Keith & Laura Ch. 01

I stood at the end of the gate waiting for everyone to disembark from the plane. When Laura finally came out after a long string of people, she was radiant. Her long chestnut hair was tied back in a braid that fell to the middle of her back. She wore a pair of kahki shorts and a white collared shirt tied at her waist, with the collar open to mid-chest just above where I imagine her bra would have crossed her chest. When she saw me, her full lips opened with a tremendous smile and her green eyes sparkled as she spread her arms and ran to me, jumping up to wrap her arms around my neck and her legs around my waist, she hugged me tight and then planted an excited, but sisterly, kiss on my cheek and hugged me tightly once more, before letting go and standing again on her own two feet.

It had been over a year since I had seen my younger step-sister, I was twenty years old and she had recently turned eighteen and graduated high school just one month before. Laura had been accepted to the same university that I was attending and, since she had barely enough money to pay tuition, I had offered to let her stay at my house. I had been in a similar situation to hers just two years before, but my grandfather had died and left me a large sum of money. Not wanting to squander it the way I imagine most college men might, I took the bulk of it and invested it in a rather nice home near the university. The money left over I left to the bankers to manage for me and give me a quarterly stipend to get through school on. It wasn't enough money to live on forever, but it would keep me in good status all through college and provide me with a good headstart thereafter.

Laura talked excitedly all the way home about looking forward to college and life on her own and how much fun we were going to have this summer. She really had changed since I last saw her. She used to be an attractive young woman, though a bit on the chubby side, and a bit of a nerd, wearing conservative clothing and hanging out with chess-club types. During her senior year, however, she had become a knockout. After dieting and exercising for a year, she was lean and trim, with a figure to die for and her taste in clothing changed, too. Now she was every man's dream.

I have to admit that even before that summer, I'd had somewhat of a crush on her. Even before she'd lost weight I had been attracted to her, and over the five years we lived together after our parents were married, we'd become good friends and confided in each other about nearly everything. Anything but brotherly love had been taboo between us, though.

Now, as I watched her running at the mouth and gesturing with her hands, I remembered why we had always been such good friends and why I had been secretly attracted to her for years, now. We were best friends, reunited.

We got home that night and as we walked through the door I was apologizing that the bed I had ordered for the guest room had not yet been delivered. I explained to Laura that I would be happy to give her my own room until it showed up and I'd take the couch.

"Why don't we just share your bed?" Laura asked, "You have this huge king-sized bed, we can both sleep in it until the new bed shows up! It's not like we're kids anymore, we can handle it."

Yeah, I thought, it's not like we're kids anymore... We had shared a bed once or twice as kids when relatives came to stay, but that was before puberty hit and things seemed a little different to me now, but as long as she was o.k. with it, why should I care?

"Are you sure?" I asked, incredulously, "I really don't mind sleeping on the couch. I don't want you to feel uncomfortable."

"Why would I feel uncomfortable?" Laura asked, "You're still my best friend. Don't worry about it."

And that was it, Laura would share my bed until the new bed arrived for her. We had dinner and sat to watch TV for a while, then Laura took a shower to wash off the sweat from the day. I sat in front of the TV for a while longer, then went into the bedroom to go to bed. I hadn't heard the bathroom door open a second time, so I was really surprised to walk into the room and find Laura standing in front of her suitcase wearing nothing but a pair of french-cut black panties, rummaging around for a nightshirt. At first I just stared, like a deer caught in the headlights. Laura reached an arm to cover her chest and gave a surprised yelp.

"Uh, excuse me," I said, turning my eyes away and going out the door. This was the first time I had ever seen Laura completely nude, even in a swimsuit she always had worn a one-piece. I felt embarrassed, but also had a growing firmness in my crotch as I remembered the sight of her plump, firm breasts.

A moment later she came out the door, this time wearing a pair of mint-green pajamas.

"Sorry," I said, as she walked into the living room and sat next to me on the couch. "I thought you were still in the bathroom."

"That's o.k.," she said, "it's nothing you haven't seen before, I'm sure." We both sat there in silence for an awkward moment, neither quite knowing what to say. Then Laura turned to me, "So, since you did see, what did you think?"

"Excuse me?" I asked, suddenly feeling cornered again. How was I supposed to answer that?

"Well, I've lost 30 pounds in the last year, I've been working out and eating right. The last time you saw me I was a balloon in comparison. So what did you think, did you like what you saw?" Laura smiled. She was having a great time watching me squirm.

"Ahh," I stalled, not sure how to respond, "well, I think you looked, ahh, just fine. Great job." I laughed nervously, I'm sure my face was beet red by now.

Laura laughed, "Omigosh! You'd think I was your mother or something! You don't have to be embarrassed, Keith, it's not like were blood relatives or something."

I just smiled back at her sheepishly. Laura reached an arm around me and rubbed my shoulder with her hand. "Come on, Keith, lighten up! I have an idea, why don't you take off your shirt, and we'll call it even!"

I looked at her with a comic smile, "You're kidding, right?"

Laura just smiled back, "C'mon, I'll give you a back rub, loosen you up a bit! I don't remember you being quite such a prude."

"I'm not a prude," I objected, "it's just that you're the closest thing to a sister I'm ever likely to have and I've come to think of you that way. But I'll never turn down a back rub," I said, pulling my T-shirt over my head, "so have at it!"

Laura had me lie on my stomach on the couch and she knelt on the floor to rub my back. I would never turn down a backrub from Laura, she was awesome, she always knew just where to dig in her thumbs and really knead the muscles. It felt great.

She rubbed my back for a while, though it didn't seem nearly long enough to me. As I lie there with my eyes closed and Laura's magical hands stroking my back, I started to feel really aroused. It suddenly occurred to me that she was going to finish soon and might ask me to get up and give her a back rub as well or just sit with her or something, and if I stood up, she'd see the firm outline of my erection through my shorts. It felt just like high-school when the teacher asks you to come write something on the board at just the wrong time. Sure enough...

"Okay, you lug, it's my turn now, get up off the couch and give me a turn!" Laura gently patted her hands on my back to punctuate the statement. I didn't know what to do. I didn't want to get up and embarrass myself, but at the same time, I couldn't think of what else to do. So I rolled over off the couch and knelt next to it, waiting for Laura to lie down in my place.

I was hoping she hadn't noticed, and maybe she didn't, but before she lay down in front of me, she had an odd smile on her face, and I felt as if all my secrets were exposed, as if she knew what I was thinking without my saying, all my feelings for her in the past, my arousal as she rubbed my back, the excitement of walking into the room and seeing her exposed chest for the first time. I looked away from her gaze shyly as she lay down before me.

I began to rub her back through her pajama top, my shirt still off, but I had been so preoccupied with not letting her see my erection that it didn't even occur to me that I was still naked from the waist up. I tried to knead her muscles through the pajama top but was obviously not doing the primo job she had done for me. After a few moments she finally said something.

"Here," she said, reaching to the bottom of her pajama shirt, "help me pull this up to my shoulders so you can rub my back without it." I reached down to help her pull up the shirt on her back, but it wasn't loose enough to stretch over her shoulders without slipping past her chest, which I didn't attempt by any means.

"I can just slip my hands under," I said, "it will be fine."

"No, it's too uncomfortable this way. Why don't you go look in my bathroom bag, I have some massage oil in there, and while your getting that, I'll situate myself a little better here."

"O.k.," I said. I stood up and walked to the bathroom to find her bag, fighting myself mentally over whether to take my time and give her a chance to 'situate herself' or rush as fast as I could to see if I could catch sight of her without a shirt again.

I decided on the former, as any gentleman would, and waited in the bathroom until I heard her call me.

"Did you find it?" She called, "or did you get lost in there?"

I had found it upon the first glance into her bag, but had been waiting for her to call me. "Yes, I think I found the right bottle," I replied, then walked out of the bathroom into the living room once more.

Laura had completely removed her top and was lying facedown on the couch, her shirt crumpled underneath her in such a way as to cover what would have been the exposed side of her breast. This might have worked fine for her if she had been slight of chest, but she had a rather large pair of breasts and the cloth fell away from her side before I even got the oil warmed up in my hands.

Laura seemed not to notice, though I was certain she was completely aware of what had happened. Her head was turned toward me with her eyes closed as I decided that the oil was warm enough and I began to rub the slick liquid into her back.

This task was even more arousing that having her rub my own back. I was mesmerized by the sight of her tight tan skin, shining with oil in the dim light of my living room, my hands firmly pressing into the muscles of her back, down her spine to her trim waist, and back up along the edges of her back, not quite brushing the sides of her breasts on the way up, to knead her shoulders and neck and then trace my way back down again. Laura moaned with pleasure, commanding my full attention, as I continued to stroke the object of my increasing desire.

After a short time, Laura had become very relaxed, very calm. Her breathing had slowed to a long, deep rhythm and I suspected that she had fallen asleep during the 20 minutes or so that I had been working on her back. I couldn't help but to let my eyes drift to the breast that was bulging out from underneath her. I longed to touch her there, to run my fingers along the attractive curves of her side and breast, but I kept to her back and continued rubbing her muscles for a time.

I decided it would be best to leave her sleeping on the couch rather than wake her, so I got up and went to the closet to get a blanket. When I returned, I draped the blanket over her half-naked body, still longing to reach out and touch her where I should not, to lean over and kiss her beautiful skin. I pulled the blanket up to her shoulders, planted a gentle kiss on her cheek, then went off to the bedroom and went to sleep.

When I woke in the morning, I was surprised to notice that Laura had got up in the night and climbed into bed. She was fast asleep with her long hair falling all around her head on the pillow. I got up out of bed and took a shower.

When I came out of the bathroom in a towel, Laura was sitting in her pajamas at the kitchen table drinking a cup of tea. She turned her head toward me as I walked through the hallway to the bedroom.

"Good morning, Keith," she smiled, "would you like a cup of tea or coffee?"

"Good morning," I returned, "yes, black tea is good, thanx." I went into the bedroom and shut the door behind me, the bed had been made and the clothes I had dropped on the floor the previous night had been picked up. I got dressed in a T-shirt and a pair of khaki shorts, by the time I was dressed, there was a knock at the door.

"Are you dressed?" Laura cracked open the door without waiting for a response, "I brought you a cup of tea." I turned to her and accepted the tea, Laura sat down on the bed drinking her own.

"So what's the plan for today?" She asked.

"Oh, I figured I'd show you the city, from the top, of course." I asked her if she would like to hike up the ridge at the edge of the city. The hike takes a couple of hours and is uphill, steep, all the way, but the view is well worth the trouble, and if you like to hike, it's no problem at all.

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When we finally got back in the early evening, we were both beat. Laura suggested we spend some time in the hot-tub, so while she took a shower and cleaned up, I went out the back door to get it ready. I had a relatively small back yard but it was surrounded by trees, so it was well shielded from the neighbors. The back door opened out to a large cedar deck with the hot-tub off to one side, with a privacy fence wrapped around it. I had just had the hot-tub fixed up the previous week, so it was all ready to go, I just turned it on and let it heat up, then went into the kitchen and fixed up a large pitcher of margaritas.

After a few more minutes, Laura emerged from the bathroom in a short green silk robe, her wet hair hanging down her back and making dark spots on the material. She looked terrific as usual, and it was all I could do to keep from staring. The slender line of her body along with her long dark hair and brilliant green eyes had my complete attention. I just had to keep telling myself that she was off-limits and to think of something else.

Throughout the day we had been hiking together and talking what had really struck me was how different I was seeing Laura now than I did when I was in High-school. Before she was kind of cute, fun to hang out with, and a truly special friend, but now she had become so much more. It's like she had grown up in the year since I'd seen her last, not only had her body become trim and sexy, but her mind had developed as well. She was interested in so many things, art, science, politics. We just talked and talked the whole day long and never really stopped. It was like meeting a whole new person all over again.

All of this flashed through my mind as I watched her walk out of the bathroom and come into the kitchen wearing her green robe. A gleaming smile took over her face and she laughed at me.


"Glad to see me?" She joked, "or just floating off in space somewhere?"

"Sorry I said, shaking myself out of my reverie, "a little of both I guess, I was just thinking about how much you and I have both changed in the last few years. We were good friends in high-school, and we talked, but not like we talk now. We've been hanging out together today and I've just been completely amazed by how much you've changed, and how nice it is to be with you again."

Laura crooked her head to one side and gave me a crooked smile, "It is nice, isn't it? I missed you for so long after you left, you have no idea how happy I was when you agreed to let me move in with you here. You were always my best friend, I was very sad when you left." She leaned over and planted a warm, moist kiss on my cheek, "Why don't you go take a shower and then join me in the hot tub?" With that, Laura grabbed the pitcher and glasses and went out the back door to the hot tub.

When Laura kissed me I felt a thrill of pleasure run up my spine and butterflies in my stomach, it was just like my first kiss so many years ago in junior high. I got into the shower and washed myself quickly, looking forward to getting into the hot tub and drinking margaritas with Laura. I dried off, put on a swimsuit, then grabbed a couple of towels and walked out the back door into the setting sun to get into the tub with Laura.

She was lying down in the large tub with her eyes closed and a half-full drink in her hand. Under the water I could see that she was wearing a blue g-string bikini that looked almost black in the dim light of the setting sun. As I walked up to her, she opened her eyes and smiled at me.

"I poured you a drink," she said, motioning to a full margarita sitting on the edge of the tub. "But I'm afraid I started without you, this is already my second drink!"

"You should slow down," I said, "you're not even supposed to be drinking, much less drinking heavily!"

I climbed into the tub next to her and lay back, taking a sip of my drink. We stared up at the sky for a long time, talking about nothing and everything. She told me about her life for the last year, how sad she was to leave friends at school, how excited it seemed to be getting ready to go off on her own and attend college. She'd had a boyfriend for a while (this was a new thing, she hardly even dated all through school when I knew her) but he had pressed himself on her.

"What did you do?" I asked.

"He pinned me down on the front seat of his car and started kissing me, so I pushed him away and told him to stop, which he did, but I really didn't want to have anything to do with him after that. I told him I wasn't interested in doing that with someone I hardly know and he just seemed to ignore me. So I broke up with him and that was that."

"So you did it, huh? You made it all the way through high school without so much as a passionate kiss? You must be the ice queen indeed!" I laughed at the thought, she acted completely different than that when she was with me.

"Ice queen?" she elbowed me in the ribs and took another drink, "I just don't want to get into a physical relationship with someone I hardly know. I'd hardly say that qualifies me for the title of ice queen!"

"Well, you certainly haven't seemed like one to me, but I bet that guy thinks you're a real piece of work! Let me just ask, though, were you as loose around him as you seem to be with me? You didn't take off your shirt for him to rub your back, did you?"

Laura crooked her head at me in her funny way again, "No, I would never do that with anyone else, I just know I can trust you because we've been such good friends for so long."

I sat there for a moment, contemplating how to respond, whether to go any further with this line of conversation or just to drop it. I wanted so badly to let her know how I really felt, but I just couldn't quite bring myself to be direct about it.

"I'm glad you feel that way. Truthfully, though, it was a tempting sight. You keep this up and I'm going to be awfully tense for the next year!"

"Keep what up? Acting comfortable?"

"Well, you took your shirt off for me to rub your back, you wear nothing but tight fitting clothes, and now that we're in a hot tub together, you're wearing practically nothing at all! I may be a gentleman, but I have to confess I haven't been able to take my eyes off of you since you stepped off the plane!"

Laura looked into my eyes and smiled, then smoothly moved to sit kitty-corner to me in the hot tub, placing her feet and legs across my lap, still keeping me entranced with her beautiful green eyes. When she spoke, I was surprised to note that she didn't respond to my comments at all.

"Can you rub my calves and feet? They're really sore from all that hiking today."

"Sure." I said, and picked up the closest leg, beginning to massage her calf. Laura just sat next to me relaxing and sipping her drink. She had finished her third and was working on her fourth (and final, since the pitcher was now empty). I was on my third and already feeling a little tipsy, I suppose that she must have been much further along than me at that point.