Chapter 20: Ride to the Riviera - Dave

The first vestiges of red and orange had just started to light the horizon when I awoke. Having forgotten to close the shades again, I was up as soon as the faintest hint of light entered the room. I tried to sit up, but my left arm appeared to be trapped. I looked down and saw it cradled between a pair of beautiful breasts. Ah yes, Tina. She had both arms wrapped around mine, and as I carefully extricated it from between her mounds, she made a whimpering noise, but soon rolled over to occupy the entire king-sized bed, which was quite an accomplishment for such a small girl. I carefully made my way out to the living room and started the coffee maker, heading for the balcony, where I found a beautiful blonde, gazing at the sunrise with great interest.

"Hey babe," I said cheerfully, walking towards Missy. To my surprise, she took two steps towards me and enveloped me in a fierce hug.

"Good morning Dave!" she said, with more energy than I could fathom for 6:30 in the morning.

"Wow, someone's happy this morning, to what do I owe this unexpected pleasure?" I asked, with a curious smile on my face.

"Not to what, Dave, to whom, and you would be referring to Jess," Missy said, blushing.

"Oh, my baby sister finally got to you? I was wondering when that was going to happen," I said calmly. Missy didn't miss my use of when rather than if.

"Well, I couldn't let you have ALL the fun, stud. How was the lovely Tina anyways?" Missy asked, rather playfully. Well this was interesting. I was half dreading this conversation, but Missy seemed very nonchalant about the whole thing. I suppose the fact that she'd spent the evening with my lovely sister had something to do with that. Still though, her lack of possessiveness was interesting.

"Tina was fine, she's still dozing. What are you doing up anyways?" I asked, trying to change the subject.

"I got up a bit ago actually, I was working on my weblog but came out here to check out the sunrise." Missy said, with a smile. "Dave, I'm happy for you,"

I started to reply, then froze. "What?" I asked, surprised.

"You're doing so much better than the last couple years. I can't tell you how upset I was to see you lock yourself up in your room for three years. I missed the fun-loving guy that was my next-door neighbor in Mesa Court, before that Elise bitch got to you," Missy said, a serious expression on her face.

"My sister said something similar," I stammered, lamely.

"Well, she's a smart girl. Hot too!" Missy smiled, then continued. "Dave, I've been in love with you since I first met you. At first I thought I loved you as a brother, but recently, I've realized that it's a lot more than that. Dave, you're the best man I've ever met. You're smart, sweet, honest... I could go on for hours, but it's not necessary. You've been doing better since you've been on this trip, Dave. Part of it is getting away, but part of it is getting your confidence back, and to be totally honest Dave, I don't care if you have to sleep with a hundred girls if it helps you get better,"

I just stared. "Missy... I..."

She cut me off. "Dave, I love you, and if things work out, I like for us to have a future together. Right now, you need to get better, and I have things of my own to figure out. Jess helped me more than you know last night, but I don't have all the answers Dave. I need to understand myself before I can be with you Dave. Someday..."

Missy broke off her sentence, and her eyes filled with tears. She turned and started back to the room, but I quickly grabbed her wrist and pulled her to me into a tight embrace. I knotted my fingers on the nape of her neck and pulled her head to mine, kissing her deeply. She melted into my arms, and threw her arms around my neck. "I hope someday is soon," I whispered into her ear, and our kiss intensified, now carrying with it a sense of promise.

"Well, this looks cozy," my sister's sarcastic voice called from the doorway. "Didn't get enough last night dear? Looks like I've created a monster!"

Missy and I swiveled our heads simultaneously to look at Jess, almost bumping together as we did it. Missy's face was alarmingly red, almost crimson. I glanced at the IWC Ingenieur on my wrist. 7:05 AM. "My lovely sister, up before noon. The surprises never cease!" I said, with a smile.

"Well, I thought we could work out, unless you two are going to do a private workout on your own. Hope I wasn't interrupting anything!" said Jess, a wicked grin now on her lovely lips.

"I was just telling Dave that I'm glad he's doing better, and that I fully intend to be with him someday, when I'm ready," said Missy, with confidence.

"Who are you, and what did you do with my shy best friend Missy?" I asked.

Missy turned to me and smiled. "You're not the only one making changes on this trip, Mister. I'm going to change for our workout. You should probably either get the lovely Tina up or let her know we're going to go, unless you plan to stay here for a 'private workout'," she said, with a grin of her own.

I followed Jess into the living room, and we each went into our rooms. To my surprise I found Tina awake, if barely. "Where did you go? I heard voices," she said, sleepily.

"That was just my sister and Missy. We were going to go hit the gym for a bit. Do you want to come with? We're going to get breakfast here after our workout. You can sleep in if you want," I said.

"Actually, I usually swim in the morning, and I would like to do that. Do one of the girls have a swimsuit I can borrow? I doubt my dress would be good for swimming," she asked.

In fact, Missy did have a swimsuit that she could borrow, as the two were more or less the same size except for height. Tina was about 5'5" in her stocking feet, but one of Missy's bikinis fit her perfectly. We made our way to the gym, and Tina immediately dove gracefully into the pool, cutting through the water with incredible speed. She was clearly an accomplished swimmer. While Missy had been on the swim team all four years of high school, Tina clearly outclassed her.

It was chest/arms day again, and after we did our warm-ups, Jess and Missy again took turns spotting each other. They increased weight again today, just by 5 pounds, while I was still stuck on the same weight. I was going to need some help to break this plateau. Maybe I'll chat with Paul when I see him in Italy. We quickly ran through our weight routine, and treadmill cardio, and when we made our way out to the pool, Tina was still going strong, nearly a hour after we'd arrived. The three of us did our laps, but we were sort of intimidated by Tina's virtuosic display, and we were perhaps a bit slower than usual. After we each took our turns in the showers without any funny business, we sat down to a nice breakfast that the kitchen had sent up. The server dished out Eggs Benedict, hash browns, and orange juice, and we all dug in.

"Tina, you're clearly a great swimmer, I'm assuming you compete?" Jess asked.

"Yes, one of the reasons I'm in Europe is to swim in the World Championships in Germany in August. I've already qualified for the US Olympic Team," she replied.

"Wow!" said Missy. "No offense, but you don't look like the stereotypical swimmer,"

"None taken," Tina smiled. "I definitely am a lot skinnier than most swimmers, but then again I swim the butterfly, which requires a different set of muscles and skill set,"

"Wait a minute, Tina... Grant?" Jess asked.

"Yeah, that's me," replied Tina.

"Didn't you win the NCAA championship in butterfly a few weeks ago?" asked Jess.

Tina nodded, blushing. "How do you know about that? It's not exactly front page material," Tina asked.

"I was there!" Jess said. One of my ex-roommates was swimming freestyle, she didn't really do that well though. I never forget a pretty face. I knew I thought I recognized you last night. You look different in a cocktail dress than you do in a swimsuit though!"

"Small world I guess," Tina said, with a smile, and everyone agreed. We chatted awhile longer while enjoying the delicious breakfast, and afterwards, Tina said she had to go meet up with her friends before they sent out a search party. She was a very nice girl although we didn't really seem to have that much in common. We exchanged contact info and she promised to make it to our party on the 4th. With that, she left.