Hide in Plain Sight

This is an entry in the 2012 Nude Day story contest, so please vote. Honest feedback is always appreciated. Copyright Foolstop June 2012. This is a work of fiction. The events, settings and characters described here are fictitious and are not intended to represent specific places or living persons. For all scenes that depict sexual activity, all participants are 18 or over. Thanks to PhantomOp for his eagle-eyed proofreading.

###

Prologue

I awoke, in darkness, to the blare of a train whistle piercing the paper-thin walls of an unfamiliar room, and as I began to get my bearings, I caught an alluring fragrance in the air. A woman was lying beside me in bed and her hair was draped across both of our pillows. A few loose strands were right under my nose.

She was on her side with her back towards me and we were spooning. My arm lay across the woman's ribcage and my hand was sandwiched between her bare breast and the mattress. Absentmindedly, I wiggled my fingers, slowly massaging her breast and feeling the weight of it. I noticed how soft and smooth it felt. Without any conscious thought, I automatically sought out the nipple and found it to be semi-erect. I played with it between my fingers and it immediately grew harder.

I allowed my fingers to explore further, traveling up to the other breast, cupping it in my fingers and hefting its weight. By that time, I felt myself becoming aroused. It was only then that I realized that my penis was constrained by a pair of briefs. That's odd, I thought. Why do I have underwear on? I almost always sleep in the raw, especially if I'd just had sex.

Suddenly, it hit me where I was and what was going on. I withdrew my hand and bolted up out of bed. "Oh, jeez! Oh, jeez!"

My sister started giggling and rolled over to face me. She held one arm across her tits in a half-hearted attempt to protect her modesty. "Good morning, Loverboy!" she teased. Beth was practically naked, wearing only a pair of black bikini panties. Her arm did an adequate job of hiding her nipples from view, but I could easily make out the globes of her ample, young breasts above and below.

Our room was quite warm, so we had gone to bed with only a top sheet for each of us. During the night, we both got twisted around. My sheet got thrown off completely, and hers got bunched up around her feet.

"I'm sorry, Beth. I was only half awake, and I didn't realize what I was doing."

"Don't worry about it, John. It's okay. Besides, it felt kinda good. You have strong hands and I like that in a man." She winked at me, devilishly.

Beth started to yawn. She turned away from me so that she could reach her arms above her head to stretch her muscles without showing me her boobs, directly. I could still see plenty of side boob from behind, however, as well as the rest of her lithe, taut, 20-year-old body. As usual, her blond hair was braided into a ponytail that stopped halfway down her spine. Below that, her milky white skin starkly contrasted with the black ink of the tattoo that she had gotten on her eighteenth birthday--a stylized design that sort of resembled angel's wings.

"Did you sleep well?" She asked me. Once again, she held an arm across her front as she turned back to face me.

"Yes," I admitted. "Thanks for not letting me sleep on the floor." I'm older than Beth by two years, but she has never let me treat her like a baby sister. So, after we found out that the room only had one small bed, and after I tried to be gallant and said that I would sleep on the floor, she insisted that we share the bed, and she wouldn't take no for an answer. We had both gotten used to making decisions on a purely practical basis lately, and that was just the latest one on Beth's part.

Beth and I were on the lam. We'd been hiding out from--somebody, we weren't sure who--for the past twenty-four hours. So, we were staying off the grid and paying for things only in cash, of which we had precious little. A tiny room in a fleabag motel was all we could afford.

###

Hmm, I guess I'm getting ahead of myself here. Maybe I had better start over from the beginning. Our predicament began the day before. I was in the middle of my final exam for a statistics class, when I felt my cell phone vibrate in my pocket, and that set everything in motion...

###

Chapter 1: A Cryptic Message

My statistics final was on a Thursday morning, and it was supposed to be my last bit of business for the semester. As soon as I was done, my buddies and I were heading to Las Vegas for three days of partying before we all settled in to our summer intern jobs the following Monday. At least, that was the plan.

So, my sister was quite surprised to see me waiting in the hallway outside of her dorm room. She smiled at me at first, but then she saw the dire expression on my face. "What's going on, John?"

As she unlocked her door and let me in, I held up my cell phone and played the message for her. It was from our stepfather, Barry. "Listen up, Johnny. I want you and your sister to come home for the weekend. The three of us have important issues to discuss about your mom's estate. So, be prepared to leave campus as soon as you are both out of your last class tomorrow and then get from there to here on the double. Oh, and do me a big favor. Don't let your sister bring that lapdog of hers. You know I can't hear myself think when Buddy is yapping away. If Anne won't take care of the dog while Beth's gone, then put Buddy in a kennel and I'll pay for it. Have you got that? Save your cell phone minutes and don't bother calling me back, unless there's a problem. OK? So, I'll just see you when you get here. So long."

I watched my sister's face while she listened to the message. By the time it was done, she'd gone through a whole range of emotions from confusion, to alarm, to fear, and then back to confusion. "What the fuck was that?"

"You mean like the fact that Buddy was mom's dog, not yours, and by the way, he's been dead for four years--almost as long as mom?"

"Yeah, and that nobody has called you Johnny since mom's funeral, when everyone kept telling you that you're now the man of the house."

I nodded my head. "Barry's sending us a message, alright, and one thing's clear. The last thing in the world he wants us to do is go home."

"Yeah," Beth nodded back.

After a moment, I said, "I think there's more to the message, but I don't want to tell you my interpretation until you come up with your own ideas. Then let's compare notes."

"Good idea." Beth sat down at her desk, took out her notebook, and flipped to a blank page.

She started making notes while she played the voicemail message back three or four times. I watched her as she drew arrows to connect thoughts together, and crossed some other thoughts out. Finally, she spoke up. "Okay, first of all, he started out with 'Listen up.' I don't know about you, John, but he only says that to me when he's being deadly serious, and really wants me to pay attention"

"Yeah, me too."

"Next is the bit about having important issues to discuss about mom's estate, but there's nothing to discuss. It's all in the family trust. We get mom's half when we turn 25."

"Or, we get it all today, if something happens to Barry," I pointed out. "I think he's trying to tell us that his life is in jeopardy."

"Hmm, maybe. Let's get back to that. The next thing he says is 'be prepared to leave campus as soon as you are both out of your last class tomorrow.' Now, you told Barry you planned to be in Vegas by tonight, didn't you?"

"Yep. More evidence he doesn't mean what he's saying."

"And I'm sure he chose the phrase 'be prepared,' carefully--as in the Boy Scout motto, 'always be prepared,'--as in how he makes us keep an emergency kit in the trunk of the car."

"Yeah, so 'be prepared to leave campus' clearly means for us to bug out. You're thinking the same thing I'm thinking, so far. Go on."

Beth turned back to her notes. "Next is the part about Buddy, who's dead. So, more life-and-death seriousness."

A new thought just occurred to me. "And something about going to jail, perhaps? Could kennel be a metaphor for jail?" I wondered.

"Oh, yeah, maybe. I didn't think of that." Beth pondered for a few seconds, and then went on, "The last thing Barry says is 'save your cell phone minutes' which is clearly a warning against using our cell phones at all, because of the GPS trackers in them, I assume."

I added, "And because they could be listening in--whoever they are--which is why I decided to come here and wait for you instead of calling you. Also, even without GPS, cell phones can be tracked by which cell towers they hit. You don't even have to be making a call at the time. Just leaving them turned on is enough. However, that's not the last thing he said."

"It isn't?"

"No, the last thing he said was 'so long.' But he never ends a call like that."

"Oh, right. It's always 'See-ya-later-bye.'" Beth said it all run together, the way Barry does. "So what's the significance of 'so long,' then?"

"I think he's referring to the title of a Douglas Adams book, 'So Long, and Thanks for all the Fish.' It's one of the sequels to 'The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy,' which is his all-time favorite book."

"What makes you think there's a connection here, and if so, what does it mean?"

"Boot up your laptop, and I'll show you."

I had Beth start up Google Earth. "Check this out. We are here." I had her zoom in on the campus and place the cursor over the center of it. I then pointed to the legend at the bottom of the screen that indicated the GPS coordinates of the cursor. "Write this down," I said to Beth as I proceeded to read off the latitude and longitude. When she had written it down in her notebook, I had her punch in the address of our house next and we watched as Google Earth "flew" southwest across 75 miles. Again, I had Beth write down that latitude and longitude of our house.

"Now, another thing Barry said was for us to 'get home on the double.' I think he wants us to head in the direction of home, all right, but for us to double the distance and keep going. So, if my hunch is correct..."

Before I could finish explaining my hunch, Beth started doing the math and read off the resulting new GPS coordinates. She then manipulated the Google Earth screen, sliding the view another 75 miles beyond our house and then zeroed in on the calculated coordinates. When she was done, the cursor pointed to just beyond a public pier that reached out into the Pacific Ocean. She centered Google Earth back on the pier and had it bring up street level photos. Sure enough, you could see fishermen standing on the pier with their rods and reels in hand. Beth whistled. "So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish," she said. "Wow, John. I never would have thought of that. So, Barry wants us to meet him there? When?"

"As soon as we can, I assume. 150 miles will take us about 3 hours."

"That's assuming we go straight past the house, but Barry seems to be saying we shouldn't go anywhere near it. Also, I didn't get any sense that we need to rush. Especially since you figured out that 'on the double' didn't actually mean to hurry. I think Barry wants us to be more cautious than anything."

"That's a good point," I agreed. "So, then maybe we shouldn't even take our car. If whoever's causing trouble for us has the wherewithal to track our cell phones, they can probably track our car, and our credit cards, too."

I asked Beth to flip back from the street-level photos to the map view and we saw that there's a train track that runs parallel to the coast and that there's a station within walking distance of the pier.

Beth opened up a browser and started researching train and bus schedules. She said, "While I'm doing this, why don't you go to the ATM and withdraw as much cash as you can from both of our accounts?" Beth gave me her debit card and told me her PIN number. "Then go back to your apartment and pack some clothes, and I'll meet you there."

"OK, Beth."

I started to leave, but Beth abruptly jumped up and put her arms around me. She kissed me on the cheek. "You are so brave," she told me in a fair imitation of mom's voice. Mom was always telling us affirmations like "you are so studious," and "you are so polite"--statements that weren't necessarily true at the time, but she figured if she said them often enough, we'd begin to believe them anyway. In this case, I'm not sure if Beth was talking to me, or herself.

We packed light, just one backpack each with our laptops and some clothes. I packed my cell phone just in case we'd need it as a last resort, but I powered it off first and even pulled the battery out for good measure. We were halfway out the door, when I thought to grab my DSLR camera, too. "The zoom lens will come in handy for staking out the pier," I explained.

"Good idea," Beth agreed.

Beth and I shared a 2005 Altima that we inherited from our mom when she died. She was killed by a hit-and-run drunk driver back when I was in High School and Beth was in Jr. High. It was Halloween day. Her Altima was in the shop at the time, getting the windshield replaced, so she was driving our stepfather's Tahoe. The Tahoe was totaled and the insurance company bought Barry a new one. There was no question that Beth and I would then share mom's car. We always shared things without arguing. That's the way mom raised us.

We drove to a bus terminal ten miles away from campus and left the Altima in the long-term parking lot. In addition to our backpacks, I grabbed the emergency kit from the trunk.

The itinerary Beth mapped out had us taking busses the whole way, since you have to show ID to buy a train ticket these days. So, the trip took nearly six hours. By the time we pulled into the bus terminal that was closest to the pier, it was nearly midnight and the pier was undoubtedly deserted. We wouldn't be catching up with Barry just then.

Beth spotted a motel two blocks away. The sign said No Vacancy, but we tried it anyway. "Just your luck," said the night clerk. "One reservation is a no-show, so I can let you have the room. I'll need to see both of your IDs and I'll need a credit card to imprint."

"No, you don't." Beth smiled at the young clerk. She passed him a $20 bill concealed in her palm so that it was out of sight of the security camera. "Mr. No-Show forfeits one room night, so the room is already paid for, right?"

Between Beth's charms and the $20 bill, the clerk couldn't refuse. "Oh, yeah. I guess you could look at it that way." He gave us a keycard and directed us to the room.

The tiny room was hot and stuffy. Beth went straight to the noisy air conditioner and tried to switch it from fan to A/C, only to find that it was already at full blast. "Must be low on Freon," she surmised.

The next thing we noticed was that the room only had one twin-size bed. As I mentioned previously, I tried to be gallant and offered to sleep on the floor, but Beth wouldn't hear of it. "We both need to be well rested for tomorrow. I'm going to have a hard enough time falling asleep between this oppressive heat, the noisy A/C, and worrying about what's going on with Barry. Don't make me worry about you trying to be comfortable down on the floor, too." By then, Beth had stripped the comforter off of the bed and was nonchalantly stripping herself down to her pale green bra and black panties. After she slipped in under the top sheet she was still uncomfortable, so she loosened her bra, pulled it out from under the sheet, and threw it on top of the rest of her clothes.

I rummaged through the dresser drawers and found my own top sheet and an extra pillow. I double checked that the deadbolt was set, then took off my own clothes down to my briefs, doused the lights, and climbed into bed. I stayed as close to the edge of the mattress as I could and crossed my arms across my chest to give Beth as much space as possible.

Beth said, "You're going to fall off like that. Don't worry. I'm not going to bite." She twisted onto her side to face me and reached over to nudge me closer to the center of the mattress while telling me to relax my arms. She kept pulling until my torso was firmly pressed against the front of her body and I could feel her nipples touching me through the threadbare bed sheet. Once I complied, she settled her head back down on her pillow, but left her arm draped across my chest--as if I'd run away if she dared to take it away. I could feel her light breath on the side of neck.

We talked in the dark for a little while, trying to figure out what could be going on with Barry and why he told us to run. Just to get a rise out of Beth, I threw out a wild speculation about body-snatching aliens from another dimension, and she countered with Barry being in a love triangle involving a jealous husband with anger-management issues. We both laughed and it broke the tension.

After a moment, Beth said, "Seriously, John, I worry about Barry. He works too hard doing those mind-numbing financial audits and doesn't have any social life to speak of. I know he adored mom, and misses her as much as we do, but five years is a long time to grieve. I don't think he has so much as looked at another woman romantically, much less dated anyone. Do you?"

"Not that I know of, no. All he's ever done since mom passed is go to work and take care of us. And, by the way, he doesn't actually do financial audits. He audits the computer systems that store financial data. There's a difference."

"Yeah, whatever. My point is, he needs to meet someone."

"Well, that's not a problem we can solve tonight. Tomorrow, we'll catch up with Barry at the pier and he'll tell us what's going on, and then we'll go from there. One step at a time, right?"

"I guess."

After that, neither of us had anything more to say. Beth kissed me on my neck and said in mom's voice, "Oh, Johnny, you are so dependable."

I replied back in the same tone, "And so are you, Miss Elizabeth."

Soon after that, we were both sound asleep.

###

And so, there I stood the next morning, amazed at my sister's nonchalance. Not only was she happy to ignore how I had just accidentally felt her up in bed, but if she really cared about whether or not I could see her boobs, she would have put her shirt back on rather than making a half-hearted attempt to cover them with one arm.

Beth was suddenly all business. "I have first dibs on the shower," she declared, asking me if I needed to use the toilet first before she hogged the bathroom. I did.

Later, as I washed up, a thought occurred to me. I said to Beth, "Before we give up this room, we should take the opportunity to change our appearance. You could dye your hair, or something, and I should give myself a buzz cut."

Beth agreed. "That's a good idea. I'll stay here and watch our stuff while you get what we need." Beth wrote down for me the brand name of a hair dye that she'd used in the past.

It was at that point that Beth dropped all pretense of protecting her modesty. She used both hands to reach for the pen and notepad from the nightstand and simply ceased to care about whether or not I got an unobstructed view of her grapefruit sized tits with their golden brown nipples. The room was still stifling hot and she was in no hurry to put any clothes back on. So, as I got dressed and headed out in search of a drug store, she just sat up in bed, topless, and turned on the TV.

I returned forty minutes later with scissors, hair dye, and rubber gloves. Beth was watching the news, still topless, but she was wearing a damp towel wrapped around her waist. "I shaved my legs while you were gone," she explained. She had also unbraided her hair.

Beth had me start by cutting off locks of her hair in the front to form a set of bangs. We then set to work dying her blond hair brown. It took us almost an hour to do the disguise work and Beth remained topless all the while. She claimed she was just being practical about not wanting to get hair dye on her bra. But even after we switched places she didn't bother to cover up. In fact, halfway through giving me my haircut, Beth's towel came loose from around her waist and it slipped to the floor. She just left it there while she finished her work, completely naked.