Chapter 1: Confusion

Linda woke up, shaking off sleep with a yawn, and stretched out the arms from her fit, sport-loving body. She glanced around. In spite of the dim light, she recognized the furniture of her beach-house bedroom. Heavy drapes kept out most of the sunlight, allowing her to sleep longer than usual. It was the weekend, and there was no need to get up at sunrise.

Linda sighed as she let her head roll over to watch her younger sister Nikki sleep. Then she looked at the red display of the clock radio: 10:23 AM. 'Dammit, so late?' she complained to herself. The seventeen-year-old girl sighed again and sat up, driving out of her body the last of her sleepiness. She got to her feet and walked over to the window. Drawing the drapes slightly apart, she looked out and rejoiced. The sky was a cloudless deep blue, and a warm breeze blowing from inland stroked her smiling face. It was the perfect weather to enhance her golden tan. In the afternoon, it would be promenade time...

Linda picked up the bikini perched on the back of a wicker chair and ambled into the bathroom, whistling a song Rick used to sing with his band. Rick Hillman, the cutest guy for the prettiest girl in San Fernando High... Linda smiled at her own reflection in the bathroom mirror, brushing her long blond hair away from her face. 'Some self-glorification can't hurt, ' she thought. But popularity was not a question of just being pretty. Self-confidence and the right amount of rebelliousness seemed to do the trick - at least for her, it did.

Actually, all Linda's sisters seemed to do fairly well as far as popularity was concerned, particularly every time the four of them were together and - more importantly - had fun together. Nikki, thirteen months her junior, was the sweetest of them all. Nikki was Linda's confidante and her best friend, the one who cheered her up when she was down, the one who listened, the one who covered up for her. In contrast, her sister Zoë was an outspoken, bullheaded, quarrelsome, tomboyish 15-year-old, who wouldn't hesitate to use either her hands to pull her sisters' hair during a fight, or her nails to protect her identical twin Jeannie from a bully. It was clear to Linda that the love and hate lost between the twins was due to Zoë's overprotective, overzealous nature towards their youngest sister. Jeannie would protest and drive Zoë away from her, but it didn't take long for them to kiss and make up. Jeannie was intelligent and resolute, yet withdrawn and thoughtful. Like any pair of identical twins, Zoë and Jeannie loved to play tricks on strangers by dressing and behaving alike. But more often than not they would wear different outfits and hairdos, affirming their own identity and character. Despite all the bickering and name-calling, Linda knew that all her sisters were there for each other. Linda was even proud of them, the way people stared at them as they walked by, arms intertwined, laughing and talking as loud as they could, whooping it up as sisters should.

Dad took pride in his "little girls", too. More precisely, Dad took pride in their good looks. With a tipsy smile on his face and a glass of bourbon in his right hand, he had once said that the McDougall genes were known to produce the most beautiful females on the planet. His daughters were living proof of it. 'Yeah, right, ' Linda thought, but her reflection kept smiling contentedly.

Time for a shower, Linda decided. She tossed her white T-shirt and panties onto the tiled floor and hopped into the bathtub. Her face welcomed the warm shower. Her right hand clasped the soap and worked it over her body and her firm athlete's breasts. Rick joked that she had the figure for model, but what the hell... Her parents wouldn't buy it... Yes, it was just another of her wild boyfriend's crazy ideas. They didn't get along those three. Come to that, Mom and Dad didn't get along with many people anyway. It was strange for someone who was such a successful manager of people and money - Fred McDougall, the most talked about CEO in Silicon Valley, the man who turned the obscure software company called Servenet into one of the hottest stocks on Wall Street. From time to time Dad mentioned his fascination for the political arena, and the possibility of a bid for Congress. Linda argued against it. She said that politics is such a dirty business, with far too much attention from the news media. The lack of freedom would be too damned stifling. No, Washington DC was definitely not the place to be. Finishing her shower and grabbing her terry towel, she concluded, 'Give me the California sun instead, and I'll be forever happy.'

Linda found, as expected, that Nikki hadn't moved a muscle. She was sleeping away, and unaware that her big sister was up and ready to go. Linda stopped in front of the vanity mirror. She examined her own reflection once more, making sure her sporty, skin-tight white and blue bikini with red streamlined stripes looked perfect, enhancing her natural curves instead of hiding them. Teasing the guys on the beach was a turn-on Linda couldn't resist. Capturing the attention of eager young faces was such a thrill, an intoxicating drug that sent chills down her spine and produced a mellow warmth down there, between her legs. Linda smiled to herself, heading for the window. She drew the drapes aside and hollered, "Rise and shine!"

Nikki's eyes remained shut. Her slender ribcage moved up and down with the regular beat of sleep despite the strong sunlight streaming into the room, and the stare of someone waiting impatiently for a reaction. Her sister Nikki was hopelessly lazy. Linda had forgotten how many times she had to shake her sister awake, drag her out of bed and splash her face with cold water to get her going. It was a daily routine Linda didn't care much for. Nikki promised she would change, but years had flown by and the promised change was still to happen.

Linda knocked on the twins' door. Without waiting for an answer she walked in and repeated the same routine, letting the daylight stream in and announcing the beginning of a new day. Linda would go easy on Zoë and Jeannie as the twins weren't as lazy as Nikki. They would eventually get up and ready on their own, without the need for a second round of hollering and poking.

Linda walked back to her room, sighing once again. Minutes elapsed before Zoë came into her older sisters' room, yawning and greeting Linda. Zoë looked at her big Sis picking clothes up off the floor, like a loving mother, while Nikki slumbered away in bed.

"Hi, Zoë," Linda smiled back, as she took a fleeting glance up at her sister for long enough to acknowledge her presence, but not enough to interrupt her tidying the room. "How did you sleep last night? No nightmares this time?"

Zoë shook her head. After a long pause she asked the obvious, "Is Nikki still sleeping?"

"Yeah, as usual."

"Why don't we do something about it?" Zoë suggested, flipping her long straight blond hair over her shoulders.

"Like what?" asked Linda, looking at her sister and holding up a sweater, Nikki's, that she was about to fold and put away in the wardrobe.

"Tickle her to death," Zoë grinned.

"Yes," said Jeannie, joining her sisters. "Let's do it."

Linda laughed, amused by the twins' mischief and enthusiasm - no wonder they sailed through the tryouts for the S.F. High cheerleader squad. Zoë and Jeannie, Mom's and Dad's favorites, scored straight A's as easily as they mastered straddle jumps. There were plenty of reasons to envy them, Linda realized. Plenty of reasons...

"OK," Linda finally agreed, "I'll count to three, and three of us will jump on Nikki."

"Yes," Zoë and Jeannie exclaimed, their clear blue eyes shining with anticipation. That too made Linda laugh again.

"One... two... three..." and the three girls dived onto Nikki's bed, tickling their sister to death as promised, showing no mercy. Nikki tried to wriggle free. She screamed and kicked, but she didn't stand a chance. Her sisters made sure she paid dearly for her laziness. This was a punishment, a lesson to be learned.

"Time to wake up," Linda giggled, pinning Nikki's arms down, preventing her escaping from the twins. Zoë and Jeannie went on tickling her squirming body, torturing her with their fingers, while Nikki pleaded with them to stop. Nikki made another attempt to kick them away, shouting and screaming, but the unrelenting twins kept a good grip on her. When the tickling stopped and she pushed them off her, Nikki laughed as hard as her sisters.

Linda got to her feet, smiling and pulling her hair away from her face. She stared at Nikki, noticing how flushed her sister's face was, and that her pajama top had become unbuttoned in the struggle, revealing her firm, beautiful, medium-sized breasts. Nikki's nipples were erect as though she had gotten off on what just happened. Linda felt a certain, undefined tension building up between her legs. The whole thing had been exciting, sexy even. Her breasts touched Nikki's during the fight to keep her sister down. Was that why Nikki's nipples looked so hard?

"From now on that's what you're going to get if you don't wake up on time," said Jeannie, smiling and showing her perfect teeth.

"Yeah," Zoë agreed. "You can count on that. Right, Linda?"

Linda woke up from her daydreaming and stammered in agreement. She urged them to get ready. It was almost 11 AM. It was a shame to remain indoors with such perfect weather outside. After breakfast, they strolled down to the promenade, looking for the right spot on the beach to settle down and enjoy the sea, the blue sky and the guys...

Wearing their 150-dollar shades, the happy, loud foursome wanted to look "cool" and distant. Adrenaline raced through their young bodies when they realized that guys and girls alike would look at them with awe, lust or envy. Walking down the promenade was an obvious game of watching and being watched.

The guys would sidle up to them and mouth the usual pick-up lines. Linda and Nikki would laugh and ignore them. Zoë usually answered in kind, knowing that their older sisters were just a few feet away if things went too far. When they were together, it seemed to Zoë that everything was possible, and allowed. No jealous boyfriends around, no Mom or Dad to deflate their high spirits...

After walking for a quarter of an hour Linda suggested a spot next to the volleyball net. Before they set foot on the beach, a male voice called out, "Hi, girls!"

"Hi!" Linda replied, turning toward the deep, manly voice.

It was Mr. Cool, an attractive, roguish kind of a guy, who covered his long light brown hair with a red bandanna. He had piercing blue eyes and was built like a bodybuilder. He craved attention and worked hard on his three-point plan for success: Number 1 - to get spotted by a Hollywood talent hunter; Number 2 - to become the next Sylvester Stallone; and Number 3 - to have the world, and the girls, at his feet. Beside him stood Max and Pete. They were less conspicuous than Mr. Cool but equally attractive. Max and Pete worked for Mr. Cool's surfing school. They were known for their prowess with the surfboard and with their female pupils - whatever that meant. Nikki and Zoë met Mr. Cool's gang at the surfing school a couple of years ago. The girls wanted to learn something new, something exciting... and those guys seemed to be the right instructors - cute, self-assured and fun to be with.

Linda and Nikki caught Mr. Cool's and Max's sexual vibes, in spite of the obvious age difference. Mr. Cool and Max were grown men in their late twenties. Both of them knew they could end up in jail if they went too far with those tempting teenage girls. Still, that didn't stop the guys' trying. Linda had to push Mr. Cool away more than once. It just didn't feel right, somehow... Linda was afraid for her sisters. She didn't want them to get hurt. And she didn't want them to do something stupid with these guys if they had too much to drink and were having a good time. She was their Big Sis. She felt responsible for her younger sisters... She just couldn't help it.