The house of Eighty-One rose out of the darkness; thin squares of light edged the closed shutters. Aton skirted the steaming hog pen, his passage eliciting the usual incurious porcine grunts. The warm animal smell brought a sympathetic wrinkle of the nostrils, though he had long since ceased to find it objectionable. He came up to the rear of the house and tapped the twins’ window with the measured signal of old.
There was no response. He poked a finger behind the loose shutter and pried it open, peering in as far as his angle of vision permitted. The room was empty.
He banged the wall in futile anger. Where were they? How could they be gone when he wanted to talk? Knowing himself to be unreasonable and a trifle snobbish, he grew angrier yet. He knew that there were other things in the boys’ lives beside himself, particularly since it had been months since his last visit, but the proof of it was irritating. What was he to do?
The shutters parted on a window farther along the dark wall and light flared out to strike the bushes and beam into the night sky. Aton stepped up to it, then hesitated. It could be one of the parents. They, perhaps more conscious of the difference in Family status, and not wanting trouble with the forceful Aurelius, discouraged the association of the children. Aton waited, holding his breath, as a head poked out: ebony outlines, features indistinguishable. Then a long braid flopped over the sill and dangled its ribbon below.
“Jill!”
She spun her head toward him, trying to penetrate the gloom. “That you, Aton?”
He ducked below the spilling light and caught the swinging hair, giving it a sharp rug.
“Ouch!” she yelped, exaggerating her pain. She caught at his hand and disengaged his fingers. “That’s Aton, all right. I’d know that jerk anywhere!”
He got up to face her squarely. “Jerk, am I?”
Her face was very close to his. Her even eyes, pupils black in the shadow, looked back with unexpected depth. “When you jerk my hair—”
He had missed the pun. Embarrassed, and unwilling to admit it, he leaned forward and touched his lips to hers.
The contact was light, but that unpremeditated action surprised him as much as it did her. Jill had always been the tagalong, the drag, the interference in male affairs, the baby sister. Her unconcealed interest in Aton had always bothered him, his irritation accentuated because he was never able to admit his displeasure. He had responded with cruelty, angry at himself for that, but able to think of no alternative.
This was no forest nymph. These lips, while not wholly unresponsive, were untrained. They lacked finesse. There was no magic—except that he was kissing Jill and finding her unrepulsive. He wondered whether he should stop.
She was the one to terminate it, finally, lifting away her head and taking a breath. “Too late for that salt, now,” she said. “You already banged the bomb.”
“I was looking for the twins.” He was unable for the moment to rise to the repartee. Had he, in reality, been looking for this girl? The thought upset him.
She nodded, one braid brushing his face. “I figured it. They’re playing checkers with Dad, up front. Want me to fetch one of them for you?”
“Checkers? Both of them?” Aton asked, trying to keep the conversation going while he settled an obscure but powerful internal conflict.
“Both together. They keep losing, too. Jerv is getting mad.”
Aton had no comment. The silence lengthened between them, awkward, uncomfortable. Neither moved.
Finally he put out a hand, holding it there, letting her interpret his meaning, and not certain that there was any meaning there.
“Well,” she said, and this seemed to make the decision. She took his hand, leaning on it as she brought her foot up to the sill. Her firm legs and thighs showed through the material of skirt and slip in silhouette, stirring a guilty excitement in him.
“Wait a minute,” she said, withdrawing. Had she changed her mind already? He seethed with disappointment and relief. But in a moment the light went out and she was back. “They’ll think I’m in bed.”
Aton helped her down, placing both hands on her waist just above the swelling hips and lifting her away from the high sill. She was heavier than he had thought, and they stumbled together and almost fell as her feet touched the ground. She was nearly as tall as he.
They walked together past the pigpen, this time drawing no remarks, and went on down the remembered trail, selecting this direction by silent consent. Aton’s mind was whirling. It seemed impossible—yet she was a girl, with a body budding into womanhood. She had always liked him, and now she had chosen to express that liking more directly.
They found themselves beside the ancient hideout. The bushes had overrun the entrance, but the main space seemed to be intact. Aton squeezed through first, feeling carefully in the pressing dark, in case there were lizards. He brushed away a few loose burs.
She joined him silently. They would talk now, and she would try to get close, as she always had, and he would push her away automatically, and she would toss her head and giggle…
She found his head, turned it, and placed her mouth against his. His hands came up to push at her chest, touched, and jumped away. Without interrupting the kiss, she caught hold of his shirt and pulled herself closer.
They broke, and she lay back, her form just visible as his eyes acclimatized. “I thought you were just teasing, before,” she said. “But you aren’t, now, are you? I mean.”
“No,” Aton said, uncertain whether he was being mocked.
“All my life, it seems, I’ve been waiting for you to do that. And now it’s done.” Had she meant the kiss?
Aton studied her as well as he was able. She was wearing a summer blouse, gently mounded, and a darker skirt that blended with the ground. She had kicked off her slippers and her white feet stood out, the toes wiggling. “I might do more,” he said, half afraid she would be angry, though he had never paid any attention to her anger before.
“Aton,” she murmured, “You do anything you want. You—” Her voice cut off, as though she were afraid she had said too much.
“Jill, I won’t make fun of you any more—ever,” he told her, trying to stave off an excitement he did not understand nor wholly trust. He was sure, now: this had been her original intent. But did she truly know what it involved?
“You never made fun, Aton. Not really. Not so I minded.”
He placed his hand on her blouse, deliberately now, pressing on the softness beneath. She did not object. He stroked, interested but not satisfied, and afraid, despite his bravado, to do more. Then, carefully, he tugged the material loose from her waistband. “Do you mind if I—?”
“Anything you want, Aton. You don’t have to ask me. Here.” She sat up. He lifted the blouse over her head, seeing her small breasts rise as her arms went up. She wore no bra.
Aton cupped one breast in his hand, feeling its delicate texture, running his thumb over the nipple. Holding her that way, he brought her sitting torso to his and kissed her again. This time there was fire. His tongue reached out to taste the sweetness of hers.
She sank back slowly, and he followed her, kissing her cheek, her throat, her breast. She brushed her fingers through his hair. “Salt—who needs it?” she inquired softly.
He forgot caution and put one hand on her knee, just below the spreading skirt. Her legs parted a little, and he slid his hand up over the kneecap and against the inside of her thigh. The flesh was smooth and very warm.
Throbbing anxiety took him. She had let him go this far; had he reached the limit? If he should expose himself, if he dared, would she take flight and bear a story to her parents that he could hardly deny?