Chapter 2

It maybe got down to eighty-five that night -- and the next day -- Wednesday -- it got up to one-oh-one. And Michael, of course, couldn't use the pool. I'd more or less predicted that. He didn't tell me -- he just didn't come over and spent a lot of time looking at the pool longingly.

One of Heather's girlfriends -- a chunkier girl named Kate -- came over at about three. I'd seen Kate before; there wasn't anything that wrong with her -- she was just a little thicker, that's all. Boys her age might not bother with her, but I would stick my dick in her in a heartbeat -- you learn as you get older that swimsuit models aren't necessarily a good fuck. Kate was also loud -- I think she had a little brother who was hard of hearing or something. They were out back and Kate had tied up her shirt to display her puffy little midriff and she announced, "I wish that guy had kids -- I'd LOVE to go in that pool of his!" Heather spoke quietly to her for a moment, and she erupted, "You did?" More mumbling. "He did? Why aren't..." Mumble, mumble... "So he's a perv or something? What did he do?" Mumble, mumble. "So? I'd LOVE to go naked! I'd go naked right now, if I could!" Mumble, mumble. "So what? Did he DO anything? Did he offer you candy to go to his bedroom or something?" Mumble, mumble. "Then what's the problem?"

"They're all being fucking stupid, that's what!" Michael erupted, and stomped off into the house.

Heather looked frustrated and mumbled some more, and Kate interrupted her with, "But, nothing. The guy TOLD you up front that all you had to do if you didn't want to see him naked is leave by a certain time! That's, what, four hours from now? If an old guy wants to perve on me in my bikini, at least SOMEBODY is! Michael's right -- you guys are chicken-shit."

Michael, realizing that his position was being supported by Heather's girlfriend, stuck his head out the door. "He's got a hot tub and a sauna -- and his house is air conditioned!"

"Jeez, everybody knows you only wear a towel in a sauna!" Kate howled. "He's got central air? I'd go naked to sit for an hour under that! Gawd, I might do more than that!" She swung to look in my direction and I stuck my nose in my book while she asked, "What's he look like?"

"Kate!" Heather howled, and I concealed a smirk. "My God!"

"You're a wuss," Kate opined. "Hiding over here because a guy who has EVERYTHING just MIGHT look at your titties! You're incredible! I'd show him mine just to get them cool and wet! I've been sticky for DAYS!"

I decided I was going to like Kate.

Jean's arrival home occasioned an uproar that made the previous day's pale by comparison. You could hear it all through the wide open windows. Jean actually made Kate leave, because she couldn't handle her objections while controlling her family. The bottom line was that you don't open up something like this and then just hack it off without a LOT of noise and complaint -- and things were just getting hotter, inside and out.

Louse that I am, I didn't want to miss a minute; after the entertainment Kate provided, I went out and got one of those directional microphone things at the local electronics store and pointed it at their house so I could hear what went on from inside my house where it was cool. I made a point of taking my seven-thirty nude dip, too -- and being highly visible about it.

Michael was reletless -- he went on the attack every thirty to forty-five minutes. Heather played apologist; Kate had conveyed to her very clearly that she thought she was hung-up and gutless -- and teen females don't like being told they're too chicken to accept a challenge. So she was in there with, "Maybe we're taking the nudist thing too seriously, Mom. Just because you're a nudist doesn't mean you're a sex fiend. Kate says you aren't supposed to wear anything but a towel in a sauna, anyway..." And so on, and so on, while Michael fairly foamed at the mouth. Add the fact that it was muggy and eighty-eight outside, and probably still hotter in the house, and Jean had two choices -- give in or take a long butcher knife to both of her children! Around ten, she screamed, "ALL RIGHT! You can go over there! But don't go alone!"

"Aw, Mom!" Michael complained, "That's SO unfair! Sis goes off with her girlfriends all the time and I'm stuck here..."

"All right, all RIGHT! You can go over -- but your sister should have either you or one of her girlfriends with her any time she's over there -- understand?"

I didn't know whether to be peeved or not! Being male made Michael safe? On the other hand, the dam had broken; we would see what happened next...

I was hanging out -- literally -- when Michael tapped on the slider Thursday morning at about ten. Fortunately, I have this kind of a towel kilt that is belted by a Velcro strip, so I threw that on -- and was still settling it around my hips as I came into the kitchen to open the slider -- which gave Michael bug-eyes, not that he saw anything. I knew that he would rather die at this point rather than tell his mother or his sister anything that might screw up using the pool AGAIN -- but I wasn't SUPPOSED to... "Hi, Michael -- what brings you over here?" I asked, then pretended to take in the towel and stuff. "Hey, I was left with the impression that your mom didn't want you over here under my bad influence..."

"She changed her mind," Michael announced. "I mean, she was being really stupid about it..."

I grimaced. "I really think she ought to tell me that, don't you?"

"Well..." he replied, eyeing me, "did she really tell you I couldn't come over? I thought she kind of left it..."

"She left an impression and we both know it was the correct one," I chided. "You don't want to screw it up for tomorrow, do you? Better call her so I can talk to her."

Michael rolled his eyes and fished out his cell phone. "Mom? Cletus wants to know if you said it was okay ... Yes, Mom. No, Mom. Okay, here..."

"Mr. Putnam?" Jean asked.

"Yes, Ma'am?"

"I, uh, decided that Michael can visit after all -- and Heather can, too, as long as Michael or one of her girlfriends is along."

"I see," I murmured. "That works for me. I'll send him along home when the time comes."

"Thank you so much," Jean replied. "I know Michael appreciates it. I'm sorry if I seemed ... stuffy."

"No harm, no foul," I replied grandly, "You're protecting your family, which is your job."

"Thank you for understanding." We closed out the call.

"Okay, we're all set," I announced.

"Yippee!!" Michael broke for the door. There was a splash before I even got outside.

I watched him, while either tanning or hiding under the awning, for a couple of hours -- until I noticed that he was pinking up. "Time to drag it out," I announced.

"Why?"

"Because if you put on any sun block in the first place, it's gone and you're frying," I related. "Let's go inside and cool off for a while."

"Oh." He glanced at his shoulders. "Okay, I guess." We went inside and I turned on the TV and we kicked back with a couple of sodas. Michael was in Hawg Heaven; he was swimming, and when he wasn't, it was cool and there was TV. I didn't mind -- if he wanted to live here, that meant his mama was going to have to show up occasionally. I spent some time with him, then went off to do my own business, banking online and checking on various things to do with managing the family properties.

At about three, Heather showed up -- with Kate. Both of them were in bikinis -- a fact I attributed to Kate's abuse of Heather the day before. They weren't thongs, but they showed more skin than the rig Heather had worn to the first swim party. "Mr. Putnam, is my brother here?" Heather asked.

"He's watching TV," I related. "I dragged him inside when he started pinking up."

"Oh," Heather nodded. "Look, can Kate swim, too?" Kate smiled winningly.

I frowned. The problem here was that I'd made Heather's mother sign a release; if I didn't keep the playing field level, then someone was going to smell a rat. "I made your Mama sign a paper giving permission," I pointed out to Heather. "I don't have one of those for Kate."

"Oh." Heather looked crestfallen.

"Sh--..." Kate cut off a curse at my glance.

"I could give you a form," I offered. "But it's not smart for me to treat one of you differently -- especially since I don't know you."

Kate pursed her lips. "What does this form look like?"

"I think I saved a copy," I muttered, and went off to the office to print one. Bringing it back, I said, "It's sort of like a school event release, you know? It just covers my ass. Do you think your mama would sign it?"

Kate glanced over the form and surprised me with, "This lets her swim too, right?"

I hadn't thought of that. "Yeah, I guess it does. Maybe I should change it."

Kate smiled crookedly. "Then again, maybe Mama will like it better if she sees that."

"Could be," I agreed, wondering what Kate's mother looked like. "You drag it back signed and I'll let you swim and stuff. Be aware that I'm not just gonna accept some signature on this -- I'm gonna call and check..."

"I don't suppose..." Kate looked crafty.

"What?"

"Well, it's a hike to my house," Kate related. "You don't think you could, like, drive us over there? I wouldn't ask, but I KNOW Mama is going shopping soon, and if we miss her..." She turned on the puppy dog eyes, and Heather mirrored them, "Pleeeeze?"

Michael rolled his eyes, but roused himself to ask, "Where's Peter?"

So, to make a long story short, I ended up meeting Karen Moffat and her son Peter. Karen was an older version of Kate -- bigger in all dimensions. She was overweight and had a big ass -- but she had a fine-looking set of soft jugs and dressed reasonably well. I decided that she rated a dick on sight. Peter was, as anticipated, hearing impaired. He got on with hearing aids, but that kind of crap tends to ruin your social life when you're a kid - anything that makes you different screws you. He had reddish brown hair and freckles and seemed cool enough -- and apparently Michael knew him and was just bored enough with being alone that he was glad to see a familiar face, so I carted him back in the car with the other three while Karen toddled off to the market. Apparently, Karen worked nights, somewhere, and generally did her housecleaning and shopping during the day. Her place was cleaner than mine, so I figured she wasn't trailer trash.

By four, I had four kids splashing in my pool, playing Marco Polo. I loved watching Kate's rack bounce in the waves, but I knew I had to be careful about it -- at least when Heather was around. Heather had a sweet bod, too, but she was jealously guarding it. Hey, no problem...

The girls decided to lie out on the deck in the loungers and sunbathe where they could take a dip if they overheated, but Michael had already gotten his minimum daily dose, and Peter decided to hang out with him. I apologized for not having any game consoles, but it turned out that Michael did, so they trooped off to unhook his setup from his room and drag it into my TV room. And that's when something untoward happened...

They were going through the input on the TV when they accidentally hit the porn video I'd been watching that morning when Michael knocked on the door. It took me maybe ten seconds to realize that the soundtrack wasn't rated 'G' and another five or six to get to the TV room. "Guys! Your mothers would BOTH skin me alive if they caught you watching that!" I rushed over to the DVD player and popped out the disc.

The boys were both bug-eyed. "That was so cool!" Michael erupted.

"Yeah, well, telling your mother you saw porn at my place is a GREAT way not to ever come back!" I reiterated. "Just remember that!"

"Yes, Sir!" Michael agreed, nodding -- but I knew the gears were turning. There was an opportunity to be had -- maybe more than one -- but it was likely to be a dangerous either-or kind of thing. Best to control it, I figured. It would be low priority, anyway; females you had to hunt and fish for, but boys -- after a spark like that, it takes nothing to get a flame going even years later. It was best to concentrate on the female contingent.

Jean came and collected her brood at five-thirty, to find me babysitting another pair of kids; they all looked a lot fresher than she did. "You should take a dip," I recommended -- which got me a look -- but I added, "There's plenty of time..."

"Perhaps la--, uh, perhaps some other time," she amended.

"Sure." I let it lie. Heather didn't -- she snickered. The whole Adult Swim thing was a hot topic with Peter for about five minutes -- but Kate already knew about it, which more or less snuffed it out. Heather made me print out four or five more permission slips for her girlfriends; I thought about changing them, but decided to let the whole thing lie.

Karen showed up at about a quarter to six to get Peter and Kate -- and Adult Swim came up during the grand tour. I was caught flat-footed. "Kate, you didn't..."

"Uh, no, I didn't, Mr. Putnam. I forgot." Kate looked apologetic.

"I'm sorry -- I thought you were aware," I apologized to Karen. "I'm a naturist. While I don't flaunt it, I don't wear clothing much in the house -- and house rules are that if you swim in the pool after seven, it's without a suit, because that's how I'll be doing it. With the kids around, of course, I wear clothes -- but come the evening..."

"Are you gonna get all freaked like Heather's mom did?" Kate wanted to know. "Gawd, that was SO stupid!" she added, rolling her eyes. "I mean, if we're not here..."

"I gather it hasn't been an issue?" Karen asked her daughter, eyeing me.

"No, Mom. Okay, he's a guy, but he hasn't been drooling or anything!" Kate was actually quite fetching in her bathing suit -- but I knew better than to get stupid about it. "Actually, he spent a lot more time inside working than he did sitting out with us -- and he spent most of THAT reading!"