42: Continuing On

School was almost out. Renee and Elaine hardly showed up the last two weeks. It was senior madness. They all got to take their final exams a week before everyone else and that was all they had to show up for. I was surprised when Renee showed up at our table for lunch on Monday. She'd mostly been hanging around with Lamar and the other seniors since before the prom.

"Brian, I was wondering if I could take you to the party at Brenda's Saturday," she said when she sat beside me.

"Oh. You don't really have to come all the way over and pick me up, but it would be great. We'd have a chance to catch up a little."

"Um ... I wasn't very clear. I know we'll all see each other at the party and it will be one big group hug. I was asking you to be my official date for the day. I won't monopolize your time or anything, but Brenda said you'd had dates at the pool party before."

"Well, sort of. I guess though. What's up, Renee?"

"I'm going to graduate Sunday and I haven't been on a real date with you since before basketball season and I'd like to spend some time with my boyfriend and if you don't want to, I understand, but I just..."

I reached around Renee and hugged her to me, stroking her fine blonde hair telling her shh, shh.

"Renee, I would love to be your date on Saturday. In fact, I'd love it if you came over early and let me fix you lunch first. Or better yet, come for breakfast and then I'll take you riding in the morning and we can talk and hold hands and kiss if you want to or just walk around and catch up on everything in our lives."

"Better stop with breakfast or I'll be over to sleep with you all night."

"That wouldn't be bad either," I said. "Let me make Saturday a special day for you, girlfriend. I'd really love that."

"What time is breakfast?"

I planned an early breakfast by Renee standards. It was at nine o'clock instead of six like I would have planned for Rhonda. I fixed egg white omelets with fresh vegetables and goat cheese. I had a nice fruit compote to go with it and made sure I had a fresh pot of coffee when she got there.

"Good morning, Renee," Mom said as she came into the kitchen just after I kissed my girlfriend good morning. She hugged Renee and looked over my shoulder. "Hmm. I should complain about the special treatment he's giving you, but he cooked just as good a breakfast for Dad and Anna and me when we got up. And his new bread recipe is to die for. We saved you some."

"Thanks, Mrs. Frost. I'm fortunate to be on the receiving end of Brian's special treatment this morning," Renee smiled.

"Well, we're glad you can take him to the party today. We're off to West Lafayette to pack up Betts and bring her home. One week and she'll be married. Unbelievable. We'll be back around noon tomorrow if all goes well, Honeybunch." She stood back and looked at the two of us, then zeroed in on me. "We trust you, Brian. Just be responsible." Dad and Anna came into the kitchen and greeted each of us as they were on their way out. Jen and Court were spending the weekend at Brenda's house. Anna was going with Mom and Dad to Purdue, so she'd stayed in the guest room last night. I think. I really wasn't sure anymore.

I served Renee her omelet and coffee, buttered toast for her, and then sat beside her as she ate.

"Aren't you eating?" she asked.

"I had to eat with the family earlier, but I'm definitely having more toast and coffee with you."

"Thank you for making me such a lovely breakfast. This omelet is fantastic. You know there's way more food here than I can eat," she laughed. "You must be used to feeding other guys. Here, share a bite of omelet with me." She cut a bit of omelet with her fork and offered it to me. It really was pretty good. I wasn't sure when I decided to only use whites. I'd mixed the yolks in with my deviled eggs earlier. I thought maybe a little paprika might accent the goat cheese.

"Mmm. Just a minute," I said and ran to the spice rack. I cut a little of her omelet and sprinkled just a hint of the red powder on it. Then I held it out to her.

"That's amazing! You have to try it. How did you know to put paprika on it?"

"I'm not sure," I answered. I sprinkled the rest of the omelet and cut a piece for myself. Yeah. That was really good. "I put paprika on the deviled eggs I made for Brenda's party this afternoon. Suddenly the combination of egg and goat cheese just seemed to call out for it."

"You made deviled eggs, too? I feel so pampered and spoiled by my boyfriend." I fed her another bite. "He not only made me breakfast, he's feeding it to me! What are you doing for the rest of my life?"

"Oh, I thought I'd like grow up, get a job, that sort of thing." We laughed. She finished eating and I cleaned things up. We sat finishing our coffee.

"I feel like I haven't really been as much a part of things as I thought I would. I guess the pull of my classmates and position in my class always kept me a little separate."

"You and Elaine spent about the same amount of time at our table at lunch as you did with your other friends. That's way more than I ever expected."

"Yes, but I've never been here for a sleepover or for a Saturday study session. I've never even seen your room." That sounded like a pretty broad hint.

"Uh, would you like to see it now?" She smiled and I led her by the hand to the attic stairs. I followed her very cute little butt to my room.

"This is way cool! You have a whole floor to yourself? No wonder you can have study sessions and sleepovers. My room at home would fit in yours three times." She walked around, discovering my little empire. I was pretty proud of it. She stopped and looked at my Mac and then reached over beside it. "You read Seventeen magazine?"

"Uh, well..."

"Wait a minute! 'Heaven Sent?' This is Joanne Barnes! 'America's next supermodel takes Paris fashion by storm.' This is cool! And you've got a copy of Elle in French? How did you get that?"

"I just got it in the mail. I think Joanne sent it to me, but there was no note. Just a couple pictures."

"Pictures?"

"They're in the magazine." Renee opened the magazine and three 8x10 glossies fell into her hands. Each was autographed and personalized. They just said, 'To Brian, from Heaven.' There was a little heart drawn before the 'from.' I really didn't know what to make of it, but they were beautiful pictures. The first one was an intense close-up portrait with her incredible smile just lighting up the page. The other two showed her in a couple different dresses walking down a runway in a fashion show. The wall behind had 'Dior, ' written all over it. A similar picture was in one of the fashion spreads in the magazine.

"She's so beautiful. You still love her, don't you, Brian?"

"Yeah. I guess so. My heart sort of aches when I look at the pictures. She even adopted the name 'Heaven.' They never refer to her as anything else or mention her real name. It's what I always called her. I try not to think about it most of the time, but she's always there. I just don't know how to fall out of love. Maybe it's true that love never ends." Renee carefully put the pictures back in the magazine and carefully put them by my computer where she found them. She walked over to where I'd been leaning in the first dormer.

"You love a lot. I've heard you tell just about every one of your girlfriends that you love them. Especially Rhonda and Jennifer and Courtney. I know they're really special to you. Do you love me, too? A little?"

"Renee, the more I've gotten to know you this year the easier it's been to love you. Don't think that's just something like a universal love or I love you like a sister. Take Mercedes or Shelly, for example. We had some rough times getting to know each other a little at first. I mean, I had to bite Mercedes in the ass before she figured out I meant what I said. We've gotten to like each other pretty well since then. But it doesn't even come close to what I feel for you and Elaine and Donna. I only single out you three from the rest of the group because you are the upper classmen. You know, Joanne never wanted to be seen together with me because she was two years older than me? And she isn't two years older. She's only about seventeen months older, but that put her two years ahead of me in school and that was too much for her to be comfortable with. But you and Elaine and Donna have never had a problem going out with us guys who are three years younger or being seen sitting with us. You are special. It's not just because I like you, but I feel like you really like me, too. So, yeah. I love you, Renee. Not just as a sister or a friend or because the Bible says love your neighbor. I love you as my girlfriend."

"Would you give your girlfriend a kiss?" I folded Renee into my arms as she leaned against me and we let our lips play with each other. Renee might be the best kisser I've ever been with. She just took my breath away. "Brian," she whispered as I held her, "for the duration of our date today, I give you explicit permission to kiss, to love, and to touch me outside or inside my clothes in any way our agreement allows. I hope sometime today or tonight that you'll undress me and make love to me as much as we can and keep a layer of clothing between us. I want to feel what it is like to be the one you focus on. Of course, if you embarrass me in front of our friends, I might end the date sooner than expected, but I'm putting myself in your hands—literally—because I trust you and I love you." Talk about taking my breath away! I guess I sort of sank down on my knees in front of her and held both her hands in mine.

"Renee, I feel so overwhelmingly honored I'm too weak to stand. I want you to have my explicit permission to kiss, to love and to touch me outside or inside my clothes in any way our agreement allows. But please, as much as I want to, let's don't just get naked and fall into bed. Let's go out and have fun together and with our friends. Okay?" She smiled and nodded.

There was a horse waiting for us in the barn.

Renee and I had fun all morning. We brushed the horses and talked about things both inconsequential and personally important. I asked her where she was going to go to college and she said it was a surprise and she'd tell people tonight. But we talked a lot about what her life was like. Her dad left his family soon after she was born, so she'd always been raised by a single mom. He wasn't interested in a baby and by the time she was old enough to be interesting—remarkably about the time she grew boobs—she wasn't interested in starting a relationship with him. He'd always paid his child support, though, so with her mom working full time, they had plenty. He'd paid off the mortgage as part of the divorce settlement. He'd made a lot of money in the stock market and decided the middle class lifestyle of a wife, kid, and house in the suburbs wasn't for him. The equitable distribution of property included child support and the house and a nice savings account for her mother, but it didn't even come close to being half of what he made. He had provided a generous college fund for Renee, though. She said a little bitterly that it was a great substitute for a father. I held her close.

Renee had no desire to ride alone. She wanted to ride in front of me, let me nibble on her ears, and occasionally brush her breast with my hand. A few times she turned in my arms to claim a major kiss and then we'd go back to talking. I loved to cook, but I was also intent on becoming a chemist. Mr. Johnson was going to get me enrolled in a course from the IU Extension next year in bio-chemistry. Mr. Jonas, my guidance counselor, insisted that I still had to fulfill my basic high school requirements which included two more credits in science. He'd signed me up for physics. Well at least it wasn't biology. But I was going to have a pretty heavy load with seven high school classes and a college class. The good part was that when I was a junior, I'd be almost done with my high school core curriculum and the school would fund more college credits as long as I kept my grade average at a B or better.

We unsaddled Gypsy and brushed her down. She was a happy girl when we'd finished pampering her and it was almost time to head to the party.

"Ooh. We smell like a barn," Renee said when we hugged each other for another kiss.

"A horse," I corrected her.

"Regardless, we need a shower so we don't go to a party and offend all our other girlfriends and boyfriends."

"I don't know, Renee. Most of our girlfriends know how one gets to smell like a horse. They might be envious instead of offended." We laughed.

"They'll be even more envious when I tell them how we got rid of the smell. Put your swimming trunks on. I'll put my bikini on and get in the shower. Come and join me." Oh my goodness. A shower with Renee? Even fully clothed, my cock was going to be stretching the fabric. I heard the water start and Renee called, "Ready when you are." I opened the bathroom door. She was already in the shower, so I stepped in as well and just gawked.

"Renee, you said you were putting your bikini on."

"I did. Well, I put on the bottoms. That's the only part we're required to cover, isn't it? And I want you to soap me up good and make sure I'm all clean. Then I'll do the same for you." She handed me the bar of Dove that we kept in the shower and I started lathering. And blathering, I'm afraid. I found out that making a girl's tits all soapy sucks the brains out of a guy through his vocal cords. I was on my knees soaping the inside of her thighs and almost touching her suit. "Brian, the agreement says no skin-to-skin. I've got my bikini on, so you don't have to be afraid to touch me there. I don't want you to try to make me come, but I don't mind you touching me a little."

I did. I let my soapy hands run right up the inside of her thigh to that hollow that brackets the Promised Land and my hand came firmly in contact with her pussy. I made sure to follow it around to the back and right between the cheeks of her butt where her bikini had more or less gathered.

"My turn," she said, pulling me to stand up.

"I don't know if I can take you doing that to me, Renee. Sweetheart, just touching you has put me on edge." She didn't say anything. She just started applying soap to my body. Directly from her body. She rubbed her back into my chest with that almost bare butt clenching at my cock. She transferred the soap from her legs to my legs and from her chest to my back, rubbing me up and down with her hands. "Oh, Renee," I moaned. "I'm going to have to wash out my suit."

"Here, lover. Better to make a mess on the wall instead of in your pants." She pulled the waistband of my pants below my cock head and kept hold of me with my swim suit as she jacked me up and down. "There are going to be all your hot girlfriends at the party in their tiniest bikinis. Everywhere you look, there will be tits and ass. I bet some of the tops accidentally come off in the pool. You'll be hard and uncomfortable all day. Relax and let it come, lover. Relax and let me make you come." One hand was gripping my cock with my swim suit while the other hand continued to rub soap on my chest. She seemed to want to make sure my nipples were extra clean. The tingling in my body connected the nipple she was playing with to the tip of my cock as she stroked and I gave up to the sensations and felt myself pulsing—spewing my come into the stream of water from the shower. I sagged against her and she pushed me forward enough to rinse my cock off and then pulled my suit up enough to cover me. We both turned and rinsed in the shower, stopping on every rotation to kiss.

"This way, no one will be able to see the wet spot on my bikini where I'm leaking for you. Thank you for letting me give you this gift, Brian. Thank you so much."

"But you're..."

"I'll collect later."

The party was a blast. Renee put her top on and we both just pulled t-shirts over the top while she drove us to Brenda's house. We hung around all our friends and talked with each other but everyone seemed to know already that Renee was my date and we were staying together during the party. Oh, we had fun in the pool and switched partners back and forth, but when we got out of the pool to head back in the house, Renee's hand was in mine.

"Renee, may we borrow your date for five minutes? I promise we won't break him," Jen said as she and Courtney came up to us.

"Sure, Jen. Courtney, you'd better collect your birthday kiss. If you want a little privacy, go over behind the hot tub. As long as you don't make a lot of noise, no one will know you're there. I have to talk to Brenda for a few minutes anyway," Renee said. She gave me a peck on the cheek and walked away. That was easy. Jen and Court had my hands and practically dragged me behind the hot tub. Renee was right. We were enough lower that no one could see us and if we were quiet, the jets would drown out whatever we were talking about.

"Happy birthday, Courtney," I said. "I didn't get to celebrate with you last year. I'm so glad the end-of-year party coincided with your birthday."

"Yeah, here I am. Sweet sixteen and never been—a lot of things that I hope to remedy. Kissed just doesn't happen to be one of them. But Brian, you can be the first to kiss me when I'm sixteen."

"Really? Jen, haven't you taken care of our sweet girlfriend?"

"Nope. I've been teasing her, but I kept her for you."

"Lovers, let's all do it together," I whispered. Both girls grinned after a second or two getting our heads turned right, the lips of all three of us came together, quickly followed by our tongues. "Were you the first baby of summer, sweetheart?" I asked.

"No. Technically summer started someplace early in the morning on the 21st. But Mom has never stopped telling me that because she was in labor the entire day, June 20th will always be the longest day of the year for her. She reminds me that I made her labor through the longest and hottest day of the year in order to get me out." We all laughed at Courtney's dramatic rendering of Crystal's statement. "I told her she should have greased the tube. I love a water slide," Courtney laughed. Then we kissed again.

"That's only part of why we wanted to talk to you, though, Brian," Jen said.

"What's up? Are you guys having fun staying with Samantha this weekend?"

"Tons of fun. But the news is that my dad says you can work for him this summer," Courtney said.

"In the restaurant? That would be great. But I can't commute to Kokomo for a job. I don't have a license, it's too far, and Mom and Dad sure aren't going to drive me. It's a nice thought, though. It would be fun to work in a restaurant."

"It's going to be even more fun sleeping with your girlfriends," Jen said

"What?"

"Well, not exactly with us, but in the same house. Anna is talking it over with your parents this weekend. She and Mom and Dad talked it over and they all agreed that if Anna would take on the parenting responsibility, we could all three live with her for the summer and you could walk to work from there."

"No way!"

"Way!"

"My folks will never agree to that. I've never been gone all summer."

"It's really only for six weeks. You come down after the fourth and stay till Jen's birthday on August 14th. Then you're back here in time to exhibit at the fair and win some more amazing awards. Dad was way impressed with your resume. Anna took him the tape of your demo and a loaf of your bread when we were here last," Courtney said.