Stop, Traveller

Dwight woke up, rolled over in his motel bed, swung his legs out, and found himself on his feet.  It surprised him, standing up so suddenly: for a brief moment he needed to hold his balance, steady himself.  Then, stretching his arms above his head, he remembered Jerri, and turned to the bed.  For some reason he felt she might not be in bed, perhaps already out on the beach—but there she was, eyes open, staring at him.  He stretched some more, naked, doing it for her.  He looked down at his wobbling erection, and Jerri giggled, mocking him with , "You're always hard for me whenever I'm near. . ." 

            "It's the brand new morning doing this to me, not you. . ." he said. 

            She laughed, shaking her head.  "No, it's me." 

            His erection in his hand, Dwight shook it at her.  "The travelling, that's what does it.  Always a new place, always a new situation."        

            "Except the fucking.  That's the same."  

            She was right, because each day, as soon as they checked into a new motel, they fucked on the anonymous motel bed.  The moment he viewed the perfectly-made bed, a bed like every other motel bed, waiting for the next person to lie on it, he was stiff.  With her standing next to him as they stared at the bed—that helped, but it was almost as if he didn't need her.  Just seeing the open bed was enough.  One time he even had himself out for her as they unlocked the door, with her palming him, snickering, "Hold on, boy." 

            After sex they always got up and ate dinner in the motel restaurant, with Jerri sometimes squirming in her chair, hissing, "I'm dripping with you. . ."

            Then, with full stomachs, they went back to the room for a nap, waking up after an hour to start up again with the sex, often with him holding off, not coming; they slapped at each other leisurely for an hour, then slept, then slept some more.  They woke up hours later, finding it dark outside.  They stumbled from the bed, put on their swim suits and took walks on the beach, with him hard in his trunks again.  She would mock him as she looked down at him, shook her head and said, "You're pathetic, you know?  You're so needy." 

            "We have to keep repeating," he said, ignoring her taunts.

            Despite her words, Jerri liked to bend over and present herself to Dwight, her hands on her knees, her bikini bottom down, there on the dark and crashing beach.  He pushed in her, stroked her a few times, then separated if perhaps people came out of the gloom towards them.  A few minutes later, on another part of the beach, again.  To be so visible to the sky and the water was mesmerizing, and it seemed to call out for yet more repetition.  Back in their room, watching TV on the bed, he was inside her once more, with her sitting on top of him, her back to him as he changed the channels and she perhaps made fun of the television commercials: "There she is, the woman with the sparkling floor!" 

            Dwight continually changed channels with the remote, never staying long, with both of them commenting on what they saw, trying to make jokes or be derisive as they thrust at each other. All was humor and distance, even the sex; his being inside her felt perfunctory, without objective, yet he was in her all the time, never growing bored, and never failing to rise.  Their fucking felt like an imitation of something else.  What?  Was it a copy of what other people did, though perhaps done more frequently than them?  It felt effortless, and could be endlessly repeated, and the repetition seemed to give their sex its very impulse, its desirability.  Another beach-front motel to pick, another meal to eat or channel to watch.  Another bout of sex.  And because they didn't know each other very well and were always in a new place, it perpetually felt like their first night together (which had been in a motel, and which they now could not even remember). 

            They'd known each other for a week and a half—and were comfortable with one another, neutral with each other.  That was enough; that was more than enough—the impartiality and detachment and acceptance.  They were traveling, never stopping, so nothing else had to be established, or found.  

            They lived in the same apartment complex in Sarasota, but had never met until one night they found themselves washing their clothes together in the downstairs laundry room.  After talking for a half hour, finding they had much in common, they decided to go driving in his car—"To do nothing," Dwight had said to her, "just maybe circle the block over and over." 

            "I think that's perfect," Jerri laughed. 

            Then during the drive around town they had concluded that they should drive for two weeks, heading nowhere.  "I'm self-employed," he said to her.  "And you just told me you quit your waitressing job.  Let's travel.  I don't know you at all.  It might work."  

            "It might," she said, snapping a rubber band around her blowing hair, a rubber band she had found lying on his car seat, as if it were put there specifically to hold back her hair now. 

            They drove back to their apartments, said goodnight to each other at their doors, without ever touching one another, and the next morning they started driving, each of them with a single bag for their clothes.  There would be no destination.  No schedule. No romance.  Only travel and fucking.  They understood. 

            Two hours later, at noon, they stopped and fucked in a motel, for the first time.  "I just met you," he said to her on the bed, pressing his index finger into her belly button.  "I think later tonight I'll meet you again. . ." 

            "Mr. Short Term Memory," Jerri said. 

            Then they ate lunch and walked on the beach, in the blazing sun.  "You're hard again," she said. 

            "It's because I don't know you." 

            "You can't believe your good luck. . ."

            They continued this way for the next four days, making slow progress up the west coast of Florida.  Always a random stop at another beach-front motel, after only a couples hours of driving on back roads.  Another key in a door, another thumping bed, another meal.  The only thing they hoped for was to repeat this the next day; if that was all they wanted, then every time would be the first time. . . 

This morning in the bathroom, both of them naked, Dwight pushed back his hair and splashed his face in the sink. 

            "No washing!" Jerri said as she sat next to him on the toilet, the sunlight falling on her through the window.  "Keep the sex and the sweat on you."  The window let the whole morning down brightly onto her.  He watched her sit back proudly against the toilet lid, her shoulders pulled back, her breasts lifted; she never got tired of showing herself to him, for it was as if she were continually saying: Look who you found today. 

            Resting his erection on the lip of the sink, he was doing the same thing with her. . . 

            Each morning her face was sleep-smeared, her hair a tangle. He liked how she let him see her this way—naked, squinty, and bed-headed; she let him hear her piss too.  He reached over to mess her hair up more, and as he stood over her he smelled the odor of pee and sperm lifting from the toilet into his nose.  But there would be no shower for them, as Jerri wanted.  No, they'd go into the ocean for that.  Another washing, and another coat of salt for them—just like their swim last night before bedtime.  Back in the room after their swim last night, he had smelled the salt drying on her, and tried to lick it all off her, and failed, and then smelled it on her the next morning, and also tasted its old bitterness on his tongue.  And after their early-morning sex (it had been barely light, and they were barely conscious, soon falling back to sleep for several more hours), they would get up, peel themselves from each other, pee, eat breakfast, smearing maple syrup on their plates and grin at each other: there was always more mess and stickiness for them.  They'd visit the beach, then check out of the hotel around twelve, as they had done each morning.  Back on the road, he would drive very slowly. "Can't go above 60," he had said.  "No interstate highways.  That'll speed us up too much. . .take us out of the state, get us out ahead of ourselves." 

            Brushing his teeth in the bathroom, he turned to her and mumbled through his tooth paste, "I like a woman who can pee in my presence."

            "I like a man who likes the taste of the sea. . ." and she smiled, opening and closing her legs on the toilet.  She stood up, not wiping herself.  "Give me your tooth brush," she said.

            "Sharing my toothbrush, that would be love," he said.  "Use your own." 

            She nodded, as if what he had said were very true, then smacked him on the butt and reached for her own brush. 

            He was impressed with her.  They had done this—peeing and brushing their teeth together—from their very first morning, starting their day side by side in the tiny motel bathroom, heading who knew where.  A great way to begin, acting as if they were all by themselves, heedless of anyone else, heedless of each other.  Or maybe, peeing together, they were acting like they had been together for years, barely aware of each other.  Which was it? 

            A great tan on her, except for a splash of brilliant white on her lower belly and butt.  The white disappeared, though, on her hips; the bikini string not even wide enough to make a tan line.  Her breasts were round and high on her, the same color as the rest of her.  She had told him, "I'm a private tanner; every other day, an hour in the booth."  Flat stomach, tiny bush on her.  Women trimmed them these days.  Very neat and tidy.  

            They prepared for the beach—a distant booming through their window.  The light was brilliant; there was no land visible through the window, only sky.  Voices came up from the patio below.  In their room he felt as if they were up high, visible, naked, suspended, with the heat already surrounding them, coming at them through the walls of the motel.  It was nearly nine.  They were getting up later and later.  When they'd started this expedition they were on the beach by eight. 

            They rummaged through the messy room, with him looking for his swimsuit while she looked for her comb, lifting sheets and pillows.  He found it and threw it to her.  Comb in hand, she sat down at the bureau and applied suntan lotion, holding her hair up with one hand, drib-bling the lotion down the back of her neck and between her breasts.  He sat on the bed, still missing his swimsuit, and watched her.

            She looked back at him in the mirror, her chin in her chest. 

            "Every morning you put on your sun block—and it's like I've never seen you do it before.  And look at me."  He displayed his new erection. 

            "You're very dependable," she said.   

            "We'll go outside," he said, "and I'll be up for the next two hours—what with you and other women around me, and the sun shining down." 

            She smiled, wagging her head at him.  "You're very boring, you know, doing the same thing over and over." 

            "Each time is the first time." 

            "Or the last time.  Okay, big guy, here."  She stood and came over to him, squirting a big dab of lotion into her palm.  She began to roll his cock between her palms, getting him nice and smooth and glossy.  He lay back, sighing.  "Gotta protect you from the sun," she said.  "You might lose control of yourself and escape your trunks, and be up for all to see.  Greeting the new day. . ." 

            When she was done with him, after also lotioning his belly and balls, she said, "Time's a wasting," and turned to look for her own swimsuit. 

Out on the veranda, they stopped and looked at the ocean.  It seemed immanent, palpable, ready to crush them; with its greenness and its semi-transparency the ocean felt as if it hung over them, poised, like huge sheets of glass.  They hesitated, waiting for something, anything.  He rubbed himself against the railing and smiled. 

            She said, "Let's go, Mr. Big Stuff."  They walked down the stairs.  Immediately they were in sand.  She kicked at it, walking two steps ahead of him.

            Then she stopped, and said, "I forgot my bag!"

            "I'll get it."  He wanted to be away from her for a few seconds, to feel himself be hard despite her absence. 

            Back in the room he found her large canvas shoulder bag.  He grabbed at it, but it was heavier than he thought it would be.  Pawing through it, he saw her wallet, some paperbacks, a bottle of juice, and a handgun.  No mention of the gun from her when they started the trip.  He held it in his hand.  A dark revolver, kind of old.  One wooden plate of the handle was missing.  Her carrying a gun—it made him think less of Jerri.  She now seemed a little weaker than before.  Was she afraid of him?  In their time together he had never imagined her being afraid.  But he was a stranger.  Girls couldn't be too careful. . . 

            Back on the beach, he handed her the bag without comment.  They started walking, with him behind her, still stiff, looking at her buttocks rising and falling in her bikini bottom.  They saw people lying in the sand; a child ran past them, pursued by another.  To their right a volleyball net was being strung by a group of teenagers. 

            She stopped very suddenly—and he ran into her.  Quickly her hand was between them, feeling him.  "Stupendous," she said, and started walking again.  "You're such a stud." 

            He had no idea if she was serious or not.  Despite all the sex, she had never once sincerely complimented him; she had also never refused him.  It didn't matter, though, whether she said anything or not, because they were always going to fuck again.  "Yes," he said.  "I'm always ready."  He liked it how he didn't feel as if he were boasting to her, or that she was particularly impressed with him. 

            She said, "I thought we always had to repeat.  If you're always hard how do you repeat?" 

            "Good question.  Maybe staying hard and repeating are the same thing." 

            They were in the wet sand now, walking next to each other.  Looking down at himself, he envisioned them an hour or two, back in the room.  He thought of their skin, covered with drying salt, clapping softly in the room.  And now, feeling the sand squish up between his toes made him feel even more like fucking.  Plus, being out in public—to have people see them, to simply register in other people's eyes, stirred him.  And her gun too.  It's presence roused him.  They were always starting with each other, but the gun, the gun ended things. 

Up ahead, he saw a splendid woman all by herself on the beach.  She looked almost like a mannequin the way she was laid out, a shoulder-rest under her, with a big beach towel spread around her, a straw hat and an umbrella, with her arms motionless at her sides.  The Goddess in repose.  No one close to her.  No radio, no book with her either.  Wearing a striped blue one-piece, her small, round boobs set high. 

            At first only her chin was visible under her hat.  Then as they got closer he saw sharp lips, a fine nose.  The woman saw them, and slowly brought her arm up to shade her eyes.  Then she touched the top of her hat; she was greeting them. 

            Jerri crossed in front of him.  "Christy," she said flatly. "How's things?" 

            Jerri knew her.  He came up behind Jerri and looked down at the woman's legs which ran with tiny blond hairs, delicate as

the tiny stitching around the edge of her bikini bottom.  She wouldn't raise her head, looking only at their knees as she talked to Jerri.  Her voice floated up from around the brim of her hat, soft and a little bored. 

            Jerri turned to him.  "Last summer in Clearwater, at Jacque's Bar," she said.  "Christy and I waitressed." 

            The tone of her voice—it sounded like Jerri didn't like Christy.  He stood listening, then he realized he was fading in his trunks; he had to do something or he would lose it.  Wonder if Christy saw him in his trunks? 

            When he squatted down in front of her, there was her face: slitty green eyes, full mouth, arched eyebrows.  Her lips were yellow, from the new sun block people were wearing.  Some freckles on her cheeks, through the sheen of tanning lotion.  He concentrated on her face, not looking down at her or at himself. Still he had not been introduced to her. 

            In this squatting position, with his cock rubbing tightly between his swimsuit and his thigh, he was rejuvenated; watching Christy helped too.  He bounced lightly on the balls of his feet, and trembled a little with new blood and the image of Christy and the fine hairs on her legs, running all the way up her legs. 

            The two women ignored him, making chit-chat.  Jerri was saying, "Ten days for us, on vacation, motel to motel, getting roasted in the sun, eating out.  After quitting waitressing, it's great to have other people serve you."  She laughed, then kicked a little flick of sand on his foot without looking at him.  "Lots of sex, too." 

            Christy was staring straight ahead at the ocean, and then looked straight at him, not in his face, but between his legs, and said, "Yes, I see your guy's trunks can't contain him." 

            Peering down at himself, he saw his cock outlined in his swim suit, with the head poking out in a bold mauve from the bottom of the right leg of his trunks. 

            Before he could say anything, Jerri said in an animated  voice, "He's going for a world's record. . .he's always hard." 

            "You better put some lotion on that," Christy whispered to him. 

            Jerri was giggling.  "We already did!" 

            For the first time Christy moved her body, bringing her face just an inch or two closer to him.  "It looks very tender, easy to burn. . ." 

            Christy took her hat off and fanned herself as if she were overheated, and then fanned him, his cock!  What a gesture. 

            He said to her, "My name's Dwight." 

            "I'm Christine."  Her hand came out, but she reached for his cock, not his hand, and pulled on it lightly, bringing him out further, doing it very deftly, very assuredly.  "Pleased to meet you," she said. 

            With Christine smiling at him, he felt a slow, desperate giving away in him; he was suddenly convinced that his always trying to stay hard was a stupid game; everyone knew it, especially this woman.  And when she withdrew her hand he felt sure he would never be hard again, never be able to initiate anything in his life.

            He sat back in the sand, defeated, smiling.  Looking down at himself, he saw he was already soft.  "Look what happened to me," he said to Christy, then to Jerri, trying to be funny, but hearing the inertia in his voice. 

            Christy said, "Yes, I see.  In life there are so many ways for us to lose our enthusiasm." 

            Then Jerri broke in with, "Cocks are always going soft around Christy."  

            "You're right," said Christy, waving her hand dismissively.              This felt quite ugly between Jerri and Christy.  There was past history here.  He decided they must leave.  As he stood up to leave, Jerri put her arm around him and asked Christy, "How's Tad Davis?" 

            "Who knows?" 

            "Who's Tad?" he asked. 

            "Some guy we knew last summer." 

            "Haven't seen him since. . .oh, about October," Christy said. 

            Had they fought over a man, shared a man?  He didn't care. 

            He patted Jerri on the bottom—a hapless gesture, he knew, as soon as he did it.  "Let's go," he said.  But Jerri was resisting him, wanting to stay.  And do what?  Say something more?  There was nothing more to say. 

            He said goodbye to Christy, and they moved away, but Jerri  said, "Let's sit in the sand."  She picked a spot only ten yards from Christy, and dropped her bag with a thud in the sand.              "Packing some iron?" he asked. 

            "What?" 

            "You brought a gun."

            "Yeah?  How did you know?" 

            "Why. . .do you carry it?" 

            "I always take it." 

            "Let's move a little further on," he said. 

            "Why?  Don't you want to look at her?" 

            "It's obvious you don't like her. . ." 

            "So concerned for my feelings?" 

            "No. . ." 

            "A picture of modesty now," and she looked at his trunks. 

            Smiling, trying to get some distance from what had just happened with Christy, he shrugged and said, "You claimed cocks go soft around her. . ." 

            She didn't laugh in reply.  Here was the first uncomfortable moment since they had started their trip.  Jerri was caught up in bad emotions; she was sullen and wrathful and not flexible.  For the first time there was an intrusion in their life, and no hope of the endless repetition of mundane and pleasurable events.  He wanted to tell Jerri to forget about Christy, and for them to walk into the ocean and get wet, or head back to their room and strip.  If they only could be beating their skin against each other. . .   

            Jerri said, "Small-titted little thing, all alone." 

            He was hungry and wanted to eat breakfast.  If they couldn't fuck, at least they could eat.  But Jerri took the beach towel out of her bag, spread it, then fished a book out.  She lay down and opened her book.  He sat next to her in the already-hot sand. Few people were around. 

            He was gone in his trunks.  Nothing.  "Poor baby," she said, not looking at him.  Still not looking at him, she reached out and patted him through his trunks.  Probably she was hoping Christy was looking.  Yes, that was it.  Jerri had revenge in mind. 

            Though he didn't want to be here, he figured they would lie near Christy so Jerri could work him up in his trunks.  That was fine.  Maybe he could get hard again for Christy.  Show her he was always rising up, couldn't be kept down.  Christy could see them.  That would be revenge for him too. 

            He looked over at Christy (who ignored them), then at Jerri, comparing them.  Jerri's breasts were good and weighty as they swelled from the sides of her bikini top.  More curves, more heat in Jerri than Christy, in every way.  She had a man too. 

            He lay back, nodding his head in the sun.  He asked, "Got the paper?" 

            She fished it out of her bag and gave it to him, saying, "It's yesterday's." 

            He nodded and opened it.  The sky was high, and the sun was shining through the paper, making it hard to read. 

            "That was pretty funny, you know, what happened with Christy," he said. 

            She grinned.  "A blast." 

            "It didn't even faze her. . ."  He mimicked her handshake, and said, "Pleased to meet you."            "She's on a mission."  Then, lifting her hand to shade her face, Jerri asked him, "Can I get you hard again?  Can I be of service?" 

            After the episode with Christy, and the sun beating down on him, that's what he wanted.  He said nothing, but without looking around, Jerri boldly peeled his suit down over his hips with one hand, though this wasn't what he wanted.  He didn't want to be quite so visible—for after his episode with Christy, he might fail.  Just wanted to swell inside his trunks, to get things started. 

            But in her hands, there was no hesitation at all from him.  Up he rose.  A very gratifying feeling after meeting Christy.  Once more they were repeating.  Jerri still didn't look around, though there was no one near them other than Christy.  Could Christy see what was being done?  She sure could, though he hadn't looked.  Jerri wouldn't look either, wouldn't look over at her as she rolled him in her palm.  The battle of the Titans. 

            She worked him up, exaggerating her motions.  When she got him fully stiff, she reached over, squirted some suntan lotion on him then topped him off with several quick flicks of her wrist.  "A real trouper," she said.  "Look at him shine."   

            She let him flop onto his stomach.  Dropping his paper, he lay back, tightening then loosening his buttocks, his hands folded back behind his head.  With his eyes closed, he concen-trated on himself, raising his prick up off his stomach several times without touching himself, using just his groin muscles.  He pointed his toes and stretched as far as he could. 

            "Oops, here comes someone."  She grabbed his newspaper, put it over his hips.  He opened his eyes and saw a middle aged woman walk past them, accompanied by her husband some ten feet behind her.  The woman glanced over at them and he lifted his cock under the newspaper, making the paper rustle.  Nothing registered in the woman's face; the man ignored them completely. 

            Once they were gone, Jerri said, "All clear," and took the newspaper off.  He closed his eyes and felt the sun on his cock. This was wonderful.  Wanting to open his eyes and look at Christy, he told himself he shouldn't.  It was better this way, to be oblivious.  Jerri hadn't looked at Christy either. 

            When he finally opened his eyes, the brilliant sky hit at him, seeming to contract several times and flare into a deep purple before returning to normal.  He felt his cock momentarily contract too, from the shock to his eyes, and he worked it again with his muscles, lifting it up, flopping it back down.  Her face to the sky, Jerri was lying next to him, her hip touching his, still reading, looking formidable and foreign in her tiny two-piece.  Had he ever seen her before?  He hadn't.  But her belly was rising up and down softly, just like his belly. 

On and off for the next half hour she handled him, as she read, with him grunting softly, a tight-lipped smile on his face.  He kept his eyes closed, his head turned to one side as if he were listening closely for when she turned the pages of her book.  Still he hadn't looked at Christy.  It felt gratifying, knowing he could be seen.  When he needed rekindling he sighed and she gave him a squeeze, or ran her fingernail up the length of him.  Occasionally she covered him with the paper when people walked by.  

            But the beach was almost deserted.  They had tried to avoid the popular beaches; they even avoided the popular beach towns.  Far off to his right, looking in the opposite direction from Christy, he saw a dog running and barking, all by itself.  What was Christy thinking?  He looked at Jerri, whom he was sure was proud at how they ignored Christy.  She kept to her book, laughing every few minutes at what she read, then reaching over to touch him. 

            Finally she put the book down and looked over at Christy.  He did too.  Christy was gone, but her towel and umbrella were still there.  It was very disappointing to see she had disappeared.  Had Christy missed everything? 

            "Too bad she can't see us," he said, looking down his stomach at himself. 

            Jerri said, "Her stuff's still here.  She's coming back." 

Then she said, "I have an idea.  When she comes back let's fuck, right here on the beach.  Let's let her see it." 

            He laughed and shook his head, saying, "I'm hard all the time, but not around her!"  He was teasing her. 

            Jerri stared at him.  "You're admitting defeat?" 

            "Let's go for a swim then head back to the room."

            She said, "What if we do it with you not here?  We dig a hole in the sand, then you lie down in it and I can sit on you.  You can fuck me while you're buried under the sand; you won't be visible." 

            "I'm buried?" 

            "Yes, except your cock.  It's sticking out and I sit on it."  "It'll be like it's growing out of the ground."  She laughed. 

            Her sitting on him, perhaps even reading, while Christy lay in the sand, and other people walked by—a fabulous, bizarre idea.  Christy would only see Jerri, but Jerri would have his cock in her. 

            "If I'm in the sand," he asked, "how can I breathe?" 

            "Your face'll be sticking out, but it could be hidden under a newspaper.  And I could put the towel around my waist.  No one would know." 

            His cock sticking up out of the ground: they would be fucking, like they always did.  Once more they would be doing things over and over again, without him even being present. 

            "Never can quit," he said as he stood up, pulling up his trunks in the same motion.  "Time to start digging." 

            This would be part of their big plan to be continually fucking; it would be kind of a joke too.  Nothing stopped them, even someone like Christy. 

            A lot of sand needed to be moved, though, to get him buried. Jerri helped him dig, on her hands and knees, giggling as she threw the sand between her legs, like a dog.  Soon there was a shallow trench; he got in it, but it was too small.  Climbing out, feeling the sweat dripping off his nose, he dug some more, with Jerri saying, "Hurry, hurry, she'll be back any minute."  

            When he lay down again, he found that if he pushed out a little with his shoulders to make it wider at the top he would fit.  He folded his hands across his stomach.  "A dead king,"

he said.           

            "Or an Egyptian pharaoh," she giggled, on her knees, salaaming to him, draping her arms in the sand.   

            She scooted up to him and he lifted his hips for her.  She pulled his trunks off without even looking around.  While he had been digging he had gone half-limp, but now she bent over him and mouthed him, humming to herself, her hair covering his chest.  He looked at the sky, listening to her.  Quickly he was hard.  He enjoyed how it was required of him to be rigid before the daunting Christy returned—and he was. 

            Raising herself onto her knees, Jerri dropped his swim trunks in her bag.  Quickly she pushed the sand back over him and smoothed it out.  There was his prick above the sand, at just the right level.  Lifting it, she began brushing it off with a kleenex, doing it delicately.  "Uggh, all sandy," she said, her face inches from him, as if she were examining a sea shell, or a crab. 

            He said, "Sand, it can be kind of abrasive."  He grinned at her, the sand tickling in one ear.  

            "Just a sec."  She finished up with the kleenex, getting every last bit of sand as he trembled and flexed in her palm.  Then she patted the sand flat and hard around his cock; if they weren't careful, the sand could rub her raw.  They'd had the problem before in one of their motel rooms, her swimsuit full of sand from the beach, leaking into her as they fucked.  It was everywhere—in the bed, between her buns, all around his balls.  They had to run out to the ocean to get free of the sand.  Then, all wet, they stumbled back to their room, to fuck on the floor.         The sand might be a problem again, but he had an idea.  He said, "Poke your finger through the newspaper and put it over my cock.  That way, no irritating itch." 

            "What a guy," she said.  "Thinking of my comfort."  She grabbed a section of the paper, the sports section, and poked a hole, tearing it a little. 

            "Not too big," he told her.  

            She lay it over him, sticking him through the hole, and gave him a quick suck to firm him.  "Ready," she said.  Suddenly going motionless, her eyebrows raised, and her fingers poised dramatically at her bikini bottom, she counted, "One, two, three," then yanked her bottom down.              Holding it balled in her hand, she climbed above him, her knees crinkling the newspaper.  He was invisible, vanished—yet she was still going to fuck him.  Only a cock, no body, nothing else.  It was fabulous.  Kind of scary too, for him.  Being gone like this.  

            When she pushed him into her, she felt a little tight with nervousness and hurry.  "No rush," he said.  "We never hurry, remember?" 

            "Shit, I can't wait till she returns," Jerri said. 

            "Slow, yes, like that," he said.  "It's always the first time."  

            She was all the way down on him, and she was now very wet.  He thought of newsprint smearing her—the wet newspaper, with newsprint sticking to her butt and thighs.  Looking down between them, she said, "Looks like a big mushroom growing out of the ground.  Wouldn't it be great if women could just take a walk in the woods and see a fat nice-looking cock with a flaring bright hood on it and sit down on it?" 

            He looked down too, his eyes straining.  He enjoyed how he saw nothing of him.  He really was gone.  Only her and the sand. 

            She got comfortable, whispering, "Shit, it's good." 

            "The towel," he said. 

            She arranged the towel around her bare hips.  Then reaching to her right, grunting, she retrieved her book.  She straightened on him, tall and proud, her shoulders pulled back.  It reminded him of her on the toilet, her back straight, her breasts out. 

            Book in hand, she started moving on him.  "Going to go real slow," she said and he nodded, feeling as if he barely heard her.         He watched her working up a rhythm, not heading for an orgasm, just gently riding him, then backing off with the rhythm, stopping.  The sand lay on him like a stone; he couldn't thrust at her, and she knew it, so she worked him.  She did all the work, which made it all the better.  Two teenagers came walking by and she stopped, trembling slightly on him.  They moved on, and she exhaled. 

            Together like this, in front of everyone, not even visible: it was fantastic.  She wore her top, and looked like she was just kneeling in the sand, her butt resting on her heels.  Someone could walk right up to them and not suspect a thing. 

            She said, "I wish I could grip you with my knees.  Love to ride you hard, but I can't here."            "Don't think of that," he said.  "Just look around you.  Look at the water, the sun, the people over there." 

           

After only five minutes, Jerri whispered, "She's coming." 

            She gently lay a section of the newspaper over his face.  He was completely invisible now, and he couldn't see anything.  He felt Jerri wrap the towel tighter around her waist.  

            Christy came walking over to Jerri; he could hear her feet in the sand.  "Where's your guy?" she asked. 

            Did Christy know?  Surely she had seen them dig the hole? 

            "He went back to the motel," Jerri told her. 

            "—couldn't wait?  Had to go on without you?" 

            Christy was so fast, so sharp with her comments.  He heard her step closer, only a few feet away, standing high above him. 

            "He said he had to pee," laughed Jerri.  "You know guys, always having to pee. . ."  

            Christy laughed too.  An easy laugh.  Perhaps conciliatory, but there would be no conciliation now, not with Jerri pressing down on him like she did.  He was pushing back, in tiny jabs, feeling his stomach muscles flex, as if he too were laughing at Jerri's joke.  It must be obvious what was happening, but Christy didn't seem to know. 

            "You believed him?" asked Christy.  "Maybe, since he's Mr. Hard-On, he's doing another girl, right now.  Who knows, he could have been doing me. . .back in my room." 

            "Christy, why are you such a cunt?" 

            "Oh, you sound like some whiny girl in a soap opera.  What, did I ruin your life, steal your husband, kill your child?"  Then she added, "Tad Davis could make up his own mind; you weren't his mother." 

            "He sure could, but where is he now, Christy?" 

            Christy said, "I think he joined the French Foreign Legion." 

            Despite her sharp humor, he felt suddenly embarrassed for Christy, who obviously didn't realize what was going on.  And Jerri was moving more sharply with her hips; this was too bizarre to comprehend, and he felt she could not go on with it, and that Christy was the sorriest, most pathetic woman ever, talking to  Jerri right now.  The two women were arguing about some guy they had fought over, and now, as they talked, another man's cock was inside Jerri.  Such glory and anger in this.  Such retribution. 

            Jerri really was quite agitated on him.  Didn't Christy see what was happening?  Had to stop things—he had to.  Yet slowing everything, bringing it to a standstill, couldn't happen.  With him buried like he was, and rising up inside Jerri, they mustn't ever stop; this wasn't some ridiculous vow of his either— instead it was a deep deep necessity.  Both he and Jerri had to keep going.  Jerri might even have an orgasm.  Her moving hips and Christy's ignorance was bringing it on, right here in front of Christy.  It would blow poor Christy away.  Jerri's face would take on that dumb look on it, like some big, gaping fish. . .that he knew so well.   

            Then she stopped moving on him, as if trying to hold off—yet if she did that he knew that she would feel an awful loss in her like a death, an ending that would spell the end of all things.  Never would there be another cock in her, another man to touch her.  How did he know that?  He felt the same way!  Coupled like this, invisible to each other, they could not pull away from each other, never stop repeating, thrusting themselves into one another. . . 

            Then Christy was asking her, "Got a problem?"

            "No!" cried Jerri.  Then, bursting with laughter, she rolled off him.  His cock was flopping down against the wrinkled, wet newspaper, like a big arrow in the sand.  "Ta-Da!" Jerri laughed, as she ripped the newspaper from his face. 

            He was laughing too, sounding like a child making stupid noises with his lips and tongue.  Christy stood above him with her hands on her hips, her chin up but her eyes down. 

            Jerri shouted at Christy, "A million bucks for your  thoughts!" 

            Still Christy's face was blank, motionless.      Then she dropped her hands, and like a furious soccer player, she gave his erection a mighty kick.  He heard the soft sffffft of her foot against his prick—it was a perfectly aimed kick, and his cock flew up in the air, pointing straight up for an instant before crashing back into the newspaper it had been lying on a second before.  The pain was tremendous; his feet and arms were up out of the sand, and he was gagging in pain, his body a big V.  As Christy continued kicking at him, kicking sand onto him now, he was rolling into a ball, his hands between his legs.  Out of the corner of his eye he saw Jerri in the sand too, on her hands and knees, still laughing.  Christy seemed far far above them both, as she kicked sand, both her arms held out away from her as if she were balancing herself.

            Lying in the sand, still laughing, yet choking in pain, he motioned for Christy to stop.  He rolled onto his stomach, wiggling, his hands still between his legs, his ass in the air; sand filled his face, and he could taste it on his lips.  Turning sideways, he saw Christy walking back to her towel, and Jerri was crawling away from him too, on her hands and knees, reaching for her bag.  The pain in his groin was tremendous, but his cock was as rigid as before. 

            "You kill everything, you bitch!" cried Jerri. 

            Jerri had her pistol out, and was aiming it.  Her focus looked formidable, as if she had to really and absolutely make the shot good: concentrate, squeeze the trigger once, slowly, as he was sure she had been taught. 

            After the first shot she looked more relaxed, her back wasn't so straight, her hands drooping a little; but she fired again, then once more.  Smoke surrounded them, a big cloud, bigger than he thought it would be—but nothing happened to Christy, she was still walking, partially obscured in the smoke. Then she was down in the sand, crawling.  It was amazing how she knew what to do, crawling away like that, trying to escape this wrath.  One more shot for her.  That one hit—no, it missed, there was the sand jumping up.  But there was blood on her, in her side. 

            He was rolling onto his back now, lifting his legs up to hit at Jerri with his feet to stop her.  It looked so ridiculous and useless, what he was doing; he was kicking at her and grunting, missing her, being completely ineffective, his balls bouncing, his still-hard cock flopping.  Twice more Jerri fired, then the hammer was clicking; she was shooting until she couldn't shoot it anymore.  She threw the gun out in front of her and shouted, "Done!" 

            As he stood up, waving both hands, not holding them between his legs anymore, with his cock beating against his thighs, he made a face at her and then ran down the beach away from the motel and Christy, who lay in the sand kicking her legs.  He was naked and under the sun.  He could feel his bare feet dig into the sand and flip fistfuls of sand up in the air behind him as he ran.  It was satisfying to feel his feet in the sand, and his moving legs, especially after being buried.  Now the sun was striking down on his body again, and the waves were slapping at the beach, doing what they had always done, just as he hoped to do still, with his erection, returning continually to a woman, any woman.  Not buried in the sand, or hearing women fight, he was back in the world, back with what perpetually happened, back with people.  To be with the people he saw on the beach, under the sun like they were, with his cock out for them to see—with all of them still looking at the sky or the ocean and not looking at him at all, confident that nothing would change for them and that they were safe in repetition just like he was—that was what he hoped would happen, still, for him, as well as for Jerri and Christy, who should never have been fighting, never have been as mean and desperate as they were, for there was always another lover, another good fuck, another time in an anonymous room or on the crashing, sun-splashed beach.