3 comments/ 38956 views/ 22 favorites Natalie's Back By: OzEliot (FORWARD: This is my second submission to Literotica. It's about 16,000 words when completed, will feature public nudity, female, and a public sex scene. I hope you enjoy it like I do. Votes and comments are appreciated, but please try to offer comments and criticism as if we were sitting down together, face to face in a public place. Thanks.) It was the first time she had been back in her hometown in 8 years, and Natalie Cramer had more energy than she ever expected, an electricity in her system that defied the jet lag and the hours of anxiety she had felt when trying to get to sleep the night before. After a short assignment in the morning, she had the day free to get to the airport and jet back to Lampton, Pennsylvania, in hopes of catching dinner with her friend, Louise. She hadn't seen Louise in five years, when she had talked her friend into coming out to Los Angeles to see how she was living, then in only modest success. It had been almost two years since she had talked to Louise, at least before her friend found her again on Facebook and they had picked up where they left off. Dinner would be really exciting—at least as exciting as anything ever got in her hometown. As she waited at the bar in the Blue Moon, she felt a little strange to be in such a familiar place and seeing no one she recognized. She wondered if Calvin Maines still owned the place or if he had sold it or moved on. She had first come to the restaurant when she was 5 years old, and they had eaten there just about every month since, right until she moved to California. Whenever she talked with Mom on the phone she would hear about the big events, who died, who got pregnant, who cheated on whom, but little things like whether Cal still owned the Blue Moon or not were never reported—she supposed if she found out tonight she would end up calling Mom, who now lived in Orlando, and update her for a change. Finally, a half-hour late, Lou came into the restaurant—and walked right past her. It wasn't that she hadn't looked toward the bar, she searched the bar for her, but kept walking all the same. Natalie ran a hand through her hair and went to the main room of the restaurant, tapped her friend on the shoulder, and beamed her a smile when she turned around. Lou's mouth was open, her eyes looking her up and down, and she still didn't seem assured it was her old high school friend. Tired of the anticipation, Natalie threw her arms wide and wrapped them around Lou. "Oh, god, Nat... what happened to your hair? Look at you!" "Yeah, I keep it kind of short these days." Back in her last year of school her hair had reached halfway down her back, sometimes braided, sometimes hanging free, and it had been a very pale peroxide-blonde color, before she stopped dyeing it and let it retain its midnight black color as a short bob these days—too many blondes out in L.A., black seemed to make her stand out more. "And your glasses are gone." "I finally found a pair of contacts that didn't hurt," Natalie said, smiling. It probably wasn't just those things, she thought; her clothes had become a little more stylish, baring her shoulders like her current purple blouse, and her bra actually produced cleavage, as opposed to the flattening misadventure her high school bras had been. L.A. had given her skin a good color, and who could say, maybe she had a lot more confidence since her success had found her. "Yeah. Pretty," Lou told her, smiling. "I never noticed your eyes were so blue." "Well, I can't take any credit for that." They sat down together and mulled over the menu for a long time, to the server's irritation, getting distracted by quick questions and answers. Lou hadn't changed much at all, she was still an intimidating, big-eyed, large-chested blonde, just as she had been in high school. Back then Natalie had done everything she could to be like Lou, the fun girl that everyone talked about, including stuffing her bra and coloring her hair. No one would have guessed that Natalie would find success as a model and Lou would turn around and head back home in defeat. Of course, Natalie wasn't about to bring that up—it had worked out for both of them, she believed, she had found life in L.A. to her liking, and Lou had gotten married and started talking about a family. "Oh, shit. I didn't know you had gotten divorced from Kyle." Three or four questions about how Lou was doing after their meal arrived finally brought out that surprise. The last time Nat and Lou had been talking, the couple had been going to counseling, things were starting to work for them again. Natalie knew that Lou had suffered a miscarriage, but it didn't seem to dissuade them both from trying again. "He seemed so nice. I'm sorry." "Don't be. It was boring." Lou cleared her throat, and it was funny how easy it was to read her even all these years later. There was a secret she was keeping, and Natalie asked her to tell her more, with that tone that said she already knew what she was hiding. Rolling her eyes while she chewed her food, Lou swallowed and said, "Okay, it wasn't entirely his fault... I did cheat on him." "Whoa! You? That's so..." She nodded, and then Lou went on, "I know. It was wrong. But it wasn't just that, there were other things going on. Like, he was having this email relationship with another girl from the bank, this kind of emotional affair—he says it wasn't physical, but who knows. And before I found out about that, I was sensing he wasn't as attracted to me as before... our sex life was getting so dull..." "No, please, tell me everything," Natalie said with a smile. "Well, you've never been married, you've probably never had these problems." Not true, Natalie told her, she had sustained a three-year relationship with a musician that had become tedious by the end, she could relate. "Exactly. I mean, I took belly-dancing classes, strip-for-your-man classes, all kinds of things, just to make him interested. We tried role-playing, I bought books by the dozens. Finally, I found out about his email girlfriend, I got tired of trying. I was still friends with Jed from the football team, so—" "You are fucking kidding me," laughed Natalie, then apologized for finding it funny. "I'm sorry, but Jed? We used to do an impression of that guy behind his back. You said he cut his hair with a weed-wacker." "Maybe so, but he's a nice guy," Lou said. She checked her watch, the third time she had done so since sitting down at the table, and then she went on, "It wasn't like I wanted to marry him. I did it to feel desirable again. Or maybe just to hurt Kyle, who knows what goes on in this head of mine..." Staring down at her half-finished grilled chicken salad, which paled against the way she remembered it tasting, Natalie said, "I never thought I'd see the day when Louise Kelly didn't feel desirable." "Well... those days are gone, along with my ex-husband," she said with a smirk. "Talk about me... I never thought I'd see the day when meek Miss Cramer was a swimsuit model." "I'm not a swimsuit model. Those were just a couple of pictures where I happened—" "I've got pictures of you in a swimsuit on my cell phone, don't deny it." Natalie's face had flushed red, and she kept shaking her head. "I do magazines, circulars. Not fashion magazines, you know, but catalogues and ads. That's it. You asked for something recent and I sent you a couple of the swimsuit shots I did. I added them to my new portfolio, so I thought... you know." "What else do you do? Like J. Crew stuff?" She was reluctant to say, but she nodded. "Sweaters. Jeans, a lot of jeans. Occasionally... you know... underwear..." "Lingerie! Oh my god, you do lingerie... why not just do a centerfold?" Quietly, Natalie chewed her food, waiting for a man at the nearest table to look away, and when he finally did, she whispered, "It's actually easier to get paid to do the internet these days. Centerfolds are going the way of landline telephones." "No shit... have you done internet porn?" Natalie was quick to say she hadn't, but the way Lou stared at her, she could tell there was more to the story. "I did a couple of photographs for a friend's project in a human anatomy study college class." As Lou was quick to laugh, she had to explain it fast. "They were topless only. Full body shots, but I was wearing a thong. They were a private thing, just for exhibition in his class, then he destroyed them... well, all but a couple he saved for himself." "Must have been a good friend." "Not that good," she said, then she laughed as Lou's eyes met hers. The server brought them the bill when Lou signaled him, then she checked her watch again. "That's like the hundredth time you've checked the time." "Sorry, don't take offense. I told you I might have to work tonight, and I do. I hate to bail out on you. I need to get there early because a girl backed out on me and I'm trying to find someone at the last minute. It totally sucks." "Ouch. Nothing I can do, right?" Lou looked up at her, smiled thinly, then shook her head. "I know you've got a lot of stuff you want to do. And you've got to be tired from the flight—" "I'm not tired at all," said Natalie, and when she thought about her plans for the evening, it was almost depressing. "I had planned to hang out with you tonight. Basically—no pressure. The only other thing I wanted to do was drive by the school. I don't know anyone else in town, or you know, I haven't seen them in forever. Can't knock on Tom Davenport's door and say, 'Hey, remember me? Of course you don't, but I had the craziest crush on you—" "You really don't know anyone else? I guess your parents have gone to the great ice floe in the South..." "Har har. Nice. You know I was never that popular anyway. I'll probably be the only one at the reunion tomorrow that needs to wear a nametag." Lou smiled wider, then shook her head. "Oh, they definitely won't recognize you, darling. I didn't. Talking about my crappy life has made me feel better, though, so thank you, I'm just sorry I have to..." She continued to stare at Natalie, who was scraping together the last of her salad into a pile in the bowl. "You could come down and hang out with me. At work. But it will be a bit of a trip, I can promise you that." "Local banking has gotten wild, has it?" she said, then hoped it hadn't sounded bitchy, she didn't mean it that way. Lou kept staring at her, teeth clenched, holding something back. "Did you quit the bank? You were doing so well there..." "Kyle was doing well there—especially with that slut Joan Miller," Lou sighed. "I did leave the bank. I couldn't stand it, being humiliated on a daily basis by those two. But I was bored with it as well. I told you I took all those classes, well... I guess they sparked some entertainer vibe in me. I was always outgoing in high school, so..." "My god, don't tell me you became a belly dancer?" "I kind of do... bachelor parties." Natalie wished she hadn't taken a drink of wine at that moment, she nearly had to spit it back into the glass. She finished coughing before she could speak again. "I'm sorry... do you... strip? Lou, do you strip for money now?" "Don't judge me, hon. Please. It was hard enough telling my mother." "Oh, god, your mother? She knows?" Natalie couldn't stop laughing, and though Lou mirrored her smile, it was also obvious she feared her old friend was looking down on her. "I'm sorry. Not sorry you're a stripper, that's your... I shouldn't laugh. It's no less crazy than what I do." "You think I'm a skank." "No, no, Lou... well, you know, I always thought you were a skank." They both laughed, and it seemed to ease the tension. "I'm kidding. But you know you were always more out there than I was. I thought I finally had a leg up on you, living out in L.A. while you were back here with the husband and the house and the regular job... but no, you had to one up me again. That's really out there. I can't believe it." "Yeah, that's what I do. I get booked enough that I only have to work a couple of times a month and I'm usually pretty good for money," she said. Natalie found that impressive, even working as a professional model required a significant number of hours a week. "So I'm working tonight. That's what I mean." "Pretty important to make the date then, I guess. Can't call in sick. Do strippers ever call in sick? Oh, sorry, I probably should call you an 'exotic dancer' or something..." Lou waved the sentiment away, checking her phone. "I don't feel better or worse with a made-up title. I actually love my job. I love it more than banking. Once in a while some drunk asshole will make my night hell, but I suppose even that I like better than catching a cold from some prick who wiped his snot on a five dollar bill. Damn, no replies." She looked at Natalie again, who was getting out a credit card to settle the bill. "Do you want to come or not? I understand if it's too weird for you." Too weird? It felt like high school again, Louise telling her that she might not want to come to a party because the kids there would be smoking pot. Natalie crossed her arms, then asked, "Are women allowed at that kind of thing? You know what I mean, not the dancers..." "Anybody over eighteen is welcome... anybody who tips well is particularly welcome." Lou began to text someone on her phone, not looking across the table, but waiting for Nat's answer. "You coming?" "I guess so. If you're alright with it. How would you feel about me sticking a hundred in your G-string?" "I might just go home with you," said Lou, and then she gathered the cash from her purse to pay for her meal. She didn't see the connection with Natalie's joke, but it made her friend smile, thinking that all of those bills had probably once been in the sweaty palms of some leering middle-aged men. * * * * * * With Natalie's rental car following Lou's SUV, they drove back to her friend's apartment so she could get ready. Natalie had a million questions once they got there, but she decided to ask as few as possible, not wanting to seem hung up on her friend's new career or pretty sheltered from such a wild life. She wondered if they had stayed together in L.A. what Lou would have been doing these days, if she would have found success as a model or if it were just something indefinable, a kind of odd talent that Nat had, some luck of the draw—maybe Lou would have blossomed into a stripper out there as well. Possibly even taken Natalie along with her. Lying back on Lou's queen-sized bed, watching her friend change into crazy thongs and skimpy bras, Natalie felt only a week or two removed from high school, instead of ten years. "I can't believe we've been talking for a month now and you never said... 'Oh, hey, by the way... I strip naked for men.' It might have been an interesting conversation." "I said stuff about work... 'Work is hell,' 'I had a bad day at work today'... you know," groaned Lou, taking off another bikini top and throwing it into a pile. She went to find another in a dresser drawer; Natalie admired her breasts, each almost two handfuls, at least that was how she had always considered them, and the aureolas of her nipples seemed like the size of silver dollars. "I was scared you would think I had turned into a freak. It was such fun talking to you again it was always like, you know, I could tell you later. I just didn't get around to it. I was definitely going to tell you while you were out here." "When I couldn't run away," Natalie said, and to her amusement, Lou said almost the same thing at the same time. "Babe, you should know me by now... I said it the first time you messaged me again. Yesterday we were friends, today we're friends, and a hundred years from now, we'll be friends." Lou tied another top and went back to her full-length mirror. "You're sweet. But I've got my doubts about long-term friendships after everything that happened with Kyle." She stopped again and checked her phone, shook her head in frustration, and drew a long, tortured breath before tossing it in disgust back onto the bed. "What's the matter?" "Nothing," Lou said, exhaled loudly, and then told the fuller truth. "There's supposed to be two of us. I've got this gig tonight, it's a regular thing with the sales team from the motorcycle dealership. I write it down in the phone, 'Two girls,' and it's my job to make sure two girls are there, or it's my fault. I went with Tara over Becky this time, now Becky's pissed and won't return my texts, and that bitch Tara... I'm just laying this all on you, aren't I?" Natalie shrugged and said it was interesting to hear about stripper problems. "Wow, thanks. No, Tara promised me she would be on time and there and everything, and while I'm waiting for you to call from the airport, she sends me a text that she can't make it tonight, her son has a fever." "That sucks. Sorry." Natalie took a long breath and stood up, bending over slightly to look in the dresser that contained her friend's "work clothes." She glanced up and saw Lou looking at her. "What's your bra size?" "Uh... thirty-two C... whuh...?" Natalie looked up and had a feeling of dread. "No." "I didn't say anything." "Then I'm just preemptively telling you no," said Natalie, feeling her heart pound. She felt way too much like she was back in high school, bearing the pressure of Louise trying to convince her to wear a thong with her low-rise jeans, saying no all the time and sensing she was about to cave in. "Okay. Calm down. I'm just in a spot, just thinking out loud." She removed her yellow thong and threw it aside, and Natalie found herself staring at the very narrow brown hairs on her nude friend's mound. She smiled when their eyes met again. "I really don't care if you stare, hon. Everyone else pays me, but you can look for free. I remember when you used to prance around in your underwear for me." "I never...!" "I firmly believe that half of the women in the world fantasize about being strippers at some point in their lives," Lou said, putting on a red thong and pulling it tight. She grew a smile and said, "The other half are just dead below the neck." "Oh, let me guess which category I fall into. You know, I'm sexually active, I have a great fantasy life, I feel good about my body and I feel attractive... maybe I just don't feel like taking my clothes off for men is good for me." "I didn't say anything," said Lou. She dug through her drawer for another top, then she looked up at Natalie and continued, "Nobody's saying you would be doing it for a fantasy or the money. You could just do it to help a friend out." "I suggest you get back on the phone and get one of your stripper friends to show up," warned Natalie, crossing her arms. "I'll be there throwing singles at you, but that's as far as I'm going." * * * * * * On the drive to the Charbol Hotel, Natalie had a sick feeling in her stomach. She had said no, she had argued until she had a headache and made it clear her answer was no, and yet she had gone so far as to try on a couple of outfits of Lou's that looked good on her. She had tried on stripper outfits. That was how these things with Lou started, even ten years later she knew the feeling. No matter how the answer might be no in her head, Lou was already sure she had gotten a yes. Well, it might be a fight, but she would make it clear she wasn't changing her mind. She stayed in the car while Lou got out, wearing her denim skirt and tank top, carrying her gym bag, and went into the hotel to see if her party was there yet. Natalie leaned on her palm, staring out the window at the cars lined up in the parking lot. A dad in white shorts and a polo shirt was yelling at his kids as they kept touching cars that obviously belonged to strangers. Another family in a small town, the kind of life that Natalie always feared she would accidentally fall backwards into. Ten years probably just shot by for that guy, then he woke up with kids—no wife was around, maybe she was in the hotel or car, maybe she had bailed out already, leaving him with weekends with the kids. Depressing normalcy. Natalie's Back Ten years had gone by for Natalie, most of them exciting, many of them good, and she had made a pretty good life out there in L.A. She was more off than on with her occasional boyfriend Angelo, but she had an agent who worked hard for her and cared about her, she could see a decent future ahead of her, and she had avoided... what? Marriage, family? Any real surprises? Maybe she was in a bigger rut than her stripper friend. Wearing the thong to Alan Dugan's party had been one of the nicest nights of her life, when she let herself be honest about it. She never would have had the nerve, but Lou had done her job talking her into it, and it was still a good memory. She had managed to catch Tom's eye, maybe the one and only time, and she had necked with Roy Heady that night. The only thing more exciting she could remember was when she, Lou, Gary, and D.J. had stripped down to their underwear and gone swimming in Gary's above-ground pool. It was the first time she had ever had sex with a guy she hadn't gone on a date with, and again, it was something Lou had talked her into. Another good memory, another proposition that had put a pit in her stomach, but she survived it and enjoyed it. Yet here she was, adamant to tell Lou no this time, quickly forgetting all the fun she had when she told her yes. Lou came back to the car, carrying her gym bag. She opened it and Natalie smiled at her, leaning forward. "I'll do it." Oh, her stomach was already turning somersaults. "If you can't get a girl, of course. If no one's contacted you yet." "You don't have to," said Lou quietly, tossing her gym bag into the backseat and climbing back in the SUV. Natalie shrugged and said she didn't mind, she had thought about it, doing a favor for a friend would be worth it. Lou only put her sunglasses back on, gave her a softer-than-usual smile, and said, "It's alright. I'll get another girl." "Where are we going?" As fast as Lou peeled out of the parking lot, it could have been that she robbed the place. "I guess you're not working tonight." "Not here. I'm working across town. At the Peach Pit." Natalie laughed and Lou looked at her, sighed, and told her, "Hon, it's so nice of you to volunteer. I mean it. But I know this isn't your thing. I'll get someone else. I can't ask you to do this—" "I know I'm not a professional, but will anybody really care?" Natalie felt embarrassed, a little rejected, and she tried not to feel insulted. It wasn't like Lou to actually consider her aversion to something genuine, so it seemed like it had to be Natalie was unfit to play the role. "I'm not knocking what you do, you're probably great at it... but if I just show up and shake my tits, are they really going to complain?" "No. You'd be great at it," she said, but it sounded less than convincing. "I know you don't want to. This show at the Peach Pit is probably going to be tougher than most of them. Don't worry about it, really. I'll just tell them I couldn't get anyone else." "What do you want? Do you want me to beg?" Natalie laughed. "Give me a chance. I'm sure I won't ruin your rep, you'll still dance great..." "Natalie..." "Fine, I'm begging," she said, blowing out an annoyed breath. "I don't really care if anyone out here sees me. I don't even live here anymore. What are the odds of someone recognizing me? And if Fat Robbie from Biology happens to be there or something, so what? I'm heading back to Cali on Sunday. Right? I'm saying, I can do it. Unless I'm just such a horrible blemish on your nudie show..." Lou looked over at her when they reached a stop at a light, studied her from top to bottom, and bit her lip. "You know... I didn't recognize you. No one else probably will." "I'm not worried about anyone recognizing me. Hey, if Fat Robbie does show up, maybe it'll be the thrill of his life," she laughed. "You don't even have to take your thong off... they probably wouldn't care about that." After Nat rolled her eyes, secretly dreading the thought, Lou said, "I really, really could use your help... if you're willing. But I don't want you to have any regrets about it—" "I learned a long time ago, I can either have regrets or hang out with you... I can't do both," she said, and Lou leaned over to give her an awkward hug across the SUV's cabin. It wasn't until she pulled into the parking lot of the Peach Pit that Lou took a nervous breath, smiled at her friend, and dropped the big bombshell on her. "I have to tell you... before we do this. And I'm so sorry, but it was an honest mistake... the motorcycle guys canceled out on me two weeks ago. Or I moved them, I can't... I had this offer to do Kevin Fiedler's bachelor party." Kevin Fiedler... why did that name sound so...? "Oh Christ," whispered Natalie, then covered her mouth. "That's not the same Kevin Fiedler who was class president, is...? Louise!" She tossed up her hands, then covered her eyes. "I know, I know... hey, I wouldn't have asked you to do it if I had remembered. I'm not that crazy..." "But you're doing it!" Putting a hand on her forehead as if she could feel her temperature rising, Natalie asked, "Who's going to be there?" "I'm not sure. There's about sixty scheduled, I know..." "Sixty? For a fucking bachelor party?!?" "The reunion's tomorrow, Nat, he scheduled the wedding for the Sunday afterward, he invited practically everybody we went to school with! Every guy at least, who knows if any of the women are showing up..." "Jesus, kid, you're going out there and stripping for everyone we went to high school with? What's wrong with you?" That made Lou laugh, but Natalie hadn't been making a joke of it. "What do I care? This is what I do. Half of the town already knows why I quit the bank and what I do now. You think they don't know I'm the same Louise Kelly that signed their yearbooks? Alan begged me to do it, he said it would be like a teenage wet dream come to life if I did the bachelor party. I'm supposed to turn that down?" "...Out of your fucking mind..." "See, that's what I thought," she said, flinging the door open and getting out. "I retract my asking. They hired me and another dancer, not me and some neurotic shaking in her boots—" "Hey!" Lou slammed the door on her, so Natalie opened hers and got out, slamming it even louder. "I was ready to do this when it was strangers..." "I know, I know—how brave you are," growled Lou. She walked around the SUV to continue the conversation more quietly. "It was one thing when it was a group of men you've never seen before. Hey, one of them could be Fat Robbie, but we knew that wasn't going to happen. Now that you know who they are..." "You were going to let me go through with it," hissed Nat, jabbing her finger at her friend. "This is just like old times. Exactly the same." "You had fun, every time I dragged you out of your stupid shell, you know you did," Lou snapped, and Natalie couldn't defend against that truth. "It's not like they would recognize you—I didn't, and I was your best friend. Look at you, you're a brunette now, you're wearing contacts... nobody's seen you in forever. It's not like they hired you by name. Why would they expect you to be up there? But no, I wasn't going to let you do this—that's why we're having this conversation. Remember? Because I had to be honest with you." She started toward the back entrance of the bar, but stopped, returning and slamming the keys into Natalie's palm. "Please... let's forget this ever happened. Go back to my place. Kick back, watch the cable, I'll be home when I'm home." "I thought you said I could watch." "Go if you want, stay if you want," she said, rolling out a heavy breath. "You're a wonderful friend, Natalie. I wouldn't have let you go up there if I thought you'd embarrass yourself. And I wouldn't let you do anything you'd regret. That's why I told you what this was. It's not going to bother me—I'll probably get a kick out of it, have a story to tell tomorrow." "I'll bet." With a flip of her blonde hair, Lou turned her back on her and proceeded to the club. Natalie stood there, watching her leave, and wished she had the ability to laugh at this kind of thing like Lou did. She was right, she'd probably be bragging about it to all the people at the reunion tomorrow—all of them who hadn't been there to see the nudie show in person. Natalie looked down at the keys of the SUV, then sucked in a deep breath. She chased after Lou, knocked on the door until it opened, and gave her friend a big embrace. * * * * * * Before the doors opened to the bachelor party, they changed into their outfits in the ladies' room and then made their way back to the kitchen, where they camped as the crowd began to collect on the floor. She went into the bathroom with Lou only considering the prospect of dancing, under the pretense of keeping her friend company, but by the time Lou had pulled her red thong tight between the cheeks of her ass, Natalie knew she couldn't live with herself if she had let her do it alone. She asked to see what outfits they had brought and she found one she thought she could live with. While Lou had worn a red bra and leather lace-up girdle to match her thong and knee-high boots, Natalie had chosen a more modest pair of white panties, a tight bikini top—the only one Lou had that would fit her smaller chest well—and a translucent babydoll camisole to give her just a little more coverage. Wearing that outfit, with her borrowed high heels, had seemed like child's play when she put it on in the bathroom, but sitting in a chair by the exit to the kitchen, with cooks and wait staff passing them every few minutes and looking their way frequently, Natalie was starting to think she would never get through the night. As if Lou could read her thoughts, she leaned in and told her, "You don't have to do this." She said she knew that. "Well... don't forget, you can leave your bottoms on. If you leave yours on, I'll leave mine on. How's that?" "I bet that'll make Alan mad," Natalie said, then smiled. She would get through it. It would definitely be a story to tell—not at the reunion. She was suddenly planning on skipping that. Many drinks were served at the bar, but they were moving so fast that they were flying out of the kitchen as well, along with plates of food. Music blasted through the early part of the evening, but every time Natalie expected it was their big moment, Lou would only shake her head, put a hand on her shoulder, and tell her to be patient. They were able to get a few beers from a generous waiter who kept an eye on Natalie, and that helped take the edge off the wait. "Who do you think is out there?" Lou said it could be anybody, but gave a short list of people she expected. "What about... Jimmy Cohen? The one with the nice...?" "I know Jimmy was coming in for the reunion, no telling if he's at the party," said Lou. She smirked and said, "I bet you're wondering about Tom Davenport. I don't know why you don't just say—" "God, thanks for suggesting that," groaned Natalie. "I'm going to fall apart. I'm going to trip over myself and land on my—don't expect a lot of tips. That's all I'm saying." The music stopped, and after almost a minute, there was the screech of a microphone out in the main room, followed by a somewhat-familiar voice bouncing off the walls. Alan Dugan! The most popular guy in school, back in their day, and he didn't sound very different. "Dugan," Natalie said, then released a wistful sigh. "I bet he's not so pretty anymore." A shrug from Lou, then she said, "He's got this awful mustache now, but he's stayed in decent shape. It's Fiedler who's put on the weight. He's got another chin now." "Ten years later and Fiedler and Dugan are still best friends. How pathetic is that?" There was a lengthy pause, then both of them broke out in giggles. In the main room, Dugan said, "I know how much fun it is to see everyone from high school again. See how out of shape the wrestling team is, how all the academic team has ended up working fast food places... or worse, seeing everybody who's doing better than you. My original plan was to have us all get drunk here and listen to Springsteen's 'Glory Days' on infinite repeat... I think that's how my dad spent his reunion." The laughs were bigger than the joke—at least some of them were drunk by now. "But I did want us to have some fun tonight so—hate me if you wanna, I did hire a stripper. I know, everybody does it..." The wolf howls of the audience drowned out a line or two of Dugan's speech. Lou stood up, pushed her breasts higher a couple of times, then took a trembling breath. Dugan continued, "...As it happens, I found someone from our graduating class that did not lose her shape. She is just as foxy as she was when we all had boners looking at her—yes, that's for you as well, Jessica..." Natalie watched her friend, smiled with great affection for her, and said with astonished realization, "You're actually nervous." "Of course I'm nervous," she said, scowling down at her. "I'm about to take my clothes off in front of all the people who used to judge me on a daily basis. I'm just hoping my tits don't fall off or something." Covering her mouth to quiet her laughter, Natalie stood up beside her. She leaned forward and gave Lou a tight hug. "Here goes nothing. I'm with you." "...Really doubt you will be disappointed to see her after all this time, especially those of you who have been out of town," Dugan went on. "And when I say you'll see her, I mean you'll see a lot of her. Gentlemen... and you curious ladies... let's welcome back our old friend Louise Kelly... tonight she's going by >Lulu!" Like that, with a roar outside to greet her, Lou transformed into her exotic dancer persona and slammed the twin kitchen doors open to emerge. Natalie took a steely breath and followed, swinging her hips back and forth in the same way Lou did. Dugan handed her the microphone when she made a gesture for it, and Lou gave the crowd a big smile, then waved an arm toward her friend with the short black hair. God, the restaurant had seemed so empty only an hour before, a concrete floor, wood-paneled walls and the low beams of the ceiling, small white tables occupying the main floor, black vinyl booths lining two of the walls near the door, and a thick formica bar along the wall opposite the kitchen; now it was hard to see anything but bodies, almost all of them male, and they all seemed to be wearing nametags as if they were attending the reunion here. All of them were suddenly looking at Natalie. She stopped breathing, worried she wouldn't start again. "My friend Alan left somebody out... I know that broke her heart—lucky for you boys she's the forgiving type," Lou said, her sultriness dialed up to 11. "Guys... allow me to introduce... Miss Nasty!" The howls broke Natalie from her trance, and she smiled brightly for the crowd by impulse alone. They wanted a show, and she felt inclined to give them one. She pitched her hips from side to side, descending to a squat before resuming her previous posture again. The music started again, and to Natalie's chagrin, it was one of Britney Spears's big hits from their high school years. She had to admit that she liked it alright back then, it had been something of a guilty pleasure for her, but as she got older she came to really despise Britney and the people who branded her for the whole act of a sexualized little girl being sold to teenagers. Still, when Nat saw "Lulu" start to shake her hips like a maraca as the beat filled the room, she could almost remember how much fun it had been. There had been a small part of her—maybe a very small part—that wanted to be lusted after the way Britney was. There were three firm wooden tables near the back of the room, and with the help of a chair, Lou topped them in a few seconds and began to perform her act. Her arms flew about in grand gestures, her bare legs rose and fell with punctuated movements, making sure every eye was drawn to them. She wrapped her arms around her chest and swiveled her hips about, periodically thrusting her pelvis forward. It was hard to believe that was her friend up there. Not everybody was watching Lou with an unflinching gaze, she realized—she noticed a few heads turned her way, observing her doing nothing at all. Right beside her was a guy with graying curly hair and a goatee. For a second she had the strange thought that it looked like Clay Walters from high school, then it hit her and made her feel stupid, fuck, it is Clay Walters. She smiled nervously at him, paranoid that he recognized her, and she proceeded to dance. Just a few small motions, shaking her body to the music, nothing to take much attention from the expert. The song was reaching its peak and Lou turned her back to the boys, then she stunned them with a frantic shake of her tanned buttocks. The dollars began to fly toward the stage, and seldom had a moment when they slowed. Definitely a hard act to follow, Natalie thought, swallowing hard—she was glad she had been tanning all over since the last bikini shoot. "Where do you work?" a guy behind Natalie asked. She glanced back, then had to glance again to be sure it was really Roy Heady, talking to her right in the middle of Lou's act. She thought he had to recognize her, but the question didn't seem to support that worry. It was almost an insult, she thought—she slept with this guy, he could have at least recognized her. She just shook her head and smiled at him, then continued to shake her ass. He must have enjoyed the view. Another song started up, a pop hip-hop song that Nat couldn't remember too well. Lou kicked her act into overdrive, giving Alan a come-hither wave to bring him closer, then pulling loose a red lace on the rear of her girdle, handing it to him when he was near enough. Everyone cheered him on as he pulled it, wrapping the excess around his hand until the last of it pulled free of the garment, and then Lou whipped it off towards the nearest table full of men. The exposed flesh of her belly made her breasts appear bigger, contained in the red lace bra she wore as they heaved back and forth. When she turned to the audience again, she eased her thong down the back of her ass, only slightly, and Natalie nearly froze again, sure that Lou was going back on her word, but despite the pleas of the men in the audience, she brought it back up with a snap and wagged her finger at them. Natalie sighed with relief. She picked up her dance where it had left off, her gyrations more subtle. Some guy pinched Nat's ass, just pinched it out of nowhere and without invitation, and she turned with frustration to find who it had been, but no one would cop to it, leaving her to pretend it had never happened and cautiously looking back toward the stage. Lou bowed to the men, wiggling her pendulous breasts back and forth and letting them marvel at her cleavage. When she rose back to her regular posture, she snuck a hand behind her and popped the hook on her top. It lost its tightness, sank off her breasts as if gravity had taken hold of it, and she clutched it close as she brought her legs together and sank to her knees slowly, in time with the song. Finally, she pulled it away and flung it over the heads of the closest men. Her boobs had never seemed more enviable, large, with diamond-hard pink nipples. Every slight motion made them quiver—she had always been so lucky to be as big as she was in that department. One of Natalie's boyfriends had once asked her to shake hers for him, in the bedroom, and he didn't act impressed at all with her best efforts. She made a gesture toward the floor, took one step forward, and it was a surprise how many guys hurried up to help Lou down, as gracefully and perfectly as if they had all rehearsed it. Lou rubbed the top of Alan's head as she passed him, still smiling like Miss America, then she clapped her hands above her in time with the song as she walked through the crowd, at least half of the men now standing, toward "Miss Nasty." Natalie's Back From side to side her hips darted, her hands clapped over her, and she called out over the music, "Are you gonna leave me up here by myself?" Getting out of the pinch zone seemed like a good idea, so Natalie hurried forward with her best runway model strut, put her hands on Lou's waist, grinning at her as she blushed, and pressing close enough to her that their breasts met. The men didn't keep their enjoyment silent, the vibrations from the noise were coming up through the floor. The tables where Lou had performed were suddenly blocked with the guys who had swarmed after her in her wake, and though Natalie could have chased them away and followed that tough act—but she turned her head and saw the bar was emptier, and it gave her an idea. She pulled Lou along with her in that direction, feeling the eyes of all the men on her as she jiggled in her high-heeled run. On the way she passed three more people she recognized, John Bell, Larry Argus, and even a woman, Meryl Harper, the girl she had shared a locker with in ninth grade. Don't worry how weird it is, she told herself, nobody would ever know it was her. The bartender picked up on what she intended to do and cleared the bar of its bottles and plastic cups. Being higher than everyone else might make it feel like a stage to her, Nat thought, and that would probably help. She pointed a thumb in the direction of the bar and gestured for Lou to kneel, to offer herself as a stepstool. When Lou did, Natalie put a clumsy foot high on her friend's thigh, stabbing her with the heel, trying to reposition it, and then pulling away to try again, landing more of the front part of her foot there and finding a firm step; she threw herself forward, a hand on the bar, and used a barstool to reach the top of the bar as delicately as possible. A sneer from the bartender made her rethink her choice, and she kicked her heels off first in order to get his approval. Some guy—probably just being nice to her—waved a five dollar bill in the air and approached until he could reach up and slip it inside the band of her white panties. He looked like a bookie, especially with his silk jacket, gold chains, and sunglasses, and it took her longer than it should have to recognize him as a member of the basketball team. Ouch, he wasn't going to be hitting any more threes from mid-court with all those extra pounds. Her first tip had taken her attention from Lou for a moment, but when Natalie looked back, she saw her friend trying to tie the band of her thong again. What had happened? Something had ripped it, she was still kneeling in the spot where she had given Nat a leg up—oh fuck. She realized her heel had done that. Natalie stopped everything, put her hands on her knees and leaned forward, checking on how Lou was coping. Someone called out for her to "work it," but she ignored him. The thong wouldn't tie again, that much was apparent, and Nat didn't know what to do; she was about to climb down from the bar and walk Lou to the kitchen again, helping her keep covered, and Lou might have suspected that when she glanced up at her. She stood and turned to the looming men around her, swayed her hips back and forth again for enticement and then—a gasp stuck in Natalie's throat—she pulled at the thong until it ripped away, sending dollars into the air with the abandoned red cloth. Lou stood there bottomless, bare above her shiny red boots, except for the wisps of brown hair growing from her groin. Natalie could watch her ass shake, feeling nervous enough for her that she felt she would explode, but Lou, as she should have known, had no obvious inhibitions. She picked up a few of the dollars from the ground with as elegant a motion as she could manage, and then Lou threw them in her friend's direction, sending the attention back her way. Natalie's heart was pounding like crazy, but she wasn't going to let her down after all of that. She took the curtains of her snow-white camisole and flapped them around, letting the boys fixate on her very flat belly. Hours in the gym every week hadn't given her concrete abdominals, but no one could pinch any fat on her in that area. Natalie let them drink in her backside, protruding in all the right ways from her tight bikini bottoms. If she could claim to be an expert on any of this, it was making her butt look good—from her first bikini shoot she had found poses that brought out the best angles of her from behind. She could see a picture of her ass and find it attractive without ever realizing it was hers, maybe that gave her too much confidence, but it was one thing she was sure worked for her. Watching the crowd over her shoulder, she loosened the knot keeping it together and then doffed her camisole. A slight roar from the wide-eyed men stroked her nervous ego. Her strip had actually begun. Down in front of the bar, Lou still stood there naked, bouncing up and down, shaking all over, and goading her on. Natalie could only imagine how many pinches she was enduring, surrounded by all the goons in high school who had fantasized about her and would never get closer. Giving her shoulders a slow rise and fall, Nat decided it was time to get through it, then unfastened the camisole and slid it off her shoulders. There were some enthusiastic shouts, but she couldn't enjoy them much with her mind on what was coming. The bar was somewhat thick, but she took a gamble with her next dance step, swirling around on her bare feet, sliding to one end with a leading knee, leaving her arm extended behind her. She was closer to the bartender than anyone else, and he applauded, grinning wide as he gawked at her. As close as she was, it gave her an idea. She pressed her forearms against her breasts in a fake show of modesty, then arched her back as she leaned toward him. "Can you get my top?" She had to repeat it before he heard her over their calls. A dollar rained down on her shoulder, then off her chest. "Can you take off my top?" Shrill howls, and the bartender looked more nervous than Natalie, but he edged closer, lifted his fumbling fingers to the clasp, and then she felt the tension break. Nat smiled at the crowd, sucked in a breath that was obvious to everyone, and then she pulled it off her shoulders by the straps. Her modest breasts stood out on her chest, dark red nipples more erect than she could ever remember them being. She held the white top out with one dainty extension of her arm. One guy reached over another and snapped it up—she wondered if she would ever get it back. If she didn't, the tidal wave of singles that were suddenly hitting her would work as a paper dress, she thought with a smile. Glancing down again, she saw Lou was actually dancing with a guy. Was it Alan? No, he looked a bit like Alan, but he had no repulsive mustache. The nametag said "Weitz," but Natalie thought he looked nothing like the Dave Weitz she remembered from gym class. How nuts it was that Lou could dance with him like that, the only person in the room who was entirely naked. "You want a water?" asked the bartender. Her stalled dance must have made him think she was passing out, she was covered from head to toe in sweat, just like Lou and some of the guys. She nodded, and the bartender sprayed the water from a hose into a plastic cup, then handed it to her. Natalie sipped a little, then collected her breath as she stood again, watching Lou swerve her pelvis in time with her partner. The men around her were mostly watching the naked girl dance, but most of the room was still watching Nat on the bar, and all she was doing was standing there. "Is the show over?" a guy asked, and a resounding groan of disappointment rolled upon her. Wiping her head with the plastic cup, Natalie spilled just a little—then inspiration struck her as she saw a guy swinging the remains of Lou's red thong; she poured the water over her breasts, and it ran in rivulets down her bare body. A shout of approval grew out of the audience. She looked to the bartender again and made a gun motion with her hand until he understood what she wanted. At first she didn't believe he would do it, that it would make a mess of everything. But he did. The bartender lifted the hose and squeezed, spraying with water her back, then her ass, then her breasts and belly as she shifted toward him. Natalie splashed the water into her face, then ran her fingers through her hair until the strands clung together. People screeched out their approval. Natalie cleared the water from her eyes when the hose stopped, and she stared over the faces, trembling upon noticing how many she recognized. Fuck, in the back of the room there was Emma Barndale, the girl who was rumored to have slept with the art teacher, her hands over her heads, clapping for her. Nat pulled the front of her bikini bottoms out very far, letting the water run down over her sensitive flesh. The approval of the audience made the bar rumble. She smiled coyly at them. She let it snap back and they all spat out a collective, "Awwww..." "I'm not that nasty... am I?" she asked, and they cheered like raucous animals, making her break character and laugh. Natalie dropped down on all fours, knees at each edge of the bar, then straightened enough to lower the back of her bikini until they could see her ass at an angle. They howled again. She held the back down until she could get the bartender to take hold of it. She squeezed his hand into a fist on the material, then told him to hang onto it and not let go... then she began to crawl toward the other end of the bar. The enthusiastic yells started to grow, the sides of her bikini wound their way down until they were stretching around her hips at their widest place, and the material stretched behind her as the bartender applied his strength to hold it. "What are you doing!" yelped Lou, laughing too hard to really protest. Swinging her head hard to the side, her wet hair flipped in that same direction and smacked against her. She kept her eyes closed, focused on the calls of the lustful men around her, feeling the air chill her ass, and she put all of her muscle into creeping along the bar. The strain of the material against her body genuinely began to hurt. Then it snapped, taking the entire piece of cloth away. A bellow from the crowd reminded her of the best touchdown the football team had ever scored. Natalie straightened her back again, resting on her bent legs, then leaned back until she could feel the bar against her bare shoulders. She looked over at the audience, then ran a hand over the slick skin between her breast and her hair-threaded mound. Natalie pointed one knee at the crowd, lifted the other leg directly into the air until they were approximately perpendicular, choking back the worry that some in the crowd were seeing everything from their angle. The storm of green bills made it hard for her to see the faces locked on her for a few seconds. "Drink," she called back to the bartender, and he brought her a shot just after the money began to really slow. She sat up, crossing one leg over the other, and slammed the glass back as was her tendency with shots. "You're beautiful, baby!" one man called out from further in the back, and she smiled at him. "What club do you work?" another asked, but she couldn't give him an answer, so she said nothing. She turned her back to them and rose to her knees, letting them drink in her backside, then, on her craziest whim yet, she bent over until she knew they could see the parted lips of her exhilarated pussy. Men stomped the floors and banged the tables, called out her stage name, whistled until she thought it would hurt her eardrums. Then she dismounted from the bar with far more poise than she had ascended it, planting both feet on the floor to loud applause. She gave her ass a powerful wiggle, earning more approval from the crowd. Lou seemed more surprised than she was, rushing her and throwing her arms around her, kissing her cheek, and whispering that she was a natural. Natalie didn't know about that, but she could tell from everything she saw that she hadn't left any disappointed faces. They both signaled for more shots from the bartender, who hurried to respond. After they drank them, the audience eventually quieted down enough that Alan picked up the microphone again. "My god! These girls make you happy you're old enough to be in here, don't they?" Loud confirmations from the room, then Alan laughed and went on. "That's Lulu... and Miss Nasty, god bless her... I think we owe them more applause... I... yes, that's it. Good stuff. Thank you. Now... cool it, guys... now what say we give the groom-to-be his last brush with greatness?" At that, Lou slapped Natalie on the ass and walked between the salivating men over to where Kevin Fiedler sat in his chair, covering his eyes and laughing loudly. With her legs together, Lou parted his knees and sank between them, then blew a breath onto his crotch. Everyone could tell he was enjoying the show, and it even seemed to twitch beneath the fabric of his slacks when she moved her head closer. Lou rose to her feet again, turned, and rested her ass on his groin as the people around her boomed out baritone cries. She shook her backside like a cartoon character settling into a chair and Kevin adjusted his posture like it caused him pain. Only the sight of her friend performing a faux sexual act with a guy could distract Nat from the fact she was stark naked in room full of people she used to idolize. Even that forgetfulness didn't last too long, and she looked to her right and saw a trio of guys who were vaguely familiar, their stares melting all over her body. She shifted her shoulders, but that only made her tits quiver. Natalie arched her hip in one direction and leaned her weight on the other foot, then wondered if she had done it because her ass always looked amazing in shots where she posed that way. A look over her shoulder revealed two of the football players she had always fantasized about dating—now they were maybe fantasizing about her. She couldn't believe she had almost said no to this, it was too good to be true. Near the back of the room, Lou was pressing her breasts into Kevin's face, and though he seemed to take it all in the fashion of an embarrassed gentleman, he did lapse at one point and lick her left nipple, energizing the crowd and winning their praise. Natalie covered her mouth as she watched, wondering where little Louise Kelly had ever come up with the nerves of steel to do something like this. Her eyes wandered just enough to see some of the other faces in the crowd, one of them Kim Young, an idol from the girls' soccer team—it did make Natalie wonder if she had come for a freakshow or if it wasn't the first strip show she had seen. Just behind her was another very familiar face, and it gave Nat a chill to see Robin Franks, everyone's favorite theater teacher—what the hell was he doing here? She didn't know if she should laugh or throw up, it was a confusing feeling. A tingle went through her skin, the air seemed much, much colder, when she saw on the other side of the room, seated at a table by the bar Tom Davenport himself. She thought she would lose consciousness, all the blood was rushing out of her body, she was breathing too fast, bombarded by thoughts. Had everyone seen her—had he watched? Was he turned on? Oh, fuck, it was driving her crazy to even consider it. She found herself staring, but that wasn't mortifying until he turned his eyes her way and caught her unbreakable gaze. "Dance for me," someone said over her left shoulder. She didn't even realize it was her he addressed until he spoke again. "I want a lapdance—honey! Miss Nasty, yo! Give me a lapdance... I've got twenty dollars for you!" A hand flapped a worn twenty back and forth just in her field of vision as if it was the least bit enticing, but it only annoyed her. She turned enough to see the guy, determined to read him the riot act, but she couldn't when she saw him, she smiled too big and lost her anger. "Fat Robbie!" she said, then covered her mouth. "Sorry, sorry. Look at you! You look great!" A couple of other guys around them were passing the words "Fat Robbie" back and forth, but it didn't sound like a taunt anymore, more like the same fondness people had when they talked about '50s rock idols like Chubby Checker or Fats Domino. Robbie stood there, leaning toward Natalie as if he would topple forward, surprised she knew him, but she only pushed his offer of money aside and pressed her body into his. She was smiling at his shock, then she pushed her lips to his and gave him a kiss, kind of quick, but long enough to make people jealous. He had lost about ten or twenty pounds since high school, looked pretty good, but nobody was going to forget he was Fat Robbie with the way he looked. "I'm sorry, Robbie, baby... I only lapdance for one man," she said, taking a long breath before she left him. She swatted aside anyone staying in her way, and all but one or two of them moved aside with good manners—the pair that didn't were forced aside by more gentlemanly guests. Natalie made a beeline for the man of her dreams, and Tom saw her about a minute before she reached him, and he didn't dare look away. He sat in his chair with one arm on the table, hand cozying a beer, the other resting limply on his thigh. He wore wire-frame glasses, his dusty brown hair was brushed back in a way that suited him more than his high school tangle of curls, and he had probably lost some muscle mass since those days—though his baggy yellow pastel dress shirt and loose-fit jeans might have hidden more than his old clothes. His head moved back involuntarily as Natalie neared, like he was watching a 3D movie. A friend of his at the same table slammed back his beer while shifting the contents of his slacks around without a thought of witnesses. It made Natalie grin, which was a welcome change from the blank expression she had worn. It prompted her to speak. "Tom Davenport... I'd love to give you a private dance," she said, fearing she would faint as her heart beat faster and her skin went nuclear. The shrill whistles around her were an unpleasant reminder they weren't alone, but it wasn't like she would get another chance. It was Tom who nearly fell, fumbling in his pocket for his wallet and pulling it out with enough force that he almost tossed it. She put a hand on his, making her heart jump, and pushed it aside. No charge, she mouthed. With the rumble around them getting louder, Nat parted her legs, revealing everything to those standing in front of her, and she straddled Tom and sat on his thighs. Someone clapped with sharp, distinct sounds. It wasn't ten seconds of sitting that way before she could feel Tom's bulge take shape, nuzzling against her throbbing labia. They were well-matched, she thought with amusement—neither of them could hide their enjoyment of the moment. Holding his hands, she leaned back slowly, letting the assembly behind her get a better look at her breasts, but then she returned to her former position, guiding Tom's face down to her breasts. He seemed unsure, even when he was close enough to feel their warmth on his chin, but she gave him a nod and he knew it was okay. He lashed out with his tongue and the crowd made a sound like sizzling. It was unbelievable, his tongue, the direct line it had to her aching pussy, and while she knew he had demonstrated no more skill than most men she had been with, Nat couldn't claim the effect wasn't a hundred times more powerful on her. Even if it was psychological, it was sick psychology that plucked all her strings. She found herself grinding against his crotch, relishing the way her wet body embraced his firm curves. Natalie rested a head on his shoulder as if she was going to sleep, and she felt comfortable enough that she could have, but she wasn't about to let the sensation fade on her. She grasped the sides of his torso, the place where other men had "love handles" and used her hold to pivot harder into him. Natalie's Back Natalie rocked against him, sensations bolting up and down her spine and a weakness piercing the back of her neck whenever she felt those swells of his crotch connect with the charged, engorged flesh at her entrance. Her eyes started to water and breaths became harder to control. The sweat and water covering her body left her feeling more bare than before, and the solution that came to mind was to take both of Tom's hands, resting by his own hips, and placing them on the rises of her ass. They shouted even louder around them, and she couldn't long forget any of them were there, but she wished they were gone. Leaning into him, she found a welcome position with her forehead against his, their breaths invading each other's mouth and nose, and she kept her eyes closed. A wet dream she had her junior year came back to mind, when she first fell for Tom Davenport, and heard Julie Rosemont telling other girls in the parking lot about fucking him on the back deck of his parents' house. In her fantasy she had been that lucky girl, and all of a sudden, she could almost believe it was her now—if not for the shouts of approval from the aroused mob. Her daring reached a peak as her stimulation escalated, and she moved his right hand again, bringing it around her waist, sinking it into his own lap—until the summits of his knuckles were making contact with her wanton pussy. She shivered, her body instinctively retreated, but he moved his left hand again and landed his fingers between the cheeks of her ass; it had only been to support her, but the touch gave her a new charge, and it became the object of new howls from her audience. Her legs went stiff, her body stretched out toward the ceiling, she shuddered all over with brief but severe intensity, and Nat came on his lap. A few people clapped, those closest to her, but when the cloudiness of her pleasure passed, she wasn't sure how many knew what was really going on. Most of them might have still believed it was all a performance. She bowed her head and let her breath slowly come back to her, twitching the muscles of her ass to make it seem like she was still moving with real vigor. Her eyes wandered up to Tom's, watery from her growing embarrassment, and she whispered that she was sorry. He must have had no doubts, as soaked with warm fluids as his lap suddenly was, and as soon as she rose from him everyone else would see it. Tom showed no thought about it whatsoever, looking away from her for a moment, then grabbing a cold beer from the table and sipping on it. He offered her some, but she shook her head. Then he poured it right onto his groin. The splash on her skin gave her instant goosebumps, and she went rigid against him, then edged away until her feet were on the ground. He had a stain on his jeans, as she had predicted—but it could have easily been the beer he had just poured. She felt a level of gratitude that few people had earned from her, and she laughed and swatted at his hand until he shook the beer and caught her in the chest with a small spray of alcohol. She stood again, wondering if people thought he had suddenly turned into a creep, but it didn't matter to him. He smiled at her and gave her a quick flash of his tongue. Natalie turned to the biggest section of her audience—among those heads she could still make out the gray-black hair of Mr. Franks, her old teacher—and she shook like an animal ridding itself of wet fur. The men mostly laughed loudly. A few more offers for lapdances were shouted at her, but she ignored them. A look to her left revealed that Lou sat on Kevin's leg like a kid on Santa's lap, her legs crossed, holding onto him as she watched her friend. With the back of a hand, Nat brushed away the thicker droplets of beer, from the top of her breasts all the way down to the sparse nest of soaked black hairs clinging to the skin over her pussy. As she finished that display, she felt a coat land on her shoulders, a sport jacket that didn't do much to cover the very bottom of her pelvis, but it gave her some semblance of a shield. Tom stood behind her, giving her a nudge forward until she began to walk, and they sidestepped the various bodies in the audience and a few tables until they reached the women's restroom. "Sorry about the beer," he said, and she didn't know if he meant it or if it was for the benefit of a pair of guys hanging out nearby. "I'll guard the door. You'll be alright in there." He pushed it open for her and she went in, nodding her head toward him in thanks. Natalie opened the door of the bathroom stall and hung the jacket on the end of it, then turned to look at herself in the mirror over the sink. Good god, was she the same person? Her skin was red all over, like a permanent burn had changed her color, her hair stuck to the side of her head and forehead, her mouth unable to close as she continued to take deep breaths, and every square inch of her skin damp. She couldn't make up her mind if she looked better or worse than her best professional pictures. She was far from polished, but there was something enticing about her post-climax afterglow. Her fascination with herself passed when she remembered Tom Davenport was waiting outside for her. She repeated it to herself: Tom Davenport is waiting outside for me. She pulled towels from the dispenser and cleaned her thighs and drooling pussy, mopped up the sweat from most of her body, then washed her face with tap water for good measure. Every time she checked herself in the mirror the scene became more and more impossible to believe. Here she was, not just naked but with no idea where her clothes were, taking a post-orgasm breather in the bathroom at the Peach Pit, with the biggest crush of her life—and about 60 more old friends and acquaintances—outside waiting for her. She tossed the last towels into the garbage can, wrapped the jacket around her shoulders again, and opened the door to leave. Several heads turned to see her join the room again, a small number of them cheered, but she leaned against Tom and sighed into his chest. It would be great if the rest of them would all disappear, she thought—but then she'd be left with only Tom, and he might not be so considerate of her without a crowd around. After all, she was just a skanky stripper, as far as he was concerned. "I'm sorry," she whispered, just loud enough to be heard over the buzzing room. "I didn't mean to embarrass you out here. Thanks for covering for me." He leaned closer himself, letting her suck in his breath. "It's okay. Okay. It's been about ten years since I've been this happy to be embarrassed." "You're a real cute guy," she said, disregarding how stupid she probably sounded. "I always... back in high school, I knew a guy... and you reminded me of him. My first deadly crush. I guess I got carried away..." Tom said, just as quietly, "I was kind of hoping it was me you were thinking of, Nat." He hadn't said that, she thought. She glanced up at him again, her eyes narrowed, and he only smiled at her. Tom raised his eyebrows. "Do you know where I went to high school?" "Somers County Central," he said, chuckling as he reached up and ran a finger along her chin. "Same as the rest of us, Natalie." "Oh, fuck," she said, feeling a giddiness that matched the exhilaration of stripping. And why not—she had just had her mask, her last article of protection, removed. "I'm... I'm not, uh... I didn't think... you or anyone... would know. How did...? How did you...?" His smirk was self-assured as she remembered it, and he traced the ceiling with his eyes before looking at her again. "C'mon... you and Louise Kelly... getting into trouble and doing the something crazy... it's about what everybody expected here," Tom said. "Okay, I thought it might be you when you came out dressed as a stripper... but I thought I could be wrong. Especially when you took all of your clothes off, I wasn't sure old Nat had that in her." "I didn't," she said, trying to smile but finding herself too uneasy as the consequences sprung upon her. "Maybe no one else recognized you... your hair is pretty different and everything. You've got more of a tan... but I had no doubt it was you when you got close enough to me I could look into your eyes." "Bullshit!" She didn't want to sound harsh, but he had to be making it up. "You don't know anything about my eyes. I spent two years in love with you in high school, you never looked my way more than a couple of times—" "Don't 'bullshit' me, Nat... we had that day in our poetry group when we were partnered up by Mr. Hobbs and we sat together in the window. I looked into your eyes while I was reading my poem... I thought that was the nicest shade of blue I'd ever seen. I wasn't going to forget that. I always kind of suspected you liked me... 'love' seems a little strong." She made a fist and gently thumped his chest, then smiled. "You... what an asshole. Did you like me? Or did you just think I had freaky eyes?" "I liked you. Kind of. Some days I liked you a lot, some days I just thought you were nice." It almost made her want to cry, thinking about all the days they never had together. "If you liked me... even a little... why didn't you ever...?" He turned his eyes to the people mulling about, several of them still checking her place by the restroom—a naked woman wasn't just going to slip away from most of these guys without someone watching—but just when Natalie thought he might speed away, Tom shifted his shoulders and gave her a guilty glance. "What do you want me to say? I was a kid. An idiot. Either I didn't always see the real you clearly... or I just got caught up in chasing other girls. I should have seen things better. There was a lot more to you than them." "Well, now you've seen it all," she whispered, grinning broadly. She tapped his cheek. They returned to the floor amidst louder hoots and hollers, but Natalie wanted to stay under a blanket the whole time, using Tom's jacket as a substitute. When she brought her shoulders together, her ass peeked out from the back, but she supposed modesty was long gone by now. There stood Lou, near the man of the hour, with her hands on her hips and not hiding under anything at all. The beaming smile she shot her friend said she read the whole situation, Tom's hanging closely to her and her flushed red state, and no story Natalie made up would deter her from the truth. "Are you doing okay? I was a little worried..." After Nat only nodded, Lou looked around the room and gave her a doubtful grin. "Look... tell me if this doesn't work for you... but I wanted to go out to the SUV, get dressed, and come back in here to share a few drinks with the guys." Indeed—she had her eye on one of them, Natalie didn't doubt, but she couldn't say which one... or if it was just one. It would be terrible of Natalie to cast a stone in such a situation, she knew. But the last thing she wanted to do was hang around these leering eyes for another hour or two. "Yeah... jeez, I hate to be a bitch, Lou, you know that, but... if I can just get a quick ride back to my car... can I...?" "Oh, sure..." "Lou, I'd be happy to take her," Tom interrupted, and he checked Natalie to see if it was alright with her. "I'll make sure she gets where she's going." Lou only nodded in reply, and bless her, she kept her stupid smile on the restrained side. The two of them started to leave, sneaking past a few of the guys who were hanging out around naked Lou, but the sound of Alan's microphone slowed everybody down. "Goddamn, that was a hell of a show... better than the version of The Sound of Music we put on senior year," he said, and a few drunks agreed noisily with him. "Friends, we've had two absolutely beautiful... unbelievably brave ladies with us tonight... we would be a bunch of fuck-ups if we didn't show them how much we appreciated their show tonight—and hey, don't touch that money, except to put it in the tip jar there, right? Can we get a...? That's it... more... louder!" The applause, even if coerced, was an avalanche of their admiration, and Natalie lingered long enough to accept it gracefully. Alan continued, "That's great. Great. So... as I said, you may know our own Lulu... Somers County Central high graduate Louise Kelly!" Taking the microphone, Lou cooed in a breathy voice, "I'm glad you could see me come so far..." The few boos she received were drowned out by the powerful whistles, and she laughed; then she urged Natalie to step closer, and her friend reluctantly did so. "I couldn't have done it alone, of course—I can only handle so many guys at once, right? So that's why I want to thank my last-minute lifesaver. Miss Nas—" Nat yanked the microphone away from Lou with a small screech, then she smiled brightly and announced to the room, "Hi, everyone! I'm Natalie Cramer... class of oh-two!" The murmur rounded quickly, a lightning bolt of audio passing through nearly everybody in the room, and then the shouts and applause and paint-peeling whistles bounded back and Natalie, who bowed her head, smiled wider, and as a final gesture of thanks, doffed her sport jacket and let it fall on the floor. She raised her arms in the air, twisted her hips from side to side, and let a few of them take pictures with cell phones they were explicitly told to turn off during Alan's first speech. It didn't matter to her anymore. * * * * * * Tom and Natalie had passed through the kitchen so fast that she had neglected to get the keys to Lou's SUV; when they discovered it locked outside, she turned to him and tossed her shoulders. "I'll have to go back in, I guess... unless you know somewhere better than my car to go tonight." "I'm usually more old-fashioned than this... but I feel like I should suggest a hotel," he said, and she smiled. "Why not? We've got ten years to make up for." "I'll go back in for your clothes—or your keys—" "Don't bother," she said, entwining her arm with his. "I'm guessing they can wait until morning." She climbed into his car and relaxed into the seat, but immediately wished the seats hadn't been covered with vinyl—she was already sticking to them. Tom started the car and she rolled the windows down just enough to create a strong breeze. She closed her eyes and let the wind whip her hair about. "Are you married?" she asked. It would drive a stake through her to hear he was, she knew, but she wasn't sure it would actually stop her. He took too long to answer, she became deeply worried. "Engaged twice. Once for over a year. Pregnant once—not me, of course... but she didn't deliver," Tom said, and Nat felt bad for him when she read that he regretted not having a child. "As long as I'm rambling about dirty laundry... I opened my own business, a restaurant, and that bombed very hard. I put my life on credit cards, so now I have a lifetime's worth of debts... but I'm paying them off. And I'm doing pretty well with my new job, counseling recovering addicts. I should have mentioned that as well... god, I hate telling people this... but I'm a recovering pill-popper. Sorry. Just a thing I got wrapped up in after a car accident. I'm clean, though... I have been for four years. I never want to get that fucked up again. It cost me my second engagement and... listen to me, I haven't even asked about you." She laughed quietly. "I'm an underwear model. I have a pretty nice apartment and just about no time for the single life." "Goddamn. Pinch me, I must be dreaming." Nat reached over and pulled a small half-inch of skin from his upper arm, and Tom winced, and called her a sadist. She leaned her seat back a little more and noticed he had a large sunroof to his Beetle that allowed a brilliant view of the stars above them. It sparked her imagination. "If you're not committed to a hotel... I've got something that might be better." "Oh?" The deflated tone he used spelled it out for her—he had a naked girl in his car, one who had wanted to get off with him for ten years now, and of course she had changed her mind, it was too good to be true. "I've never been to Ansel Quarry... you know, with a boy. I always wanted to go." He nodded, looked her way, then said, "It's a bit of a drive." She said nothing else, so he told her, "But it's worth it." They took the winding road out of the county, up the rocky, hilly area where teens had been parking under the moonlight for decades. When they reached the grassy space overlooking the quarry, long just called "the overlook" by teens spreading the legend, they passed a small fleet of cars all parked for the same nefarious reasons until they found a more secluded spot behind some overgrown shrubs and a small tree. Once the car was parked, Tom turned the lights off and twisted uncomfortably to his side to look at his passenger. Natalie shed her borrowed jacket and filled her lungs, her breasts standing out further under his gaze. They tried three different positions in the car, but they were impossible to hold in a Beetle. Tom kept laughing with frustration and humor, promising her he would get a van one day if he could—maybe even an 18-wheeler, if that was better. She raised her arm and bent it over the top of her head, smirking at him. She asked if he had a better idea than hers, he thought for a moment, then got out of the car, took a blanket from the back, and spread it on the ground by the driver's side door. Natalie checked both sides of the car—not that spies would have stopped her—and she stepped out of her own door and walked around the rear of the car; her pace was deliberately slow, daring someone to catch sight of her nude body walking under the bright full moon. Natalie sat, legs bent beneath her, and she had no sooner taken a deep, soothing breath of the higher-altitude air than Tom had his arms around her, his fingers pressed into the flesh of her lower back, his lips on hers, his tongue crossing into her mouth. She hadn't known how much she wanted this until it was happening, and every fantasy she'd ever had about him seemed the synopsis to an epic film. His palm found her hip, seemed to singe it with his warmth, and she had to separate her thighs to allow her sex the cool air it wanted. His hand dropped to the flesh of her leg, climbed toward the source of wetness, and soon his fingers were placed where she wanted them, rubbing her, stealing heat from her, seeming to read everything on her mind through their contact. Nat stopped kissing him long enough to look in his eyes and Tom seemed fragile in that moment, as glasslike as her, ready to burst with his own ecstasy. He bowed close again, ran his tongue up her neck, and she quivered like she was already reaching her apex. The wetness pouring from her began to sink into the blanket. Tom dove down, prodded her thighs further apart, and his tongue swept over her outer lips until she blurted out his name. He had flopped one way then another on the blanket, as if a fish deprived of water, until he found a more comfortable angle to resume his assault. His tongue was godly, spreading his saliva and her own juices all over her pelvis and thighs, stabbing into her cutting hot swaths through her tight pussy. When she expected she could handle whatever followed, he rested a hand in her black pubic hair, drew back the fleshy awning at the crest of her pussy, and boxed her clit with his lips and tongue, finally settling into a sucking motion on it that finished her off. Natalie took her hands off his head and covered her own face, cried out into her palms, and came with rampant pleasure. She fell back and thumped her head against his car until the euphoria kicked its way through her body. Her breath barely slowed when Tom rose to hold her, stopping to suck on her left nipple for some seconds. He held her head against his chest and kissed the top of her head. Natalie's Back "I've never had a night as perfect as this," she said, kissing threads of hair over his pectoral. "I never expected to... to do what I did," she said between breaths. "Especially what I did in front of you. What I did... to you..." "When I saw you coming toward me," he started in a tired whisper, "I never wanted anything so much as to taste your pussy. That smell was... so sweet... I licked it off my knuckles when you were in the bathroom." It made Natalie laugh, which made him join her. She pressed her lips to his, kissed him deeply, her tongue scraping the edges of his teeth. Parting, she confessed, "I've dreamed about your dick for ten years, baby... let me see it." He stretched, straightening out a kink in his back as he unbuttoned his shirt. "That's a lot of pressure... I hope you won't be disappointed." "I'm sure I'll be happy with it... because it's yours," she told him. Her hands reached down and started undoing his pants, tossing the buckle aside on his belt. By the time his shirt was fully unbuttoned and coming off his shoulders, she had reached into his open jeans and found a curving pipe through his underwear. Tom rose to his knees, taking his pants down, and an engorged cock, uncircumcised, with a slight upward bend to it, sprang free of his shorts. Sucking a deep breath through grit teeth, Nat pumped it a few times to see if it would become any harder, then she lowered her head and wet the thick round tip. He almost fell backwards, balancing on his hands before he did, and for seconds Natalie only sucked on the very end. Every place on his body seemed wired to overreact to her touch, but nothing was as sensitive as his cock. "Fuck... oh, fuck..." he squealed, nearly whimpering when she applied the most serious suction yet to him. It worked free of her mouth with a small pop and she glanced up at him licking her lips. Tom rubbed under her chin and asked her to take it easy on him through gasps. Her head fell again, she engulfed him, and Natalie tried to force him down her closed throat, though the angle made it impossible; it was enough to push him further toward the edge, and he gently pulled her up from his cock, holding her at bay until his breath came back. "Oh, Jesus... you gotta... we gotta pace ourselves... I've got... about... a hundred different... positions... I want to do with you... tonight." Nat laughed, and he kissed her again. Their kissing continued, their passion climbing higher, and he lifted her from the blanket with his hands on her ass and laid her on her back. He looked her in the eye as the coated wet arrowhead of his cock rubbed against her enflamed labia. Natalie reached down and opened herself further, stroking her inner lips, then nodded that she was ready. He shifted around, poking this way and that, until he was unquestionably seated between her swollen red lips and glossy inner lips. He pushed slowly—she gasped and clenched her stomach against the pain. Stroking her hair, he told her to take a breath and then, as she did, he pushed in a little further. She squirmed on the end of his staff, shaking her head that she wasn't sure she could take anymore, but he said she would feel better when he was in her. Natalie took another breath, felt him ease in considerably more, and when he stopped to give her a break again, she locked her heels on his ass, took a bracing breath, and worked him in the rest of way by her own initiative. Tom stared down at their coupling, then looked up at her face, his hot breath smelling of her musk. Nat rocked forward and back, drawing him out and in again, amazed at the feeling shooting through her body. She could gaze down between them and see her greedy pussy swallow him up each time, and she never wanted to let him go free again. His hands gripped her buttocks as he slowly pumped her, but then he released them, licked his own thumbs, one at a time, and began to play at her nipples. The moisture accumulating on them made them stiffen harder, brought goose-pimples to the surface of her skin, and she could feel her orgasm starting to rumble in her lower body. "Faster," she whispered, not for her sake as much as the thought that she would leave him behind. Taking a needed deep breath, Tom slid out of Natalie, then back in, and repeated it with increasing speed. The friction began to wind her up all the more like a spring that would soon carry too much tension. Her breathing was ragged and her thrusting lost its rhythm, descended into only what she could manage of her chaotic muscles. Her hands fell just above her head, her fingers knotted together like a spider's web, and the high-pitched moan emanating from her became her best response to the fire he was stoking in her. "Natalie?" he asked in the darkness. "Are you alright—" Her chest lunged upward, like a jolt of electricity had been administered to her heart, and she clamped her knees against him. It slowed him down for a moment, but he quickly returned to his quickened rhythm, huffing breaths against her face and neck and he hurried after her. One of Natalie's hands grasped him by the back of the neck, the other clutched his buttock, and she hissed as every muscle in her body tightened. Her wetness coated his cock, her own ass and pussy, and was soon covering his balls and filling the air with her smell again. "What are you... gonna do?" she asked between racing breaths. "Will you... cum... on me?" He was running on less oxygen than her as he pumped her wildly, muttering that he wished every one of their friends could see what she was doing to him, but she only had a vague idea of what he meant to say. Natalie put a hand against his sweaty face and tried to dry his cheek. "It's alright... do it... whenever you want... wherever you wa—" Tom slid out, at first she assumed by accident, but then he cried out and blasted a white stream up the front of her body. As he tried to balance himself upright on his hand, he fell, and the next rocket of semen caught in the damp tangles of her pussy hair, running down and aside one of her labia. The last shot caught the back of her raised thigh, while more leaked from the bulbous head of his cock and onto the blanket. Natalie pushed herself up on her elbow, reaching to stroke the top of his head until he brought it to rest on her thigh as she encouraged. Her eye found the longest splash of cum on her body and she loved the sight of it. If she had walked through the Peach Pit crowd wearing that, most of them would have felt disgust and not the same arousal. But she loved that he had marked her, gave her a brand of his own making, just as he was wearing her all over his cock, balls, and chin. She glanced back behind her when she heard something and saw three kids standing there, teenagers most likely. She cringed inside, but then dismissed that society-sewn seed of guilt and smiled at them. Tom wasn't so forgiving, trying to get to his feet and shouting at them to leave them alone, which they quickly did, but Natalie grabbed his cock at the root and held him from leaving. "It doesn't matter what they see," she said, taking another long, fortifying breath. "All that matters is what we feel." His energy was too gone to argue, and Tom fell beside her, lifting a leg to drape it over her. He managed a weak smile and pressed his forehead against her cheek. "What's next,... hon?" She didn't know what he meant, looked toward his face, but he kept his eyes closed. "You know... I don't suppose you have any plans... to move back here? Good ol... Lampton...?" She hadn't thought about anything like that. As thrilling as the night was, as much as she would love to see it become a repeat affair... she couldn't imagine finding any satisfying work in a small town like Lampton. She winced, then shook her head—it was more than likely that this would become a perfect memory of one great night. "I don't think Lampton will ever be big enough for me," she admitted, but then as he pressed his lips against her shoulder, she turned to look at him again. Tom's eyes opened, and Natalie smiled. "You do know... there are a fair number of addicts in L.A. who want to get better..." T.E.