Naked Women In Shorts

by Kara Bryn

Claudia opened the door and Theresa's hand in the small of my back pushed me over the threshold. I teetered forwards for a second, my head spinning with the residual alcohol and the new experience of stepping naked into a crowded room. I was never good in stilettos and Theresa put a hand on my hip to steady my balance.

  A frisson passed around the room as eyes turned towards me. The only thing in my favour was my small height, at a touch over five foot, even with the heels, that meant not everyone could see me. But I could tell that once a pair of eyes fell on me, they didn't seem to turn entirely away again.

  My mouth went dry. "I need another drink," I whispered to Theresa. She grinned even an wider grin and, taking my hand, led me through the crowd of forty or fifty people towards a small bar at the back of the room where Claudia had hired someone to mix drinks for her guests.

  The waiter turned around and tried gamely not to stare at my chest, to the point where his chin was almost raised to the vertical.

  "What'll it be miss?" he asked, ignoring Theresa entirely.

  "A mojito for me please," I said, "And make it a strong one."

  "Same," said Theresa, with a raise of her hand.

  As the waiter went to work I turned to face Theresa. I leant with one arm propped on the bar as if standing there naked was the most natural thing in the world.

  "What am I doing here?" I asked her.

  "Having fun!" she said, her eyes alight. At least one of us was having fun, but it wasn't me.

  The waiter slid our drinks over and I took a sip. Almost instantly I felt the alcohol hit my system and I urged it to soak into me, to remove the inhibitions I still felt. I had already crossed the point of no return already, so I wasn't sure what inhibitions I was expecting to have removed.

  "Natasha," I said suddenly to Theresa, "I need to find Natasha." As if being naked in a room full of strangers would be better if I had "one of my own kind" to keep me company.

  "Oh, didn't you see her on the way over? She waved to us."

  I shook my head. I must have been more distraught than I realised to have missed her.

  "Look," Theresa said pointing, "Over there." I followed her directions and then spotted the blonde girl with her short cropped hair, her beautiful white skin, and the colourful tattoos which were - and now my heart sank into the bottom of my stomach - covered by a light summer skirt and a tightly fastened blouse. A small leather purse was slung over one shoulder.

  She turned around and noticed Theresa still pointing and, as she saw me, a wide grin opened onto her face. She almost danced across the room towards us and took both of my hands in hers, before standing back to look me up and down.

  "Well! Rupa!" she said, "When you do something, you don't do it by halves, do you?"

  I was feeling sick and dizzy, yet somehow my face was turning red at the same time.

  "But you, but you," my stutter began as soon as I was flustered, "But you're wearing clothes."

  Natasha pulled me towards her for a hug. Again, the feeling of someone else's clothes against my bare skin only heightened just how naked I felt.

  "Yeah, well," she said stepping back, "I thought you were going back to Theresa's, and," she looked around the room, "I didn't know who was going to be here so I played it safe."

  She maintained a wide smile. Her happiness at my nudity was a polar opposite to my own.

  "But you guys obviously changed your mind," she added and glanced at Theresa, obviously unaware that I had nothing to do with this decision. I was too embarrassed to say otherwise. "Good on you! I'm proud."

  She looked me up and down again. I wish people would stop doing that. I tried to smile but I'm not sure what expression I managed to make.

  Natasha looked down at my feet. "And the shoes! Oh, wow. Those stilettos still look amazing on you. Wow, you're braver than I thought."

  I felt so whatever the opposite of brave is; not cowardly, because I think you feel cowardly before you do something frightening, not during it. Perhaps terrified is the right word.

  I took a sip of my mojito and tried to shrug nonchalantly. "Well, I figured once I was back in London it would be too cold to walk around naked, so why not make the most of it while I was here?"

  Theresa grinned at the lie. "I'll just leave you two nudists while I catch up with some people, okay?" she said. So much for looking after me.

  Natasha was studying me as I tried to casually look around the room. Each pair of eyes would look away if mine met theirs, but I could tell they would be glancing back. The women were either dismissing me as a crackpot or a whore, depending on whether they knew Natasha and her ways, and the men probably the same.

  "But you're okay?" Natasha asked with genuine concern, her fingers resting lightly on my forearm. Every touch from another person was being magnified a thousand-fold.

  I mustered a more genuine smile back at Natasha. Actually, I realised that at least it couldn't get any worse than this. I nodded my head.

  "Just let me know if you're not, okay?" she continued, "And we can get you out of here."

  I nodded again. Running away so soon after arriving would be the thing that would set everyone talking; somehow, one of Natasha's crazy friends turning up naked wasn't much of a story to gossip about. I figured by now that everyone in the room that didn't know about Natasha's ways had probably had it explained to them, albeit with me as their focus instead of Natasha. This was still going to be a far from normal evening, of course.

  I turned back to the waiter, and I realised I had a guaranteed way of attracting attention as he caught sight of my nipples facing towards him.

  "Another one of these please, mate," I said, waving my glass, the alcohol bringing out a touch of my old accent.

  "Be carefuly, hey?" Natasha prompted, still concerned as she looked at my empty glass, "Not too many of those."

  I nodded. I wasn't planning on too many, but I needed another one if I was to keep this act up.

  "So, what now?" I asked.

  "I dunno. We could mingle?" I wrinkled my nose up. I wasn't good at mingling at the best of times. "Isn't that what people do at parties?"

  "Yeah, I don't like parties," I replied. We both laughed for the first time that evening. What was either of us doing here? What was I doing like this?

  "We could dance," Natasha joked, or at least I hope she joked. I smiled but felt no need to respond to that.

  "We could just, sort of, hang around, being a bit weird and put people off talking to us?" she suggested

  I laughed. "That sounds more my style. Let's do that."

  We stayed by the bar and went back to chatting as we had done during most of the day. I found out that Natasha's parents were eastern European immigrants, hence her striking features, and her name, and I told her about how mine had arrived in London from Sir Lanka in the nineteen eighties. For the moments that I managed to shut the room out, the fact I was naked mattered to neither of us.

  The flow was broken by Georgia suddenly appearing before us.

  "Hey, Rupes! I see you decided to stick with the outfit," she said as she glanced down at me. "Quick, Tash, Rebecca's about to leave and we need to sort out next week."

  And without Natasha having any say in the matter she was pulled away and across the room. I almost followed and I felt naked and vulnerable now that my shield had been taken away from me.

  I tried to relax against the bar, elbows resting on its cold, hard surface with drink in hand, but I realised that this just pointed my nipples even more towards the room. So I took to standing straight and upright and tried to hide behind the cocktail glass.

  After a few minutes I noticed a pair of tall football-type guys talking to each other nearby. They kept looking over at me. I did everything I could not to look in their direction, but I knew what was going to happen. I may not be the type who gets picked up in bars and clubs usually but, well, it had happened enough that I recognised the signs.

  I watched out of the corner of my eye as they high-fived each other and one of th
em walked over. I thought it would be too obvious if I tried to scuttle away, and the mojitos and the high heels were bound to conspire against any attempt. Falling over head-first, undressed as I was, was not how I wanted to be remembered that evening.

  "Hi," a male voice that I couldn't ignore said from beside me. "I'm Aaron." I just smiled as minimally as I could get away with, willing him to go away, but knowing that he wouldn't.

  "I wonder if you could settle a bet between me and my friend over there," he indicated his companion, who he was doubtless going to refer to as his "wing man" at some point. "He thinks you're Indian, but I've got some friends who are Indian and they don't look the same as you do." As if all Indians look identical. "So I'm going for Bangladesh, because I saw this documentary at school and that had some totally beautiful women in it." I closed my eyes briefly in despair. But at least I'd discovered that total idiocy was one way to distract me from being naked.

  "Both wrong, I'm afraid," I said and took a sip of my mojito, "I'm English. From England." I thought he might need the extra clarification.

  I could tell that, as usual, that that wasn't the answer he was looking for.

  "English?" he questioned, "Like where white people are from?" I rolled my eyes and stared up at him, a stare that he couldn't maintain. Unfortunately, the only way he could break eye contact was to look me up and down a couple of times.

  "You know," he said, as if he was about to say something I didn't know, "Your outfit is totally hot."

  Did he think that if he just kept saying different things I would forget how dumb everything he'd said before was?

  His eyes settled on my breasts and I sighed. But the mojitos were giving me courage.

  "Look, dude, I know I'm short, but my face is up here, okay?" His head bolted upwards and his mouth wanted to make a noise but his brain was unable to send it any useful sounds. He turned and went back to his friend, and I was grateful.

  Not more than a minute had passed before the friend came over.

  "Sorry about Aaron over there," he opened with, "He's a bit of a dick sometimes."

  So it was the "I'm the clever one you can relate to" angle now, was it?

  "I hear you're a friend of Natasha's?" he continued, "She's a nice girl"

  So far so weak, I thought, but he wasn't stopping there.

  "I met her at a party at her place once and I was like, 'woah, there's a naked girl at the party'! But now I'm totally cool with it and all."

  Somehow he seemed to think that talking about being naked meant it fine to stare down at me, and he hadn't gotten a clue from just how one-sided this conversation was: I hadn't spoken a word yet, and he wasn't about to let me.

  "So, yeah, Natasha, I remember she was into loads of weird shit like comics and films. Are you into that kind of shit too?"

  Oh, jeez, I know I'm bad at conversation, but at least I don't just drown people with a stream of inanity and insult their interests at the same time.

  "I'm into graphic novels, if that's what you mean," I replied. His eyes looked up at the sky as he mentally logged to say "graphic novels" instead of "comics" next time. Never mind calling it "that kind of shit", which hadn't even occurred to him to be wrong.

  "So, those graphic novels, is it, like, Avengers and Batman and that? Have you seen the new one? The Avengers film?"

  I nodded. He carried on talking.

  "Good, innit?" I shrugged. "And that Guardians of the Galaxy one too. How did they do that little raccoon guy anyway? Was it all CGI and shit?"

  Oh lord, I thought, of course it was CGI.

  "I'm not sure," I said, "I think they might have had some really little guy in a costume do a lot of it." Would he believe that?

  "Really? Wow, that dude must have been tiny. I mean, at least in the Star Wars they have remote control robots so they don't have to have dudes in them." Should I tell him that R2-D2 had a man inside? There seemed no point.

  Then, doofus number one, Aaron, reappeared by his friend's side.

  "Hey, Aaron, did you know the raccoon guy in the Guardians of the Galaxy film was a little dude in a suit?" doofus number two told him.

  "No way!" Aaaron said, obviously impressed, "That's crazy!"

  Yes, yes it is, I thought, and that's why it's not true.

  A third boy, since I wouldn't give them the title of men, appeared at Aaron's side.

  "Hey, stop hogging all the naked lady time, would you?" he almost shouted to get attention.

  Uh-oh, I thought. This was what Natasha had warned me about: a group of boys was turning into a hunting pack.

  "Hey, so what about it?" the new arrival said to me. "Which one of us gets to take you home tonight?"

  An insidious smile grew on his face as he, like the others, looked me down and then up, and then he bent at the knees and tilted his head to get a better view of my body.

  Suddenly I felt a hand around my waist that made me start, followed by the feeling of fabric as somebody pressed against my back. But the hand was small with slender fingers and the touch was gentle; the fabric against my skin was soft and smooth, and a soothing friendly voice said gently, "Hey, Rupes, how you doing?" I looked around: Natasha had returned to rescue me.

  Then, more surprisingly, I felt a kiss planted on my neck, and her other hand slid across my chest, Natasha's forearm rubbing my breast as it went, before her hands locked into each other and her arms drooped around my shoulders. I felt my nipple harden against her forearm and, as she stood by my side, her pelvis pressed into my hip.

  She turned to face the three boys. "Guys, I think we need some time alone, okay?"

  They held up their hands and turned to leave us.

  "Woah, I totally should have worked that out, the way she blew me off!" I heard one of them say.

  "Yeah. Why is it all the best ones that have turned, eh? Jeez, she was hot. Such a waste."

  I chuckled at how easily Natasha had misdirected them, and then twisted in Natasha's arms so I was facing her.

  "Thanks," I said, "That was pretty sma--"

  I was cut off by Natasha pressing her lips onto mine and, again I blame the gin and tonics and the mojitos, because I didn't stop her as she closed her eyes and bestowed a prolonged and gentle kiss. I felt a tingle inside and was starkly conscious of her clothed body against my naked skin. Goose bumps raised on my arms, no doubt due to the strangeness of the whole situation.

  "Sorry," she said once she had broken off, "I've wanted to do that all day."

  I opened my mouth in shock. I hadn't expected that at all. I had been so concentrating on her covering for Martin's sexuality that it hadn't occurred to me that the relationship might be entirely reciprocal.

  "So, so you're a…" I started to say.

  She smirked and gave a half-shrug. "Sometimes," she said. I decided now wasn't the time to ask exactly what "sometimes" meant.

  We stood there, Natasha's arms around my neck with our bodies pressed against each other. I didn't know what to do with my hands, or what to do with any part of me at all.

  "But, but does everyone else know?" I asked her.

  "Only Georgia, I think, but I reckon she's told Theresa." That explained Theresa's comment about a "fun day" earlier. "And, well, now I guess everyone here does too." She glanced around, but really didn't seem to care if people were watching or not. I did, and I could tell that most of the room was pretending not to, but not a single movement by either of us was being missed.

  "And what about Martin?" I asked. She'd blown his cover now too.

  Natasha shrugged. "He's off to college soon, and I think he's tired of football, and he's smart so he's going to concentrate on his studies."

  So it seemed it had all worked out well, except that I, a straight English woman, was standing here naked in the arms of a young American… well, lesbian, I guess, for want of a better word.

  Natasha kept staring into my eyes while I was lost in thought.

  "So you're not a…" she asked me hopefully.

  "Afraid
not," I said, "I mean, you're stunning and all, and if I were going to be one, then you'd be at the front of the line, but, well…"

  She smiled and leaned forwards to kiss me again and, again, I let her. It would be fair to say that I enjoyed the sensation, and the feeling of how her body pressed against mine and moved subtly but passionately as she did so. I also felt a bit like an idiot with my arms hanging by my side.

  "You'll blow my new cover," Natasha whispered to me.

  It was my turn to adopt a quizzical look.

  "My new cover," she continued, "As a lesbian. You're not making it look very believable."

  I laughed and put my arms around her waist. "Is that better?" I asked with a smirk.

  She took her arms from around my neck and then moved my hands so that my palms rested on her buttocks. "There's. That's better," she said.

  I laughed. "Hey, don't push it."

  Her hands released from mine and she swung her small purse off her shoulder and put it onto the stool next to me. Her hands returned to rest on my bare shoulders. It was pleasurable to be touched. She glanced down at my breasts, the nipples pressed lightly against her chest.

  "I love your breasts," she said to me, prompting me to turn red again. Wasn't I supposed to return a compliment too? I wasn't sure what I was supposed to say now.

  "I'm… erm, thanks… Is this still part of the act?" I asked, and glanced around again.

  "Whatever works for you," Natasha said with a smile.

  "And you look so good in those heels," she continued, "One hundred percent totally fuckable."

  I felt a shiver run through me. I wasn't sure if I was being seduced or just enjoying the new situation for its strangeness, but who doesn't like compliments?

  "You know?" Natasha wasn't letting up, "If you stayed here in the States, I'd hide all your clothes, and never let you out of the house."

  Dear God, she actually was managing to turn me on.

  "Maybe I'd put a collar on you, and take you for walks," her hands slipped around my back and pulled me closer to her. I didn't know which way I should move with my hands still holding onto her buttocks. "I'd show you off to everyone, but only just to make sure they knew you were mine."