Chapter 6
Delighted giggles issued through the living room of the beach house as Zipper Hardy, an arm around each of the girls, pressured them close, jammed both Terry and Dottie as close to his front as possible.
"Man, what in the world's come over you?" Dottie exclaimed. "You've hardly noticed us since we've been cruising with you Cats-and now-man-. "
"What's come over me doesn't mean a damn," Zipper mumbled. "What matters is now-and you two alone in this damn house with me."
"That's great with me," Terry replied. "Just great."
To show how great it was with her, Terry lifted her mouth, parted her lips, then took Zip's dashing tongue as soon as he bent and smothered her with a kiss.
For a moment, Dottie watched them, quite intrigued by the play of their tongues upon each other. But then her expression became disturbed looking. She thrust her hips close to Zip, close to Terry, too, for both girls cuddled at his front, then snaked her hand behind him and gripped at his hard-muscled back.
Soon, Zip pushed both of the girls away from him.
"Hey, don't stop now," complained Terry. "I'm not planning on stopping," Zip said sternly.
Indeed he wasn't. Zip, since interrupting Ham and Darcy at the end of their intense act of love, had turned savage in his own desires. He wasn't sure what had caused it, but he knew that it was concerned with some break in idealism that he had built into the image of Darcy Williams. And this idealism in turn had been a part of his growing discontent for the Devil Cats, for the members, for the club itself and for the futility toward which they steamed. Suddenly, seeing Darcy, whom he had built into the image of his desire, with Ham-frantically with Ham-crushed all thoughts and dreams he had had of the pretty, auburn-haired high school girl. As if to seek an antidote for his feelings, Zip had turned mean and savage and constantly on the prowl for sexual encounters-with any and all with whom he came into contact. And now it was Terry and Dottie.
Dottie took a step backward. Zip acknowledged that it was a very pretty step indeed, for she was dressed in nothing but a short terry cloth robe, and the movement caused a flash of lovely bare thighs.
"Come on," Terry begged, locking her arms around Zip's neck. "Come on-we were playing-let's not stop."
"I'm only beginning," he growled.
His eyes lowered to pass over Terry's body, nude, except for the very skimpiest of bikini swimsuits. He liked the way the bra-top dipped in such a way as to reveal her hard, pressing nipples. And he liked the indentation of her navel, below which the suit swooped terrifyingly low.
Teasingly, Dottie fastened her hand to the bow of the belt circling her robe. Then she said, "Hell, Zip, maybe you better wait until one of the boys gets back-two of us are probably more than old red-beard can stand."
"Not you two," he said.
"You've gotta prove it, baby."
"No, I don't. But I will."
"Promises, promises, promises," Terry added.
Zip spun around and quicker than she could move a half step his hand lashed out, caught the front of her bra and zipped it from her body.
"Hey, not so rough," she declared. Her breasts jiggled at him as if they, too, scolded.
He only grinned, his eyes narrowing in a mean stare.
"You know, we've got a problem," Dottie said, placing her hands on her hips. "One of us is bound to get jealous-at least for a little while."
"Well, I hope it's not going to be me," Terry said, starting to put her arms around Zip again before he stepped back a pace.
Dottie had dropped one hand to her side and began playing with the ends of the terry cloth belt. Then she gave it a quick twist, tightening it in a way that pressured the robe against her breast. Her face took on an odd expression; then she gave the belt another tightening tug.
"Hey, you know what?" she said to Zip and Terry.
"Yeah," said Terry, smiling. "I know that if Zip doesn't stop teasing I'm going to bust."
He looked at her and thought how stereotyped she was, how very much she was like every girl who had come to ride with the Devil Cats. Then he looked at Dottie and considered that she, like Terry, like all the others, was so similar to every girl who became attracted to the Cats because of their desire for thrills. And he, for the barest moment, thought how sad it was, and again he thought of Darcy and experienced a very decided pain at his chest. Then he knew that he must subdue it, get rid of it by any means available. And the available means were Dottie and Terry.
"Yeah, so, what have ya been thinking?" he asked Dottie.
"That I'd like to try that bit Itchy and Lil were so involved in the other night."
"That doesn't do anything for me," Terry protested.
"And I'm hardly the type," Zipper added.
"But maybe with Terry-with both of us-well, what the hell, why don't we find out?"
"All right, what the hell," Terry agreed.
"Yeah, what the hell-what the hell for anything," Zip said.
Terry, minus her bra, Dottie, in a terry cloth robe, and Zipper, attired in his usual jeans and tee-shirt, exited the room, went through the dining room and entered a kind of sun porch. Although all of the house showed a lack of housekeeping, was littered with beer cans, loaded ash trays, odd pieces of clothing, and the general elements of total disarray, the sun room was quite neat. It contained a couch, a table that looked as if it had been secured from a gymnasium, where it had been used for rub-down purposes, several chairs, and against one wall, a huge, closed cabinet.
Zip glanced at Terry and noticed that a change had come over her expression. Her eyes had narrowed sensually, and a firmer bounce had come to her naked breasts. The ends of them had alerted and pointed ahead like beacon lights. Dottie, too, upon entering this back room, had changed. Her breasts heaved vigorously, much as if the room created memories from which her body took sexual fuel.
The three of them stopped in the middle of the room.
"Well, let's get with it," Zip said, looking at Dottie.
"Don't be so cold," she complained. "When you put it into words it-well, it kind of cools me."
"Me, too," Terry agreed.
Upon this statement, Terry walked close to Zip, reached out and took both his hands, then raised them to cup over both her breasts.
"You can start right here," Terry said. "And, baby, that should help Dottie too."
Zip cuddled the flesh within his palms. He squeezed, then released the flesh, then brought his thumb and forefinger to the tips and rolled them between his fingers, feeling their heat, their firmness, the thousands of tiny crack-like pores that crisscrossed them like a map.
While Dottie watched, Terry enjoyed the caresses. She leaned her head back and shut her eyes, strained so far backward that her neck cords tightened and bloated. And the pose was one that offered more of herself for Zip's investigative fingers. Her hair cascaded about her shoulders, and Zip, although he felt a certain detachment, admitted to himself that she was an exotic sight, one of gross and anxious promiscuity.
Zip massaged at her breasts. The stimulation that he felt was different from that which he had once enjoyed. Now, passion came as an antidote, filled him with a heat that had come from obedience more than from genuine desire. But it was enough, he knew very well, enough to make him rage and storm and pump and conquer any woman that was offered-any that was not offered, too.
"Ummmmmm, Jeeeez, you two are getting to me," Dottie said.
She moved next to them. Then she lifted her face toward Zip to receive the kiss that she had thus far only observed.
Zip brought his hands away from Terry's breasts. As she brought her head forward, he turned from her and clutched out at Dottie's pressing, terry cloth-attired body.
Their mouths clashed sharply. Even the tiny clink of teeth could be heard as they fought for the adjustment that would allow room for their tongues to frolic and dive, to twist and turn and wiggle in excitement.
Dottie made a dagger of her tongue. It shot forward and Zip received it with a heavy draw. It was sweet, but tangy. It nicked at his underlip, cuddled against his teeth, then shot in and out at a frantic pace. And then they traded the attack, and it was Zip's turn to nick and tuck and whirl and thrust.
Observer Terry became impatient. She moved behind Zip, pushed her bare breasts forward, then wound her arms around the boy's waist as she pressed herself hard against his back. Gently, she moved from side to side as the long kiss between Zip and Dottie continued. But soon she became impatient. She broke her singular embrace, took the bottom of Zip's tee-shirt, then raised it high to his neck. Then she renewed the contact of her flesh to his. She did it lightly, swinging her shoulders from side to side, bracing herself with her hands on his shoulders, and nicking her hard nipples against his bare back as she swung. Sometimes she moved fast, other times she slowed, but always there was the rat-a-tat-tat of her heavy, swinging breasts against his back, adding a new area of excitement even as he knew the passion of the other girl's mouth.
Abruptly, Zip pulled away. And suddenly, as if a bolt of lightning had struck him, he saw himself as a phony. He didn't like this, wasn't enjoying it at all, was only being sexual and pursuing because of thoughts of Darcy Williams, because, to his mind, she had offended him by being with Ham. She had been built so lavishly in his mind. She was so adored there, even without his knowing her. And then...
"Come on," Terry complained. "What's the matter with you, anyway?"
"Nothing," said Zip.
"When you leave us, baby, it's something," Dottie cried. "Come on."
Zip turned from the girls. "Go on and play with each other if you want. I'm going for a walk."
He heard their astonished gasps behind him as he walked out of the room, through the other rooms, and finally out the front door and into the night.
For a few moments, Zip stood listening to the lap of the lake. Then he lit a cigarette and dragged heavily upon it. But the taste was bad. He threw it away, flipping it with a snap of his fingers that made it arch like a rocket, then shatter into pieces as it landed.
Nothing seemed good to him anymore, Zip thought to himself. Not the Cats, the cruising, the janes, the rumbles-nothing.
Slowly, Zip walked toward the lake. His mind moved again to Darcy and he wondered why a girl, a very pretty girl who had everything a teenager should have, wanted to become a Devil Cat. Prestige, he guessed, something to talk about in front of the other high school kids. But why? She didn't need that. Nobody needed that kind of nonsense. Nonsense? he asked himself, then replied affirmatively, thinking that he had finally admitted to himself that his life for some time now had been nonsense. A waste. It was as if his interest in the Cats and capers and all the rest was a defense against a better life that he could lead. For a moment he thought of himself as a student, as one who perhaps attended the same school that Darcy attended. He wondered how he would make out, if he could succeed in a life that was closer to normal. He wondered. Then he shook his head, banishing the thought, feeling that it was much too ridiculous for him to consider, too far removed from the life he lived. A feeling of gross disappointment engulfed him and remained with him as he walked the lonely beach.