In the dim light I saw the eyes glare at me in the so familiar indignation that I knew better to avoid or we'd have our own private little fight that would soon give away where we were.
'It's not fair that you can squeeze out of this and leave me behind to deal with those two idiots. I wanna go with you!' She forcefully continued in a loud whisper and demonstratively strapped her tennis tote bag on top of my escape-bag.
'No. You can't go with me. I don't even know where I'll be staying,' I started to protest as I fruitlessly tried to remove my sister's bag, but Emily cut me short.
'Fine, that suits me perfectly! I don't wanna know where we're going as long as it's not here. I've had it with them. I'm going with you or I'll scream my head off!' she threatened and drew in her breath in preparation for her most potent weapon; The Scream. That heart-rending awe-inspiring, blood curdling and paralyzing scream that would make any person within a mile and a half come running to see what's going on.
I knew that I lost the argument. Running would be useless and I had no choice other than to comply with her desire to accompany me in my flight. Besides, it struck me that I didn't really mind having her with me. Better with me than aimlessly wandering around to stay out of sight or what was worse, had her be exposed to my parents' nearly endless streams of diatribe that was often heavily laced with sexually explicit, but never, ever flattering terms and descriptions.
I dejectedly sighed, slumped my shoulders and faced her to spell out the rules. 'All right then, but you do as I say, Okay?' I saw her nod in agreement. 'Okay, follow me, do as I say and hang on tight. This could be fun.' I laughed as I opened the door of the shed, peeked outside and then broke into a crouched run, while pushing the moped. Emily quickly and nimbly followed, quietly shut the door, put on the latch and sprinted to catch up with me.
We ran about a hundred yards and I let the clutch come up. The moped spluttered and came to life as I jumped on it. I had halfway expected the need to stop and let my sister get on too, but with apelike agility she jumped and landed right behind me on the buddy-seat.
'Got it! Let'er rip!' she giggled and firmly put her arms around my waist. I didn't need any encouragement and pulled open the throttle. The moped seemed to jump and quickly accelerated as we sped away.
I didn't have any clue where to go. I had little money so I couldn't stay in a motel, even if they had those where we lived, but on previous occasions I had camped out on the beach. With me being tall for my age and displaying the quiet and serious demeanor and teenager Angst that I even really felt, I had kind of blended in easily with the rest of the Hippie crowd and stayed with them without really being part of them. I had my sleeping bag with me and this time of year I could just camp out. If I would have been on my own, that is. With Emily with me that became an entirely different thing .
I found my way to the coastal road that led to the beach and decided to cut through the dunes to a less busy part of the beach. It was still light and it would be until close to 10PM and while speeding along the narrow bike path I recognized the ugly squat remnants of the World War II fortifications that the Germans had twenty-five years before built to ward off possible invasion by the allied forces. I smelled the tangy sweet salty sea air in the wind as we neared the last line of dunes and at a small and miraculously empty parking lot, I brought my moped to a stop.
'We're there. Get off and I'll park this thing. We'll walk from here on.' I announced over my shoulder. Emily silently nodded, let go of me, jumped off the seat and quickly retrieved her tote bag as well as mine. I got off myself, killed the engine and pushed the moped to one of the wooden railings that served as bicycle stands. I looped a chain around the wooden post, through spokes of the front wheel and around the frame, clicked the padlock shut and carefully pocketed the key before I joined my sister who stood quietly waiting while she surveyed the surroundings.
'Nice and quiet here. Been here before?' she asked.
I shrugged. 'Seems like it, now doesn't it? C'mon let's go. The seawater must be fine and I'd like to go for a swim.' I answered. Emily got red in the face and seemed taken aback by that. 'I don't have a swimming suit with me. Didn't know what you had in mind'
That set me to thinking and suddenly a bright idea lit up in my mind. Nearby was a small sweet water lake that was totally secluded by the surrounding dunes. I'd been there before and knew that there weren't even paths other than an overgrown service road leading to it. Besides that, the thought of taking a swim in the sea and not having the possibility to rinse off afterwards until we got home was suddenly not all that appealing at all.
'All Right have it your way then. We can go skinny-dipping. I know a place where no one will see us. Follow me.'
I slung my bag over my shoulder and led off at a brisk pace through the thorny bushes towards where I knew the secluded little lake to be. Emily hesitated and lamely and insecurely protested. 'S-skinny dipping? You mean like in swimming all naked? You sure really no-one can see us?' She spluttered while halfheartedly following me.
'As sure as you can be expecting Mom and Dad to fight all weekend without even missing us. Besides, if anyone shows up, they'd more than likely be there for the same reason as we are.' I assured her. 'C'mon give me a hand. The next part is going to be tricky and we'd better help each other there.' I advised as we went over the first of two rings of hills that hid the lake from sight. The descent was very steep and the bushes with their inch- long thorns looked as uninviting as they had proven to be before.
I inadvertently winced as I recalled the painful exercise of removing the twenty-odd thorns and spikes from the different parts of my anatomy at the first time that I had come this way, lost my footing and had rolled all the way down.
Not this time however and helping Emily as she helped me we quickly made it down towards the shallow hollow towards the inner ring of hills. That was going to be easier, since for one reason or the other the thorn bushes became spaced further apart and thinned out completely to a nice sandy lakeshore that in turn led to a crystal clear dune-lake.
There were some patches of grassland around it and on the far side there was an old forestry service shelter that I knew to be fairly clean and usable and that looked as if it hadn't been used for a good many years. It sat on the edge of a small stand of birch and maple trees and it even had a working freshwater tap, so we wouldn't have to worry about drinking water either. All in all this was a perfect little hide-away for a weekend camp-out if you didn't set your standards too high.
Emily peeked suspiciously around and finding no one in sight she drew an elated sigh before expressing not only her approval, but also her delight.
'Wow! This is a perfect little place! It's beautiful! How did you find it anyway?' she asked while offering me the brightest and happiest smile that I hadn't seen for the longest time from her.
I told her, 'Ran into it when I split a couple of months ago. Last May, I think it was. You know, that time when mom and dad each gave each other a black eye I had enough of it and gave them the slip for the weekend. Well, this is where I stayed. It's nice and quiet and you can even hear yourself think again after a while.'
I gave Emily a sideways hug while making the peace sign with my other hand. 'Welcome to Peace and Love, Sister!' I added as an afterthought, referring to the Hippy crowd that I would normally hang out with.
I let her go from my hug and got out of my t-shirt, kicked off my boots and quickly got out of my pants.
'Last one in is a filthy Fascist Pig!' I chided Emily who stood as nailed to the ground as I showed myself to her in my Adam's costume.
'B-but,' she muttered as she turned a lovely shy blush as she prudishly averted her eyes and uncertainly fidgeted with the buttons of her shirt.
'In your bare butt! C'mon there's no-one around for miles and you don't have to be shy for me, I've seen you before and I have nothing that other guys don't have, so get over it already!' I gallantly took her shirt when she seemed uncertain of where to put it and held her hand as she balanced herself while getting out of the skin-tight jeans. She didn't wear panties I noted, but then it dawned on me that she had had Gym practice as her last period at the year-round school that we attended. I guess that it had been more convenient that way and it would prevent showing those unsightly panty lines. All in all I had to admit that Emily had changed a heck of a lot since I had last seen her in her Eve's attire.
A distinct change for the better, or so I noted, remembering the gangly and awkward knobby kneed brat with metallic grinning braces that she had been up to a short while ago. Still no hair other than the red curly mane around her elfish and freckled face, but a nice coke-bottle figure with pleasantly firm looking budding cream-
