Chapter 41

We finished our ice cream and I unlocked the bikes. Nothing had been said since Jill had made her offer but I could feel the change between us. A closeness that hadn't been there before. A commitment.

She looked different to me as we rode toward the lake. A little more mature. More attractive, more desirable.

My first impulse was to grab Jill and take her back behind the bushes on the side of the road. But, looking at her, I realized she was too special for that. As was I.

I must have been staring at her, taking her in, for a couple of minutes. She looked over at me.

"What?"

"I'm sorry. I just... I love you."

"Why? Because you're going to get lucky?"

"I already am lucky."

Her brakes squealed as she stopped. "Come here."

I was a few feet ahead of her so I turned around and rode back, facing her as I came to a stop.

She reached out and pulled me in. Her eyes closed, she raised her mouth and we swapped souls. Or something like that.

I imagine we could have held hands as we rode the rest of the way to the lake but we didn't. We each looked at the other and smiled a lot.

It would have been nice to be the only two people at Lake Fremont. To find a place with chirping birds and grass that didn't itch and blue sky and gentle breezes where we could make sweet, gentle love without a care in the world. But it wasn't.

We paid our $2 each and entered the park.

There's a section that has some sand and is treated as a beach. There was the usual assortment of noisy children running around with everything from air mattresses to inner tubes to swim fins with or without masks and snorkels to the young ones with the water wings around their thin arms. And the ones stuck on the sand with their plastic pails and shovels.

I didn't spot any topless models or thongs. No one at all I would call attractive. It's amazing what people think they can get away with wearing at the beach. Come to think of it, they do get away with it. The whole gamut was there. Skinny legs, fat legs. 40DD breasts hanging down on 56" bellies. Fat butts, skinny butts, sagging butts. There was a man with white hair and a gut strutting around in a speedo. As if someone would care. There were four of five other males, mostly sitting in chairs or laying down with an open beer nearby. The majority of adults were moms.

A little further down were a couple of cement ramps that sloped down into the water. A trailer with a small boat on it was being backed down one of them.

The lake wasn't big enough for boats of any size. But I counted 12 of them from rowboats to motor boats 12 - 15 feet long. Most of them were still in the water with people fishing over the side. Except the solitary sailboat. I could see the two guys in it rowing. There was no wind.

There was a bike path that circled the lake. Jill looked at me.

"Are you game?"

"Sure."

We took off at a leisurely pace, checking out the sights.

Being a fresh water lake, there was quite a lot of vegetation. Some of the trees were fairly tall. There was an area on the far side that went back a quarter mile or so, then ran into a small mountain. Not quite as many trees and a large open space with grass. Picnic benches and grills on concrete slabs littered the area. There were a couple of volleyball nets, some tether balls hanging next to their poles. Over to the south was a baseball diamond. And there was a fairly large slab, maybe 100 feet on a side, covered by an aluminum roof. Suitable for dancing or for setting up tables. This place was booked just about every weekend day in the summer for company picnics.

Today there were families at two of the picnic tables. I saw a guy in an apron cooking some burgers on one of the grills. Four girls, maybe between 5 and 9 were trying to play badminton on one of the volleyball courts. I don't think I saw anyone hit the shuttlecock after another person did. They'd run after it, laughing, bent over trying to get to it before it hit the ground, making one or two swings in the air. One girl hit it backwards the couple of times I saw her try. But they were having a blast.

There was a softball game going on, too. A few fathers, two mothers and an assortment of kids from 8 or 9 to 15 or so. On further inspection, it wasn't a game. One of the dads was pitching and they would rotate batters. The younger the batter, the slower the pitches. It appeared that each batter was allowed to stay at the plate until he had gotten several hits. It was funny to see the older kids get razzed by the two mothers. I got the idea the two oldest thought their shit didn't stink and their mothers were enjoying pointing out that they weren't perfect. It was funny to see a kid tense up and grit his teeth after he swung and missed and the moms let him hear about it. The guy pitching made sure it wasn't easy on them, too.