Heather's Exquisite Map of Tassie

Arriving at Pelion Plains early in the afternoon, they inspected the giant hut there, but decided against sleeping inside. "I don't want to share with twenty or so stinky snoring people," Heather said. "I've done enough of that in my life."

The campsite was large enough for them to pitch their tents off to the side, as Heather suggested, away from most of the other hikers. They spent the afternoon exploring the main hut and the old hut, plus investigating the nearby creek which they found had several nice waterholes. The temperature was likely in the mid-to-high twenties and therefore still warm, though much cooler than the previous day. It was definitely warm enough for some hardy souls to have a splash in the cool creek, including Antonio and Anita. Kathy sat on the warm rocks chatting with Tim while Heather excused herself. "I need some alone time if you don't mind. I'll see you back at camp later."

Tim couldn't get over the similarity between Kathy and his ex-girlfriend Abigail. Kathy's hair was dark brown, to the point it was almost black, and her eyes were clear blue. Her face and any exposed skin was lightly freckled all over, and if someone told Tim that Kathy and Abigail were cousins or even sisters, he'd almost believe it.

"Looks like Anita and Antonio are getting along fine now," Tim said, noting the two splashing about in the stream. Anita's long blond hair was silkier and even lighter than Heather's shorter wavy sandy blond locks. In her early twenties, Anita appeared soft and innocent, carefree and happy, while Kathy was a year or two older, but already wiser to the ways of the world.

"I think he prefers Heather," Kathy said, her tone matter of fact. "But I think he's also realising he won't get anywhere with her. She's too strong for him and I'm certain she's interested in someone else. And it'll only be a matter of days till Anita gives into Tony, you mark my words."

"You reckon? And who could Heather be interested in?"

Kathy stifled a laugh that came out as a snort. "If you don't mind me sayin', I think yer a bit slow on recent developments. Like, who's Heather hangin' out with these days?"

"What?" Tim started to put two and two together with surprise, wondering if he'd heard Kathy right, because sometimes he struggled to follow her quickly spoken southern-Irish lilt. "Are you talkin' about me?"

She grinned at him. "Took yer long enough. I'll call it women's intuition, like, or maybe it's the way she kept looking at you in the lake yesterday, but she's definitely into you. Right now she's probably back at her tent, thinkin' all about ya and rubbing one out." She chuckled and Tim gave a little laugh, not believing Heather might have a thing for him.

From previous discussions Kathy already knew the story about Tim and Heather's connection to one another and how they'd become walking partners, knowing they'd only met in person for the first time earlier the very same day they met the girls at the lodge bar. It was quite obvious Heather and Tim were not a couple, but it was also clear there was a rapport between them. If anyone who'd never met them before spent a few hours in Heather and Tim's company, they'd realise the two were not dating, but might conclude they were quite good friends. However, Kathy was now telling Tim there was more going on. She looked at him with her head slightly tilted. "I think you like her too, if you'll excuse my meddlin'."

"Yeah, well, she's a girl, right. I'm a bloke. Of course I like her."

Kathy laughed, causing Anita and Antonio to stop their splashing and giggling to look over to see what was so amusing. Kathy dropped her voice low, almost to a whisper. "Yeah, of course yer like her. But it's more than like, isn't it? Maybe it's lust? But I think it's deeper. Like I said, it's my intuition."

"Ayyyyy," Antonio called out, "What are you two gossiping about?"

"Oh, we're talkin' about you, not with you, so you needn't worry," Kathy called out lyrically with a cheeky smile. She dropped her voice again. "Perhaps she only wants to jump yer bones, like, but whatever her reasoning, she's interested, I can tell. I also think you think she's way out of yer league, because you probably think yer not alpha, or perhaps because you think yer too young for her. Which is all bullshit by the way."

"So you don't think I'm way out of her league?"

"Yer a tall, handsome, genuine man, Tim. Yer generally smart, even if yer a bit slow when it comes to the ladies, and you can hold a conversation just fine. Don't get any ideas about me sayin' this but I think yer a bit of a catch. And just quietly, so does Anita. I think you'd punch well above what you think yer weight is. Heather might be intimidatin', but that's part of the attraction, isn't it?"

Tim felt his face flush. He wasn't sure if Kathy was being honest or taking the piss, but he decided her facial expressions and tone of her voice suggested her assessment was genuine. He breathed out a sigh. "Heather's me house mate's sister and she lives way down here. Probably best not to get too involved."

Kathy laughed again, and once again Antonio and Anita stopped and stared. "But..." she waited for Tim to continue and when he didn't she verbally filled in the blanks. "Have it yer way if you like, but you'd probably be missin' out. I reckon you wish something to happen between Heather and yerself. Perhaps you'd be happy with a simple fling too, but either way I think you've bonded with her in the last few days and hope there's something more. Sure, the situations confusin', like, because she is yer mate's sister, and perhaps she's lookin' for something more than a fling too? Either way, I'd put money on you two getting together by the end of this little walk."

Tim thought for a moment, wondering if Kathy's evaluation of the situation was accurate, because he'd not considered things the way she'd described it. He'd known Heather for all of four days, and it was still over a week before he was returning to Brisbane. He hadn't even thought further ahead, or too much about his growing bond with Heather. Sure, he'd sleep with her if she asked him to, but he doubted she would. And he wasn't planning on asking her; partly because he was out of practice with asking a girl if they'd be interested in sleeping with him, and partly because of his feeling she was way out of his league.

Surely it was absurd to think there was something between Heather and himself more than a growing friendship. He was enjoying walking with and getting to know her, and he didn't want to make things awkward between them. "Jesus, don't go putting ideas in me head now, Kath."

"Oh, these ideas are already in yer thick skull. You only need to work out how to make it all work. Remember what they say, fortune favours the bold."

There were some dark clouds beginning to form in the late afternoon sky and the temperature was dropping fast and so the four of them walked back to camp together. Not far from camp two wombats, a mum and its young, were grazing on the grass beside the track.

"Oh my, how lovely!" whispered Anita.

Kathy also went to mush. "Oh, they're so sweet!"

The four of them stood quietly watching mum and baby wombat feeding, seemingly oblivious to the humans nearby.

"Look at the little cub following his mother about," Antonio said, every bit as charmed by the creatures as Kathy and Anita.

"A baby wombat's called a joey," Tim whispered, not completely confident. "But did you know wombats do square poos?"

"Ah, that explains the cubic poo all over the place!" Kathy whispered, as if relieved a great mystery was solved. The wombats wandered away from the track and the humans wandered back to camp. Antonio, Kathy and Anita were staying in the large hut for the night and Tim farewelled them for the evening.

Tents dotted the campsite, which was maybe half-full, and other hikers milled about, the smells of cooking dehydrated meals saturating the air. It seemed to Tim everyone was cooking some form of curry going by the flavoursome spicy odours.

Heather was stretched forward on the ground in front of her tent, with her head near her ankles and hands holding onto her bare feet. Her sandy hair was untied, covering her face, the tips resting on her leg beside her shins. Tim had no idea how long she'd been in the position before he arrived, but she must have held it for a further minute or two before she sat up and smiled at him and simply said "Yoga," as a way of explanation. After a moment she said with a smirk, "Did you have any luck with the Irish."

"We had a good chat. I wasn't even trying with her though. We did see a mother and baby wombat not far from the hut. Hey, do you know if a baby wombat's called a joey?"

Heather smiled. "Yeah, it's a joey. Why?"

"I thought it might be. Just wonderin'. Maybe after dinner we could see if they're still about."

"Sure. So what ya cooking?"

Before flying into Tasmania, Tim bought a number of dehydrated meals, and Heather brought along her own, which were a different brand to his. They cooked their meals separately, but shared samples of each for a little variety. Tim delved into his rucksack, pulling out the first ration pack he came across. "Looks like vegetarian Masala Dal for me. What about you?"

"I'm not sure yet, but I'm glad we're not sharing a tent. You'll be farting like a stinky farting champion!"

While Tim gave a little snort at her comment, she turned and entered her tent on hands and knees, inadvertently showing off her tight bum only an arm's length from Tim. She called out, "Have a guess."

"Um, how about a nice hot curry?"

Heather turned and laughed, holding the packet up to him. "Thai green chicken curry. I do have my doubts about its level of spice."

They cooked and ate their meals, swapping a small portion, then cleaned up their mess kit. The air was quite cool now, with the sun dipping low to the west, occupying the gap between the building dark cloud base and the horizon, sending its rays red and orange over the mountain across the golden grassy plain in front of the hut.

"Let's check if your little wombat family's still about," Heather said, pulling on her polar fleece and ugg boots.

They walked through the camp where small groups of people were chatting in low voices by their tents. Fires were not permitted in the National Park and so people boiled water for tea on fuel stoves, or played cards by torchlight. The hut was reasonably full, and occasionally someone would clomp along the timber veranda in their heavy hiking boots, off to visit the pit toilets or fill bottles at the water tanks.

Heather and Tim found the grazing wombats fifty or so metres down the track and sat on a log to watch them as the sun snuck below the horizon. Several wallabies and a pademelon grazed nearby while a currawong chortled from somewhere low in a eucalypt, signalling to its flock mates there were humans about, maybe with an early evening snack to steal before heading off to roost. "Wombats are so cute," Heather whispered with a smile in her voice.

The clouds were increasingly menacing, and the air was now quite chilly in the twilight. Tim turned to look at Heather, who watched the grazing wombat family with a smile on her face, and he couldn't help but smile at her obvious pleasure. She certainly had a soft spot for nature. In silence he handed her his pewter flask of scotch and she shared her dark chocolate with him.

Heather's eyes followed a wallaby hopping to another patch of grass and she caught Tim's look. He averted his gaze back to the wombats, not wanting to stare, but couldn't keep the smile off his face. Perhaps all those things Kathy said about their mutual feelings were true?

He glanced back, wondering if she'd take his hand if he put it on the log between them. Or what if he was more proactive and simply took her hand? They made eye contact again, the twilight bright enough for him to make out her seemingly nervous little smile.

What was the other thing Kathy said? Fortune favours the bold. Fuck, stop with the thinking! It's not like I haven't done this before! With his heart beginning to thump in his chest, Tim leant in towards Heather, a little way at first, and noticed her lean towards him too. He lent in further, slowly but now with confidence, despite his still racing heart. Their faces were close now, and kissing was a foregone conclusion. Both tilted their heads slightly and closed their eyes at the last second before their lips gently touched, sharing a long moist chocolate-scotch kiss in the dark.

Their kiss was slow and gentle, sensuous without rushing hungrily to suck each other's face off. Tim opened his lips a little, letting his tongue find Heathers, dancing lightly in the space between their mouths. They kept their hands to themselves, sitting on their log and pashing in the cool night air.

Gradually their kissing grew harder, their tongues more adventurous and attempting to entangle each other. Eventually Heather moved back slightly, disengaging, and Tim could see her grinning at him in the dark, before he leant in again, their lips covering each other and tongues caressing vigorously.

With the slightest rustle in the leaves above, a light drizzle fell on them, and they hesitantly disengaged their lips. Without saying a word, Heather smiled at Tim, taking his hand and stood. They walked quickly back to camp while the drizzle grew harder, becoming a shower. Heather only let Tim's hand go to unzip her tent flap entry, crawling in. Tim's heart had calmed, but now beat again as he crawled through the flap, seeing Heather beginning to pull her polar fleece jacket off.

"Zip the flap please," was all Heather said, and after he'd done so, Tim turned to her, reaching out in the dark tent, his hand finding her muscular and now naked waist. She reached for him, caressing Tim's face and he took two of her fingers in his mouth, sucking them slowly from base to tip. He noted the silhouette of her shoulders rise as she took in a deep breath, then she reached down at his shirt, pulling the sweaty polyester over his head.

She pushed him down to the floor of the tent, kissing him hard, and not liking to be dominated, he fought back. Heather was very strong and gave nothing away and her grip on his hand actually hurt. However, their wrestling space was limited, ending in a stalemate on their sides in the tent's centreline, breathing hard while the rain began to patter heavily on the tent's siliconized nylon skin.

Tim let go of her gripping hand and contrary to their preceding roughness he gently caressed up her flank with the tips of his fingers, feeling the muscles there and reaching around her back to unclip her bra. She helped him removed it, and they kissed hard while he covered her firm left breast with his right hand, feeling her hard nipple against his palm.

Heather fumbled with his hiking pants, pulling them down, and then slipped her own sports pants down her long legs. They were naked in the dark tent, ready to pounce on one another as the rain fell steadily through the tree canopy above and onto the taut tent skin. Tim's hand found Heather's in the dark and they entwined fingers, leaning their faces to each other and joining with a deep sensual kiss.

Tim's cock felt so hard, like it would burst out of its skin, and when he moved to cover Heather, she lay back on the tent floor, pulling him onto her, kissing him hard all the way. Positioning himself between her legs, he felt her thigh skin tighten around his hips, and his cock grazed her hairy muff. His glans touched her pussy lips, which were wet and ready for him to penetrate her easily, his length sliding deep into Heather's innermost sanctum, and she arched her neck and back with a hushed gasp escaping her lips before he kissed her again.

Heather wrapped her arms around Tim's back, embracing him and pushing her bottom off the ground and grinding their groins together. The length of his cock snug against the walls of her moist vaginal canal, his fat glans consistently hitting a most pleasureful spot inside her. "Oh, yes," she whispered, "Feels amazing. You're hitting the spot. Right there. Yes!"

They weren't moving fast, but pushing against each other in a steady, hard grind. She pulled him forcefully into her, and he pushed back hard, their bodies deeply and utterly connected. Sometimes they kissed and sometimes their faces hovered millimetres from each other, simply breathing each other in the dark. Their tempo increased slightly, as did their pleasure, and Tim kissed Heather slowly as he pushed his cock harder into her enveloping cunt.

She embraced him harder, kissing him lightly with her tongue rolling up his and coming to rest on his upper teeth for a moment. He could feel her breasts firm against his chest, while their abdominals tightened, flat against each other with sweaty skin-on-skin occasionally trapping air between and expelling it with a noise like a wet fart.

"Oh, God, Tim," Heather whispered, their bodies completely together. "Oh, ohh, ohhh." They moved quicker now, their pleasure building at a similar pace, Tim's hard cock hitting her pleasure spot with increasing frequency.

He kissed her jawline, sucking down the skin of her neck, and she arched back. It wouldn't be long, the pleasure tingles beginning to flow through both their bodies. Heather gasped, panting frequently, "Oh, oh, oh, oh." It was like a dream. Earlier when they started kissing Tim couldn't believe the turn of events, and since then he'd tried and succeeded to give her as great a fuck as he possibly could. His strongest sexual turn on was pleasuring his partner, and he could tell he was pleasuring Heather immensely, which increased his own pleasure in the greatest positive feedback loop imaginable.

"Oh, Oh, Oh," her breathing was deeper and she held him tighter, and suddenly she pulled his lips hard to hers, shoving her tongue roughly onto his, stifling a deep moan in their mouths, causing his pleasure to overload, pulsating through his body, travelling up his cock, pumping thick cum juice deep into Heather. Her legs, wrapped up around his waist squeezed him tighter as he came, pulling him in, further and further.

Their kisses slowed, their tight embrace slackened, and then they simply breathed heavily into each other in the dark with their lips slightly apart. Tim felt the occasional post-orgasmic tremor pulse through Heather, as they came down from their pleasure high. The rain pattered on the tent, and the wind picked up through the leaves in forest canopy.

Embracing for several minutes like neither wanted to let go, they brought their breathing back to normal, then Tim made a move to pull out of Heather.

"Where do you think you're going?" she whispered.

"Earlier you said you were glad we weren't sharing tents."

"Oh, yeah, the curry. I guess I've changed my mind. You can stay."

"I s'pose I could stay with you then," he said cheekily. "I'll get my sleeping bag and mat."

"Okay. You better come straight back. Just keep the farting to a minimum."

"I dunno. It's dangerous enough in here. A Tassie devil mauled me and I might need to gas it." He didn't see her shake her head with a smile in the dark, and completely naked he crawled through the tent flap into the steady cold rain. He fetched his sleeping kit from his own tent as quick as he could, throwing it into Heather's tent and following it in through the flap.

Heather ran her hand down his chest. "You're wet."

Despite his shivering, he grinned. "I'll get you wet."

She chuckled softly. "Seriously, put this around you before you freeze." She helped him wrap his sleeping bag around his body. He reached out, caressing her arm, from hand to shoulder, then ran his fingers lightly down over her breasts, her skin erupting in goose-bumps under his touch. His fingers caressed her nipples, then down her abdominals and along the tops of her thighs.