Love Notes from Summer Camp

We cuddled for a while, lying entwined as our vital signs settled. Then we began kissing, followed by fondling, followed by groping, clasping, rubbing, squeezing and stroking. Finally, Amy said, "Enough foreplay, big boy. You promised me some serious pushing, so let's get your Tab A inserted into my Slot B!" I broke up laughing at that.

"What's so funny?"

"When you said that, you sounded like you were narrating a page from an Ikea sex manual."

This caused Amy to convulse in laughter. "Oh my god! Can you imagine getting one of those in the mail?"

"Yeah, except instead of Tab A, and Slot B, our genitals would have Swedish names, like Hjalmar and Kunthilda."

"Baby, baby, bring mighty Hjalmar over here and slam him into Kunthilda!"

This doubled us over anew in helpless laughter. Finally, once the giggling slowed down, Amy threw her leg over me in cowboy position, and stroked mighty Hjalmar until he was quite rigid. Then, she raised up, and and slowly engulfed him, until he was deep inside of her. This was a great success, so she raised up and lowered herself again. I moaned, "I'll give you exactly 30 minutes to stop that!"

"Big talk, Hjalmar! I don't think you can last that long."

"If I blow it, we'll just have to do it again."

As it turned out, neither mighty Hjalmar nor his partner lasted 30 minutes before they both crescendoed into a shattering boutade of orgasmes à deux. We took this failure in stride, and soldiered on. We proceeded to blow and do each other in multiple positions a few more times before the night was over.

- - -

The next morning, I awoke to find myself spooning closely against Amy's back. When I stirred, she turned over, kissed me and looked deeply into my eyes, and asked, "Ron?"

"Hmmm?"

"Want to be my boyfriend?"

"Aren't you supposed to ask me that before you spend the night fucking my brains out?"

"So? We got a few things out of order."

"Things? Things plural?"

"Yes, we had four wonderful children, then had a wild night of hot monkey sex, and then I asked you to be my boyfriend."

"Hmmm... when you put it that way, I suppose that it does sound a bit ass backwards. However, I'm pretty happy with the results."

"You still haven't answered my question: Wanna be my boyfriend?"

"Umm.. nope!"

Amy pulled back from me, eyes and mouth wide, and said "Nope? Are you shitting me!? I thought you liked me?"

"I meant that what I'm feeling for you is a lot more serious than being your boyfriend. It's only been a month, but I can think of only one word that adequately conveys how I feel about you: love. I've been falling for you ever since you asked me to dance that first day at camp. Amy, I love you. I don't want to be your boyfriend — I want to be with you for the rest of my life."

Amy's gaze was filled with wonder. She closed her mouth, and then opened it again and said, "Wow."

"Wow? That's all?"

"Well, actually two things. First, there's this!" She leaned over to me and gave me a torrid kiss and said, "I love you, too, Ron. But secondly, there's this!" With that, she slapped my ass as hard as she could.

"Ouch!! What's that for?"

"That's for jerking my chain like that, asshole. Toy with me and I will kick your ass!"

I pulled her into my arms, and said. "Actually, that spank was pretty arousing. Mind doing it again?"

She spanked me again, and said, "Ooohhh... I can tell. That did get a rise out of... Owww!!!" as I surprised her with a whack on her own buttock. She said, "Asshole...mmphf!" before I covered her mouth with my own.

I adjusted my angle slightly, and aimed mighty Hjalmar once more into the breach, which was quite wet and ready. I thrust a few more times, upon which Amy rolled on top of me and embarked on a wild ride to the finish line for us both.

As we lay together in postcoital bliss, we drifted off to sleep once more, which lasted until the insistent chime of my iPhone. I reached over and felt around in vain atop my bedside table. "Crap! Where is it?"

"Umm?" murmured Amy beside me.

"Where did I leave my iPhone?" I sat up, and finally located the chime as coming from a pile of our clothes over on the floor. I got up and pulled the phone out of my pants, spied my brother's name of the screen, and said, "Hello?"

"Are you guys OK? It's 10 am. Weren't you coming over for breakfast this morning at 9?"

Amy asked, "Who's calling? Are the girls OK?"

"Sorry, Mark, but we, er, um, overslept. We'll be right over!"

I swear that Mark had a smile in his voice. "Sorry to wake you two! The girls have all eaten. But don't worry, we'll save some bacon for you!"

"Okay, see you soon!" I blushed, and was thankful that I had not hit the FaceTime button when I answered the phone. "Amy, we overslept! We're an hour late for breakfast over at Mark and Lisa's."

"Oh, shit!" She got up and looked for her clothes, and then added, "We can't go over there looking and smelling like this! We need a quick shower first."

I pouted. "Oh, man. Our first shower together, and we don't have time for shower sex. Raincheck!"

* * *

During the drive over to Mark and Lisa's house, I said, "OK, clearly Mark now knows that we banged boots last night. And if he knows, then Lisa does too. The girls will know something is up. What do we tell them?"

"They did ask us the boyfriend / girlfriend question the other day. Maybe we should tell them that, if they ask."

When they arrived at Lisa and Mark's place, the girls were all playing out in the back yard. Mark waggled his eyebrows and said, "Good morning, sleepyheads! Have a good time last night?"

We both blushed, and mumbled, "Sure" "Great dance!" "Really tired."

Amy said, "We drank a lot of wine and made out on the couch for a while after we got back to Ron's place last night. So we overslept!"

Lisa crossed her arms, and said, "Oh, bullshit! Don't give me that. You've both got that freshly fucked look on your faces."

Amy shrugged her shoulders and said, "OK, fine! Bust-ed! So we like each other. So what!?"

Lisa came over and gave Amy a hug, and said, "Sorry for busting your chops a bit. We're just so freaking happy that you two are together. The last nine months have been pretty rough on Ron and his girls, and we've had a front-row seat. For a long time, we didn't see Ron smile much, except when he was alone with his girls. Since you two met at camp, he's moved on into shit-eating grin territory. So, yeah, we're going to fuck with you from time to time, but it's because we love both of you and are so glad to see you two happy together."

Four misty-eyed grownups embraced each other. Then the girls came bursting into the house, chattering like magpies. Jennie and Stacy said, "Hi, Uncle Ron! Hi Amy!" and hugged them. Thanks for letting the girls sleepover with us — it was epic!"

Our own daughters gave us a speculative look, and Milly asked, "It's about time you guys got here. We've been up for hours!"

Lilly added, "We saved you guys some bacon."

Lori asked with an overly innocent look on her face, "Why did you guys sleep so late, Mom?"


Cindy looked at us with wide eyes, and asked, "Did you guys finally push your beds together last night?"

I hadn't realized that Amy and I could blush any more intensely, but somehow we did.

The six girls squealed and with a gleam of mischief in their eyes said, "Ewww, Uncle Ron!" "Ewww, Mom!" "Ewww, Dad!" "We're just little girls!"

Then they ran over and mobbed us in a huge group hug, as Mark and Lisa dissolved in laughter.

* * *

The rest of the day was rather anticlimactic by comparison. Amy and I finally got to eat our bacon. Mark asked, "Hey Ron, I hear you're getting pretty good on piano these days?"

"I'm still pretty rough, but can manage some simple backup in a few keys now."

I was cajoled into sitting down at the piano, and the other adults pulled out instruments. While the girls played outside, the geezers played fiddle tunes together for several hours.

Lisa and Mark were both very complimentary. "Ron, we'll have to get you to play with us at our next gig!"

I was pleased. "Well, maybe after I build up my endurance. My arms are pretty tired after playing today. Maybe in a few months I'll have enough stamina to play for a whole dance."

* * *

That evening I drove my girls over to their grandparents' house in Ballard for the handoff. Sarah was there early, and waiting outside. For some reason, this didn't bother me as much as it usually did. The twins gave me a hug, and then ran in to say hello to their grandparents.

"Hi, Ron!" said Sarah.

"Hi."

"I hope that you and the girls found a few fun things to do after we got back from New York."

"Yep."

"They had so much fun there. I'll bet they can hardly wait to get to Hawai'i." She noticed the flat expression on my face, and added, "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to rub it in your face. I know that you wanted us all to go there together. But I'm glad that I'll get to spend time with them there."

She paused, and added, "I'm sure that you guys managed to find some fun activities to do around here."

"Yep."

"Oh, Ron. Don't thirteen years together buy me more conversation than a few monosyllabic grunts?"

"Nope."

I turned, got in my car, and drove away.

* * *

I found it remarkable how much my outlook had changed in just a few weeks. When I had first dropped the twins off with Sarah at the beginning of the summer, I had been deeply depressed. I had been miserable while the girls were away with Sarah, and I missed them badly. This time had been much easier. I still missed not having my girls around, but not as profoundly as I had during their previous absence. I kept fairly busy during the next two weeks, catching up with my actuarial consulting business.

Unlike on their trip to New York, the twins sent me almost daily texts and pictures from Hawai'i. There were the usual collection of glam shots from Waikiki beach, but they also thoroughly documented Sarah's terrible sunburn, complete with raccoon facies from her sunglasses. The girls mentioned being taken to a lavish dinner in a Japanese restaurant where they ate lots of cooked tempura, but turned up their noses at the fresh sushi. Dickwad apparently ate a lot of the sushi, and ended up in the emergency room two nights later after spending two days on the toilet. One of the twins "accidentally" walked into the bathroom and got a great shot of him with his ass glued to the toilet. Apparently Festerface had encountered a particularly virulent form of fish tapeworm that would require several weeks of an unpleasant oral vermifuge. Sarah took the girls snorkeling one day, but then earned her own visit to the emergency room to have sea urchin spines removed from her hands. I loved the pictures the twins sent me of colorful tropical fish and coral, but I especially enjoyed the pictures of Sarah on the plane home with both hands bandaged. Schadenfreude, anyone?

Meanwhile, I took time to attend a few of the local Seattle contradances. I also rode the train down to Olympia for the next weekend, and stayed with Amy and her girls. We had a great seafood dinner together, and then went to a contradance Amy was playing for at the South Bay Grange.

I had been planning on spending the night on their couch. After the dance, I asked Lori and Cindy where the extra bedding was. They rolled their eyes at me and Cindy said, 'Ron, don't be silly. You and Mom are pushing beds together tonight."

I looked over at Amy to see how she was handling this. To my surprise, she was smiling broadly and said, "You heard them. You're out-voted 3 to 1. My boyfriend is sleeping with ME tonight."

The girls headed off to bed. Amy and I wound down with a glass of wine, and then we went up to her bedroom. I was looking forward to sleeping with Amy, but didn't imagine that there would be any sex involved. However, I was pleased to see that Amy's bedroom was separated from the girls' room by a bathroom. I slipped into bed next to her and asked, "Are the girls asleep?"

"Yeah, they were sawing tiny logs when I peeked in. Slide over a bit closer to me and let's do some quiet canoodling."

Somehow, we were able to successfully canoodle each other's brains out without waking the girls. I slept soundly and woke up feeling splendid.

The next day, they dropped me off at the train station. Everyone was rather excited about going to camp together on the following weekend. I felt a bit giddy getting on the train after multiple hugs and kisses from three enthusiastic women.

* * *

I spent the next week getting ready for the upcoming Oregon camp. Now that I had been to one of these events, I was able to pack with a bit more foresight. Along with the usual shorts, T-shirts, swimming gear, sandals and running shoes, I added my new banjo and compendium of fiddle tunes. Since this camp would be taking place at 4,000 feet of elevation on the wet side of the Cascades, I also packed a small umbrella, a pile jacket, and two pairs of long pants.

When time came to pick up the twins from my ex, I was almost chipper. This time, it didn't bother me at all when I overlapped with Sarah. I even ventured a few pleasantries, and asked her how the past two weeks had gone. This time, it was Sarah who was noncommittal and deflected my queries.

"The girls seem awfully excited about going to camp with you this week. They have been constantly showing Jason and me pictures of all of things you guys did at the last camp. They had lots of pictures of their new friends. It was nice to see shots of Mark and Lisa and their kids. However, I didn't realize how many single moms were at that camp. They also sent me a picture of you playing a banjo!? Also, you seem happier these days."

I decided that I, too, could play the noncommittal card, and said something bland about how much there was to do at camp. Suddenly the girls came bursting out of the door and embraced me.

"Hello, pumpkins! Great to see you again. Tell your mom goodby and I'll grab your bags. We want to get to camp before dark this evening. Bye, Sarah."

* * *

We drove down to Olympia and parked in Amy's driveway. Amy and her girls' gear was already stowed in her minivan. I moved all of our gear over to the van while the girls caught up with each other.

Amy came out and pulled me into a close embrace and kissed me soundly. "How was the handoff?" she asked.

"Not too bad. Actually, they are getting easier and easier for me lately. You know, I sense that Sarah is finding them less comfortable."

"Why do you think that?"

"Just a hunch. She seemed pretty tired. I'm not sure that she and Assface had as much fun in Hawai'i as they had hoped. Another factor might be that I've been a lot happier for the past six weeks. Somehow I think that she finds that unsettling."

We rounded up the girls, got everyone buckled in, and Amy pointed the minivan down I-5 south toward the Oregon border. The girls chatted and giggled in the back seats, filling each other in on their adventures from the past two weeks. Amy and I rode along in an easy, amiable silence, holding hands from time to time, and basking in the pleasant noise of happy little girls. After crossing the Columbia River, we rolled into Portland and stopped for a quick bite to eat.

As we ate, Amy asked the twins, "How was Hawai'i?"

Lily answered first. "Well, it was really pretty, but we didn't have a lot of fun there."

Milly chimed in, "We spent a lot of time at the doctor's office because Mom and Jason were sick or hurt a lot of the time." The twins recapped the medical misadventures for Amy, and seemed to have quite a few pictures to show of miserable adults.

Lily said, "We didn't let them push their beds together while we were there."

Amy and I tried not to choke on our burgers, and I managed to gasp out a strangled, "Really?"

Lily said, "When Jason is with Mom, they tend to ignore us a lot. We got tired of that during the New York trip, so we made them keep the door open between our rooms in Hawai''i."

Milly added, "Yeah, we told them we were scared to sleep in the room by ourselves. Anyway, I don't think they got much sleep. Mom's sunburn was pretty bad, and Jason kept going to the bathroom all night."

It was all that Amy and I could do to keep a straight face. We didn't even dare to look at each other. However, when the girls went up to order milkshakes, we completely lost it, and were still giggling when the girls came back to their table.

"What are you two laughing about?" asked the girls.

"Oh, nothing, honey," lied Amy. "Just a corny joke Ron told me."

"Tell us! Tell us!" they chanted.

"OK," I said. "When does green mean stop, and red means go?"

The girls thought about it for a moment, and then gave up.

"When you're eating watermelon."

The girls laughed politely, and Lily said, "Good dad joke, Dad. But, only dads think jokes like that are funny. So, why is Amy laughing? I thought moms were immune to dad jokes."

Amy and I started giggling again. I snorted, "Never mind, sweetie. Where's my milkshake?"

* * *

The Oregon camp was a hoot. We saw a number of friends there who had been at the camp in Idaho with us. We again enjoyed arts, crafts, music and dance. We hiked on the trails at the camp, and even made a field trip one afternoon up to the Timberline Lodge on the shoulders of Mt. Hood for some T-shirt skiing. After much wheedling and coaxing by the girls, I was talked into playing piano and my new banjo at several of the evening dances. The twins asked me when they could start music lessons back in Seattle.

The six of us shared a cabin, and the girls showed no reaction when Amy and I pushed our bunks together the first night of camp. Although no canoodling occurred, much kissing and cuddling took place once the girls were asleep.

On the last day of camp, the girls ranged around the cabins, saying goodbye to all of their friends. As we were loading the minivan for the drive home, they accosted Amy and me and asked when the next camp would occur.

I turned to Amy, who said, "I've always wanted to go to this really fun dance and music camp on Vashon Island for New Year's Eve. What do you guys think?"

The girls squealed "Yes!!", and jumped up and down.

I wisely saw that there could be only one correct response. I turned to my five smiling women and said, "I'm in. When can we sign up?"

* * *

The girls all started school after Labor Day. School activities made it harder to get together, but either Amy or I made the trek up or down I-5 as often as we could. When Sarah had the girls, I would essentially move to Olympia for the week.

Things evolved somewhat in early November. Amy and her daughters had taken the train up to Seattle, and were spending the weekend with me and the twins. One night after supper, the girls went upstairs to do their homework. Amy cuddled up on the couch with me, watching an NPR documentary on the banjo. After the documentary ended, we snuggled closer together, and were contemplating some minor make-out time. Suddenly we noticed that we were being intently watched by four sets of eyes.

Amy asked, "What's up, girls? Is everything OK?"

Lori replied, "We're fine, Mom. But we all need to talk."

I looked at Amy, who looked just as puzzled as I was. I asked, "What do we need to talk about?"

All four girls rolled their eyes, and Milly said, "Daa-aad! We're all tired of driving back and forth between Seattle and Olympia. We think it's time we all moved in together!'

Lily added, "Yeah, Dad. Amy has been your girlfriend for months now. When are you going to get off your butt and ask her to move in?"