First Wild Oats

fiction

by Bestia Mortale

She started out tired. She'd planned to leave work early, right after lunch, but one of her clients needed changes to some art that was just going to press, and in the end it was almost 5 when she escaped, then 5:30 by the time she got on the highway. The traffic was rough; fleets of giant trucks on the right, schools of sharklike SUVs chewing each others' tails on the left, everyone impatient and on top of everything, her old car's engine wasn't sounding so good.

She hadn't even wanted to go to this wedding. She hadn't seen her college friend for years, she was exhausted and what was a cultured urban black girl doing driving into the redneck badlands known as middle America?

Plus, it was hot, she didn't have air-conditioning and there was way too much diesel exhaust to keep the window down for long.

By 6:30, she'd worked her way past the suburbs into the mountains, and it seemed like things might be getting better.

Around 7:45, though, after she'd come down the other side and was out in the farmland, whatever was wrong with her engine started getting worse, and she thought the car was losing power. She tried to ignore it -- there was only another 60 miles to go.

By 8, when there was nothing for miles in every direction but wheat fields, golden in the sunset, beautiful and empty as far as the eye could see, she started smelling an ominous smell and realized she really had to do something. She slowed down, desperately looking for an exit. Big semis swerved past her, growling unnerving suggestions about what would happen if they hit her.

Finally, in the middle of nowhere came an exit. No gas station sign, but there was bound to be something. She took it. There was nothing in sight at the bottom of the exit ramp, but the road it emptied out on was fairly large and well-maintained. Surely it led somewhere soon. She wished she'd brought a map.

So she limped along, praying to find a filling station soon. The road curved off into the wheat fields, without a single human building anywhere in sight. She felt like she should turn around, but the smell was getting worse, and she didn't want to get back on the highway. Surely there would be something soon.

She must have driven almost five miles on that big, empty road before the engine finally stalled and wouldn't start again. Right in the middle of nowhere. She hadn't seen so much as another car.

She set the emergency brake and climbed out. In the silence, she heard the ticking sound of the hot engine, and crickets and the rustle of a light breeze in the wheat... nothing else. Fear, frustration and desperation clamored in the back of her mind. She felt like bursting into tears.

The sun was getting low in the sky, pouring a luxurious brightness across the golden fields that was almost surreal. In another hour or so, it would be dark. She felt completely vulnerable out here alone, easy prey for who knows what.

She had to do something, go somewhere and find help. It couldn't be that far to a farmhouse. Or maybe a car would come along. She grabbed her shoulder bag off the passenger seat and started walking.

There was something strange about it, about the silence, the lack of cars, the vast uniformity of the land, the sun hot behind her right shoulder, casting her long shadow out over the wheat, the scuff of her sandals on the road, the sweat on her neck, on her back, trickling down her sides, sticking her heavy blouse to her skin, the air on her legs under her skirt as she walked. After no more than 10 minutes, she found herself half in a trance, dream-walking.

She had a half-bottle of water left in her bag, and she drank some sparingly. At the rate she was sweating, it was a good thing sundown would be coming soon or she'd get dehydrated.

After another 15 minutes, she came to the crest of a gentle rise from which she could see ahead for at least a mile. She halted and swung her shoulder bag to the ground. As far as the eye could see, there was nothing but wheat, golden and lonely against the sky.

Shit! She looked around carefully. This was ridiculous. Where was everything? Where was everybody? She felt like she'd been transported to another planet.

Go back? No way. Go forward? She could be walking all night. She picked up her bag and then set it down again. Ahead on the left, she could see a line, maybe a fence cutting across the wheat, heading north. Where it met the road ahead, it looked like what might be a turn-off.

North could take her back to the highway. She'd mostly been driving east since getting off at the exit, so she should have been going roughly parallel to it -- it couldn't be more than a mile or two away. If she could rejoin it, at least she'd have a chance of hitching a ride to the next gas station. It seemed risky, but better than walking this empty road to nowhere. She decided to give it a try.

The turn-off was farther than she'd guessed, and it was getting very close to sundown when she finally reached it, but it was definitely a road, a dirt track that seemed in fairly good repair. She turned onto it and headed across the field.

There was no fence on either side, only the wheat, higher than her waist, stretching away on either side like a vast, patient army on some unintelligible campaign. Although the sun was now just touching the horizon, its heat still enfolded her, sapping her will. She trudged ahead doggedly.

At the same time, she couldn't help appreciating the drama of the sunset, the color in the western sky and the deep shadows in the land ahead. She breathed and let the beauty flow through her, feeling her feet reach down into the earth as she moved, feeling her connection with the land and the vast sky, accepting the sun's heat, saluting the endless grain. She felt herself overtaken unexpectedly with a wild, almost sexual joy in this strange, forsaken place.

Glancing ahead, her eye caught a shadow moving on the wheat, and her mood broke with a jolt of adrenalin. Suddenly alert, she looked carefully, expecting what -- a wild animal? Worse, it was a man, bare-chested, moving through the grain ahead and to her left, not more than 30 feet from the dirt road.

A white man, golden tanned like the grain, with pale blond hair. Slender and muscular, no doubt dangerous. He must have seen her -- his path was going to intersect the road ahead of her. Strange sunglasses gave him an ominous look.

Out here, she was sure the savages would regard her simply as prey. She had nothing in her bag she could use as a weapon. She looked around in the dirt for a rock, but the loose stones were all too small, and the larger ones were packed in hard.

She heard him getting closer. He couldn't see her hands yet. She'd have to bluff.

"Stop," she called out. "If you come any closer, I'll shoot." She was surprised at how calm and sure she managed to sound.

He froze.

As he turned his head toward her, she could see that what she'd taken for sunglasses was actually a blue bandana rolled tight and worn like a blindfold. He was quite beautiful in a strange way. Young, early twenties. Young predatory male, no doubt. Perhaps not.

"Who are you?" he asked. "I don't think I recognize your voice."

She stood utterly still, watching him, sensing his body language, adjusting.

"Why are you blindfolded?" she asked.

He didn't answer at once. "I'm blind."

"What are you doing out here?"

"Walking. What are you doing here? You must be on the tractor track."

"I'm lost. My car broke down. I'm trying to find a filling station."

"Oh."

She waited for him to say something more, to offer to help her, but he didn't. She suspected a trick -- no sightless person would be walking these endless fields. His arms and shoulders were lean and corded with muscle. Sexy but dangerous. Probably used to forcing local girls when their brothers weren't watching.

"Who are you?" he asked. "Are you from around here?"

"I'm what you see before you," she said. "You can't be blind. Maybe you think girls are stupid, but if you give me trouble, I'll put a bullet in your leg."

He stood there for a moment, his head cocked, listening. Then he reached a hand up and pulled off the bandana. The skin around his eyes was very pale compared to the rest of his face, and even at that distance, she could see the scar tissue.

"Oh," she said. Then, after a moment, "Sorry. I thought you had to be putting me on."

He just stood there.

"I'm sorry," she said again. "I'm feeling a little nervous, is all."

"So you going to shoot me?" he asked, with a sardonic bitterness that she found reassuring.

"No," she said, "I don't actually have a gun." Then she kicked herself for telling him that.

He put his blindfold back on. "So is it all right if I come out on the road?" The blue looked good on him. He was really very beautiful, this strange young man.

"Sure," she said, "Just as long as you don't try anything."

He strode through the wheat with assurance and emerged on the dirt road. Some part of her was unreasonably surprised he was wearing jeans and work boots -- had she really thought he was naked? She shook herself mentally.

The way the jeans hung, though, low on those lean, sculpted hips, she'd bet he didn't have anything on underneath them.

"Are you so pretty, then?" he asked. "That any passing man would want you?"

"I'm black," she said. "Some places in this country, people still don't think a woman like me needs consideration."

"Oh," he said.

"Is that how you think?" she challenged.

"No," he said. "No, I get what you mean. Around here, I'm like the local black man."

"Yeah, right," she said under her breath.

He heard her. "What I mean is -- okay, I work three days a week at the feed store, stacking sacks. You don't have to see for that job." He sounded like a child, pleading. She found herself embarrassed for him. "So every couple of weeks, the other guys get bored, and start a pool. They set up obstacles, things on the ground to trip over, or at waist level to fall over, maybe catch me in the crotch, or at eye level to hit me in the face. They bet on which one will take me down first. They find it amusing."

"And I'm supposed to be sorry for you?"

He didn't say anything for a bit. "I thought maybe you'd see. Never mind. Hope you get your car fixed." He strolled into the wheat on the other side of the road.

"Hey," she called, "Wait a minute, I do get it." He kept walking. Shit. "Could you at least tell me where the nearest gas station is?"

He stopped and turned. "Keep going until the tractor track hits the road and turn right. Then -- " He paused, thinking. "It's four or five miles. You probably..."

"What?"

"Well, they're going to be closed, and you wouldn't want to go there anyway."

"What, are they white supremacists or something?"

"No, just not very competent or honest."

"Where can I go instead?"

"You're kind of out of luck," he said. "There's no mechanic at the freeway station either."

"Great." She'd have to call her friends and get them to send someone. Except half the time they didn't pick up the phone, and they might not get around to listening to messages for days at this point.

"What's wrong with your car?"

"I don't know. I'm guessing something pretty serious."

"Well, I have a friend who could probably take a look at it in the morning."

"So what do I do tonight?"

He shrugged. "It's a nice night. You could walk with me."

"Where would I sleep?"

"You could stay at my place. My mom's house. But I won't be getting back there for a couple of hours."

"You're saying I could walk through the fields for a couple of hours in your company so I can spend the night on at your house and maybe possibly have someone look at my car in the morning?"

"Look..." he started. The pain in his face, the sudden vulnerability, made her breath catch. He raised his hands. "Maybe you're from the city, but you can see this country. Isn't this all beautiful? I'm blind now, but I can still feel the sun on my back and the wheat brush my stomach, and the cool air of the evening creeping in. They'll be cutting these fields tomorrow. This is my last chance to walk the wheat until next harvest. Can you..." He caught himself. "Sorry, I know it's weird. I'll just take you to my mom's house."

"No," she said, "I want to walk with you. I do feel it. You're right."

She could tell he didn't trust her now, anticipating secret ridicule. She swung her bag up and walked toward him. When she got close, he started to flinch back and she almost lost her nerve, but she put a hand on his shoulder and leaned up to kiss him gently on the cheek. Then she stepped back, her heart pounding and her hand unaccountably tingling.

He froze and slowly blushed. After a moment, he said, "You smell strange."

"Well, I'm drenched in sweat," she started, but he continued haltingly.

"You smell like the land. Not like dirt, I mean, but like the whole land. If the entire earth had a smell, that's what you smell like."

She tried to deflect her emotion. She felt like the land, but what did he know?

"So, let's walk," she said.

"All right," he said shyly. "I don't... I just wander. I know the roads, so when I hit one, I know where I am. That okay?"

"Sure."

He set out, self-conscious now, and she followed a yard or two behind. Watching his back, she waited for him to relax, but her presence clearly made him tense.

"So how old are you?" she asked.

"Twenty-two."

"How long when... what happened to make you lose your sight?"

"It was when I was fourteen. Eight years ago."

She forced herself to ask into the silence that followed, "What happened?"

"Oh... a kid squirted battery acid in my eyes."

"God. Was it an accident?"

He was silent for a moment. "No, his mom ran off with my dad a couple of months before, and he blamed our family, I guess. He'd been kind of a friend of mine, but he was pretty fucked up."

"Did they arrest him?"

"Around here? No. His dad beat the shit out of him. Of course, his dad beat the shit out of him all the time anyway. I don't blame his mom for leaving."

"What happened to him after that?"

"Nothing. Like I say, he was messed up. Couple of years ago, he hung himself in his barn."

"But you went blind."

"Yeah. They say there's some kind of laser treatment that might give me some of the vision back, but it costs a lot and we don't have any money."

She was silent, contemplating it in the gathering dusk as the wheat brushed past her arms. His back was less stiff now, but he was still listening, waiting for her response.

"So what are you going to do?" she asked him.

He stopped. "What?"

"What are you going to do? You have to get out of here, right?"

He turned around, facing her. "And go where? And do what? I dropped out of school, I can't read, I can't drive."

"You sound smart."

"I used to be," he said bitterly. "That was no help. I was the smart kid everybody resented in school. I used to love to read. I used to love going to the movies. Then..." He shrugged.

He must have sensed her outrage and he deflected it by asking about her life.

"I'm 27," she told him, "about a year out of a bad six-year relationship, working as a graphic designer in downtown Seattle, got an apartment on Capital Hill, I don't know. What is there to tell? I have it easy compared to you."

He wanted to know more about her work, what it meant to be a graphic designer, what it was like working in an office, what the city was like. He was a good listener, good at asking questions. He really is smart, she decided, as they strolled slowly, side by side.

They were talking about the night life in Seattle, places to go out dancing, and the music scene, when he fell silent. Looking at his face in the dim light, she could tell what he was thinking about, and waited with curiosity to see how he would hit on her.

"Lots of boys like you?" he finally asked.

She laughed. "Some. Some girls too. How about you?"

"Me?"

"Do lots of girls like you? Maybe one special girl?"

"No," he said. And that was all. They walked in silence for a while.

"Why not?" She finally asked.

He stopped again. "You don't understand this place," he said. "There aren't that many girls. And none of them wants to be saddled with a blind guy. None of them liked me before I was blind, anyway."

"You're beautiful," she told him. "In the city, you could have any girl you wanted."

"Beautiful!" He snorted. "What crap. You're just saying it to humor me."

"I don't do that," she said coldly. "I mean the things I say."

"Well, okay, would you have me?" After he said it, he flinched. They were silent for several steps.

"Would you have me?" she returned.

"Me?" It rocked him. Then he laughed. "Sorry, I shouldn't have asked you. I'm 22 and never even been kissed, and you seem to me like a goddess out of a myth. Except better."

"So would you have me?"

He shook his head. "I already apologized. Don't tease me about it."

"I'm not teasing, I'm asking you."

"Yes, of course I would," he said angrily. "I'm fucking desperate. You don't have to humiliate me about it."

"Well," she said lightly, "I would have you too. But I don't want to humiliate you, so let's keep walking, okay?"

With a look of fear and confusion, he followed her lead and they continued through the grain.

She let herself be hypnotized by the steady swish of their passage. The heat of the day was passing, and stars had begun to dot the vast sky ahead of them, and the rich smell of the place was having an effect on her. She realized she really had wanted him, really would have made love to him if everything weren't so awkward... but the moment had passed and all she felt now was sadness.

Glancing up at the dark land ahead, she became aware that something was changing. She glanced over her shoulder and stopped dead. "Holy..."

He stopped ahead of her. "What?" His voice sounded sad as well.

"It's the moon. A huge full moon, just at the horizon, drenching the fields with light. It's so beautiful. I wish you could see it." She found herself almost in tears.

His face in the moonlight, terribly vulnerable but also resolute as he looked sightlessly in her direction, wrenched her heart. "You are so fucking beautiful," she told him. "You just don't know. May I please kiss you?"

"Yes," he said, certain now.

She kissed him slowly, experimentally, tasting her own feelings as much as his lips. He put his arms around her tentatively, clearly uncertain what he should be doing. Yet under that, unexpectedly, she felt a crackle of energy that seared through the awkwardness, and suddenly it was a real kiss for both of them.

It went on a long time, and the smell of his sweat and the muscles of his back under her hands brought her alive. She pushed her hands down the back of his jeans and cupped his strong male butt (she'd been right, no underwear). Real heat was moving in her.

She whispered to him, "You are the light of the sun on these fields, you're a young god. You take my breath away. I want you."

She moved his hands to the buttons on her blouse to let him unfasten them. When he fumbled at the first one, she took one hand away, kissed it and put it back, telling him, "Slowly. There's time -- I'm not going anywhere."

He settled and undid the buttons easily. She shrugged out of the blouse and let it fall in the wheat. She moved his hands onto her breasts. The way he touched her was delicate and sensuous -- she felt him seeing her with his fingers, and saw herself through the sensations. She sighed with pleasure.

They kissed some more, and she relished the touch of his chest with her nipples, of his stomach on her stomach, and she began to be deliciously aware of his hard cock in his jeans.

"Okay," she said after a bit. "Take off your boots and jeans, and I'll take off my skirt."

He sat down in the wheat and started unlacing one boot. She slipped out of the skirt and pulled down her panties. She left the sandals on, not entirely trusting the ground.

When he stood up and dropped his jeans, she took them and her clothes and made a little nest in the wheat, then sat down on it and catching his hand pulled him down beside her.

His body was so unspeakably beautiful, and she loved the way he touched her with his fingertips. He let her guide him and set the pace.

After a while, she went down on him. The salt of his skin and the musty smell of his crotch made her want him inside her. She pulled a condom out of her bag and rolled it onto his lovely young cock. Straddling him, she slipped onto him. His gasp lit something for her, and she started to move as slowly as she could stand.

The sensation of being inside her set him on fire, and his orgasm almost immediately burst over him. Within seconds, he was bucking under her, making cute hoarse little cries. She held him then and felt surprise at the strength of her connection to him.

She had to show him how to stimulate her with his fingers, but he proved dexterous. She was reluctant to ask him to try oral sex because of his inexperience, but after a minute or two, he actually asked. He licked with a delicacy that at first frustrated her, but then he gradually teased her to one of the most intense orgasms she'd had in years.

They held each other in the moonlight under a sky full of stars.

What have I done? she asked herself. But to her surprise, she felt an unaccustomed assurance. She really did want this.

"So," she said to him. "How was that?"

He sat up abruptly but didn't answer. She felt his hand tracing up her thigh. He rested his palm on her pubic hair and curved his fingers gently over her labia.

"You're too good to be true," he said. "I haven't looked for anything good in a long time. After I lost my sight, my mom read to me in the evenings, and I thought I might be able to come out of this, but then she hit the bottle. You're the first thing after that that's given me some hope."

"After tonight, this field will be empty," she said. "You have nothing to hold you here. If you let me, I'll take you back to Seattle with me."

She looked up at the shock in his face. "We can pretend this doesn't matter, that we met like this by accident, but it doesn't feel that way to me."

Sitting up too, she caught one of the long stalks of wheat that surrounded them, then turned and traced it across his chest. "I invite you in the moonlight to come live with me in the city and see where your life can go from there. Be my lover if that works out. Be my friend if it doesn't."

"Are you serious?"

"Yes." She saw his fear when she didn't laugh and say she was just kidding. "It scares me too," she whispered.

He nodded then. "Okay. I will."