Fourteen, almost fifteen-year-old Jerrod Whitney sat on the bottom step of the back porch bored out of his skull. In the fashion typical of early adolescence, he was wallowing in self-pity, partly because he’d been practically booted out the door by his mom when she’d had enough of hearing him whine about having nothing to do, and partly because he couldn’t think of anything to do. After listening to him complain all morning, Mrs. Whitney finally threw up her hands and yelled, “For pity’s sake, give it a rest, will you? Go ride your bike or take a walk or something! Jesus, Jerrod, have you no imagination? Are you not able to function on your own?”

Barely a week into summer vacation between eighth and ninth grade, and he felt like he’d been abandoned. His best friend, Adam, was off with his own family for two weeks at their cabin in the Smokies. His other best friend, Will, was grounded for swatting his little sister on the butt when she called him a big weenie, and the fourth member of the clique, Scott, the group’s dim bulb, was in summer school because he failed eighth grade math and English. Again. That left absolutely nobody to hang with.

Electronic entertainment was out of the picture, too, because his mom was really strict about how much time he spent watching TV and surfing the web, and he wouldn’t be getting a smartphone until he turned sixteen. That was over a year away.

Forever!

Crap!

Exasperated and feeling terribly abused, Jerrod stood up and thought, “Screw it! And screw Mom and screw everybody!” He crossed the back yard and headed down the alley toward the edge of town and the beginning of Bowman Wood. He and his friends had explored several square miles of the dense deciduous forest thoroughly through the years, and they knew practically every tree, rock and stream in what they considered to be their territory. But even knowing it as well as they did, they nearly always found something new and interesting every time they played war or whatever diversion they could invent to spend a day in the woods and out of the view and earshot of their parents.

If his dad were still living with them, they might have taken the .22 and gone hunting for rats at the landfill, but his folks were divorced, and now his dad lived halfway across the country with his new wife. Jerrod missed him something awful, and sometimes he wished the custody award had gone the other way.

He hopped from rock to rock as he crossed the shallow twelve-food wide creek and followed the well-worn trail into the trees, soon arriving at the fork where it split off three ways. To the left would take him south toward a hidden area off the highway where the high school kids liked to park and make out. Sometimes Jerrod and his friends would hide in the brush on a Friday evening and spy on them. Once, he and Will actually saw a couple fucking in the back of an old Ford station wagon. Well, they didn’t actually see the guy put his dick in the girl’s pussy; in fact, all they saw of the girl was her naked legs wrapped around the guy’s waist, but through the fogged-up side window they could make out his bare, lily-white butt bouncing up and down enthusiastically. Imagining the rest was pretty easy, and they couldn’t resist jerking off right there in front of each other. Since then, they’d grown to be not the least bit shy about doing that. They hadn’t gotten around to doing it to each other, although it was probable they’d given it some thought. Neither would want to be the first one to suggest it.

Going straight ahead would take him toward the radio station, but there was nothing of any interest that way. The right fork led deeper into the forest where the trail ended at a large open area with a good-sized pond. He and his buddies used to catch crawdads and salamanders and skinny dip in that pond when it was warm enough. It was about a two-mile hike, and getting there would take up a fair chunk of the afternoon, so that’s the way Jerrod chose to go.

There was little chance of him getting lost, because even if he wandered off the trail, he knew that if he followed the afternoon sun, he’d eventually walk out of the wood and onto Frank Bowman’s farm. Mr. Bowman was stinking rich, and he owned the biggest farm in the county as well as a significant patch of the forest west of town; hence the name.

Actually, the locals named it Bowman Wood because the town fathers tried unsuccessfully for years and years to buy it. They wanted to log it and sell off the lumber, then expand the city limits and put in a couple of new subdivisions. Bowman adamantly refused, and when he was pressured, he successfully petitioned the state to designate every square inch of his wood as a wildlife sanctuary. Hunting and logging was strictly forbidden, and those poachers who were caught wound up paying huge fines. The town fathers finally accepted defeat and expanded the town in the other direction.

Jerrod and his buddies hadn’t yet explored the woods north of the pond. Not that there was any particular reason not to, they’d just never gotten around to it.

The day was pretty hot, probably in the low nineties, but the thick canopy of the deciduous forest knocked a few degrees off that. Jerrod, dressed in cutoff jeans, a faded blue T-shirt and an old pair of Nikes, snapped a four-foot limb off a dead maple tree to use as a walking stick and struck north toward the glade and the pond. There were quite a few deer in the wood, and he was hoping he might surprise one or two along the way. There were supposedly black bears in the forest too, but none had been spotted in the area for years, so he wasn’t too worried about it.

He jumped across a small streamlet that fed into the creek and headed up the first hill, letting his mind wander. For a while he imagined himself a frontiersman in the manner of Daniel Boone, striking out across the Appalachians in search of new territory to settle, ever alert for dangerous wildlife, bandits and unfriendly natives. With any luck, he’d run across a Cherokee village and spend a couple of nights in the arms of a beautiful Indian princess at the invitation of her father, the chief. He’d be made an honorary member of the tribe and learn to speak their language. He could use that knowledge and status later to lead groups of settlers to new homes across the mountains.

He soon grew tired of the frontier fantasy, then envisioned himself exploring a newly discovered planet lightyears away from Mother Earth. Because of runaway global warming, the world’s ecosystems were collapsing, and he was sent through a recently discovered wormhole to find a new home for humanity in a distant star system. He was leading his team through a dense, steamy jungle inhabited by carnivorous plants, strange flying creatures and incredibly dangerous six-legged predators. He held his phaser/walking stick at the ready to blast the first threat that dared show its ugly face.

An hour’s hike found him at the edge of the glade, maybe a hundred yards across. The pond was an approximately seventy-five by one-hundred-foot oval, no more than ten feet deep in the middle. It was spring-fed, so it never dried up, and the water was clean, or at least not stagnant. It was pretty much surrounded on three sides by rushes and cattails, leaving an open stretch along the near bank where he and his friends stripped and waded in for a swim. They’d built a rock fire pit nearby where they could roast wieners and marshmallows when they were allowed to camp out overnight once or twice during the summer.

Jerrod looked at the clear, inviting water reflecting the forest on the other side of the glade, and decided, “Why not?”

The warm air felt heavy, and the only sounds of life were from the birds, most of which he could identify by their songs. He easily picked out a cardinal, a crested titmouse and a Carolina chickadee. And doves, of course. There was never a shortage of doves. A pair of blue jays scolded him for being too near their nest.

He stripped naked and hung his cutoffs, T-shirt and underwear on the limb of an oak tree. His lean, suntanned body was just beginning to take on adult male characteristics by way of a dark pubic patch and tufts of hair in his armpits. His legs were starting to get kind of hairy too, and he figured he’d probably wind up looking like his dad in that respect. Naked, Mr. Whitney looked like an undersized Sasquatch with hair everywhere, even on his back. He also had an impressively large penis, the genetic code for which he’d kindly passed on to his only son.

The water was warm, but several degrees cooler than the surrounding air as Jerrod waded in a few feet before diving underwater and frog-kicking almost all the way across to the cattails. Then he laid back and slowly paddled his way around the pond taking in the sun and the peace and quiet. He was feeling better now because the hike and the exercise had gotten him over his little snit.

A few minutes of idle drifting got Jerrod wondering what to do next, and he thought he might do a little bit of exploring into the territory north of the pond. If he found anything interesting, he’d have something to hold over his friends the next time they got together.

He waded up onto the bank to walk around for a couple of minutes in the warm air to dry off a bit before getting dressed. And while he waited, and as long as he had time on his hands, he thought he might as well jerk one off. It felt kind of exciting to do it right out in the open, and once he got his dick hard, it didn’t take long at all to spew out a few shots of baby juice, young teenage penises being as sensitive and volatile as they are.

Of course, hard was practically a permanent state for Jerrod. But keeping himself from getting hard at the most inappropriate moments was sometimes a struggle. His friends all said they had the same problem, so he guessed it must be normal, but he still hated it when he had to walk through the hallway at school with his notebook held over the front of his jeans to hide a persistent boner.

He was sure it was only his imagination, but a couple of times while he was taking care of business, he had a feeling that he was being watched. But that didn’t even slow him down because the fantasy that some girl was spying on him made jerking off in the open air all that much more erotic.

So, a few minutes later, relieved, drained, dried and dressed, he headed around to the other side of the pond to check out some new territory. There, he was a little surprised to find a faint trail; barely noticeable, like it wasn’t used very often. It looked pretty fresh because the grass was just bent down, and not broken and dried out. It continued uphill and generally north in the direction he was planning to go anyhow, so he decided to follow it to its source.

Jerrod was now off on a new adventure to discover what mysteries the day might hold. Taking on the persona of a Texas Ranger, he reasoned, “If there’s a path, somebody must have made it. It doesn’t look like a deer trail and there are no droppings around anywhere, so it’s gotta be man-made. I bet somebody’s got a pot farm growing around here somewhere. Or maybe a still. Jeez, wouldn’t that be cool!”

As Jerrod climbed the hill with his walking stick, he was wishing he’d brought along an apple or a granola bar or something to take the edge off his hunger, because it was still hours before his mom would have dinner ready. There were plenty of walnut trees around, but the nuts were probably either germinated or rotten from lying on the ground all winter. And the blackberries wouldn’t be ripe for another three or four weeks.

The narrow trail was easy to follow all the way up the hill and down the other side. It’s like whoever made it went out of their way to walk through every grassy area in the forest, like the trail was made intentionally for him to follow. He was thinking it probably wasn’t used by more than one or two people, and he was curious as to who they might be. And were they armed? If they were growing pot or making moonshine whiskey, they might be.

The trail became harder and harder to see as he moved through some even denser wood. Suddenly, he was startled when he thought he saw something in his peripheral vision moving very fast, maybe a deer, judging by its size. Whatever it was shot past him a few yards off to his left. He stopped dead still trying to spot it, but it had vanished. The motion struck him as kindof weird though, because deer usually bounced and leapt when they were running away, and what he saw was sort of streaking along like a cat or a dog. Or a wolf. But it pretty much had to be a deer because there were no other animals in the forest of that size, as far as he knew.

Mysterious.

Another half hour or so of hiking found nothing else of interest, and he’d long since ascribed the phantom movement in the woods to an over-active imagination. The afternoon was waning and he began to think about heading back home with the mystery of who made the trail and where it went unsolved. It was a good two hours back to the house and his mom always got really pissed if he showed up late for dinner.

“Dinner’s at six, Jerrod,” she’d nagged him a thousand times, “Not six-0-one.”

Jeez, talk about anal!

But as it happened, Jerrod was indeed going to be late for dinner. Very late. What he didn’t, and couldn’t know was that, while he was following the fresh trail, he was himself being followed by the one who made it; one who had very definite plans for the rest of his afternoon.

He’d just decided to turn around and head for home when his eye caught site of what looked like an old shed or a ramshackle cabin several yards off through the trees. He couldn’t resist checking it out, and as he got nearer, he could see wisps of white smoke coming out of a stove pipe sticking through the roof.

“Shit! Somebody lives here! I wonder if I’m on private property.”

His eyes focused on the covered porch and the front door ... and then on the biggest damned dog he’d ever seen in his life! “Jeez Louise, that thing must weigh as much as I do! Is that what shot past me a little while ago?”

The dog was lying with its eyes closed and its muzzle on its paws like it was sleeping, so it must not have heard him or smelled him yet, meaning he must be downwind from the cabin. Fearing the huge animal might suddenly wake up and see him, Jerrod began to back away quietly, and immediately bumped into something solid. Startled, he whirled around and found himself face to face with a woman! And a rather large woman at that!

Not fat by any means, just big! At least she was bigger than him. Jerrod was a hair over five feet ten and weighed in at a hundred and twenty-six pounds. She was at least two inches taller and thirty pounds heavier than he was. He guessed her to be in her twenties, definitely younger than his mom. She was dressed in green and brown camo pants, a khaki shirt with the sleeves ripped out, and soft leather calf-high boots - no, moccasins, beaded even. She had strange eyes, a deep, deep green and kind of slanted, giving her sort of an elvish look. Her thick mane of auburn hair was in need of a good brushing, but it wasn’t dirty or ratty-looking or anything. And neither was she. In fact, her shape was sexy as hell, and her unusual face was very pretty, in a rough, outdoorsy sort of way.

The woman just stood there, arms crossed under her ample bosom and a half smile (smirk?) on her face as Jerrod stood paralyzed, gaping wide-eyed at her. From what he could see of her cleavage (and he could see a lot of it because it was right there in front of his face, and the top buttons of the shirt were unbuttoned), it was obvious she wasn’t wearing a bra, and just as obvious that she didn’t need one. After a few moments of uncomfortable silence, she opened the conversation in a soft, low-pitched voice, asking, “Would you be looking for anyone in particular, young man?”

Tearing his eyes away from her nearly exposed boobs, he stammered, “Um, no ma’am. I was just out hiking. I found a path coming this way from the pond and I just wanted to see where it went. If I’m trespassing on your property, I’m sorry. I didn’t see any signs.”

She leaned over and sniffed. “Yep, you smell like the pond alright. The name’s Ellie, not ma’am, and this isn’t my property. This whole section of the wood is a wildlife refuge belonging to Frank Bowman. He gave me permission to live here and keep an eye on things. You wouldn’t be here to poach any of our denizens, would you?”

“Oh no, ma’am! Hunting’s not allowed in these woods! But, um, anyhow, I’m sorry if I disturbed you. I Guess I’ll be heading on back home now.”

Jerrod started to step around her to beat a retreat, but she sidestepped and blocked his way. Then she did it again. Her grin widened like she was enjoying teasing him, and she asked, “You hungry, boy?”

He didn’t know what to make of her, but her question reminded him that his stomach was feeling empty. “I guess I am, kinda, but my mom’s gonna have dinner ready by the time I get home, so I probably shouldn’t spoil my appetite.”

That wasn’t really true of course. In fact, his mother often wondered at his appetite, expressing amazement at the amount of food he could pack into his thin body.

Ellie ignored his excuse. “With all the walking you’ve been doing today, I’ll bet a growing boy like you could handle a big bowl of hot apple crisp. And I’ve got some good cider to wash it down. Come on over to the cabin and rest yourself for a bit. Tell me your name, boy.”

Her voice was almost hypnotic, and somehow it didn’t seem to fit with her impressive size and rough appearance.

“Um, Jerrod, ma’am, uh, I mean Ellie. Jerrod Whitney.”

She didn’t give him a chance to come up with any more evasions, draping her arm over his shoulder and steering him toward the cabin. That caused her boob to brush against his arm as they walked, and that gave him kind of a funny feeling in his chest, like his heart was pounding.

At the sound of her voice, the monster dog that looked like a mixture of Irish wolfhound and something else equally as big, rose up and waited on the wooden porch to meet her. He never barked or growled at the sight of the stranger, probably because his mistress’ arm was still over the boy’s shoulder, indicating he must be acceptable company. Jerrod felt sorry for any unsuspecting soul that approached the cabin uninvited.

As they neared the small, crude building, Jerrod could see that it had been patched up in several places with a few new boards and some new window frames. The door looked new as well, and the corrugated metal roof wasn’t all that rusty. He spotted a good-size vegetable garden on the far side. The place was definitely somebody’s home.

As he stepped up onto the porch, he tentatively held out his hand for the dog to sniff, but the beast startled him by rearing up on its hind legs to place his forepaws on his shoulders, looking down at his face as it dribbled slobber on his T-shirt. The animal sniffed his hair once and gave his cheek a small lick. (Taste?)

Ellie scowled at the animal’s breech of manners and commanded, “Down, Rufus! Be nice to our new friend!”

Rufus obeyed and stood there with his whole backend wagging in greeting.

“Don’t worry, Jerrod, he won’t eat you. At least, not unless I tell him to. He’s just all excited because we rarely have company. Truth is, he fancies himself more a lover than a fighter. Delusional, probably.”

Jerrod dared to reach out and pat Rufus gently on the head, hoping they were indeed friends, because, delusional or not, he was pretty sure the dog could take his arm off with one bite.

The inside of the one-room cabin was kind of a surprise. Not that Jerrod was expecting anything in particular; he just assumed that the inside would reflect the outside - rough-hewn and primitive. Well it was primitive in that there weren’t any modern conveniences like electricity, a TV, or any kind of appliances. Other than that, it was neat, clean and organized. And it smelled of something yummy and spicy.

He stood in the middle of the room and looked around at what seemed to him to be a very comfortable living space. One wall was solid bookshelves and jam-packed with reading material. In one corner there was an old knotty pine dry sink with a hand pump for water. The stove was a cast iron wood burner, and there was a tea kettle keeping some water hot on the flat surface. He could see through the grate that there was a small fire going, and he wondered why the room wasn’t hot and stuffy. It was in fact much cooler than outside. He couldn’t figure that one out.

A full wood box sat next to the stove, and next to the dry sink there was a stack of shelves loaded with quart and pint jars of veggies and fruit Ellie had probably canned herself. No need for a refrigerator, apparently.

In the middle of the room stood a trestle table with benches on either side, apparently home-made, and with an old oil lamp sitting in the middle. On the opposite side of the room from the kitchen area was a double bed made up with a colorful crocheted quilt, and an antique four-drawer bureau. A couple of nails in the wall was apparently all she needed for her hang-up clothes. He saw a door on the back wall and thought it must lead outside, but it stood ajar and beyond it he spotted a standard white porcelain toilet.

Not even considering that it might be poor manners, he remarked, “Oh, you have an indoor bathroom. I mean, uh, like with running water and stuff.”

Ellie chuckled, “It runs if I pump hard enough. If you’re wondering about the toilet, Bowman put in a septic system when I moved in, but I still have to pump water into the tank every time I use it. It’s a little inconvenient, but I only have to take a dump once a day, so it’s not so bad. You need to use the john?”

Jerrod blushed at her willingness to openly talk about her toilet habits, feeling like her strange, sexy voice didn’t quite agree with her rough demeanor and crude language. “Um, no, ma’am. Sorry, I didn’t mean to be nosy.”

“Ellie.”

“Oh yeah. Ellie. Sorry.”

“Stop saying you’re sorry, kid. It was a reasonable observation.”

“Oh, okay. Sorry. Oops!”

She couldn’t help but smile at his charming innocence. It only increased her desire for his young body.

He attempted to shift the topic of conversation. “Um, have you read all of these books?”

“Most of them. I have a lot of free time on my hands. As you can see, I don’t own any electronic gadgets, nor do I have electricity to run them, so books are about it for entertainment.”

Jerrod had a lot more questions, but he thought he was already being too nosey, and he definitely didn’t want to irritate her, so he just stood there and looked around with his hands stuffed into his back pockets.

Rufus wandered in through the door and turned three or four circles before plopping down onto a ratty old rug that was obviously his own personal territory.

Ellie lifted the cover from a flat pan on the edge of the stove and scooped a heaping helping of warm apple crisp into an earthenware bowl. She set it on the table and pulled out the bench. “Dig in, kid! I think you’ll like it.”

His mouth watered at the sight and aroma, but he felt he should make at least an attempt at good manners. “Aren’t you gonna have some?”

“Later. Would you prefer tea or cider?”

“Um, cider sounds good. Thanks.”

Ellie poured a mug from a crockery jug sitting on the dry sink and handed it to him. “I pressed it myself from apples from Bowman’s orchard. Careful though, because it’s got a kick; probably about the same alcohol content as wine.”

Jerrod pushed it away reluctantly and said, “Oh, uh, I’m not old enough to drink anything with alcohol in it. Mom would ground me for a month if she smelled it on my breath, and she’s got a nose like a bloodhound.”

Ellie pushed it back. “You’re a big boy, so I think you can handle it. Besides, there’s plenty of mint growing in the forest to clean up your breath. Try a little sip and see what you think of it.”

He lifted the cup and sipped. And smiled. “Mmm, it’s good!”

“Told ya. Try the apple crisp.”

He shoveled a spoonful into his mouth. It tasted as good as it smelled!

“Wow, this stuff is really great! I wish my mom could cook this good.”

Ellie laughed, “You meant to say ‘cook this well’, and If you want to stay on good terms with her, don’t ever let her hear you say anything like that. Moms are sensitive about that kind of thing.”

She sat on the bench across the table and asked, “So Jerrod, do you go swimming in the pond a lot during the summer?” She was leaning forward enough that Jerrod could see a whole lot of breast, giving him that funny feeling in his chest again. He forced himself to look up at her amused face. Was she teasing him again?

“Not a lot. Me and my friends hang out there sometimes and roast wieners and marshmallows. We’ve even camped out in a tent a couple of times. Um, have you lived here a long time? I mean, you must be pretty smart if you’ve read all of these books. I was just wondering why you lived in the middle of nowhere by yourself.”

She had an odd, enigmatic expression on her pretty face. “You really are a curious sort, aren’t you? Well, first of all, I’m not alone, because I have my companion Rufus for company. He’s generally more pleasant to be around than most people I know, although he can be a pest at times.”

Rufus’s head came up and he gave out a short ‘woof!’, as if in protest.

“Secondly,” she went on, ignoring Rufus’ comment, “I can’t really say how smart I am, but I am pretty well educated. Not formally educated, mind you, but I read a lot of books and I know a lot about a lot of things. In fact, I know pretty much everything there is to know about this forest.

Jerrod scooped the last of the apple crisp from the bowl. “But don’t you get lonely not having anyone around to talk to?”

She thought it an amusing question, considering she could and did communicate perfectly well with every beast and bird in the forest, but she kept up the pretense. “I don’t. I talk to Rufus and he usually chooses not to answer, and I find that to be a satisfactory relationship. I doubt you’d understand if I tried to explain it, but as a general rule, I find human beings to be rather tedious and disappointing creatures. Not you, specifically, but humans in general. Don’t you ever get tired of people?”

Shrugging, he answered, “Yeah, I guess. Sometimes. But I just go to my room, or maybe get lost in the woods for a couple of hours like I did today. I’m out hiking because I was getting on my mom’s nerves and she kicked me out of the house.”

Ellie, perhaps slipping a bit and letting her true nature show, nodded and said, “So you have some idea of what I’m talking about. Except in my case, I have little tolerance for humans and their uncaring and arrogant attitudes about all the other creatures on this earth. I can honestly say I don’t miss human contact at all. Well, except for some of the more basic biological needs from time to time, if you know what I mean.”

Jerrod didn’t appear to catch her drift. “Um, not really. Could I have a little more of that apple crisp? It’s really good!”

She laughed as she stood and picked up his bowl. “Sure, kid. You can have all you want.”

Ellie was beginning to really get into this seduction. Of course, she could have just bewitched the kid and fucked him silly, but where’s the fun in that? No, she wanted his full, conscious participation; not some zombie-like automaton rhythmically poking his dick into her. Jerrod might be very young and naive, but from what she saw from no more than ten feet away as he was pleasuring himself back at the pond, he was more than ready for an introduction to the joys of sex. Real sex, not adolescent autoeroticism. He was an attractive, appealing man-child, but he didn’t have childish equipment, he had grown-up equipment, and damned impressive in her extensive experience. If she could teach him how to use it, they could bring each other pleasures long remembered.

She was really hoping she was going to be his first, because it had been many a year since she’d felt any inclination to morph into human form and turn her attention to a young innocent. In fact, the last had been Bowman himself when he was not much more that Jerrod’s age, and that was more than fifty years ago. Her true calling as a wood nymph was the care and protection of the forest and its creatures, but lately she’d been feeling overdue for a little creature comfort for herself.

Rufus, in his usual satyr’s persona, was okay in a pinch, but he was no lover, of no more use than a drone bee. In truth, he was childish, selfish and boring ... and good for no more than five minutes of hard fucking. And in his dog form, which he preferred for some reason, he didn’t even last that long! By the gods, she hated it when he mounted and pounded her from behind like a machine gun and tried to ram that damned knot into her! Rufus had no interest at all in making love, only raw animal fucking.

Ellie had seen Jerrod and his friends playing in her forest many times, and they’d seen her, although they never knew it. She blended into the forest scene perfectly, appearing to them as nothing more than a faint shadow slipping between the trees, or perhaps an interestingly shaped area of tree bark if they were looking right at her. Her prurient interest in the young humans grew with each encounter.