"I don't want to."
"I think you should," she sighed in frustration. "Try to get rid of whoever it is."
"Right." I said, heading downstairs.
My precognitive flash, or whatever it was, was strengthened by the fact that by the time I made it downstairs to the phone it was well into its eighth or ninth ring. Whoever was on the other end wasn't giving up easily.
"Hello?" I asked, fighting to make my voice sound pleasant.
"Hi," said my Dad. "Took you a while to get to the phone."
"Sorry," I mumbled, anything but.
"I figured if I let it ring long enough, you would answer. Sorry to uh… bother you."
"That's okay," I said, wondering if my Dad somehow knew what I'd been doing.
"What's up? Is Tracy okay?"
"She's fine," he assured me. "But the doctor can't complete his examination of her until he gets some recent X-rays. She was supposed to go over to the radiology clinic for that but the radiology techs are in the middle of some sort of labor dispute and they're having a sick-out today. So basically, this whole morning was a waste of time and the ambulance guys are putting her back in for the trip home right now."
"Right now?" I asked, glancing upstairs.
"Right now," he confirmed. "We should be home in about fifteen minutes or so. Just thought I'd give you a little… uh… warning."
"Okay," I said, feigning nonchalance. "Too bad for Tracy. I'll see you when you get here."
"Right," he said, hanging up the phone.
I set mine back down, feeling frustration, feeling my erection wilting in my shorts, but most of all feeling relief that my Dad had some foresight and common sense. He must have strongly suspected what I was up to or he never would have called. Dad was not the type to drop friendly little warnings that he was on his way home. I could only imagine the embarrassment for all concerned if they had come home while Nina and I had been engaged upstairs. Would we have heard them come in? Seriously doubtful.
Time was short so I rushed back upstairs.
"Who was it?" Nina asked, sitting up on the bed, still naked.
"My Dad," I told her, "they weren't able to complete Tracy's appointment. They're on their way home right now."
"Right now?"
"They'll be here in fifteen minutes," I nodded.
"Damn," she exclaimed, standing quickly up. "Stupid interruptions."
"I know," I said regretfully, looking at her naked body, knowing I'd been less than a minute away from finally entering it.
"Oh well," she shook her head sadly, as frustrated as I was, probably more so. "The best laid plans and all that." She took a good look at herself, at her dripping body. "I need to get cleaned up before they get here. I can't go home smelling like this."
"No," I said, paling as I thought about Mary Blackmore getting a whiff of the odor of sex on her daughter. Sure, she probably suspected that Nina and I were intimate with each other, that was one thing. But to have physical proof of it was quite another. "That wouldn't do, would it?"
"I need to use your shower," she said, gathering up her dress. "I'll be out before they get here. Can you go out to the car and get my bra?"
"You bet." I said. "And I probably oughtta brush my teeth too."
She giggled. "Probably oughtta," she agreed, heading for the bathroom, her dress trailing out behind her.
By the time the EMTs dragged Tracy back into the house and deposited her in her bed Nina was dried off and dressed once more, her bra properly in place.
Everyone greeted her warmly, not expressing any surprise at her presence. I did notice a few knowing looks from both Tracy and my Dad however. If they had anything to say, they kept it to themselves.
Nina and I chatted with Tracy for a while and then Mom and Dad, who had assumed their places before the television set. I kept up my end of the conversation but I couldn't recite a single thing we talked about. My teenaged hormones were surging through my body and I was having a difficult time keeping my erection from returning as I thought about Nina just sitting there, talking normally, while under her dress she had no panties on. My balls were aching fiercely.
We went up to my room about a half-hour before I needed to start getting ready for work. This was nothing unusual, we often spent time up there alone. Usually we did nothing more than kiss.
"Got blue balls?" Nina asked me, a smile on her face.
"In the worst way," I nodded.
"I'm sorry," she told me, sitting on the edge of my bed once more. "I really meant to let you make love to me. I wanted it Bill. I still do."
"I know," I told her. "It's okay."
"I guess fate just doesn't like you for some reason."
I had to laugh at what she said. Fate like me? Probably not. "No," I said, "I don't believe that fate likes me at all."
She gave me a puzzled look for a moment and then her eyes took on a little shine. "So what are you gonna do about the blue balls?" she asked. "Play with yourself after I leave?"
"Probably before your car even starts," I confirmed. "I can't go to work like this."
"Maybe I can help," she said softly. "Come over here."
"Why?" I asked suspiciously.
She reached out and grabbed the waistband of my shorts, tugging me to her so I was standing between her legs. Her mouth was right at the level of my crotch. "You ask too many questions," she told me, reaching for the button and undoing it.
"Nina," I said, feeling myself coming to full erection once again, "my parents…"
"Would never come in without knocking," she put in. She unzipped me and pushed my shorts down. Another push to my underwear and my cock was waving in her face. "Just be quiet and let me do my work."
"If you insist," I croaked as her mouth slid over me.
My mom was in the habit of leaving me a plate of whatever she'd cooked for dinner that night in the refrigerator so I could heat it up when I got home from work. That night was no exception. I was gobbling up a large bowl of her beef stew and turning a thought that I'd been having over in my mind when the doorbell rang. I heard my Dad answer it and a moment later say, "he's in the kitchen." A few seconds after that, Mike came in, wearing a T-shirt from the fire department.
"What's up Mike?" I greeted, putting my thoughts on hold for the time being. "How's the new job?"
"It's cool," he answered, grabbing a seat. "I spent most of the day filling out the forms and all that crap. Then one of the captains that works days took me out in the truck to show me what I'd be doing. I'll start tomorrow on the normal route."
I offered him some of Mom's stew, there was plenty in the fridge, and he declined. While I finished up he continued to tell me about his new career.
When I was done eating and had put my dishes in the sink, we went out front.
"I'm off the buds now," he told me seriously once we were out of my parent's earshot.
"You?" I asked, raising my brows, "off the buds? What's up with that?"
He shook his head sadly. "I'll be driving a courier truck for the fire department. They have a policy. If anybody driving any vehicle gets into any accident of any kind, they have to get drug tested. It's some lawyer shit they have there. I wish I would've known about it a few weeks ago. I smoked some the other day with Maggie. Now I have to hope and pray I don't have some asshole crash into me in the next six weeks."
"Hopefully fate will be kind to you," I said, suppressing the joy I wanted to express. When I made my crack about fate I hadn't even been worried about it. Mike had already beaten fate. He had been forced to choose between marijuana and a career and he had chosen the career with hardly a second thought. Remarkable when you consider what had happened to him in his previous timeline, when he'd continued to smoke pot knowing that he would eventually be drug-tested and caught. He just hadn't cared. Now, at eighteen, he was much more mature than "the other Mike", as Tracy would have put it, ever was or ever would be. "Are you gonna miss it much?" I asked him.