Summer Memories

[rgrove0172]

I had seen the girl before of course, twenty-three year old guys have a sort of natural radar that can pick up on women anywhere in their vicinity, but I had never really met her. She had caught my attention at a distance a few times the way anything even remotely female does. She was the girlfriend or fiancée of the son of the rancher down the road from the place I was working that summer and provided a nice distraction from hard work when spotting her across the pasture but that was all.
Rancher might have been too serious a title for the guy in this case as their place was hardly a real ranch. His house, barn and a few livestock were nestled on a few acres butting up against the couple of sections my real rancher boss called home. I had worked for old man Potter the summer after graduation and had returned during each break from college. It was hard work but he paid well and it went along with the degree in agriculture I was studying toward. The little place next door had never even entered my attention until spotting the girl there.
She was cute, in a pig-tails and tom-boy kind of way, although I don’t recall her ever really wearing pig tails. She just sort of came across that way when I would catch sight of her riding their old mare from time to time or helping the owner’s son feed their stock. His name was Trent, I knew that, I had met him a few times. He was a decent enough sort about my age and his Dad was alright too, but they were an oil family. Their stock and barn were a hobby for them, something they spent their oil money on for fun, or so I had heard. This drew my contempt as a farm and ranch man and I don’t think I exchanged more than a few words with any of them during those previous summers.
The girl was a new fixture though. She had appeared a month or so before, only a few days after my return. I had watched her a few times, even so far as to use a pair of binoculars for a few minutes when I spotted her in a sports bra one afternoon, until old man Potter kicked me in the ass with a devilish grin. She had looked pretty good that day, nice trim little body, firm if a bit small set of tits on her, long legs and a wild mop of sun-bleached blonde hair. Like most blondes she was pale but it looked good on her, that milky smooth skin. I liked what I saw, no doubt there, but in the glasses that day I also caught a good look at her face, and although cute as hell she looked like she might be a bit too young for me to be checking out.
Another clue that hinted the cutie could still be ‘jail-bait’ was that she only appeared on weekends during the winter, or so a couple of Potter’s regular hands had told me. Yeah, they had noticed her too, showing up now and then over the past year but not so much when class was in, like maybe she was still in high school. This made it seem a little creepy to talk about her and we kept our dirty thoughts to ourselves at first until the kid Trent hid a new mare at Potter’s place for a week.
It was a birthday present for the girl and I we were relieved when we heard it was her eighteenth. That opened the barn door, as the old man would have said, allowing us guilt free discussion. We all joked and made the typical rude comments about her after that of course, the old man even whispering something about that ‘sweet little filly next door’ a few times, but it was harmless. I still laughed though when I considered that the son over there, Trent, was dating this young thing. I could imagine his parents weren’t too happy about that. Mine had thrown a fit when I had brought a high school senior home during my third year of college. That relationship hadn’t lasted and as it turned out I had been right about how Trent’s folks felt about this one. Eighteen might be legal in our eyes but to parents it’s still a kid, and really when you get to thinking about it, it is.
It was innocent fun back then, thinking and joking about her, was for a while anyway. It was Innocent right up to the point when it went crazy and nobody but maybe old man Potter saw it coming.
I didn’t know the details of how it started at the time, it took a while to get the whole story as everybody clammed up afterwards, hardly wanting to admit it had happened at all. It wasn’t like somebody had gotten hurt or anything but afterward, when the blood returns to your brain after something like that, you realize you screwed up and don’t want to be reminded. What I did learn eventually is that the owner of the place next door had taken his wife on vacation, Hawaii or something I think somebody said. The son Trent was working on site for his old man and was away for a week or so. In the mean time his girl hung out to watch over the place, care for the animals and tend their garden. Seemed reasonable to me but one of the hands told me the owners hadn’t been too keen on it and gave the girl a hard time, not trusting her. He said it took a lot of convincing from their boy to get them change their mind.
When I think about that now it kind of makes sense and explains that look she had on her face when we first went over. She looked trapped, not by a bunch of us guys horning in around her, but by her own doing. I think she was scared to death of letting those people, maybe her future in-laws, down. The idea of having to explain what had happened that morning and hand them a bill for the damages would have been bad, really bad, maybe bad enough to wreck what her and their son had going. I kind of feel sorry for her now, I did then too but there were other feelings surging that had drowned all that out.
The first I got involved was about ten o’clock that morning, maybe three weeks after the big birthday when they came to fetch the horse. It was shaping up to be another West Texas summer scorcher and a couple of the hands and I were hanging back in the shade of the barn trying to avoid the old man. We were just smoking and shooting the bull when one of the other guys actually working on something started shouting for the rest of us to bring the truck, that some of the east fence was down near the road. When I asked if I should get the tractor, knowing we would need it to restring the barbed wire, I was confused to hear him reply that it was already there. The four of us piled in the old F150 and sped down the county road to the point he had indicated, right at the intersection of our land and that kid Trent’s place. Seeing the snarl of fence, Boss Potter’s truck and a few head of cattle in the roadway we had a mess to clean up and got to it.
Sure enough the tractor was there, somehow it had gotten some of the fence wire wrapped around an axle and before any of us even jumped up to start it the old man was b*tching that the clutch was burned out on it and we would have to tow it back to the yard. I hadn’t even known the tractor was gone but we had spent most of the early morning working on the water well and I guess I never noticed. As we bailed out to start rounding up the cattle the old man sped off, throwing dirt as he headed further up the road toward the neighbor’s little place, now being watched by the girl.
It didn’t take very long, the four of us driving the cattle back through the breech and temporarily wiring up the fence. We had just finished towing the tractor back into the yard when the radio crackled in the truck. Old man Potter had a whimsical tone in his voice over the speaker.
“You boys bring the truck and come on over here to the Hewett’s. I got something your gonna want to see.” There was almost a chuckle in his voice.
We unhooked the tractor and loaded back up, a little curious but expecting nothing less than more work of some kind. The short ride over however was perpetuated by comments about having a legitimate reason to get a good look at that ‘sweet thing’ we had been joking about. I know for myself, I was a little excited. She was young sure, and none of us had any real business thinking that way, but we were just going to look. No harm in it, or so mature men tell themselves when encountering young but attractive girls the world over.
As we pulled up in the Hewett’s drive, a good hundred or so yards from the main road, I could see Potter’s truck pulled up next to a little Toyota pickup, the girl’s I figured. To one side the old man was towering over her and pointing an accusing finger back at the fence. Even from a distance I could tell from her posture something was wrong. She looked like a scolded kid, head hung low and shoulders slumped, tossed blonde hair all but covering her face. As we shut off the ignition we could hear her sobbing a little, sputtering between sniffles about not having enough time to pay something back.
She glanced up at us as we emerged from the truck. Her face was wet with tears and her eyes a little swollen. She quickly looked back down. We approached, hanging back a little, uneasy with the unexpected scene. Potter was using his Big Daddy Showman voice, the one he used when haggling for a good price or politicking, but what he was saying shocked me, all of us I think.
“I’m real sorry sweetheart but the clutch on that tractor aint going to fix itself and theres a good fifteen or twenty head of my cattle roaming down the county road half way to who the hell knows where! Not to mention I got to pay these hands a wage to set that mess you made to rights. If you didn’t know how to run the tractor you shouldn’t have tried. You told my wife you knew what you were doing, now look were that got us. I figure to be out almost three thousand dollars because of your little accident.”
The words and tone were calculated, I could see that, aimed at scaring the girl right up to becoming frantic but holding her there at her most vulnerable. The fact that it was mostly bull-shit was also evident to us but not to her. The tractor would be working by that evening and the fence and cattle were already good to go. She didn’t know it though and none of us was stupid enough to challenge the boss. She was tearing heavily as he spoke but not quite weeping and you could tell her mind was still working, still searching for a solution, not yet succumbing to the situation she was facing.
“I was just trying to patch the fence.” She blurted “I didn’t even see the wire till it was all wrapped up Mr. Potter. I’m really, really sorry and I can pay you back.” she continued stammering then sobbed again. “Really, I’ll work for it but I’ll need more time.”
“Work?” Potter laughed gustily “I’ve seen your work darlin, no thank you ma’am.“ He paused then and shifted to a warm, sympathetic smile. “Look, Tonya is it? How about I get this taken care of and Ill work it all out with Mr. Hewett when he gets back, no need for you to trouble yourself about it. You just got in over your head, that’s all. You should have asked for help. A ranch is hard work, no place for a little girl on her own.”
Wow, now that I think about it, knowing what I know of the girl’s situation, Potter had been masterful. I don’t know if there was anything he could have said that could have been as threatening to her as that. If he had meant to completely disarm her, and I guess knowing what I know now he did, he had done it expertly. He had tapped into her worst nightmare, having to admit she was exactly what her boyfriend’s parents thought she was, a silly little girl who hadn’t grown up yet. The girl didn’t know it then, or maybe she sort of did, but whatever choice she might have had in what followed left her right there.
“No” she interjected harshly, regaining some composure “Mr. Hewett doesn’t need to be involved in any of this.” She took on a very adult and almost professional air. “It was my mistake and I will take care of it. Just tell me what I can do to make this right.”
The wait after that offer seemed like a long time. Guys are horrible letches, let’s just face it, and the three hands and I were all sort of thinking the same thing but didn’t dare really consider it. What could she do? What would she do, with us maybe? The question was there but we pushed it away. It was crude guy thinking, the kind of crap that circles around in your head all the time but has no bearing on reality. She was just a young girl too. Now that we had a real good close look there was no doubt about it. She was only a couple weeks past eighteen we knew but could have passed for younger. She was a looker though, that good close look provided a few more pleasant details too. Her legs were long and shapely beneath a mid thigh pair of cutoffs, displaying the slight pink tinge of sunburn. The t-shirt she wore was tiny, tight across the fist-sized boobs filling in nice from underneath. When she turned we got a good view of a sweet little round ass, nothing immature there, and her lightly freckled face and scared blue eyes were making that change from girl to woman slowly, holding an innocence that frankly drives most men crazy.
These thoughts were swirling through my head when Potter’s reply stunned us all.
“Well sweetheart, OK, I tell you what. You jump up there on the hood of my truck and do a little dance for me and the boys here and I’ll consider knocking a sizeable chunk off that cash the Hewetts are gonna owe me. How about that?”
Her gaze went blank and her mouth sort of dropped open, and so did ours. There was this sudden weird surreal feeling in the air, like we had stepped into a movie or something. The old man had opened up something with that proposition and was letting something out, and it was tickling us, tickling us in places that had no business being tickled with this innocent and suddenly defenseless young girl there looking back at us. Did he really just ask her that?
She literally stuttered when she replied, barely understandable as she questioned what he had said but Potter was in full gear. He laughed disarmingly like she had misunderstood him somehow.
“Dance honey, just a dance, like you do at that school of yours. Ill flip on the radio in the truck there and you dance. OK? You can dance right? Them pretty legs of yours are worth a good roll of cash, use’em!”
The easy-going way he presented it sort of took the tension down a notch both for us and her. It was pretty amazing really. This young girl had obviously never even dreamed of doing something like that before in her life and at face value it was a pretty daring, suggestive, and scary request. He was asking her to stand up there and dance in front of five strange men. She should be terrified and we should all be running for fear of a police report I knew, but we didn’t run and amazingly she just sort of stood there looking down and was obviously thinking it over. She was thinking about three thousand dollars too I bet, and her boyfriend’s parents I was sure. What Potter was asking wasn’t really that threatening now that I think about it, not really, not the way he put it. He had taken a lot of the scare out of his suggestion somehow and made it seem almost playful. It must have managed to overcome her obvious inhibitions too because without warning she just stepped on the running board and jumped up to the hood. She smiled down at us uneasily as she waited for the radio, her hands on her hips and a forced look of defiance on her face. A moment later Bon Jovi was “Living on a Prayer” and she started to dance.
She wasn’t great, at dancing I mean. Don’t get me wrong, she did ok but she had no idea how to dance the way women dance when in front of leering guys. There was no pole up there and it was clear she wouldn’t have known what to do with one had there been, but she moved pretty well and her looks and the erotic feel of the whole situation made up for a lot. She did do this one sort of thing with her hips I remember where a kind of circular grind would end with a little pelvic thrust to the front that drew a few groans from the guys. We weren’t really sure how to act at first but within a minute or so we got into it and started whistling and cat-calling in a friendly rather than threatening manner. We didn’t want to scare her after all and were trying to encourage her more than anything else. This seemed to put her at ease some and I actually remember her laughing a couple times when one of the hands grasped his chest and faked a heart attack while another started dancing right along with her.
By the end of the song a lot of the tension had bled off. It really hadn’t been that uncomfortable, for her or us, but Potter wasn’t even close to letting go. Just as we were relaxing a bit, a little guilty at ogling this young thing but feeling more at ease with her as she was calming down too, Potter gave a short applause.
“Whew! Sweetheart the girls I ran with never moved liked that! I sure missed out. Do one more for us ok? I’ll knock another chunk off what you owe for one more.” He offered this with the same circus showman flare that had worked so well before.
She didn’t even hesitate this time, why should she? She had a good thing going and knew it. But when she stood back up as the next song started, Potter shook his head and caught her attention.
“Oh no darlin, I’m sorry but we got to work a bit harder this time. I’ll make it worth your while don’t you worry - but you have to lose that t-shirt this time.”
The affect was stunning. I swear the wind quit blowing, the locusts in the trees stopped buzzing and the animals stood stone still, just as we did. Again there was that weird current in the air like we were losing reality but this time it was stronger and there was no reprieve. We all wondered then and there in disbelief where Potter was taking this girl and how far it would go.
None of us said a thing but all our eyes were on her, awaiting a response. She shook her head slowly then more emphatically. Finally she managed to reply.
“No. No way, I mean. I’m not going to…” but she didn’t get to finish.
Potter just thrust out his hand to help her down from the hood.
“Fine” he interrupted, speaking flatly “No problem Tonya. Me and the boys will wrap things up down there at the fence and I’ll see you in a few days when the Hewetts return. No problem.”
His hand held there extended for several seconds and her hand lifted to take it but stopped. It wavered then lowered again. Slowly he withdrew his and stuck it in his pocket as he leaned back against our truck from where he had watched her first performance. Her eyes moved to us, momentarily locking with each of our own gazes. I don’t know if she was looking for help or sympathy, but if she had been, she didn’t get it.
I wanted to look away, knew I should. Hell, down inside somewhere I wanted to get in the truck and drive off, or better yet step up and put a stop to the whole thing but I didn’t. I’ve wondered for years why I didn’t. I’ve told myself it was my job, the one paying my way through college. Or maybe it was the pressure of the boss and the other hands standing there. I know better though. It was her, that beautiful young frightened thing standing there on display, like prey to hunting predators. Her light blonde hair fluttered in the wind a little and her big blue eyes darted around nervously while we waited. Her sleek young body quivered noticeably and her hands pulled into fists as her mind raced. I stood there ashamed but wanted to see, needed to see where it was all going to go, privately yearning for her to keep going no matter what. So I said nothing and just stared.
When the music started, I can’t recall the song that time, she started to dance again slowly but then awkwardly grasped the bottom edge of her shirt and drew it up over her head. As it fell to the ground next to the truck one of the hands picked it up in a sick parody of a chivalrous act and actually folded it before placing it on the truck behind us.
She was wearing a bra of course, a plain white bra cut for a girl of her age and delicate frame. It was obviously an older one however, probably a better fit when she was an A cup rather than the full B she seemed to be now. The tight squeeze accentuated her bust as it pushed up from under the restraining material. She danced more carefully this time, not raising her arms and trying unsuccessfully to not draw attention to what our eyes were completely locked on. Her breasts were young and very firm and didn’t bounce much under that tight fabric but when they did, oh man, you could feel a little jolt pass through us all.
She had been catching some sun that summer, that much was obvious, the pink of her face, arms, legs and even her belly wasn’t reflected in the pale smooth skin peeking out from under her bra. All of our imaginations were providing images of what that white skin would look like revealed. My eyes moved to her face, down to her legs and across her butt, and even to the tight stretch of denim at her crotch a few times but lingered most on those barely jiggling breasts almost but not quite revealing themselves.
This time when the song ended she just raised her hands to cover her boobs and waited, breathing rapidly from the exertion and no doubt exposure. She knew, as we did, that she wasn’t coming down yet. We all knew too what was probably coming next but we waited to actually hear Potter say it. I was holding my breath
He didn’t say it as it turned out but just stared up at her confidently with that little owning grin until the next song started. When it did he made a quick gesture with one hand, pointing at her shorts. She didn’t look around at us this time, accepting I suppose that there was no help to be found there, and the level of intimacy this strange incident was reaching made me grateful she didn’t. I didn’t think I could look into her eyes again while this continued, but eventually I did. It was becoming a sort of storm of lust there around that truck and the girl atop it, building slowly but gaining strength and knocking aside all common sense and decency. I felt it, feared it but was part of it, lending my own energy as it swirled around this girl.
She reached down with maddeningly slowness and unsnapped the shorts then unzipped and finally let them fall to her ankles. She kicked them aside and nobody moved to claim them this time. Their loss had revealed a faded pair of white panties, barely concealing the pale flesh underneath, and speckled with what I think were little red chili peppers. The aged thin and well-washed fabric clung like a second skin and highlighted crevices and fissures they were meant to conceal. One of the ranch hands next to me muttered under his breath. “Holy Shit.”
I understood his sentiment exactly. That this was really happening in front of us was a little overwhelming, almost too much to handle, outright crazy. The dance that followed was possibly the most conservative of that day though. The girl was nearing the edge of her nerve but had not yet reached that threshold of abandon which would come later. She barely moved at times, stepping side to side, only swaying a bit at her hips all the while trying desperately to avoid eye contact, but it was enough. There was something about that plainly exposed figure up there, so womanly yet attired in seeming innocence that was alluring to the point of madness. None of us were pediphiles, or so I believe. I know certainly for myself I have never been attracted to anything younger than the occasional deceptive teenager. I cannot hide from the fact however that it was the illusion of youth up there, as much as her body that pushed the excitement. She was definitely a woman, a fine one, but those childish panties and ill fitting bra, obviously never intended for even her boyfriend’s viewing, raised her appeal to unexplainably degenerate levels.
Beside me that same ranch hand moved his hand to his crotch, rubbing his offending organ through his dirty levis. He was the first to do so I think but others followed. I held off, for some reason actually fearing some sort of contempt from the girl if she noticed, which she obviously did as her eyes darted to the others so engaged. It was a silly concern. How she certainly felt about us then and later wasn’t likely to change based on that sordid, self-indulgent gesture. We were perverts in her eyes I knew, manipulative and sick bastards. It stung but I accepted it. Still I avoided encouraging what was occurring within my pants until Potter’s next direction when I simply couldn’t help myself.
She had completed the song to another theatrical round of applause from Potter. One of the hands made as to join him but then stopped with his hands half raised. Potter was using that applause as part of his manipulation, we were simply the guilty but fortunate recipients of the girl’s compliance. The friendly hooting and whistling we had done before might have been accompanied by encouraging applause earlier, but not now. We had moved far beyond that. Any semblance of friendly collaboration and support were long gone. She was performing and we were the clearly the benefactors. We stood silently as she sat down on the hood and the song ended, clasping her knees in front of her modestly as the radio granted her a commercial-filled stay.
Something happened in those long moments as one ad followed another, each teasing with the promise of a following song and what it would bring. Her breathing calmed and the quivering subsided and she eventually looked up not only at us but at Potter too. There was a sort of acquiescence in her expression, less fear and more of a resolute kind of determination. She barely noticed when Potter commended her on what a good job she was doing and how she would have all that money paid back in no time. When the music started again she got up, hands again defiantly on her slim hips.
The ranch hands and I had been lulled into a sort of horny daze by the whole situation. We hadn’t said a word in minutes but we looked at one another now questioningly. We all knew what we secretly hoped would come next but honestly I was having a hard time believing Potter would go there. This had been a crazy few minutes, an unbelievably exciting but also perilous venture. To take it any further was insane. I found myself wondering if and then believing that it was surely over. The boss would stop here before anything really criminal happened. He had to right? He had orchestrated something incredible here. He taken advantage of this poor girl and in doing so propelled us into some perverse male fantasy but he would pull back now, enjoying his mastery of the situation and her vulnerability as much as the performance. There was really nothing else that needed to be done. He would order us back to the yard and laugh at our discomfort for weeks. Instead he stepped up to the hood of the truck, reached out his hand, and asked politely for her bra.
It should have shocked us but it didn’t. The transformation from disbelief only a few seconds before to exhilarating arousal was instant. Apprehension, fear and guilt all vanished in a surge of raw lust. She hesitated only a few seconds, closing her eyes to help calm the nerves that were no doubt screaming. Then we watched in awe as she reached behind her, nimbly arching her back to catch the clasp with her fingers, and popped the bra loose. It dangled from her hand a moment before dropping into Potter’s. She didn’t bother raising her hands to cover herself, the moment between the songs had all but vanquished her last bit of modesty. She was ours, his more accurately, and trying to cover up would have been silly and futile.
My eyes ran across those stunning young breasts over and over. Smooth white globes highlighted by the sun-tinted pink of the torso around them. Flush pink nipples jutted up from the pleasant swells, sweat-glazed in the sunlight. When she started to dance they didn’t flop or bounce but only jiggled, unrestrained now, quivering more with every sharp move. At one point she bent over at the waist and they protruded downward, not big enough to hang exactly but suspended there for a moment, the promise of what they would feel like dipping down into an open hand piercing our imaginations.
I realized I was rubbing myself then, unashamedly. I was hard as rock down there and so completely taken in by what I was seeing I couldn’t help myself. God this girl was hot, but in a way I’m not sure I had ever appreciated before. This was no sl*tty, big-boobed stripper or even a saucy little bar-tramp eager for the picking. This was just a pretty girl, the kind you see every day and maybe admire for a moment but typically forget soon after. Everything about her, her undeniable innocence, made conjuring up the carnal inappropriate. This situation though, the sheer impossibility of it, and her inescapable presence, changed everything. The pale skin, sun-bleached hair, slight build, uneasy expression, and clumsy movements lent her a vulnerability and sensuality that is impossible to explain. When she caught my glance with her own by accident the burst of excitement I felt was stifling, taking my breath away. I wasn’t sure if it was truly just her or the lascivious situation that was affecting me more but I cannot recall a single time in my life when I have been more turned on. I ached for her.
I have to stop here for a second and try to explain something that I’m not sure I have the words for. As the scene unfolded that day, the sun beating down on us as this pretty young girl danced and undressed, there was a kind of weird conflict present.
On one hand the whole situation seemed unreal, unbelievable in some way and I had the distinct feeling that I was dreaming and would suddenly wake up, cursing myself for the interruption. These kinds of things only happen in an x-rated film, between the sticky pages of some pornographic magazine, or in the head of a teen-aged boy. This sustained disbelief detached me somehow from what was happening, making me feel like a distant observer only of an erotic but remote spectacle. It was strong enough to cloud my judgment and suppressed scruples that otherwise would never have accepted, much less participated in, such a violation.
Pressing down on me at the same time however, as keenly as the heat, was the very realness of it, an intoxicating closeness, a seducing intimacy. She was there, not on some glossy page, T.V. screen or even up on some dimly lit stage, but right there. Her shadow moved on the ground at my feet, I could catch the smell of her shampoo on the breeze. The squeak of her sneakers on the metal hood, the music scratching through the old truck’s speakers and her heavy breathing, they made it all so present. I was part of this, in this. That sweet young woman up there whose modesty and innocence were being stripped from her more and more every minute was real, so real.
When the music stopped she half attempted to cover her heaving breasts and dropped down to sit on the hood. Her dancing had taken on a more energetic, even abandoned feel to it this time and she was breathing hard. I’m sure it was Potter’s composed inevitability of her situation that had begun to relax her inhibitions but inside I hoped it was arousal beginning to surface. The idea that some part of her was starting to enjoy this was both intoxicating from my animalistic standpoint but somehow sympathetic too, hoping her fear and humiliation would turn to something less painful.
Potter strode up beside her and suggested she take a minute to catch her breath. He offered her a beer from the cooler in the back of our truck but she declined with a silent shake of her head. She was noticeably stressed, physically from the exertion in the hot sun and what she was being forced to contend with emotionally. We fidgeted there in the dirt, the interruption easing the fervor raging within all of us but only slightly. When she stood up again, asking for that beer on second thought, it was back strong as ever. We watched as she tilted that graceful neck, pointing her tits to the sky as she worked the beer bottle. She swallowed hard and took a deep breath after draining more than half, a tantalizing dribble of white foam dripping onto her chest and racing down her belly. She handed the bottle to the old man and she stepped back.
She knew what was next and stood there several minutes motionless, the beer-foam soaking into the fabric below her belly button. We waited for a nudge from Potter but he was patient, giving her time. She closed her eyes and gnawed at her lip, settling some final inner compromise.
In slow motion it seemed she reached down and slid her thumbs into the elastic waistband of her panties. The material slid down first in the back as she bent over at the waist to ease them down, revealing the white expanse of smooth, tantalizing cheeks then dipped in the front as well. The little red chili peppers crinkled and folded as they moved down her thighs, past her knees, and slid down long slender calves. She straightened then, letting them slip from her fingers as they settled about her ankles. Strangely my eyes were drawn not to her womanhood immediately, now nearly visible between clenched thighs, but those panties, resting in a little bundle about her feet. First one foot rose slightly, relinquishing its hold on them and then the other. When the second foot lifted however the material clung precariously to one toe. Potter held out his hand and the so adorned foot rotated toward him, ever, ever so slowly. That long graceful leg turned out, away from the other, then extended ballet like. When she finally dipped the foot forward and dropped the panties into his hand, I traced the leg back, along ankle, knee and further.
Nestled between the already closing thighs was a triangle of pale white flesh, never graced by the sun under even the most daring of teen bikini bottoms. Within and beneath the triangle a rosy pink fold peered out coyly, the fragile petals of tender flesh delicately framing an oh-so-tiny darker recess. Only the faintest hint of transparent golden down surrounded her guarding labia, thinning as it fanned upward, catching a second of teasing sunlight as she pivoted back toward us. The thighs came quickly together and ended that alluring glance but even after the far more provocative and revealing images that would follow it is that momentary glimpse I have carried with me so dearly for all the years since.
Again the music began and she moved. There was a power in her dancing this time, all but gone were the prudish and embarrassed gestures of minutes before. Her hips moved without shame and her arms wound up in that blonde mane, proudly exposing her quivering bosom. The abandon lent confidence and quality to her movements and despite her still obviously amateurish display, she captivated us.
Her waist was so tiny it gave her hips and bust curves they hadn’t yet earned and her tummy there was so taught as to show not a crease when she would bend full over in a rush, dipping her head and cascading her hair in a swirl. She spun away suddenly and for one devilish moment spread her legs widely, then bent completely at the waist, her ivory bottom facing us and the flesh beneath suddenly tantalizing visible.
“Oh shit” came a strangled cry from one of the hands who quickly turned and darted behind the truck, grasping at his crotch. I sympathized, feeling an impending climax myself. I stuck my hands frantically in my pockets, fearful that just one more rub accompanied by this dervish of forbidden lust in front of me would send me stumbling away too. My hands moved of their own volition within my pockets however, reconnecting with the throbbing flesh down there so eager to join with what my senses were taking in.
The song ended all too quickly and the girl dropped to her knees then sat back on her heels. Facing us briefly she graced each of us with a short glance then toppled back at the waist and reclined onto the windshield looking skyward, arms flung out in exhaustion. Her legs, pinned beneath her spread reflexively and she effectively collapsed, eyes closed, panting hard, breasts heaving.
I took a long intense look at her then, fixating and committing to memory every detail. Head to toe my eyes caressed her and then back again. I stepped closer, actually leaning over the hood, taking in her sweat scent. The feminine mix of sweat and maybe lavender soap filled my nostrils and the enticing nearness of that quivering belly drove me over the edge.
My groin contracted then released in an explosion of violent pleasure. My hands knotted in my pockets as I grimaced and let out a stifled grunt. I lurched back, stumbling a little, my eyes riveted on the glorious flesh laid out before me. She looked over briefly, a strange mix of humiliation and amusement in her eyes. I couldn’t hold her gaze and looked down sheepishly, gasping as my body continued to respond.
The ranch hand next to me brushed past suddenly and moved toward the truck, actually reaching a hand toward her while the other clawed at his groin. I would have stopped him but I was still in the grips of release myself and could hardly stand much less interfere. Potter shouted a warning however and his tone was unmistakable.
“Get the hell back Ruiz or I’ll fire you then shoot you in the Goddamn head!”
Ruiz halted, looked over angrily and the two men’s gazes met. I was coming around by then and moved forward a little but was still pretty unsteady. I wondered privately in those few seconds if Potter was serious. Could you goad these guys, goad me, with such a situation and not expect us to act on it, not let us finish it off? I wanted her, God I wanted her. She was still lying there but looking up uneasily now, beginning to recover and beginning to sense the danger. She was looking at Ruiz but glanced at me again and in that second I realized I couldn’t touch her, wouldn’t let anyone touch her.
What she had shared, unwillingly of course, was something rare. It was tawdry yes, perverse certainly but special. Some of her innocence had been exposed and exploited up on the hood of that truck for out benefit, but not all. We, I, was so fortunate to have experienced it. There was no way I would tolerate someone trying to rip the rest from her. I guess Potter felt the same way or maybe he just feared pushing his luck. He might just get away with this, using the girl’s fear to keep her silent, but a ****? That would be a whole different story. I prefer my line of reasoning but I’m not a fool, it was probably the latter that drove the old man to actually grab Ruiz by the shoulder and shove him away.
A few seconds later we were being shoved into the truck. Potter was yelling for us to take our horny asses back to the yard and forget this ever happened or else. As we pulled the truck around the drive I looked back and saw him handing her the t-shirt. She was still sitting up there on her knees but modesty was returning. She clutched the item quickly and drew it about her torso, scooted across the smooth metal to the far side of the truck away from him and hopped down. I got one last glimpse of long legs and the white of her butt before we made the turn onto the road and accelerated.
We returned to the ranch and Potter followed only a few minutes after. I was convinced then and still am that he never touched her after we left, he didn’t have time. I suspect he made it clear what was at stake and tried to secure her silence and apparently he must have done a good job of it because nothing was ever said. I’ve often thought about what might have happened if she had dared reveal it all to her boyfriend or the police. There was no proof at all, Potter had been careful. It was our word against hers and even if someone believed her, there were so many nasty spins that could have put on the story that Potter would have ruined her. He would have too.
In the end it just died right there. You would think we would have talked about it amidst ourselves, embracing the memory together, thrilling in its recall, but we didn’t. What we did privately with the images we would hold forever I’m sure is different but publicly, even amid ourselves, nothing, not a word. Potter didn’t even warn us, he didn’t have to. It never happened. We got it.
I didn’t see the girl again that summer, not even out on the pasture. I don’t know what happened to her immediately after but the owners came home, nothing was ever said about the tractor and she married Trent about a year later. That summer was the last I worked for old man Potter, picking up a better gig with a state agency through the rest of my college. I really didn’t spend much time in town afterward either to be honest, not due to anything connected to the incident, life just took a few new turns for me that fall.
A year or so after graduation I heard Potter died, a heart attack. I had intended to make the funeral but missed it. It was probably just as well, it would have been awkward now that I think about it. The last few weeks that summer had been gracefully brief. We went on like nothing had changed but it had, it was always on our minds, wondering and worrying. I looked up constantly for the girl, half hoping and half dreading I would see her, but I never did. None of the hands worked through the next season either and there is no telling where they all went. Life goes on.
I’ve thought about the girl and the incident over the years of course, (incident; the word hardly does what then girl endured and we experienced justice but I’ve given up trying to find something more appropriate) it brings both pleasant and sometimes troublesome emotions. Pleasant when I’m single and horny and troublesome when I’m in love with someone and legitimate affections make me feel like a total asshole for being part of that girl’s ordeal. It doesn’t plague me though and I can go months without it even coming to mind. It was almost twenty years ago now and sometimes I think it will fade, eventually.
Last week I traveled back to town to meet up with an old friend who’s mother passed away. It was just a quick trip to pay my respects, attend the funeral, and catch up a little then return home. The night I arrived my buddy offered dinner and I accepted, an eight-hour drive and a single lunch stop behind me. We were sitting there over a steak and beer when a couple sat down at the table next to ours. Yeah, I won’t play around with any teasing build up here. It was Trent and his wife. Her.
Evidently my buddy didn’t know them, despite it being a fairly small town, as through an hour of dinner we never exchanged so much as a word. Nor did Trent recognize me apparently, twenty years and a few pounds retaining my anonymity. I watched her plenty though, actually getting caught by my friend more than once. I waved it away as just me checking her out, she was still a looker, but it was far more than that to me.
It seemed incredible that I could be sitting here less than five-feet from that same girl. She had aged gracefully, her hair still long and about the same color. She still sported freckles across her nose and cheeks but they were fewer now. She was still thin, her legs shapely beneath the knee length dress, but she had grown an impressive bust line during the intervening years, either from children or implants I couldn’t tell. I tried but I couldn’t keep my eyes off her, actually drawing a mocking snicker from my buddy.
We finished our meal, sat through coffee, and were about to leave when she finally looked my way. My friend was paying the check and I was gathering my coat when I took what I longingly thought would be my last good look at her. My eyes met hers this time, looking right into me. Her face was blank, seeming to just glance around at her surroundings but they were locked onto mine with startling intent. She knew me, she remembered. The recognition was obvious even through her vacant stare. Her eyes were saying it loud and clear. I wanted to look away badly but didn’t, for a few brief seconds there she was, young again, standing atop that truck looking down at me and I felt again all the same intense swirl of emotions. I took a breath and played out something I had imagined countless times over the year. I swallowed hard and silently moved my lips to articulate “I’m so sorry” to her, putting as much genuine emotion in my expression as I could muster.
She turned back to her husband then, answering some question he had formed but then slowly looked back to me. After a moment’s continuation of that plain blank stare, she just smiled, more with her eyes than her lips. It wasn’t a kind or forgiving smile but a knowing and almost impishly provocative smile. There was no condemnation in it, of that I’m sure, more the recognition of a shared secret. She shrugged slightly, the smile there an instant and then gone.
A minute later and I am on the road, the restaurant and the girl, the woman I suppose I should now say, receding behind me. My heart had been racing in that brief reunion, engorged memories suddenly surfacing in a hot flash . It was slowing now and all the nervous energy replaced with a sense of longing but for what? Was it for the woman back there?
My mind races with the meaning of that smile, the subtle tilt of her eyebrows and playful shrug. Had there been an invitation in them? Could it be she had carried the memories of that day as dearly as I had? Tawdry possibilities fill my head with ideas and intentions I know will only bring me trouble so I’m headed home, suppressing the lingering excitement, determined to leave the memories as they are, sweet, exhilarating but in the past.