Date: Sat, 27 May 2006 11:28:03 -0700 (PDT)
From: Douglas Grant <dlgrantsf@yahoo.com>
Subject: gang-of-five-12

Copyright 2006 by dlgrantsf@yahoo.com; all rights reserved.

Next installment (of sixteen) in a short novel about friendship, growth,
and different kinds of love, in different combinations, between five
high-school boys.

First warning; the story can be very sexual.  If I were to code it
properly, it might be (BBBBB/group/oral/anal/mast/rimming/awholebunchelse).
Be aware.

Second warning; the characters sometimes talk about politics, the potential
for a military draft, and the state of the U.S. and the world, among other
aspects of their lives.  They have some fairly strong opinions, as people
will do.  Offense to any reader is not intended.

More after the end of this chapter.  Thanks for reading . . . .


***********************************************************************

Gang of Five -- Part Four

Chapter 12

-----------------------------------------

So maybe, after all, you can come home again; but maybe, when you do -- it
can get confusing.

People change; my friends had all changed, I'd changed, myself.  But it
took me awhile to figure out HOW we'd all changed, how we'd all grown.  And
I almost made the biggest mistake of my life, before I finally got it.


                                     *


The next real event -- the next real milestone, for me -- came the next
weekend.

Zach's father was home (to the extent he ever WAS at home), so instead of
hanging around Zach's house, we went to the beach.  Clay's Beach.

My bike was still in a shipping container, somewhere in the UK or wherever;
so I used Tim's older brother's bike.  It was an old Trek mountain bike,
and it seemed really heavy to me, after my own road bike; but by the time
we were running downhill, I was glad for the mountain bike brakes.

See, the thing is -- our quasi-rustic neighborhood sort of outside the town
with the initials of M(ill) V(alley) is not really far from the ocean, in
direct miles; but there's that little problem of Mount Tamalpais, and all
the hills and canyons in between.

I thought I'd die, on the way.  London's mostly flat, and I was totally out
of practice for real mountain biking.  Sure, I swam, as well as riding, in
the UK; but.  This was completely different.

And glorious.

There's a reason why living's so expensive, in Marin County, and San
Francisco.  EVERYTHING's beautiful.  The view of the bay, Angel Island,
Tiburon and Sausalito, from the hills; Mount Tam itself, the grassland, the
oaks, San Francisco and the Golden Gate off shining in the distance --

And then there's the downhill run to the coast.  That's when the better
brakes came in handy.

Almost all of it -- from the beaches to Mount Tam, and chunks even to San
Francisco Bay -- is protected; the Golden Gate National Recreation Area,
which is basically a kind of national park, or Mount Tamalpais State Park,
and Muir Woods National Monument off to one side, and conservation
easements and wetlands --

It was one of those times when I felt most torn, so perfectly balanced;
moving through this glorious, indescribably beautiful place, seeing things
again-for-the-first-time, overwhelmed by the beauty, grateful to be with my
friends --

And still somehow missing the life I'd left behind a week ago.  Still
feeling slightly whiplashed, from moving thousands of miles and a cultural
light-year away, in just a day.  And yeah, feeling a little homesick for
Robert, and Jose, and even school (THAT was a surprise,) and maybe just
London in general.  And no, it didn't really make sense to me either; but.


                                     *


Clay's Beach was better than anything I could have imagined.  But it was a
lot better BEING there, than seeing it the first time.

I need to explain.

See, it was July on the coast near San Francisco.  Now, most places -- and
even where we lived, with Mount Tam between us and the ocean -- July means
summer, and hot.  Inland from us, the San Joaquin Valley was baking; most
days are in the nineties or hundreds, all summer.

Not on the coast.  When it's that hot inland -- all the cold air from the
ocean (it's the Alaska Current that keeps the ocean water so cold; REAL
cold) rushes inland like an express train.

It's foggy on the coast in July.  Almost every day; absolutely reliably.
Really, really foggy; with a stiff, cold wind blowing in from the sea.

Like it was right then.  We were on our bikes, on the access road, near the
head of the trail leading down the cliffs to the beach; and the fog was
whipping by in tatters, and I was shivering, in spite of sweating just a
few minutes before.  We'd seen the fog from the top of the ridge; it looks
prettier when you're not wrapped up in it.

"This is just, like, incredible," I said, as we dismounted, "but -- it's
not exactly beach weather."

There were only four of us, today; Liam was off at the mall with Candace.
But at least he was warm.

"I don't know," went Zach.  He peered out and down through the fog; I could
see glimpses of rocks and beach, below, but no people.  "It really depends
on the wind; if it's not windy right on the beach, it can actually be a lot
warmer down there.  We've had some of our best times, on days like that."
He glanced over at Tim and Jarod with a smile, and I could see he was
remembering something special.

"It's worth a try," said Jarod.  He pushed his bike over to a metal
signpost, and we all arranged our bikes around it, with bike locks and
cables running everywhere, in and out and through frames and wheel spokes;
it was pretty secure.

"So tell me again," I said towards Zach's back, as we started down the
trail, single-file.  "This is an officially-unofficial nude beach - ?"

He smiled back at me, for a second.  "Yeah.  Well, just about everybody who
comes here goes naked, it's pretty well-known, it's in the newspapers and
everything.  And it's part of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area;
it's federal land, and the policy is not to bother you, unless somebody
else complains, which nobody ever does.  And we've never even seen a
ranger, so far."

"But we did see -- " said Tim, and locked up.

"Those soldiers, or whatever they were," finished Jarod, right behind me.
I glanced back at him.  "Last year; on our way down to the beach, we saw
them walking around on the trails.  They were in camouflage uniforms, and
they had M-16s, and everything."

"Whoa," I said.

"Well, they were just patrolling, I guess," from Zach.  "I don't know what
for, or who for.  But it was just kind of weird, coming down the trail to
the beach where we were going to get naked, and well, you know," and he
glanced back at us, "and find soldiers with machine guns on the way."

"Yeah."  A lot of things about the world were weird, these days. And I
wished a lot of things about the world were different.


The brush was actually pretty high, most of the way, but the trail was
well-used, and we pushed through the last of it and kind of ran down the
last slope, whooping, jumping down onto the sand.

And it was WARM.  It was beautiful, actually!  Not exactly sunny; and,
well, not exactly tropical, but it was a lot warmer and brighter than the
top of the trail.  No real wind; the cliffs were blocking it.  Just a nice,
gentle breeze.

"Feel this," went Zach, and he kneeled down at put his hands in the coarse
sand.  So I did too.

"Jesus!"  The sand was incredibly warm, almost like it was heated.

"Yeah; it just bakes in the sun in the morning, and keeps the beach warm
when the fog rolls in, around now.  This is a good day to be here."  He
looked around, for a second.  "Come on, let's try over there."  He
shouldered up his day pack, and started towards the driftwood condos
against the cliff wall.

Yeah; that's another thing to explain, about Northern California beaches.
Usually -- it's not really warm enough to lie out in the open, on the
beach; not very comfortably, anyway, unless you're fairly warmly dressed.
Even today wasn't exactly lie-out-and- bake weather, more like
lie-out-and-almost-but-not-quite-shiver weather.

So.  People adapt.  They build windbreaks, up against the cliff walls; with
rocks, and driftwood; whatever's around.  Open to the top, open to the sun;
just a little bit of shelter from the wind.  That's true EVERYWHERE in
Northern California, believe me, not just Clay's Beach.

Being California, of course we call them condos.

The thing is -- condos do more than just block out the wind.  They give a
certain degree of privacy, too.  Not from the cliffs up above, but from
beach level.

I kind of knew some of this.  I'd seen some of the digital pictures at
Zach's house last weekend; of the four of them, here.  So I knew it was
pretty likely, we were going to wind up -- doing a group thing.  Group
lovemaking; I didn't really know what to call it, these days.  (It used to
be `fooling around', but that was a long time ago.)

But I had a really specific plan, as part of that.  And it was giving me
more butterflies in my stomach, and making my mouth kind of dry, in an
anxious, but good anxious, kind of way.

And I could barely wait.

I watched Zach check out a couple of condos, from a fairly-respectable
distance; one, I could just see, as I came up, had a couple of pale bodies
lying side by side in it; the other seemed empty but the walls were kind of
low.  He climbed up to another one, glanced up the cliff towards the trail,
then waved us on up.  "This one's perfect!" he called.

So we went up, and climbed in, and spread out our stuff -- Zach had an old
sheet for us all to lie on, and we put our towels down on that --

And in another few seconds, I was naked for the Very First Time on my Very
First Nude Beach.



It was so, so wonderful.  I don't think I can describe it properly.

We've been back -- a lot -- since that day; it's wonderful every time,
whether we wind up doing a group thing, or anything sexual, or not.  It's
just glorious.

It actually isn't about sex at all, really; and not that much about being
nude -- although both are great parts of the experience.  It's just so
BEAUTIFUL, with the breeze, and the rocks, and the surf breaking on the
beach and in big sprays against the cliffs to either side, and the birds,
and everything . . .

And it's so, so not crowded.  It's not an easy climb down to the beach, and
the only parking is on the narrow paved street above, and there are no real
signs or anything pointing the way.  Yeah, people know about it, and we
were just four of maybe twenty or so people on the beach that day, but
still -- especially with the condos for privacy -- it's a little like being
on your own, private beach.  Your own, private nude beach.

I don't expect anybody from Florida or Southern California to believe me.
But it's true.

I said a second ago that it wasn't about being nude, that much, really.
But still -- for me, it was an incredible PART of the whole experience.  It
was almost overwhelming, actually.

Before I left, three years ago, all we'd really done was skinnydipping at
Zach's house -- which is beautiful, and wonderful, and sensual, but, it's
just one back yard -- and kind of running around, bike riding at night,
finding remote clearings and creeks where we could get naked and fool
around.  And hope nobody saw us.  And watch out for rattlesnakes, on the
way.

It was all fun; don't get me wrong.  REALLY fun.  And we did it a lot.

This was different.

As soon as we were out of our clothes, we left the condo, climbing a little
awkwardly down the rocks in our bare feet, then running across the sand to
the water --

And everything was just kind of, well, perfect.  The beautiful bodies of
Zach, and Jarod and Tim, in front of me (I went last; mostly because I was
a little hard), and the BREEZE blowing on my body, which didn't happen
really at Zach's house, and the water, and the warm sand under my feet, and
then the cold water and foam around my ankles as I got to the water's edge
. . .

And I didn't have to, like, worry, about somebody seeing us.  It was okay,
being naked like this, out in the open.  Normal; for this beach, anyway.
Nude, cool and beautiful.

And watching the three of them splash in the water, yell and laugh at how
cold it was, and push and pull at each other, joking around --

I really wanted my camera, right there, that moment.  But I'd left it up in
the condo.  Where I had plans for it, later.

And then Zach and Tim were grabbing ME, and their hands were cold and wet
as the pulled me deeper into the surf, and I was laughing too, and I felt
incredibly at peace with the world and everything in it.


And that was just the beginning.

Zach brought his frisbee; we played with it, on the hard-packed sand at the
water's edge, moving our way along the beach; in eyesight of our condo, but
just running along, moving along, enjoying the day.  Keeping warm in the
cool breeze, and the grey glow of the sky.

Watching a beautiful 16-year-old boy play Frisbee, naked -- watching THREE
of them play Frisbee naked, heck, just feeling and watching myself running
and throwing and catching, moving my body like that --

Awesome.  Like I said; I can't describe it right.  You have to see it; or
better, do it.  Almost the definition of beauty; and something more, the
feeling of something just, right, almost spiritual.  Some moments are like
that.  I won't ever forget that one, ever; even though we've done it over
and over again, since.

And when we didn't play Frisbee, we -- I don't know.  We did a lot.  Ran
sprints on the beach (ever run nude along the beach?  In a cool breeze?),
and climbed on some of the rock towers at the water's edge, and explored
pretty much as far as we could go in either direction --

Zach even climbed up one of the cliffs, all the way to the very top; and I
followed, feeling kind of soft and vulnerable, even though it felt so GOOD.
And we found one of the trails, and padded along it, packed sand under our
feet, meandering through the bushes, before it led us down to the beach
level again.

Watching Zach climb, nude; watching Zach do almost anything with his body,
nude; well.  Look up `sublime' in the dictionary.


                                     *


I said that being at the beach that day was almost like being on our own,
private beach for the day, and it was.  But we weren't completely alone;
and that actually was something I found really kind of nice, in the end.

Most of the other people on the beach were hunkered down in the condos;
baking in the cloudy glow from the sky.  But some others were peeking up
out of the condos, and a few were on blankets in the open, up against the
cliffs, and occasionally we'd pass a couple or two down by the water, as we
played.

At first, it was just a little strange, for me.  I mean, I'd been
skinnydipping forever at Zach's house; but that was between the five of us.
Outside of the locker room at the University gym back home, I hadn't really
been nude, in public, before.

But Zach and Tim and Jarod completely ignored it, and it was just so
BEAUTIFUL, being there and having fun, so I just kind of . . . forgot about
it.

Until it occurred to me that, well, most of the other people on the beach
-- the ones we could see, anyway -- well, were men.

Almost all men, actually.  There was one mixed couple, on towels by the
cliff; but that's all.

And then it occurred to me that we -- the four of us -- were getting a lot
of attention.  A lot of people looking at us.

Not tremendously obviously; not in a nasty, lewd way (although I've seen a
few things at the beach since then . . . but.  Even since then, nothing
comes close to spoiling that beach, for me.  Nothing.)  But we were getting
a lot of attention.

I said something about it to my friends.

"Uh-huh," went Jarod.  The breeze was ruffling his thick black hair; his
lean body was perfectly bronzed, not a tan line anywhere.  "Most of the
people who come here are gay men.  It seems to me, anyway.  Zach has this
elaborate theory about it."

"Not so elaborate," Zach shrugged.  We were wandering north, away from our
own condo, the cool, packed, wet sand under our feet.  Zach played with his
frisbee, a little, as we went.  "I just think women -- and girls -- are a
lot more shy about showing their bodies in public.  Unless they look like
supermodels, or something; it's so, so much about body image.  So they
don't tend to come to places like this, as much.  And if their girlfriends
don't come, straight guys won't come either.  So, more gay people."  He
swirled the frisbee up a little, and caught it as it hovered down.  "It's a
real shame."

"Did Liam try . . . ?" I guessed.

"Getting Candace here?  Not yet; I don't think he dares.  But he will try."
He did the flip- the-frisbee-up-thing again, and caught it again.  "But he
also says she doesn't even like going around in a swimsuit; so I doubt if
she'll ever do it.  Which is also a shame; she's really cool."

"Yeah."  I still hadn't met her, yet; but I was looking forward to it.  "So
. . . you really think most of the people here are, like, gay?"  I looked
around; a few heads showing above the windbreak walls, a few clumps of
people on the sand, mostly in couples; not everybody's eyes on us, but a
lot.

"I don't know," he shrugged.  He glanced up at the cliff.  "Half?  More
than half?"

Another muffled laugh, from Tim.  "We could stop for a second, and
. . . . . . start making out.  And see who looks."  He grinned at me.
"We've done it . . . . before."

"By accident," said Jarod, and he slapped Tim's white, bare butt, very
gently.  "We thought we were alone that day.  Anyway, save it for when
we're back with our stuff.  Like, the lube?"  And Tim smiled more broadly,
at him, and I shivered, just a little, and thought about what I had
planned, and tried to ignore that I was getting a little aroused, down
there.


A little ways farther along, I saw two figures off in the distance, people
walking our way; and then a little later, as we got closer, a big dog came
bounding up; really thick fur, a tail in a kind of a short curve -- it
looked like a cross between a panda and a St. Bernard, only not quite as
big.

One of the figures whistled, and I heard him shout, "Wasabi", then whistle
again.  And of course the dog completely ignored him; came up to us,
stopped, and looked, wagging that huge, brushy tail, and since I'm a total
and complete pushover for dogs, I did the `hi, come here' sort of standard
body motion things, and the dog came bounding up, almost knocking me down
by leaning against my legs as I petted him and patted him, and then all
four of us were doing it as he twined around between our legs, panting.

"Sorry about that!" said one of them, coming up pretty fast, and I looked
up; he was a kind of shaggy blond boy, with a wispy goatee, older than us,
but not that much; more tan than Jarod, even, and totally bare.

"That's okay!" I said, still scratching the dog's thick fur.  He was back
to leaning against my legs, looking pretty happy, actually.  "That's okay.
What's his name -- ?"

"Oh, that's Wasabi," said the blond boy; acting a little embarrassed.
"Like the mustard?  He's an Akita.  And he's a big doofus."  He looked down
at the dog, sternly.

"What's an Akita?" asked Zach.

"Oh, it's a Japanese breed.  They get pretty big, and strong.  And this
guy's only eight months, he doesn't know how big he is yet."

While we were talking, the other figure came up; another boy, about the
same age, but this one was a little taller, more slender, with shorter,
brown hair.  And also totally tan, and also nude.

And they were both -- beautiful.

It was just one of those beach-conversations, or dog-conversations;
everybody has them.  We didn't even exchange names, or anything; mostly all
we found out about them was that they were from UC Santa Cruz, just taking
a slow trip up the coast to Mendocino, camping out along the way.  And that
Wasabi (it's a Japanese kind of mustard, by the way) was kind of a pain,
which I thought was unjust on the part of the blond boy; I mean, if you
take a dog on a camping trip, he's bound to need a lot of attention, right?

But that wasn't the interesting part.  The fun part.

The interesting part was just HOW we talked; and the way we talked, and the
way we looked at each other.

Again, nothing in bad taste, or anything; but it was pretty clear, pretty
early on, that the shaggy blond boy and the short haired boy were, well,
gay; just by the way they looked at us, and talked to us; the way they
smiled.

And it was also pretty clear -- they had us figured out.

Pretty easy, I guess; I know I had a hard time keeping my eyes to myself.
They really WERE beautiful, and beautiful together, and I wondered if Zach
-- if all of us -- would grow into bodies more like that, in a few years.

But that all just made it so FUN; so totally, totally fun.  The
friendliness, the acceptance; the things we DIDN'T talk about, the admiring
looks.  The way we had a kind of unspoken yeah, you're cute, but I'm not
going to hit on you, thing going.  It was just innocent, but also a kind of
-- energy . . . . (and yes, I know that sounds utterly Marin County; but).

I felt comfortable enough, I asked the shaggy blond boy to take our
picture; (I'd gone back to get my camera, after the frisbee game).  And so
the four of us lined up, Zach, me, Jarod and Tim, arms around each others'
shoulders, or waists, pressed up pretty tight against each other; nude,
smooth, the foggy sunlight on our bodies; maybe just a little tumescent,
from the close contact, and from the admiring looks from the two college
boys.

And Jarod leaned his head down on my shoulder, so Zach touched his head to
mine, and Tim turned in to Jarod, and the shaggy blond boy took two or
three like that for us, and then one more, with me kneeling with my arm
around Wasabi, Zach's hand on my shoulder^Å

They were the first pictures of the five of us -- or four of us, in this
case -- since I'd come back.  And the first with my own camera.

They're still some of my favorites.  It really was a special day.

And then I got utterly daring, and asked the two of them if I could get a
picture of the two of THEM, just as a souvenir; and they agreed!  It was
just one of those crazy things, those spur-of-the-moment things, I think;
they never would have done it, if we hadn't talked, and, well, liked their
dog.  So I got two nice ones of them, just two beautiful, bare college
boys, which we all admired on the little LCD screen.

And then we were kind of parting ways, and the blond, shaggy boy was
saying, "Good meeting you!"

"You too!", I went, bending down to take a farewell scratch session with
Wasabi's thick fur.  "He really IS cute."

"So are you," said the blond boy, and I looked up; he grinned at me.
"Totally cute.  All of you," he went on, looking at the rest of us, as Tim
began a stifled laugh.

"Actually, I think I'd call it HOT," said his friend, and made a whistling
noise, shaking his fingers like he'd touched a hot plate; and he smiled
too, and gave a little wave as they turned and started back down the beach.

And then Zach had his arm around my waist, and leaned in to kiss my cheek.
I could tell he was smiling, too.  "You should see how much you're
blushing."

"Yeah.  Well," I said, looking down at my sandy feet.  "It was a really
nice thing to say."

"And true!"  He was laughing, now.  "You ARE hot, Christian!  Totally hot.
Don't you know that?"

"You guys are," I said.  "Well -- okay, maybe WE are."

"You.  And us."  He kissed me again, then began pulling me along the beach,
back toward the condo.


***********************************************************************

Chapter 13 will be uploaded shortly.

Comments, reactions, and criticism are welcome at dlgrantsf@yahoo.com.

I'm particularly interested in hearing from people who may have had similar
physical and emotional friendships with other boys; similar friendship
groups.  I get the impression that such arrangements used to be a lot more
common than they are now, which is -- in a way -- a shame, I think.  Even
if it does indicate progress, in a way.

I'm also interested in hearing from expatriates.  Christian's predicament
is partly based on experiences of several friends of mine.  I have enormous
(retroactive) sympathy for them both.

Many, many thanks to Nifty for providing this priceless service.

My previous Nifty story is `Naked with Connor', in the High School
directory.

Thanks to everyone who has already written; and, thanks again for reading.