First Day in the Caribbean 22

"It has been a pretty good day, on the whole," Charlie thought to himself as he biked home. He hefted his rucksack and thought about the memory chip in the camera. He had been tempted to leave his bike at the bike shop with Jenny's just for the romance of it, but he was eager to get home and look at his photos with artistic and lascivious intent. He not only liked Jenny, but she was cute and sexy and gorgeous and had a great smile, not to mention other attributes, like playfulness. If only she followed through more on her hints. Well, she did plenty of hinting in those poses at the rock, and she had started the water fight that got them both soaked. And she let him kiss her. But that was it, and he was frustrated and eager. Oh well, like Bill had said, there's always next time. It was almost a week until Saturday; he could hardly wait.

His folks wanted to know all about the "hike," as they called it. So Charlie talked about hiding the bikes, finding and cleaning up the little campsite, and how much Jenny liked the pirags. He didn't mention the photography or the water fight.

His dad cocked his head. "So did you dunk her in the water or make out or anything?"

Charlie reddened a little. "Uh, no..." It wasn't quite a lie. They hadn't done those exact things.

His dad raised an eyebrow. "Son you're either a liar or a fool."

"John!" Mom scolded. "We raised him to be a gentleman!"

Dad snorted, and Charlie smiled bashfully. "Well, we held hands on the way back."

"Well, better than nothing. Jenny's a nice girl. She'd make a good catch. Just make sure she knows you're interested."

"He lets her know by being nice to her, don't you, Charlie?" Mom asked.

"Yeah, but I try to be nice to everybody. Besides, maybe I'm not interested," he grinned.

"Right. Like I said, you're—"

"John!"

Charlie retreated to his room while the retreating was good. He locked his door, got the chip, and settled in front of his computer. It was the bakery's old desktop CPU, and the monitor was a CRT, but so far it had met his humble student needs fairly well. It even had a network card so he could get onto the internet through their cable subscription. He started to insert the card and discovered the slot was too big! The computer predated the little memory chips now used in phones and cameras! He hit his head in frustration. An adapter? What time was it? Too late; the electronics store would be closed by now; it was Saturday; He'd have to wait until Monday. He threw himself on the bed and began to review the day in his mind, thinking of all the female bodies, and how good some of the shots of Jenny at the rock had looked in the viewfinder.

The viewfinder! Duh! It was small, but it was a screen. He jumped up and grabbed the camera, put the chip back in, and menued his way to the review screen. It wasn't much, but it was better than nothing. He scrolled through the pictures. He deleted a couple that were blurry because she had moved, but the rest of the pictures looked pretty good. He really liked that she had left the wet top clinging to her torso the whole time. It was hard to pick the sexiest, and he looked at the pictures several times each. Finally he settled on one that emphasized her breasts as she stood with her back to the stone, hands behind her head, giving the camera a knowing smile.

He grabbed his trusty old gym sock, covered his already eager member, and began to pump.

——————-

Charlie stuck his head through the dive shop door. Karen appeared to be waiting on someone in the military, so he slipped in quietly, to not interrupt.

Karen saw him and called him over. "Charlie, meet Lieutenant McGraw, an old friend, now in the coast guard."

"Call me Troy," said the good looking-man. "I'm actually looking for Rick, and just stopped here for directions. So I'll let you folks be. Thanks for the help." He gave a very informal salute, and left.

Charlie sensed that Karen wasn't telling him something, but didn't sense that there had been any messing around. He shrugged internally and held up the small memory chip.

"Okay, let's get started. I take it that's pictures you took that afternoon." Karen smiled. "Jenny?"

Charlie blushed. "Yeah. She kind of did the posing. We were checking out the south shore for good photo spots."

Karen nodded and kept a poker face. "Well let's take a look at the dive pictures, shall we? I had a little chance to look them over Sunday, and put the fuzzy ones in a discard folder, but I'll let you actually delete them." (Charlie didn't know this was a test; good photographers mercilessly delete their bad photos.)

They settled in front of the computer Charlie at the keyboard, Karen to the side. "Okay, go to the folder labeled "first." Those are all plain nature shots mostly." Charlie opened the folder and double-clicked the first photo. It opened into a slide-show-type program and they scrolled through the pictures.

"Okay, nice detail here, see? Next. Too much background. Do this," and she reached for the mouse and dragged a rectangle on the picture, then dragged the sides of the rectangle. Finally she pressed Enter to make the crop. "See? Now the fish isn't lost." They continued through the set, Karen commenting, occasionally demonstrating, but mostly making Charlie make the changes. She sat so close their legs touched, and she didn't pull away. Sometimes she put her hand on his shoulder and pointed at the screen with her far hand, causing her breast to contact his arm. Sometimes she patted his leg or back, praising a particularly good shot.

Charlie enjoyed the contact, but it made him nervous.

Together they moved a couple pics to a "final" folder. Then they moved to the next folder, shots of the snorkeling girls. "Yes. These are more, shall we say, interesting!" They scrolled through some shots. "Okay these silhouettes straight against the sun are pretty standard stuff, and these turned out pretty well. Professional looking." They looked at some more. "Nice cleavage shots here. The girls will either love them or hate them."

Charlie looked at her sideways. "I bet the guys'll all love them."

Karen laughed. "I bet you're right!" They continued through the selection, Karen making mainly suggestive comments such as "nice butt shot," "suggestive pose there," and "Crop this. Move in on her." They moved some into the final folder.

Finally they got to the folder labeled "third."

They heard the door open, and they looked up. Some guy came in, looking around. Karen jumped up to greet him. She had seen him before, but couldn't place him.

"Uh, I"m looking for a guy name of, uh, Asch Jones? Ashurbanipal, I guess."

"I know who he is, but he doesn't work here. Who might you be?"

"Oh, uh, sorry. John Aldus. Editor over at Island Paradise. It's only a quarterly, but with the cruise ships, the readership changes practically every day, so circulation is pretty good. I see you have a few in your rack. Thank you! Anyway, this guy submitted an article about learning to scuba dive, but didn't leave any way to get in touch with him. But he did mention this place, rather complimentarily, too, I might add, so I thought maybe I'd find him here. I want to pay him and see if maybe he'll write a couple more articles."

"Do you have photos for the article?" Karen asked. "Charlie, bring me the final folder and open it."

Charlie jumped up and presented the laptop to the editor, who scrolled thoughtfully through the pictures, and looked up. "These are excellent!" He looked at Charlie. "Did you take these? May I use some? I see about four that will go excellently with the article. I'll pay you the going rate, in cash." He pulled out a flash drive and held it up. Cash so I can take them with me right now. And give me your name so I can give credit. And the name of your business."

"Charlie Baker, and uh, Island Photography," Charlie said with confidence he didn't feel. "At your service. I'm just starting out, so the best place to find me right now is at Bill's Bikes."

"Okay. Give me these four," and he selected four photos, which Charlie copied onto the flash drive while John fished around in his wallet, counting twenties.

"That's single use license," added Karen. "We don't need to formalize that in writing, do we?"

"Nah, you know where I live. I wouldn't dare." He smiled and added, "Um, one of these might be good for the cover. I don't have that kind of cash in my pocket, but I'll get in touch if we decide to do a cover, okay?" and he handed over the cash.

Charlie put the money in his pocket and they shook hands. Karen handed him her card. "I don't know if Asch wants me to divulge his info. Give me a call, say, next Monday? I'll be seeing him over the weekend." That was agreeable so they shook hands and he left.

Charlie pulled the money out of his pocket and counted it while Karen watched, smiling. He looked up, stunned. "He gave me three hundred dollars! I don't believe it. I never even would have thought of charging him—they were practice!"

Karen gave him a big celebratory hug, which he returned. But then Karen didn't let go. "Kiss me." She demanded.

Caught off guard, he braced himself, pursed his lips, and kissed her.

"That's what I thought. You don't know how to kiss. I wondered why Jenny was holding you off."

Charlie looked completely blank. "Huh?"

"Look," she relaxed her grip on him a little, but didn't let go. "Kiss like this. First, relax. You're not going to a wrestling match."

He consciously relaxed a little.

"Now especially, relax your mouth. And turn your lips out a little, like you were saying 'push,' see?" She opened her mouth a little and offered her lips. So he tried it. It wasn't too bad a kiss.

"Hmm." he said. "I see what you mean. It's better." He took a deep breath. "You're good looking and all, though, but it still feels like I'm kissing my sister..."

She chuckled. "That's because you're not in love with me! Try it on Jenny and see what happens. Just remember, lips soft and slightly parted." She released him. "Let's look at the rest of the photos, shall we?"

The third set of pictures was considerably racier, but Karen kept the conversation professional, analyzing composition and describing bodies dispassionately. Charlie played along, and paid attention, but he could hardly wait to get home with the chip. He had already picked up an adapter at the electronics store.

"Okay, let's look at your pics of Jenny." She slipped in the chip and they scrolled through the folder. "Pretty good focus; nice composition; not too much background; good-looking chick; oo, what a come-on! She definitely likes you. I like the way you made use of that feature in the rock." They went through the whole set and Karen had him move two of the pics into the final folder.

"One last assignment. We're getting together at Asch and Octavia's on Saturday. Make a presentation to show us. I recommend you mostly use pics in the final folder, but use anything you like. See if you can arrange them to suggest a story. Bring it on a flash drive and I'll bring this laptop; we can hook it to their TV. Okay?"

Charlie nodded, already thinking about how he might arrange them. After he made use of his sock again.

"Okay, then get out of here. And give me a practice kiss." So he did.

——————-

Lt. Troy McGraw approached the boatworks with some trepidation. It had been a couple years, but he still had occasional nightmares about Rick. "Well, here goes nothing," he muttered to himself, and walked into the large, garage-like building. He spotted Rick right away, talking to an older fellow about a sailboat they were working on. He approached and waited at a respectful distance.

Rick ended the conversation and looked Troy's way, then came over. "Hello, Lieutenant. How may I be of service? I'm pretty sure you don't want us to repair a coast guard boat, but we're certainly willing to try." He rubbed his hands together eagerly.

"Obviously you don't recognize me, sir," Troy replied. "Maybe this will help," and he took out his wallet and pulled out a well-worn dollar bill. He handed it to Rick and waited, almost at attention.

Rick got a puzzled look on his face, then looked at the dollar, then at Troy. Recognition dawned. "So you're the kid I performed the Haka dance for! You've changed." Rick smiled at him. "Did you come to give the dollar back? It's yours, y'know."

"No, sir. I came to apologize and thank you. You changed my life. Maybe saved it, the way I was headed."

Rick nodded encouragingly. Their lady mechanic came over to hand a phone message to Anthony. She was wearing a revealing top; Troy glanced at her and quickly looked away.

After she was gone, he took a deep breath. "After that night, I had nightmares for weeks. Every place I went to for help had some element of true-believer fanaticism; I couldn't really get into any of them." He sighed. "Then I talked to a coast guard recruiter, and he gave it to me straight, no sweet talk, no sympathy, no mystical solution, none of that stuff. He said I needed to get a grip, face up to what I had been, and just decide to be something else." He smirked. "And he said it would help if I had something else, something wholesome and all-consuming to think about, like coast guard boot camp. So I enlisted, and he was right. I was too tired to have nightmares, and I got into the habit of, well, of having good character. And I learned about protecting the coast; oceanography, ichthyology, law of the sea, all that." He sighed again. "I really like it. Thank you."

He held out his hand and Rick took it. They shook. Rick had a lump in his throat.

Anthony and several of the others had gathered around to listen. "Rick, what did you do to this kid? Some sort of initiation or something?"

"Something like that. He seems to have turned out pretty well, wouldn't you say?"

Anthony held out his hand to Troy. "Well, young man, thank you for your service. The coast guard is pretty important to us around here. We appreciate all your good work." He tilted his head. "So what's the dollar for?"

"I gave it to him a couple years ago. A memento."

It still frightens me every time I look at it," said Troy. "And to this day, I can't look at a woman's breasts. Keeps me in line."

Anthony looked puzzled.

Rick ignored the others and spoke to Troy. "Looks to me like the curse is no longer necessary. Let's fix that." He took the dollar and slapped it against his arms, legs, and chest, Haka-style. Then he held it close to his face and looked at it wide-eyed, then pursed his lips and noisily sucked in air. Then he leaned over as if to pass gas, and made a farting noise with the stored air in his lungs. "Okay, curse is gone, now let's make it give you luck." He pressed it against his groin, then held it to his face and blew on it. He looked around and saw the lady mechanic. "Lucy, throw a kiss at this."

She did, grinning, and making an enthusiastic "Mmmwah!!" with a wide sweep of her arm.

Rick clapped the dollar between his hands, put it to his chest, then presented it to Troy, who accepted it gingerly.

"Hey I'm not frightened!" he exclaimed.

Lucy sauntered over, swaying her hips. "So whatcha doing for supper tonight, sailor?"

Troy looked at her and didn't look away, but he was clearly bashful. "Um, supper? Uh, How about I take someone out for supper? Um, might you want to volunteer?"

"Thought you'd never ask." She looked around. "Eat your hearts out, guys, I'm having dinner with a sailor." She turned to Troy. "Meet me at Momma Rita's at 6:30, okay? I gotta go home and get cleaned up." Then she went back to work, looking occasionally toward the group of men standing around Rick and Troy and smiling.

Anthony was flabbergasted. "Lucy! You've always been pretty careful to keep us at arm's length. What's gotten into you?"

Lucy gave him a mysterious smile. "Dunno. Seems like the right thing to do!"

Troy picked up the ball again. "I got your location from Karen, who also accepted my apology. If you two care to join us tonight, my treat."

"Lemme see what Karen says. If yes, we'll be there." They shook hands again and he took his leave.

"Wow," said Anthony. "There are things about you that I still have no idea about."

"Yup." Rick smiled, but said no more.

——————-

Rick strolled into the dive shop a few minutes after Charlie left. "I know that secret smile. How did the photo session go?"

"He got a two-kiss-one-embrace kissing lesson. Said it was like kissing his sister. But he needed the lesson. I'll bet Jenny smiles a lot this Saturday. You're still my favorite, though. The kid's going to be a good photographer. He has a knack for catching moving objects at the right instant. Just wait until Saturday; You'll see how beautiful I am."

"I already know how beautiful you are," And he put his arms around her, spun her around, and put his hands on her breasts. "And soft and smooth and seductive. I can't wait."

"Well, you don't have to. Let's close the store early and see if the mattress still works. I want you to look me over very carefully."

They locked up and headed for the bed in the office. She leaned back against him and raised her arms. He pulled her top off and they settled onto the bed, she on her back, nipples already erect in anticipation.

Rick settled on his side next to her and began to trace figure-eights around her mounds. Then he started. "Speaking of kids, Troy."

Her belly bounced once in a chuckle. "He made it over there, huh? He was sweet. Humble and sweet. I take it he apologized and offered thanks?"

"Yup." Rick looked thoughtful as his hand drifted downwards, making her tremble a little. "Long story short, we're invited to dinner at Rita's with him and Lucy."

Karen opened her eyes and lifted her head. "Isn't Lucy that ice cube of a mechanic you guys hired a while back? Does she even like guys?"

"I'll let Troy tell the story if he wants to tell it."

"Hmm. In that case let's make it a quickie instead of long and drawn out. We can always do long and drawn out—uh. Laterrr." Rick had gotten between her wide-spread legs with his hand. She reached down and grabbed his member and played with it, squeezing and pushing. He was already pretty hard, so it didn't take much to get him really excited. For that matter, she couldn't hold her hips still from the excitement his fingers were causing in her vulva, especially his circles around her clit. They both kept it up, more and more vigorously until suddenly she climaxed, bucking and grunting. The sound was all it took for Rick, and he made a mess on her waist when he came. She smiled. "Wow. That was quick." She took a deep breath. "Let's go get clean."

——————-

They arrived at Momma Rita's at the stroke of 6:30, and Octavia led them to Lucy, whom she had just seated in a booth at the back. Lucy had on a dirndl blouse, and maybe a feature-enhancing bra to boot, not that she much needed one. Rick raised his eyebrows and gave her a nod of appreciation. She gave Rick a somewhat guilty smile. "Not sure what's gotten into me. Maybe I like guys in uniform."

You made it pretty clear to everyone that you wore what you wore to make yourself feel good, not to attract us. Though you were probably wise not to dress like that at work." He leaned over to Karen. "It might be one guy got a black eye, but Anthony saw it and supported her position on dress. As long as her clothing was safe, she could wear what she wanted. And the guys got used to it and before long they discovered she was a good mechanic, carpenter, and electrician. And she wasn't afraid to get dirty. Pretty soon they were all big brothers and they made sure no customer harassed her. She's been a real asset."

They all laughed when Karen replied, " Well, she certainly has some good assets."

About then Troy showed up. "Am I supposed to sit here? Who are you? I was expecting a grubby little sister type, and you're stunning!"