I woke up this morning not feeling very well. After a trip to the bathroom to just dry-heaves, I settled on just some saltine crackers and apple juice. Even that didn’t set very well in my stomach. I figured this was what I get for being pregnant: morning sickness.

It didn’t help at all to have Ruth so perky. I just wanted to go back to bed.

“So,” she said, “what’s on your agenda today?” I felt like that was a silly question.

“I think I’ll just take a nap, then maybe go catch some sun. My tummy’s not feeling all that well right now.”

“I thought I heard you in the bathroom, sweetie,” she said. She came over and rubbed my shoulders. “I think I need to get a new swimsuit. Want to come along?”

I shook my head. “No. I’m still kind of queasy. Maybe later we can do something, OK?”

“Sure,” she said. “You get some rest and I’ll see you later.”

“OK,” I said, and I stretched out on the couch. I felt her kiss my forehead and heard her leave, but I was only barely there.

I woke up a couple of hours later. I was feeling better, but still not really good. For some reason I was feeling, as my grandmother might say, peckish, so I thought maybe some sun might make me feel better. I’d heard that a lack of Vitamin D might affect mood, and there were all those stories about Seasonal Affective Disorder, so maybe an all-over sun bath might help. I gathered up a beach blanket to lay down on and I set out for the beach just outside the door. I wanted an all-over tan, so I didn’t take a bathing suit along. Ruth had told me that it was a clothing-optional private beach, so I didn’t think that I needed anything except my sunglasses.

I felt the warmth on my shoulders as I laid the blanket out and made sure that it was straight. I went down to the water, stuck my toe into it, but it felt kind of cold, so I trudged back up to the blanket and settled down on my back. I put my sunglasses on and hoped that I could get back to my usual, perky self soon.

I made sure that I turned over a couple of times so I wouldn’t burn, and after about a half-hour, a shadow fell across my body.

“You’re blocking my sunshine,” I said, accusingly.

“You’re naked!” exclaimed an excited male voice.

I sighed. Just what I needed, someone who played ‘Captain Obvious’ to the max. I didn’t feel like dealing with it, but he didn’t move.

“Brilliant,” I said. “You’ve got eyes and you can see.” I felt a lecture coming on, but I ruthlessly suppressed it. That’s not the way I am. “You’re still in my sunshine.”

“You’re still naked,” came the reply.

I levered myself up on one elbow, putting my other hand over my eyes to shade them as I looked up into the shadow. It was a young man, dressed in a blue shirt and shorts, wearing a bicycle helmet. That’s about all I could see because of the sun’s glare.

“OK,” I said. “I’m naked, as you have so brilliantly observed. I’m on a private beach, and I assume I should be afforded some privacy, so why don’t you just move on down the beach and hassle someone else?”

“We had a complaint of someone being obscene on this part of the beach,” he said, not moving.

“Oh,” I rejoined. “And do you see anyone performing an obscene act on this part of the beach?” For some reason, I just couldn’t keep the snarkiness out of my mouth. Maybe I could blame it on the new pregnancy hormones. Out of the corner of my eye I could see a small crowd starting to form about fifty yards down the beach, in the public section.

Just after Nils and I were informed that I was going to have a baby, our friend, Ruth, called me up and invited me to go on Spring Break with her. Her father, the judge and also a friend, had a house on this beach and had this section and all of the beach from the access point to the north designated as a private beach so that he and his family could get away from crowds. When this was all explained to me, I eagerly accepted. Nils decided to stay home and take care of the critters and get some “uninterrupted work done.”

The guy said, “You need to get at least a bikini on to sun bathe here.”

“And if I don’t, are you going to call the police?” I snapped. I lay back down. “Get out of my sunshine, if you don’t mind!”

He didn’t. But he said, “I am the police, and I say you need to get some clothes on and do it now, or I’m going to have to haul your curly head into the station!”

Well, that got my attention, let me tell you! I scrambled up to stand directly in front of him. I was close enough that he had to back up a little. Now, I’m not real tall, nor am I fat, but I was taller than him and probably outweighed him by five or ten pounds. I stood as tall as I could and I pointed a finger at him. “Listen sonny,” I said, and suddenly I couldn’t control my mouth. “I’m on a private beach, minding my own business, and you are hassling me for no good reason. If some busy-body over there is complaining, tell her to look the other way!” I know I was getting out-of-control, and my finger was wagging in his face. My finger touched his nose.

Suddenly, my wrist was in a grip of steel and I was spun around with my arm being bent behind my back. I felt the cold of his handcuffs slip over my wrist as my other arm was being twisted and cuffed. “What are you doing?” I screamed. “Ruth! Ruth! Help! Help!”

“You assaulted me, lady,” said the diminutive cop. “You’re going to go to jail for that!” I felt the crowd getting closer. They were definitely on the wrong side of the dividing line, knocking down the fabric fence between the private and public areas. I saw a number of people with their phones out, capturing my predicament on their video feeds. I was going to either be a laughing stock on Tik-Tok, or a celebrity on the news. Nils was going to have a fit either way!

Just then, Ruth came tearing up the beach, yelling! The cop held out his hand in the classic “stop” position and said, “Stay back, miss, or I’ll have to arrest you for interfering with a police officer in the performance of his duty.”

“What?” she yelled. “What did Naomi do? What are you arresting her for? I need to know for our lawyer.” She said this last a lot more quietly. Of the two of us, she was definitely the more level-headed.

“She’s being arrested for creating an obscene display on this beach and for assaulting a peace officer.” He bent his head to my ear. “You have the right to remain...” the rest of his comments I knew by heart and so didn’t listen.

“Ruth,” I said, “call someone, please. Don’t let them take me and my baby to jail!”

The cop interrupted himself. “Baby? I don’t see any baby!”

“She’s pregnant, doofus,” said Ruth. “Don’t worry, baby. You’ll be out as soon as Daddy gets here and this, this...” she sputtered. “Well, I don’t know what’s lower than beach patrol, but Daddy will find it for him!”

With that, the cop spoke into his little radio and called for a car to haul me to the station and jail. The crowd, which by this time was about fifty people strong was cheering and making cat-calls. One old biddy, sitting up on a small dune that overlooked the beach, had a very self-satisfied look on her face. That fell when the cop, dragging and pushing me along up to the path leading off the beach looked at her and he motioned for her to join him.

“Mrs. Gronski, I need you to come along and file the initial complaint,” he called to her. She didn’t seem to like that, but she nodded her head and came down off the dune and followed us. When we got to the end of the path, a squad car was waiting for us. There was quite the parade, too, following us. The cop was pulling me along, with Ruth right beside me. It was kind of funny, actually; she wasn’t exactly nude like me, but her bikini was so small that her pussy lips slipped out on either side of the bottom panel, and her areola was plain to see, even if her nipples were covered. Her ass was totally bare, with a small string parting her cheeks.

Mrs. Gronski followed her, trudging in her comfortable shoes and housedress. She was followed by the rest of the camera-toting and shouting crowd. The patrolman from the car, wearing sergeants’ stripes, came around the front of the crowd and demanded, “What’s going on here?”

The kid, as I considered him, even though he wasn’t that much younger than me, took him aside and tried to explain. Ruth stood in front of me, glaring at Mrs. Gronski, who glared right back. The rest of the crowd had gotten pretty quiet, but you could hear them shuffling around, trying to get the right angle of the nude pregnant woman who was going to go to jail.

The sergeant nodded throughout the cop’s recitation. He turned to Mrs. Gronski. “Are you sure you want to press charges?” he asked.

“I don’t know, officer,” she said. “She is naked, after all, and we do have some standards here.”

“OK,” he said. “I don’t think the judge will like it very much, but that’s up to him. Now,” he continued, looking at me. I will say this for him: he looked at my eyes and not my body. “Now, what’s this about assaulting my officer?”

I hung my head. “I was telling him that this is a private beach. I think I was a bit forceful and my finger touched his nose in the telling.”

He looked around. “All right, folks. There’s nothing to see here. We’ll get this all straightened out, but we don’t need an audience. I’ll thank you all for going about your business. Enjoy this beautiful sunshine!” Most of the people who were gathered reluctantly turned back to the beach. A couple of teenagers started to hang around, but a glare from the sergeant sent them down towards the beach. They didn’t get very far before they just turned around and watched. Ruth, of course, stood her ground.

The sergeant looked at her. “I take it, you’re a friend of hers?” and he jerked his head my way.

“Yes, sergeant,” she said.

He looked slightly startled. “You know the difference?” Ruth nodded. “OK. My name is Sergeant Donald Roy, and it looks like I’m going to have to take your friend into the stationhouse. Care to wrap that beach blanket around your friend so that she can be covered when we go in?”

He made it sound so reasonable that she complied quickly and soon I was covered. It wasn’t a heavy blanket, so it was pretty comfortable. Sergeant Roy opened the door to the cruiser and helped me into it. He leaned in to fasten the seat belt, and as he did, he whispered, “Cooperate and we’ll get this cleared up as quickly as we can. We’re not in the habit of harassing the tourists.”

I nodded my head, and I noted that he did not take any liberties with me that someone with less scruples might have. He did not touch my breasts as he pulled the seat belt across, nor did he touch me more than necessary as he buckled it. I immediately liked him. “Yes, sir,” I said. “I wasn’t trying to cause trouble. I just wanted to get an all-over tan before I have my baby.”

He just harumphed and backed out of the cruiser. “Mrs. Gronski, please follow me to the stationhouse and fill out your complaint.” He turned to the beat cop. “As for you, O’Malley, seeing as how this is your first Spring Break, I want you to really think about charging this young lady with assault. Was her touch accidental or was it deliberate. Your decision, and I want you in the stationhouse by 3 PM with your answer. Got it?”

“Yes, Sergeant,” came the meek reply. Sergeant Roy got into the driver’s seat and drove past the businesses along the waterfront. We got to the stationhouse just a few minutes later and he helped me out of the cruiser. It was actually pretty awkward, but he tried his best to be a gentleman and not grope me, but at one point I stumbled and he put out his hand to steady me and accidentally put his hand on my boob. He straightened me up and pulled his hand back as if he had touched a live wire, apologizing the whole time.

He took me into a small room where he watched as a woman took my fingerprints and photographed me. I felt so horrible: here I was, looking like a perp in a crime drama and all I had done was lie down in the sun!

He led me into an interrogation room where he took my statement. He took lots of notes, and when I was done, he handed me a pad of paper and a pencil and asked me to write out what I had said and said he’d be right back. While he was gone, I wrote. He wasn’t gone very long, and when he returned, I had the statement written out. I even signed it. He brought with him a sandwich and a soda, which he placed in front of me.

I didn’t know I was hungry until I saw the sandwich. He had brought one for himself and ate it while he read my statement. “Hmmm,” he said. “Good writing, Naomi. You have a nice feel for the narrative. Correct punctuation, too.”

I perked up at the praise and thanked him. “You don’t sound like a cop,” I said. “You sound more like an English teacher.”

He looked at me over his soda. He swallowed and said, “That’s because I used to be a teacher. Have you ever thought about writing?”

“No. I only write in my journal. That’s for my grandchildren to read after I’m gone.”

“Well,” he said, “I suspect they will have some interesting reading about Grandma.” He laughed.

There was a timid tap at the door. Sergeant Roy got up and opened the door, and there stood O’Malley. “Well?” said Sergeant Roy. Actually, I was thinking of him more as Donald than Sergeant Roy.

“I thought about it, as you ordered...”

“Suggested,” said Donald.

“Suggested,” said O’Malley, “and I think the touch was inadvertent. I may have overreacted.”

“Good,” said Donald. He turned to me. “Do you think you could forgo the charges of police harassment and brutality?”

I stood up and walked over to the young man. He was looking down at his shoes, perfect for pedaling a bike on the beach, but not very practical on the street. “I think,” I said, “I can be persuaded to forget Patrolman O’Malley’s overenthusiastic response, provided he actually apologizes.”

Donald stood beside me. “Well?” he asked.

O’Malley looked up to me, his puppy-dog eyes glistening. “Miss, I apologize. I didn’t mean to escalate everything, but I could hear the crowd behind me, and Mrs. Gronski was watching with binoculars and ... and...”

Donald spoke up then. “First rule: when you’re in a hole, stop digging!” He turned his head to me. “Does that work for you? He sounded pretty sincere to me.”

I agreed. “OK,” I said. “No charges. But what do I say when my lawyer shows up? He’ll probably want to throw the book at this young man.”

“We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it. And, speaking of lawyers, I’ll bet that’s him coming down the hall with your girlfriend.”

I peered around the corner and there was Judge Joe coming down the hall with Ruth right beside him.

“This is the man I was telling you about,” said Ruth, pointing her finger at O’Malley.

“OK, Ruth,” said Joe. “I’ll take it from here.” He stuck his hand out to Sergeant Roy. “Judge Joe, for the defendant.”

“It’s OK, Judge,” said Donald, “I know who you are. I’ve gotten Patrolman O’Malley to drop his charges against Naomi, but you still have Mrs. Gronski’s obscenity charge.”

Joe and Ruth came into the room and Donald started to go out the door. He stopped midway and handed Joe my statement. “She just wrote and signed this. You might like to see it. Please give it back when you leave.”

Joe took the paper and sat down and I stopped Donald from leaving with a hand on his arm. “Thank you for the sandwich and the drink. I really appreciated it.”

“Can’t have my prisoners say I didn’t treat them right,” he said and gently closed the door.

The judge didn’t say anything while he read my statement. He finally put it down and said, “You didn’t have to make that statement, you know. You could have not said anything until I got here. Although, I’m not sure you would have gotten the sandwich if you had been stubborn.”

“It was all a misunderstanding, Joe,” I pleaded. “I just wanted to get an all-over tan and lots of Vitamin D while I was here. You know I’m going to have a baby, right?”

“Yes, Ruth told me. Still...” He hesitated a moment. “You were on our side of the fence, right? The signs saying that our side is a private, clothing-optional beach were still in place, right?”

“Oh, yes, Daddy,” said Ruth. “I made sure that they were when we first got here. One was broken, so I got a spare from the boat house and replaced it.”

“That was before this morning, right?”

“I did that right after we got here last night, just like you always taught me!” Ruth was very adamant. In fact, I remember her slipping out the night before while I was fixing dinner. So, that was what she was up to!

“Good,” said Joe. If those signs weren’t up, we might have a fight, but since they were, we’ll get this straightened out pretty quickly.” He turned to Ruth again. “Do you have those clothes with you?” She nodded. “Well, give them to Naomi so she can get dressed before we see the judge. He won’t appreciate the beach blanket.”

Ruth handed me a roll of cloth. When I laid it all out, it looked pretty minimal. I looked over at the mirror as I untucked the end of the blanket that held it up to my chest. “Get a good look, perverts,” I said in a teasing voice. “I’m going to get dressed now!” I put my feet into the skirt portion of the sundress that Ruth had brought. I pulled it up over my breasts and Ruth came over to zip me up. The skirt was short, but showed off my legs. The bodice was low-cut and rucked and was more of a peasant-blouse top, coming off my shoulders, leaving them both bare. Ruth didn’t bring me a bra, so my nipples got kind of hard and stuck out a bit. Ruth had even brought some heeled slippers that I slipped over my feet. I stood back up and shimmied everything into place.

About that time came a discreet knock on the door. Donald opened it and peered in. He whistled, almost silently. “Ready?” he asked.

“Keep your eyes in your head, Sergeant,” chuckled Joe. “Yes, we’re ready.” And we all marched out of the room and down the hall to the local judge’s hearing room. As we sat in the back of the room, Joe gave me a quick run-down of what was going to happen and what to expect.

Just then, the man Joe identified as the bailiff stood up and said, “Hear ye, hear ye! The court of the Honorable George P. Hastings is now in session.” We all stood and waited until the judge seated himself. It seemed pretty informal, and the judge wasn’t even in robes.

“OK, Jim,” said the judge. “What’s on the docket this afternoon?”

The bailiff handed him a folder and said, “Docket number 537 is an obscenity charge. A citizen states that the defendant did expose herself to the public on the East Avenue Beach.”

The judge looked up at the three of us. “OK. Will the defendant and her counsel please take a seat on the left side of me?”

When we were seated, a woman came hustling in and sat at the other table. “Sorry I’m late, your Honor,” she gushed. “My daughter had a crisis at the pre-school.”

“No problem, Jean,” said the judge. “This is just going to be a hearing, so no need to be terribly formal.” He said that, and in his gaze I knew he was including us in that statement. “I’ll give you a minute to get your head around this complaint, then we’ll proceed. Is that acceptable to both sides?”

Joe said “Sure, your Honor,” and the prosecutor agreed, so we just sat quietly.

After about three minutes, the judge said, “Ready, Jean?” She answered she was. Judge Hastings said, “Proceed.”

Jean stood up and said, “On the ____ of March ___, Edith Gronski made a complaint of indecent exposure and obscene behavior about the defendant, Naomi ____. Mrs. Edith Gronski says that the defendant willingly exposed her body to the public at the East Street Beach for about an hour before the police arrived and brought her here to the jail.”

The judge looked up. “Is that all?” he asked.

The prosecutor looked chagrinned. “I’m afraid so, your Honor.”

“Hmmm,” the judge said. “Edith, are you here in the courtroom?” I’m not sure why he asked because she was sitting right behind the prosecutor right in front of the judge.

“I am, your Honor,” she replied.

“Well, come on up here, so we can hear what you have to say.”