Look at Me!

Instead, it seemed that she’d landed herself in some sort of Sodom.

Was she sure? Well, now that the scales had fallen from her eyes, she’d soon be able to tell.

The train was idling outside. Constance said, ‘Ola’ and hopped on. The motor’s hum deepened and they were away. There were people waiting outside the small casino, the women dressed in everything from beachwear to tropical styled cocktail dresses but nothing actually shocking.

But the players on the tennis courts were topless, both the men and the women. A redhead stopped a serve with her left breast. Her giggling companions, of both sexes, vied to be the ones to kiss her hurt better. Hm.

The train got to the beach. Connie alighted. The snack bar, about 5,000 square thatched-roof feet of it, had the cover-up sign but half the women inside were topless. Apparently the rules slackened closer to the waves.

The beach was dotted with small tables, umbrellas and loungers, all facing the ocean. Next to the boardwalk there was a row of showers with frosted glass walls and doors. There were bins for used towels and racks for fresh ones. The Aphrodite couldn’t be faulted for the way it catered to its guests.

Connie trudged through sand as fine and white as sugar. She glanced down at the lounger she passed. Oh! The man sprawled asleep in it had a crumpled newspaper draped across his hairy chest but he was bare from his navel down, very bare and very large, curled like a gigantic snail out of its shell.

Connie focused straight ahead. Volleyball. Nude volleyball. The women bounced and jiggled. The men swayed like rope pendulums. Well, that settled that. Sodom it was! She’d come here intending to shock the other vacationers but it was she who was being scandalised. What next? As she made her way back towards the station, Connie considered her options. She could retreat. That would mean hiding in her room. Or she could just hang out, keeping herself to herself. In the clothing she had with her, she’d be invisible anyway. She could do her best with her wardrobe. Going topless wouldn’t be so hard, not when most of the other women were also showing off their boobs, as Jeff called them. That way, she might just be able to blend in.

That was funny. She’d have to show her boobs off so as not to be noticed.

But blending in wasn’t what she’d come for. She was there to be daring – the cynosure of all eyes. The third alternative would be to find some way to stand out from all the other women and become the Queen of Gomorrah.

But how?

Chapter Seven

‘I want to see the sexiest outfits that you have in stock, please,’ Constance blurted.

An exotic-looking girl stepped from behind the counter and grinned. ‘Right on, sister! Sounds like fun.’ Her hair was blue-black, obviously dyed. Her features were oriental, Chinese or Korean, Constance thought, but she had enormous luminous eyes and a red dot painted in the middle of her forehead. More, she was wearing a glittering metallic green and gold sari, but a very short one – just above mid-thigh – and four-inch heels. Just to complete Connie’s confusion, her accent was flat New York with no affect – the vocal equivalent of dead-pan.

‘You wanna stand out in the crowd, right? I can dig it.’

‘Can you help me?’

‘You see the problem there, right?’

‘Problem?’

‘You’re cute, very cute, and you’ve got yourself a killer little bod there. Anywhere else all you’d need do is flash some skin to get mobbed by suitors of a variety of sexual persuasions. Here, though, the main competition is a lot of pretty girls and handsome women. Their outfits range from tiny to nil. You might get noticed if you dressed up like a Las Vegas showgirl and hired your own band, but that’d seem a bit needy, doncha think? And wearing all those feathers would be a bit of a drag, if you’ll forgive the pun.’

Constance grinned agreement.

The girl continued, ‘You been down to the beach yet?’

‘Yes.’

‘Lots of naked girls and women there?’

‘Yes.’

‘Were they being stared at?’

‘Not particularly.’

‘Y’know why?’

‘Why?’

‘Being nude is like “all done”. They’ve arrived where they were going. After a girl’s naked, there’s nothing more to look forward to. Strippers undress on stage. They don’t come out already bare, right? It’s the peeling that’s sexy.’

‘You think I should put on a strip-show?’

‘Nah. That’d be over sooner or later. What you want is to look like you’re doing a strip, or you’re just about to.’

‘Tease them?’

‘Exactly.’

‘I still don’t get it.’

‘You wanted to know what the sexiest thing I got for sale is?’

‘Yes.’

‘It’s this.’ She reached down a glass vial full of a clear liquid.

‘Spray-on paint?’

‘No. It’s called “Strip-Tack”. Exotic dancers use it.’ She picked up a length of fabric that looked as if it’d been sewn out of pale green fog. ‘Watch.’ Deft fingers dabbed a tiny droplet onto one corner of the scarf. She touched that corner to her wrist and let go. The scarf hung. ‘Pull it off.’

Constance tugged. The fabric pulled on the girl’s skin but it didn’t come free.

‘Now peel it.’

Constance got a nail under a corner and peeled the fabric away easily. ‘I see the possibilities!’

‘Good for you! I’m Tina, by the way.’

‘Constance – Connie.’

‘So you see the possibilities, huh, Connie? Now try this on.’ She took a little black dress from a rack. ‘That should fit you.’

There was a changing room, which, considering how casual everyone was about nudity, seemed quite strange, but Connie used it. From the waist down the dress was flouncy layers of fine black net. Above the waist, it had no back or sides at all, just a black satin ‘M’ that had points that reached just high enough to barely cover Connie’s nipples. It was held up by a spaghetti strap that looped behind her neck. From the front it was provocative. From the side it was very close to indecent – sexier, Connie realised, than topless would have been.

‘You like the look?’ Tina asked her.

‘Daring.’

‘That’s what you wanted, right. Now try it like this.’

The spaghetti strap was fastened to the bodice by a pair of tiny hooks and fabric loops. Tina inserted two fingers between the dress and Connie’s left nipple.

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