The towel-wrapped ensemble trooped up to the top floor and fell hungrily on the small spread laid out. All of the parents except Cindy had eaten and were puttering around doing various things, so everyone was able to fit around the large dining table. The chatter was animated and wide-ranging, at least after a few final volleyball challenges were issued. Much of the talk was about what everyone wanted to do during the rest of the week. The girls' plans mostly centered on the pool, the beach, and shopping at various quaint little shops and shopping centers sprinkled around the area.
When Jack mentioned the small amusement park adjacent to the area's popular boardwalk, everyone thought that sounded fun, and plans were made to go Wednesday evening so that Jack's older sister Martha and her daughter Elizabeth could join them.
At one point Jack noticed that Zane and Lea were sitting close together, but not really paying overt attention to each other.
Hmmm, is something brewing there?
Jennifer had been chatting with the girls about some boutique or other. She continued verbally while answering Jack,
There are some possibilities. Each is attracted to the other, but both are scared to make any indication. Zack is just inexperienced. Lea, well, she's a little more complicated.
Oh? Should I ask how? Complicated in a sexual way, I assume?
Well, sort of. I actually learned most of her information the old fashioned way; we talked while the other girls were in the pool.
Ah. So... anything you can repeat?
I'm your Genie, Jack. I must repeat anything you ask me to.
Ok, then, let's start with anything that she wouldn't mind you repeating, or that's fairly common knowledge among her friends and family.
Well, like Zane, she's had one parent raising her, her mom, but the similarities end there. While Zane's family situation has been a supporting and loving one, Lea's hasn't always. Even after Zane's father was killed, Cindy has been able to support them both fairly comfortably, and raised Zane to be a well-adjusted kid. Lea, on the other hand, grew up in a much more unpleasant environment, at least until her father left.
Was she abused?
She didn't go into that.
Can you tell?
Hmmm. She wasn't sexually, at least. And her sexually-related hang-ups aren't that deviant; mostly just what you'd expect for someone who has been living under some fairly serious repression.
Repressed? How?
Although I don't really know if her mother was abused - she wasn't abused sexually, either, I can tell that much - I do know from Lea's comments that her mother has always been very protective of her, initially perhaps from her father's anger, if not abuse. That protectiveness has turned to over-protectiveness over the years, including not allowing her to date. Her mother even forbade her to come on this trip. Lea informed her that she had just graduated high school, was eighteen and therefore an adult, had a scholarship to State, and would go on this trip if she wanted. Her mother's response was that if she was an adult, then she could be one on her own. That really scared Lea, but she was so fed up at that point that she didn't back down. Before she had to figure out how to go out on her own, though, her mom relented.
Are they okay, now?
Well, it sounds like things are still a little brittle, but for the most part, yes.
So she's just really inexperienced with guys? How is that much different from Zane?
Zane may not have much experience, but at least he has had some exposure to the opposite sex. Lea has had very little. Now that she's asserting her independence a bit, she has a drive to make up for lost time, goaded along by some fairly serious hormones.
She told you all that?
Well, the hormones I read for myself, as well as a few other things. I can't read her very deeply without you wishing it, but just by 'looking through her dorm room door', to use our earlier metaphor, I can tell that under that meek veneer there is a little sexual tigress just waiting to come out and play. Don't get me wrong, it will take quite a bit of doing to get her to come out of her shell - or her cage if you will - created by the years of repression, but once she's out...
Are we talking, like, a potential nympho or something?
If she isn't careful, or falls in with the wrong person or persons, then yes, or something.
Wow. It sounds like I need to use your abilities to
limit
sex!
That isn't my place to say, master, and besides,
she turned her head away from the concurrent verbal conversation she had going long enough to look at him with a raised eyebrow,
what's wrong with being a nympho?
Jack returned a small smirk,
Nothing, as long as the nympho has a brilliant master to direct her nymphomania in the right directions.
She stuck her tongue out at him, hidden from the rest by the hand she had her chin propped on, before turning back to the conversation. Jack looked at Zane for a moment.
If she needs to avoid the wrong people, is he a right person? I mean, I know he's a good kid, but if he's as inexperienced, and probably as horny, as she is, is that good or bad? On the other hand, I say 'kid' but they both are legally adults now, so I guess they can do what they want.
I cannot say for sure, but he's probably as good as any, and better than most. The biggest risk, as you say, is their combined almost total lack of experience.
