Jens Island Excursion

Special thanks to Jen and Shaun Reagh

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Jen's Island Excursion

I was staring out to sea, wondering if what had happened at breakfast was my fault, when my uncle came out of the hotel and asked me to go with him.

"No chance," I said, doing my best to sound firm as I pulled my wrap tighter round my shoulders. Not only had I no wish to go on a jet ski, they scared me. Probably down to a motorcycle accident I'd had as a kid. Twelve years old, fooling about with the guy next door. Grandma was not well pleased. I'd been terrified. He'd hit the curb, I'd fallen off and grazed my knees and elbow.

Why do older men want me to sit on things with them? First the guy next door -- he was always pestering me to try out this bike, or that bike -- he was always buying motorbikes. Retarded juvenile. Must have been close to forty! Now my uncle was doing the same thing. I didn't like them. I felt uncomfortable just looking at them, never mind sitting astride them. When things are between my legs I like to feel in control... sorry, that didn't come out quite as intended, though I guess it was basically true. I had just turned 18. Still a virgin. But no longer quite as proud of it as I had once been.

(Was something wrong with me?)

"Don't be a wuss. You'll love it," said my uncle, striding past, paying no attention to my objections.

He was paying a beach boy from a thick wad of cash he had in his shirt pocket, evil looking jet ski glistening in the shallows beyond -- as if I was going with him and that was that.

Fat chance!

"Take me!" chanted my youngest cousins in unison, now either side of him. Yeah, I thought, take them! So he did. One on the front and one on the back. I watched them go. They loved it!

I wandered back up the beach, took off my wrap, put it on the grass, stretched out to work on my tan ... and thought about breakfast again.

'The youngsters' -- as my uncle calls us -- were first down to breakfast. I was in charge, as the oldest. A breakfast buffet. Thick-leaved tropical plants surrounded the sides of the open restaurant. Tile on the floors, potted plants between the tables, beach and sea beyond. It was warm. The four of us wore swim suits. Mine was a yellow bikini, first time I'd worn it. I'd bought it especially for this trip. Yellow. French. When I put it on in front of the mirror this morning, it looked more brief than I'd thought, but compared to the tiny outfits worn by the young Thai girls also staying in the hotel -- most with Westerners twice their age -- it was modest!

Over my bikini I wore a diaphanous beach wrap my uncle bought me last night in the hotel shop as we were checking in. The boys each got a toy. Sylvia, a Barbie Doll in a tropical outfit. My uncle was generous that way.

We were in Pattaya, Thailand. Palm trees and sun and girls in tiny bikinis, and an endless blue sea dotted with islands and boats and tinged all over -- or was this my imagination -- with the sexual undercurrent of what was said to be Bangkok's weekend playground. (I had read the guide books. And over the past couple of years I had developed a pretty fair imagination where sexual undercurrents were concerned -- a rampant hormones thing!)

My aunt and uncle arrived at breakfast five minutes after us. We were pretty much done but happy to go and get more. Uncle took the seat next to me at the end of the table. Auntie the other end, flanked by the boys. It was a table for four but we'd grabbed two extra chairs so's we all could sit together. That's when it happened, or rather, one minute in is when it happened -- or maybe 'started' is a better way to put it.

"Let me rub some sunscreen on you," my aunt called out, interrupting my memory of breakfast. It was the second offer this morning. Her husband had offered, ten minutes back, before she came out, but I'd declined, covered myself with the parrot wrap to show I wasn't going to expose myself to the sun. Actually I was reluctant to expose myself to him.

My last two years it's been like that. Since I started to become aware that I was... how should I put it... 'grown up.' At least in places! Added to which, I'm not used to having a man around. I never knew my dad, and my mother passed away when I was young so it was always just Grandma and me. My grandmother brought me up. 'Properly' as she puts it. Meaning church twice a week and prayers every night. The only 'man' who ever got close, ever seen me in my bedroom for example, is my Uncle.

Has this made me touchy on the subject?

"There, that's better," said my Aunt, putting the finishing touches to rubbing sunscreen on my back, then patting my shoulder. "We don't want to burn that gorgeous body of yours, now do we?"

There had always been a bit of the slut in my aunt. Grandma would not have approved of a comment like that! But I was used to it by now. Besides, it went with the perv in my uncle, who never missed an opportunity to look, or touch, or kiss, of hug.

Me.

Back to my wrap, and work on my tan, and think about breakfast some more... Uncle got himself a plate of pastries. Bald head, red face, poor shave, huge shirt with tropical flowers, huge shorts the size of a tent, hairy knees, broad calves, and sandals the size of fishing boats. He plonked himself down at the end of the table next to me, legs spread as always, and I suddenly found I had an uninvited knee planted against the side of my leg...

What to do?

Trips anywhere were a rarity when I was growing up. Grandma didn't have that sort of money. My Uncle, so he says, had sold a block of condos somewhere upstate, so he and my Aunt wanted to bring me with them on this holiday, partly to celebrate my birthday -- I'd just turned eighteen -- and partly as a reward for getting into college -- I started next month -- and partly because Uncle Marv, as he boastfully put it, was 'rolling in cash.'

How he'd come to sell a condo when he ran a used car lot, no-one had explained, and as Grandma had brought me up not to question my elders, I hadn't asked. When he phoned to put the invitation to Grandma she had missed the name of where we were going, but he said it was 'somewhere warm' and that I should 'buy a bikini.' (He sent money for that too.) So I bought a bikini. It was only when we reached Baltimore airport that I discovered we were going overseas.

All that money spent on me entitled him to... what, exactly?

Did it entitle him to expect that should his bare knee come into contact with the outside of my bare leg, that I would snatch my leg away, as if he repulsed me? That hardly showed gratitude. Was this all in my mind? Was I so self-absorbed that I believed every man who came close wanted into my pants? (And what did I know about that in any case?)

Which is when he got up to fetch toast he'd put in the toaster.

I sat there with a leg turned numb. A leg I hadn't snatched away from contact with his... hadn't moved at all. I wondered whether I should leave it where it was NOW, to show I didn't find his touch repulsive. I didn't for a moment want him to think that. Do I move it to safety to avoid the embarrassment of not being able to make up my mind?

I left it where it was.

He returned. His bare knee returned to the side of my leg, though lower down this time... or so it seemed. I continued my breakfast. Didn't react. His knee beneath the table dropped further until it was practically under my leg, as if he wanted to lift it. I think I had decided at this stage that although such skin to skin contact might be unpleasant, to move my leg away in an obvious manner would be ungrateful, or impolite, or even an overreaction -- around our table there were plenty of heavily-built and balding Westerners, in much more obvious contact with scantily clad Thai girls ... and they were not complaining. So I stretched my toes, lifted my knee, and let his knee beneath my leg. I then relaxed my leg so it spread over his knee. This seemed to make him happy. I got a lovely smile.

A little later, when I wanted to go to the buffet for more juice and fruit, I wondered what the protocol was. My right leg was over his left knee. His left hand was laid casually on my knee as he listed, with a passion unusual for him, what he loved about the Orient. When a gap appeared in his delivery I said, polite as I'd been taught,

"Can you excuse me a second, Uncle. I want to get more fruit."

Like a perfect gentleman he gave me another lovely smile, lowered his knee from under my leg, and helped by moving my leg with his hand, before taking that too from my knee. I was free to go.

In fact it didn't help, I realized, when at the fruit bar. Now I was left with the dilemma of what to do on my return. As I chose some pineapple slices and mango, I began to wish I'd simply said I was finished and wanted to go to the beach. But I hadn't done that so I had to return to the table. What would he expect when I returned? If I sat well away from him -- I could take one of my cousins' seats as the boys had left and gone to the beach -- then what would he think? That I was ungrateful? That simple physical contact was something I had a problem with? (A teenage Thai girl just three tables away was sitting on fat red German man's lap feeding him a banana for goodness sake!) They already thought of me as a bit of a nerd -- sheltered upbringing, many of Grandma staid opinions -- so this would just support that opinion.

GET A LIFE!

I returned to the table with my fruit and sat where I had before, chair much closer than it needed to be now that there were just the four of us at the table. Despite that, I sat in the chair in the position I'd left it and put my leg back where it had been. His knee was still there so I stretched my toes, lifted my knee and upper leg, and made it... how do I put this... 'available' to him, should he wish to return to our previous position.

Which he did.

He listed a few more things about Thailand that were better than his Baltimore home. My knee was eased further over his. His broad hand patted my knee now and then, whenever he emphasized a point. Once or twice the pat was a little further up my leg, or so it seemed. But again this was merely, it seemed, his way of emphasizing a point. And sometimes the squeezes were more generous than they needed to be. But they were gentle. And I got a greater number of smiles from my uncle that I can ever remember having received in the past, so I let it be, and smiled back.

At one point his knee lifted my leg so high my toes came off the floor -- and my legs are longer than his by more than a couple of inches! Then Auntie said we were finished and it was time to go. So we went. He didn't complain. Nothing about his demeanor suggested he wanted to keep the contact going, or that the contact had been anything more than him being friendly.

"Okay cupcake, you're next."

My Uncle was back.

I opened my eyes. The round red face; the close-set black-currants of his eyes; the hair on his chest -- I don't think I'd realized how hairy he was, although I'd seen him in his shorts before. His shirt hung open. He was big. Not just his pot belly, but all over. Even his shoulders were big. There was nothing 'ripped' about my uncle, he was just big, in a lumbering water-buffalo way.

He'd never called me 'cupcake' before. No-one had. Was this the result of breakfast? The result of me letting him lift my leg off the floor and letting him casually touch me? The fact that I would permit such things -- hadn't I? Yet out of the corner of my eye, not 20 feet away, the fat German from breakfast had his pretty Thai Girl laid out on top of him, actually lying on top of him, front to front. He on his back, she on his front. Not something you'd see in Baltimore! Was this the norm in this part of the world? Was my uptight reaction to physical contact... childish... backward... naïve?

"I don't really like those things," I said, leaning up on my elbows, looking at the jetski in the shallows, one of my cousins restraining the beast.

"Come on, get a move on!" my cousin shouted from the shallows.

At me. As if I was the one holding things up, as if he wanted to go again but his father said they must share the fun with their cousin, as if I would be mean if I didn't 'hurry up.' Was I being mean to all of them if I didn't join the fun? Grandma always taught me that if you're about to react in a way someone else may find unpleasant then you should count to ten, and then be pleasant instead.

So I did. I smiled up at my Uncle and said, "Just a quick run round the bay?"

Another happy smile from my uncle. His eyes had come to mine by way of my breasts, but that was just his way. I was used to that. He was always looking at me. I'd got used to it over the years. And it was nothing compared to what was going on between the nearby German and Thai girl. (German was one of my languages at school. I'd heard him speak German to the girl, who'd replied half in German, half in English, though her giggles were clearly Thai!)

What happened next surprised me. My uncle reached a hand down to help me up. It made me feel good to be treated this way. To be treated like a lady. Had my approval rating soared since breakfast? I took his hand. Stood up. I am taller than he is, so I looked down on him slightly, and my weight is distributed differently - I have a good figure - but as my Aunt was quick to point out, most girls my age have.

"C'mon," said my uncle, still with my hand in his, taking me off down the beach. There sat the jet ski. Yamaha written large on its purple flank.

"Take me. Take me," said his daughter, catching up with us. The boys were back up the beach chattering away to each other, filled with excitement from their ride. Why did they like it so much?

"I'll take you next, sweetie," my uncle said to his daughter, pulling me into the shallows. "First your grown up cousin wants to see the island out there." He pointed at the island I'd admired from the breakfast table. I said it would be nice to go there but I'd meant in a boat, not on the back of a jetski.

Once next to the jetski, he asked if I wanted to drive, which was probably the last thing on earth I wanted. No, I said. Did I want to sit in front or behind, at which my mind did the uncharitable thing: Where would I be safest from his touch?

Grandma always taught me not to think bad of people. My uncle was keen to take me to the island, that was clear. So surely I should accept graciously as Grandma had taught me. My eyes were on the jet-black jetski. It could hardly be dangerous, after all my two young cousins had just been out -- though I don't think they went as far as the island. They'd obviously enjoyed it. And he was right, I had said I wanted to go to the island. I thought he may have wanted me along on the trip merely to babysit the cousins -- which I was happy to do anyway -- but maybe he was just being kind. If I was a generous person couldn't I give him the benefit of the doubt and stop being such a tight-ass?

I sat behind.

Once he was astride the beast I swung my leg over the saddle behind him, as instructed.

"Wrap your arms around my waist," he said.

He gave it a little gas to show me that if I didn't hang on round his waist I'd fall off the back. I put my arms round him, my body angled back, away from his ample ass.

Whoooom!

Jeeesus!

The wind was something else, charging into the waves like this. Which is when I realized I'd left my wrap on the beach, and my groin had my uncle's ass pressed hard against it -- but I could do nothing about it. I had to hang on for dear life. I rested my cheek against his back and said a cautionary prayer.

How would God feel, I wondered, about me praying not to die in the next half hour when I was pressed, half naked, against my uncle's broad back with my hands inside his shirt around the front, holding on to his skin for dear life... and becoming aware of the vibration against my pussy, and the fact that what I had between my legs was warm and male, and that the smooth inside of my legs was pressed against the hair on the outside of his?

More than a few Hail Marys.

The trip to the island couldn't have taken more than ten minutes but it seemed to take a lifetime. I'd become hugely aware of the fact that it was my uncle between my legs. The machine's vibration, the feel of him in front of me, and the bench vibrating seat beneath me, the heat and hair of his legs against the inside of mine, the cold wind and spray whipping round me, the warmth and broadness of his back against my shoulders and cheek, and the fact that my arms were wrapped around him... complicated!

I'd moved my hands up so they were not on his shorts, which didn't seem the best place to put them -- knowing what was in them as it were! I'd spread them on his middle, just below his ribs. But owing to the bumping and jumping of the craft -- and wanting something more substantial to hold -- my right hand had climbed higher. My fingers were now tangled in the thatch of hair covering his chest. It was instinctive. A larger than usual wave caused the craft to buck and rear, but once we were level and I realized where my hand was, I found I was faced with a question similar to the one I'd faced during breakfast -- if I moved it away, would I in effect be signalling displeasure? Disapproval? Disgust? That was hardly justified. What, after all, had he done wrong?

Perhaps for the same reasons I left my leg where it was beneath the breakfast table, I left my hand on his chest. I doubt he even noticed. Judging from the running commentary he gave me over his shoulder -- about the jet ski, the island, the state of the sea, how pleased he was I was with them on their holiday -- there was no sign he even noticed. Which seemed to confirm I'd done the right thing in leaving it there. After all, I hadn't put it there so I could feel the hair on his chest.

We approached the island and slowed, then stopped. I hesitated, faced with the same problem, again: I was pressed against him, arms around him, cheek against his shirt collar, yet now that we were stopped I didn't need to be this close, but to what degree could I move away? My position against him was not his fault. If I broke contact would he be offended? Would it suggest I disliked him?

I didn't.

"It's a lovely island but I thought there'd be a beach," he said, seemingly unaware I was as close as I was, and pressed so tight against him. I lifted my head to look over his shoulder. I left my hands where they were, my arms around him. Resisted the temptation to draw my groin back from his butt or open my legs. If he was unaware of my proximity then I shouldn't draw his attention to it. Pulling away surely would.

We were getting on fine -- don't spoil it!

"Maybe there's one around the other side?" I suggested, for there was certainly no beach on this side. But no sooner had I said it than I realized that might not have been too clever. Did I want him to go around the other side? Out of sight of the hotel?

"You're right," he said, delighted at the suggestion. "Let's go take look!"

Whoooom!

Jeeesus!

I grabbed a tighter hold of him and felt bad about my miserable opinion of my uncle -- all men perhaps. Why couldn't I just accept people did things for good reasons? What evidence did I have he wanted to take me out of view of the hotel for bad things? Absolutely none! It was all in my head. He was being kind, including me in the fun, going out of his way to make sure I was involved to the same degree his family was, that was all!

Get that through your thick skull, Jen!

As we rounded the island I pressed myself harder against him to show him, I think -- and perhaps show myself -- that this proximity thing was no big deal; that I was as okay with it as he was ... even if perhaps, deep down, I wasn't.