Connie led the way to the stream. We stepped down its shallow, sandy bank and waded in. The water felt great—slightly cooler than the night air.
The stream is basically so narrow that, during most of its course from the jungle to the inlet, you can jump across it without much trouble. It is also fairly shallow. Ankle-deep in many places, knee-deep in a few.
Connie and I entered one of the deeper areas. She faced me. We were out of range of the firelight. “You can put down the ax,” she said.
I swung it underhand, and let go. The heavy, steel head thumped onto dry sand near the shore. The haft dropped toward me, and splashed into the stream where it would be easy to grab in case of an emergency.
Crouching in front of me, Connie rinsed the bloody rags. She stayed down. After draping one of the cloths over her knee, she reached up with the other and began to wash my wound. To hold herself steady, she clutched the waist of my trunks with her left hand, over near my hip.
I couldn’t help but feel the backs of her fingers in there.
Couldn’t help noticing how she’d tugged my trunks down a good inch—just by virtue of hanging onto them.
Not to mention, her face was straight in front.of my groin.
I tried not to let these things affect me.
They affected me quickly and obviously.
“Not again,” she said when my trunks started sticking out.
“Sorry,” I told her.
She stopped patting the wet cloth against my wound. She lowered that hand, but the other stayed. “Don’t apologize, make it go away.”
“Huh?”
“You heard me. I’m trying to help you, and here you’ve got your thing in my face.”
“I don’t have a lot of control over it. You know? It just… responds. To things like you.”
“Things like me.”
“Yeah, you. The way you look. Your hand there. The water. It all… adds up.”
“So then, it’s my fault?”
I smiled. “Pretty much.”
“I’m supposed to be flattered, or something?”
“Maybe,” I said.
She looked up at me and didn’t speak for a few seconds. Then she said, “You had one when we were fighting, too.”
“Yeah. When I was on top of you.”
She dipped the rag in the stream, then lifted it and began mopping the blood off the area between my wound and the top of my trunks. “And when I took my top off,” she said.
“You noticed that?”
“Of course.”
“Thought maybe you were too busy slapping me,” I said.
“Ha ha, very funny.”
She dipped the rag again. As it came up soaked, her left hand plucked the waist of my trunks away from my belly. She mashed the sopping cloth against my skin, and a flood washed down. It drenched my works, then spilled out through the leg holes of my trunks and streamed down my legs.
Keeping my trunks pulled out, she dunked the rag into the stream again. She swished it around. “Would you like me to take my top off again?” she asked. “I could do it, you know. Right here, right now. You want me to?”
“Sure.”
“Or would you rather have me pull your trunks down?”
All I could think of to say was, “You’re kidding.”
“Take your pick.”
“How about both?”
“One or the other.”
It wasn’t a very difficult decision. “My trunks,” I said.
“Why?”
“Sort of tight in there.”
“I’ll bet. Why else?”
I thought about that for a second, then said, “It’ll make it easier for washing the blood off me.”
“Lousy reason. Give me another.”
I shrugged. “Well, I’ve already seen… you know, seen you topless.”
“And once was enough, huh?”
Woops.
“No,” I protested. “But it’s too dark here. I wouldn’t be able to see.”
“You could touch.”
“Really? You didn’t say that before. Okay, I pick that.”
“What?”
“Taking off your top.”
“Too late. You already made your choice.”
“Can’t I change my mind?”
“No.”
“Okay.”
“You sure give up easy.”
“I just don’t want to argue.”
“You just really don’t want to see me topless again. Don’t worry, pal—you won’t.”
With that, she pulled at the waist of my trunks as if she wanted to see how far the elastic would stretch. She drew it out about half a foot, then let go. It shot in and snapped me.
And it hurt.
I staggered backward to get out of her reach—not knowing what to expect next.
She stood up. “Fuck you,” she snarled. “You’re such a pathetic fucking loser. You really thought I’d pull your trunks down? Or take off my top? No way. Not a prayer. Last thing I want is your stupid cock in my face. And the only reason I let you see my tits back at the fire was to let you take a good look at what you’re never gonna see again.”
I doubted the truth of that. Fact is, I doubt that she ever says what’s really going on in her head—maybe doesn’t even know what’s going on in there.
But she was looking for trouble, so I gave her some. Not a smart move, but what I said was, “I figured you took off your top ’cause you wanted to show off your boobies—such as they are—to Wesley.”
Her mouth fell open.
A moment later, she blurted, “That’s the thanks I get for trying to be nice to you.”
Whatever that meant.
I was afraid she might go for the ax. She didn’t, though. She stomped through the water and ran up the bank and didn’t stop till she reached the sleeping area. There, she flopped down on her usual assortment of rags.
I was left standing in the stream, a bit confused about what had gone wrong.
She’d been getting pretty friendly there for a while.
Unless it had been an act.
When it comes to Connie, it’s just mighty damn awful hard to tell what’s real from what isn’t.
All I can be sure of is that she is never likely to react the way I’d expect a person to react. Not like Billie or Kimberly, for instance. You can make sense out of them. Unlike Connie.
Could it have to do with the fact that she’s still a teenager? At eighteen, though, you’d think she might be past the usual adolescent crap.
Doesn’t seem to be.
She reminds me of a cat I used to know. One time, I was petting its head. The cat was really into it, eyes half shut, its purr rumbling away. But all of a sudden, God knows why, it went nuts and shredded my arm.
I was thinking about that sort of stuff while I finished at the stream. What I did there was kneel in the water, wash the blood off my body as well as I could, then work at getting my trunks clean. Finally, I waded out, picked up the ax and returned to camp.
Connie was probably not asleep. I considered going over to her and trying to make amends, but that didn’t seem like such a hot idea. I might just end up setting her off again.
So I went to the fire and sat down, figuring I might as well keep watch—even though sentry duty didn’t seem very necessary.
Our ambush hadn’t been a complete failure—Kimberly had delivered a couple of nasty wounds to Wesley. They were probably not fatal (barring infection), but they were pretty sure to keep him in major pain for a while.
And out of our hair.
Though I didn’t expect an attack, I stayed awake and kept watch. There was plenty to occupy my mind. My plan was to stay up all night, so that the gals could get plenty of sleep. A while before dawn, though, Billie woke up and came over to the fire.