She had got to do it, she knew she had.
Sal had a real wish to go beyond the end of the garden, not just creep into her neighbour's garden but go further afield. Indeed, into the fields and woods.
It had just so not been her plan to meet a group of ramblers. She had scouted her route out whilst clothed one morning: well clothed in a light cotton dress, though not actually anything else. She had stayed clothed most of the walk but had dared slip it off for one short stretch just 'to see what it felt like.' It had felt good. Her first attempt had gone like clockwork. She had been up with the lark slipping out of the door in her back wall dressed in just sandals and absolutely nothing else in the morning light and had made her whole two-mile circuit completely alone.
Her second outing was somewhat different. Again, an early rise, and again she had slipped from her garden door with the morning light only just appearing and even that seen through a film of vapour. There was a light mist that somewhat obscured everything and gave an other-worldly feel. And other worldly was a bit like Sal felt as she set off. As if it was another self, not really her, walking out naked. The sun had shone weakly, at least at first, through the obscuring mist with the trees down the path behind her house showing rather ghost like above her. Sal had stepped over the stile, loving the way it made her part her legs -- a feeling of exposure -- before walking across the field of standing wheat down the little path made by the few people who walked that way following a right of way.
In the midst of the field Sal felt wonderfully exposed. She could only go forwards or backwards and the path was so narrow meeting someone would have meant a real meeting, even a touching to pass. She could not even see the end of the field and, when she stopped and turned, could no longer see the stile. The photographer in her knew how wonderful the setting would be, preferably a shot taken a little distance from her, perhaps from the path or into the wheat: 'naked girl in the early morning mist.' It would have been admired at her photography club.
Sal knew if someone was coming towards her she could scamper back before really being seen: someone behind her would be more of a difficulty -- she would have to run on ahead in her sandals. But she had a feeling of being completely alone and she was. She walked on across the field and into the wood. There was less mist in the wood and the light a little stronger, but she could see the mist beyond the trees and it gave a certain enchantment to the scene as if the wood was a hidden secret place in a dream world. Sal walked on as happy as anything up the hill and out onto the high field. Crossing that she walked out above the mist and for a moment found herself with it around her ankles but herself above it as if she was walking on a cloud. Sal naked on a sea of white. A wonderful picture had she had her camera -- and a tripod to set it away from her. But even had she had a camera it was all too fleeting, and the mist flowed away leaving her exposed in the midst of the field -- but exposed to just a few cows watching her. Sal walked on and through the small wood beyond the field.
There were eight of them, five men, three women and there was nowhere for her to hide. Moments before she could have slipped into and under bracken, a couple of minutes earlier would have had advance warning by seeing them in the distance and could have disappeared into the wood: but at the point she met them she was hemmed in by brambles either side of the narrow path and, as the path turned, there they were -- and there she was.
As one they halted.
"It's a dare," Sal said. The words had not just come to her but had been what she had planned to say if she had come across someone. It had seemed unlikely, or so she had thought so early in the morning, but naturally she had thought about it. Of course, she had, because the risk of being seen had been part of the excitement of being out and about -- naked. It had been a risk but now it was reality. Sal felt a twinge, the same as she felt in her photography class when modelling, the same as when upon the beach, the same as when Paul and Chloe had looked at her. And the men, certainly, were looking at her.
She was engaged in conversation, perhaps more so by the men anxious to keep her with them so they could look at her closely -- and they did. She had to make up more about the dare. An imagined friend, waiting to see if she really did the deed.
"What is the bet -- how much?"
"I get to fuck her boyfriend." Sal said it to shock. It was so unlike her, not just the 'F' word but the whole idea -- Sal saying something to shock,
"Yes, well," said one of the women starting to move off but the others tarried. "Alone?" asked one of the women -- perhaps she found the idea arousing.
"Oh, no, I'm sure she will want to supervise. She is a terribly jealous sort and she tells me he's got an awfully big cock." Sal grinned. She was not just being exhibitionist with her body but her words. "And I'm looking forward to seeing that."
Sal pressed past the group trying to avoid scratching her buttocks on the brambles and walked on. She knew she was being watched but turned just for confirmation. She wondered if all the men were erect. It was rather nice thinking of the effect she could have.
To have a further person there on her trail seemed rather overdoing it. She had been completely on her own the other two times she had walked it. Not another soul had appeared. Perhaps it was not such a good choice of walk after all. The second time it was a horsewoman, high above her on a bay in jodhpurs and riding hat. They met as the path turned by another wood. The woman looked at Sal in surprise: the horse just looked at her.
"I rode my horse once naked as Lady Godiva around my circuit..." The woman said after a moment, "is this much the same?" There was an element of authority in her tone
Sal was looking up at the horsewoman. "Probably," she said, feeling so much under scrutiny "it rather depends why."
The woman smiled wryly, "It certainly left a wet patch on the saddle. Firm leather you know -- very firm."
Sal nodded, "The same reason then."
"Sexual. Makes one do odd things. You going back to someone special to... having warmed up a bit?"
"No."
"No? Hmmm seems a pity -- for you. My husband was waiting in the stable with something big for me! A fantasy of stable boys -- naked and erect!"
The thought gave Sal a pleasant tingle. She liked hearing what the woman said. "Sounds nice," she replied.
The contrast between the confident and properly dressed horsewoman and the idea of her leading her horse, naked, into its stable and finding a naked man there with 'something big' seemed surprising. Of course, how people appeared to their friends, colleagues or strangers and how they were with their sexual partners -- or indeed sexually on their own -- might well be a very different thing. What was Mr. Soames like in the bedroom or Mrs. Riley? She knew rather more about sweet little Chloe though she did not know what Chloe's friends knew about what she and Paul got up to. Was their naturism a secret, did they know Paul and she copulated in semi-public on the beach? Would this woman's friends imagine her doing such a thing in the stable?
"It was. You know, young lady, I might do the Lady Godiva again tomorrow. You have inspired me. I hope to see you walking then." She raised her eyebrows.
It was so much a command. Sal felt like saying, "Yes ma'am."
There was no one else on her morning walk. Sal slipped through her garden door and bolted it with a smile on her face. She wondered as she walked towards her house whether she was being captured by her neighbour's camera. Had it seen her slip out in the mist? A vague but clearly naked wraith?