Chapter 31

Back to work on Tuesday morning; not much had happened while I was gone, at least nothing the most junior NCO in the shop needed to be concerned about. There was only a trace of rain the first couple of days; then we had a long stretch of dry days; very warm and humid, then every week or so for the rest of the summer we’d get some significant rain, usually in the form of afternoon and evening thunderstorms.

When I had checked in at the Education Office, they had told me what courses were available on base and in the area; when I checked with my Gunny about taking some courses, he referred me to the squadron education officer. That person turned out the be the Executive Officer (XO), the second in command at the squadron; it was one of his collateral duties. It must have been a slow afternoon for him when the Gunny took me in for counseling and advice; we talked for almost an hour about my interests and background. I brought up to the Major my interest in American history, and all the unstructured reading I had done; and that I was a pretty good home handyman and liked fixing things. It turned out he had studied history in college as a minor; he gave me one of his personal books about early American history to read; and told me to come back when I finished it, he’d lend me a couple more. He stressed the College Level Examination Program (CLEP) as a way to build up college credit from independent study and work experience; he had some experience shepherding Marines though that program, and thought I should start there.

JB and I hung out together most evenings after work, and initially stayed on base; mainly just to see what there was to do. A lot of sports was played; JB and I would play basketball 5-6 night a week, but the guys that hung out in the gym were good, and had played together for a while. Eventually I was able to figure the game out and be part of a team; mostly how to move without the ball, but it took a while. I did discover the game of racquetball; I had messed around with it a little at Memphis, but didn’t really know what I was doing. There were 35-40 serious racquetball players at Cherry Point that played at lunchtime and most evenings; they let me play with them, and showed me how to play well. The biggest one was to hit the ball when it’s close to the ground, maybe a foot off the ground or less; don’t just flail at it whenever it was close to you. Move to that point, wait for the ball to come to you and then hit it; and hit it hard! Then, how to not get in anyone’s way and not get hit with the ball or racquet; and a bunch of other little tips that made the game so much fun. I quickly developed a killer serve that even the best players had trouble with; it got to the point that I rarely used it unless playing with the very skilled guys.

The enlisted club was busy every evening, but filled with mostly guys; there weren’t many unmarried females around, and the ones that were had all the attention they wanted. There was a monthly amateur night, usually on a Wednesday; sort of an open mike affair, a precursor to karaoke. The performer could do whatever he or she liked, most sang or played an instrument; but there were a couple stand-up comedians, and even a juggler once. JB and I did it a couple times and had a good night; eventually we ended up playing for a bunch of individual singers during those evenings. We did meet a male Marine that had a portable electric piano and was a decent singer; the three of sounded pretty good together and the club was interested in us doing a twice-monthly show for a little money; but he was just about to get out of the Corps, so we declined.

One Saturday we headed to the beach to see what was happening there; very busy with families everywhere. We stopped in a couple of the larger restaurants and bars in the afternoon to see if anything musical was possible; a couple had small stages, but no one playing. Very noisy too; we checked them out in the evening and it wasn’t any better.

I stopped in the credit union and deposited the $2000 check, and a little cash; I enquired about getting a credit card and that got arranged. It turned out the base exchange (department store) had a dedicated telephone room where you could make a long-distance call and pay for it on the spot; instead of calling collect or having to use a pocketful of change. It was open 12 hours a day; I used it a couple times to call Erie, and Karen in Nashville; and a couple others later.

I returned the history book the Major had lent me a week later; he seemed to be a little surprised I had read it already. I told him about my unusual memory; it must have been another slow day for him; we discussed the book and when I demonstrated that I remembered what I had read, and understood it; he gave me a couple more. He seemed to be a little excited about the whole thing, and had a list of books he thought that needed to be read before taking many of the CLEP exams; I was to get though the new books and get back to him when I thought I had the material mastered.

Work wasn’t hard; the computer did most of it and there were long periods of time when I was just sitting there; watching the tape run through the testing procedures. The Gunny didn’t have any problem with me reading while waiting for the computer to finish; three weeks later I took the loaned books back to the Major; and arranged to take the CLEP exam on the early history of the United States at the base education office. We didn’t get the results back right away; but when they were reported to the squadron Commanding Officer, he got involved. I had passed with a very high score; the Colonel had a double master’s degree in mechanical and structural engineering; useful as a pilot, I guessed. He gave me more advice and arranged to loan me some of his college textbooks on advanced mathematics, if I wanted to try those exams. The XO had me continue with history, now working on the period after the civil war; the incentive to complete the testing was that they counted toward my next promotion. I might as well; I could do a lot of reading at work, and didn’t have much to do after work, especially later in the evening.

I ran into my first serious challenge at work; mainly because I was a little intrigued by a problem we were having; had been having for a while. The power supply box for the Inertial Navigation System I worked on was being turned in faulty from the flying squadron a lot; when I got a chance to work on one, I was told to immediately open it up when it came into the shop, and dry the thing out. Dry it out? Turned out that for a couple years the boxes were coming in with water in them; not much, but enough to cause problems if we just applied power. Water and electricity do not play well together; the system was getting old and the boxes were deteriorating; between condensation and a couple other issues, the power supply was becoming a major problem. I did some checking with the squadron; turned out the box was mounted in the aircraft nosewheel compartment, and would get splashed with water when taking off and landing during a rainstorm. The A-6 was considered an all-weather aircraft, the pilots actually looked forward to flying in bad weather; the only thing they avoided was major thunderstorm cells. We were now getting afternoon thunderstorms a couple days a week, some quite severe; the pilots had gotten to the point where they turned off the navigation system just before landing; it really wasn’t needed anymore.

The third power supply box I worked on I took almost completely apart; I gutted the box and I did some extensive corrosion control work on the interior, and re-soldered most of the connections. I then put it back together and sealed all the seams with aluminum tape I bought at the local hardware store, then re-painted the box so the shiny tape didn’t show. I had checked with my Gunny to make sure I wasn’t doing anything that would get us in trouble; once I had the first box ready to be put back in supply; I started pulling all the others off the shelf and reworked them also. It took a few weeks, but soon the Avionics Officer noted that the power supplies were not coming in for repair near as often; the Gunny took me with him to explain what was going on. That led to a meeting with the Commanding Officer (CO) and XO; I got an ‘atta-boy’ for the extra work I had done; and some extra time off. I was also told by my Gunny that after the Labor Day weekend I would be working on the night shift; the Marine there was married with kids and wanted to have a regular home life after school resumed. That would be a bit of a change; the night shift worked Sunday nights through Thursday night; our weekend was all day Friday and Saturday, then report to work Sunday night at 16:30 (4:30 PM, for those still trying to figure that out).

That pat-on-the-back happened just as the Labor Day long weekend approached; the base Commanding General had declared a ‘safety stand-down’ for the entire weekend, starting on Friday. No flying or real work was supposed to be done; just a review of our work processes, cleaning up the shops, and attending a few mandatory lectures. The CO had me fill out a leave request for over that weekend, plus the Friday before and the Tuesday after; then he put them in his office in-basket, not formally submitted it to the admin office. The military uses a vague phrase when reporting everyone is present for work; everyone is either ‘present, or accounted for’; that is what gets reported up the chain of command. If I called the shop by 07:30 the morning, I would be gone but accounted for; and I could call in from anywhere, like Nashville. If I ran into a problem along the way, car accident or something, or didn’t call in; the leave papers would be submitted, and everybody’s ass would be covered. If I did call in on the work days to be accounted for, and got back on time; the leave papers would simply be thrown away, I’d just be getting a couple extra days off.

I let JB know, he arranged to get that time off also by taking a few actual days leave; road trip! We weren’t able to leave until after work Thursday; but by 1700 we were on the way in the Buick again. We called his folks and Angie to let them know we’d be arriving in the wee hours of the morning, and have Angie call Karen; then switched driving a couple times during the trip so we both could nap in the back seat when needed. FYI; I could easily sleep in the back seat; JB, not so much, he needed to curl up significantly.

It’s a long trip in a car from the North Carolina shore to Nashville, especially at 55-60 mph. The authorities were serious about the national speed limit, and enforcement efforts were high; I had installed an after-market cruise control on the Buick so we could set it and forget it. I had done a couple other things to the Buick, mostly installing a low-restriction air intake and exhaust system so the car now got almost 20 mpg; it had a 20-gallon tank so we could travel for hours between stops. The car had only an AM radio, and once we were in the NC mountains reception got very spotty; so JB and I talked. Mostly about work, but also about what to do after work, and mainly about the girls.

JB had yet to formally propose to Angie, though the tentative plan was for them to get married once she graduated from college. When I mentioned that while that was two years away, the time would pass fairly quickly; and ladies like to plan a wedding, and that could start anytime. Maybe it would be a good idea to put an engagement ring on her finger? Maybe check with his parents first, then figure out if she’d like to pick out her ring, or ‘surprise’ her with it? That conversation was good for a couple hours; and yes, I’d be honored to be his best man.

The other big discussion was how often we were going to be making this drive to Nashville. Close to 700 miles one way, 12-13 hours each direction if we didn’t have any problems; with me soon to be the working the night shift and having to be at work Sunday night around 4, we weren’t going to be able to make the drive all that often. Even the 3-day weekends we got would be a challenge to fit the trip into; maybe he should look into flying just himself back and forth during those weekends.

That led us into discussing my relationship with Karen, and how I figured that would go. He accepted pretty quickly that she wouldn’t have any problems finding a new guy; but only gave me a 50-50 chance of getting her to date anyone else while I was in the picture. I told him that between the very reduced trips to Nashville I’d be making, and that I was not even considering putting any kind of ring on her finger; maybe she’d move on? I guess I’ll have to have a serious talk with Karen about it; make sure she knows I’m not her ‘forever guy’.

Like I said, a long trip and we didn’t get started until mid-afternoon. Everyone seemed to be asleep when we got to the Brooks place at almost 5 AM; we snuck into the pool house where JB discovered Angie sleeping in the spare bedroom, and I discovered Karen in what was now considered my bedroom. She had left the small bedside lamp on for me, and looked so lovely in her sexy babydoll nightie in the dim light; I quietly went to the bathroom to clean up a bit; not quietly enough.

“Is that you?” she softly called from the bedroom.

“Yes sweetheart, we finally made it. Just stay put, I’ll be there in a minute.” I finished up and stripped down to my underwear, which got a comment when I eased into bed next to her.

“No, no; baby,” she chuckled, putting her arms around me for a kiss, then reaching down to push them down my legs; “it’s been a long 2 months; I need all the skin-to-skin contact I can get. We don’t need to make love right away if you’re too tired; but I want you naked next to me.”

“I’m never too tired,” I told her; returning her kiss and helping get the offending garment off; “it’s been a long 8 weeks for me too.” I started to comment on her nightie; I had barely started when she drew it up and over her head, and tossed it to the side.

“I’ve been dozing and teasing myself, waiting for you to get here,” she murmured, wrapping her arms around me and pulling me on top of her as she rolled to her back; “I’m ready for you to make love to me now.” Her naked, full breasts pressed against my chest, the smell and feel of her as she started gently writhing beneath me; within seconds I was completely hard. She wasted no time reaching down between us and getting me in position; it didn’t take any urging for me to bury myself in her wetness. “Yesss,” we both said, pretty much in unison, then she wrapped her legs around me. “Much better,” she declared with a soft smile, “Now just do me baby; I don’t care how.”

The first orgasm was quick and intense for both of us; I think I held on just long enough for her to get a little bit of physical satisfaction from it. Just being able to hold her in my arms as she encouraged me was the best; what I had really been missing. I was able to hold back a little and not totally empty myself; she clung to me and held me close, then moaned her appreciation when I slowly started pumping into her again. The second time lasted quite a while; this time she was completely into it and I know she enjoyed herself a couple times before I completely drained myself into her.

“There’s my guy,” she chuckled, slowly unraveling her arms and legs from around me, giving me a kiss; “I knew I hadn’t been just imagining how good making love with you was. By the way; I love you.”

“I love you too, baby; that was pretty good, wasn’t it?” I told her, once I had caught my breath and moved to beside her. “I need to set the alarm for 6; I need to call my shop then to let me know I made it okay.”

“Huh?”

“I need to call my boss in an hour to let him know I didn’t have any problems along the way.”

“What? I thought you were on leave.”

“If I have problems getting back on time, then I’m on leave; if I don’t, I’m just getting a couple extra days off for being a good Marine avionics technician.”

“What!?” she demanded, curling up against my side.

Okay, I’ve got almost an hour to kill and now we’re both completely awake; I might as well explain this. By the time I needed to make the call she understood what was going on, and was caught up on how my summer had gone. The Gunny thanked me for calling (thanked me; I’m still adjusting to being treated as a real human being), and reminded me that I was to report for work Wednesday night by 16:00. Karen overheard that part, so I ended up explaining that I was moving from the day crew to the night shift; I would be working evenings from now on. We also got into a bit of a discussion on when I would be able to come back again; when I told her probably not until Thanksgiving, she was not impressed.

“I thought you got all the three-day holiday weekends off; there’s two in October.”

“Yes; but JB is still working days and won’t get off work until Friday afternoon; and I’ll need to be back at work on most Sunday afternoons around 4,” I explained. “It’s a 12 to 13-hour trip to get here, then the same going back; that doesn’t give us much time to visit; it’s better if we wait until November for the four-day weekend. Christmas and New Years are going to be a challenge this year too; both days are on Wednesday, right in the middle of the week. We’ll get a couple days off, but not the whole week; and definitely not two weeks off without taking leave.”

“You mean I won’t see you at Christmas and New Year’s?”

“Probably not both; most likely just for a week, for one or the other. The squadron will have limited operations going on, but we still need to have the shop manned; I’ll know more after Thanksgiving.”

“Could I come visit you?”

“It wouldn’t be easy; I’ll still be working, and we’d have to get you a hotel room somewhere; there’s no place I can get for you on base.”

“Okay,” she said after a couple minutes, caressing my chest; “we’ll deal with that then. What is the plan for this weekend?”

“JB took a few real days of leave; we need to leave Tuesday after noon, no later than 5. This weekend was all done on short notice; I don’t know what is planned, if anything. We’ll have to check with JB and Angie, and Bob and Carol; it there anything you’d like to do?”

“My parents are leaving for the weekend this afternoon; they said we can use the house if we want,” she said. “I think my mom had to talk my dad into it a little bit,” she giggled; “but I’d like to spend a couple nights alone with you in my bed.”

For the last several minutes she had been gently playing with my cock, getting it halfway erect; she gave it a couple loving squeezes and pumps, then asked me with a smile; “We need to talk some more later; but right now do you want to sleep a little, and nap later; or play right now, and catch up on our rest later?”

Okay; I need to listen closely sometime soon; got it. “Whatever you’d like to do,” is my automatic answer. “Before we make any plans, we need to check with the others; I’ll bet JB and Angie won’t be up until around noon, but we really need to check with Bob and Carol.

“Okay; let’s cuddle and try going back to sleep,” she said, snuggling up to me. “I can use a couple more hours; we’ll get up before lunch and figure out what we’re doing then. The weather is not going to be very nice the next few days with rain likely, and Sunday and Monday it’s supposed to be really bad.” A woman that keeps track of the weather; she is pretty special. It took about 15 minutes before she quit playing with me and turned over; I spooned up to her back, we got comfortable, and both quickly drifted off.

I woke up in an empty bed about 11:30; almost 5 hours of sleep, close enough for government work. I did my business in the bathroom and then checked the living room; Angie and Karen were deep in conversation there. I was quickly installed on the long couch between them, and put to work massaging feet and legs; Angie moaned and told me that if JB didn’t marry her, I would have to. Okay, that was a good enough opening; I got Angie’s ideas of what she’d like to have happen with her and JB. I also got a chance to subtly let Karen know that eventually she should move on from me; that I was really good with her dating other guys while I was gone. If she ended up intimate with one, I wouldn’t be angry or disappointed; that I loved her but wasn’t the guy she was going to spend the rest of her life with. That actually went pretty well; but she bluntly told me that this weekend was hers, and we would be spending plenty of it in bed. And if we spent a day or so at her house; it would be naked most of the time.