It was getting along in the morning before Howie really woke up. It felt good to sleep in and not be interrupted; it wouldn’t be long before school was getting under way and he’d have to get up before the birds did. When the depths of the winter hit in Spearfish Lake, about the only daylight he would see would be from the classroom, and that really sucked. Howie much preferred the summer time, when he could sleep late and enjoy himself.

On the other hand, he thought as he lay in bed, Misty was probably up already. Yesterday had been exciting, especially the making out with her between Nintendo sessions, then hanging out with her in the evening, a five-way Frisbee match going with Jack, Vixen, Stas, and Misty and him. There’d been a lot of fun in that, too. Today, he had the prospect of a swim with Misty in her bikini, and most likely more making out. Could there be a better way to spend a summer’s day?

Thinking of Misty was enough to get him up and moving. He headed to the bathroom first, then went back to his room and got dressed. The plan was to call her this morning, and he could do that in a few minutes; he might as well get around first.

On his way down to the kitchen, he heard voices coming from Jack’s room. The door was wide open, so he peeked in, to see Stas asleep on the bed, and Jack and Vixen working on the computer. That was strange, he thought. Why aren’t they out in some swamp somewhere, looking for some bird he’d never heard of before?

He didn’t worry about it; he was hungry. He headed on down to the kitchen, made himself a big bowl of cereal and popped a couple pop-tarts into the toaster. It wasn’t much like a real breakfast, but it would fill the hole. He ate it quickly, with his mind more focused on the memory of the cute little nipples on Misty’s cute little breasts, and how she moaned in delight when he tongued them. As far as he was concerned, it beat the hell out of Nintendo.

The only problem he saw was that if Jack and Vixen were there, it would mean that he and Misty would only be playing straight Nintendo, not the “strip Nintendo” they’d enjoyed yesterday. That had been loads of fun, even when he lost and could only feel those soft, warm breasts through Misty’s top. He really ought to be calling Misty pretty soon, he thought, but he really didn’t want Jack and Vixen knowing how much he and Misty had been making out. Despite what he’d said last night, Jack could still screw up somehow and his parents could find out. That would suck.

Are Vixen and Jack going to be here all day? That seemed strange! Well, there was a lot of strange going on in the last few days. Finally, he decided that he only had one way to find out. He put his dirty dishes in the sink, and headed back upstairs, to find Jack and Vixen still working on the computer. It wasn’t a game; from across the room it looked like Jack had Word up, with Vixen typing away at the keyboard. “So what’s happening with you guys today?” he asked.

“Oh, hi Howie,” Jack said, looking up from some bird book. “You finally dragged your butt out of bed, huh?”

“Had to sometime,” Howie yawned. “It’s strange to see you here. I thought you’d be out birding somewhere.”

“We decided to take it a little easy today,” Jack told him. “We got a little too much sun yesterday, so we decided to work on Vixen’s journal and stuff, and just hang out. We may take the binoculars out on the back porch and study the bird feeders a bit. Beyond that, we don’t have any real plans.”

Well, shit, Howie thought. So much for strip Nintendo with Jack and Vixen hanging around all day. On the other hand, it wasn’t a total loss. He and Misty had talked about going swimming, and there was that bikini of hers to think of. Swimming with her and watching her in the bikini was an interesting prospect, and if they could find an out of the way spot, some making out might be good, too. “Well, have fun,” he said. “Misty and I may go for a swim. We were talking about it last night.”

“Yeah, have fun,” Jack told him. “Don’t forget your fanny pack.”

“What? Oh, yeah, I wouldn’t want to forget that. Catch you later. I’m gonna go call Misty.”

Howie headed back down the stairs. The phone in the hall was a little too close to Jack and Vixen for him, not that he had anything he wanted to say to Misty that it would hurt if they overheard. He picked up the phone in the kitchen and punched her number, hoping that she would answer, not her mom and especially not Rusty.

As luck had it, she was the one who picked up the phone. “How are you doing today?” he asked.

“Bored, just waiting for you to call,” she said. “The lion is roaring in his cage again, and it’s getting a little tiresome.”

“Jeez, how long is that going to go on?” Howie asked.

“No end in sight,” she sighed. “I need to get out of here. You want to do something?”

“Got a little problem,” he said. “It looks like Jack and Vixen are going to be here all day, so we can’t do exactly the same as yesterday.”

“No problem from my end,” she said. “You remember we were talking about going swimming? It sounds like a good idea to me.”

“Yeah,” he replied. “You said you knew of some place where we could go and not be bothered.”

“You know the pond in the trailer park at Hannegan’s Cove?” she asked. “There’s a little stream that feeds into it, and there are a couple little ponds upstream a ways. I know the kids from the trailer park go to the lower one once in a while, but it’s pretty rare that anyone goes to the upper one.”

“I know where you’re talking about,” he replied. “I’ve been there a couple times, and I never saw anyone there. It’s kind of hard to get to, all brushy and stuff.”

“I know a way that’s not too bad,” she told him. “It might not be a bad idea to have jeans on while we’re hiking in, but once we’re there swimsuits are no problem.”

“It sounds like a winner to me,” he told her, “but I don’t think I know the way you’re talking about. That’s over on your side of town, after all.”

“We don’t have to meet there,” she snickered. “How about if we meet at the soccer field at the back of Matson Park and go in from there?”

“Sounds good,” he said. “It’s going to take me a few minutes to get there, though.”

“Take your time,” she said. “I’ve got to do a few things before I can leave, and I want to grab a sandwich or something before I go. You’ll probably beat me there.”

“All right, I’ll see you in a while.”

Howie hung up the phone, then headed back upstairs, ignoring whatever Jack and Vixen were doing when he passed Jack’s room. He pulled on his board trunks, then his jeans from yesterday. If the way into the little pond was where he thought it might be, he figured he might as well put on socks before he got his sneakers on.

In a few minutes he was as ready to go as he needed to be. After a quick “See you later” to Jack and Vixen, he headed downstairs, grabbed a scrap towel from the garage, and used a bungee cord to strap it to his bike. He cinched the fanny pack with the bear spray around his waist, and took off.

It was darn good that Jack had given him the bear spray last night, he thought. He certainly wasn’t looking for a confrontation with Frenchy, but it would be good to have if it happened. With that thought in mind, he decided that he wasn’t going to risk riding on the streets and having Frenchy come across him. It would be a little longer to get there on the network of running paths, railroad grade and alleys that he worked out in his mind, but it would be less likely that he would be seen. Oh, well, it would be a more interesting ride anyway, and he had plenty of time.

A twelve-pack of beer doesn’t really weigh all that much, but Frenchy could feel the load of twenty-four of them in the back of the Eagle. The trunk was packed to the gills with the brew, so much so that he’d barely been able to shut the lid. Fuckin’ Schadler’s, he thought. Hell, he’d have rather even had Pabst, but with Lame Badger you had to take what he had and still pay through the nose for it.

The beer run had gone pretty good, he thought. He’d kept it under the limit, but the traffic was light so he still made good time. Best of all, he hadn’t seen one cop on the way up there or the way back. Now, if he could just get the stuff unloaded without the town clowns catching him first, he’d be home free and would have that out of his hair for a while. Another fifteen minutes and he could think a while about settling some scores that had needed to be evened up. Maybe later he could pick up Larry and Matt, then go find some of those who needed their asses kicked. Maybe he’d get lucky and find that goddamn Frankovich if he wasn’t hiding out at his folks’ house.

Once he’d gotten into Spearfish County, he turned off of the state road and took a longer route on gravel roads to get to town. The county mounties didn’t seem to go out on the gravel roads unless they had to, so it seemed a more likely way to get into town safely, even though he’d have to get back on the state road for a couple miles. He was keeping his eyes open after he got on the state road and into the edge of town, but just as he was about ready to turn onto Central he saw one of the town clown’s cars in the parking lot of the Spearfish Lake Café.

“Fuckin’ cops!” he swore out loud. It might well be that they weren’t looking for him, but if the cop was sitting in the wrong place in the café, he’d be able to see Frenchy drive down the railroad grade to the hiding spot he’d planned on using. He’d recognize Frenchy’s car, wonder what he was up to, and he’d just be fucking screwed. That just plain blew the hell out of using the place he’d been aiming for, this time anyway. What to do? He was pretty sure that the old spot was blown, that fucking Frankovich probably told the cops about it, and Larry, Matt, and a few others knew about it, too. That probably meant that using that place was blown to hell, too.

Hoping he wouldn’t be noticed, he turned off on Garrett Street, short of the Central Avenue intersection. He thought about it for a moment, and realized that he’d have to use another hiding spot. He’d used it once or twice before, although never for a load as big as this. At least he would be well out of sight while getting there.

It was just a short drive to the other site, which was pretty well concealed. It was right along the railroad grade, too, and he could use the maintenance road to access it, although the last bit was over a very rough two-rut that was also thankfully very short. In a couple minutes he was there.

The place was an old tumble-down shack that had been one of the buildings involved with the old lumberyard that had been torn down many years before. The lumberyard was mostly gone, now, but a few scraps like this building remained. The building was tiny, only about six by six, and he had no idea what it could have been used for. Probably something they didn’t want to keep around the main building, he thought – maybe dynamite or something, but he had no idea. Whatever it had been, although it looked like hell it was solid, and it was pretty much a place where no one ever went. He backed the Eagle up to the shack, popped the trunk, and got out to unload.

“Fuck!” Howie thought. He’d gone all this way to keep out of Frenchy’s sight, and there the fucker was right in front of him! Worse, he was right on the way to where Howie wanted to go, and to avoid him he would have to backtrack quite a bit.

Howie was pretty sure that Frenchy hadn’t seen him; he was intent on whatever it was that he was doing, and Howie was back in the bushes a bit anyway. He thought about turning his bike around and riding like hell, but that might be likely to draw Frenchy’s attention. At least he’d been listening when Jack had talked several times about how to stay out of sight while watching birds. He got off his bike, lay it down carefully, and found a place where he could look through the leaves of a bush and see what Frenchy was up to. It didn’t take a lot of figuring out; he could plainly see that Frenchy was unloading twelve-pack after twelve pack of beer from his trunk into that old shack. He could even read the logo on the outside of the twelve-packs: Schadler’s.

Now, that was interesting! He knew through the grapevine that Frenchy brought a lot of beer into town and spread it around his friends, and sometimes elsewhere. Mike had gotten a twelve from him a year ago, Red and White or something, and had shared it out among his own friends, Howie had a couple cans of it. It was crappy beer, and warm, but it had seemed exciting to be drinking it with his friends.

The opportunity had never risen again. Howie really didn’t have all that much taste for beer, but it was sort of family policy that if one or two went missing from the refrigerator nobody noticed as long as no one got into trouble because of it. Every now and then Howie had a can of his father’s Miller Genuine Draft, and it tasted a hell of a lot better than the stuff Mike had come up with, but that may have been partly because it was cold.

But shit, that was a lot of beer that Frenchy was unloading! He didn’t know how much, since Frenchy had been unloading it before he saw him, but it was a pot load, and now Howie knew where Frenchy was hiding it. Boy, he thought, wouldn’t it just frost his balls if it were to come up missing? Christ knew that Frenchy deserved to have something bad happen to him. Assholes like him seemed to get away with everything; it sure would be nice to take a slice out of him!

He thought about it for a moment, and it just didn’t seem like it was possible. Without a car, it would be too hard to hide it, and where would he hide it, anyway? If he had a car, he could just pitch it someplace where Frenchy couldn’t find it and that would still pay him back a little. But still, that was a lot of beer, it seemed like a shame to just pitch it, even if it was crappy beer. Guys like Mike and Greg would pay through the nose to get their hands on it!

Howie stayed hidden behind the bush while Frenchy finished his unloading, Howie watching and trying very carefully to stay quiet and out of sight. Eventually, the unloading was complete; Frenchy closed the trunk, then took a padlock from his car and locked the door – at least that was what Howie assumed, since the door was out of his vision. He watched as Frenchy got back in his car, and drove out the trace of two-rut to the railroad grade and disappeared.

Howie relaxed a little, but decided to just wait for a few minutes to make sure that Frenchy didn’t come back for some reason. When it felt safe, he stood up, picked up his bike, and walked it over to the shed. That padlock looked pretty solid, he thought, but the hasp for the lock seemed pretty worn and the wood didn’t look very good. It wouldn’t take much, he thought. A wrecking bar could pop that whole lock and hasp off the door in one bite.

It could be done, Howie thought. In fact, it didn’t even seem like it would be a big trick. He looked around; there were no houses in sight, and anything close by was hidden by trees, except maybe from the railroad track itself. That was probably why Frenchy chose this spot, he thought. It was something to think about.

But not now. Frenchy had cost him a lot of time, and if he didn’t haul ass he’d have Misty waiting for him. He got on his bike, followed Frenchy’s path out to the railroad maintenance road, and turned the other way to go meet her.

Vixen leaned back in her chair, yawned, stretched, and took a final look at the computer screen. “I think that’s about it,” she said. “I make it forty-three life birds that I have recorded, and there is a bunch I know I’ve seen over the years that aren’t in the record. I mean, we’re missing stuff from cardinals to Canada geese.”

“Bound to happen,” Jack said from the side of the bed, where he’d settled to look over her shoulder and advise her as she worked. Her work looked pretty good to him, and she’d mostly done it herself, just using him for guidance. “You could count them, I suppose, but you wouldn’t have the sightings documented. It’s a little more work to start over from the beginning, but I think you can learn more that way. It’s good to have the records anyway.”

“Yeah, I can see that,” she replied, turning the swivel chair to face him. “Still, it’s a pretty good start. Do you think I can crack a hundred before the end of the year?”

“I’d say you have an excellent chance,” he smiled after thinking it over for a moment. “We haven’t even started to get into the fall migration yet, and there’ll be a lot of birds coming through. Some of them are only in the area for a day or two, so we’ll have to get out every day we can and at least look for some at several different spots. But we should turn up a lot of birds, and hopefully some of them will be new to me, too.”

“Maybe we can get free for a weekend and go to one of those hot spots you were telling me about, like Horicon Marsh or maybe Whitefish Point.”

“Maybe,” he shook his head. It would be a longish drive, but do-able. However, there were other problems. “I don’t know if your folks or mine would go for our taking off together for a weekend.”

“Good question,” she smiled, understanding what he was saying. “I’ll bet I could sell my mother on it now, but I’m not sure on how the rest of the parents would react. I suppose we could take a tent and go camping.”

“It’d be a little cool if we went after our two months are up,” he pointed out. There was no point in taking the risk of a bad reaction from the parents if only birding was involved. Well, if it was to be a birding-only trip, maybe they could take along a chaperone or something, but he didn’t feel like making that suggestion just then.

“Yeah, it’d be a little cool, but at least I’d be able to snuggle up to you in a nice warm sleeping bag,” she grinned, obviously thrilled at the prospect. “But maybe not, either. I’ll be over eighteen then, and your birthday comes up pretty quick, doesn’t it?”

“Next month,” he admitted. “So what does that get us?”

“It gets us a chance to rent a motel room without anyone questioning us too closely,” she laughed. “Maybe one with a nice Jacuzzi or something. It would beat a tent all hollow for our first time.”

“Yeah, you might have a point there,” he smiled, with a pleasant vision of her naked on the sheets waiting for him crossing his mind. “And if you’re enough into birding, they might even buy off on it innocently. Do you think you’ll be ready for it?”

“Hell, I’m ready for it now,” she laughed, waving her head in a way that made her long hair ripple with joy. “There you are, sitting on your bed, and there’s no one else in the house. It’s about all I can do to keep from ripping off my clothes and tackling you right where you sit.”

“You make it hard to wait,” he smiled, the vision of her naked on the sheets sticking with him. After yesterday, having her naked on these sheets didn’t seem like such an impossible proposition. “Two months is going to be a hell of a long time.”

“Yeah, it is,” she admitted with a sigh, “but that doesn’t mean that there aren’t other things we can do, and that bed gives me ideas. What do you say we give it a trial run but keep our shorts on?”

“Don’t think you’re going to have to talk me into it,” he grinned as he welcomed the prospect. “We might as well take advantage of the fact that the house is empty.”

“We might as well,” she laughed. “Do you expect Howie and Misty to come walking in any time soon?”

He shook his head, considering the idea for a moment. “I doubt it like hell,” he said finally. “I wouldn’t be surprised in the slightest if they’re gone all afternoon. They’ve probably found some quiet little place to play a nice game of kissy-face and touchy-boobie.”

“That’s my guess, unless something goes wrong – and the idea of a little kissy-face and touchy-boobie sounds just fine with me, so long as it’s my face and my boobies that are involved,” she smiled as she stood up and peeled her top off, leaving herself bare breasted. “Aw, the hell with it, let’s take the risk I mean, I’ve already slept with you and been naked with you, I’d just like to know how it feels to be in bed with you.”

“I have to admit, I’ve been having the same curiosity,” he smiled as he took off his T-shirt. “Guess we’re going to have to wake up Stas and kick him off the bed.”

“Oh, I don’t think that’s necessary,” she laughed as she pulled off her shoes. “Let the poor old guy sleep. There’s plenty of room, since I plan on being very close to you. There’s a lot of you to kiss and I want to get started at it.”

A very interesting and enjoyable hour followed, with plenty of kissing and hugging and laughing and moaning. There was more than a little squirming, enough that it eventually woke up Stas. He hopped off the bed and curled himself up in an easy chair on the far side of the room that Jack often used for reading, but what was going on didn’t interest him enough to keep him from going back to sleep.

Stas was a dog who knew where his priorities lay.

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