A Taste for Bikinis

I hate the summer because it's so hard to hide my tastes. I guess I should call them kinks or fetishes, but I don't like that. Everybody has their tastes, and mine are mine and I don't feel like I should have to label them like that. It makes them sound embarrassing and shameful, and I don't want to feel that way.

But I do anyway, and winter clothes let me keep my tastes to myself. Not everybody keeps to themselves, though. My coworker, Joy, talks all day about her sexual tastes. You wouldn't think it to look at her. With her conservative business attire and her hair expertly styled, Joy looks like a Sunday school teacher, only maybe a little more innocent. She has one of those smiles that turns her clear blue eyes into little slits, too. She smiles a lot.

So yes, it was a little surprising the first time we were alone in the office together and sweet, innocent Joy said, "Jesus, I am so fucking horny you can probably smell me from there," and then she laughed and her eyes disappeared. I didn't know what to do, so I laughed, too. "I haven't gotten laid in a month," she said.

"You should probably save this conversation for one of your female friends," I said.

"You're close enough," Joy said.

"What does that mean?"

"You're gay, right?"

"No!"

"Oh, I just assumed you were. I don't care, it's no big deal," she said. "Dick is great. I don't blame you."

"Why would you even think that?" I asked.

"I don't know. It's like on that TV show. You're thin and neat."

"Well I'm not gay," I said. "Never have been."

"Either way, I don't care. If I can't get fucked I can at least talk about getting fucked, and you're the only one around to listen to me," she laughed.

"I don't want to hear this," I said.

"I think you do. I think you'd love to hear about some hairy caveman fucking me in the ass. I have to be in the mood, but when I am there is nothing better than getting fucked in the ass."

At the time I thought she was trying to shock me—the prim little lady saying outrageous things—but that's just how she was. Joy was business savvy enough to reel herself in when anyone else was around, but if it was just the two of us she had no filter. She'd talk about having sex when she had it, and she'd talk about having sex when she didn't.

She'd come back from the ladies room and tell me how she masturbated in the stalls. Once she wore an insertable vibrator to work and told me every time she sneaked an orgasm. She had no filter and I was nothing but filter. We couldn't have been more different, but we grew to be very close friends. Eventually we started hanging out outside of work, which brings us back to my tastes and why I hate summer.

Joy was given what in my opinion was a ridiculous bonus at the end of the first quarter when her department exceeded their sales goals. I would have stuck that cash into my savings account, but she blew it on a swimming pool. For the next three months she talked about nothing but her new pool, which in some ways was a nice break from hearing about her sex life, but in other ways not so much. I missed the vicarious thrill I got from her filter-less conversation, and staring at cellphone pictures of holes being dug and cement being poured was pretty dull. It was kind of cool seeing it come together, though. By the end of June she was showing me photos of her finished pool: lawn chairs on the redwood deck, clear blue water glistening in the sun.

"You should come over and check it out," she said.

"Totally."

"How about Saturday? Bring your suit," Joy said. My face must have registered panic, because she added, "What? You know how to swim, right?"

"Yeah, of course," I said.

"Then what's the problem?"

"No problem," I said, but there was a huge problem. I was terrified of what Joy would think of me when she saw me in nothing but a pair of shorts. It wasn't like I could not go, though. I mean, she was my friend and she dumped a lot of money into building that stupid pool. All week long I worried about what she was going to say, but on Saturday afternoon I knocked on her door as requested.

"Hey," she said. She was wearing a bikini top with a matching flowered sarong, and a pair of flip flops. Her toenails were painted pink. A blast of cold air from inside explained why her nipples fought to poke through her top.

She gave me a hug. "What are you poking me with there, bud? Just kidding, come on back," she said. I watched her big ass jiggle beneath the thin fabric as I followed her to the back door, and I tried to adjust myself so that she couldn't see what I poked her with.

She slid open the glass door and said, "Well, what do you think?"

"It's beautiful," I said.

"I know! Grab a lounge chair, and I'll get us some drinks."

Maybe I had this whole summer thing all wrong. Sitting in the warm sun next to Joy's new pool, seeing her in those thin fabrics—what did I have to complain about? I couldn't get the images out of my head: her sarong shifting as she walked, the tiny triangles of her bikini top fighting to keep their secrets intact. I could get used to this.

Joy returned with a pair of cocktails and reclined in the lounge chair next to mine. "Not bad," she said.

"Not at all," I said.

"No, I mean your legs. Not bad. I thought they'd be skinny, but they're nice."

"Cycling."

"Oh, that explains it," Joy said.

"Explains what?"

"You don't have any hair on your legs. You shave them for wind resistance, right?"

I hesitated. "Sure. Let's go with that," I said.

"What does that mean?"

"I'm just kidding. Yes, it's for cycling."

"I don't think you are!" Joy said. "I think you're holding out on me! What's the story, bud?"

"No story," I said. I could hear my voice shaking. I'd never been so embarrassed.

"Yeah, there's a story. You can't tell me? Jesus Christ, you know how many fingers I like in my ass. If you can't tell me, then who can you tell?"

"I just...I don't like body hair, that's all."

"Like a metrosexual thing?"

"I guess."

She picked up her drink and waved it toward me. "You are an interesting little man. Cheers," she said.

We sat there in the sun, talking and drinking, and for long stretches we did neither. I watched beads of sweat form on her belly while she laid there. "Aren't you hot in that shirt?" she asked.

"I'm good."

"Jesus Christ, are we going to go through this again? I get it, you shave. It's no big deal. Take your shirt off if you want to."

I couldn't remember the last time that someone had seen me naked, and even though a pair of shorts wasn't exactly nude it was close enough for me. The idea was both awkward and titillating. I pulled my shirt over my head.

"What the fuck? You even shave your pits? Is that a belly button ring? Okay, be honest: You're gay, right?"

"No! Stop with that already."

"I don't think you're telling me the truth," Joy sang.

"I am. I'm straight."

"Well then you're not telling me everything," she sang. I would've looked her in the eyes, but they were hidden in her smile. "Okay, bud. I'll stop teasing you, but first you have to tell me something."

"What?"

"Are you shaved everywhere?"

"Not exactly," I said.

"What's that mean?"

"It means I leave...some."

"Oh, that's hot! Show me!" she said.

"No way."

"Why not?"

"Why do you think?"

"Don't be a prude. Let me see your little bush," Joy said.

"No way."

"Why not?" she said. I understand why criminals confess now. It's like you get to a point where the stress of keeping the secret weighs more than the actual secret. My heart was pounding, my mouth was dry. I must have been bright red, because Joy's tone changed from teasing to serious. "Come on, bud. What is it?"

"My underwear," I said. "It's not exactly...right."

"What do you mean? Do you mean you're wearing panties?" she asked. I nodded my head. "That's what you're turned inside out about? Oh, honey. That's no big deal."

"It's how they feel," I muttered.

"I know. They feel good, don't they? I don't know how men wear those rough cotton boxers with their junk rubbing on them all day. That can't feel good," Joy said. I'd never experienced such relief. At that moment she became the best friend I'd ever had.

"It's not just how they feel," I said.

"I know," she said. They all came gushing out of me then, my secret tastes. I told her how turned on satin bows made me, and how I changed into slips and stockings as soon as I got home from work. I told her a funny story about the time I tried to walk in high heels and looked like a drunken hooker. That was the end of that experiment. I explained that I didn't like wigs or makeup or anything like that, but then I took off my shoes and showed her my painted toenails. I didn't try to explain why I liked that but not makeup. I couldn't have, anyway. It was just my tastes.

Joy never interrupted me, never said a word. She just sat and listened. I tried not to notice her nipples poking hard against her bikini top, and I tried not to assume that my story had something to do with that. I had 20 years of pent up secret life to let out, and she was so kind to let me do it. When I finally stopped talking, all she said was, "Show me."

I stood in front of her, unbuttoned my shorts, and lowered the zipper. I folded one side back like a bed sheet. My bare hip bone jutted above the lacy waistband of my white panties, the little white bow dangling just below my belly button ring. Joy sighed. "I'll be honest bud, I didn't expect that to do anything for me, but that's really sexy."

Emboldened by her flattery, I folded the other side of my shorts back, exposing my entire lower abdomen. My penis jutted sideways, pressing almost violently against the thin white fabric. A small dark circle emerged where my excitement had leaked through the satiny material.

"Show me," she said again, almost like she was in a trance or something.

"Show you what? My cock?"

"Show me how you shave it. Pull them down a little." I hooked my thumbs behind the lacy waistband and pulled my panties down another inch or two. "Oh my God, a little triangle. It looks like a trimmed pussy. Fuck, that's hot," she said.

"I thought you liked hairy cavemen," I said.

"I like whatever makes my pussy wet," Joy said. "I'm an equal opportunity skank." We both laughed, and whatever trance she was in was broken. She stood up and grabbed my hand. "Come on, follow me," she said.

"I'm not sure we should do this," I said.

"Yeah you are," she said. She led me to her bedroom and walked straight for her dresser. She opened the second drawer from the top. It was packed with bikinis. "Pick one."

"I don't think I want to do this."

"Yes, you do. Pick one. What color do you like? Do you like flowers?" She was tossing them onto the bed while she spoke. "Tankinis? Thongs? I've got them all."

"I can't do this," I said.

"Then I'll pick one for you," she said. "This one ties on the sides. That's kind of like bows, right? Do you like this one?" I nodded. "Me, too. Let me find the top." It was a black string bikini that rode high on the hips, the sides nothing more than a pair of shoestrings tied in bows. The top was just a pair of triangles, no cups that would look empty jutting from my flat chest.

"Do you want a sarong, too?" she asked. I nodded. Joy opened her closet and grabbed a floral print piece of fabric so thin that I could see through it. "Should I leave while you change?"

"Yes, please."

"Okay, bud. I get that," she smiled. Five minutes later, I returned to the pool with absolutely no secrets. Joy complimented how good her bikini looked on me. I'd never been so happy.

If this were another kind of story, this is the point where I'd describe in great detail the amazing sex we had that afternoon beside Joy's pool, but it's not that kind of story. I'd be lying to you, anyway. We didn't fuck that evening. We just laid in our deck chairs until the sun went down, drinking and talking in our bikinis. Well, I did most of the talking. I had a lot of catching up to do.