Rachel loved that sound. It was the sound of nothing. There was so much nothing in the air that she could hear the slap of her bare feet on the blacktop of the road leading down to the river, to the house where her best friend, Jeannie, lived. Only occasionally was the sound of nothing broken by a car hissing past her, swerving to the opposite lane to avoid hitting the barefoot 19-year-old woman with the long curly chestnut brown hair, the sleeveless T-shirt and the faded overalls. Every once in a while, the sound of a bird would interrupt the nothingness, or a boat's horn far off in the distance as it headed for its mooring in the cove. Nothingness dominated the evening air as the sun was already behind the horizon and the duskiness was starting to take over and the temperature was dropping from its midday high of 75 to its now somewhere in the low 60s.
Rachel loved the sound she was making. Bare feet on the asphalt road. The weekend had been special for her. It was finally barefoot weather in her chilly little fishing village. Although the opening weekend of June was technically still spring, to Rachel it was the first of summer -- when the shoes came off and the free time during the day would be spent in pursuit of the perfect suntan and the world was suddenly a wonderful place to be. It was sand between her toes and the smallest bikini in the world on her body and Frisbees and Vortexes flying through the air on the burning sand of the beach and the guys who looked so good and made her wonder which one of them would think she was cute enough...
Guys. That was Jeannie's department. Rachel wondered if any guy would ever look twice at her if Jeannie weren't around. Jeannie was the hot one. Rachel was the one called "cute" by those who wanted to compliment her, chubby by those who didn't. The two had been best friends from kindergarten, products of the Portugese-Amercian fishing community, two bookends who could almost read each other's minds and finish each other's sentences. Physically, however, these best pals were Mutt and Jeff.
A screen door cracked open and slammed closed with an old-wood-on-old-wood bang. "Hi, Rachel," called Mrs. Doane, a handsome 40ish woman in a flowing print dress and no shoes on her own feet. "Going down to see Jeannie?"
"Yes I am," Rachel answered to her old fifth-grade teacher. Rachel waved and walked past as Mrs. Doane left her front porch and walked to the back of her house, no doubt to tend to the most beautiful garden in the village. Mrs. Doane liked Rachel, and Rachel though Mrs. Doane was far too pretty to be a teacher. Mrs. Doane was one of the few people who took a greater liking to Rachel than Jeannie.
Jeannie was, in the slang of the day, a hardbody. She had the looks that virtually demanded attention -- six feet tall, with short dark brown hair parted flawelessly on the right side of her forehead. Her olive complexion had not a freckle or birthmark or blemish of any kind to distrupt its smoothness and pull one's gaze from her brown eyes so large they reminded admirers of nothing less than baptismal fonts. Her flesh was drumhead tight, a classic 36-26-36 with legs that seemed to never quit -- 35-inch inseams with calves and thighs you could strike a match on if they still made such matches. Yet no one ever described her as muscular. A thin coating of womanly fat actually perfected her sculpted body. She was as feminine as she was awe-inspring.
Rachel was seven inches shorter than her friend. She had huge, bouncing breasts, but also what was delicately referred to as baby-fat on her arms, hips and thighs, and even a bit on her tummy. Rachel was not obese, or even what any fair-minded person could call fat. She was who she was. She just wasn't Jeannie. Her round face was encircled by her mountain of curly hair, bordering pudgy cheeks dotted with only a few, yet rather large,freckles that were fine for the Irish girls in her town, but that she thought looked horrible on a daughter of the Mediterranean. She had eyes as big as Jeannie's, but hers were a dull hazel rather than her friend's magnetic dark brown. And that slight double chin -- oh why had God given her that f@#$%ing double chin?
Rachel turned up Jeannie's driveway. She marveled at how well she could walk on the broken clam shells that covered the drive, as it was too early in the season for her feet to be tough enough to tred on such a torturous surface. "Rachel!!!!!" called out Jeannie. "'Bout time ya got here."
Jeannie and Tom, a classmate of theirs, were on the front lawn lazily tossing a baseball back and forth. Jeannie wore new blue jeans and a burgundy T-shirt bearing the logo of the North Carolina college where Tom had just finished his freshman year, on his baseball scholarship because he was a hell of a hitter and a hell of a rightfielder who could throw out runners at the plate on the fly or erase those foolish enough to try to stretch a double into a triple with one bounce to third. Tom already acquired his suntan, courtesy of many a tournament in some locale where spring was sunny and 80 degrees rather than rainy and in the 50s all the time like it was in their hometown. He wore only a pair of faded jeans. Jeannie and Tom, like Rachel, were barefoot. It's what the Jeannies and Rachels and Toms did when the air finally warmed their world.
"What's up, Rach'?" called Tom. "You and Jean going to the island tomorrow?"
"Yup. Going to start working on our tans. Should be a beautiful day. They're saying 85 tomorrow. You comin' too."
"Got to work," answered Tom.
"That sucks," Rachel replied.
The island was a 12-mile strip of sand accessable only by boat. Jeannie and Rachel were taking the 14-foot dinghy with the 40-horse power outboard motor out to the island that years ago had been designated a wildlife refuge to stifle any ideas the local developers might have had any ideas of building vacation homes. Nothing out there but sand, wisps of beachgrass, dried seaweed, a few tiny, weathered shacks, a few anglers casting for bluefish in the surf and the ubiquitous seabirds. Tommorrow was Monday. The schoolkids were still in class. The tourists had yet to flood the village. It would be a perfect day for two lifelong friends to be alone and undisturbed.
CHAPTER II -- Jeannie and Rachel weren't the only people on the island hoping to be undisturbed.
Rachel loved the sound she was making. Bare feet on the asphalt road. The weekend had been special for her. It was finally barefoot weather in her chilly little fishing village. Although the opening weekend of June was technically still spring, to Rachel it was the first of summer -- when the shoes came off and the free time during the day would be spent in pursuit of the perfect suntan and the world was suddenly a wonderful place to be. It was sand between her toes and the smallest bikini in the world on her body and Frisbees and Vortexes flying through the air on the burning sand of the beach and the guys who looked so good and made her wonder which one of them would think she was cute enough...
Guys. That was Jeannie's department. Rachel wondered if any guy would ever look twice at her if Jeannie weren't around. Jeannie was the hot one. Rachel was the one called "cute" by those who wanted to compliment her, chubby by those who didn't. The two had been best friends from kindergarten, products of the Portugese-Amercian fishing community, two bookends who could almost read each other's minds and finish each other's sentences. Physically, however, these best pals were Mutt and Jeff.
A screen door cracked open and slammed closed with an old-wood-on-old-wood bang. "Hi, Rachel," called Mrs. Doane, a handsome 40ish woman in a flowing print dress and no shoes on her own feet. "Going down to see Jeannie?"
"Yes I am," Rachel answered to her old fifth-grade teacher. Rachel waved and walked past as Mrs. Doane left her front porch and walked to the back of her house, no doubt to tend to the most beautiful garden in the village. Mrs. Doane liked Rachel, and Rachel though Mrs. Doane was far too pretty to be a teacher. Mrs. Doane was one of the few people who took a greater liking to Rachel than Jeannie.
Jeannie was, in the slang of the day, a hardbody. She had the looks that virtually demanded attention -- six feet tall, with short dark brown hair parted flawelessly on the right side of her forehead. Her olive complexion had not a freckle or birthmark or blemish of any kind to distrupt its smoothness and pull one's gaze from her brown eyes so large they reminded admirers of nothing less than baptismal fonts. Her flesh was drumhead tight, a classic 36-26-36 with legs that seemed to never quit -- 35-inch inseams with calves and thighs you could strike a match on if they still made such matches. Yet no one ever described her as muscular. A thin coating of womanly fat actually perfected her sculpted body. She was as feminine as she was awe-inspring.
Rachel was seven inches shorter than her friend. She had huge, bouncing breasts, but also what was delicately referred to as baby-fat on her arms, hips and thighs, and even a bit on her tummy. Rachel was not obese, or even what any fair-minded person could call fat. She was who she was. She just wasn't Jeannie. Her round face was encircled by her mountain of curly hair, bordering pudgy cheeks dotted with only a few, yet rather large,freckles that were fine for the Irish girls in her town, but that she thought looked horrible on a daughter of the Mediterranean. She had eyes as big as Jeannie's, but hers were a dull hazel rather than her friend's magnetic dark brown. And that slight double chin -- oh why had God given her that f@#$%ing double chin?
Rachel turned up Jeannie's driveway. She marveled at how well she could walk on the broken clam shells that covered the drive, as it was too early in the season for her feet to be tough enough to tred on such a torturous surface. "Rachel!!!!!" called out Jeannie. "'Bout time ya got here."
Jeannie and Tom, a classmate of theirs, were on the front lawn lazily tossing a baseball back and forth. Jeannie wore new blue jeans and a burgundy T-shirt bearing the logo of the North Carolina college where Tom had just finished his freshman year, on his baseball scholarship because he was a hell of a hitter and a hell of a rightfielder who could throw out runners at the plate on the fly or erase those foolish enough to try to stretch a double into a triple with one bounce to third. Tom already acquired his suntan, courtesy of many a tournament in some locale where spring was sunny and 80 degrees rather than rainy and in the 50s all the time like it was in their hometown. He wore only a pair of faded jeans. Jeannie and Tom, like Rachel, were barefoot. It's what the Jeannies and Rachels and Toms did when the air finally warmed their world.
"What's up, Rach'?" called Tom. "You and Jean going to the island tomorrow?"
"Yup. Going to start working on our tans. Should be a beautiful day. They're saying 85 tomorrow. You comin' too."
"Got to work," answered Tom.
"That sucks," Rachel replied.
The island was a 12-mile strip of sand accessable only by boat. Jeannie and Rachel were taking the 14-foot dinghy with the 40-horse power outboard motor out to the island that years ago had been designated a wildlife refuge to stifle any ideas the local developers might have had any ideas of building vacation homes. Nothing out there but sand, wisps of beachgrass, dried seaweed, a few tiny, weathered shacks, a few anglers casting for bluefish in the surf and the ubiquitous seabirds. Tommorrow was Monday. The schoolkids were still in class. The tourists had yet to flood the village. It would be a perfect day for two lifelong friends to be alone and undisturbed.
CHAPTER II -- Jeannie and Rachel weren't the only people on the island hoping to be undisturbed.
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