Contryside Adventures Ch 01

With thanks to neuroparenthetical for masterful editing.

With thanks to Andreas_Kreuz and Iamthatwhore for their reviews.

Pay attention to the tags.

I laid everything out on the table: two camera bodies, three lenses, flash, batteries, memory cards, microfiber cloths, blower, brushes, straps, clamps, and cords. One tripod leaned against the wall. The other was still in the car.

The 24-70 lens was filthy. Dried mud on the hood. I took it off, wiped it down, blew dust from the glass. Cleaned the mount. Set it aside.

Next, the 85. Smudged. Fingerprint on the front element. Wiped. Done.

Camera bodies were fine. No new damage. Battery doors still tight. I swapped out cards, formatted them. Labeled fresh ones. Charged everything that wasn't full.

Checked the flashes. Test fired both. One misfired. Loose connection. I reseated the batteries. Fired again. All good.

I looked out the window.

The river was wide and slow, moving steady past the trees far below. Its surface caught the light in patches -- brown water with a hint of gold. No boats out at the moment. Just still water and heat.

The whole valley stretched out in green. Palm trees, banana trees, tamarind, mango, teak. Thick canopy in some spots, open in others. Birds made noise in the distance -- nothing sharp, just background sound.

Between the trees, houses stood quiet. Single-story, mostly. A few bigger ones. Metal roofs, some tiled. Painted walls in shades of cream, blue, and green. Nothing flashy. No signs of damage or neglect either. Yards were swept. Fences were straight. A few had neat rows of plants -- chili, lemongrass, morning glory.

A motorbike came down the path near the river, kicking up a long line of dust behind it. I saw it through a break in the trees, the engine noise reaching me a second later -- thin, high-pitched, echoing off the water.

A steep drop stood between me and that path. My place sat high on the bank, with a sharp slope running down through the grass and brush. I could not see them in great detail.

The bike wasn't fast, just steady. The rider kept close to the edge of the path, where the grass met the slope. The pillion rider sat upright, one hand on the back rail. Mid-length hair, loose and dark, blown sideways in the wind.

It looked like Ivan and Darlene.

The frame matched. Ivan in front -- thin, slouched forward, elbows out, helmet too big or maybe just loose. Darlene sat behind him, legs tucked close, one knee pressed against the side of the bike. She wore a white shirt and jeans, or something like jeans. Sunglasses. Her hair whipped around her face but didn't seem to bother her.

She looked good, even from that distance. She always had.

When we'd been kids, people had noticed her. She'd always had that kind of presence that pulled eyes without trying. Even back then -- thirteen, fourteen -- she'd turned heads. Not in a loud way. Just walked into a place and people had noticed.

Slim, girly figure. Long legs. Her hair was dark and usually cut short around her jaw -- sometimes a bit longer, depending on the year. It always looked right. No frizz, no mess, just clean lines that swung when she laughed.

Big eyes, sharp nose, full mouth. Skin a warm tone, even brown from being outside all the time. She didn't hide from the sun. A shade darker than most of the other girls, always tan, always glowing like she spent more time outside than in.

She was loud in a good way. She laughed a lot. Quick, easy laugh.

She went to a different school. Lived farther out, past the old rubber grove. We'd only see her at temple fairs or local games.

We hadn't talked much growing up, just known each other by sight. Ivan hadn't talked to her at all, as far as I knew.

And yet: there he was on the back of his bike, dust in their wake, cruising the river path like it was theirs.

How the hell had Ivan pulled that off?

He was my age, give or take. Medium height. Always looked like he got dressed in the dark. Bad shirts, worse pants. Hair like he cut it himself with a pocket knife. Skin had never cleared up, even after school.

I watched until the trees swallowed them again.

***

Every Sunday, people gathered at the big open lot near the old bus depot. It turned into a market, a fair, whatever you wanted to call it. Rows of stalls under tarp roofs. Some with tables, some just blankets on the ground.

You could get anything there -- grilled chicken, fish balls, fruit shakes, noodles, shirts, knives, phone cases, toy guns, cheap jewelry, secondhand tools. There were booths with loudspeakers selling snake oil and skin cream. Kids ran around with sugar on their faces. Music came from three directions at once. Someone always had a mic.

I went most weeks. Sometimes for photos. Sometimes just to eat and walk around.

Ivan and Darlene were regulars too. I saw them a lot. Not just walking side by side -- more like chasing each other, dodging through the crowd. Sometimes she'd be ahead, tugging his arm, weaving between stalls like she knew a shortcut. Other times he'd be the one pulling her, holding her hand as they ducked under some plastic sheet or slipped behind a row of tents.

They showed up in places you didn't expect -- between the noodle stall and the place selling rubber boots, crouched behind a wall of water bottles, or sitting low behind the truck where a guy sold speakers out of the back. Always moving, laughing, ducking out of sight, showing up again on the other side of the market.

***

Not far from the market -- maybe a ten-minute walk -- there was the beach. That's what people called it, though it wasn't sand and waves. It was a stretch of riverbank, thick with trees -- mostly palms and tamarind -- flat enough for people to sit, eat, and waste time.

Down by the water, a few wooden shacks stood in a row. Just simple things -- bamboo floors, open sides, thatched roofs. Each one could fit a group of five or six. People sat on mats -- shoes off, legs crossed -- drinking iced tea or beer, eating grilled fish, papaya salad, fried chicken, sticky rice in little baskets.

A little farther inland, past the first line of trees, there were more huts and small food stalls. Some had charcoal grills going all day. Others had ice boxes full of soda, bottled water, and bags of ice tied with rubber bands. A few served fresh juice or fruit cut on the spot. Nothing fancy. Just wooden counters, coolers, plastic chairs.

It was busy on weekends. Whole families came out. Teenagers, couples, people from the next village over. Music played low from someone's speaker. Dogs wandered through now and then, hoping for scraps. The river moved slowly, same as always.

One long afternoon, I was at the beach. The heat had started to pull back, but the ground still gave off warmth. Air moved through the trees now -- slow, steady wind shaking the leaves, rustling through palm fronds. It felt good on the skin.

Groups of people were scattered around, most of them young. Some sat in the riverside huts, legs stretched out, food wrappers and beer bottles between them. Others lounged on mats under the trees. Loud talk, bits of music, someone laughing too hard.

A guy grilled something over a small charcoal stove. Smoke drifted sideways. Another poured ice into a plastic bucket, handed out drinks.

It wasn't packed, but it was full enough. Familiar faces, familiar setups. People doing what they always did -- talk, eat, drink, scroll, shout, nap.

The river moved quiet in the background, same as always.

From where I sat, I saw them come out from behind the shacks -- past the tree line, through the narrow space between two huts. Ivan and Darlene.

They weren't holding hands. Just moving one after the other, weaving between huts, checking what was open. Ivan walked ahead, glancing back now and then. Darlene followed a few steps behind. Her clothes were in place, but her face caught my attention.

In the sunlight, it looked pale -- not her usual tone. Like it was plastered with thick, chalky makeup. When they got closer, I could see the application was smeared, uneven. A faint, wet-looking sheen across her cheeks, forehead, chin, around her mouth.

Up close, it was clearer -- a thin, streaky film. Frothy at the edges, drying in spots. It could have been only one thing: Ivan's cum, rubbed on her face. His face was clean. His shirt looked rumpled.

No, that type of thing wasn't happening around the village. But then, the two of them weren't the ordinary boy and girl always together.

They both looked relaxed. No attempt to hide anything. Darlene had a lazy smile. She said something to Ivan and laughed. He didn't respond -- just kept walking, like it was nothing out of the ordinary.

Time passed. The sun dropped lower. Shadows stretched out across the ground.

Ivan and Darlene came and went. Sometimes I saw them at one of the hut bars by the river, sitting with a group -- eight, maybe ten people crowded around a low table. Plastic chairs, bottles of soda, beer, plates stacked with half-eaten food. They sat close but didn't hang off each other. Just part of the scene.

The wind picked up. It tugged at shirts, lifted Darlene's hair across her face. She pushed it back without thinking. The rustling of the trees took over the background -- palm blades knocking against each other, dry and rhythmic. It was louder than the lounge music playing from a speaker near the bar.

They got up again later. Left their drinks. Walked off toward the back of the huts, where the forest thickened behind the food stalls. Third time I'd seen them take that path. No one else used it. There was nothing back there but trees, brush, a dirt trail.

They were gone for a while. Came back looking the same -- Darlene with that loose, slow walk, adjusting her waistband. Ivan looking blank, like a guy waiting for food.

Nobody ever asked or said anything to them about it. Not a word. It was just... normal. Everyone kept to their own.

Only once, as I sat there with a drink, the chatter around me fading in and out, did I hear a voice to my side daring to speak of it. Low, casual -- a woman's voice, though I didn't look. "She's wearing his semen." I did not actually know what she was referring to, but it could not have been many things.

It wasn't the first time I'd noticed Ivan and Darlene slipping off together, but it was the first time I really thought about it. The way those words were dropped... like it was no surprise, like it was obvious.

That was when the thought hit me -- maybe I had been blind to it. There was something in the way they moved, the way they interacted, that I hadn't picked up on before. Something about their dynamic shifted in my mind.

Maybe they were more than just two people fucking around.

***

Later, thinking it over, the whispers came back to me. The rumors. The things people said about Ivan and Darlene, about the stuff they posted online.

Kids, young people, were always posting stuff online. Always sharing. Pics, videos, little bits of their lives for everyone to see, or not see, depending on the circles they moved in.

Ivan & Darlene were no different. Whatever it was they were doing, they hadn't tried to hide it. It had always been out in the open, but somehow, I'd missed it.

The talk -- I'd brushed it off. Just noise. Idle gossip laced with that small-town mix of moral panic and boredom, full of half-baked outrage -- that self-righteous murmur of small towns. I'd ignored it. People needed something to cluck about.

But after that day on the beach, watching them slip behind the huts like it was the most natural thing in the world -- Darlene laughing, Ivan too casual, too at ease -- I couldn't keep pretending it was nothing.

One slow afternoon, I searched for the recordings -- the ones they'd shared.

They were not few, but they weren't that many either. Not by the standards of our generation. But while the count was ordinary, the content was not. It wasn't new to me -- I'd seen things like it before. Just not from people I knew. Not people from there.

Most of it was sex that shouldn't have happened, or at least, shouldn't have been filmed.

Her on all fours in a tiled bathroom, clutching the bowl, him fucking her from behind while pressing her face down in the toilet. The two of them standing, facing each other, fucking on a narrow bridge at night -- one that saw heavy foot traffic by day. More sex standing in a sunlit alley near the market, town folk visible in the distance. The roof of a department store, overlooking the same crowded square.

Then the field: rain-slicked, village rooftops in the background. Them frolicking and fucking on the ground, covered in mud. Another from what looked like the same day -- still naked, mud-smeared, slipping through the back alleys of the village, pausing often to kiss, to grope. Faces consumed, devoured with the intensity of wild beasts feeding. Tits and genitals pulled, grabbed, twisted with careless urgency.

For some of these occasions. Somebody must have been there with them, somebody must have held the camera. The angle was dynamic, the focus intentional.

A sizable portion of their "portfolio" was toilet sex. That was the really wild part, the kind of play most people never do or admit to. At first, I thought it was strange that I hadn't heard about Ivan & Darlene doing that. Plenty of people must have known. I had no trouble finding the vids. No doubt others had found them long before I did. But the truth is, I

had

heard the whispers about their dirty sex. I just didn't think it was that dirty.

Most of the recordings were variations on the same theme. He'd take a dump on her face, in her mouth, then he'd fuck her. On a few occasions, she'd be the one taking a dump in his mouth, then it was the same rough, urgent sex. It was plenty obvious they were comfortable with doing these types of things, and that they played a lot more than they recorded. Things like rubbing excrement onto their faces, like pushing filthy fingers down their throats. Things like brown kisses.

I suppose most people find all that repugnant. I suppose it's for good reasons. I suppose it -- because I'm not like that.

I was finding it arousing.

But unlike Ivan & Darlene, up to that moment, I had only ever watched porn about it. If only I had known that some of the hottest brown porn stars were people I knew. Acquaintances. From here. The discovery greatly excited me.

I could not rest.

I could not let it pass.

***

The cafe-bar sat at the corner of the square, where the pavement broke into uneven slabs and the tree roots curled under like sleeping dogs. The square itself was lined with rain trees, their canopies spreading like giant hands. A couple of gnarled frangipani grew near the cafe wall, blooming lazily. Plastic tables and chairs sat half in sun, half in shadow, scattered like they'd been blown there by a quiet wind. More than a few of the chairs were cracked.

"You two, huh?" I said. "Made your art and passed me by -- the best photographer and video artist in town."

"The only one," Ivan said, deadpan.

"But seriously -- I've got some seriously good equipment."

"What do you say?" Darlene asked Ivan. "Do we call him next time?"

"You couldn't afford this guy, sugar."

"Harsh," I said, feigning hurt. "I was offering a volunteer engagement. No charge. My gift to culture."

"Pro bono?" she asked.

"Pro bono," I said, and winked at her.

"Classy."

We sipped our drinks. I waited for an answer that never came.

"Ever thought about expanding your portfolio?" I asked them. "New locations, new themes? Go where you haven't been before?"

They exchanged a brief look, and said almost in unison: "Nah."

More sipping drinks. I surveyed the large dirt square. A squirrel darted across the open ground, quick and nervous, then scrambled up the trunk of a nearby tree and vanished into the branches.

"You don't have a programme, do you?" I said. "A grand plan you're working from? Some artistic vision you're trying to bring to life?"

They laughed.

"Not to worry," I continued undeterred. "I've got plenty of ideas. I'm also a film director, you know."

More laughter. Louder that time. Ivan snorted.

"Maybe we do have a plan," Darlene said, grinning. "New settings. New locales."

"Like?"

"The eastern knoll," Ivan said, like he was thinking aloud.

The river road from the village passed right at its foot. "I like it. What about it?"

"We go there," Darlene said. "Get naked. He poops on my face, then rubs it all over me, head to toes. Then we just stand there."

The spot was visible from the market -- close enough that people could tell something was happening, but too far to make out the details. Unless they had binoculars. Or a spyglass.

"Brilliant," I said flatly. "Bold."

"You don't like it," Darlene said, with real or fake concern.

"It's fine. But listen -- you two need to do something radically different. Raise the stakes. Reinvent the game."

"And you just happen to know how," Ivan said, smirking.

"Exactly! Want to hear my ideas?"

Another look passed between Darlene and Ivan. They shared a shrug.

"Alright," Darlene said. "What've you got?"

Darlene looked at me expectantly. Ivan had no expression, but he was watching too. Only I chickened out. Couldn't bring myself to say what I'd really been thinking. All the earlier swagger, the cringe, the phony director act -- it drained out of me. I didn't trust they'd take to my wishful little plan, so instead, I reworked theirs.

"Here's what," I said. "There are no stakes in getting naked on top of a hill. But do it at the gas station five klicks down the road. That's something. Not a lot of traffic, and fewer people actually stop -- but someone might. Someone might need fuel, a piss, a bottle of water. And there's the staff."

"Where at the gas station?" he asked, interested. "Behind the house? Or across the road?"

"Too risky. You'll get caught for sure. I was thinking about the toilet block. You won't find anybody in there. But if there's someone, you wait. She strips inside. You shit on Darlene, and see she wears it all over her. Then you two walk out across the parking lot to the car. It's empty like all the time. You stay out in the open. Linger. Hang around as long as you dare."

***

The road ran straight in long stretches, curving gently past a hill. Fresh black tarmac, smooth and untouched, shimmered faintly in the heat.

On either side, the rice paddies stretched out wide and flat, broken into neat rectangles by narrow earthen borders. The water in them reflected the sky like glass. Young green shoots poked above the surface. White egrets moved through the shallows, slow and deliberate, or stood still, statuesque.

Beyond the paddies, the land shifted. Patches of trees clustered together -- coconut palms, banana plants, and thicker, tangled growth. Some trees stood alone in the middle of a field. Others formed dense groves that looked almost dark from the outside.

Knolls rose in all directions, covered in thick grass, trees, and scrubby undergrowth.

Above it all, the sky stretched deep and blue. The late afternoon light made everything glow -- the leaves, the water, the road. No other cars. No other people. Just the hum of insects.

Then the road curved again, and the gas station came into view. The building was low and square, glass-fronted, and modern. Inside, rows of shelves and a counter stood in clear view.

Two fuel pumps stood out front, painted bright green and white. A metal signboard listed the prices.

Past the station, the parking lot opened wide and empty. I drove the oversized pickup to the far end and killed the engine.

I turned to look at Ivan and Darlene, sitting close on the rear bench. She wore a short pink skirt and a white strappy top. Her skin was tanned to golden-brown.