Chapter 26

Back at the hotel, I took a shower, and then changed into something that I could wear comfortably, no matter where we decided to go out for that evening. I was sitting in the room, watching television, when Em and the rest came back from having their dinner. They had gone out for Mexican food, and were coming back to change to go walk on the beach.

This meant I needed to change again too. We drove over to the beach, and went for a walk. It wasn't cold, but there was a breeze blowing in, and it was a little cooler than we were prepared for. Em and I were all wrapped around each other, partly for the warmth, and partly because it just felt so good.

Gary had loped off, by himself, running down the beach at a brisk trot. Part of his regimen for getting into better shape for the next year's basketball season, or so he claimed. We thought he just didn't want to be seen with Emily and I, when we were being what he termed 'all mushy'.

Emily told me that several girls were interested in Gary now, mostly because he was one of the few freshmen with a varsity letterman's jacket. She said it was funny, watching all the freshman girls, most of them, her size, or even shorter, fawning all over him in the hallways. She said Gary wasn't even taking advantage of the opportunities all this attention was affording him.

Gary had started getting a lot more playing minutes in the second half of the season. Him learning how to become a stronger rebounder hadn't hurt his chances for getting this extra playing time. Gary had been working with one of the assistant coaches on rebounding position, and on perfecting his outlet passes after he managed to get the defensive rebounds. He was quickly becoming something of a catalyst for getting the teams fast break started. He was still something of a project for his coaches, but they were optimistic about his potential as a sophomore, junior, and senior. While he was desperately hoping to stop growing, his coaches were praying for a legitimate seven footer. So far, the coaches prayers were still being rewarded. Gary was already six eight, with no end of growth in sight. He had slowed his rate of growth though, and he found that encouraging. He wore a size fifteen sneaker though, and he thought that meant he might make it to seven feet. To him, any seven footer would automatically have achieved freak status. He didn't want to get there.

Kitty was walking behind Em and I at first, but she pulled up alongside us, asking me about the Webb's and Anne's first reaction to their home.

"She really liked the bedroom they have for her. She wanted to stay there, instead of coming back to the hotel with me. She's playing golf in the morning, and then I'll call her in the afternoon, after we get back from the zoo. They have a daughter that makes Anne seem a lot more normal. Its kind of sad really. She had an auto accident, and she had some really severe brain injuries. They managed to keep her alive, but she has some permanent damage to her brain. It affects her speech, makes her childlike, and she has very poor impulse control. She's also horny all the time. She sneaks out when she gets too horny, and this causes her parents a lot of worry."

"How old is she?"

"She looks close to forty, but she kind of acts a lot younger. She does things in public that she shouldn't."

"What things?" Emily was pulling on my arm when she asked me that question.

"Different things. I told you that she sneaks out? She finds men, and she sleeps with them. Apparently a lot of them. Her father said she sometimes like to masturbate at the dinner table, during meals. While we were visiting, she sat on the sofa, next to her father, and opened her legs while lifting her dress, so Anne and I could see her crotch. She had taken off her panties, too."

"I'll bet you had a nice long look."

"No, I turned away as soon as I thought to do it. It took awhile before I even knew what she was doing. Her father wanted me to see her doing things like that, because he wanted me to know what Anne might be exposed to. Anne just laughed. She said she'd seen people do that before, at her hospital. She told the Webb's it wouldn't bother her, not unless Lenore, that's the girls name, was wanting to have sex with her. Later when Mr. Webb told us about her liking to masturbate at the dinner table, Anne told him she didn't mind that either, just as long as Lenore wasn't going to be the one passing out the food after she did that. She asked Lenore why she didn't just wait and do that alone in her bedroom."

"What did Lenore say?"

"She told Anne to shut up."

"What does this Lenore look like?" Emily was again tugging at my arm when she asked her question. Did she think I wouldn't hear her if she wasn't pulling on my arm to get my attention?

"I'd say open and a little swollen. I saw some pink, but the curly dark hairs kept me from really getting that good a look at it." My arm felt like she'd pulled it out of its socket. "She's medium height, a little plump, and she has a lot of big scars on her forehead and on one side of her face. She's about forty years old, Em, why are you getting so upset?"

"Do you think Anne's going to enjoy staying there?" Kitty was trying to defuse my situation with Em.

"I think so, especially if she can play golf everyday. She hasn't had any chance to try to live a normal life, not for a long time. If she stays away from alcohol, she might start to get better. The doctor said a lot of her problems were caused by her lifestyle. She gets delusional at times, but he thinks that's mostly just confusion, because her brain isn't used to functioning without being under the influence of either alcohol, drugs or both. Her nerves, and her aversion to loud noise, are also symptoms that should improve in a calmer, quieter, setting. He thinks she needs time to get acclimated to a different level of living, before some of her other problems can be dealt with. He thinks she'll always be what he called 'fragile', and will need to live in a somewhat protected environment."

"Did you speak to Lenore, Kenny?" Again with the arm tug.

"I said hello to her when we were first introduced, and when I left, I gave Anne and her hugs. I told Anne to enjoy her golf, and that I'd call her tomorrow. I thanked Lenore for showing me her pussy, and then I told her it was a very nice one."

"You didn't really tell her that." This time it was another socket pulling tug.

"I did. She was getting jealous of all the attention her parents were giving to Anne, especially her father. I thought telling her that might take her mind off of being angry about the other things. She seemed to calm down after I said it. I really want Anne to fit in there, and the Webb's won't keep her, not if Lenore gets too upset by having her there."

"Emily, Ken was trying to help Anne. I'm sure he didn't mean what he told her." Kitty again tried to help me with Em.

"Em, your mom is right. Sometimes, when you see a situation starting to become unraveled, you need to step in and do something, before it becomes too serious to fix. That's all I was doing. You know I'm not interested in any other girls besides you."

We stayed out, walking on the beach until we all started getting tired, It was only ten o'clock in California, but to us, it was midnight. Unfortunately, by the time we realized how tired we were, we were a good four miles from the rental car. Gary offered to jog back to the car and drive it over to the road that ran parallel to the beach. I thought it was a good idea, and so did Emily.

The problem was, Gary didn't have a driver's license. He had taken a few driving lessons with his father, but even he admitted he really didn't know how to drive very well. Overruling Kitty's advice against him going back to get the car, I tossed him the keys, and told him we'd be waiting out along the side of the road for him to come to get us. After he had run off, back in the direction we'd left the rental car, Kitty really lit into me about my being so reckless and irresponsible.

"Kitty, you and I drive all the time, but did you want to run four or five miles back to get the car, and then have to drive back here to meet us? I didn't either, because, as far as I'm concerned, we're all here for a vacation. For Gary, who doesn't get many chances to drive, this will be a great adventure. I'll bet, if you ask him after we get back home, what his favorite thing for the whole trip was, he'll tell you it was us letting him drive the rental car by himself. He'll be careful driving too, because he'll want to show us that he did it without having any problems at all. Worst comes to worst, if he crashes, the car rental is in your name."

I had a difficult time getting loose from Em's grasp when Kitty decided to try to attack me. I was faster than her though, and, by the time we ran up to the road, Kitty had run out of steam. There was a wood and wire fence about two and a half feet high, separating the road from the start of the beach. Kitty and I sat on separate wooden poles, and Emily sat in my lap. It must have been close to an hour later that Gary slowly pulled up alongside where we were sitting. We all got back in the rental, and I drove us back to the hotel.

"Nicely done, Gary. You have any problems?"

"I got really tired from all that running, but driving wasn't hard at all. I only took so long because I had to stop for a few minutes, about halfway there, to rest, because my side hurt so bad. Other than that one stop, I ran all the way."

"It would have taken any of the rest of us three times as long to do what you did. Admit it, Kitty, I was right to send Gary."

"Just drive us back, Kenny. I can't wait to get in that hotel bed. I can't believe walking on the beach like we did can make you so tired."

"It's that sand. We should have stayed down closer to the water, where the sand is nice and firm. I'm not that tired. Not like I would have been if we'd all hiked back to the car together."

"But the water was so cold, Kenny. At least the soft sand wasn't cold. But, I'm not that tired either." Emily was sending me another message, telling me she had high hopes that some good fucking was in store for both of us, as soon as we said goodnight to both her mom and Gary.

We got back, said our quick good nights, and went into our own suite. I'm not sure what Emily was trying to prove, but she kept after me, all through the night, waking me whenever I'd doze off, spurring me on to make love to her some more. I was so tired at one point, that I didn't even bother pinning her hands or lifting her legs. She finally had to ask me to do it. I think it was around five in the morning before she finally fell asleep herself. Gary and Kitty phoned our room, waking me up at eight o'clock. Emily, of course, slept right through her phone call. I told her we were still sleeping, but she and Gary should have breakfast in the hotel dining room, or else call down to get room service. I told her I had some kind of travel lag or something, because I needed at least three or four hours more sleep. I promised we'd be ready to have some lunch, and head over to the zoo no later than one o'clock. I went back to sleep.

At twelve o'clock, Emily woke me with a blow job. I tried to push her head away from me, but that hurt her feelings, so I told her I'd only been kidding, and turned us around so I could have my breakfast too. We were both showered and dressed before one. We went to another Mexican restaurant for lunch. There were a lot of Mexican restaurants in San Diego.

The zoo was huge, and its reputation as one of the world's better zoos was probably well deserved. The thing was, none of us were really that interested in seeing a lot of different animals locked up. We had been talking about packing it in at the zoo and doing something else, when Gary asked if we could go down to Mexico. Kitty had been to Mexico before, but none of the rest of us ever had. It was only about three thirty when we decided to do it.

I found a pay phone and call over to the Webb's. Mr. Webb answered the phone, and he and I spoke for a few minutes. He said he and Anne had enjoyed a nice round of golf. She was pretty rusty, he said, but she had still made enough good shots that he was confident she'd be giving him strokes within a month. That sounded promising. I asked him to put Anne on the phone.

"Hi, Anne, Mr. Webb said you guys had a good time golfing?"

"We did. I forgot how much fun it was, and the golf course was green and nice, even in February. Jack says he plays all year round."

"Jack?"

"Mr. Webb. His name is John, but he goes by Jack. He told me to call him that. I didn't play very well, but I still had a good time. Jack has his own golf cart, and he bought me a set of used clubs, instead of just renting them. These are good clubs, but they were selling them because another member's wife had died. We're going back later, to the driving and putting ranges. We're all going, even Lenore, because she promised us she'd be good."

"Well, I just called to make sure you were still happy with staying there. We're all going down to Tijuana for the evening. I'll call you again in the morning, before we head up to Anaheim."

"We're playing golf in the morning. What time were you going to call me?" She sounded concerned. I thought she was worried that she'd have to miss golf, because she needed to wait around for my phone call.

"I can hold off, and call you from the hotel, tomorrow afternoon. Are you sure you like it there? If you're already sure, you can stay there, and I'll have your personal stuff packed at the hospital, and sent to you."

"I don't have to go back with you?" She started crying.

"No, not if you don't want to. You weren't committed to that hospital, Anne, you're a voluntary patient. All we have to do is notify them that you've decided not to return. You do want to stay where you are, right?"

"I didn't know you could do that. I didn't want to go back, but I didn't want you getting mad at me. I'm sorry. Yes, yes, I do want to stay here. I brought all my personal stuff, and my clothes with me."

"Okay then. Put Mr. Webb back on the phone, Anne. I'll talk to you again before we leave."

"Hello?"

"Mr. Webb. From what Anne was telling me, things are going great from her end. How about with you, your wife, and Lenore?"

"We've had no problems, and no more reservations about Anne. We all think she'll fit right in here. I heard Anne telling you about that set of clubs we bought. It was too good of an opportunity for us to let pass up. Anne and Lenore are starting to get along better. We think Lenore likes having someone she can share her secrets with. The only other detail for us to work out is how to set up the monthly payments for her stay. I wish we were well enough fixed that we wouldn't need to charge for her being here, but the Navy pension isn't stretching as far as we'd originally hoped it would."

"What I'll have Mr. Clooney do is to wire ten thousand dollars into your account immediately. I think he has that information from you? Then, I want you to keep track of all the extras, like golf, new clothes, going out to eat, or even going to a movie. Any entertainment items that are over and above the basic care rate that we agreed to. I'll pay those to you on a quarterly basis. I'd like to make sure she has as good a life as she can. If she needs something special, you can call me, and it will be provided, or the money for it will be sent to you"

"You are being very generous, Ken. I will do my best to make her stay here with us a pleasant one, all of us will. Pat and I are consumed with curiosity to see whether her influence over Lenore will still hold sway when we're all out at the range later. Lenore has promised Anne that she'd behave. We could never get her to promise us that, so this is a real milestone. She usually keeps her word. Not always, but usually. It would be wonderful, for my wife and I, if we could once again start taking Lenore out in public with us. We've been like prisoners here ourselves."