At the end of my sophomore year, two of our friends, Futoshi and Kenta, left Oceanview, and moved to Los Angeles. After they left, things got a lot quieter. I guess they were really more my then-boyfriend Ryosuke's friends than mine, but all the same, I was sad to see them go. I guess part of it was that Futoshi had been sweet to my best friend, Satomi, so she was kind of bummed about them leaving. She looks kind of cute even when she is moping with her puppy dog eyes and duckbill lips, but I wanted her to be happy.
In order to cheer her up, I started going down to visit her at her dorm. School was out, so the regular students were gone, and new people had moved in. A lot of them were Mexicans here to study English, but there were Japanese people too, some Chinese and even a few Europeans. Actually, it was kind of exciting seeing all these new faces. I was working near there, so I kept dropping by, getting to know the newcomers. They'd just arrived in the States, so we tried to help them find their way around, the way people did for me when I first arrived.
Because I was working on campus, Satomi invited me to come sleep over in her dorm room. The first night, I met two European girls staying just down the hall. One girl from France, Natasha, used to work as a nurse, but now she was engaged to an American guy. She was really nice, so beautiful, blonde and proud of her country. The other girl was Sarah. She was from Italy. She was young, maybe 18 or so, tall and slender and really beautiful too. I was surprised because both of them could speak English so well.
A few days later, I dropped by the dorm again. Satomi and I were sitting around in her room when these two young Japanese guys showed up.
"Excuse me. Excuse me, Miss Satomi," the taller one said. He was wearing old-fashioned horn-rimmed glasses, but actually he and his friend were both kind of cute. The tall boy spoke with this faint smile on his lips in a strong Kansai accent that sounded so funny. "Ah! You have a visitor," he exclaimed as soon as he saw me.
"Who's this?" I asked. Satomi tilted her head to the side almost as if she didn't want to say.
"Takuya and Hiro from Osaka," she finally revealed.
"Actually, I'm from Kobe," the shorter one, Hiro, said sticking out his hand to shake mine. I felt really weird shaking hands with a Japanese guy, but they were both trying so hard to act 'American.' I was having trouble keeping a straight face.
"And you are...?" Takuya asked, looking at me.
"Emi, Emi Tsuruta from Tokyo," I giggled. They really were so funny. The four of us ended up going out for lunch together. At first, I thought they might be trying to hit on us, but it turned out they were really young, fresh out of high school, and were feeling a bit lost, living away from home for the first time. It reminded me a lot of how I felt when I came here to Oceanview. Everything seemed so strange and wondrous back then. They kept staring up at the buildings or saying things like "the sky is so big in America." They were very friendly, but they treated Satomi and I more like big sisters than potential girlfriends. Satomi didn't seem to mind, but I definitely wasn't used to be treated like an 'older' woman. I was only 21 for heaven's sake. Still, we soon became friends, and hung around together.
I started spending more and more time at Satomi's dorm, getting to know Sarah, Natasha, Takuya, Hiro and them. Sarah and Natasha swam, so I invited them to come with me to the pools on campus. They both turned out to be pretty good swimmers. Sarah especially would dive into the pool so gracefully, and swim really fast with her long arms. I was so glad to find people to come swimming with me.
One morning, I woke up in Satomi's room. Satomi had already gone off to breakfast, but I could hear her other dorm mates rattling around. I wanted to have a shower, so I took off my p.j.'s, wrapped a towel around myself, and cautiously peeked out her door. No one seemed to be out in the hall, so I quickly ran across to the bathroom, took off my towel, and hung it on the hook just outside the shower. It felt so weird to be naked in the public area of the dorm, but exhilarating too.
One strange thing about this dorm is all the bathrooms are co-ed. I guess it used to be a male dorm, but even after they let girls in, they didn't build more washrooms, but just made the ones they had co-ed. You'd be there doing your make up or whatever, and a guy would walk in. It was so weird. In Japan, I think almost all washrooms are just for women or just for men.
Anyway, while I was showering naked, I heard guys coming this way. I got all panicky, wondering what to do. I hadn't brought any clothes with me just the towel. I stood there quiet, while two of them came right in, standing just a few feet from where I was.
"Who's that girl staying with Satomi?" I heard one ask.
"Oh yeah, I've seen her around before. I think her name is Emi."
Hey! That's me! Curious, I pushed the shower curtain aside, and peeked out trying to see if I knew them. I got so nervous though that I slipped, and almost fell.
"Kya!" I squealed. The guys went silent. They knew I was here. They could probably see my bare feet under the bottom of the curtain. I turned off the shower, and stuck my hand out trying to find my towel. I got it off the hook, but all tense, I ended up dropping it on the floor.
"Are you OK, Miss?" one of the guys asked, clearly talking to me. I was so frightened I didn't answer at first. I knew they must be watching. I squatted down, and felt around outside for the towel.
"Oh, here. Let me get that for you." This guy came right into the shower area, and picked up my towel. "Here you go," he said, his voice wavering a bit. I stood back up, and pushed open the curtain a crack. Both of them were staring straight at me, so I covered my breasts with one arm, and quickly took the towel from the guy who was holding it out. I pushed the curtain back shut, and hurried to towel off. It was so weird being naked with these guys right here.
"You're Emi, aren't you?"
A shiver ran up my spine. How did he know my name?
"We met at the toga party a while back," he explained. I vaguely remembered him. I met a lot of people that night. I guess he might have been one of the guys I danced with. I toweled off as quickly as I could. I felt so tense, and then I heard someone else come in.
"Good morning!" one of the boys said.
"Morning." It was a girl's voice. "Um, do you guys think you could... uh... leave? I want to take a shower." I finally recognized the voice as Sarah's. I was so glad.
"Uh, yeah, OK," the guys said, slowly backing away. I waited until I was sure they were gone, and then finally opened the curtain.
"Emi? What are you doing here?" Sarah exclaimed.
"Me? I was just taking a shower when those guys came in. Thanks by the way for chasing them off."
"Yeah, no problem," she nodded, taking off her towel. Sarah had a deep tan except for where her bikini bottoms must have been. There was something strangely erotic about how white the area around her pussy was compared to the dark brown of her legs and tummy. It must have been quite a revealing bikini. Even her breasts seemed tanned. I kept staring at her, fascinated, but she didn't seem embarrassed at all. She could be a model.
"Where did you get that tan?" I asked, curious.
"Oh, in Italy before I left."
"Do you sunbathe topless?" I asked gesturing towards her breasts.
"Yeah. Oh, I guess people don't do that here," she smiled.
"There's a nude beach just at the back of the campus down the cliffs."
"Really?"
"Do you want to go?" I asked. I'd heard that Europeans are more relaxed about nudity than people here in the States.
"Um. Well, I don't know. What's it like?"
"It's kind of small, but the water is nice and warm. I've only been once or twice, and there weren't many people there."
"Yeah, well, maybe some time."
It didn't sound like she was so interested, but at least she wasn't against the idea. Maybe I can get Satomi and Natasha to come with us. That would be fun.
A few weeks passed without much happening. Then one day, I dropped by at the dorm, and found Satomi studying up in her room. No one else seemed to be around, and it was too nice a day out to be inside, so I convinced her to come down, and sunbathe with me in the quad. We laid out a big blanket on the grass, lay down, and relaxed. Satomi had some test coming up that she had to study for, so she brought her books. I told her about Sarah, and our plan to go to the nude beach.