Impact 17: of The Bikini

"What happened?" she calls in alarm when she sees me walking towards our spot, starting to raise herself off her towel.

"I lost it, I'm so sorry!"

She is blinking in shock, struggling to take in the sight of me. Kip and the guys look almost as surprised.

Walking onto the shore I'd made no attempt to cover myself. And it's not that no one noticed, EVERYONE noticed. But I surprised myself, I didn't blush or feel ashamed, in fact I felt wonderful and clear, returning smiles and greetings as I walked up the beach and then climbed the slope up through the hot sand to our towels.

"When?" Claire asks, still trying to wrap her head around what she's seeing. "How?"

"Like twenty minutes ago I think? Some guys tried to help me find it, but it was gone. It was stupid. I got tossed by waves and didn't realize it had come off?"

"Oh my God, wait - twenty?!?" Claire cries, finally registering something other than my boobs. "Come here, you're going to burn!"

The guys and I laugh as Claire slathers my breasts with lotion, but Claire is not amused.

"She is going to blister!" she frets, but I reassure her I was under water a good bit before I realized I'd lost it. That, and reapplying sunblock, seems to calm her down.

"You never fail to amaze me," she whispers as we settle back onto our towels.

"Sarah Beth!!!" Kip howls, shocking me - for an instant I start to jump up, afraid I've sat on something of his. But he is waving the Piketty book and pointing at the color coded Post-It flags I've been using to help keep track of and organize important passages. others laugh. "How is this beach reading?!?"

"It's interesting!" I whine, knowing what's coming.

"Everyone was talking about it in Brussels," Claire chimes in, defending me. "It's very controversial..."

"You are terrible at this," Kip says to me, gesturing at the sunbathers all around us. Then waving the book in the air like a hellfire preacher, he declares, "This is work!"

I reach for it, but he jerks it out of my reach and jams it in a bag, rummaging around and pulling a Cosmo out. "No more Das Kapital until you finish your personality test!"

I make a show of pouting, but read the questions and answers out loud, and we all do the test together. But before I'm halfway through, and we can find out what kind of man is perfect for me, the chubby Asian boy from "Hotlanta" shows up waving my top!

"Some guy was poking it with his toe when we came back in!" he tells me, handing it over.

He and his friends are a hit with the guys. Introductions are made, and the boys are rewarded with beers and cheers and what's left of the spliff - but I don't put the top back on. I'm enjoying the nonchalance of being naked with Claire - and especially the looks we're getting: like we are out of this world.

Claire and the Bobs want to follow the boys back out into the water to cool down and body surf in the afternoons bigger waves. Kip demurred, saying he wants to stay with the towel, "to roll a proper joint." I opt to go back out, but Claire insists we wear our tops.

"Your nipples will thank me," she says. "Trust me."

I last a while, but I'd already been out a long time on my own, and after a couple very hard tumbles I need to retreat. Claire is having so much fun with the boys and wants me to stay, but I am bruised and deeply chilled so with a quick hug she lets me go.

My teeth are chattering as I cross the wonderfully hot sand. Kip greets me with a lit joint and a dry towel, wrapping me and rubbing my back to warm me, while I struggle for breath through a coughing fit.

He had been haranguing me about hockey, which is why I think the boys excused themselves and the others had fled the towels with them. So wrapping me in a second towel, he plucks the joint from my mouth and picks up where he left off. He gets a little aggressive when he's high.

"...Name one advantage," he demands, taking a long drag. "ONE! That the Sabers have on the Islanders. You can't!"

"Literacy."

"Oof, I walked right into that didn't I?"

"Like a rookie Kippen, like a rookie."

"I blame the hash," he mutters, taking another long hit from the joint. "Clouds the mind."

There's a pause while Kip smokes, and after offering me another hit, wets his fingertips on his tongue and extinguishes the joint by carefully pinching the cherry. He digs in the cooler for beers, opening and passing me one, and taking one for himself. All the salt water and sand I've been force fed over the past half hour has made my throat dry.

'The joint probably didn't help,' some distant part of me realizes.

It's the best beer I've ever had.

"So she seems nice," he tells me, peeking at me over the top of his sunglasses.

"You like her?" I chatter. The sun is warming my back but I'm still cold, and Claire isn't here to reapply my sunblock. She has made me paranoid, so I stay wrapped in the towels, pulling the second one protectively up over my head like a hood.

"I do," Kip says, looking out at her and the Bobs and the boys.

Claire is laughing and splashing Robert, who is trying to get her to do something.

"She's way more fun than I expected a French art curator to be," he admits. "I see why you like her so much."

"I'm so in love with her," I confess, whispering and feeling shy.

"Of course you are," he says, wrapping his arms around me and squeezing the towels tight against me, warming me with his body. "And what about her?"

"She told me all she wants is me... forever and ever."

"Is that scary?"

"No... it's just... I mean I guess women do that? Can do that? But is Claire the type of woman to do that?"

"What type of women do that?"

My stoned brain throws out images of pinch-faced spinsters, maiden aunts, nuns, and big mannish women with shamelessly short hair all named Marge... but all I say is, "I don't know?"

Claire is screaming as the Bobs launch her out of the water. Her arms and legs pinwheeling and her trunks drooping as she turns entirely over in the air, mooning the beach.

"Oh my God the Bobs are going to kill her."

"They really love her..."

"I think I'd better get back out there before they love her to death..."

But just then Claire popped out of the water laughing hard. And yelling to go again.

"I think she's fine," Kip tells me. "Let's go get ice cream sandwiches!"

The ride home is decidedly less rowdy. Kip keeps the top down as we make our way back down Long Island. But traffic is slow, as everyone else is going home too. Still, the great pink slab of a car moves with the smooth momentum of something truly heavy.

"Mary Kay didn't fuck around," Kip tells us as he fills the tank at a Stop & Go. "Four thousand, six hundred, and seventy pounds of raw pink power... and seriously, like half a mile to the gallon."

He puts the top up and soon we're on the highway where traffic is moving fast. We drive into the sunset which seems to set the atmosphere ablaze.

Exhausted from the sun and the swimming, Claire, Bobby, and I cuddle against each other like puppies in the backseat. Kip and Robert talking quietly up front. Their low voices meaningless but loving rumbles that remind me of listening to my dad and uncle Pat on long drives. I wake up in the darkened back seat as Kip is pulling up to the parking attendant's booth. Everyone else is awake, they are laughing about something, Claire is smiling at me.

"Welcome back."

We unload our stuff from the car, trudging towards the elevators with towels draped over shoulders and wrapped around necks, or in Bobby's case, thrown over his head like a shroud. Our bags seem somehow fuller than when we left. Robert is dragging Kip's cooler, which rattles with empty cans.

"You girls get the bathroom first," Kip announces as he opens the door to his apartment. "But no hanky panky, we need to motivate!"

I lead Claire through the master bedroom while the guys head down the hall towards the kitchen.

We rush to get undressed and within seconds are in the shower, scrubbing the lotion off each other and seeking out any remaining sand.

"I feel like you brought home half the beach in your hair!" Claire laughs.

"It's always that way," I admit.

She dries me and again begins to lotion my skin. It's vaguely citrusy and bright.

"Mmmm, feels nice... what is that? It smells good."

"Estée Lauder After Sun Rehydrator," she murmurs as she spreads it over my shoulders and down my breasts. "You're a little red... not as bad as I thought though."

"There's no avoiding it," I tell her, picking up the orange tube. "No matter how diligent you were... although going topless all afternoon was definitely pushing my luck."

"You really surprised me."

"I really surprised myself."

"No, I mean it. Never in a million years..." she says, cupping my breasts and looking at me in the eyes, studying me. "It wasn't that you did it, it's how bold and sure you were... and it was very sexy, I'm still turned on. I want to fuck you so bad right now, but Kip will kill us if we dawdle."

"Dawdle?" I laugh, kissing her.

"That's right, isn't it?" she asks, a worried look on her face.

"No, it is." I tell her. "Its just not something I ever thought I'd hear you say - and 'dawdling' isn't how I'd ever in a million years describe being fucked by you."

I squirt some of the lotion in my hand and see the price on the tube - it's in Euros, so it takes me a moment to do the math.

"Jesus Christ, Claire! What's in this stuff, gold?"

"I know, I know, but don't fret... it's Brigitte's" she says with a naughty smile. "She won't even know it's gone."

Claire packed two tiny silk cocktail dresses for us, fresh panties and sandals, but no bras. I don't even have the impulse to complain.

She puts the heart shaped locket I gave her around her neck and puts a cowrie shell choker around mine.

"Because," she explains. "The beach!"

Our hair is still damp and tangly when we emerge from our bath. The Bobs rush past us to take their turn in the shower and Kip hands us each a mojito, gesturing to two lines of coke on the basalt counter of the kitchen island.

"Oh my fucking God Kippen, I love you so much right now!" Claire says, grabbing him by the face and kissing him hard on the lips. "But we cannot give Sarah a line, it will kill her."

"How do you know- " I start to protest, but Kip talks over me.

"Oh Jesus, I know! Not to worry, those are for you Claire!"

This earns him another big smooch. Then turning to me, he smiles wickedly.

"Come here Sarah, and I'll give you a bump!"

"Just a bump!" Claire says, bending over to do her first line.

"But I-"

"It's just a bump!" he croons. And I watch him make a cute little "bump" on the side of his hand, between his thumb and index finger. Looking up at Claire, who has already done her first line, cheeks glowing and eyes sparkling with a preternatural pleasure.

I lean in and take my first snort of coke off Kip's closed fist.

I had always imagined the feeling would be frantic, that I would be jumping out of my skin and talking uncontrollably, and while the euphoria is sudden and intense, I feel at ease as it unfolds and opens, like sliding slowly down a snowy slope into deep drifts of powder. It's nothing like what I imagined.

While Kip is in the shower and the Bobs are dressing, Claire is sipping her drink and looking at Kip's art. Most of which is black and white sports photography, but there are lots of black and white pictures of naked men too.

"There's family money?" she asks and I tell her Kip's last name.

"Old money," she says, turning back to look at the art.

"Some," I agree.

"Well, this is a wonderful Mapplethorpe," she says, looking at a giant black and white picture of a fluted lily. "He needs some color work, though. You should tell him I could help him find some things he'd really like."

"You can tell him."

"Mm. Better it comes from you, that way he won't feel obligated."

"OK bitches!" Kip bellows from down the hall. He and the Bobs are clean and tan and shining. I seriously don't think I've ever seen men look better. "Do your second line bitch," he bellows at Claire. "Because it is time to GO!"

Joe's Pub is just down the block from Kip's. We get seated and place our dinner orders just before the lights go down.

The show is old fashion cabaret, the star is in an outrageously big wig and a little sequined cocktail dress with a body that is so round it's almost spherical and comically thin arms and legs. Picture a cartoon pumpkin in drag. She sings and tells stories - and climbs into Robert's lap at one point - and exchanges snappy repartee with her guest star, a boyish looking man who everyone but me seems to know.

We all laugh and have fun, but Claire and Robert are beside themselves. I have never seen her laugh so hard or have so much fun - not even close. She scream-laughs into Robert's wide open mouth. The two of them wild eyed and bright red with hysteria, looks of absolute disbelief in their eyes.

I am laughing harder than I ever have, but more because of her, and her hysteria, than any particular thing said or done on stage.

"Just one drink!" Claire says with a naughty look in her eyes. She is pulling me towards Kip's. Kip, who is walking ahead with the Bobs, is looking back at us smiling.

"I mean it," I hiss to Claire, "not with Kip!"

"I understand," she says, with mock solemnity. "I promise to be good."

Kip makes us all cocktails while Robert cuts lines on Kip's coffee table. Bobby is swinging his ass and singing along shockingly well to Squeeze's Goodbye Girl in front of Kip's stereo.

"No, Robert! A line is too much," Claire explains seriously. "She's never had it before. Just a bump!"

Claire and I have never really discussed drugs, so I'm not sure how she knows, but she's right about me. And as fun as the high is, I suspect she's right about my tolerances. Still, as I'm excited to be doing coke with her, I am more than happy keeping myself to bumps.

Robert gives Claire his bag, which she carefully scoops from with her pinky nail and offers to me. Holding her by the wrist and bowing my face over her hand while Robert watches, I snort the coke. For the world feeling like Claire's baby bird.

Part of the reason I've never done coke was seeing Danny on the stuff. He only did it in front of me twice, but that was enough to turn me off for a lifetime - or I had thought it was. He had been unable to modulate his volume, almost yelling, and his whole manner had been aggressive and frighteningly jumpy. I had put my foot down after that, and to his credit he had never done it around me after that, or ever asked me to try it again.

But it's strangely thrilling to watch Claire snorting long lines off the table with the men. She's so fucking cool.

Her laughter is gravely and deep. She sits with her knees parted, exuding a confidence and ease I find myself worshiping. I wish I was topless again. I wish I was naked, that I could sit on the floor between her feet, licking her cunt while she talks and laughs with the men.

There is a second round of cocktails and another spliff. We discuss the show, the laughter almost as wild now, just with the retelling. Claire announces that we will all go to see the cabaret in the Bastille.

"The prison?" Robert asks.

"The prison was destroyed," Kip corrects.

"I'd do prison cabaret!" Bobby decides.

"It's a neighborhood! In Paris!" Claire tells them, exasperated. They are all talking at once. I can't stop laughing long enough to catch my breath.

At some point Claire tells the guys about Helen - not that she watches us or anything, but that I have a crush on her.

"Nooo..." I protest.

"It's true," Claire tells them, googling her and showing the guys on her phone.

"She looks like Carmen Dell'Orefice!" Bobby tells us.

"Let me see! Let me see!" I demand, finally getting a turn with Claire's phone. "Ohhh, that's such a pretty picture of her!"

"See?!?" Claire laughs.

"I totally do," I admit, earning kisses from her.

I change the subject by telling Kip he needs new art...

"Color!" Claire tells him. "This is too severe... too black and white, Kippen!"

"Oh my God, someone finally said it," Robert says with a sigh.

"Really?" Kip laughs.

The conversation careens from there.

We discuss Claire's past in ice cream sales.

The boys who rescued my top.

"I got his number," Kip tells us.

"Which one?" I want to know, hoping it's Brent, the Asian boy.

"All of them," Kip admits, making an embarrassed face.

It's decided that the French are superior in all ways.

"Just so," Claire pronounces, making an extremely Gallic face.

...and that I've only been pretending to be sweet and innocent the whole time.

"Noooo...." I whine.

Bobby is cuing up more music while Robert has Claire laughing uncontrollably with his blow-by-blow account of Showgirls! The Musical. I am standing at the kitchen island with Kip. He and I are licking and salting the spot between thumb and index finger on the backs of our hands. He hands me my shot of tequila and retrieves his own. We touch glasses, scrape the salt with our teeth and drink, biting down on lime slices.

He smiles at me as he wipes his chin and hand, doling out another bump of coke on his fist for me.

"Not too much KIPPEN!" Claire bellows, making Kip look up in shock and then back to me. "I mean it!" she yells.

"I mean it!" he parrots back, before turning to me in horror, and whispering, "Jesus, how does she fucking know?!?"

I shrug and Kip puts out his hand, but as I start to lean over, he and I both stop to look at the bump he's doled out - it looks REALLY big. With a glance back at Claire and Robert - who are oblivious to our drama - Kip snorts the big bump and then measures out a much smaller bump for me. I'm still recovering from the shot, but I lean over and snort it.

"I'm corrupting my little Sarah," Kip mutters as he measures out another giant bump for himself. "What would Amelia think?"

I am beyond care.

I retreat to the bathroom to pee and spend a long time staring at myself in the mirror afterwards, wondering at my own face, how girlish and beautiful it is. I'm wearing just a bit of mascara, but otherwise no makeup. What little lipstick I had put on is long gone. My skin is scrubbed and glowing from the sun, making my lips look so full and pink, and my eyes are enormous and dewy. The pale blue of my irises seems to glitter. Would I be an icy blonde? Would Claire like it if I bleached my hair? I push the straps of my dress off my shoulders and expose my breasts. Watching my nipples stiffen in the mirror. I enjoy the sight of my hands cupping and squeezing them. They look so wonderfully swollen and over full. My fingers pull and pinch at my nipples, making the pink rosier.

There's a quiet tapping at the bathroom door and Claire's voice asks, "Hey, are you ok? You've been in there a long time..."

I crack the door. We are almost nose to nose, looking at each other through the gap.

"What are you doing in here?" she asks, her expression worried until she sees my nakedness. "Sarah!"

I reach for her and pull her in, shutting the door before the guys can see. I embrace her tightly.

Holding her I think of the ocean, of the way the water seemed to hold me, the pressure of the tide all around me, the powerful muscular feeling as the waves passed over me, spinning me head over heels, pulling and pushing my limbs like a doll. I want to hold Claire that way. I push my tongue into her mouth wanting to deafen her with the thunder of my entrance. I want to block out the world, for her to hear the surge of my body and nothing else. I want her to float over my depths, listen to my infinite roar.