fellow scouts, Jack leaned over and whispered in my ear, “Let’s go swimming.”
Swimming at night was not allowed, but before I could protest, Jack had disappeared into the shadows. I went after him, following his darkened form as he raced down the path, not toward our camp, but toward the southernmost end of the island. As we darted through the trees, I tried to get him to slow down. He simply laughed and ran ahead, forcing me to keep up. The moon, in its waning quarter, provided little light, and Jack’s shadow leapt from one patch of silvery glow to the next like Peter Pan’s running from its owner.
Finally the forest ended and I found myself standing beside Jack at the edge of the river. He was already removing his shoes and socks.
“We can’t swim in the river,” I said. “It’s against the rules. We’re only supposed to swim in the pool.”
“Come on,” Jack said. “It isn’t flowing that fast, and we won’t go far. Nobody will know.”
He pulled his T-shirt over his head and shucked his shorts off. I saw a glimpse of his ass, pale above his tanned legs, as he waded into the water. He turned and waved at me.
“Come on. It’s not that cold.”
I reluctantly did as he said, placing my clothes beside his and walking to the water. I stuck one foot in. While not exactly warm, it wasn’t as cold as I’d expected, and I followed after Jack until the water was up to our chests and we could swim.
“See,” Jack said. “The current isn’t bad at all.”
He was right about that. There was a slight current, but as long as we swam against it, we weren’t pushed away from the island. Confident that there would be no difficulty getting back, Jack ducked under the water. A moment later, I was pulled under with him.
We came up laughing and sputtering, our hair plastered against our heads so that we resembled seals. I returned Jack’s ducking, pushing him down and under. He came up behind me, wrapping his arms around my waist as he rocketed up and out of the water. For a moment, before he pulled me back down with him, I felt him pressed against me. His penis was nestled in the cleft of my cheeks, and I felt the curly swirl of hair at its root against my skin.
Then I was underwater, looking up as bubbles swarmed around my face. Jack let go and I floated away from him. I turned and watched him surface, his arms and legs ghostly against the darkness. I reached for him, wanting to pull him back against me, then remembered that I couldn’t breathe and swam toward air and light.
Jack was heading back to shore, his strong arms carrying him quickly. I started to follow, then realized that my cock had swelled to attention. I didn’t want Jack to see it that way, for fear he would guess what had caused it, so I slowed my strokes and waited for it to go away. By the time I reached shallow water, Jack was putting his sneakers on and my erection had abated. It was helped by the shock of the night air which, despite the relative warmth of the water, caused gooseflesh to rise on my skin.
“Let’s get back to camp,” Jack urged as I dressed. “We don’t want them to miss us.”
I nodded, saying nothing. Then I followed Jack back down the path we’d taken until it joined the one leading away from the ceremonial grounds. When we came to Unami Lodge, we went right, past the Win campsite and on to our own. Although several of the tents were zipped up and lit from within, others were dark, indicating that their tenants were still out, perhaps brushing their teeth or engaged in earning their astronomy badges. We had not been missed, and we entered our tent with feelings of having accomplished something dangerous and forbidden.
“Boy, that was fun,” said Jack, unzipping his sleeping bag.
“Yeah,” I said.
“What’s the matter?” Jack asked me. “You sound funny.”
“I’m just cold,” I told him. “I need to warm up.”
“Here,” Jack said, unzipping my bag and pulling it closer to his. “We learned this in survival class today.”
“What are you doing?” I asked him.
“Putting our sleeping bags together,” he answered as he fed the teeth of my zipper into the slider of his and joined them. “Now we both get in and our body heat warms us up. It’s how you stay warm if you’re trapped in the snow or whatever.”
He slipped into the new, double bag. I hesitated, then got in beside him, turning so that my back was to him. Jack zipped the bag closed and turned on his side. I felt his arm go around my chest.
“Don’t worry,” he said. “I’m not going to feel you up or anything. I know you don’t do that on the first date.”
He laughed, and I felt his breath against my neck. I closed my eyes. The tent smelled of wood smoke and water and pine. I tried not to think about Jack pressed against my back, or his hand resting on my stomach. I tried not to feel the heat moving between us.
“Now, if you were Cheryl Kipe, I might feel you up,” Jack continued. “I might even do more than that, if you know what I mean.”
He thrust his hips against me. Again I felt the bulge between his legs brush against my ass. My dick jumped in response, and I cringed inwardly. No, I told myself. Don’t.
“Man, I wonder what it would be like to be with her,” said Jack. “Have you seen her boobs? Pete Lowry told me she let him touch them once after he took her to a basketball game.”
He reached up and squeezed my chest as if he had one of Cheryl’s breasts in his hand. “I bet they’re soft,” he said. “So, who would you want to do it with?”
I struggled to think of an answer. My penis, already half erect, was getting harder. Jack still held me to him, his hand cupping me as he thought about Cheryl.
“I don’t know,” I said, picking at random a girl from my biology class. “Maybe Sheila Mullally.”
“A Catholic girl,” Jack remarked. “Everyone says they’re the easiest. I bet she’d let you go down her pants.”
As he said it, he slid his hand down my stomach to my underwear, mimicking what I might be able to do to Sheila. I held my breath, waiting for the awful moment when he realized I had a hard-on and pushed away from me.
His fingers touched the head of my dick and stopped. For a moment, Jack said nothing. Then he playfully squeezed my penis. “Looks like you already thought about that,” he teased.
He didn’t let go. Instead, he slid his hand under the waistband of my shorts. His fingers closed around my cock and stayed there. I could feel him breathing behind me, but neither of us said anything. He began to move his hand up and down, slowly, still not saying a word. I felt the bulge at my back lengthen, and I knew he was getting hard as well.
“You can touch mine if you want to,” he said hoarsely.
He rolled onto his back and I onto mine, so that we were lying side by side. My hand trembling, I reached over and felt him. His dick was shorter than mine but thicker. My fingers barely met around the shaft. Our hands moved together, stroking gently, and neither of us spoke.
I remember that Jack came first, but that even after his shuddering subsided he continued to pump me until I, too, had release. It was the first time that I can remember that he considered the needs of someone else once his own had been met. Neither of us said a word as we wiped our hands on whatever soiled clothing we had nearby, and neither suggested separating the sleeping bags. I remember falling asleep soon after, despite the thoughts racing through my mind, and waking up in the morning with Jack once again pressed against my back, arm around me, snoring gently.
That was how it began. Although I expected there to be awkwardness between us that next day, there was none. Jack acted as if nothing at all unusual had occurred in our tent the night before. He went through the day as usual, devouring his morning pancakes with relish, taking his first shots with a rifle on the Marshall Island shooting range, and orchestrating an evening attack on the Jersey