“That was really fun!” Summer gushed as they headed down the street in the Jeep. “I’m so glad you two invited me along! Alan is really neat, isn’t he?”

“He really is a good kid,” Jack said, pleased at her excitement. Asking Summer along had come on the spur of the moment, and it had worked out far better than he ever could have dreamed. “It looked to me like the two of you were, uh, getting along pretty well, especially when Laurel came with the pizza.”

“How could you tell?” Summer teased. “Your attention was so on each other that you wouldn’t have known if the roof had fallen in on you.”

“That was later,” Vixen laughed from the back seat. “When we saw the lip lock that the two of you had going after Laurel left, we figured we might as well use the time wisely.”

“You saw that?” Summer grinned, a little incredulously. She’d thought she’d been a little discreet with Alan that time, but apparently it had escaped no one.

“Part of it,” Vixen grinned. “Only part, then we were, uh, otherwise occupied.”

“Summer, I have only one question to ask,” Jack laughed. “Did Alan get any farther than Rusty did?”

“Not yet,” Summer grinned. “That’s not saying that he’s not going to the next time we get the chance. That’ll depend on whether his parents will leave us alone long enough.”

It didn’t take long for Jack to drive Summer home, but the teasing both ways never let up for one second along the way. It was clear that all of them had a good time that evening, and there was the prospect of more good times to come.

After Summer got out of the Jeep, Vixen climbed back into the front seat. The kids all promised to keep in contact to work out their next activity, and hoped it would be as much fun as this one had been.

“My God, that was fun,” Vixen said when Jack had backed the Jeep onto the street and headed for her house. She was obviously about as tired as he was, but her excitement was infectious.

“That was a ball, I agree,” he said. “It really is fun hanging out with a gang like that. It’s been a long time since I’ve laughed like that. So are we going out birding in the morning?”

“As far as I’m concerned, we are,” she smiled. “Back out in the swamp again?”

“Yeah, but a different spot,” Jack told her. “There’ll be a different mix of birds. This one could be a little buggy, so wear long pants and sleeves. I’ve got bug dope.”

“Why do we want to go where it’s buggy?” she asked.

“Because there’s a very interesting sight if we get there at the right time,” he said. “After we’ve seen it, maybe we can head out and find a place where the bugs aren’t quite so bad. We can’t go as late as we did this morning, though.”

“Why not?”

“Because I’ve got to get some work done. I’ve got our lawn to mow, and I do about a dozen others around the neighborhood. Some of them are tiny, and some of them are old folks so I only charge them a couple bucks. But it adds up to fifty or sixty bucks most weeks, and that’s money we’re going to need to go birding and dating on.”

“I sort of wondered about that,” she said. “I haven’t felt like I’ve been paying my way.”

“No big deal,” he said. “It’s just gas, the odd Coke, maybe the odd movie or meal. I mean, aren’t boys supposed to pay a girl’s way on dates? ”

“Well, maybe,” she frowned. “But it doesn’t seem fair to me. Look, how about if after we get done birding in the morning, I help you with your lawns? I mow ours, so I know what I’m doing. That way we’ll get done a little more quickly, and then maybe we can go out birding, or hang out with Alan or Summer, or something that’s more fun than mowing and sweating.”

“You don’t have to do it, Vixen,” he said, “but I’d sure appreciate it if you did. It’d make things go a little more quickly.”

“I may not have to do it, but I want to,” she said. “What do you use, a lawn tractor or a walk-behind mower?”

“Both,” he said. “There are some places I just can’t do right with the lawn tractor.”

“OK, maybe we can switch off or something. Jack, I’ve spent about all the time I want to hanging around the house this summer. It’ll be good to get out and do something else.”

“Well, since you feel that strongly about it I’m not going to stop you,” he said. “See you in the morning? Maybe a little later, about six? ”

“Sounds good to me, I can stand the shut-eye,” she smiled. “Jack, pull over.”

“Sure, but why?”

“Because I want to give you a real serious good-night kiss, and I don’t want my mother to see it. I’m still not sure what she was thinking this afternoon, but it seemed strange to me. Look, I’ll call if she pitches a fit about me going out early again.”

“OK,” he said, “but I don’t get the feeling that’s what she’s planning. She actually seemed pretty cool to me.”

“You don’t have the history with her that I do,” Vixen said. “I hope you’re right, but I’m not holding my breath. Now shut up and kiss me goodnight.”

It was not a brief kiss, and it was noticeably darker when Jack dropped Vixen off and pointed the Jeep toward home.

Home again, he thought when he shut off the Jeep and got out. Jeez, what a day! What a weekend! In a way he was glad it was over with; maybe tomorrow things could get back to normal, although it would be considered a new normal with Vixen now involved. His social life now looked promising. At least no other huge surprises seemed likely to happen.

He walked in the back door, noticing that his folks were watching TV in the living room – another reality show. Do things ever change? “Hi Mom, Dad,” he said. “I’m home.”

“Did you have a good time?” his mother asked.

“Oh, yeah, a great time,” he said. “Mrs. Hvalchek made a really great dinner.”

“Have you had something this evening?” she asked.

“Oh, yeah,” he said. “Vixen and Summer and Alan and I had a pizza over at his house. We played cards and messed around some. I’ll catch you in a minute, I’ve got to use the john.”

Not noticing the mutual grins that his parents shared as he turned his back, Jack walked up the stairs. As he was heading toward his room, he heard the beep-beep-beep-CRASH of Howie playing his Nintendo. Some things don’t change there either, he thought. The kid has about worn that game out. Jack had to head past the open door to get to the bathroom, and out of the corner of his eye saw something that brought him to a screeching halt.

Howie wasn’t alone, and it wasn’t one of his buddies there with him, unless his buddy had started wearing a bikini!

This was so unexpected he had to back up and get a closer look. Sure enough, Howie and some girl wearing a tiny bikini were sitting on his bed, with the Nintendo going full bore. This was unbelievable. “You guys having fun?” he asked.

“Oh, yeah,” Howie said, pausing the game and turning his head to look at Jack. “You know Misty Frankovich, don’t you? She’s good!”

“Yeah, I think we’ve met,” he said as the girl turned toward him. It was definitely Misty Frankovich, and that bikini really looked good on her. This was just a little surreal. What was Howie doing playing Nintendo in his room with a bikini-clad girl?

“Your brother saved my butt this afternoon,” Misty announced. “He got banged up a little, and I’ve been helping him keep his mind off it.”

Good God yes, Jack thought. You in a bikini like that would keep Howie’s mind off of anything! “What happened?” he asked.

“Oh, we were hanging out on the beach,” Misty explained, and gave a brief summary of Howie’s fight with Frenchy, and Cody and Jan Archer patching him up and bringing him home.

After he heard the story Jack said, “Hey bro, you done good. That Frenchy is a pain in the butt at the best of times. I’m just glad you weren’t hurt too bad.”

“I couldn’t let Misty get hurt,” Howie said bashfully. That was a little strange for him, Jack thought.

“You know,” Misty said. “It’s getting dark out there, and I really ought to be getting home. Howie, I wouldn’t mind getting together with you tomorrow, but we better not hang out around my house since Rusty will still be running an attitude.”

“There’s no reason you couldn’t hang out here,” Howie said. “Mom will be here part of the time, but we should be able to hook up the Nintendo to the TV in the living room.”

“Hey, Misty,” Jack said. “It is getting dark, and it’s a long haul across town to your place. It’s too long to walk if you don’t have to. I can take you home.”

“You don’t have to do that,” Misty said. “I rode my bike.”

“It’s still a little dark for that,” he said. “I can throw your bike in the Jeep with no trouble at all.”

“Well, if it won’t be any trouble,” she said. “I need to talk with Howie for a couple minutes, though.”

“Fine with me,” Jack replied, realizing that since he was heading out again he could take the pictures to Summer and have them out of his hair; it was right on the way. “I really need to use the bathroom and do a couple other things anyway.”

“No problem,” she said. “Just head downstairs when you’re done with your stuff up here, and I’ll come down as soon as I’m ready.”

“It’ll be five minutes or so,” Jack said. “Catch you then.”

“Thanks, Jack,” Howie said. “I appreciate it.”

Strange, Jack thought. Very strange. It was nice to see Howie with a girl, rather than with those young punks he normally hung around with. Sometimes it seemed like that gang was on the way to being Frenchy revisited. Maybe it wouldn’t work out that way.

He headed into the bathroom and did his business. Oh, man, I have just got to have a shower, he thought. I’m surprised I didn’t stink Vixen out of the place. It’ll have to wait for a few minutes, though. Once he was done, he headed into his room and found the hiding place for the envelope of photos he was taking to Summer. Yeah, it really is her business, he thought, still wondering what it was all about. He mentally flipped a nickel – he’d promised to deliver the photos and negatives to her, but still, it was the first photo of a nude woman that he’d ever taken and there might not be many more.

Finally, he gave in to temptation. He flipped on his computer to boot it up, picked out the best four of the pictures and set them on the scanner. As soon as the computer was ready, he scanned the photos in one batch, then saved the single scan to a hidden, password-protected directory buried among his Windows applications, then put the photos back in the envelope and shut down the computer. That’s what’s called having your cake and eating it too, he thought. He didn’t plan to tell anyone about what was on those photos, and it would take some serious cracking to get into his hidden file, which admittedly consisted mostly of porn shots. He was human and a teenager, after all.

As soon as Misty saw Jack leave, she reached out with her foot and kicked the door most of the way closed. “Howie,” she said. “I really should have done this before, but if I’m going to do it I’d better do it now.”

Howie couldn’t figure out what was going on, until she pulled him close and kissed him on the lips. It was a pretty serious kiss that went on for a while. “Thank you, my hero,” she said. “I’m real proud of you.”

“Like I’ve been saying, I just didn’t want him to hurt you,” he repeated for maybe the three dozenth time.

“Yes, I know,” she said, “and I could have been really hurt. But that’s not what I wanted to talk to you about. Kiss me again.”

Naturally, Howie was perfectly glad to oblige. This was something that he would never have dreamed would have happened today. As he was kissing her, and quite pleasurably, he felt her take his hand and place it on the bare part of her breast. He’d never felt that before, and wow, did it feel wonderful!

She pulled back from him a little, continuing to hold his hand on her breast. “You like that?” she whispered, an enigmatic smile on her face.

“Oh, God, do I ever,” he said.

“Good,” she said. “Look, Howie, we can kiss again sometime, and you can feel it again sometime, maybe without the top. Don’t plan on getting below my waist anytime soon, but I’m not saying that’ll be forever.”

“Oh, God,” he said. “I can barely wait.”

“Me either,” she said. “Believe it or not, Howie, I like you touching me and I hope we can do it lots. But there’s one thing you have to remember. I hear a lot of the talk around this town, and if I ever hear through the grapevine that you’ve been blabbing to your friends about kissing me or making out with me, it’s over right that instant. Everything. Is that clear?”

Howie’s mind moved at the speed of light. Yeah, it would be nice to brag to his friends about this, but to lose the chance of it happening more? Hell, no choice. “Real clear,” he said. “Maybe we can hang out together, but not even hold hands or anything. Just be pals.”

“Pals is fine with me,” she said. “That may change too, but not just yet and maybe not soon. We’re agreed?”

“Agreed,” he said. His buddies could go suck eggs on this one, for all he cared. He was getting a little tired of the same old shit anyway. This could be a lot more interesting. “You want a blood oath?”

“No, just your agreement,” she said. “I’ll find out darn quick if your word isn’t any good.”

As it worked out, Jack came out of his room with the envelope of photos in his pocket just about the time that Misty came out of Howie’s room. “Got your stuff? ” he asked.

“This is all I brought with me, except for my bike,” she said. “I had a T-shirt but it got all bloody on Howie’s face, so I tossed it in a trash can.”

“Well, thanks for taking care of him,” Jack said. “He’s been kind of at loose ends anyway, and it would be worse if he was hurting.”

“We’re just pals,” Misty grinned, “but he really is kind of neat to hang out with.”

They headed down the stairs. Jack paused at the living room for a moment to announce that he was taking Misty home, and his dad thanked him; he’d thought of offering to do it, but Jack had beaten him to it.

They went outside; Misty found her bicycle right where Cody had put it, and Jack loaded it into the back of the Jeep. It was only a few minutes’ drive across town to her house. Not atypically for Spearfish Lake he knew where she lived, mostly because he knew her brother, not that he particularly liked him.

He stopped in front of her house, set the parking brake, and got out to unload her bike. “Hey, Jack,” she said, “thanks for the lift. It really is getting a little darker than I thought.”

“No problem,” he said. “Anything for my brother’s girlfriend.”

“I’m not his girlfriend,” she protested lightly, giving Jack the impression that there was more going on there than met the eye. “We’re just pals, but there are some things we both like, and one of them is Nintendo. You’ll probably be seeing me again, maybe tomorrow.”

“Maybe not,” he said. “I’m not around the house a lot right now. But it’ll be good to see you again, and like I said, thanks for being pals with Howie.”

“Sure,” she said. “I think he’s worth it. See you next time, Jack.”

Jack got back in the Jeep as she pushed her bike toward the Frankovich garage. He was slightly amused, noting the fact that she had a really cute butt filling out that bikini, and that while she said she wasn’t Howie’s girlfriend, he didn’t expect things to stay that way long. She pushed the bike in her garage, gave Jack a wave, and he started the Jeep. Yeah, she has a body, he thought, but it’s still a kid’s body. Now, Vixen – she was something different.

He pulled away from the curb and headed toward Summer’s house, which wasn’t far out of his way. Once again, he thought about the photos in his pocket. Whatever was going on, it had to be strange. He’d often figured that women had a conspiracy against men, and Summer had pretty well admitted it. Strange as hell, in any case. Maybe someday Summer might explain a little more about it, but he doubted it. When you got right down to it, he had few facts: it was somehow related to Wicca but wasn’t Wicca, it was old as hell, it was all women, and it was secret as hell because the people involved were paranoid as hell about it, and maybe with good reason. But the bottom line was still what he’d figured right at the beginning – it wasn’t any of his business, and he was best off not knowing any more than he did.

The lights were still on at Summer’s house, and in fact he could see her in the living room, watching TV. He hopped out of the Jeep, went up to her door, and rang the bell.

Summer must have seen him driving in, and came to the door. “Yes, Jack?” she asked.

“You must have left this in the Jeep,” he said, handing her the envelope. “I figured I’d better get it back to you while I was thinking about it.”

“Thanks, Jack,” she smiled. “I owe you one, and it can be the one we talked about, if need be.” She was obviously talking about the offer to pose nude, he thought.

“Can’t see it happening,” he smiled. “Although I admit that I would probably enjoy it if it did.”

“Still, I owe you one,” she smiled, turning her face up to kiss him on the lips – just a quick, friendly one. “We better not do that again,” she grinned. “I can taste Vixen on you. I don’t want to think about what would happen if she were to taste me on you.”

For some reason, the kiss had done much to cure Jack’s curiosity as he drove home again. Once again, what a weekend! He couldn’t believe everything that had happened in the last two and a half days, and it seemed like a month. Finding Howie in his room playing Nintendo with a babe in a tiny bikini just put the icing on the cake.

Once again, he drove into the driveway, parked the Jeep and got out. The show his parents had been watching was just ending as he walked in the door. “Wow,” he commented to them. “She’s cute, isn’t she? Howie is a lucky kid! ”

“Darn cute,” his Dad replied, “and she’s been running around here in that bikini all evening, too.

“Not to take anything away from Howie, or from Vixen, for that matter, but I sure wish that I’d had someone like her hanging around with me all day dressed like that at his age. It sure would have made life more interesting.”

Jack’s dad shook his head. “I hear you,” he smiled. “I don’t know how Howie could take it.”

“Hell,” his mother said, “I don’t know how you could take it.”

“With difficulty,” Jim smiled. “The only reason I managed at all is that the bikini Jan was wearing desensitized me a little.”

“I don’t think you could call hers a bikini,” Barb laughed. “Dental floss is more like it.”

“Let me tell you, Jack,” his father grinned, “you really missed out on that one. She really is a pretty neat girl. Do you know Cody and her at all?”

“A little,” Jack said. “Not real well.”

“From what I hear they’re in college some place,” his mother said. “Doing pretty well I guess. Cody and his family really put her life back together. It’d be nice if you could talk to them about college sometime. I’ve heard that they’re going to a pretty special one.”

“Might be,” Jack said, not really interested. “I’m going to take a shower and hit the hay. This has been a long day, and I’m picking up Vixen at six tomorrow to go birding again.”

“Life’s getting interesting,” his father smiled. “We go from our boys having zero girlfriends to two in two days. I wonder what’s next?”

“Beats me,” Jack said. “The best I can do is take it one day at a time.” With that, he headed for the stairs. He peeled off his clothes and headed for the shower. When he went by the door to Howie’s room, he noticed the TV and Nintendo were off, and that Howie was sitting on his bed, staring at nothing in particular.

“Hey, Howie,” Jack said, “she’s pretty cute.”

“Yeah,” he replied, “she’s something else. I really like her, and I guess maybe we’re going to hang out together some. That makes it worth all the bad stuff.”

“Yeah, it does,” Jack told him. “Hey, no promises, but maybe we can think of something where the two of you could go somewhere or do something with Vixen and me.”

“Well, maybe,” Howie said. “I don’t know that there’s anything that would interest the four of us.”

“Put your thinking cap on,” Jack suggested. “Maybe there’s something.”

“Jeez, I don’t know,” Howie said. “This has been awful quick. How are you supposed to figure out what they’re thinking?”

“Look,” Jack smiled at his brother, “don’t come looking to me for advice on any of this, since I have a total of one more day’s experience with a girlfriend than you do. But I do know for a fact that women really do have a secret conspiracy to drive men nuts, so get used to it. Be nice to her, listen to her, don’t shaft her or get her pissed, and roll with the punches. That’s about the best you can do.”

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