Fiction by Straber

Part 6 - Chapters 17-20

Chapter 17

Although April's parents wouldn't let her visit the campground over the school holiday, she was permitted to talk to me over the phone once a day; I think her parents were starting to sense what I'd come to feel myself: April and I were getting to be more than just good friends.

When I got back from the campground at the end of winter break, I brought April and her family a few presents from my parents and me. Her dad got a small magnet that read “If God had meant for us to be naked, we would have been born that way.” Her mom got a free voucher for a massage and spa treatment at the campground, which was a clever way for my parents to entice her to see what the place was like, and, with her parents' permission, her brother got a copy of the “Loxie and Zoot” naturist comic book. It seemed that the Collins family might soon be comfortable with the thought of April spending time with me and my family nude at the campground, and maybe even at my house.

April and I picked up right where we had left off after the winter dance (since that was the last school day before the break). We took occasional Saturday trips into Springfield to play at the arcade, go cosmic bowling, play laser tag, and even go mini-golfing and go-karting at the indoor entertainment complex. Sometimes we went with a group of friends, other times just as a double-date Abby and her new boyfriend, and once or twice by ourselves. We made sure to go to the valley whenever we took our customary walks into the forest by my house, and enjoyed the occasional snuggle in the hammock and jetski races alike. We canoed out to the island on the lake and hung some birdfeeders and birdhouses, and got pretty good at acrobatic jumps off the tire swing. We were definitely enjoying the ride on the romance train.

Yep, things were looking up as the New Year got rolling. If only April and I hadn't been so careless when Valentine's Day came around...

* * *

April and I were absolutely smitten with each other by that point, and we'd gotten pretty mushy and lovey-dovey, especially as Valentine's Day drew nearer. Flowers, candy, cards stuffed through each other's locker grilles - I even got her a sizeable stuffed teddy bear.

Valentine's Day was on a Thursday, and we planned to “stay late at school” in order to spend half a day at the lake, on the hill, and in the forest, and then the rest of the day on April's beach, followed by watching a meteor shower from her island at twilight. At this point we had figured out how to bring small things like matches, s'mores materials, and fishing tackle with us, although it was tricky keeping it hidden up until we snuck into that storage area under the stairwell by the gym. I suggested we bring a nice camera with us to try to see if we could take pictures of the beauty of our little piece of heaven to keep in the scrapbook April was making for our amorous relationship.

Everything was in place; April's bag, the boxes, and our logistical bluff of needing to work in the school library for a while. We also had agreed that it was probably safest to leave our wallets and phones and my keys in my locker, just in case the worst happened and someone found and moved the duffel bag. I picked up April from her house that morning so that we wouldn't have to take one of the late buses back to our houses that afternoon. The library was open a full three hours after the day's last class, so she and I figured that the whole day in paradise would neatly fit into that time window in the real world.

It was a magical day, obviously. April had the sun shining brightly on the lake, a family of ducks going about their business from their home on the small island on the lake, and even convinced the pair of swans to coast by every now and then while I tried to catch a few fish to cook over the fire at sunset and while she dangled her feet off the dock and read a book. We played on the tire swing a bit before lying on the meadow hill naming the shapes of the puffy white clouds in the sky. We held hands as we walked through the forest, listening to the birdsongs and trying to stay dry as April's rain shower softly pitter-pattered on the big leaves above our heads, and we splashed each other in one of the deeper pools of the stream before heading to the beach.

We had already brought sand castle building materials with us and had gotten really good at constructing grand fortresses; this time I tried to create an elaborate moat and drawbridge. We rolled around in the sand, washed ourselves off as we swam in the ocean, and did some boogie boarding, too! As the sun started to go down, we swam over to her island to start the fire and watch the sunset, while I rubbed her shoulders. The fish and chips meal was delicious, and the s'mores we had at dusk were the best I've had in my life; being with April probably had something to do with it. As night fell, we snapped a few shots of the meteor shower, and spent a few minutes making out.

I should mention that even though our relationship had become one of romance out of a strong friendship, we had discussed numerous times our commitment to abstaining from sex until marriage. We both were aroused every now and then in each other's company, mostly when we were in the valley and at the beach, but we made no big deal out of it, knowing it would happen but knowing, too, that the arousal would pass just as quickly. What mattered so much more was just treasuring the time we got to spend together, completely free from the hubbub of the real world and in our most natural state - naked!

And so, after one last, long kiss, April's face hardly an inch away from mine, I gently whispered to April that we should probably be getting back to our “library” date. She agreed, and we doused the fire before standing up to look at the moon, and then hugged each other tightly. With April's head resting gently on my shoulder, we teleported back to school, completely unprepared for what awaited us inside the storage area.

Chapter 18

We should have known our secret forays couldn't rely on the same hiding place at school for so long. Thinking back, we probably tread on our luck too much, because although it might have been safe to teleport from our storage area to enjoy a lazy afternoon in paradise during study periods at the library or to watch a glorious sunrise or sunset there during the afternoon break, we should have known better than to assume no one would need to access the storage area after classes ended for the day.

Thank goodness there was very little space in there (it probably couldn't even be considered a tiny closet) because we knew it would have been downright shell-shocking for a custodian to be inside that storage area when we rematerialized there. Still, we were panicking almost instantly upon our return; someone had clearly been accessing materials inside, and must have spotted the duffel bag a while ago, because it was now gone from where we had left it, which apparently was not hidden enough.

We later learned that whoever found it was scared that it might be concealing a bomb, and that after the remaining people in the school were evacuated, a bomb squad had investigated the bag, quickly learning it only contained two full sets of clothes that obviously belonged to a young man and woman. And of course anyone who might come across a hidden stash of clothes like this would instantly assume there was a pair of teenagers somewhere nearby, presumably naked and engaging in inappropriate behavior.

We were still lucky in one aspect - no one had really been terribly attentive to our initial presence in the group of people who were still in the building after the last bell rung, so no one was looking for us before or after the evacuation. Still, several questions were flying through my thoughts, as I'm sure they were through April's, since we didn't yet know what had happened: Where were our clothes? Would anyone try to figure out whose clothes they were? What should we do next?

“April, what are we going to do?” I whispered urgently, almost breathlessly. She looked at me and made a shushing gesture. She closed her eyes, clearly thinking hard, then quickly took my hand. The next thing I knew, we were in someone's backyard, on the far side of a small playhouse for children, hidden from view of the house. I had no idea how far we were from the school. In the waning hours of daylight, I could still see that she was pale with fear. I'm sure I looked just about as scared myself.

“Where are we?” I whispered still, not wanting to draw any attention here, either.

“Abby Parker’s house. I brought us here because I thought she might be able to help us,” said April, looking off into space, obviously contemplating our next move.

“Look, April, it’s really interesting that you were able to move us between two places in the real world, but why did you bring us here? What could Abby do? How in the world could we explain to her what happened? Where we had been? How we managed to get all the way to her house without a car?” I was getting close to hysterics, but I knew I had to keep a lid on it.

“Well, for starters, she knows I can teleport.” I stared at her in disbelief. “But Gary,” she said, clearly sensing my fear, “she doesn't know you can do it, too.” I breathed a sigh of relief, and April went on with her idea. “Likewise I haven't told her about being able to teleport to a private world, where time passes differently and where I can change and expand it to my heart's content. She just thinks that I've been teleporting to the far side of the hill outside the public library, where you first tried to introduce me to nude recreation.”

She looked at me, drooping her shoulders and frowning. “Yes, Gary, I told her all about my exploration of social nude recreation and the hand you played in it. But she's okay with it. I mean she still thinks the idea of being naked around other people is weird, but she believed my story that I first learned how to teleport when I ran into the mist after arguing with my parents.

“The point I'm trying to make is that I think she might believe me if I said I had figured out how to bring you to the hill with me when I teleport, and that I wanted to watch the sunset with you.”

“And you can tell her we had hidden our clothes under the stairs and that when we got back, they were gone,” I said, catching on.

“Right,” she replied. “I’ll teleport into her bathroom – hopefully she won’t be there – and then I’ll see if she’s in her room and wait for her if she isn’t. Oh, and just in case you were wondering, I do know for a fact that she’s home; she told me she wasn’t planning on going out because she has a big project due tomorrow.

“Anyway, I’ll work things out with Abby and borrow some of her clothes, and hopefully convince her to grab some of her older brother’s clothes for you. She can make up some excuse about needing to go out on an errand, bring the clothes to her car, and pick us up at the end of her driveway after I come back for you.” April exhaled slowly. “Hopefully everything will go off without a hitch. Losing our clothes at school was surprise enough!”

“You said it!” I smiled weakly. Then I added, “And hey, your plan sounds really good. I’m glad to have such a smart girlfriend.”

She blushed; it was the first time one of us had mentioned the boyfriend/girlfriend term. “Thanks, Gary,” she said, about as red as a tomato. Then she gave me a quick kiss and disappeared.

Chapter 19

Fortunately for us, everything did go according to plan, although Abby was switching between being speechless with me, probably because she’d seen me naked and was equally unsure how to grapple with the fact that April and I had been “nude stargazing”, and being overly talkative, even for her, with April. She told us about the bomb scare at school, which had already made the 5 o’clock news, which her parents called her downstairs to watch before she returned to her room and nearly screamed when April revealed herself. Needless to say, that news really threw April and me for a loop.

Abby asked a bunch of questions, and April did her best to be ambiguous when she could, to avoid piling more untruths onto the main lie. Thankfully many of her questions were related to the general experience of being naked outdoors and additionally with someone of the opposite sex. Of course, Abby was trying to tiptoe around the fact that she was really surprised (in the wink wink, nudge nudge sense) because she knew April and I were quite an item those days. April reassured her being nude with her boyfriend was just like being with him in clothes, except that being nude together actually felt a little more relaxed and not as hormonally charged.

When April referred to me as her boyfriend, Abby made a bunch of those gleeful sounds girls make when they’re excited about things they think are cute or romantic. I could tell just by how April spoke in response that she was blushing a bit, since it was getting pretty dusky outside and I couldn’t see April’s facial reactions that clearly from the backseat. When we got to the school parking lot, only a few cars were left, and we saw a group of people leaving from the entrance by the library that had to be the last group from inside, because as Abby cautiously drove by, she and I saw that one person was locking the doors.

“April, the building’s probably all locked up now,” said Abby with a bit of anxiousness in her voice. “What are you going to do?”

“Don’t get your undies in a bundle, Abby,” I said, startling her. “I’ll just pop into the hallway where my locker is and grab our stuff and then pop right back in here.”

“Wait, what?!” she exclaimed. April looked back at me with an expression on her face that said “Way to go, genius. Your secret’s out now!”

April quickly ended the immediate tension in the air, saying, “Abby, I’m sorry, but I wasn’t completely honest with you about the whole teleportation thing when I first told you. Gary can teleport, too.” She turned to me and said, “Gary, why don’t you go get our stuff and I’ll give Abby the quick version of the story.” She paused and then quickly asked Abby, “If that’s cool with you, I mean. We do need to be able to get into Gary’s car so he can take me home.”

Abby nodded, looking completely stunned. "Now, Abby," April said, "it might be less of a shock for you if you didn't actually watch Gary disappear. It is kind of spooky the first you see it happen." Abby nodded again and in the reflection of the rear view mirror I saw her firmly close her eyes. April turned back and gestured with her head for me to go. After I got back with our things and put Abby’s brother’s clothes back on (since I had to leave them in the car when I left), April explained that Abby would take her home. After she saw that I was the startled one then, she added the details. Abby, April and I would tell our parents that we ran into each other in town outside the coffee shop that was popular among the high schoolers, and that Abby offered to take April home for me since she lived much closer to her, so that April and I could get back to our parents faster and reassure them we were okay after the bomb scare. April and I agreed to say we couldn’t reach our parents on our cell phones right away because the networks were busy. It all made for a convincing story, in my opinion.

I knew, though, that the main reason behind the girls’ idea was so that April could tell Abby the long version of the teleportation story. And at that point, I knew I should just let April do all the explaining, since she was much closer to Abby than I was. She could fill me in on what exactly she had told Abby when we met for lunch the next day.

After Abby drove us over to my car and we got out, I kissed April and gave her a thank-you-so-much hug. She whispered, “You’re welcome, boyfriend.” We looked at each other, smiling, and parted when Abby called out from her car, “Okay, lovebirds, let’s get a move on!”

Chapter 20

The issue of the whereabouts of April’s duffel bag was a mystery for weeks after the event at school. Rumors flew around for a while about who the guilty party was, and somehow word had gotten out about the bag’s actual contents, but thanks to April’s and my library date alibi that no one could disprove (except Abby, who kept our secret safe), we were spared from suspicion. Everyone at school, including the administration, it seemed, agreed it would have been inappropriate to publicly seek out the offenders. There was a bulletin on the morning school report broadcast throughout the building on the following Monday that the bag and its contents had been taken away and that the administration was extremely disappointed by what had happened and expected something like this never to happen again, for there would be extreme consequences if it did.

April and I had dodged quite a big bullet, but now had to sort out how to handle Abby’s increased knowledge of April’s and my powerful ability. After many discussions, April and I agreed the best thing to do would simply be taking Abby to our private paradise, so she could fully understand why being able to teleport was so special for us, and why it was imperative that it remain a secret. It took plenty of attempts on April’s part to convince Abby of the idea, and interestingly enough, Abby warmed up to the idea a lot more after she herself tried nude stargazing with April one warm and beautiful night in late March.

Then, as April’s namesake month rolled around, April’s mom and my mom went to the campground so Mrs. Collins could use her voucher for the free massage and spa treatment. Apparently when she remarked to my mom that she thought the campground was going to be a lot more rustic, my mom replied that “We’re resort-y enough to have a spa and a lot of other nice amenities; everyone just lovingly refers to it as a campground because it’s got such a strong family atmosphere.” Mrs. Collins thoroughly enjoyed the experience, even staying nude after the massage, taking in the other facilities and spending some relaxing moments swimming nude in the pool, and she wasn’t the only Collins family member who had a change of heart that day.

See, my dad had arranged to go golfing with April’s dad on the same day that the ladies went to the spa. "After all," my dad had explained to try to convince Mr. Collins, “why should our wives get to have all the fun?” My dad later told me that he and the pastor talked a lot about the possibility of April visiting the campground over the summer, as well as our relationship in general. Apparently my dad had put in a lot of good words for me, and I was very grateful for that. They also lightly discussed the possibly that the tenets of Christianity could coexist with many of those found in nudism or naturism, agreeing to meet at the Springfield Country Club several times more in the coming weeks to delve more deeply into the Scriptures and plethora of research studies.

And so, our families, now quite established in peace, met for dinners and fun outings, and finally set up dates (yes, more than one!) for April to spend time with me and my family at the campground. Mrs. Collins came with April the first time (and actually went nude the whole time she was there), just to have that parental accompanying presence, but quickly sensed April’s desire for some distance from her mom, just as all young adults do, especially when it comes to spending time with their significant others. My parents reassured Mrs. Collins that they’d keep an eye on us, as would many of the other campground regulars.

* * *

May came and went, and April and I finished with good grades at the end of June, and with our college applications well under way, we were most glad of the summer break and ecstatic we could be together at the campground several times during the vacation. My family and April’s met at the Collins’ place for a Fourth of July cookout and then watched from their backyard as the family that owned the nearby pasture set off a great fireworks display. As the evening finally wound down, April grabbed her towel, sunscreen, and sunglasses and left with my family, all of us looking forward to a wonderful week at the campground. She and I were overjoyed, and did our best to rein in our emotions. Sam was a bit jealous that April was getting to spend so much time at the campground, but his summer was pretty jam-packed with sports and camps and, unfortunately for him, a summer school class, too. His parents suggested he could visit the campground at the end of the break, provided the class went well, and he grudgingly accepted this proposal.

On the car ride that night, April and I tried to brainstorm how we might work to get Abby interested in visiting the campground, and how to help her convince her parents, too. After all, Abby had mentioned being interested in going to the valley with April, since she was such a big fan of beaches, so she could experience nude recreation in the great outdoors. Maybe once she went to the valley she would be more interested in trying out the social aspect of nude recreation by visiting the campground.

However, it was during this car ride along the country roads that things really got complicated for April and me. All I remembered, days later, was cresting the top of a hill on one stretch of road that’s more or less a straight shot for several miles and seeing a car flying up the hill, coming right at us, apparently trying to pass a slower moving tractor-trailer going the opposite direction, and completely ignorant of the fact that it was attempting this pass in a no-passing zone. I saw my life flash before my eyes, made a wish, and then everything went black.

To be continued...