(
Note to Readers:
This is an entry in the Summer Lovin' Contest, so please read and vote and comment and do whatever you do in a contest. All sex acts, within the story events and referred to outside the story events, involve characters who are at least 18 years old. All of the sex is straight and vanilla, two people at a time. The story is set in the U.S.A. in the summer of 2021. The two main characters are NOT conventionally attractive, and they have mental health issues. Don't say you weren't warned.)
***
Ziri pushed back the screen door and clomped onto the front porch. She asked, "What's a nudist's biggest problem?"
Eldon could tell that she already had an answer, so he said, "People pointing and laughing."
Tess, rocking slowly on the porch swing, said, "Butt crack sunburn."
Arch didn't look up from his phone. "Society's laws." As always from him, relevant but not funny.
Ziri declared, "Finding a place to sit!" She let fall to the porch a small but bulky thing with straps. Triumphantly she added, "Problem solved!"
Eldon leaned to peer at whatever it was. "Are those my seat cushions?"
"Uh huh," said Ziri, nodding.
Arch looked over. "Those are backpack straps."
"Yeah," said Ziri, looking at him. "They were yours." She turned quickly to Tess. "And your white bath towel is in here. So you all contributed, which is why we'll share equally the fortune this will earn. But I get full credit for being the inventor."
The loud objections of her housemates delayed Ziri's explanation of how the swiped stuff solved a problem for people unknown to them.
The noise brought out Mrs. Driscoll from the kitchen. She wiped her hands on her apron and said, "What's all the fuss about?" in a voice that wasn't loud but always got immediate attention.
"Ziri--just plain
stole
stuff from us!" Tess spluttered. The presence of the house's co-owner made Tess take this further. "You should kick her out. Hell, we should call the cops!" Eldon and Arch shouted agreement.
"Let's calm down," said Mrs. Driscoll, holding out a placating hand. The others obeyed instantly, not sure why they did, but she had that effect on them. "Ziri, did you steal from them?"
"I took their things without asking," Ziri replied. "But as I just told--"
"Then make it up to them. That way we don't have to bring in the police." The look on her face showed that Mrs. Driscoll definitely didn't want the police on her property. She and her husband complied with the town's arcane law that allowed them to run a boarding house near the college campus, but she still wanted no trouble.
Ziri spoke with urgent speed. "I needed the stuff now, I had to see if this worked! And I was fair, so all three would--"
"Make it up to them," said Mrs. Driscoll. Same volume, more intense gaze.
Ziri exhaled, and looked at Tess. "I'll buy you three white towels." To Arch: "You can pick out a new backpack, yours had holes in it, the straps practically came off--"
"Find one on your phone," Mrs. Driscoll told Arch. "Send the link to Ziri, she'll pay for it." She looked at Eldon. "What'd she take from you?"
"Two seat cushions from the Tri-City Tornado," said Eldon, getting more upset. "A giveaway from two years ago. The team went out of business, because of COVID-19! The cushions are collectable! She can't replace--"
Mrs. Driscoll held out her own phone, already on a sports memorabilia site. "Show me how much they're worth."
Eldon ran out of steam. "I use them, uh, when I go to games on campus." Tess's laugh deflated him further. "Sentimental value?"
"Ziri, you owe him ten dollars. I'm not kicking you out, but you better learn some impulse control." Mrs. Driscoll looked at whatever it was that Ziri had dropped on the porch. "So what is this thing that caused so much trouble?"
"The Neat Seat!" said Ziri, picking it up with a proud smile. "That's the best name I've thought up so far. I haven't done the trademark search yet, but I know it's better than The Carcass Parker--"
"And it's for what?"
"Well, imagine you're a nudist, but you--"
"I will
not
imagine that," said the landlady.
Eldon, fundamentally a horny guy, couldn't help looking at Mrs. Driscoll and imagining that for her. She was tall, and lean and fit for a mother of four. She and Mr. Driscoll were always formal and polite around their boarders. But, thirty years married, and four kids, and him even taller, also lean and fit...
"But you want to be a good person," Ziri pressed on, putting her arms through the straps with the rest of the bulk on her upper back.
"A good person?" said Eldon. "Like, someone who respects other people's property?"
Ziri ignored that. "And keep your butt away from furniture. When you're hiking, you don't want to rest on top of twigs and rocks and bugs." She fastened the crosspiece between the straps, just below her collarbone, and started gesturing freely, to show that The Neat Seat didn't confine her.
"It's a fucking infomercial," Tess muttered.
Ziri grinned, and played that up in her voice tone. "But now you can be naked, and still have what you need to sit down, without distress to yourself or anyone else." She elevated her spine to show that the front of her torso would be away from all of the straps, and able to commune with nature, were it not for her Aeropostale t-shirt.
"The rough nylon of the straps is lined with felt, providing soft contact to bare skin." Ziri twisted the straps to show this. "There's also felt between the plastic of the seat exterior and the wearer's back, to limit sweat and stickiness."
"Where'd you get the felt?" asked Arch darkly.
"I have lots of sewing stuff," Ziri said, taking no offense, as she undid the cross strap and shucked off the burden. "Like these zippers." She was already unzipping it while setting down the construct that was based on two square, foam-filled seat cushions. The zippers, with their tops together, connected the cushion stack on three sides. The other side was secured, more or less, with duct tape.
Ziri crouched to open The Neat Seat, revealing the white towel sewn onto the cushions. "Simply unzip The Neat Seat," said Ziri, returning to her pitch, "set it flat on the ground, or a chair, get the straps out of the way, and sit on the comfort of plush cotton backed with foam rubber." She did just that, cross-legged, contacting the towel with her cargo shorts and a small amount of leg skin.
"Couldn't you just carry a towel around?" asked Tess. Seeing Ziri about to shoot that down, Tess quickly added, "Or tie a towel around your waist, to keep your hands free?"
"This is better for afterwards!" Ziri stood, and picked up the seat. "When you get up, simply zip the seat closed, and anything that might have migrated from your nether region is tucked away from contact with you, or anyone, or anything else." With a dramatic flourish, Ziri closed the zippers, put her arms through the straps, and strode down the porch steps. Then, with an about face, she ascended the steps while saying, "And when you get home, simply remove the cotton seat liner and put it in your next hygienic laundry load."
"And if you call in the next ten minutes," said Eldon, trying for the same voice, "We'll send you a second Nudist Asswipe at no additional charge!"
Ziri shot him A Look, but still smiled.
Deciding that the incident was over, Mrs. Driscoll looked at all four and said, "Our house rules still call for proper attire, so nobody will be using this here. And if anyone goes out streaking, don't call us to bail you out." She returned to the house. Eldon thought he saw a smile curl her lip.
***
Ziri Klefstadt, majoring in Business & Economics, had been especially amped by her spring-trimester class in Entrepreneurship. She followed what she'd learned about starting a business, by hatching an idea for the business to pursue. She pursued the idea from scribbles to designs (some of them dead ends), and finally to her mockup Neat Seat.
That night, long after the front porch kerfuffle, she gave the mockup a more direct test in her bedroom.
She doffed her cargos and underwear, set the Neat Seat on the hardwood floor, opened it, and sat on it, with her knees up and feet flat on the floor.