Strelnikov
4th Level Red Feather
- Joined
- May 7, 2001
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by Strelnikov
Copyright 2007 by the author
Author’s Note: This story is a sequel to “Old Custom”.
http://www.ticklingforum.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=48161
***1***
The last guests in the dining hall had cleared out an hour ago, and the kitchen cleanup was just about finished. Meghan Williams checked her watch – 1:30 PM. She scanned the kitchen again and signaled to her co-worker Meredith McKay. Meghan and Meredith had kitchen cleanup detail today – they had come in at 11:30 AM.
It was another normal Sunday at Lakeshore Lodge, a small family resort on the south end of Sparrow Lake in the Muskoka region of Ontario. The staff was small too, just eight college-age girls. The place catered mainly to budget-conscious families with children. It was run on the so-called American Plan, with housekeeping and all meals provided as part of the package – that meant that the moms got a vacation too. It was a mom-n-pop operation; the proprietors, Bob and Sue McKenzie, were the third generation of owners, taking over after Bob’s parents retired.
Bob McKenzie ran the food service – he was a balding middle-aged guy whose impressive bay window suggested that he liked his own cooking just a bit too much. He had four staff members to help him in the kitchen – the girls were also the waitresses during the meals. The girls worked with their hair done up in pony tails, in jeans, sneakers, aprons and pale blue t-shirts. The shirts were printed in dark blue with a stylized Canada goose and Lakeshore Lodge – the staff uniform, such as it was. There had been regular uniforms in Bob’s father’s time, but profit margins were too thin now to allow such niceties.
This was Meghan’s first summer on the staff at Lakeshore Lodge – she had started just last week. She was slender, a little taller than medium height, with shoulder-length wavy dark brown hair, gray eyes, and the sort of fair skin that freckles on the way to a suntan. She was a work in progress, pretty enough but no great beauty. In a few more years, she would be absolutely stunning. Meredith was 19 yrs old – this was the second summer here. She was a petite girl with a cute shape, a summer tan, bright blue eyes, silky shoulder-length blonde hair, and the wholesome good looks that one associates with “farmer’s daughter”.
Tammy Reid and Andrea Turner had come on at 10:30 to help Bob with the cooking and to set up the dining room for the guests’ noon lunch. The guests normally thinned out to a few stragglers by 12:30, so the girls on the early shift were through until it was time to start the dinner preparations.
Bob looked up at the wall clock in the kitchen. “OK, girls,” he said. “We’re through for now. See you at 5:30.”
Meghan tossed her soiled apron into the laundry bin by the kitchen door. “OK, Bob,” she said. She looked outside. “Doesen’t look like the rain’s gonna let up anytime soon,” she said to Meredith. “Looks like we’re gonna have to amuse ourselves indoors.”
“Maybe tickle Ashley,” Meredith said, grinning. “She’s got such a pretty laugh,” she said as she took off her apron.
“Ashley’s off today, remember?” Meghan said. “Holly too.” Sundays were easy days for the staff, just one day into the new week, so two of them could take the day off. The girls had an off-day rotation schedule so that everybody got a chance at the more desireable off days.
“Oh, you’re right,” Meredith said. “Well, there’s always somebody around here who needs tickling. I’ll make do.”
Tickling was a staff tradition at Lakeshore Lodge – it had started the first summer the place was open, back in 1946. Every year since then, the returning employees had initiated the new kids. For most, it was something fun to do in their off time. Ashley loved to be tickled, and the others were always happy to oblige – they enjoyed making their friend laugh her head off. Some of them, like Meredith, became... enthusiasts.
But Meghan still had mixed feelings about it. Her older brother Adam tickled her feet until she was raving, did it often, and had for years. She had hated it, which of course just encouraged him, and she had never seen the attraction in making another girl scream like a howler monkey. She had joined in to fit in, and found that tickling could be fun, but she wasn’t very good at it. She still didn’t much like being tickled. She got a rush off it – endorphins released by the laughing – but while it was happening, it drove her crazy.
The two girls left by the back kitchen door and headed to the staff bunkhouse behind the lodge, hurrying a little in the drizzling rain. Like all other buildings on the site, the bunkhouse – fondly known as “The Swamp” by its residents, for reasons lost in the mists of time – was a white clapboard structure with a red shingle roof. The ridgeline ran east-and-west, perpendicular to the shoreline. On the south side was a screened-in porch, a necessity for evening comfort due to the region’s notoriously ravenous mosquitos.
Andrea and Tammy were chatting on the porch, sitting side by side in two of the stackable white plastic armchairs when the other girls entered. Andrea was a pretty girl about medium height, with nice curves, wavy shoulder-length brown hair, brown eyes, and a touch of olive in her complexion. Tammy was the same physical type as Meredith but a little taller, Celtic-looking with fair skin, long dark brown hair, dark brows and lashes, green eyes, a girl-next-door face and a cheerful smile. Like Meredith, both of them were 19, and here for their second summer. They had changed into shorts after they finished work. Their bare feet were propped up on the seats of facing chairs.
Meredith quickly reached down and tickled their feet. Both girls squealed and jumped.
Tammy rolled her eyes. “You’re gonna kill us all, Meredith,” she said.
“She’s a regular tickle monster,” Andrea said. “And I thought my sister was bad!” Andrea’s sister Melissa had discovered years ago that tickling was an ideal chastisement for her pesky little sister – it left no marks, and nobody took it serious. But that also made it the ideal way for Andrea to get even with her bossy older sister. Melissa and Andrea had been tickling each other for years.
“You’re both bad,” Meredith said. “The original sadistic siblings. There were times last summer, I thought you were gonna tickle me to death!”
“We didn’t tickle you any more than anybody else,” Andrea protested. “Still don’t. Mostly we tickle each other.” She grinned. “But we really enjoy tickling you – great laugh, great reactions, and you can’t control it at all.”
Meredith turned to Meghan. “I had to learn Advanced Tickling, and learn fast,” she said. “Just so I could get even.”
“Well, you learned, right enough,” Tammy said. “And not just for revenge either, or you wouldn’t do it so much.” Meredith loved to tickle – she was the most fiendish of them all. She had the nack for it, and could get the most amazing and enjoyable reactions. She made every one of her co-workers laugh hard, and laugh often. All of them agreed that a good tickling from Meredith was an experience to be remembered.
“Everybody needs a hobby,” Meredith said. “Anybody want to watch a movie?”
Meredith and Meghan kicked off their shoes, and all four girls went inside. The residents of The Swamp left their shoes in cubbies outside on the porch to minimize the amount of dirt they tracked in. Or at any rate, that was the reason they gave if anyone asked.
The floor was bare planks, polished smooth by 60 years of sweeping and mopping. The joists and rafters were uncovered, exposing the inside of the plywood wall sheathing and roof. Along the north wall, aligned with the windows, were four double bunks, with two footlockers at the end of each and free-standing wall lockers against the walls in between. On the south side, just inside the door, was a wall mounted telephone next to a whiteboard for messages, and a small wooden table with four bent-cane chairs. The west end of the room had two bathrooms, with a washer, dryer and linen cabinet filling the space between the doors. The east end of the building, closest to the lake, was furnished with a mock-Turkish rug and a battered sofa with four matching arm chairs, rust-speckled chrome tubing and upholstered in green vinyl. Between the windows on that end was an entertainment center: TV, VCR, DVD, and a boom box stereo.
They shuffled through their collection of DVDs, but none of them held much appeal – they had all seen every movie more than once. Meghan gave up and walked to her locker to change clothes.
Tammy flopped down on her bunk – she had the bottom space, second from the bathrooms. “What a crummy day!” she said. “I think I’ll take a nap. Somebody wake me up in about an hour.”
Meredith changed too, and got a book out of her footlocker – a generic romance, something to occupy her time without requiring any thought. She sat in one of the armchairs to read. Andrea had a needlepoint project going – she took another chair and got to work. Meghan found a deck of cards and laid out a solitaire game on the table.
The rain picked up a little, the sound of it falling on the roof got louder. Meredith and Andrea were still occupied, Tammy was breathing softly on her bunk, fast asleep. The solitaire game hadn’t worked out – Meghan scooped up the cards, shuffled and started over.
The second game didn’t work out either, or the third. Meghan yawned and stretched. She checked her watch – almost 2:30. Melanie and Melissa ought to be finished with the housekeeping pretty soon.
Melissa was the first to arrive – she nodded to the others and changed into shorts. She was two years older than her sister, a little taller, but there was a strong family resemblance. Both girls had the same build, coloring and features – even their tickle laughs sounded similar. Melanie Laurier was right behind. She was the other new kid, 18 yrs old, an attractive brunette with a few lighter highlights in her curly hair, a great figure, bright hazel eyes, long dark lashes and a deep summer tan. She had grown up bilingual in a Québéc border town – she sounded like a New Englander, not a Canadian, because she had learned English at her Yankee mother’s knee.
“Lively group, eh?” Melissa remarked.
“Got that right,” Melanie replied. “I’m getting sleepy just looking at ‘em.”
“Tammy’s asleep,” Meghan explained.
Melissa checked Tammy out, flat on her back on her bunk. “Are you gonna let her saw logs all afternoon?” she asked.
“Not if you have a better idea,” Andrea said cheerfully.
Melissa grinned. “As a matter of fact, I do,” she said. “How d’you want to do it?”
Andrea went out onto the porch and returned with a coil of clothesline. “Let’s use this,” she said.
Meghan scooped her cards into a pile and drifted over to watch. This was the real reason for the barefoot rule – it made tickle attacks a lot easier.
Andrea made a loop and slip knot in one end of the rope. She took a turn of rope around the steel tube frame that supported the upper bunk over Tammy and pulled the loop downward, giving herself plenty of slack. Melissa positioned herself next to Tammy’s ankles – suddenly she grabbed both ankles and lifted up. Andrea slipped the loop over Tammy’s ankles, then grabbed the other end of the rope and pulled hard. Melissa kept her hold and pulled too, shifting Tammy toward the end of the bunk. Tammy ended up with her feet up, ankles roped together and against the underside of the frame.
“Wha– ” Tammy started. “OH NOOO!” she wailed, wide awake now. “NOT THAT!”
Andrea knotted the rope around the support. “Save your breath,” she said.
“You’re gonna need it,” Melissa added. She tied Tammy’s big toes together with string.
“OK, you got me,” Tammy said glumly. “Get it over with. Hehe! HAHAHA! HAHAHA-HAHAHA-HAHAHAHAHA!”
Melissa had the right foot – she scratched between Tammy’s toes, tickling between each pair, getting a wild burst of ticklish laughter each time. Andrea had the left – she held Tammy’s toes back and tickled the soft skin underneath, then the stretched out soles. Tammy arched her back and laughed her head off.
Andrea released the toes and covered the arch and heel with tickling nail flicks. Melissa drew triangles, squares and other tickling shapes on the arch and heel, then counter-rotating circles with a single nail each. Tammy laughed like a madwoman, tears of laughter running down her cheeks. Andrea held back Tammy’s toes again and tickled side to side on the stretched out sole, paying special attention to the crease in the middle. Melissa tickled a sole again, two handed – Tammy’s toes twitched and curled as she laughed and laughed.
“That looks like fun,” Meredith said. “Save some of that for me, eh?” Meghan glanced around – the others were watching the fun too. Melanie was on her right, Meredith was behind and slightly left.
Melissa looked over at Meredith. “Find your own,” she said. She speeded up, tickling Tammy’s sole mercilessly. Andrea tickled in the back of Tammy’s arch and onto the heel, getting great reactions and stream after stream of helpless laughter. Neither tickler missed a stroke – Tammy’s face turned red as she laughed at the top of her lungs.
Suddenly Meredith grabbed Meghan from behind – her ankles were hooked out from under her, and down she went. She ended up on her tummy on the floor, with a weight on her hips. Hands grabbed her ankles and pulled – she was trapped in the figure-four leg lock, upturned feet perfectly positioned for tickling.
“Hey! Get off!” Meghan yelled, trying to buck her attacker off.
“Nope, Melissa’s right, I need to find my own ticklee,” Meredith said from her straddle position, raising her voice over the sound of Tammy’s laughter. “Time for you to laugh!” She got down to business, guitar-chording both of Meghan’s heels.
“HAHAHAHA! HAHA-HAHAHA!” Meghan laughed, squirming and struggling. Meredith drew circles on both heels – Meghan’s laughter went up a notch. She traced circles in Meghan’s arches – Meghan laughed like mad, tears of laughter running down her cheeks. Meredith worked her way up both arches, then scratched a sole in the exact center, along the crease. Meredith switched to the other sole crease, tickling with a single nail. Meghan laughed helplessly, squirming and struggling – she knew what was coming next.
Meredith flicked her well-manicured nails on the balls of Meghan’s feet, just behind the big toes – Meghan arched her back and laughed at the top of her lungs. Gratified by the response, Meredith gave Meghan a good two minutes of tickle torture, getting great reactions and a flood of laughter.
A short break, just enough to catch her breath – Tammy wasn’t laughing any more, the sisters must have finished with her. But Meredith was far from finished – she held Meghan’s toes back and scratched lightly under them, tickling the soft skin, and Meghan laughed with wild abandon. Meredith released the toes and tickled both soles two-handed, watching the toes twitch and curl, then down the arches to the ticklish heels. Meghan bucked and squirmed and laughed her head off. Her feet were sensitized by the tickling – she didn’t have a sweet spot any more, so everything Meredith did drove her wild.
Meredith tickled Meghan’s heels and arches, getting great reactions and wave after wave of helpless laughter. She tickled up the arches to the soles, making the toes twitch again, then held the toes back and tickled the stretched out soles. Meghan laughed and laughed, musically, helplessly, face red, tears streaming – she was losing it, right on the edge. Meredith shifted one hand under the right toes, the other to the left heel, and countermarched both hands, tickling from toes to heels and back. Then holding Meghan’s toes back again, Meredith attacked the balls of Meghan’s feet, tickling mercilessly. Meghan laughed herself breathless.
“Good one!” Andrea said – she recognized art when she saw it.
“It was OK,” Melissa allowed. “But we could do better. Right, Tammy?”
Meghan gasped for air and blinked away tears. Just OK? It had tickled horribly – even Adam couldn’t have done any better, she thought indignantly.
“You really think so?” Meredith demanded. “Watch this!” She gave Meghan’s soles another flurry of nail flicks, enjoying Meghan’s sudden wild burst of laughter.
“Let her go, Meredith – she’s had enough,” Melanie said.
Meredith quit and dismounted. Meghan giggled weakly, rolled onto her back and took a long shaky breath. “That tickled... so much... ” she gasped out. “I’ll get you... for this... ” But Meghan knew that the threat wouldn’t dissuade Meredith, or anybody else for that matter. It’s hard to get even when your technique sucks, she thought.
The other girls were going on like the tickle fest was nothing out of the ordinary – and it wasn’t, Meghan realized. They kidded Tammy, critiqued the tickling techniques, exchanged good-natured threats of more to come. Melanie gave Meghan a hand up and looked her over. “You OK?” she asked.
Meghan winced – her abs were pretty sore from laughing. “I’ll live,” she said.
“You’re pretty new at this, Meghan,” Melanie said. “And you seem to be above-average ticklish too. Is it getting to you?”
“Don’t worry about me, Melanie,” Meghan said. “I’m used to it – my brother tickles me all the time.”
“Yah, mine too,” Melanie said. The sky was lighter – maybe the rain was finished for a while. A ray of sunlight broke through the clouds, reflecting off the wet grass. “Looks like it’s clearing off,” she observed.
Meghan checked her watch – 2:55 PM. “Let’s see if anybody wants to go swimming.”
The girls changed into their bikinis, gathered up their towels and stepped into their flip-flops. They stopped at the kitchen to get trash bags – the guests were pretty good about not trashing the place, but the little kids sometimes forgot. Then down the gravel driveway past the south end of the lodge. A broad avenue was cut into the woods to the right, perpendicular to the drive. Another clapboard building stood there – “Oriole”, looking like the Bates Motel, a prime example of 1950’s motel architecture. Its long side backed up against the woods on the west.
They continued across a gravel road to the beach. On the right was a playground with swings, monkey bars and so forth, and past that the white clapboard boathouse, its ridgeline parallel to the beach. Beyond the boathouse, bordering the beach on the south, was a patch of scrub willow. The boat dock was on the south end of the beach. They were lucky, or the mom-guests had been vigilant – all they found was a few discarded soft-drink cans near the boat house.
The sun was out in full force by then. The guests were coming out to the beach, kids and their moms mostly, the women probably relieved not to be cooped up indoors with bored, whiny kids. The girls left the beach and walked north past the Lodge along the graveled road. On the left, separated from the Lodge by a rocky outcrop, was a big two-story frame building with a covered porch all the way across the front – “Alouette”, sixteen guest rooms. A little further along was a similar two-story building, smaller than Alouette – this was “Bobolink”. Across the track from Bobolink, near the lake shore, was a building the size of a walk-in closet – the well house. Past that to the north were two double cabins, looking like something out of a 1930’s tourist court – “Chickadee” and “Goldfinch”. Beyond the cabins was a tall hedge, with a gap closed by a gate. The track continued through the gate to Bob and Sue’s house a little further north.
The shore here was lined with silver birch trees and armored against winter ice with suitcase-sized gray stone rip-rap. They approached the shore near the well house – at this point, someone had laid three of the stones as steps and upended two others, one on either side. Twenty yards offshore was a huge granite boulder, mostly submerged, with a few water lilies on each end. The area above water was about 10 ft by 7 ft. This was where the staff went swimming – the beach was for the guests.
The girls kicked off their flip-flops and went down the steps. There was a narrow strip of sand at the bottom, thin over the granite bedrock that formed this part of the lake bottom. The water was shallow, no more than 4 ft deep at the shore side of the boulder and a foot or two deeper on the other side. They splashed around in the lake, enjoying the summer day and the warm water.
Meghan and Andrea climbed out onto the rock after a while and laid down to get some sun. The warm sun made Meghan sleepy. She felt herself dozing off...
“Better give the spit a half-turn,” Melissa said.
Meghan rolled over and raised up on her elbows, rubbing sleep out of her eyes. It must be close to 4 PM, she thought. Melanie, Tammy, Melissa and Meredith were standing in the water on the shore side of the rock. She stood up and stretched, and the Devil bit her on the butt.
“Cannonball!” Meghan yelled.
SPLASH! She surfaced, grinning, and saw Andrea sitting upright, dripping wet. “You looked like you needed cooling off,” she said.
“You are so gonna get it!” Andrea said.
“You’ll have to catch me first!” Meghan replied, and splashed her. Andrea dived off the rock and gave chase. It took a while, but eventually Andrea managed to grab an ankle. Melissa grabbed the other, and they turned Meghan upside down and dunked her.
Meghan surfaced, blowing. “Good one!” she said. “I need a rest after that.” She swam over to the rock, climbed out, laid down on her back and closed her eyes. Andrea and Melissa joined her and stretched out too, with Meghan in the middle.
“This beats the hell out of an office job,” Melissa said on Meghan’s left.
“It’s nice here at the lake,” Meghan answered. “I always had to make do with a concrete beach at home – the town pool.” She paused, considering. “Kinda like this rock, but more crowded. In fact– OH SHIT!” she yelled. “HAHAHAHA-HAHAHA-HAHA-HAHAHAHA!”
She was on her back, feet up – Andrea had both of her ankles trapped in an arm lock, and stood over her tickling her feet with skill and enthusiasm. I let down my guard, Meghan thought as she laughed like a maniac, eyes closed, tears of laughter running down her cheeks. Stupid! She blinked away tears, still laughing like mad. Melissa sat up too, she saw – she got her feet under her and stood up.
Andrea’s tickling fingernails flicked and scratched the balls of both feet, forcing stream after stream of helpless laughter. She tickled in Meghan’s arches, drew circles and other tickling shapes on both heels, while Meghan laughed like a madwoman. Meghan wasn’t struggling – the tickling sensation had completely overpowered her.
Melissa padded over next to Andrea and grabbed one of Meghan’s ankles. Andrea shifted her grip, holding on to the other ankle, tickling the trapped foot mercilessly. Melissa added her tickling fingernails to the effort. Meghan’s feet were beyond ticklish now, all over – she laughed at the top of her lungs. Andrea stopped tickling, grabbed Meghan’s ankles with both hands and held them while Melissa got them in an arm lock of her own. Andrea gave Meghan one more burst of two-handed tickling, forcing another wave of helpless laughter, then left the tickling in the capable hands of her sister. Tag-team tickling, thought Meghan through a haze of tickle torture – I’ll have to remember that.
Melissa tickled Meghan’s heels, then up her arches to her soles – Meghan’s toes twitched and curled as she laughed and laughed. Melissa tickled side to side across both arches, tickling just behind the soles, and Meghan laughed with wild abandon. She worked her way down the arches, tickled them just in front of the heels and onto the heels behind, and Meghan laughed at the top of her lungs. Melissa speeded up, tickling fiendishly, and Meghan’s laughter went off the scale.
Good enough – Melissa quit and released her victim. Meghan laid there gasping and red-faced. “How was that, girlfriend?” Andrea asked.
“I’ll... get you... for this,” Meghan said breathlessly. She knew that the others would get her too, if she wasn’t careful… “Hehehe!” she giggled. She sat up in a hurry, pulled her feet back and doubled her legs under her.
Meredith grinned up at her from the water – she had made a sneak attack while Meghan was distracted. Meghan felt fingernails flick her upturned sole, giggled again and rounded on the new attacker – Tammy had come around behind her and repeated Meredith’s tickle attack.
“It’s about time for us to go back to work, Tammy,” Andrea said, interrupting the tickle play.
Melissa checked her shoulders. “I’ve gotten enough sun,” she said. “I think I’ll go too.”
“Meghan and I have kitchen cleanup,” Meredith said. “We’ve got a little more time.”
The others left. Meredith and Melanie stayed in the water, but Meghan had had enough swimming. The season was in full swing – there was plenty of boat and ski-doo traffic, enough to raise a chop on the lake. She sat on the lake side of the boulder, feet dangling in the water, watching the activity and enjoying the day.
“Eep! Hehehe!” Meghan pulled her feet out of the water and backed away.
Meredith surfaced at the edge of the rock, grinning. “Gotcha again!” she said. “You should know better by now than to give me an opening,” she said. “C’mon, Meghan, time to go to work.”
Meredith and Meghan cut between Bobolink and the cabins to a graveled parking lot, then followed the graveled driveway across the back of the camp behind Alouette and the Lodge. They would come on duty just before dinner, wait tables, and then clean up afterward.
Meredith and Meghan went to work at 5:30, joining Andrea and Tammy, all four setting tables and helping with last minute dinner preparations under Bob’s direction. At 5:45, Bob flipped a switch in the kitchen – somewhere, a siren gave one long blast. Bob’s wife Sue came in to lend a hand – she was the general manager of the place, but in a small business like this one, everybody does what’s needful without worrying overmuch about job descriptions. She was in her mid-40’s like Bob, still trim, with brown eyes and a few streaks of gray in her brown hair.
Bob gave one more siren blast at 6 PM, and the guests started filing in. Waiting tables here wasn’t too difficult – this was a dining hall, not a restaurant. Everybody got the same meal, served family style. All the waitresses had to do was set out the serving bowls and platters, take drink orders, make sure the drinks stayed full, and bring dessert afterward. The fare was tasty but nothing fancy – among the guests were people who thought ketchup was just a tad too spicy.
Once the guests were served, the girls could eat their own dinners at a table in the kitchen. Bob and Sue joined them. The four waitresses checked the dining room in relays – there was always at least one of them in the dining room. They rotated every few minutes.
The guests were mostly finished and gone by 6:30. Meredith and Meghan stayed until 7:30, cleaning up. Finished, they tossed their aprons into the laundry bin and headed back toward The Swamp.
Melanie had guests – she was with them on the porch because The Swamp was a guy-free zone. Meghan and Meredith had already met them. Gordon McKenzie was Bob and Sue’s son – he was tanned and fit-looking, with brown hair and blue eyes. Melanie’s brother Marc was tanned even darker, athletic-looking, with hazel eyes and brown hair with a few lighter sun streaks. Both were 20 or so – they roomed together at college. They wore wife-beater shirts, cargo shorts and ratty sneakers – the barefoot rule didn’t apply to guys. They both worked at the Collishaw House – Gordon’s parents and the Collishaws had traded heirs for the summer.
Marc grinned and made tickling motions. “Melanie tells me Meghan decided to get with the program. Are you turning into a tickler like her?” Like his sister, he sounded like a New Englander.
“Not really,” Meghan said. “Mostly, they tickle me.”
“Broke her in Saturday,” Meredith said, grinning. “She’s got such a pretty tickle laugh – you ought to try her.”
“It’s not so bad,” Meghan said. “I’m used to it.”
“Yah, I know all about your sadistic sibling,” Gordon said. His mom and Meghan’s had worked here together years ago, and had stayed in touch – Meghan had gotten this job through the most basic form of networking.
“You don’t know the half of it,” Meghan said. “Oh well – it was good basic training for working here, eh?”
“That’s the spirit!” Marc said. “And you got off easy compared to Melanie. Our cousins... ”
“Ashley, Stacy and Shelly Haviland,” Melanie interrupted. “The Terrible Trio. All older than me. They used to tickle me ‘til I didn’t know my own name.”
“You got good enough to pay ‘em back with interest, sis,” Marc said. “Especially Ashley. She’s the oldest – the bossy one,” he explained to Meghan and Meredith. “But tickle her and she’s helpless.”
“I had to do the same after I came here last summer,” Meredith said. “Otherwise, they would’ve tickled me to death.”
“Like you do to us,” Meghan said.
The screen door opened. “Do what to us?” Ashley asked.
Ashley Collishaw and Holly Nicholson were back from their day off. Both were local – Ashley’s family owned the Collishaw House Resort across the lake, and Holly had been her best friend since the Third Grade. Ashley was 20, a pretty girl with straight light brown hair in a pony tail, blue eyes, a cute shape and a summer tan. Holly was Ashley’s age – she was another cutie, not quite medium height, fit and trim looking, with curly shoulder-length brown hair, blue eyes and flawless fair skin.
“Three guesses,” Gordon said. And the first two don’t count, thought Meghan. Ashley loved to be tickled, and Gordon was always more than happy to oblige. They had been friends and tickle buddies for years.
“Won’t have to guess if I go inside,” Ashley said. “I’ll know.” She kicked off her shoes into her cubby and went inside to change.
“Well, so much for that,” Gordon said. “How about you, Holly? Gonna join us?”
Dumb question, thought Meghan. Holly had the hots for him – it was obvious to anybody but a guy.
“Thought you’d never ask,” Holly said. She dragged up a chair, put her feet in Gordon’s lap and crossed her ankles. “How about a foot rub?”
Uh-oh, thought Meghan. Surely Holly knew that this was asking for it!
“One fingernail at a time?” Gordon asked, confirming Meghan’s suspicions. He rested one hand on the crossed ankles and gently tickled the soft soles with the other. Holly started giggling softly, a cheerful girlish sound, but she didn’t pull away.
“Private party, or can anyone join?” Meredith asked.
“Hahaha! Don’t you– haha! –ever– hehehe! –get enough?” Holly asked and giggled. “AH-HAHA! Go tickle– heha-hehe! –Ashley– hehehe!”
That was clear enough. Meghan and Meredith excused themselves, kicked off their shoes into their cubbies and went inside to change. Ashley and the others were kidding around – she hadn’t wasted any time. She insulted everybody outrageously and tickled every upturned sole she saw. Pretty soon, the “outraged” girls would gang up on her and “punish” her, which was the whole idea behind their little game.
Meghan changed into shorts and went back out onto the porch – she wasn’t all that interested in playing. Holly was still giggling, sometimes with solid laughter mixed in when Gordon got on an especially ticklish spot.
Meghan sat down. “That would drive me crazy,” she said.
“Haheha! It’s not– HAHA! –so bad– hehe-hehe!” Holly said and giggled and laughed. “I can– hahaha! –go like– hehe-AHAHA! –this for– haha! –hours– hahaha!”
Another one like Ashley? “So how did you meet Holly?” Meghan asked Gordon.
“We’ve known each other since we were kids, just like Ashley,” Gordon said. He tickled a little faster – another sudden burst of laughter escaped Holly’s lips. He eased off, and Holly dropped back to giggles again. “Ashley’s my tickle buddy, but it’s nice to have some variety, eh?”
“Is she enjoying that, or just putting up with it?” Meghan asked.
“She’s not complaining,” he said. He tightened his grip on the uppermost ankle and guitar-chorded Holly’s sole. Holly threw back her head and laughed like mad, her fair skin turning pink. “Having fun?” he asked, flicking his nails in her arch. Holly nodded her head – she was laughing much too hard to speak. “Want me to stop?” he asked, tickling the back of the arch and onto the heel. Her tickle laugh was a musical contralto – she laughed harder, and this time, she shook her head.
Gordon eased off – back to giggles again. “Too hard to talk with all that racket,” he said. Was it possible to look indignant while giggling? Somehow Holly managed it.
“Interested in going to a party Saturday night?” Melanie asked. “Andy Franusz called and invited all of us.”
“Yah, we’re invited too,” Marc said. “Should be fun – I imagine it’ll be pretty big.”
“Hehe! Couldn’t– haha! –keep me– hehehe! –away– WAH-HAHA!” Holly got out. She squirmed a little. “Sta– haha! –ap! HAHAHA! Gotta pee– hehehe!”
Gordon quit, and considerately rubbed Holly’s soles to get the tickle off. “There’s your foot rub,” he said. “We need to get back to Collishaw House, Marc – 5 AM comes awful early.”
Holly wiped away tears. “That really got the blood flowing,” she said.
“Were you really enjoying that?” Meghan asked. “It would’ve drove me crazy.”
“Used to drive me crazy too,” Holly said. “But I really like him, and... well, you know.” She stood up. “I really do need a bathroom,” she said. “Anyway, it depends on who’s doing it. It’s fun with Gordon, or with Ashley. Everybody else, it’s an excuse to get even, and that’s not so bad either, eh?”
All three girls went inside, and were greeted with a sudden wave of laughter. The game was progressing nicely. Ashley had sneaked up on Melissa, sitting in an armchair with one leg crossed over the other. She had grabbed the dangling foot – she covered it with tickling nail flicks. Melissa laughed like mad, struggling to pull loose. Holly and Melanie headed for the bathrooms, but Meghan came over to watch. It wouldn’t be long now...
Holly came out of the bathroom and hand-signed something to Meredith – they took up positions on either side of the other bathroom door. Melanie came out, and let out a startled yelp as Holly and Meredith bushwhacked her and bulldogged her down to the floor.
Ashley stopped tickling Melissa and let go. She saw the look on Meghan’s face. “Stay out of it, Meghan,” she advised.
Melanie is my friend, Meghan thought – I should help her, at least even up the odds. She moved toward the struggling girls – Ashley grabbed her from behind.
“I told you to stay out of it,” Ashley said. “Game’s over, everybody!” she called out. “It’s my turn to do some tickling, and I’m gonna tickle ‘em both. Melissa, help me tie Meghan up. Holly and Meredith, bring Melanie over here. We’ll do a chair tie. Andrea, set ‘em up – you know the drill.”
Holly was sitting on Melanie. Meredith leaned over. “Gonna behave?” she asked.
“Yah, you got me,” Melanie said in a resigned tone. Meghan didn’t struggle either – she was had either way, and she knew from long experience that there was no sense starting off tired.
“Good thinking,” Holly said. “Let’s go.”
Andrea set the straight chairs up in side-by-side facing pairs next to the table. Meghan and Melanie ended up side by side, hands tied behind their backs, bound to the chairs around their waists and shoulders. Their ankles were tied together, feet through the open backs of the facing chairs, ankles tied off to the canes above. Andrea and Melissa tied their big toes together with string. Ashley fetched a canvas tote from her footlocker and spread the contents on the floor near the girls’ bound feet. She dragged the footlocker over and sat.
Andrea and Melissa dragged up another footlocker and sat down. “I’m not sure how you’re gonna work this, but I’m sure it’ll be worth watching,” Andrea said.
Holly approached the two ticklees. She gave both girls’ feet a quick tickle, and was rewarded with a stereo giggle. “Meghan deserves this anyway – teach her not to interfere.”
“My thought exactly,” Ashley said. She picked up a paint brush in each hand from the pile at her feet. “Now then – how long do you think I should tickle you?”
“Five minutes?” Meghan said hopefully.
“Nah, I was thinking 10.”
“But shouldn’t you deduct 5 minutes because you’re doubling up?” Melanie asked.
Ashley laughed. “Nice try. OK, 10 minus 5 is 5. But just for that, I’ll multiply times 5. That makes it 25 minutes.”
“Oh NOOO!” Meghan wailed. “I’m too ticklish! I couldn’t stand 25 minutes!”
“Should have thought of that before you tried to weasel out,” Ashley said. She gently brushed Meghan’s soles, then Melanie’s – side to side, then up and down. Both girls started giggling, a steady stream of girlish giggles.
Ashley started brushing in circles. The girls lost it – they laughed like maniacs in two-part harmony, tears of laughter rolling down their cheeks.
Ashley was an artist with the brushes. Meghan and Melanie laughed and laughed as she flicked them back and forth across their toes and soles, up and down from toes to heels and back again, then figure eight's on both pairs of feet. Ashley started brushing in big circles covering both feet, and that was the worst, because once on every circle it got THE SPOT – the balls of Meghan’s feet, just behind the big toes, and the soft skin under Melanie’s toes. Every time the brushes flicked the sweet spots, Ashley gave them a few extra quick strokes, and their laughter went off the chart. Both girls laughed their heads off, red-faced, streams of laughter pouring out of them.
“Wow! I didn’t know you were this good,” Meredith said, grinning. “Can I be your disciple?”
Ashley grinned back at Meredith. “Kind of a role reversal, eh? Sure, why not?” she said, and concentrated her efforts on THE SPOT, on both pairs of feet. The tickling bristles flicked their soles, side to side, up and down. Melanie and Meghan threw back their heads and howled with forced mirth. They were past being able to struggle, unable to resist the fiendish tickling or even form a coherent thought. Their toes twitched and curled as they laughed and laughed.
Ashley stopped and checked her victims out – she seemed a little disappointed in what she saw. “I need a break,” she said.
“YOU need a break!” Meghan gasped.
“If you’ve got breath enough to complain, you’ve got breath enough to laugh,” Holly said. “Move over, Ashley.”
“Hey, I helped you catch Melanie,” Meredith said. “How about some tickle time?”
“Be my guest,” Ashley said, and stood up.
Holly sat facing Meghan’s trapped feet, Meredith selected Melanie. Tammy dragged up another foot locker. “Dibs on Melanie’s right foot,” she said. She flicked her manicured nails up and down Melanie’s right sole, along the crease.
“Hehehe! No– haha! –more!” Melanie begged and giggled. “HAHAHA-HAHAHA-HAHAHAHA!” Meredith joined in, and Melanie’s laughter went up a notch.
“Meghan, don’t think I’ve forgotten about you,” said Holly. “Hey, does this tickle?” She zig-zagged a single nail down the right sole crease and circled it in the arch just behind.
“Eep!” Meghan squealed. “WAH-HAHAHAHAHA! AH-HAHA-HAHAHA!” It tickled horribly, much worse than before – every square inch was a sweet spot now.
Holly held back Meghan’s toes and tickled side to side across the stretched out soles, over and over. Tammy and Meredith did the same to Melanie – their tickling fingernails flicked and scratched, covering both feet with unbearable tickling. Both ticklees laughed like madwomen, their stereo laughter filling the room.
Holly flicked her nails on Meghan’s heels, then tickled two-handed up the arches to the soles. She spread Meghan’s toes apart two by two, tickling between each pair. Meghan laughed her head off, tears of laughter running down her face. Holly held Meghan’s toes back and scrabbled her nails on the soft skin underneath, then across both soles, side to side and back again. Then two fingernails, drawing circles around and onto the balls of both feet – Meghan laughed at the top of her lungs.
Holly backed off a little – she didn’t want to tickle Meghan out too soon. Meghan blinked away tears and looked at her friend, laughing madly beside her. Melanie’s eyes were closed, tears running down her cheeks as she laughed and laughed – Tammy and Meredith were really giving her the treatment! But Holly dug in again, and Meghan howled with forced mirth.
Holly tickled Meghan’s arches and heels until Meghan thought she would go mad. Then holding back Meghan’s toes, Holly spider walked her nails along the crease in the exact center of the right sole – four fingernail strokes in succession, three times a second. Meghan laughed helplessly as Holly tickled across the balls of both feet to the left sole, flicking and scratching. She released the toes and tickled two-handed in the middle of Meghan’s soles – Meghan went crazy, bucking and squirming, laughing her head off.
“Breather – thirty seconds,” Ashley said, and mercifully the tickling stopped. “Hanging in there?” she asked.
Meghan sat there gasping, trying to get her breathing and heart rate normal again. “Oh Ghod!” she said. Beside her, Melanie took long deep breaths. She was in no real distress – she’s got lots more endurance than I do, Meghan thought.
“Anybody gonna use the rest of that stuff?” Melissa asked.
Tammy grinned. “Just getting to it. Hey Holly, let’s trade. C’mon, Meredith.”
“Nah, I got her earlier,” Meredith said, flexing her fingers. “Help yourself.”
“Watch this!” Holly said. She picked up a hair brush, the sort with round plastic knobs on the bristle ends, and scrubbed Melanie’s soles. Melanie laughed at the top of her lungs, helpless to resist the well-techniqued tickling.
“Not bad, eh?” Tammy said, raising her voice over the ticklish laughter. “But I bet this’ll do even better.” She picked up an electric tooth brush.
“Hey!” Meghan said. “Is that my tooth brush?”
“Nope, belongs to The Swamp,” Tammy said. It was an old one, Meghan saw now – it could even date back to her mother’s time here. Tammy flicked it on – it buzzed menacingly.
“NOOOO!” Meghan wailed. “HAHAHA-HAHAHA-HAHA-HAHAHA!”
“Ooh! That really, really tickles!” Andrea said. “My sister tickles me like that. Go easy!”
“It won’t hurt her,” Tammy said, and ran the bristles up and down the crease in the middle of Meghan’s left sole. Beside her, Holly was hairbrush-tickling Melanie’s heels. Meghan and Melanie laughed their heads off, tears of laughter running down their cheeks.
Tammy made sideways figure-eight’s on the balls of Meghan’s feet, covering every square inch of ticklish flesh with unbearable tickling. She ran the brush between the toes, tickling between each pair – Meghan let out a wild burst of helpless laughter each time. Tammy tickled her way down the right sole crease to the arch, zig-zagged to the heel and circled the brush on the heel – Meghan was losing it, she couldn’t take much more. But Tammy backed off a little, and kept her laughing until she thought she would go crazy.
Holly gave up her place to Melissa and Andrea – poor Melanie laughed with wild abandon as they covered her soles with fiendish and well-techniqued tickling. But Meghan had problems of her own – Tammy looped the brush onto her left heel and zig-zagged upward, tickling horribly. Meghan laughed at the top of her lungs as Tammy’s tickling brush glided up the middle of the right sole crease, then side to side under the toes.
Now both feet were being tickled – Meghan blinked away tears, laughing madly, and saw Ashley leaning over Tammy’s shoulder. Ashley was using her nails, flicking the ticklish skin. Ashley said something to Tammy, who slid to one side and stood up. Ashley stepped over, took the vacated seat and kept on tickling, two-handed now in both arches. She never missed a stroke. Neither did the sisters – they were using the paint brushes now, Meghan saw. Melanie’s laughter had an edge of desperation, she was very near the limit of her endurance.
Meghan was well past hers, but her ticklish torment wasn’t over yet. Ashley held back her toes – Meghan laughed and laughed as Ashley tickled under all ten toes, then back across the stretched out soles. Ashley kept it up, tickling mercilessly, spider-walking her nails from the soles into the arches behind. She tickled the left sole crease, then the right, forcing a solid stream of wild helpless laughter. Finally, mercifully, she finished Meghan off, nail tips flying on the balls of both feet, and tickled her breath away.
“Good one!” Tammy said. Meghan gasped for breath, looking around through a haze of tears. Melanie laughed with wild abandon – Andrea and Melissa were still tickling her.
“I bet that really tickled,” Holly said sympathetically. She had gotten her share of attention from Ashley over the years, and knew all about it from the inside.
“You have... a real talent... for understatement,” Meghan said breathlessly. She took a deep breath. “You’re a fiend, Ashley!”
“I do my poor best,” Ashley said, all false humility. She raised her voice. “Finish Melanie off, you two,” she called out to the sisters.
“Party pooper!” Melissa called back. “Oh, all right. Both hands, sis!” They speeded up, and Melanie’s laughter went off the charts. It was more than she could endure – she laughed herself breathless.
“You’re game, I’ll give you that,” Ashley said as she untied Meghan. “Still doing OK?”
Meghan winced as she put her feet down – her abs were pretty sore. “Could be worse,” she said. She rubbed her wrists and took stock of herself. “Has been worse, a few times. Right now, I feel pumped, believe it or not.” She belched – she had swallowed a lot of air. “Must be all that aerobic exercise.”
Again Ashley looked her over. “Glad I could help,” she said. “Maybe now you’ll be motivated to return the favor, eh?”
Meghan showered and changed into her nightgown. By the time she finished, it was time for lights out. That suited Meghan fine – the glow had faded, and she was exhausted. She climbed up into her bunk and curled up under her blankets. Sleep came immediately – it was like being hit on the head with a rock.
Copyright 2007 by the author
Author’s Note: This story is a sequel to “Old Custom”.
http://www.ticklingforum.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=48161
***1***
The last guests in the dining hall had cleared out an hour ago, and the kitchen cleanup was just about finished. Meghan Williams checked her watch – 1:30 PM. She scanned the kitchen again and signaled to her co-worker Meredith McKay. Meghan and Meredith had kitchen cleanup detail today – they had come in at 11:30 AM.
It was another normal Sunday at Lakeshore Lodge, a small family resort on the south end of Sparrow Lake in the Muskoka region of Ontario. The staff was small too, just eight college-age girls. The place catered mainly to budget-conscious families with children. It was run on the so-called American Plan, with housekeeping and all meals provided as part of the package – that meant that the moms got a vacation too. It was a mom-n-pop operation; the proprietors, Bob and Sue McKenzie, were the third generation of owners, taking over after Bob’s parents retired.
Bob McKenzie ran the food service – he was a balding middle-aged guy whose impressive bay window suggested that he liked his own cooking just a bit too much. He had four staff members to help him in the kitchen – the girls were also the waitresses during the meals. The girls worked with their hair done up in pony tails, in jeans, sneakers, aprons and pale blue t-shirts. The shirts were printed in dark blue with a stylized Canada goose and Lakeshore Lodge – the staff uniform, such as it was. There had been regular uniforms in Bob’s father’s time, but profit margins were too thin now to allow such niceties.
This was Meghan’s first summer on the staff at Lakeshore Lodge – she had started just last week. She was slender, a little taller than medium height, with shoulder-length wavy dark brown hair, gray eyes, and the sort of fair skin that freckles on the way to a suntan. She was a work in progress, pretty enough but no great beauty. In a few more years, she would be absolutely stunning. Meredith was 19 yrs old – this was the second summer here. She was a petite girl with a cute shape, a summer tan, bright blue eyes, silky shoulder-length blonde hair, and the wholesome good looks that one associates with “farmer’s daughter”.
Tammy Reid and Andrea Turner had come on at 10:30 to help Bob with the cooking and to set up the dining room for the guests’ noon lunch. The guests normally thinned out to a few stragglers by 12:30, so the girls on the early shift were through until it was time to start the dinner preparations.
Bob looked up at the wall clock in the kitchen. “OK, girls,” he said. “We’re through for now. See you at 5:30.”
Meghan tossed her soiled apron into the laundry bin by the kitchen door. “OK, Bob,” she said. She looked outside. “Doesen’t look like the rain’s gonna let up anytime soon,” she said to Meredith. “Looks like we’re gonna have to amuse ourselves indoors.”
“Maybe tickle Ashley,” Meredith said, grinning. “She’s got such a pretty laugh,” she said as she took off her apron.
“Ashley’s off today, remember?” Meghan said. “Holly too.” Sundays were easy days for the staff, just one day into the new week, so two of them could take the day off. The girls had an off-day rotation schedule so that everybody got a chance at the more desireable off days.
“Oh, you’re right,” Meredith said. “Well, there’s always somebody around here who needs tickling. I’ll make do.”
Tickling was a staff tradition at Lakeshore Lodge – it had started the first summer the place was open, back in 1946. Every year since then, the returning employees had initiated the new kids. For most, it was something fun to do in their off time. Ashley loved to be tickled, and the others were always happy to oblige – they enjoyed making their friend laugh her head off. Some of them, like Meredith, became... enthusiasts.
But Meghan still had mixed feelings about it. Her older brother Adam tickled her feet until she was raving, did it often, and had for years. She had hated it, which of course just encouraged him, and she had never seen the attraction in making another girl scream like a howler monkey. She had joined in to fit in, and found that tickling could be fun, but she wasn’t very good at it. She still didn’t much like being tickled. She got a rush off it – endorphins released by the laughing – but while it was happening, it drove her crazy.
The two girls left by the back kitchen door and headed to the staff bunkhouse behind the lodge, hurrying a little in the drizzling rain. Like all other buildings on the site, the bunkhouse – fondly known as “The Swamp” by its residents, for reasons lost in the mists of time – was a white clapboard structure with a red shingle roof. The ridgeline ran east-and-west, perpendicular to the shoreline. On the south side was a screened-in porch, a necessity for evening comfort due to the region’s notoriously ravenous mosquitos.
Andrea and Tammy were chatting on the porch, sitting side by side in two of the stackable white plastic armchairs when the other girls entered. Andrea was a pretty girl about medium height, with nice curves, wavy shoulder-length brown hair, brown eyes, and a touch of olive in her complexion. Tammy was the same physical type as Meredith but a little taller, Celtic-looking with fair skin, long dark brown hair, dark brows and lashes, green eyes, a girl-next-door face and a cheerful smile. Like Meredith, both of them were 19, and here for their second summer. They had changed into shorts after they finished work. Their bare feet were propped up on the seats of facing chairs.
Meredith quickly reached down and tickled their feet. Both girls squealed and jumped.
Tammy rolled her eyes. “You’re gonna kill us all, Meredith,” she said.
“She’s a regular tickle monster,” Andrea said. “And I thought my sister was bad!” Andrea’s sister Melissa had discovered years ago that tickling was an ideal chastisement for her pesky little sister – it left no marks, and nobody took it serious. But that also made it the ideal way for Andrea to get even with her bossy older sister. Melissa and Andrea had been tickling each other for years.
“You’re both bad,” Meredith said. “The original sadistic siblings. There were times last summer, I thought you were gonna tickle me to death!”
“We didn’t tickle you any more than anybody else,” Andrea protested. “Still don’t. Mostly we tickle each other.” She grinned. “But we really enjoy tickling you – great laugh, great reactions, and you can’t control it at all.”
Meredith turned to Meghan. “I had to learn Advanced Tickling, and learn fast,” she said. “Just so I could get even.”
“Well, you learned, right enough,” Tammy said. “And not just for revenge either, or you wouldn’t do it so much.” Meredith loved to tickle – she was the most fiendish of them all. She had the nack for it, and could get the most amazing and enjoyable reactions. She made every one of her co-workers laugh hard, and laugh often. All of them agreed that a good tickling from Meredith was an experience to be remembered.
“Everybody needs a hobby,” Meredith said. “Anybody want to watch a movie?”
Meredith and Meghan kicked off their shoes, and all four girls went inside. The residents of The Swamp left their shoes in cubbies outside on the porch to minimize the amount of dirt they tracked in. Or at any rate, that was the reason they gave if anyone asked.
The floor was bare planks, polished smooth by 60 years of sweeping and mopping. The joists and rafters were uncovered, exposing the inside of the plywood wall sheathing and roof. Along the north wall, aligned with the windows, were four double bunks, with two footlockers at the end of each and free-standing wall lockers against the walls in between. On the south side, just inside the door, was a wall mounted telephone next to a whiteboard for messages, and a small wooden table with four bent-cane chairs. The west end of the room had two bathrooms, with a washer, dryer and linen cabinet filling the space between the doors. The east end of the building, closest to the lake, was furnished with a mock-Turkish rug and a battered sofa with four matching arm chairs, rust-speckled chrome tubing and upholstered in green vinyl. Between the windows on that end was an entertainment center: TV, VCR, DVD, and a boom box stereo.
They shuffled through their collection of DVDs, but none of them held much appeal – they had all seen every movie more than once. Meghan gave up and walked to her locker to change clothes.
Tammy flopped down on her bunk – she had the bottom space, second from the bathrooms. “What a crummy day!” she said. “I think I’ll take a nap. Somebody wake me up in about an hour.”
Meredith changed too, and got a book out of her footlocker – a generic romance, something to occupy her time without requiring any thought. She sat in one of the armchairs to read. Andrea had a needlepoint project going – she took another chair and got to work. Meghan found a deck of cards and laid out a solitaire game on the table.
The rain picked up a little, the sound of it falling on the roof got louder. Meredith and Andrea were still occupied, Tammy was breathing softly on her bunk, fast asleep. The solitaire game hadn’t worked out – Meghan scooped up the cards, shuffled and started over.
The second game didn’t work out either, or the third. Meghan yawned and stretched. She checked her watch – almost 2:30. Melanie and Melissa ought to be finished with the housekeeping pretty soon.
Melissa was the first to arrive – she nodded to the others and changed into shorts. She was two years older than her sister, a little taller, but there was a strong family resemblance. Both girls had the same build, coloring and features – even their tickle laughs sounded similar. Melanie Laurier was right behind. She was the other new kid, 18 yrs old, an attractive brunette with a few lighter highlights in her curly hair, a great figure, bright hazel eyes, long dark lashes and a deep summer tan. She had grown up bilingual in a Québéc border town – she sounded like a New Englander, not a Canadian, because she had learned English at her Yankee mother’s knee.
“Lively group, eh?” Melissa remarked.
“Got that right,” Melanie replied. “I’m getting sleepy just looking at ‘em.”
“Tammy’s asleep,” Meghan explained.
Melissa checked Tammy out, flat on her back on her bunk. “Are you gonna let her saw logs all afternoon?” she asked.
“Not if you have a better idea,” Andrea said cheerfully.
Melissa grinned. “As a matter of fact, I do,” she said. “How d’you want to do it?”
Andrea went out onto the porch and returned with a coil of clothesline. “Let’s use this,” she said.
Meghan scooped her cards into a pile and drifted over to watch. This was the real reason for the barefoot rule – it made tickle attacks a lot easier.
Andrea made a loop and slip knot in one end of the rope. She took a turn of rope around the steel tube frame that supported the upper bunk over Tammy and pulled the loop downward, giving herself plenty of slack. Melissa positioned herself next to Tammy’s ankles – suddenly she grabbed both ankles and lifted up. Andrea slipped the loop over Tammy’s ankles, then grabbed the other end of the rope and pulled hard. Melissa kept her hold and pulled too, shifting Tammy toward the end of the bunk. Tammy ended up with her feet up, ankles roped together and against the underside of the frame.
“Wha– ” Tammy started. “OH NOOO!” she wailed, wide awake now. “NOT THAT!”
Andrea knotted the rope around the support. “Save your breath,” she said.
“You’re gonna need it,” Melissa added. She tied Tammy’s big toes together with string.
“OK, you got me,” Tammy said glumly. “Get it over with. Hehe! HAHAHA! HAHAHA-HAHAHA-HAHAHAHAHA!”
Melissa had the right foot – she scratched between Tammy’s toes, tickling between each pair, getting a wild burst of ticklish laughter each time. Andrea had the left – she held Tammy’s toes back and tickled the soft skin underneath, then the stretched out soles. Tammy arched her back and laughed her head off.
Andrea released the toes and covered the arch and heel with tickling nail flicks. Melissa drew triangles, squares and other tickling shapes on the arch and heel, then counter-rotating circles with a single nail each. Tammy laughed like a madwoman, tears of laughter running down her cheeks. Andrea held back Tammy’s toes again and tickled side to side on the stretched out sole, paying special attention to the crease in the middle. Melissa tickled a sole again, two handed – Tammy’s toes twitched and curled as she laughed and laughed.
“That looks like fun,” Meredith said. “Save some of that for me, eh?” Meghan glanced around – the others were watching the fun too. Melanie was on her right, Meredith was behind and slightly left.
Melissa looked over at Meredith. “Find your own,” she said. She speeded up, tickling Tammy’s sole mercilessly. Andrea tickled in the back of Tammy’s arch and onto the heel, getting great reactions and stream after stream of helpless laughter. Neither tickler missed a stroke – Tammy’s face turned red as she laughed at the top of her lungs.
Suddenly Meredith grabbed Meghan from behind – her ankles were hooked out from under her, and down she went. She ended up on her tummy on the floor, with a weight on her hips. Hands grabbed her ankles and pulled – she was trapped in the figure-four leg lock, upturned feet perfectly positioned for tickling.
“Hey! Get off!” Meghan yelled, trying to buck her attacker off.
“Nope, Melissa’s right, I need to find my own ticklee,” Meredith said from her straddle position, raising her voice over the sound of Tammy’s laughter. “Time for you to laugh!” She got down to business, guitar-chording both of Meghan’s heels.
“HAHAHAHA! HAHA-HAHAHA!” Meghan laughed, squirming and struggling. Meredith drew circles on both heels – Meghan’s laughter went up a notch. She traced circles in Meghan’s arches – Meghan laughed like mad, tears of laughter running down her cheeks. Meredith worked her way up both arches, then scratched a sole in the exact center, along the crease. Meredith switched to the other sole crease, tickling with a single nail. Meghan laughed helplessly, squirming and struggling – she knew what was coming next.
Meredith flicked her well-manicured nails on the balls of Meghan’s feet, just behind the big toes – Meghan arched her back and laughed at the top of her lungs. Gratified by the response, Meredith gave Meghan a good two minutes of tickle torture, getting great reactions and a flood of laughter.
A short break, just enough to catch her breath – Tammy wasn’t laughing any more, the sisters must have finished with her. But Meredith was far from finished – she held Meghan’s toes back and scratched lightly under them, tickling the soft skin, and Meghan laughed with wild abandon. Meredith released the toes and tickled both soles two-handed, watching the toes twitch and curl, then down the arches to the ticklish heels. Meghan bucked and squirmed and laughed her head off. Her feet were sensitized by the tickling – she didn’t have a sweet spot any more, so everything Meredith did drove her wild.
Meredith tickled Meghan’s heels and arches, getting great reactions and wave after wave of helpless laughter. She tickled up the arches to the soles, making the toes twitch again, then held the toes back and tickled the stretched out soles. Meghan laughed and laughed, musically, helplessly, face red, tears streaming – she was losing it, right on the edge. Meredith shifted one hand under the right toes, the other to the left heel, and countermarched both hands, tickling from toes to heels and back. Then holding Meghan’s toes back again, Meredith attacked the balls of Meghan’s feet, tickling mercilessly. Meghan laughed herself breathless.
“Good one!” Andrea said – she recognized art when she saw it.
“It was OK,” Melissa allowed. “But we could do better. Right, Tammy?”
Meghan gasped for air and blinked away tears. Just OK? It had tickled horribly – even Adam couldn’t have done any better, she thought indignantly.
“You really think so?” Meredith demanded. “Watch this!” She gave Meghan’s soles another flurry of nail flicks, enjoying Meghan’s sudden wild burst of laughter.
“Let her go, Meredith – she’s had enough,” Melanie said.
Meredith quit and dismounted. Meghan giggled weakly, rolled onto her back and took a long shaky breath. “That tickled... so much... ” she gasped out. “I’ll get you... for this... ” But Meghan knew that the threat wouldn’t dissuade Meredith, or anybody else for that matter. It’s hard to get even when your technique sucks, she thought.
The other girls were going on like the tickle fest was nothing out of the ordinary – and it wasn’t, Meghan realized. They kidded Tammy, critiqued the tickling techniques, exchanged good-natured threats of more to come. Melanie gave Meghan a hand up and looked her over. “You OK?” she asked.
Meghan winced – her abs were pretty sore from laughing. “I’ll live,” she said.
“You’re pretty new at this, Meghan,” Melanie said. “And you seem to be above-average ticklish too. Is it getting to you?”
“Don’t worry about me, Melanie,” Meghan said. “I’m used to it – my brother tickles me all the time.”
“Yah, mine too,” Melanie said. The sky was lighter – maybe the rain was finished for a while. A ray of sunlight broke through the clouds, reflecting off the wet grass. “Looks like it’s clearing off,” she observed.
Meghan checked her watch – 2:55 PM. “Let’s see if anybody wants to go swimming.”
The girls changed into their bikinis, gathered up their towels and stepped into their flip-flops. They stopped at the kitchen to get trash bags – the guests were pretty good about not trashing the place, but the little kids sometimes forgot. Then down the gravel driveway past the south end of the lodge. A broad avenue was cut into the woods to the right, perpendicular to the drive. Another clapboard building stood there – “Oriole”, looking like the Bates Motel, a prime example of 1950’s motel architecture. Its long side backed up against the woods on the west.
They continued across a gravel road to the beach. On the right was a playground with swings, monkey bars and so forth, and past that the white clapboard boathouse, its ridgeline parallel to the beach. Beyond the boathouse, bordering the beach on the south, was a patch of scrub willow. The boat dock was on the south end of the beach. They were lucky, or the mom-guests had been vigilant – all they found was a few discarded soft-drink cans near the boat house.
The sun was out in full force by then. The guests were coming out to the beach, kids and their moms mostly, the women probably relieved not to be cooped up indoors with bored, whiny kids. The girls left the beach and walked north past the Lodge along the graveled road. On the left, separated from the Lodge by a rocky outcrop, was a big two-story frame building with a covered porch all the way across the front – “Alouette”, sixteen guest rooms. A little further along was a similar two-story building, smaller than Alouette – this was “Bobolink”. Across the track from Bobolink, near the lake shore, was a building the size of a walk-in closet – the well house. Past that to the north were two double cabins, looking like something out of a 1930’s tourist court – “Chickadee” and “Goldfinch”. Beyond the cabins was a tall hedge, with a gap closed by a gate. The track continued through the gate to Bob and Sue’s house a little further north.
The shore here was lined with silver birch trees and armored against winter ice with suitcase-sized gray stone rip-rap. They approached the shore near the well house – at this point, someone had laid three of the stones as steps and upended two others, one on either side. Twenty yards offshore was a huge granite boulder, mostly submerged, with a few water lilies on each end. The area above water was about 10 ft by 7 ft. This was where the staff went swimming – the beach was for the guests.
The girls kicked off their flip-flops and went down the steps. There was a narrow strip of sand at the bottom, thin over the granite bedrock that formed this part of the lake bottom. The water was shallow, no more than 4 ft deep at the shore side of the boulder and a foot or two deeper on the other side. They splashed around in the lake, enjoying the summer day and the warm water.
Meghan and Andrea climbed out onto the rock after a while and laid down to get some sun. The warm sun made Meghan sleepy. She felt herself dozing off...
“Better give the spit a half-turn,” Melissa said.
Meghan rolled over and raised up on her elbows, rubbing sleep out of her eyes. It must be close to 4 PM, she thought. Melanie, Tammy, Melissa and Meredith were standing in the water on the shore side of the rock. She stood up and stretched, and the Devil bit her on the butt.
“Cannonball!” Meghan yelled.
SPLASH! She surfaced, grinning, and saw Andrea sitting upright, dripping wet. “You looked like you needed cooling off,” she said.
“You are so gonna get it!” Andrea said.
“You’ll have to catch me first!” Meghan replied, and splashed her. Andrea dived off the rock and gave chase. It took a while, but eventually Andrea managed to grab an ankle. Melissa grabbed the other, and they turned Meghan upside down and dunked her.
Meghan surfaced, blowing. “Good one!” she said. “I need a rest after that.” She swam over to the rock, climbed out, laid down on her back and closed her eyes. Andrea and Melissa joined her and stretched out too, with Meghan in the middle.
“This beats the hell out of an office job,” Melissa said on Meghan’s left.
“It’s nice here at the lake,” Meghan answered. “I always had to make do with a concrete beach at home – the town pool.” She paused, considering. “Kinda like this rock, but more crowded. In fact– OH SHIT!” she yelled. “HAHAHAHA-HAHAHA-HAHA-HAHAHAHA!”
She was on her back, feet up – Andrea had both of her ankles trapped in an arm lock, and stood over her tickling her feet with skill and enthusiasm. I let down my guard, Meghan thought as she laughed like a maniac, eyes closed, tears of laughter running down her cheeks. Stupid! She blinked away tears, still laughing like mad. Melissa sat up too, she saw – she got her feet under her and stood up.
Andrea’s tickling fingernails flicked and scratched the balls of both feet, forcing stream after stream of helpless laughter. She tickled in Meghan’s arches, drew circles and other tickling shapes on both heels, while Meghan laughed like a madwoman. Meghan wasn’t struggling – the tickling sensation had completely overpowered her.
Melissa padded over next to Andrea and grabbed one of Meghan’s ankles. Andrea shifted her grip, holding on to the other ankle, tickling the trapped foot mercilessly. Melissa added her tickling fingernails to the effort. Meghan’s feet were beyond ticklish now, all over – she laughed at the top of her lungs. Andrea stopped tickling, grabbed Meghan’s ankles with both hands and held them while Melissa got them in an arm lock of her own. Andrea gave Meghan one more burst of two-handed tickling, forcing another wave of helpless laughter, then left the tickling in the capable hands of her sister. Tag-team tickling, thought Meghan through a haze of tickle torture – I’ll have to remember that.
Melissa tickled Meghan’s heels, then up her arches to her soles – Meghan’s toes twitched and curled as she laughed and laughed. Melissa tickled side to side across both arches, tickling just behind the soles, and Meghan laughed with wild abandon. She worked her way down the arches, tickled them just in front of the heels and onto the heels behind, and Meghan laughed at the top of her lungs. Melissa speeded up, tickling fiendishly, and Meghan’s laughter went off the scale.
Good enough – Melissa quit and released her victim. Meghan laid there gasping and red-faced. “How was that, girlfriend?” Andrea asked.
“I’ll... get you... for this,” Meghan said breathlessly. She knew that the others would get her too, if she wasn’t careful… “Hehehe!” she giggled. She sat up in a hurry, pulled her feet back and doubled her legs under her.
Meredith grinned up at her from the water – she had made a sneak attack while Meghan was distracted. Meghan felt fingernails flick her upturned sole, giggled again and rounded on the new attacker – Tammy had come around behind her and repeated Meredith’s tickle attack.
“It’s about time for us to go back to work, Tammy,” Andrea said, interrupting the tickle play.
Melissa checked her shoulders. “I’ve gotten enough sun,” she said. “I think I’ll go too.”
“Meghan and I have kitchen cleanup,” Meredith said. “We’ve got a little more time.”
The others left. Meredith and Melanie stayed in the water, but Meghan had had enough swimming. The season was in full swing – there was plenty of boat and ski-doo traffic, enough to raise a chop on the lake. She sat on the lake side of the boulder, feet dangling in the water, watching the activity and enjoying the day.
“Eep! Hehehe!” Meghan pulled her feet out of the water and backed away.
Meredith surfaced at the edge of the rock, grinning. “Gotcha again!” she said. “You should know better by now than to give me an opening,” she said. “C’mon, Meghan, time to go to work.”
Meredith and Meghan cut between Bobolink and the cabins to a graveled parking lot, then followed the graveled driveway across the back of the camp behind Alouette and the Lodge. They would come on duty just before dinner, wait tables, and then clean up afterward.
Meredith and Meghan went to work at 5:30, joining Andrea and Tammy, all four setting tables and helping with last minute dinner preparations under Bob’s direction. At 5:45, Bob flipped a switch in the kitchen – somewhere, a siren gave one long blast. Bob’s wife Sue came in to lend a hand – she was the general manager of the place, but in a small business like this one, everybody does what’s needful without worrying overmuch about job descriptions. She was in her mid-40’s like Bob, still trim, with brown eyes and a few streaks of gray in her brown hair.
Bob gave one more siren blast at 6 PM, and the guests started filing in. Waiting tables here wasn’t too difficult – this was a dining hall, not a restaurant. Everybody got the same meal, served family style. All the waitresses had to do was set out the serving bowls and platters, take drink orders, make sure the drinks stayed full, and bring dessert afterward. The fare was tasty but nothing fancy – among the guests were people who thought ketchup was just a tad too spicy.
Once the guests were served, the girls could eat their own dinners at a table in the kitchen. Bob and Sue joined them. The four waitresses checked the dining room in relays – there was always at least one of them in the dining room. They rotated every few minutes.
The guests were mostly finished and gone by 6:30. Meredith and Meghan stayed until 7:30, cleaning up. Finished, they tossed their aprons into the laundry bin and headed back toward The Swamp.
Melanie had guests – she was with them on the porch because The Swamp was a guy-free zone. Meghan and Meredith had already met them. Gordon McKenzie was Bob and Sue’s son – he was tanned and fit-looking, with brown hair and blue eyes. Melanie’s brother Marc was tanned even darker, athletic-looking, with hazel eyes and brown hair with a few lighter sun streaks. Both were 20 or so – they roomed together at college. They wore wife-beater shirts, cargo shorts and ratty sneakers – the barefoot rule didn’t apply to guys. They both worked at the Collishaw House – Gordon’s parents and the Collishaws had traded heirs for the summer.
Marc grinned and made tickling motions. “Melanie tells me Meghan decided to get with the program. Are you turning into a tickler like her?” Like his sister, he sounded like a New Englander.
“Not really,” Meghan said. “Mostly, they tickle me.”
“Broke her in Saturday,” Meredith said, grinning. “She’s got such a pretty tickle laugh – you ought to try her.”
“It’s not so bad,” Meghan said. “I’m used to it.”
“Yah, I know all about your sadistic sibling,” Gordon said. His mom and Meghan’s had worked here together years ago, and had stayed in touch – Meghan had gotten this job through the most basic form of networking.
“You don’t know the half of it,” Meghan said. “Oh well – it was good basic training for working here, eh?”
“That’s the spirit!” Marc said. “And you got off easy compared to Melanie. Our cousins... ”
“Ashley, Stacy and Shelly Haviland,” Melanie interrupted. “The Terrible Trio. All older than me. They used to tickle me ‘til I didn’t know my own name.”
“You got good enough to pay ‘em back with interest, sis,” Marc said. “Especially Ashley. She’s the oldest – the bossy one,” he explained to Meghan and Meredith. “But tickle her and she’s helpless.”
“I had to do the same after I came here last summer,” Meredith said. “Otherwise, they would’ve tickled me to death.”
“Like you do to us,” Meghan said.
The screen door opened. “Do what to us?” Ashley asked.
Ashley Collishaw and Holly Nicholson were back from their day off. Both were local – Ashley’s family owned the Collishaw House Resort across the lake, and Holly had been her best friend since the Third Grade. Ashley was 20, a pretty girl with straight light brown hair in a pony tail, blue eyes, a cute shape and a summer tan. Holly was Ashley’s age – she was another cutie, not quite medium height, fit and trim looking, with curly shoulder-length brown hair, blue eyes and flawless fair skin.
“Three guesses,” Gordon said. And the first two don’t count, thought Meghan. Ashley loved to be tickled, and Gordon was always more than happy to oblige. They had been friends and tickle buddies for years.
“Won’t have to guess if I go inside,” Ashley said. “I’ll know.” She kicked off her shoes into her cubby and went inside to change.
“Well, so much for that,” Gordon said. “How about you, Holly? Gonna join us?”
Dumb question, thought Meghan. Holly had the hots for him – it was obvious to anybody but a guy.
“Thought you’d never ask,” Holly said. She dragged up a chair, put her feet in Gordon’s lap and crossed her ankles. “How about a foot rub?”
Uh-oh, thought Meghan. Surely Holly knew that this was asking for it!
“One fingernail at a time?” Gordon asked, confirming Meghan’s suspicions. He rested one hand on the crossed ankles and gently tickled the soft soles with the other. Holly started giggling softly, a cheerful girlish sound, but she didn’t pull away.
“Private party, or can anyone join?” Meredith asked.
“Hahaha! Don’t you– haha! –ever– hehehe! –get enough?” Holly asked and giggled. “AH-HAHA! Go tickle– heha-hehe! –Ashley– hehehe!”
That was clear enough. Meghan and Meredith excused themselves, kicked off their shoes into their cubbies and went inside to change. Ashley and the others were kidding around – she hadn’t wasted any time. She insulted everybody outrageously and tickled every upturned sole she saw. Pretty soon, the “outraged” girls would gang up on her and “punish” her, which was the whole idea behind their little game.
Meghan changed into shorts and went back out onto the porch – she wasn’t all that interested in playing. Holly was still giggling, sometimes with solid laughter mixed in when Gordon got on an especially ticklish spot.
Meghan sat down. “That would drive me crazy,” she said.
“Haheha! It’s not– HAHA! –so bad– hehe-hehe!” Holly said and giggled and laughed. “I can– hahaha! –go like– hehe-AHAHA! –this for– haha! –hours– hahaha!”
Another one like Ashley? “So how did you meet Holly?” Meghan asked Gordon.
“We’ve known each other since we were kids, just like Ashley,” Gordon said. He tickled a little faster – another sudden burst of laughter escaped Holly’s lips. He eased off, and Holly dropped back to giggles again. “Ashley’s my tickle buddy, but it’s nice to have some variety, eh?”
“Is she enjoying that, or just putting up with it?” Meghan asked.
“She’s not complaining,” he said. He tightened his grip on the uppermost ankle and guitar-chorded Holly’s sole. Holly threw back her head and laughed like mad, her fair skin turning pink. “Having fun?” he asked, flicking his nails in her arch. Holly nodded her head – she was laughing much too hard to speak. “Want me to stop?” he asked, tickling the back of the arch and onto the heel. Her tickle laugh was a musical contralto – she laughed harder, and this time, she shook her head.
Gordon eased off – back to giggles again. “Too hard to talk with all that racket,” he said. Was it possible to look indignant while giggling? Somehow Holly managed it.
“Interested in going to a party Saturday night?” Melanie asked. “Andy Franusz called and invited all of us.”
“Yah, we’re invited too,” Marc said. “Should be fun – I imagine it’ll be pretty big.”
“Hehe! Couldn’t– haha! –keep me– hehehe! –away– WAH-HAHA!” Holly got out. She squirmed a little. “Sta– haha! –ap! HAHAHA! Gotta pee– hehehe!”
Gordon quit, and considerately rubbed Holly’s soles to get the tickle off. “There’s your foot rub,” he said. “We need to get back to Collishaw House, Marc – 5 AM comes awful early.”
Holly wiped away tears. “That really got the blood flowing,” she said.
“Were you really enjoying that?” Meghan asked. “It would’ve drove me crazy.”
“Used to drive me crazy too,” Holly said. “But I really like him, and... well, you know.” She stood up. “I really do need a bathroom,” she said. “Anyway, it depends on who’s doing it. It’s fun with Gordon, or with Ashley. Everybody else, it’s an excuse to get even, and that’s not so bad either, eh?”
All three girls went inside, and were greeted with a sudden wave of laughter. The game was progressing nicely. Ashley had sneaked up on Melissa, sitting in an armchair with one leg crossed over the other. She had grabbed the dangling foot – she covered it with tickling nail flicks. Melissa laughed like mad, struggling to pull loose. Holly and Melanie headed for the bathrooms, but Meghan came over to watch. It wouldn’t be long now...
Holly came out of the bathroom and hand-signed something to Meredith – they took up positions on either side of the other bathroom door. Melanie came out, and let out a startled yelp as Holly and Meredith bushwhacked her and bulldogged her down to the floor.
Ashley stopped tickling Melissa and let go. She saw the look on Meghan’s face. “Stay out of it, Meghan,” she advised.
Melanie is my friend, Meghan thought – I should help her, at least even up the odds. She moved toward the struggling girls – Ashley grabbed her from behind.
“I told you to stay out of it,” Ashley said. “Game’s over, everybody!” she called out. “It’s my turn to do some tickling, and I’m gonna tickle ‘em both. Melissa, help me tie Meghan up. Holly and Meredith, bring Melanie over here. We’ll do a chair tie. Andrea, set ‘em up – you know the drill.”
Holly was sitting on Melanie. Meredith leaned over. “Gonna behave?” she asked.
“Yah, you got me,” Melanie said in a resigned tone. Meghan didn’t struggle either – she was had either way, and she knew from long experience that there was no sense starting off tired.
“Good thinking,” Holly said. “Let’s go.”
Andrea set the straight chairs up in side-by-side facing pairs next to the table. Meghan and Melanie ended up side by side, hands tied behind their backs, bound to the chairs around their waists and shoulders. Their ankles were tied together, feet through the open backs of the facing chairs, ankles tied off to the canes above. Andrea and Melissa tied their big toes together with string. Ashley fetched a canvas tote from her footlocker and spread the contents on the floor near the girls’ bound feet. She dragged the footlocker over and sat.
Andrea and Melissa dragged up another footlocker and sat down. “I’m not sure how you’re gonna work this, but I’m sure it’ll be worth watching,” Andrea said.
Holly approached the two ticklees. She gave both girls’ feet a quick tickle, and was rewarded with a stereo giggle. “Meghan deserves this anyway – teach her not to interfere.”
“My thought exactly,” Ashley said. She picked up a paint brush in each hand from the pile at her feet. “Now then – how long do you think I should tickle you?”
“Five minutes?” Meghan said hopefully.
“Nah, I was thinking 10.”
“But shouldn’t you deduct 5 minutes because you’re doubling up?” Melanie asked.
Ashley laughed. “Nice try. OK, 10 minus 5 is 5. But just for that, I’ll multiply times 5. That makes it 25 minutes.”
“Oh NOOO!” Meghan wailed. “I’m too ticklish! I couldn’t stand 25 minutes!”
“Should have thought of that before you tried to weasel out,” Ashley said. She gently brushed Meghan’s soles, then Melanie’s – side to side, then up and down. Both girls started giggling, a steady stream of girlish giggles.
Ashley started brushing in circles. The girls lost it – they laughed like maniacs in two-part harmony, tears of laughter rolling down their cheeks.
Ashley was an artist with the brushes. Meghan and Melanie laughed and laughed as she flicked them back and forth across their toes and soles, up and down from toes to heels and back again, then figure eight's on both pairs of feet. Ashley started brushing in big circles covering both feet, and that was the worst, because once on every circle it got THE SPOT – the balls of Meghan’s feet, just behind the big toes, and the soft skin under Melanie’s toes. Every time the brushes flicked the sweet spots, Ashley gave them a few extra quick strokes, and their laughter went off the chart. Both girls laughed their heads off, red-faced, streams of laughter pouring out of them.
“Wow! I didn’t know you were this good,” Meredith said, grinning. “Can I be your disciple?”
Ashley grinned back at Meredith. “Kind of a role reversal, eh? Sure, why not?” she said, and concentrated her efforts on THE SPOT, on both pairs of feet. The tickling bristles flicked their soles, side to side, up and down. Melanie and Meghan threw back their heads and howled with forced mirth. They were past being able to struggle, unable to resist the fiendish tickling or even form a coherent thought. Their toes twitched and curled as they laughed and laughed.
Ashley stopped and checked her victims out – she seemed a little disappointed in what she saw. “I need a break,” she said.
“YOU need a break!” Meghan gasped.
“If you’ve got breath enough to complain, you’ve got breath enough to laugh,” Holly said. “Move over, Ashley.”
“Hey, I helped you catch Melanie,” Meredith said. “How about some tickle time?”
“Be my guest,” Ashley said, and stood up.
Holly sat facing Meghan’s trapped feet, Meredith selected Melanie. Tammy dragged up another foot locker. “Dibs on Melanie’s right foot,” she said. She flicked her manicured nails up and down Melanie’s right sole, along the crease.
“Hehehe! No– haha! –more!” Melanie begged and giggled. “HAHAHA-HAHAHA-HAHAHAHA!” Meredith joined in, and Melanie’s laughter went up a notch.
“Meghan, don’t think I’ve forgotten about you,” said Holly. “Hey, does this tickle?” She zig-zagged a single nail down the right sole crease and circled it in the arch just behind.
“Eep!” Meghan squealed. “WAH-HAHAHAHAHA! AH-HAHA-HAHAHA!” It tickled horribly, much worse than before – every square inch was a sweet spot now.
Holly held back Meghan’s toes and tickled side to side across the stretched out soles, over and over. Tammy and Meredith did the same to Melanie – their tickling fingernails flicked and scratched, covering both feet with unbearable tickling. Both ticklees laughed like madwomen, their stereo laughter filling the room.
Holly flicked her nails on Meghan’s heels, then tickled two-handed up the arches to the soles. She spread Meghan’s toes apart two by two, tickling between each pair. Meghan laughed her head off, tears of laughter running down her face. Holly held Meghan’s toes back and scrabbled her nails on the soft skin underneath, then across both soles, side to side and back again. Then two fingernails, drawing circles around and onto the balls of both feet – Meghan laughed at the top of her lungs.
Holly backed off a little – she didn’t want to tickle Meghan out too soon. Meghan blinked away tears and looked at her friend, laughing madly beside her. Melanie’s eyes were closed, tears running down her cheeks as she laughed and laughed – Tammy and Meredith were really giving her the treatment! But Holly dug in again, and Meghan howled with forced mirth.
Holly tickled Meghan’s arches and heels until Meghan thought she would go mad. Then holding back Meghan’s toes, Holly spider walked her nails along the crease in the exact center of the right sole – four fingernail strokes in succession, three times a second. Meghan laughed helplessly as Holly tickled across the balls of both feet to the left sole, flicking and scratching. She released the toes and tickled two-handed in the middle of Meghan’s soles – Meghan went crazy, bucking and squirming, laughing her head off.
“Breather – thirty seconds,” Ashley said, and mercifully the tickling stopped. “Hanging in there?” she asked.
Meghan sat there gasping, trying to get her breathing and heart rate normal again. “Oh Ghod!” she said. Beside her, Melanie took long deep breaths. She was in no real distress – she’s got lots more endurance than I do, Meghan thought.
“Anybody gonna use the rest of that stuff?” Melissa asked.
Tammy grinned. “Just getting to it. Hey Holly, let’s trade. C’mon, Meredith.”
“Nah, I got her earlier,” Meredith said, flexing her fingers. “Help yourself.”
“Watch this!” Holly said. She picked up a hair brush, the sort with round plastic knobs on the bristle ends, and scrubbed Melanie’s soles. Melanie laughed at the top of her lungs, helpless to resist the well-techniqued tickling.
“Not bad, eh?” Tammy said, raising her voice over the ticklish laughter. “But I bet this’ll do even better.” She picked up an electric tooth brush.
“Hey!” Meghan said. “Is that my tooth brush?”
“Nope, belongs to The Swamp,” Tammy said. It was an old one, Meghan saw now – it could even date back to her mother’s time here. Tammy flicked it on – it buzzed menacingly.
“NOOOO!” Meghan wailed. “HAHAHA-HAHAHA-HAHA-HAHAHA!”
“Ooh! That really, really tickles!” Andrea said. “My sister tickles me like that. Go easy!”
“It won’t hurt her,” Tammy said, and ran the bristles up and down the crease in the middle of Meghan’s left sole. Beside her, Holly was hairbrush-tickling Melanie’s heels. Meghan and Melanie laughed their heads off, tears of laughter running down their cheeks.
Tammy made sideways figure-eight’s on the balls of Meghan’s feet, covering every square inch of ticklish flesh with unbearable tickling. She ran the brush between the toes, tickling between each pair – Meghan let out a wild burst of helpless laughter each time. Tammy tickled her way down the right sole crease to the arch, zig-zagged to the heel and circled the brush on the heel – Meghan was losing it, she couldn’t take much more. But Tammy backed off a little, and kept her laughing until she thought she would go crazy.
Holly gave up her place to Melissa and Andrea – poor Melanie laughed with wild abandon as they covered her soles with fiendish and well-techniqued tickling. But Meghan had problems of her own – Tammy looped the brush onto her left heel and zig-zagged upward, tickling horribly. Meghan laughed at the top of her lungs as Tammy’s tickling brush glided up the middle of the right sole crease, then side to side under the toes.
Now both feet were being tickled – Meghan blinked away tears, laughing madly, and saw Ashley leaning over Tammy’s shoulder. Ashley was using her nails, flicking the ticklish skin. Ashley said something to Tammy, who slid to one side and stood up. Ashley stepped over, took the vacated seat and kept on tickling, two-handed now in both arches. She never missed a stroke. Neither did the sisters – they were using the paint brushes now, Meghan saw. Melanie’s laughter had an edge of desperation, she was very near the limit of her endurance.
Meghan was well past hers, but her ticklish torment wasn’t over yet. Ashley held back her toes – Meghan laughed and laughed as Ashley tickled under all ten toes, then back across the stretched out soles. Ashley kept it up, tickling mercilessly, spider-walking her nails from the soles into the arches behind. She tickled the left sole crease, then the right, forcing a solid stream of wild helpless laughter. Finally, mercifully, she finished Meghan off, nail tips flying on the balls of both feet, and tickled her breath away.
“Good one!” Tammy said. Meghan gasped for breath, looking around through a haze of tears. Melanie laughed with wild abandon – Andrea and Melissa were still tickling her.
“I bet that really tickled,” Holly said sympathetically. She had gotten her share of attention from Ashley over the years, and knew all about it from the inside.
“You have... a real talent... for understatement,” Meghan said breathlessly. She took a deep breath. “You’re a fiend, Ashley!”
“I do my poor best,” Ashley said, all false humility. She raised her voice. “Finish Melanie off, you two,” she called out to the sisters.
“Party pooper!” Melissa called back. “Oh, all right. Both hands, sis!” They speeded up, and Melanie’s laughter went off the charts. It was more than she could endure – she laughed herself breathless.
“You’re game, I’ll give you that,” Ashley said as she untied Meghan. “Still doing OK?”
Meghan winced as she put her feet down – her abs were pretty sore. “Could be worse,” she said. She rubbed her wrists and took stock of herself. “Has been worse, a few times. Right now, I feel pumped, believe it or not.” She belched – she had swallowed a lot of air. “Must be all that aerobic exercise.”
Again Ashley looked her over. “Glad I could help,” she said. “Maybe now you’ll be motivated to return the favor, eh?”
Meghan showered and changed into her nightgown. By the time she finished, it was time for lights out. That suited Meghan fine – the glow had faded, and she was exhausted. She climbed up into her bunk and curled up under her blankets. Sleep came immediately – it was like being hit on the head with a rock.
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