an

I'm so disappointed in you

. And I'm thinking, step off, Mr. Enlightenment, I've had a Moment. Since that night in the baths, I've associated being nude with joy and calm and peace. By the way, that's when I started meditation, too, when we got home from the trip. Visiting the place changed my life, Eng. Inner and outer. All Kyle got was a certificate."

Eng shared out sandwiches—soggy multigrain bread dripping mustard, but appreciated. They proceeded to fruit and a dessert of freeze-dried astronaut ice cream. When Eng finished eating, he removed his shirt to wipe sweat from his forehead and mustard from his chin. C.C. leaned close.

"Did I leave those bruises?" she said. Eng's look suggested she may have done so. "You're as marked up as a high school junior. Well, give me credit for staying under your shirt collar area." Her smile lines faded. "Is it okay we did what we did? We're good? You did mention you quit seeing your Natasha person."

"I am not quite her thing," Eng agreed. "Yes, we're good. Of course."

Eng placed two pieces of cut firewood just so and suggested a short hike. But he was incredulous when C.C. put on her boots and only her boots. "Today's the day to earn your nudism merit badge," she said as she piled up her hair. "Don't frown at me."

"No, no, I'm imagining my body hair near plants with burrs."

Though backed up by a biology degree and years of gardening, C.C. failed to convince him it was too early for even the greenest cockleburs. She tied the Cub Scout kerchief around her neck and led the way down the trail applying sunscreen to the paler places on her body.

The canopy offered partial protection from the sun, though the trees also blocked the faint breeze. Every time the trail reached a clearing, they stopped to look for wildlife. "Wild turkey," Eng said once, pointing into tall grass. Further on, C.C. bent over to examine a Jack-in-the-pulpit. An instant later she burst out laughing and swung her hips away. "Sorry, very truly sorry," she said when she saw Eng with his hands over his eyes.

The trail climbed toward a ridge marked on the ranger map as a SCENIC LOOKOUT. The ground cover became a colony of bonsai-like bushes with dark leaves growing thick on splayed limbs. Many of those limbs reached over the trail. C.C. tip-toed through them without harming a twig and reached the top far ahead of Eng.

Trees stretched to the horizon. C.C. had no idea a forest this size still stood in the Midwest. As they passed the water bottle, she side-eyed Eng's arms and wide chest. He had one of those sturdy though less-than-defined builds shaped by regular physical work rather than time in the gym.

"You really are hairy," C.C. said. "Lucky for you the birds have finished nesting."

Eng gestured at her with a head-to-toe motion. "My parents requested the body of a thirtysomething professional golfer. But there was a mix-up."

"I like it when you flatter me," she laughed.

Fatigue heightened by the heat set in during the return trip. The further they hiked, the more they paid attention to their footing rather than look for wildlife. But at the edge of the campsite a burst of white light caused their heads to snap up at the same time.

To the west, a tumbling line of gray-black clouds advanced before a flat, green-tinted sky lit by strobing flashes of lightning.

"Surely there isn't enough time to put up the tent," C.C. said in a low voice.

"It's safer from high winds in the pack."

For whatever reason, C.C. thought it wise to face a thunderstorm while dressed, and she hurried into her shorts and shirt. Eng spread a tarp over their packs. A false dusk fell as dark clouds blocked the sun. Eng handed C.C. a flashlight and asked her to bring the heaviest pieces of sandstone she could carry to weigh down the tarp.

A rushing sound in the trees and the storm hit. C.C. saw Eng dive atop the packs an instant before a wall of wind staggered her. Drenching sheets of water separated them. The volume and force of it blinded C.C. to the lightning hissing overhead and the nearby strikes in the forest. Cracks of thunder broke through the white noise created by the rain.

C.C. found the sandstone wall and pressed against it. She felt a crazy though momentary fear that Eng had been washed away. Incredibly, the storm gained in strength. The immense sound of the thunderclaps staggered her, the rain pressed her down like a solid weight. Yet C.C. took comfort in holding onto the wall—an unmovable anchor. A few minutes later the wind, though still gusty, had slowed. The rain became drizzle. The front pulled along the most spectacular lightning as it plowed eastward over the forest. When she saw a blink from Eng's spotlight, she let out her breath and answered with the flashlight.

The cool breeze at her back blew away the lingering traces of heat and mugginess. Waterfalls poured off the cliff to slap the sandstone floor. Eng crossed to her slicking back his hair. C.C. squeezed his offered hand. "I feel we have honored the Cub Scout tradition by surviving," he said.

Eng preferred to let the rainwater run off before raising the tent. While he mourned his perfect campfire, C.C. dug soap from a pocket on her backpack. Nude again, she put a hand into the strongest of the waterfalls and shouted profanity as she ducked into the water. She took the crashing stream on her back until the temperature became unpleasant instead of paralyzing.

"You'll feel better if you step in," C.C. called.

"You sound worse."

C.C. stepped into bright sunlight wringing out her hair. Drops of water glistened gold on her rangy body. Eng brought her the largest and softest towel. She pretended to take it, then flung it aside to jerk him into the waterfall.

"This is miserable," he said when he could breathe again.

"We sweated for hours today. The stream won't last. Take advantage."

Eng studied the top of the falls before peeling off his clothes. C.C. felt an odd thrill at the thought the soap had touched every part of her body and now glided over his neck, his chest and stomach, and lower down.

C.C. offered to scrub his back and nudged him between the shoulder blades. "Bend just a little," she said. "Plant yourself solidly." She worked up the best lather possible and, having soaped his shoulders, reached underneath him. Eng trembled as she touched his scrotum. She kneaded it while her other hand caressed his buttocks. No possibility of an erection in this cold water, but she squeezed and rubbed his privates before drawing back her hand.

"You wash me," she said in his ear. In her experience, one kind of man kept up the polite illusion of washing for a time. The other went straight for the erogenous zones. Eng cleaned her already clean chest and shoulders in the same meticulous way he built a fire. It was no different with her breasts, though he did stop twice to stare. Later he mentioned the allure of her chest's "constellation of freckles." At the first kiss C.C. opened her mouth to invite him inside. When she looked down at Eng touching her nipples, emotion rather than cold water shortened her breaths.

Eng dropped his hands and surprised her with a strained and very unsexual expression. C.C. had been turned down in her life, but not often, and not recently. "Are you hesitating for a reason?" she asked as she followed him out of the water.

"It's an extreme change for us. A little startling."

C.C. accepted his confusion as genuine. With Eng, you accepted everything as genuine. "It is. With the exception of the other night. That day I turned you down way back when—it was years ago, Eng. But I get it. Sometimes a punch in the mouth never stops hurting."

"Oh, I don't feel pain about you ever turning me down. Was it twelve years ago? More, I think. Give me a little credit, C.C. Even in real time, I accepted that you wanted what you wanted. Telling you my feelings was just one task to push through, then on to the next." C.C. nodded. If anyone could frame romantic rejection in the language of efficiency, it was Eng. "As for today," he said, "you're married."

"Separated."

Her tone of voice offered an argument, but Eng declined. "It's getting colder. Fortunately, I packed the world's warmest thermal shirt for you."

C.C. wrapped her arms around him. Whatever the conflicted emotions in the air, the chill encouraged them to press together. She kissed him on the side of the mouth as she had done during countless goodbyes.

"You know," she said at arm's length, "you washed

under

my breasts. That shows impressive savvy."

"I've acquired some?" he said.

The tent rose as the sun moved toward the horizon. Once satisfied, Eng unpacked a length of line holding clusters of clothespins. Soon their sopping clothes flapped between two trees. "The cold breeze should dry them," he said, a silhouette against the orange and pink sunset. "It'll just take more time."

The rain having ruled out the fire, C.C. unrolled the sleeping bags a polite distance apart and crawled into hers up to the neck. Eng entered the tent, added a foil survival blanket to her covers, and put out their battery-powered lantern.

Eng could fall fast asleep with a sleeping bag pulled over his head. C.C. felt like someone had buried her alive. She shifted and squirmed trying to create an adequate air hole while staying covered. Finally, she let out an exasperated growl and crawled toward him like an inchworm, bag and all. Eng proposed they pool their warmth by sharing the larger of the two sleeping bags. The survival blanket provided a second layer. He unzipped the smaller bag and spread it over them like a comforter to create a third.

C.C. recalled Eng's ex-wife saying she slept next to a furnace every night. That description of him was true tonight, at least. The interior of the sleeping bag felt almost as warm as the afternoon. Being trapped in the no man's land between horniness and bone weariness made C.C. restive. It took time but her stirring awakened Eng. Incoherent and half-asleep, he put a reassuring hand on her waist as a goodnight.

C.C. clasped the fingers and moved his hand to her chest.

"I am told friendships often don't survive sexual intercourse," Eng mumbled. "And you're married."

"I'm married like you were wearing pants when you conceived your daughter." Both talked but C.C. bore him down. "Eng, you're unattached. I'm unattached. We trust and love each other—yes, on another level—and between us we have enough sexual frustration to fill a college dorm. The urge to rut like the rest of the forest animals isn't related to going around without clothes. But my joy and relaxation and much-needed feeling of freedom play a big part in turning that loose. Quit thinking. Nothing about this moment involves thinking, sweetheart. I'm having an orgasm within the next half hour. You can either listen or participate."

Near total darkness prevented Eng from seeing her smile, but C.C. knew he would hear the good humor and affection in her voice. When he let out one of his quiet wheezing laughs, she laughed, too. Her off-target kiss landed in the stubble over his upper lip. "Help me undress. I can't get out of this clingy damn top you gave me."

Once C.C. had stuffed the shirt behind her, she stroked Eng's cheek and, after minutes of slow kissing, helped him to her breast. Eng licked and sucked—she winced at his prickly facial hair—and followed as she rolled to her back. "The sides of my breasts first," she said. "With your fingertips. Work around from there."

In time, when he had made his way to forcefully handling her breasts from the bottom, C.C. pushed off her pants. "Eng," she whispered, "touch between my legs. Just touch. Feel how wet I am. I swear it's running down my legs like the rain. It's for you. That wetness is for you." She took him in her hand and thumbed under the head of his penis. But whenever one of them tried to move down the covers pushed away. "It's like making love in a space capsule," she breathed.

They accepted oral sex could wait. Their hands did well enough. Eng moved his penis in her expert grip. When C.C. opened her legs once more, he worked her clitoris with his middle finger. "There," she said. "Like that but a little, just a little, slower. I can't wait for you to eat me. Do you want to eat me?"

"Yes."

"You're throbbing. Slow down a bit more, sweetheart. Yes. That way. Eng, if I'm going to come, and I'm definitely going to come, I want it to happen with you inside me. Clumsy quickie sex tonight, sensuous lovemaking all day tomorrow." C.C. told him to glide through her wetness. From there, she shifted and, holding his penis at the base, tapped her sex with it. She only stopped because he pulled back. His first drops stuck to her fingers. "I like children," she said in a soft matter-of-fact voice, "but having one now would be inconvenient."

"There are condoms in the first aid kit," Eng said.

"Sorry for sending you out there."

He was halfway free of the bag when C.C. seized his hips and took as much of him as possible into her mouth. A moment later the cold sent a brutal shiver through his body. She pulled away and made sure to do it loudly. Eng returned with two condoms—"Just in case, I don't want to leave the bed again"—and C.C. tore open a packet.

"Lubricated," she murmured. "See? More of your savviness. I don't love what the Pill does to me. Child of the moon. My body hates being denied its natural cycle. Mmm. Easy to get it on you. Am I talking too much? I may be nervous." And before Eng could answer, "Will you lie on your back?"

Eng put the covers around her as she mounted him, as if wrapping a woman in a cape. "You can stay underneath?" he asked.

"I only need forty-five degrees." C.C. lifted his penis and slid onto it. "Deep. As deep as we can, sweetheart." She shuddered as his fingers picked at her nipples. "They're very sensitive now. Oh, you're far, far inside me."

"Your wetness really is unbelievable," Eng said as he arched his back.

"I love that you're in my wetness. Moving a little this way now. A surprising amount of geometry goes into an orgasm. Close, oh perfect, wow, yes, better now. Best. That. Massive pressure." C.C. began to rock. "Will you nibble there when we get home? Can I straddle your face while you eat pussy?" Eng moaned his reply. "You feel even bigger when I talk dirty. I'm going to fuck you, sweetheart. You're making me wetter than I've ever been and I'm going to fuck you like I've needed to fuck you all week."

Eng offered his hands to brace her. They locked their fingers. As her movements became more forceful, C.C. let out sharper, louder sounds, faster and faster.

"I want to feel you come," Eng whispered. C.C. ground against him even harder. The moment she said, "Soon, soon," he lifted her a few inches with his hips. "I'm coming with your cock inside me," she said between hard breaths. "Sweetheart, I'm coming, now, now—"

C.C. gave a drawn-out cry as the orgasm burst through her. Just as she peaked Eng writhed from anticipated pleasure. "Try to wait," she panted as she wound down. He managed. C.C. finished as she kissed and caressed his chest. "Your turn," she said. "Can I tell you how I need you?"