Harry Silver

Ripe for plucking

CHAPTER ONE

At first the young girl pretended the noise she heard was nothing but the wind rushing through the tall pines outside the cabin. At the age of fourteen, she considered herself too old to be frightened by a few stray sounds in the dark. But she couldn't keep herself from ducking her head under the cover and burrowing her turned-up nose under the pillow. She pressed her adolescent breasts into the smooth sheet and hugged one arm across her trim midriff for comfort. The light scuffling sound came again, closer this time, and she drew the lengths of her slim thighs up under the covers until her rounded knees were tight against the hardened tips of her small brown nipples. She lay in a ball in the middle of the unfamiliar bed and felt her heart trip faster and faster. She had to admit now that the noise wasn't coming from outside the cabin at all.

Suddenly she heard a girl's voice whisper to her from out of the darkness. "Claire! Claire, are you awake? Don't be scared, it's just me. I slipped down to your cubicle barefoot so no one would hear me. Be real quiet and I'll slip under the covers with you," said the mysterious intruder.

Claire froze when she recognized who it was. It had to be Dana, the cute blonde two years her senior, the girl who had shared Claire's bus seat with her on the long ride through the forests to the campgrounds. She lay stiff as a poker, hoping the older girl would think she was asleep and go away.

"Claire," persisted Dana, "come on, wake up. Did you think I was kidding when I told you I'd sneak to your bed tonight? If it's Miss Kressler you're worried about, forget it! She turned out the lights in her cabin over two hours ago. I would have come to see you a long time ago if it hadn't been for Sally and Lynda. I thought they'd never shut up and go to sleep so I could sneak down the hall past their cubicles without them hearing me."

Claire kept her mouth tightly closed. The thought of Sally or Lynda or any of the members of Campfire Girls, Troop 73, catching Dana in her bed, was simply awful. She'd had no idea Dana was serious earlier that day. Somewhere, Claire had once heard, there were supposed to be girls who did things with other girls. She could hardly believe it, but Dana must be one of them.

But the bold sixteen-year-old took Claire's silence in a way the inexperienced young girl never intended. Instead of leaving, she sat down on the edge of her bed. It was clear she wasn't about to go away. Claire felt the covers raise along her side and realized she was about to have a bed partner whether she wanted one or not. She was glad her back was turned to Dana because her face was red as a beet from embarrassment. At home her folks always made her wear a nightgown or pajamas to bed, but she had celebrated the freedom of her first night at camp by taking off everything except the panties she had been wearing under her dark green Campfire Girls' uniform.

"Oh, a heavy sleeper, huh?" she heard Dana whisper to herself. "Then you're about to wake up in a very groovy way."

Claire knew it was too late to do anything except continue her act. If she jumped up or started talking to her, one of the other girls was bound to wake up and hear them. How would she explain Dana being in her cubicle? And if Miss Kressler ever found out, she was certain she would be in big trouble.

She felt the sudden warmth of Dana's body against her back and felt a bead of sweat on her upper lip at the thought of what seemed about to happen to her. Pretending to be asleep had backfired on her. If Dana found out she was awake, she'd simply think that Claire had wanted her in bed but had been too shy to answer.

Dana rubbed her hand up and down Claire's back a few times and Claire hoped it might not go any further. Then she felt the older girl's hand cross her ribs and begin softly caressing her flat stomach. Slowly, carefully, Dana traced her fingertips around and around her navel, then reached upward. Claire was very aware of the fact that she'd left her brassiere off because she soon sensed Dana's warm fingers at the very base of her naked breast. First she kept her own arm folded stiffly across her nipples, but then relaxed it and allowed Dana to touch her there too. She was afraid she'd let her know she wasn't really asleep if she kept it in place.