Appalachian Memory

Even now, in my fifties, when I think back on the long Columbus-day weekend I spent with Dolly and Meghan in the Appalachian Mountains I can hardly keep from smiling. And after smiling, I always dig deep in my wallet to bring out the faded, laminated black and white photo that I best remember Meghan by.

We were in our sophomore year in college, and planned the trip at the least minute, with news from Dolly that her family's cabin was free for the weekend if we wanted it. With the crush of midterm exams behind us, it seemed a perfect way to spend this short break from our studies at Vanderbilt.

Meghan and I had been an item for almost a year, and Dolly was a mutual close friend from our freshman dorm.

Dolly had the cabin, I had the car, and Meghan had the plan. We would leave just after classes on Thursday afternoon and get to the cabin in time for a late dinner. Then we would relax, enjoy the brilliant fall foliage for a few days, and head back to campus bright and early on Monday morning.

I picked up Meghan and Dolly from their dorm at the scheduled time. We visited the food coop before leaving Nashville and picked up supplies sufficient for a weekend of home-cooked meals. We stopped by the ABC store and bought a half-gallon of rum, some wine, a case of ginger ale, and some apple cider. 'Rum and ginger' was our collectively favorite drink, and hot rum and cider would be our nod to the fall season.

My Dodge Dart had a bench front seat that allowed all three of us to all ride up front. Meghan had the window seat, and Dolly was in the middle. We didn't wait to reach the cabin before mixing up some of our beloved rum cocktails. By the time we reached the foothills, the fading sun and rising buzz compelled me to occupy the far-right lane, holding the speed limit and letting most of the highway traffic pass us by.

As headlights started to appear after dusk, Meghan had the idea to play padiddle, the game where the first person to spot a car with a missing headlight yells out "padiddle" and then punches the person next to them in the arm. In the rustic Appalachian foothills, this game is not given to long pauses. Dolly was disadvantaged by being in the middle: a target for padiddle punches from both Meghan and me. After only a few minutes, it was clear that she was going to get twice as pummeled as we were. Even though we were not hitting her hard, Dolly protested, and said that she did not want to get punched in the arms anymore.

I recommended that instead of quitting, we change the rules so to make the game fairer to Dolly. Feeling a bit randy, I recommended that whenever someone spotted a padiddle, the other two would throw one piece of their clothes into the back seat. Meghan scowled, remarking that I was the only person she knew who would come up with strip padiddle. But she had been finding the one-eyed cars at almost twice the rate of Dolly and me and with the cover of darkness she was just tipsy enough to agree to this new twist. Dolly was not so easily persuaded. She was, after all, wearing only a gauze dress, some panties, and a pair of sandals. As was her wont in those days, she was not wearing a bra. She pointed out that Meghan and I had many more items of clothes to lose. Meghan, who was turning out to be a much more enthusiastic ally in this effort than I could have hoped, declared that we would first all get to the same starting position before the game began. Before waiting for a response, she unzipped her half-high-boots and socks and threw them across the seat into the back, then slipped off her belt and threw it over as well. She raised up her arms, and said "Viola, Dolly. Jeans, shirt, bra, and undies. We're even." Dolly was still dubious. I pulled off my sneakers and socks and tossed them over into back seat. "Belt, shorts, boxers, and t-shirt. We're all at four."

Dolly looked like she was still going to resist, but then out of the corner of her eye she saw a one-headlight car at the ridge a half-mile ahead. She took it as an omen. "Padiddle!" she shouted.

Meghan argued that we hadn't yet started, but Dolly and I rejected her claim. I asked Dolly to grab the wheel and stripped off my tee shirt, tossing it behind me. Meghan pouted, but gave in. She reached under her shirt, pulling in her arms and undoing her bra from within. In seconds, she pulled the bra back out through an arm hole of her tee shirt and tossed it behind us. While no more skin was visible than before, the cool night air made a pronounced display of her nipples against the somewhat tight tee.

We all got quiet, keeping eyes peeled for the next padiddle. Meghan spotted it first and shouted victoriously. Dolly tossed a sandal into the back seat, and I pulled off my belt and did the same.

Meghan asked for another rum and ginger ale, and Dolly turned to reach the cooler in the back seat to refresh our drinks. While she was doing so, splayed over the seat with her backside forward, Meghan yelled out "Padiddle!" and playfully punched Dolly's ass.

Dolly protested that it was unfair to score a padiddle while she was getting drinks for us.

I argued that it was tough luck, but that no time-out provision had been agreed upon when we made the short list of rules up. I asked her to hold the wheel again while I deftly unzipped my pants and pulled them off. Leaving me in boxers. Dolly continued to complain as she tossed her second sandal behind her.

We fixed our eyes back on the approaching stream of cars. For me especially, with only boxers left, it was important not to miss the next padiddle. After more than fifteen minutes, Dolly cried out "Padiddle." Sure enough, far in the distance a single headlight had appeared. As it came closer, though, we discovered that the light was a motorcycle headlight: a miscalled padiddle. Dolly cursed. We had established the rules to be just like the punching game, in which a miscalled padiddle got the caller a punch. In this case, it meant that Dolly owed the back seat one more of her remaining two pieces of clothing. She propped her bare feet on the dashboard and pulled up the hem of her dress, grabbing the elastic of her panties and pulling them smoothly off. She tossed them over her shoulder, noting that she and I were now in the same boat, with only one remaining item of clothing. No matter who got the next padiddle, someone was going to be naked. But it wasn't going to be Meghan, and she was just plain giddy. Without ever taking her eyes from the road, she talked trash to me and Dolly, teasing about the glorious prospect of riding with her two naked best pals.

We were only twenty miles from the cabin by then. We exited the interstate to begin the long, winding, climb on a secondary road to our destination. Cars were much scarcer on this road, and the serpentine route gave little chance for spotting padiddle at a distance. So, ten minutes later around a tight left turn, the padiddle that did appear was no more than 100 feet from us. Because of her position on the far right, Meghan had a split second advantage. She shrieked "Padiddle!"

Dolly and I simultaneously spewed curses at her, as Meghan broke out into her trademark loud guffawing laugh. Soon enough we were all laughing.

"OK you two, lets see some skin!" Meghan cackled.

Dolly briefly tried to appeal to Meghan to end the game but did not want to appear a bad sport. She cursed one more time to no one in particular before lifting her butt off the seat, pulling her dress up and over her head, and discarding it in the back seat.

Dolly had a boyish frame, thin and bony with small breasts, flat stomach, and slender thighs. Her nipples were fully erect in the cool evening air, and she made an effort to cover them with her arms. Her pubic hair was wild and untrimmed, which, back then, was the norm for our bohemian crowd. She was deeply embarrassed. Even by the moonlight, I could see that her cheeks were blushing crimson beneath her strawberry blond pixie haircut.

When Dolly was naked, Meghan clapped giddily and pointed to my shorts, grinning from ear to ear. I asked Dolly to hold the wheel again. She complied, even though it meant uncovering her adorable breasts. I slipped off my boxers. My cock was not quite erect, but tingling. I was using all the willpower I had to keep from sprouting a raging hard-on.

After tossing the boxers across the seat, I retook the wheel.

Both girls stared at my groin for a few moments. While Meghan had seen me naked before, this was a first for Dolly. Meghan reached across Dolly and patted my thigh. "Nice tool, Jack." Then unexpectedly, she grasped my cock and gave it a wiggle. "Be cool, PoPo," she commanded. PoPo was her name for my cock. I grew semi-hard almost instantly.

"Hey, no distracting the driver," I declared, pushing her hand away.

"OK are we done with this game now?" Dolly asked, implying that she was ready to get dressed again.

"No way," Meghan responded, draping her arm around Dolly's shoulder, and lightly caressing her collarbone. "You stay in the buff all the way to the cabin." Dolly groaned and took a big swig of her drink.

We had ten miles to go to the cabin. The rest of the trip was relatively uneventful. No more padiddle, and few cars. When we did pass a small number of cars coming the other way, Dolly slouched down in the seat to avoid being seen. One large truck passed us along a slow, curvy stretch of road, and it was clear that he got an eyeful of Dolly. He tooted his horn after passing us. Dolly yelped, covering herself well after it did her any good.

When we finally pulled into the cabin driveway, Dolly reached back to get her dress, and generously handed me my boxers.

"Well that was delightful," Meghan said, to no one in particular.

I had little idea then how that embarrassing game would set a tone for this unusual weekend.

After unloading, we explored the cabin and yard. The site was perched high on a hilltop, with about a half-acre of grassy lawn in front of the simple log structure. Behind the cabin was more lawn, and an outdoor shower. A three-walled log shed stood of to the right side of the cabin, filled with old stalls and riding equipment for horses that Dolly's grandfather had kept here when she was a child. Inside, the cabin was spacious. It had two bedrooms, a third bed in a loft, a small bathroom, and an expansive living area that combined kitchen, dining area, and fireplace into one inviting room. The front porch of the cabin was wide and deep, and contained a half dozen rocking chairs and a wooden swing bench.

Our first night's dinner was intentionally simple: spaghetti with pesto and a large fresh baguette. After finishing up, I lit a fire in the fireplace, and we plopped ourselves down in large comfy couches and chatted about life and plans for an hour or two before turning in for the night. Meghan and I took the loft bed, and Dolly slept in one of the downstairs bedrooms.

The next morning, Dolly was already brewing coffee when I came down from the loft. She wore a long flannel nightgown, and looked wide awake, if disheveled.

She asked if Meghan was up. I let her know that Meghan was sleeping soundly (having had some strenuous but satisfying exercises with me and PoPo last night, I thought to myself). Dolly winked at me and said that she was anxious to get even with Meghan for last evening's embarrassing display. She wanted to know if I would help her.

Of course, nothing would have suited me better, so I agreed enthusiastically. How, though, did she plan to carry out this retribution?

Dolly said knew that Meghan liked playing board games with friends, and then pointed toward a Trivial Pursuit game on the shelf. "If you propose a game of Trivial Pursuit, then talk us into playing it for clothes, we can get her back. Of course, I'll agree to the terms of the game, since she's going to lose," Dolly explained. "With the two of us in agreement, she would never chicken out. She's just too afraid of being called a wimp."

That was true. Baiting Meghan was not hard. On the other hand, she was unlikely to join a game like this without a decent chance of winning it.

"How do you know she will lose?" I asked.

"Because I know the answers on every card," Dolly grinned. "Summers up here were always long and sometimes boring. So my older brother and I played a lot. He usually won. We often bet on the games, and I would usually end up having to do something embarrassing when I lost.

Like what? I asked, intrigued.

One time we bet that the loser would have to run to the mailbox and back in their underwear! I know it doesn't seem like much compared to what Meghan put us through last night, but I was mortified at thirteen. And he still teases me.

Anyway, one summer I realized there were only a finite number of cards in the deck, so I took them to the dock out back and memorized all the questions and the correct answers. After about six hours, I had enough recall to get 95% of the answers right. From then on, I kicked my brother's ass. I'm sure I'd still remember most of them. I'm good that way."

"Wow, that's a great trick," I acknowledged. "But how will I beat her?"

"Easy," Dolly replied. "Take the first fifty or so cards and memorize the shit out of them on your jog this morning. Then put them in front of the box of cards and we're good to go. That should give you enough of an edge to come in second."

An excellent plan, I had to agree. I asked Dolly what she wanted the stakes to be.

Well, you could try to make it more interesting, but I doubt we could get her to agree to much beyond strip Trivial Pursuit. After all, she'll make the odds just about one in three that she will lose.

I had an idea about how we might get Meghan to risk a little more, and shared it with Dolly. We worked out the details, shook hands on the conspiracy, and headed out to the front porch to sip our coffee and watch the morning unfold.

A half-hour later, Meghan showed up at the cabin doorway clutching a mug of hot coffee. She looked especially sexy, wearing a long Vanderbilt tee shirt that barely covered her legs. A flash of white lacy underwear peeked under the hem as she shuffled over to our rocking chair circle.

After coffee, I proposed to take my morning jog. Before going I slipped fifty or so Trivial Pursuit cards in my pocket. On the porch, on my way out, I found Meghan alone. She mentioned that Dolly had gone out back to take an outdoor shower. The thought gave me a tingle.

I shook it off and turned my attention back to Meghan. It was time to launch the first phase of my plan.

"Meghan, I'm planning to lure you and Dolly into another stripping game today," I said, matter-of-factly. "I can think of no better way to enjoy our sunny privacy up here than to have one or the other of you scampering about in the buff. So while I go running, think of what game you might want to play."

She laughed and said I must still be delirious from last night's party, waving goodbye as I jogged down the dirt driveway.

I have to admit that instead of proceeding on the jog, my voyeuristic tendencies kicked in. I circled back and through the woods to the back yard of the cabin. Perched in a thickly overgrown patch of mountain laurel rising to the left of the back yard, I crouched twenty-five feet away from the outdoor shower to catch a glimpse of Dolly.

The outdoor shower structure was comprised of a simple wooden platform. Along one edge of the platform was a wooden plank wall, six feet tall and eight feet wide to provide privacy from the house. The showerhead was mounted on a metal pole at the middle of this wall. Of course, from the side, where I was crouched, the wall offered no privacy at all! I was pleased to catch Dolly just as she pulled the flannel gown over her head and slipped off her panties. She hung both from a hook at the edge of the wall. In the sunlight, her body sparkled, and thousands of freckles stood out against her pale skin. I noticed that her ass was beautifully shaped, and that her pubic hair --which I had seen more closely but in darker circumstances the night before -- was a ruddy match to the hair on her head. I watched for a few minutes more, as she started the shower, washed her hair, and soaped and scrubbed her body beneath the stream of water. Then I slipped away, a lovely image burned in my memory just perfectly to entertain me on my run.

When Dolly got back to the cabin, Meghan was still enjoying the peaceful scenery from the porch. Dolly, wrapped in a large terry towel, sat in the rocker next to her. They were quiet for a bit, and then Meghan said, "You want a laugh? Before he left, Jack proposed he was going to get us to play another strip game."

Dolly was clearly relieved that Meghan brought this up, as I had predicted she would. Her backup plan -- to raise the topic herself, seemed far riskier.

"Oh he is, is he? Well I think I might have had enough of that for one weekend..." She paused for several seconds, "unless we could guarantee that he loses."

Dolly waited a few moments more, and then proceeded to tell Meghan about her Trivial Pursuit exploits and her memorization trick. She proposed to Meghan that they might use this it to trap me. Meghan loved the devilishness of the plan, especially since I had been so confident and cocky when leaving for my run.

Like me, Meghan asked how Dolly's advantage could keep her (Meghan) from losing. Dolly replied with a clone of the plan that she had proposed for me: Meghan would select some cards and quickly memorize them before I got back from my run. Meghan quickly agreed but noted that I would probably be back in less than an hour. Dolly dashed inside to get a pile of cards and returned to the porch to begin cramming with Meghan. After forty minutes, they had fairly mastered this stack of cards. They high-fived and agreed to set the trap right after lunch.

"I almost feel sorry for him, Dolly said. He's a sitting duck." Meghan shook her head. "No need to feel bad, Dolly. All's fair in love, war, and stripping games," she declared. Meghan got up to plant the cards back into the deck, and Dolly scampered off to get dressed.

When I returned, I was less sweaty than usual, since I had only run several hundred yards before settling in to memorize my stack of cards. Nevertheless, I headed straight back to the outdoor shower. There, I stripped off my shorts and tee shirt and drenched myself in the warm spray. After a few minutes I grabbed the soap and began stroking myself to the memory of twice seeing Dolly naked in the past twelve hours. Unexpectedly, I heard Dolly calling from the other side of the privacy fence.

"Jack," she said. "Its me. Give me your cards so I can slip them back into the box. Meghan is busy in the bathroom and this is our chance."

I dropped the soap, and quickly rinsed my hands and cock. Grabbing the towel from the hook, I wrapped myself and turned off the shower. "Just a minute," I called back, a slight tension evident in my voice. I fished the cards out of my running shorts pocket and, with them in one hand and the knot holding my towel together in the other, I came around the side of the privacy fence. Dolly, dressed in another gauze dress and sandals, grabbed the cards and tried to maintain eye contact. I was grateful for this discretion, since I was still hard enough to cause a noticeable tent in the towel.

"The plan is working like a charm," she said, smiling. "Your cards will be in the back of the box. Hers are already in the front. See you inside."

She turned and sprinted back to the cabin.

I went back to the shower, hung up the towel, picked up the soap, turned on the water, and completed the task I had begun.

When I returned to the cabin, Dolly and Meghan were already preparing lunch. Meghan had put on a colorful Indian print skirt and a button-down oxford shirt. She wore her half boots, too, and a petite cowboy hat that she had found in our loft. It was a cute, playful outfit, and I looked forward to getting it off of her.