.
                                                  ::

                                            as falls cuyahoga,
                                      so falls cuyahoga falls

                                                  ::

Jackson Cuyahoga snaps his cell phone shut and stares a moment
out the window at the passing scenery.

Peter get off okay? says Vanessa, driving.

Don't snark, says Jackson.

I wasn't snarking.

Yes, said Jackson. He did. Had to take off his shoes, though.

His shoes?

Security. We need to talk, Vanessa.

I want you to get together, moans the radio, sampled voice over
chugging snare and cymbals, a churning piano vamp. Put your hands
together one time.

We will, says Vanessa.

Stop it! Mom! They're doing it again!

In the middle seat of the Range Rover, Addison sniggers. Her hand
rests in Edie's lap, palm flat on the flesh of her thigh, her
little finger brushing the crotch of Edie's black string bikini.
Alexandra, headphones dangling from her neck, hanging angry over
the back of the seat. Edie puts her hand on Addison's.

Addison, stop it; Edie, behave yourself; Alexandra, myob. Vanessa
pops the turn signal, brakes. Up ahead a weather-beaten sign
half-buried in greenery: 8 miles, it reads, or maybe 3. Private.
We're almost there, says Vanessa.

Addison peers up at Alexandra and bugs her eyes out and sticks
out her tongue, nyeh! Alexandra yanks her headphones back over
her ears and disappears into the back seat. Addison squeezes
Edie's thigh, and Edie giggles. Edie leans against Addison, and
kisses her there on the shoulder, and Addison tilts Edie's chin
up so she can kiss her mouth. Stop it, whispers Edie, smirking.
Stop it, says Addison, quietly mocking.

Torvald's due in next week? says Vanessa.

Don't throw that in my face, says Jackson.

I wasn't - Vanessa spares him a glance as she wrestles the Range
Rover around and down a hairpin turn. I wasn't throwing anything
in your face.

You just happened to bring that up after I express a desire to
talk -

I happened to bring that up because we were just talking about
Peter. Jesus, Jack -

Don't Jesus, Jack me.

Jackson...

At the bottom of the hill is a small gravel parking lot, and in
the lot there's a battered old dusty pink Karman Ghia and a Volvo
sedan of a nondescript foresty color. The Range Rover noses
between them and crunches to a stop. Doors fly open. Addison
dashes around the back of it as the rear hatch opens and
Alexandra barefoot in a short and clingy sundress tumbles out.
Edie catches Addison's hand and towels over shoulders they plunge
down the narrow trail. Girls, calls Jackson. Girls. Slow down.

He's not here, says Alexandra, stepping over to the Volvo.

Maybe he's already down by the river, says Vanessa.

Oh, says Alexandra.

Hon? says Vanessa.

Vanessa, says Jackson.

In a minute. Hon?

Okay, says Alexandra. Okay.

Sam's lying already naked on a towel on the big rock hanging out
over the water. The man standing next to her, peering out at Edie
and Addison in the shallows, is almost entirely bald and smoking
a cigarette. He wears threadbare khaki shorts and river sandals
and a giant blue T-shirt that says Or All the Sea With Oysters in
white letters.

Probably the last day this summer we'll all be able to get out
here like this, says Sam, idly turning a page of her book. A
couple of dildos, shocking neon pink and beige and a long purple
jellied one with two heads, a couple of tubes of this and that, a
battered box of condoms all lie on the towel about her.

Damn shame, murmurs the man.

Out in the river, maybe ten yards above the falls, Addison is
kissing Edie as she unties the top of Edie's tiny black bikini.

Out from the trees pops Alexandra, her long brown hair swaying as
she stops in her tracks. Mister Tisdale, she says, but not loudly
enough.

You know what we mean to each other, Vanessa is saying to Jackson
as they come up behind her. You know how this works.

Yes, but -

Mister Tisdale, says Vanessa, quite loudly.

The man on the rock turns and flicks his cigarette out into the
water. Edie giggles and shrieks as Addison nibbles on a breast.

Sandy, says Mister Tisdale, and Alexandra looks away.

Come here, Sandy, says Mister Tisdale, and Alexandra starts to
walk up to the rock.

I just don't, Jackson starts to say, as Mister Tisdale reaches
down to help Alexandra up. Her hand is small in his, and lifting
her is effortless. I just don't, says Jackson again, want to -

When is Torvald getting in again? says Vanessa.

Jackson says nothing as one of Mister Tisdale's hands lifts the
skirt of Alexandra's sundress up above her waist and strokes once
her thin bare buttock.

Yes, says Vanessa. That time I was throwing it in your face. She
unbuttons, unzips her shorts. Shucks them down her long legs.

Knee-deep out in the river, Edie's hands are on Addison's head,
and Addison's head is between Edie's thighs. On the rock,
Alexandra stands now with her back to Mister Tisdale. Her eyes
closed, her mouth open, working. He rests his chin on the top of
her head and murmurs something, his eyes on the treetops, one
hand between her thighs, her sundress hiked up so his hand is
seen there, darker than her thighs, bunching, working. Her
sundress falling off one shoulder but not enough to bare the
small flat tit his other hand has swallowed. And Jackson still
says nothing.

The minute she says stop, says Vanessa, unbuttoning her shirt, it
stops. She lets the shirt fall to the grass and marches naked to
the rock.

Hey, sis, says Sam.

Hey, says Vanessa, kneeling on the towel beside her. Where's
Richie?

Blew me off, says Sam, rolling over, half sitting up. You want
some lotion?

Sure, says Vanessa. Her dark, dark hair down to her shoulders the
same shimmering black as Sam's close-cropped cap.

Testis, says Mister Tisdale, is derived from the Latin noun for
witness. It is, of course, a single male testicle. His voice a
deep but quiet drone. Oaths in antiquity were sworn by gripping a
man's balls; hence: to testify, to attest. Testament.

Oh, says Alexandra. Hips rolling. Oh.

So, says Sam, kneeling behind Vanessa. Squirting some lotion into
her hand and passing the tube around to Vanessa. We had the
weirdest goddamn night, me and Richie. Smearing the lotion along
Vanessa's shoulders, shining now, greasy in the sunlight.

Oh? says Vanessa, sheening her tits, the skin between them. Her
belly.

That thing, says Sam. For Jackson's friend.

Marlowe, says Vanessa.

Marlowe, says Sam.

Out in the river, Addison's mouth on Edie's mouth again, each
hungry for the other. Edie naked, tugging at Addison's swim
shorts. On the rock, Alexandra moaning, one dark hand of Mister
Tisdale squeezing a nipple between two fingers, her sundress now
a ring of rumpled fabric bunched about her waist. Praeputium,
says Mister Tisdale, the foreskin. Dozens of dried rings of skin
throughout Europe were venerated as being that of Christ,
circumcised the eighth day after his birth. His other hand
slapping now between her thighs, a glimpse snatched of fingers,
glistening.

Well, says Vanessa, lotioning an arm, then smiling as Sam's knees
spread to either side of her hips, as Sam presses close, her
hands snaking around to slick her hands along the tops of
Vanessa's thighs. Oh?

Missed a spot, says Sam, tits pressed to Vanesssa's back. Her
smile in Vanessa's ear. You were saying?

I, says Vanessa, I got pulled over by a cop.

Do tell, says Sam.

The falls are not so much falls as they are a sudden sharp
rapids, a stumbling block in the river's path. The drop is maybe
a yard, if that. Some dangerously sharp rocks jut here and there
from the lip of it, but smooth ones, too, flat and inviting. The
water is not ripped so much as creamed. It's a lazy river,
chuckling more than roaring over its drop. Addison still in her
swim shorts hauls herself out of it onto a rock, flat, smooth.
The river creaming about her ankles, chuckling. Rolling over onto
her butt she holds out a hand for Edie, crouching naked against
the current.

But it's a rock, says Edie. We don't have a towel.

So lie down on me, says Addison.

And out comes Edie and up onto the rock. Red hair wet a dark
muddy brown slapping her back. Green eyes shining as she laughing
tumbles into Addison's lap. Addison grunting, oofing with the
weight of her. Kissing Edie, getting kissed.

God, says Edie, fingering Addison's lips.

Nothing to do with it, says Addison, nipping Edie's fingers.

No, I mean this, says Edie. God. This. I could feel like this
forever.

So do it.

I will, says Edie.

Forever and ever, says Addison.

Never end.

Ever.

On the rock he's on his back now, Mister Tisdale, the band of
flesh from waist down halfway along his thighs still pale from
not much sun. His eyes squeezed shut against the light as he
murmurs Gorillas and orangutans, with respect to, to the size of
the body, have the smallest penises of all the primates, an inch,
a mere inch or two at most. Alexandra naked between his knees,
hands clasped behind her back, hair stirring in the warm breeze
as her mouth rounds, surrounds his straining upright cock. Aw,
fuck, groans Vanessa, leaning back against Sam, Sam's hand around
pink plastic sunk deep within, jerking as Vanessa jerks. Skin
oily slick and gleaming under sliding palms, tits rolling under
hands, hers, Sam's, belly shivering, thighs clenching, Sam's lips
on her throat, the corner of her jaw. Oh Jesus, Jesus fuck me.
And Alexandra hands still clasped behind her back hunching
forward now to lick up pale jellied puddles of come caught
shimmering in the tangles of hair that climb from Mister
Tisdale's softening cock, his languid balls, up his darkening
belly to his navel and above. And out in the river Addison's
shorts now down about one dangling ankle, the other foot pressed
hard against a nearby rock, legs spread wide as Edie in the water
now, water sucking and churning at the small of her back and
pushing her against the rock, her hands braced by her breasts
flat against it, her head lifted and her mouth sucking at,
licking at Addison's pussy, Addison lifting her head with
straining neck and gritted teeth and slammed-shut eyes, oh! Oh!

Roll over, sis, says Vanessa. Alexandra lying curled between
Mister Tisdale's legs, her head pillowed on her hands resting on
his sweat-damp belly. His hand in her hair, big enough to cup it,
thumb to pinkie. Good girl, he says, voice roughened. A cough.
Sandy. Good girl.

On your knees, sis, says Vanessa, sitting up to reach now for a
slim beige plastic cock. I've made up my mind. I'm going to fuck
you up the ass.

Where's Jackson? says Sam, rolling around to lean forward on her
elbows, shining sun-browned ass high in the air. Wiggling.
Vanessa, kneeling behind her, peering out at the trees, hand
shading her eyes.

Vanessa? says Sam. Wiggling again. Bring it the fuck on, sis.

Vanessa shakes her head. Spreading Sam's ass with one hand, thumb
and forefinger pressed into yielding flesh, holding open buttock
cheeks as the pink rosette pouts, dark and deep. I don't know,
she says, pressing slick plastic to oiled skin. Pushing. I don't
know, she says again, maybe getting the hot dogs and beer or
something.

Oh, says Sam. Oh. Oh!

                                                  ::
                                                  
                                            as falls cuyahoga,
                                      so falls cuyahoga falls
                                             an object lesson.005
                                                 
                                                          --n.
                                                  ::
                                                  
/~nickurfe/
http://www.ruthiesclub.com/
nickurfe@yahoo.com

This story may be freely circulated by anyone, anytime, anywhere.
"Rose Rouge" by St. Germain.

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