Note: For all scenes that depict sexual activity, all participants are over 18.
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The good and proper children of Ms. Beverly Nelson's fourth grade class were already in their seats before the bell rang, and when it did, they promptly quieted down. They knew something special was afoot, because Ms. Nelson had two visitors in the classroom, a dark-haired man and a blonde woman.
"Children, I'd like to introduce you to some friends of mine. They belong to a group called the Society for Clothing Anachronism. Now, who here can tell me what clothing is? Yes, Jasmine, do you know?"
"My grandma talked about clothing once. She said it was something they had to use before PCOs were invented." Jasmine used the common pronunciation, "peek-oh's."
"Before Personal Climate Optimizers, you mean. Yes, that's exactly right. Before PCOs, people were at the mercy of the weather and the elements. For example, you couldn't stand around in the snow without putting on clothing -- they called it 'wearing clothes' -- or you would get a disease called 'frostbite.' And at the other extreme, if you stood out in the bright sun for any length of time you would get something called a 'sunburn.'
"Next question: Who knows what a historian is?"
Jason raised his hand first. "Someone who studies history -- the way things were before today," he answered.
"Right. Now, my friends here are historians, but they are a special kind of historian. They practice something called 'living history.' That means that they don't just read about history in the library, but they also reenact it. They try it out, and sort of play-act. That way, they can see for themselves what history was really like."
The two SCA members took that as their cue to step forward. They opened a trunk and pulled out examples of clothing. They passed them around the room and described them to the students. When the garments returned to the front of the room, the SCA members proceeded to put them on, to the utter shock and horror of the students.
One girl screamed. Another girl yelled, "You can't do that!" A boy yelled, "But covering your body is against the law." The other pupils just covered their eyes.
"Children, children, calm down. It's okay. Today is July 14th. It's a special holiday called 'National Clothing Day,' and that means that this is the one day of the year when it's okay to cover your bodies. That's why I chose today for this demonstration. Now, don't worry, I'm not going to make you wear any clothes, but I would like you to pay attention to what our visitors do."
One by one, the students uncovered their eyes and settled down. The SCA members then continued with their demonstration. They talked about the different kinds of garments and showed the students how they were worn. Some garments had a special purpose, they explained, like jackets, and aprons, and raincoats and waders. They talked about oddities like how a 'pair of trousers' is plural even though it refers to a single garment. Through it all, the kids were fascinated, for they had never seen anyone wearing clothes before. One boy said, "Now I know why everyone looked funny when I saw my grandma watching something old on the 3D that she called a 'move-on'."
"I think you mean a 'movie,' Kevin." Ms. Nelson explained. "Movies are an old form of vid. Studying old movies is one way that the SCA does their research."
The demonstration took up a lot of time, because the kids had plenty of questions, but Ms. Nelson reserved the last few minutes of the class period for one final lesson. "Now, can anyone tell me why's it's normally illegal to cover your body?"
When no one else spoke up, a girl in the back of the classroom hesitantly said, "Because it's against the law?"
"Well, that's what 'illegal' means, in general. But the reason why it's against the law to cover your body, in particular, is that it's considered a waste of resources. The invention of the PCO meant that we only need to use a small amount of energy to keep ourselves comfortable and protected. In the old days, they used to have to heat up, or cool down, a whole room or even a whole building just so the people inside could be comfortable. Or, as you just saw, you could use clothing to accomplish the same thing, or the two together. But, just as heating up a whole building is a waste of energy, so is it a waste to produce clothing. It takes up resources and energy to manufacture clothing, and those resources are better spent on other things.
"However, when PCOs first came out, some people didn't like them. They liked the old ways, because they were used to it. So, even though everyone agreed that PCOs were better than clothes, some people didn't want to switch. But the majority of people who accepted the PCOs couldn't stand that some people continued to waste the resources, so they voted to make it against the law to wear clothes."
"Except today, right?" said Kevin.
"Yes, except today, since it is National Clothing Day."
"I don't understand. Why would anyone want to wear clothes instead of using a PCO, even for one day a year? It doesn't make any sense."
"No, Kimberly, it sure doesn't seem like it now. But people in the past had funny ideas about covering their bodies. You'll just have to take my word for it."
The bell rang and the students all looked at Mrs. Nelson for permission to leave, so she gave them a warm smile and a nod of her head. The students ducked out of the low opening of the classroom yurt, and walked barefoot across two hundred meters of frozen tundra to the cafeteria cabin. They were undaunted by the fact that it had started to snow, for their Personal Climate Optimizers work flawlessly to keep them comfortably warm.
As soon as the last student filed out of the yurt and Beverly Nelson let the flap drop to cover the opening, the blonde woman, who's name was Cynthia, jumped on Beverly and kissed her full on the mouth. Cynthia and Beverly were live-in lovers, so Beverly enjoyed the moment. But Cynthia kept it going, making it ever more passionate, so when it moved beyond a simple public display of affection, Beverly pushed Cynthia away. "Not here! What if one of my students comes back?"
"Oh, but I feel so kinky wearing these clothes. I started getting worked up the minute I put on that first pair of bloomers." Cynthia continued to hold Beverly by the shoulders, peering lustfully into the teacher's eyes.
"Me too," said Henry, the male SCA member, who was also the third member of their mΓ©nage Γ trois. "Except for me, it was that leather vest and the leather gloves. I always feel so naughty putting on leather, even though we get our leather from PETA-certified sources that only use the skins of animals that die from natural or accidental causes."
"You two will just have to wait until the orgy tonight. Now, hurry up and get out of those clothes before one of my colleagues sees you and you get arrested, and I get fired."
"But it's National Clothing Day." Cynthia pouted.
"You know, as well as I do, that it's technically only official in the continental United States so far. Independent Alaska still has July 14th on the books as National Nude Day, which is completely redundant. The bill to switch it around is still sitting in parliamentary committee."
"Yeah, yeah. Whatever. Don't lecture me, teach." Cynthia began undressing. She folded each garment neatly before placing it back in the trunk, and Henry followed suit. Once they were again properly bare, Henry and Cynthia each grabbed a handle on the trunk and carried it off to the school's shuttle stop. There they waited, naked in the snow, for a good thirty minutes before an open-air shuttlecar arrived to take them home.
In the mean time, Beverly had also been turned on by the public display of attire, but she didn't realize just how much at the time. Eventually, however, an undeniable urge came over her. So, she sat down at her desk and promptly reached between her thighs to frig herself. She reasoned that if someone walked in unexpectedly, they'd assume that Beverly merely had her hand under the desk to scratch an itch -- which is what she was doing alright, except it was not that kind of an itch, and not that kind of a scratch.
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School let out at 2:45 Alaska Daylight Time. Beverly took the next shuttle directly to the maglev station where Henry and Cynthia awaited her with three backpacks and three tickets for the 3:40 bullet train to Seattle. They boarded the train and rode mostly in silence through one stop in Alaska, and two stops in Canada. The trio then perked up and eagerly watched out the windows to spot the exact moment when they'd cross into the United States.