First Day in the Caribbean 08

Fred looked over at her, still wiping his face, tears in his eyes. "Anita, that was the best timed, funniest, and most painful joke I've ever heard in my life." He turned his head. "Cliff, this place is getting to be bad luck for me. Maybe I should go someplace where I don't get beat up all the time."

"Here. Lemme make it up to you some," said Cliff, and he refilled his drink from the soda gun. In spite of himself he was grinning.

Anita came over and took the towel. She wiped his neck and collar. "Clay, I'll have one of whatever he's having." She looked genuinely apologetic as she handed the towel back.

By now Fred was pretty much recovered. "I guess you overheard Asch's douchebag remark earlier. Did you hear why I came over?"

"Yes, I did overhear the remark and I just couldn't pass up the chance to use the line—that's an old tavern joke, y'know—but I didn't hear anything about why you came over to the bar," she lied, batting her eyes at him expectantly.

Clay placed a coke in front of Anita and retired. Fred took his drink and, looking into it, said "Asch and Octavia are going to the community concert tonight, and they invited us—well, me—to join them, and I'd like to have you join me—us." He looked up sheepishly.

"Y'know, I've been meaning to take in one of those concerts all winter. Let's do it. Asch and Octavia, huh? Let's go make arrangements."

The ladies made arrangements about where and when to meet up and where to go afterwards. Asch waited patiently, and Fred hid the biggest grin of his life.

The concert was at 7:00. Octavia and Asch got there an hour early with some sandwiches and found a good spot about halfway back from the little concert shell right in the center of the spectator area. People were already starting to gather, and most of them had brought picnics of some sort. Octavia marked an area about right for four people. They sat down to munch on their sandwiches and keep an eye out for Anita and Fred.

"Rita makes a pretty good sandwich," Asch remarked, looking end-on at his. "Nice and thick."

"I'll have you know I made these sandwiches," Octavia said haughtily. "You think I'd trust another woman to provide sustenance for my man on a potentially romantic assignation?"

"Not even Mary?" Asch grinned wickedly.

"Mary can have you when I'm busy," she pouted. "Mary's okay." She sobered. "It's about time for her to show up again. I kind of wish the airline wasn't so unpredictable in their scheduling of personnel. She hardly ever gets much notice when she's gonna head this way."

Asch tried to make the best of it. "All the more exciting when she does show up, I suppose."

They spotted Anita and Fred. Octavia jumped up and waved her arms. The motion pulled her already rather short sundress even higher up her legs, and Asch suspected it was on purpose for his benefit. He resisted the temptation to lie back and look up; they were in public, after all, even if she was an exhibitionist. She caught their attention and plopped back down.

"Like what you saw?" she asked quietly, smiling to herself.

"I didn't look," said Asch primly.

"Well I'll make you look later, then," she said, also primly. "I don't have any panties on, you know."

"Why am I not surprised," he muttered, grinning. He put his hand on her thigh and kissed her cheek.

Anita and Fred waded through the maze of blankets and chairs and joined them. She had on a cute plaid spaghetti-strap sundress, and he had on a collared short-sleeved shirt made of the same fabric. "We, um kind of both have really good taste," Fred said bashfully. But everybody loved their accidentally matching outfits. A guy nearby was about to make a salacious remark, but he caught Fred's cool gaze and thought better of it. He also didn't catch his wife's dirty look.

They got settled in; Fred brought out an insulated bag of soft drinks and gave Anita her choice of the remaining sandwiches. She ended up eating half and Fred finished it for her. Between the four of them all the chips pretty much disappeared.

The concert started. It was a mix of light classical and pop tunes and vocal numbers, rather like something you would get at a Boston Pops concert. Asch could hear Fred humming the baritone part to a sea chantey sung by the men's section of the glee club. As the evening turned into dusk, then dark, the foursome gradually turned into two couples.

At the end, the conductor announced that they were planning a performance of Karl Orff's Carmina Burana for the summer's end, and put out a call for instrumental and choral participants and understudies for the soloists.

Fred heaved a longing sigh and looked at Asch. "Do you know Carmina Burana?" he asked.

Asch gave a slow nod. "Yep. Y'know, you've got a lot of culture for a welder. Are you another one of this island's seriously overqualified laborers?"

Fred almost bristled. "I like to make stuff, especially with a welder. Something satisfying about creating a useful physical object. But I grew up in a pretty intellectual environment, though. Dad taught philosophy at the college and Mom was a piano teacher. Dad hated TV and spectator sports. But he had a pretty good collection of classical music, and I listened to it a lot and got to like it—It holds up well under repeated listening. And we actually had a couple copies of Carmina Burana. Of course it also lends itself to being played loud. Once all three of us stood in the living room singing along with parts of it at the top of our lungs. It was pretty fun. We had quite a conflict when I wanted to go to trade school instead of the college. He's okay with me now, though, since I'm the best welder on the island." He snorted. "So no, I'm not exactly overqualified, I just got some background that doesn't fit my foreground."

He glanced over, and noticed that Anita was listening intently. "So do you know the music we're talking about?"

She kind of winced. "No, but I bet you'd tell me about it if I asked, and I'd like to hear."

"Tell you what!" Fred became animated. "I have a CD, the one with Michael Tilson Thomas conducting the Philadelphia Orchestra, and I'll play it for you and tell you what's going on while it happens. Whaddya say tomorrow night? That'll give me time to, um, clean my apartment." He looked at Asch, who correctly read that he was asking if a clean apartment was included in rule two.

Asch smiled approval and gave him a thumbs up.

Anita said, "Tomorrow's okay, but let's do it in a listening room in the music store. I don't know if I'm ready to force you to clean your apartment yet." Then she leaned over and whispered into his ear so nobody else could hear, "But I am curious to learn more about your eight inches someday, though, I think. Maybe. Eventually."

Fred turned bright red, but it was dark, so no one noticed.

Octavia chimed in, "Fred, since that's a public place, would you mind having a couple more listeners? I don't happen to know Carmina Burana either. Afterwards you and Anita can have dinner at Rita's and I'll get you the employee discount. How's that?"

"Y'know, that actually sounds like fun," said Fred. "And it'll give me a little more time to clean my pigsty I mean apartment. I get off at four, so give me an hour to get cleaned up. We'll all meet at five."

"I'll make arrangements to reserve a listening room at the music store," offered Asch.

"And I'll make arrangements to get to work late. How long will this adventure take, do you think?" Octavia asked.

"Figure an hour and a half." They all stood up to head out, and Fred turned to Anita. "Anita, may I take you out for supper at Rita's afterwards?"

Anita batted her eyes and put her hand on her chest. "Why, sir, I'd be honored to accompany you for dinner. Will this be a formal event?" She blinked a couple more times.

Fred played along, bowing deeply. "Why, no, ma'am. This event will be completely casual. You may dress as (ahem) comfortably as you wish." He looked stern. "Do not wear heels."

Anita snickered. "You got it, sweetie. I'll dress so comfortably even Octavia will be embarrassed."

"That would take a lot," stage-whispered Octavia.

They all laughed, and arriving at their corner, the two couples went their separate ways.

As Fred and Anita walked hand in hand toward her place, Fred cleared his throat. "Anita, I have something to tell you."

She tensed a little, expecting the worst. "Shoot."

"Before I came over this afternoon to invite you to this concert, Asch had counseled me not to drink, so I broke a habit of a decade and didn't have anything tonight. Not a drop. And I had more fun than I've ever had since I was a kid. I got to spend the evening with stimulating company, listened to music I haven't heard for years, a beautiful woman actually seemed to enjoy my company and let me hold her hand, and, oh, just more good things than I can count. I'm looking forward to tomorrow, and also to your 'someday maybe eventually.' I hope I don't blow it." He took a deep breath, shuddering. "You have no idea how grateful I am to have had your company tonight, sober, and if I'm ever stupid enough to start to mess it up, and you catch me, please hit me over the head and knock me out. I mean it."

They arrived at her doorstep. Anita smiled at him. "I'll try to make my company good enough that you won't be motivated to mess things up. And I really enjoyed the evening, too. See you at the music store tomorrow," And she reached up and kissed him on the cheek. Then she turned his head toward her and kissed him soundly on the lips, then scampered into her house.

He stood there about six inches in the air. Then he threw her a kiss and headed for his apartment.

Octavia and Asch walked hand in hand too. "I noticed Fred didn't take too long to decide how long his music lesson would be," remarked Asch.

"Yes, and he really seemed to enjoy the prospect of doing it, even with extra people there to ruin the intimacy."

"Yup. I have an idea. Let's invite your mom, Bill, and Lydia along. Sadie too, if she's free, and Jenny and, um, what's his name, oh yeah, Charlie, the bike repair guy. And Mary if she shows up," he added wickedly.

"You want to throw in the guys at the welding shop and the conductor while you're at it?" she snickered.

They sat on her porch for a while waiting for time for her to report to Anchovies. At one point she went in and brought out some iced tea. "Mom and Bill are asleep," she said, and instead of sitting next to him, she sat on his lap, wiggling a little to improve the closeness of their contact, then she put her arms around his neck and didn't give him much chance to work on his tea. He didn't object. After all his hand was in her lap and it was an awfully short skirt.

His hand found its way up her legs, and she spread her knees to give him better access. He caressed her pussy while she alternately threw her head back or kissed him deeply. "I just love stroking such smooth silky skin," he murmured.

"Shut up and keep stroking," she murmured back, rotating her hips and pushing against his hand.

He reached into her moist slit and lightly ran his fingers over her clit, making slow circles and female moans.

Finally they came up for air. Octavia drew in a shuddering breath. "It's a good thing the whole neighborhood is asleep and we're in the dark, but it's too bad it's so close to work time. Maybe I'll get you up in the morning. In both senses of the word." She wiggled some more, enjoying the sensation of his hardness under her.

When it was time, he walked her to Anchovie's, then headed for his room.