Summer College Surprises

He trudged back towards the Driscoll residence, resuming his musing towards a poem in praise of Tess. She had accused him of taking her for granted, and he decided to prove otherwise by giving her a portion of his creativity. Surely this would mean more to her than him listening to her endless litany of petty complaints.

Arch always labored to find the right words for Tess's slender, limber body, after having used 'slender' and 'limber' in the first stanza. Words that looked and sounded excellent, like 'orotund' and 'grandiloquent,' he found not to have the meanings he hoped they would. He shook his head, bearing the burden of aesthetic struggle, knowing that the bourgeois world would never understand his torment.

***

"Now, I don't approve of how Ziri started this venture of hers," said Mr. Driscoll to the house's other residents, "but since that's water under the bridge, there'll be no discussion of that tonight. We'll make a video of Ziri's presentation, and submit it to Piranha Pool." He smiled at Ziri, who seemed to have trouble holding still in one of the living room's overstuffed easy chairs. "She told me today that The Neat Seat has a new feature. She's now confident that she can, as they say on the show, wade into the pool."

"Piranha Pool?" asked Arch.

"Tell you later," said Tess.

Eldon was now guarded about anything Ziri might do or say. Yet, when Mr. Driscoll sat behind the tripod and started the video camera, Ziri stopped fidgeting. After a slow breath, she stood and moved to the center of the room.

"Hello everyone," she said at the camera, with a fixed smile and the intonation of memorized lines. "I'm Ziri Klefstadt, and I'm looking for investors in--" She pulled straps off her shoulders and held her work in front of her. "--The Neat Seat!"

Eldon had to admit that he wasn't dismissive this time. But he thought this might be because he and Ziri had become intimate.

After much of her old pitch, Ziri got to what was new. "This pack adds bulk, and a little weight," she admitted, "but it's not a burden to an adult healthy enough to be active while nude outdoors." She showed the squarish pack that was now stitched to the outside of The Neat Seat. "The user will decide how much weight to add as the contents of the pack."

Smirking, Tess whispered to Arch. "That's another piece of your old backpack. You should ask for another share of the profits."

As usual, Arch showed no amusement. "I'd rather forget all about that."

Mrs. Driscoll faced them with a finger-before-lips hush gesture.

Ziri opened The Neat Seat and spread it on the floor. The sewn-on pack extended from the end of the seat. The up-facing side of the pack had a zipper.

Ziri sat on the towel-covered cushions, and unzipped the pack. "In here a person could carry keys, phone, wallet, water bottle, and so forth. In the real product, there'd be internal pockets or mesh bags to organize everything, but a few items a nudist needs will make the point now." One by one, she pulled out what she had placed there.

"Sunscreen," she said, showing a plastic tube. "Insect repellent," she said, showing a spray bottle.

Then she brought out an open cardboard box. "Condoms."

Tess hooted in hilarity. Arch frowned. Eldon turned beet red.

Dennis, again in residence, looked at his father, who looked down and shook his head. Expecting a retake, Dennis felt free to declare, "Great idea! Spice up those stodgy nudist camps!"

Mrs. Driscoll stormed out of the room.

Ziri, confused, shoved the condoms back into the pack.

Eldon hurried to Ziri's side as she stood. "Talk?" he asked her.

She met his eyes and nodded, lips clamped.

He guided her to the empty dining room. Anyone in the living room could watch and overhear, but nobody tried.

"Do you remember," asked Eldon, "how you used to think about sex?"

"That it was weird and stupid," she replied, "and, except to propagate the species, why would anyone ever do that?"

Eldon nodded. "Now, here's a neurotypical thing," he said, alerting her to think about people who weren't like her. "Lots of people think that about sex. That might include the Piranhas, and the show's audience. But almost everyone who thinks it's weird and stupid, or has problems because of sex, still wants to do it."

"Really?" she said, leaning to him incredulously. She relaxed from a hunched posture she hadn't noticed.

"Really," he said, smiling. What he was getting from his Psych studies seemed to click.

"So they're all weird and stupid," said Ziri. She looked at him closely. "But, you and me, aren't we smart and happy?" She and Eldon had coupled a few more times, and even when she didn't orgasm, she liked it, especially the naked hugging. Eldon was less anxious around her. And, to her great relief, she found that she could still focus on classwork when she tried to.

"We are," he said, not adding so far. "And so are lots of other people. But just about everybody keeps sex private." He then improvised, hoping it would make sense. "The smart and happy people keep quiet about it, so they won't make the, um, weird and stupid people feel bad."

As she mulled that, Eldon glanced over his shoulder at the living room. He saw Mr. Driscoll and his son peering at the vidcam's settings. They looked ready for another take.

"So, no condoms?" Ziri asked.

"Or anything else about sex," he elaborated. Then, quickly, "Or drugs." As far as he knew, Ziri didn't even drink.

Then Eldon leaned close to her. "But just between us, I think you're exactly right. People, in private, will put things in The Neat Seat that can help them have sex."

Ziri took an intuitive leap. "And they'll figure that out themselves," she said, "when they see that there's a place to hide stuff."

Eldon was surprised to see a sly look on Ziri's face. Some of her expressions were almost neurotypical. They contrasted strongly with her resting face, which was blank and affectless.

Ziri moved past Eldon and said, "Mr. Driscoll, can we do that again? I'm sorry about the condoms."

In the retake, the condom box was replaced with a protein bar, to uphold the rule of three.

Ziri had seemed fine through that, and nobody tried to undermine her. Still, Eldon felt the need to check on her later. He knocked on her bedroom door, not rapidly.

"Hi," she greeted him, smiling.

"Are you okay?" he asked, looking at her closely.

"Why? Oh, you mean because of that?" She shrugged. "Sure. You were right. And I'm right too. Now we can do some more research."

"Uh...on what?"

She ducked into her room and returned with the condom box in one hand and her phone in the other. "I've web-searched what happens in sex. Had to skip over a lot of clutter." She showed him the phone screen, where she had written notes under this title:

SEX THINGS THAT PEOPLE DO FOR SOME REASON

"Most of them look weird and stupid," she said, "but some might be okay." Then she held up the box. She needed three starts to get the wording that had her so amused. "The condoms don't get to be on TV!" She spluttered, and almost doubled over. "So, uh, so, what else are they good for?"

From down the hall they heard Tess's laughing voice: "You go, Girl!"

Eldon thought he might have heard a male voice groan. He shook his head, beyond embarrassment. He indicated the hallway. "We could find out right here."

"No way," said Ziri. She scrolled the phone with her thumb. "Sex on a hard floor, definitely no." Despite both hands being full, she hooked his arm and got him into her room.

Fearing that she wanted a Kama Sutra marathon, Eldon said, "Ziri, you know, I haven't done this very much, and I probably can't, um--"

"Yeah I know," she said, stripping. "You're jerky and twitchy, but you listen, and you cooperate." Thus she summarized their liaisons to date.

She hugged her nude body to his clothed one. "And we're smart and happy!"

Eldon worried, because he had a homework assignment due the next morning.

But he had a hardon. And her happiness made him happy.

They didn't do much. Her dislike of kissing carried over to any oral sex, but she liked being fingered, and fingering him. That became their baseline foreplay. She also showed something she'd learned from her research, that she could delay his burst with a firm finger-and-thumb grip below his glans and on his frenulum. He had never heard of that.

She accepted his desire to kiss her breasts, and to avoid annoying her he did it lightly, and briefly.

"Are you sensory-defensive?" he asked as they lay side by side, still foreplaying.

"On some things," she said. "High-pitched sound. Suddenly feeling cold, like from winter wind. Some tastes, and other things with the mouth. Sorry."

"It's okay. You've got your list on all kinds of sex, but I have to make one on Ziri Klefstadt. Any touch or skin issues?"

"No sloppy tongue stuff. Other touching, I don't mind." With a grin she moved his hand from her vulva to her bosom. That gave him a rush. The breast filled his splay-fingered hand. He wondered, B-cup, maybe C? He ordered himself not to sneak a look at the bra tag, certain that doing this would reveal him as a creep. They're her breasts, they feel great, and she lets me touch them.

When they were really excited, he condomed and she tried a new position, riding him in cowgirl.

"Females are superior," he murmured, gazing at her, marveling at how his standard of beauty was centering on her. He was tense, however, trying to work against his nature by keeping his body still.

Soon Ziri said, "I don't like this very much. Could you get on top?"

They reconfigured, not too awkwardly by their standards.

Once she was in missionary, her heart quickened. Slowly swiveling her trunk around his thrusts got her hotter and wetter.

Eldon was holding up his torso, hands to the headboard. "Come down," she said, getting her hands around his sides.

He let her pull him to her. She hugged him tightly, more than she had before. "Hold me, please," she said, breath quickening. "All around."

Eldon did that, getting his arms between her back and the bed, while trying to keep banging her.

"This!" Ziri yelped. "Yes! And I know why!"

It was after they had their fairly awkward, but smart and happy, orgasms, that she explained. "I've read about other people on the spectrum. I'm like some of them. Sometimes, I enjoy being...enclosed. It doesn't just make me feel safe. It's pleasure. Like a naked hug, but even better. So this is how I should do sex."

She relaxed her grip. "Just thought of something. You came over to my place. Did you want to do this?"

He did, but was honest when he said, "I wanted to see if you were okay."

"Which you never did when I was a nuisance!" She giggled. "Well, I'm really okay!"

"Good. Um...but I have a paper to work on," he said. Despite wanting to keep being her enclosure, he lifted from her. Lassitude crept through him, to his annoyance. Was he really the kind of male who'd fall asleep after sex?

"Me too," she said. "I could make us some coffee."

"Uh, yeah," he said, again surprised by her. "That'd be nice."

They got dressed, and made their separate bathroom trips. Ziri went down to the kitchen while Eldon went to his room and started work. So far, his basic anxiety fought off drowsiness.

What he didn't expect was that Ziri would join him. She brought in both coffees, and in later trips her books and laptop, and the chair from her room.

Nor did he expect that she'd strip, and get him to do so. And spread the Neat Seat on the armless chairs. "Different research," she said, with no affect, so he had no clue if that was serious, naughty, or a joke.

Least of all did he expect that he'd actually do a decent job on the homework, and that feeling her flesh on his would be enjoyable but not distracting.

It seemed perfectly normal when she dressed, gathered everything up, and returned to her room.

His attempt to sleep was impeded by more than caffeine. He now feared what his life might be like without Ziri.

***

Eldon had never been diagnosed. He was a scrawny kid, and his parents believed that this was what made him so jumpy. They expected that he'd grow out of it, and meanwhile he should just calm down. Their main effort was to limit his sugar intake.

He didn't grow out of it. Sugar didn't seem to matter. School counselors urged his parents to see if he had ADHD. His parents didn't think he was that afflicted. His grades were good, so they thought his attention wasn't deficient. They heard and read about diagnosed kids who seemed to become drug-dependent, or lost their identities when medicated. Like so many people, his otherwise caring parents thought mental conditions must be either/or. They didn't grasp that the severity of syndromes could be spread along a spectrum.

Eldon researched on his own, in a scattershot way. He tried to get ritalin without a prescription. He badgered kids with prescriptions to slip him some. They refused, and Eldon soon gave up, fearing that they'd rat him out.

He was drawn academically to Psychology, in the hope of learning a way to heal himself.

Now, whoever and whatever he was, he hoped to be a person Ziri wanted to be around, and felt safe with. He wasn't sure he could stay that way if he resorted to medication.

But he wanted to reach the elusive state of quiet body. This could not only benefit his interactions with Ziri, but maybe help him get through job interviews once he graduated.

Thus, both online and through campus activities, he sought an approach that changed a single letter from his previous panacea. Instead of medication, meditation.

***

A week later, Ziri was invited to appear on Piranha Pool.

Ziri texted Eldon. They were both on campus at the time. They agreed to meet in the student union's cafeteria.

"Congratulations!" said Eldon, with an excited smile. He had come around to Mr. Driscoll's belief that, even if the Piranhas said no, the exposure could make The Neat Seat into a going concern. And Ziri was...well, she was Ziri. Social media ridicule, following fame, might roll off of her.

"Thanks," said Ziri briskly. "But what I need to know now is what to call you. Do you find 'boyfriend' demeaning?"

"Uh, what?"

"We could say we're lovers. Is that too much?"

Eldon leaned in, hoping to limit the range of Ziri's projection. "Why is that important?"

"I already told you," she said impatiently. "The show will provide air fare and hotel for me and a guest. I have to tell them what my guest is."

"I'm your guest?" he burst, louder than anything she'd said. "What about, um, your mother?" Or anyone who can take responsibility for you! he wailed silently.

"I'm a grownup," she said. She looked away and said, more quietly, "I don't want my parents in this."

Beneath his anxiety, he realized that her look and tone were new to him. He wondered, Something about her parents? But then the anxiety got him back on topic.

"Mrs. Driscoll?"

Now she was more Ziri-like. "She hates this whole thing. Says her husband is setting me up to look like a fool."

Hard to argue, Eldon managed not to say aloud.

"Anyway, what are you? Boyfriend, lover, paramour, main squeeze, hot peen machine?"

It finally got through to fretful, awkward Eldon that he was happy, and delighted to be Ziri's guest choice. Even as he spluttered at her last suggestion.

He tried to take his own initiative. "Ziri Klefstadt, will you be my girlfriend? May I be your boyfriend?"

"Okay, boyfriend," she said neutrally, looking at her phone and poking a stylus at it.

Most of the wind left his sails, but as he already knew, Ziri was Ziri.

***

All four boarders had no classes on Thursday morning.

They scouted a trail in a forest preserve.

"We've been the only people here for six minutes," Ziri stated. They stood at the crest of a hill, hemmed in by trees in full leaf. A cool breeze made the summer heat tolerable.

"Let's do it," said Tess, grinning. She tickled Arch's gut, feeling his abs through the t-shirt.

"All I need to know," said Ziri, "is if it's comfortable to sit on."

"We'll investigate that," said Tess, stifling a giggle.

"You're the ones who haven't ever used it." Ziri said, thinking that Tess wasn't paying enough attention.

"Uh huh," said Tess, leaning against Arch.

Eldon thought Ziri looked annoyed.

"We'll warn you if we see anyone," Eldon told Tess.

"Good," said Tess, now a little flushed. The sun, the breeze, the male body next to her, all made her skin tingle. "My phone's on."

Ziri nodded to Eldon. Each trekked down the hill on either side. There were no paths into the trail along this stretch.

Arch looked one way, Tess the other.

"Gone," said Arch, when Ziri was hidden by foliage.

"Here too," said Tess, looking after Eldon. She unzipped her shorts and pushed them down her legs along with her thong.

She saw Arch gazing at her shade-dappled mons veneris. This made her even friskier, but she told him, "Open the damn thing and set it down!"

Arch jolted, then shed The Neat Seat and unzipped it.

Now a month old, The Neat Seat was the worse for wear. The cushion plastic and felt had been patched with duct tape, including where the straps had been stapled. The foam had lost some of its bounce. Despite laundering, the towel was scratchy here and there. Tess didn't know what it had been through, but had some guilty, squirmy fun imagining what Ziri, and also Eldon, might have done.

The ground below the seat had a few pebbles and a tree root, along with packed dry earth. Tess sat, and twitched her butt. "Not bad," she said. "Could be better."

She stood and said, "Your turn."

Arch unzipped his cargos and, with only butt exposed, started to crouch.

"All the way off," said Tess. "Get your jewels involved."

He gave her an peevish look, but complied. Tess, pleased to see that he was commando, took his cargoes. She clamped her lips tightly in grin prevention.

Arch sat and moved as Tess had. "Better than nothing," he said. "Probably should be softer."

Tess crouched in front of him and stroked his dick. "This shouldn't!"

"Uhhh...uhhhh?"

"Ziri was right the first time!" said Tess. "So was Dennis! This is what nudists will use it for!" With her non-stroking hand she unzipped the pack, and fished around to find the lube and condom she'd snuck inside.

Arch was appalled, but did nothing to stop her latexing of his prong. "We can't--this isn't--"

"Whaaat?" said Tess, giddy mentally and physically. "Oh, my goodness! Repressive, bourgeois denial of passion, from my literateur?" She set her sandaled feet past his legs and lowered her damp vulva onto him in a tantric posture. His prick was a steady spindle. As she got halfway down, she held out her phone and selfied them, getting faces and their points of contact.

Tess had been stoked about this since breakfast. Now, banging outdoors for the first time in her life, she came almost at once, nearly swooning. She thought she might cum again, loving the sun, the breeze, but she could feel Arch flexing hard on her ring muscles. It's okay, she thought, more fun ahead!

Arch, of course, let it all happen. He got his hands inside her crop-top to hold her sides and thumb her nipples. Yes, certainly, Tess should desire sex with him, here, now, but he hadn't initiated! As his orgasm bloomed, it felt wrong to him. What word should he use for it? Tainted? Or was that because his perineum was pressed into the stiff towel?

Tess stood as his spasms subsided. "How's your ass?" she asked.

"Rough," he wheezed. "This thing definitely needs more padding."

"Experiment over, result confirmed unanimously," she said, donning her thong.