All Hands Aboard

“Oh shit! What a cunt I am!”

Coming from Girish, it didn’t surprise me. He had still not grown out of the college lingo in spite of the fact that he has been married for over a decade and a half, had a couple of kids and had resigned from a steady job almost three years ago.

What did surprise me was that he had uttered these words to me in the presence of his wife.

I quickly glanced at Nita and was even more surprised that she didn’t even bat an eyelid. Obviously, this kind of language went with the territory.

“What’s the matter, honey?” she asked him.

“I completely forgot to specify what kind of a sailboat we wanted. And the only thing the assholes have is a single lounge type yacht. Shit! Hey, Mahesh, most of them are your family, could you please plant some kind of a story that will keep out my part in this?”

I grinned at him and then looked at Nita. “Your hubby’s got a pretty handy tool in me,” I told her.

“No kidding, pal. I had told them that the trip would be made in a luxury yacht and each couple would have their own separate cabins. When they realize that this isn’t going to happen, they will fuck me!”

I was embarrassed that he was talking to me as if Nita wasn’t around. After all, one learns not to use army language or college lingo with ladies around.

But I guess Nita was not one of those types of ladies who insisted on ethics, morality or even conduct when it came to usage of four letter words.

To escape from the situation I pretended to study the rest of ‘them’ who were at the moment chattering away between themselves on some topic that involved the inhuman treatment meted out to wild animals. Apparently, the sight of the bison we had hunted down yesterday was still fresh in their minds.

To a certain extent Girish was speaking the truth when he had termed most of them as being part of family.

Deep was my wife’s elder brother and Aparna was his wife. Divya was his second cousin. Atul was her husband.

“Relax, man. I’ll let slip that the hotel’s luxury yacht is under repairs. You take care that it sounds authentic; talk to the manager ASAP. Lucky my wife isn’t around, or she’d have me by my throat.”

“What’s the matter bro? You guys having problems?” Anjali, his sister was walking to us, having broken away from the rest of the group. When she heard about the problem, she muttered to her younger brother, “Some kind of a organizer! It’s a stroke of luck that you have Mahesh around, or those guys would have you for breakfast!”

“Tell me about it,” he shrugged philosophically, turning around to walk to the hotel, presumably to talk to the manager.

There was a collective groan when I broke the news to the group. Divya was particularly upset.

“That was supposed to be one of the USP’s of the tour,” she protested. “This isn’t fair! Somebody’s got to take it up with the hotel management.”

“That’s what Girish is doing at the moment. But look, if we are going to waste time just waiting here and arguing with those guys, we would be wasting our time.”

“I say we take whichever boat is available,” declared Deep. Being the eldest (he was 47, an year older than me) his opinions often carried a lot of weight. Luckily for Girish, this time too, it did because everybody agreed.

And that’s how we sailed into the storm.

****

It was an eighty-footer and quite beautiful. Forward, just behind the Control cabin was the captain’s cabin, a tiny cubbyhole, about eight by eight. Next to it was the crew’s shack also of the same size, but fitted with double decked bunkers to sleep four.

Behind this structure was a huge oval shaped lounge, almost a thousand five hundred square feet. The hotel manager had hastily thrown in a few shag rugs, some chairs, a dozen or so pillows and an equal number of blankets. To one end was a small kitchen, which temporarily doubled up as store. There was little beyond alcohol and other small snacks that occupied this room. Attached to this was a slightly larger cubicle with a couple of showers.

The rest of the yacht was open. It was basically built for the foreign visitors: lots of space to simply lie down and soak yourselves with the sun.

Speaking of which, it was a pretty bright day. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky and when the Carpenters sang ‘Top of the World’ from the booming speakers, I thought it was pretty apt.

The captain was a local guy named Joy and another wimp named Raja assisted him. The manager’s young daughter, Nasreen and his daughter-in-law, Parveen acted as guides.

We didn’t really notice them at first, because all we were intent on doing was to drink up as much beer as possible and rib the guy who’d be having his turn with the fishing rod.

“Hey, I got something, I think.”

“Must be the luxury yacht.”

“With his luck, he would pull out a dead whale”

“Oh yeah? Just ‘cos you’re my wife don’t mean you got the right to criticize me. Just wait, I bet it’s a mermaid I got”

“Whatcha gonna do with a mermaid, meathead?”

“Yeah, you can’t screw them”

“I know. I heard they give great head! Ouch, honey that hurt. I was kidding!”

With the beer flowing freely (I swear Girish was adulterating the beer by mixing whisky in it, because it seemed to be getting stronger) tongues got loose and everyone entered the game in the right spirit.

I was seated on a rocking chair away from the stern, nursing my fourth beer / whisky.

“Aren’t you too young to be a guide?” I asked Nasreen who was sitting next to me in a similar chair.

“Oh, but I’m not the regular guide,” she explained. “I’m on vacation and I do these rounds quite often, so I kind of know this place.”

She was an exquisitely beautiful girl. Sort of aristocratic features, satin-soft complexion, almond shaped eyes as blue as the sea and a slim coltish figure, with the curves in the right places. She was, as was everybody on the yacht, wearing minimum clothes: denim shorts and halter. You’d have to be inhuman to wear anything else but minimum cloth with the kind of sun that was blazing down.

I had kidded her by asking her where her burqua (the traditional veil) was and she had kidded right back and asked me what I was doing without my dhoti. She was very easygoing and very, very charming.

“How far are we from the coast?” I asked looking towards the direction from where I presumed we had sailed.

“Approximately eight nautical miles,” Parveen answered for her sister-in-law.

Parveen wasn’t seated on the chair. She was standing, half bent from the waist behind one, her arms resting on the back. This was rather distracting because Parveen, though just as finely sculptured as Nasreen, was more of a woman, and in the position she was in, her half blouse half bikini top revealed the top of her luscious breasts. Plus, the thin material did little to hide the nipples punching through it.

“And how further do we go?” I asked, looking at her.

“Another three miles and we are in the Fisherman’s Cove,” she replied.

“So named because that is or rather used to be a favorite for fishing,” Nasreen interrupted. “It’s a lovely place, you guys will like it. A sort of a reef on a very tiny island, it looks like a kind of a porch. You can set anchor there and shelter yourself from the sun. And believe me, by the time we reach there, you and your friends are going to wish for a little bit of shade.”

There were squeals and screams and we turned to watch a huge wave hit the side of the yacht and spill over the stern. Almost everybody, including the three of us came under it.

“Phew! That was a big one!” I gasped.

Parveen chuckled. “You get many of those around here,” she said, shaking her body furiously to get rid of the water that was dripping over her. This made her large breasts swing under her blouse; the wet material now revealed more of her nipples.

Aware I was suddenly getting an erection, I rose and quickly walked toward the group.

That wasn’t a big help either because the women there too were equally splashed. I noticed Girish trying to wipe off the front of his wife’s top. She giggled and slapped away his hand. Like her sister-in-law Anjali, Nita was large breasted. I suddenly became aware that Aparna and Divya too were large breasted.

I shook my head, as if trying to shake off my thoughts. Jesus Christ! What the hell was I thinking of? I reckoned that maybe with my wife not around, I was getting horny.

There was a kind of a melee going on with the guys pretending to shake the water off their respective wife’s fronts.

“It’s not just at that place, you dolt!” Divya yelled at Atul. “There’s water even on my face and hair!”

“That, the sun will dry quickly. This needs to be dried or you are going to catch a cold,” he laughed.

Anjali was standing alone laughing and flicking away at her blouse. She was about a year younger than me and had lost her husband four years ago.

“Need any help there?” I asked her jokingly.

She smiled at me. “I thought no one would ask,” she quipped and I pretended to pat away the water off her left breast.

She pulled away, laughing. No one had noticed us and I felt a sudden pang of lust coursing through my body at the touch of the soft big flesh inside that blouse.

By the time we reached the Cove, it was four thirty in the evening and we heaved a collective sigh of relief when Joy dropped anchor under the reef.

It was truly an amazing and beautiful place. We clucked our tongues in appreciation and I guess generally made buffoons out of ourselves like most tourists do.

We decided that a swim was in place and everybody, including Nasreen and Parveen joined in. We sloshed each other, tried to duck the next guy / girl and had a heck of a time.

Deep and Divya preferred to stay on board, occasionally yelling out to us and warning us that we were going too far away from the yacht.

Girish took the responsibility of ensuring that we stayed as close to the yacht as possible. Towards the island, the water was only chest deep, and he stood there with Nita, supervising over ‘his flock.’

I noticed Girish and Nita getting more and more physical. Whenever they thought no one was looking, they would quickly grope at each other. I sighed, wishing my wife had been there now.

I felt myself suddenly being pushed below the water and gasping, pulled myself out. Aparna was laughing at me and moved forward to repeat what she had done. I was quicker, because I grabbed her shoulders and pushed her down first. She moved her hands frantically when she went under the water, trying to pull back to the top, and I felt one hand brushing my crotch. I released her, pretending to laugh in spite of the fact that the contact had me getting erect again. This was getting to be too much, I guessed, and began to swim and waddle back to the yacht.

This time Nita dipped me in and as I spun around after emerging from the water, I caught hold of her shoulders and pushed her down. She had been swimming up toward me and that brought her real close to me, so that as she went down, I felt her tits press against my chest, trail down over my belly and finally rub my hard on. As I backed off she emerged, pushing her long hair back over her forehead. Her eyes widened and I guessed she must have felt it too.

“Naughty, naughty,” she whispered abruptly turning around.

I managed to climb back into the boat after a brief round of playful dousing with Parveen. I showered, changed into dry shorts and grabbing a beer, walked over to where Deep and Divya were sitting.

“Why are the two of you here?” I asked lowering myself on a chair beside them.

“I can’t swim,” Divya quickly explained.

“And when I do,” Deep explained, “I usually end up with a running nose.”

“Aparna is enjoying herself,” I remarked, looking at her. She had joined Atul and the other crewmember, Raja (Joy had got back into the yacht) and the three of them were splashing water over a giggling Nasreen.

“She should,” Deep murmured wistfully. “Most girls her age love to have a good time.”

Aparna was thirteen years younger than her husband, and that made her thirty-four. I suddenly felt sorry for Deep: he really wanted to go out there. But he was basically a sort of a permanent patient. He always seemed to be suffering from some or the other handicap, the most common being, of course, cold.

Divya was sitting on the chair, hunched over, elbows in her lap. That afforded me a sight of almost half of her tits from the top of her halter. I mentally cursed myself for thinking about tits because I would inevitably start to sport a hard on.

It was precisely at that point of time that Joy emerged from the control cabin and yelled, “Storm coming up! Quick, quick all of you. Get back in. I can see it coming and its huge!”

They barely managed to scrabble back on board when it hit us. And Joy was right: it was huge. The yacht moved violently as huge waves began to hit it, tilting it precariously, until I thought we would keel over.

The wind began to howl and rush at us, lightning flashed and the skies opened up. It was a typical tropical storm: winds touching almost thirty miles and the rain, hard and furious, driving all of us into the lounge.

The yacht swayed and tilted, the lights flickered. There were quite a few gasps and stifled screams as Joy quickly set about, pulling the French doors shut till the noise level subsided.

“T-this is horrible,” wailed Anjali.

“Not to worry,” Raja seemed to sound almost cheerful. “I’ve seen worse. This will blow away in say, another three to four hours.”

“What the hell do we do until then?” Deep questioned him.

“This boat can’t handle the storm. It has to remain anchored. I have been here before many times,” Parveen volunteered

Maybe it wasn’t new to them, it was to us. We gazed in awe outside the French windows. The black clouds had gathered over us like a blanket and suddenly it was pitch black outside.

“It would be a good idea to shower and relax with a drink,” Nasreen suggested. “I assure you that we are in no danger.”

“What the hell, guys?” Girish yelled, “Like they say, we got nothing to lose but our lives. Lets follow Nasreen’s advice.” The bloke was high with the enormous quantity of beer / whisky that he had consumed. He headed toward the kitchen.

Nita leaped to her feet; she had been sitting cross-legged on the floor. “I’m going to have a shower. There are two showers in there. Care to join?” she indicated to Aparna.

Girish, who was lugging a case of beer looked up. “I wouldn’t mind,” he shouted, and that made everyone laugh, easing the tension a bit.

Aparna agreed to Nita’s suggestion and the two headed to the cubicle.

“I’m going next,” Parveen said.

Having already showered, I accepted a beer from Girish gratefully and lighting up a cigarette, I gazed thoughtfully outside, where all hell was blowing over.

We sat in a kind of a circle and the crew joined us. I was seated on the floor (nobody really had preferred the chairs) upon which Nita had arranged the mattresses and pillows. I was propped up against one side, Anjali on my left and Parveen on my right.

The rest of the gang had curiously paired off in couples. Deep and Aparna sat next to Divya and Atul, Girish, as usual, was with Nita while Nasreen sat between the crewmates.

It all began when there was a loud bang of thunder, a flash of lightening and suddenly, the lights in the yacht dimmed.

We could barely see each other. “Hey, Joy, what happened?”

“What the fuck?” Girish yelled in his usual inimitable style.

“Cut the power, Raja,” instructed Joy. “Put her on the auxiliary. I don’t want a short circuit.”

Raja, armed with a torch, disappeared; we heard the sound of a switch being pulled and suddenly the lights went low. It was as if a dozen very low power lamps instead of the harsh light that had been there earlier lighted up the lounge.

No sooner that happened and there was a sudden giggle. It was Divya.

“Oh god, stop that, will you?” she was telling her husband.

He laughed. “I don’t know about you guys. But I find this situation to be romantic.”

Deep laughed. “Romantic? We are scared to death and you wish to paint landscapes in air?”

“Well, ok then, not romantic, say, horny,” Girish, corrected him.

There were more giggles. I noticed a sudden movement in the corner and could make out Atul leaning to his side and kissing Divya right on the mouth.

They did not just kiss: they also made a loud smacking noise. The light was enough for me to see her mouth open against his.

By the time Raja returned after yelling out to Aparna and Nita the reason for the dimmed lights, his captain had sidled towards Nasreen and they had started kissing each other just as passionately as Atul and Divya were.

I glanced at Anjali. She was sitting there on the floor her eyes shifting rapidly from one couple to the other and it became obvious that she was beginning to breathe hard.

Aparna and Nita returned, refreshed after the shower and both, having changed to skimpy one-piece short skirts.

Parveen, like Anjali, was engrossed in watching the amorous couples kissing, so despite having announced earlier that she was due to have her shower next, Girish and his sister Anjali rushed to the cubicle. Though they were siblings, I thought it was rather strange that they would shower at the same time in one cubicle.

“Hey, what’s going on?” Nita asked approaching Atul and Divya and noticing the way they way they were cuddling to each other.

“That guy started it all,” Parveen announced. “And you know how contagious it is. Look at this shameless pair,” she indicated to her sister-in-law who was now locked in an embrace with Joy having turned to face him. When you are sitting in a cross-legged fashion (like all of us were) it is difficult to kiss without leaning into your partner, and this caused their chests to come into contact.

Aparna took her place next to Deep, and she too started staring at the adventurous couples.

By the time everybody had showered and were nursing their drinks things had started to heat up. The conversation was aimless; in fact, each one was discussing separate topics and the voices seemed to be sort of hushed up.

The action also began to heat up. Girish, always the aggressive guy had pressed himself against his wife, their mouths fused together while his hands were busy fondling her tits through the material of her short one piece skirt. Joy had gone one step further: he had managed to bunch up Nasreen’s skirt over her waist and his hand was moving furiously between her legs; she had pushed her hand into his shorts and I saw the billowing rhythmic movements suggesting that she was wanking him off.

Atul was lying on the floor and Divya was atop his body, grinding herself into him. Her head was thrown back and he was kissing her neck.

Not more than a few feet away, Deep had fished out Aparna’s large tits and bending down, was sucking on one nipple.

All this action was getting through to me. I figured that I was the luckiest, since I had two women sitting on my either side.

“Missing your wife?” Anjali, leaning towards me whispered, her lips brushing my ear. I became aware that she was pressing the side of her tit against my upper arm.

“Lucky you!” cooed Parveen from the other side; boldly reaching across and putting her hand down directly on my bulging crotch.

I groaned. Ever since I had glimpsed her tits when we had started the voyage, I had been watching half naked breasts and legs of various sizes and shapes. The playful dousing in the sea had further ignited my passion, and I wondered whether Parveen was speaking the truth.

Perhaps the booze inside me, and the storm raging outside our anchored yacht made me do what I did next. Casually, as if I hadn’t a care in the world about being watched, I thrust one hand into Parveen’s skirt, from the top, grabbing her naked tits. I was delighted to find that she wore no bra.