by Sy Walker
Luke squeezed into the booth; the worn red vinyl creaked under his weight. He winced as his knees bumped the legs on his way in. Jennifer giggled a little behind her hand at the face he made.
“You have such a pretty laugh,” Luke commented. Jennifer was bowled over by the sweetness of his smile. Boyish charm erased the hard façade his mountain man looks gave off, “What’s your name?”
“Uh,” Jennifer had to think about it. She was so enamored with the man in front her she almost forgot, “Jennifer. I’m Jennifer Armstrong,” consciously she reminded herself to shake his hand. What is wrong with me? He’s just a guy. No man has ever made you goo goo eyed before. Get a grip.
“I’m pleased to meet you, Jennifer,” his huge hand swallowed hers up for a shake; his touch struck the flint inside of her. Feelings of intrigue and more than a little bit of lust caught her by surprise.
“Are you just here for the festival or…?” Come on brain. Work!
“Yeah, but I live about twenty minutes away in Chico,” Luke was trying to figure out how to put Jennifer at ease. She sat on her hands and he had never seen such a curvy body look so tense and rigid before. He tilted his head to catch her gaze. Luke figured he’d address the 800-pound gorilla in the room and get it over with, “Am I making you uncomfortable?”
“A little bit,” she shifted her body off of her tingling hands, “Last night was really weird. You kind of freaked me out,” she decided being honest was probably the best course of action, “I mean a gorgeous giant walks into a bar – wow I feel like I’m starting a joke - and singles a girl out. How is she supposed to feel?”
“Gorgeous am I?” Luke relaxed against the backrest and crossed his arms.
Jennifer’s eyes widened and a cold sweat trickled down her back. She felt like the awkward teenager she thought she left behind when she went off to college in Arizona, “I have working eyeballs, you know and you’re kind of hard to miss.”
Leaning his elbows on the worn Formica of the table, he significantly shortened the distance between them and sent Jennifer’s pulse racing, “Well if it helps, I think you’re pretty gorgeous yourself,” he grinned at her. His face showed no malicious intent, just sincerity that sent Jennifer’s heart racing and put color in her cheeks. He was attracted to her and he really wanted her to know it.
She covered her face with her hands, too embarrassed to answer. An overwhelming shyness swept over her. She suddenly wanted the floor to swallow her up and she had no idea why. It’s not like she had never been complemented by a man before and she was by no means a virgin, but Luke had a quiet intensity and charisma that drew her in and threw her off.
“Don’t ever do that,” Luke ordered as he removed her hands from her face, “As long as you’re with me don’t ever hide. You have nothing to be embarrassed about,” his hand lingered on her wrist. The silence hung between them, waiting for one of them to say something or make a move.
The server cleared her throat, breaking the strange spell that had settled over the pair, “Uh, is everything alright here? Can I get you guys anything else?”
Luke let go and turned his attention to the server, “Yes, ma’am everything is fine. Just the check, please.”
“Where are we going?” Jennifer remained silent as Luke had paid the bill and escorted her out of the restaurant. As a precaution she text Tiffany so someone would know her last known whereabouts and what direction they were traveling in.
They approached a white 1970s Harley Davidson. Jennifer lagged behind as Luke climbed on and tied his hair back. She watched with apprehension as he tried to pass her a black helmet, “Get on.”
As badly as she wanted to go with this man, every news story and cop drama about abductions she had ever seen flooded her imagination. The fear was enough to root her feet to the ground, “Not until you tell me where we’re going,” she had to be firm about this. Yes, she was drawn to him, but Luke Robertson was still a stranger, she had literally just met him an hour before.
“I’d like to spend the day with you. I’m only here for a few more days and would like to spend time with you and get to know you some,” he gestured with the helmet, indicating she should take it.
“Where are you planning on taking me? I’d like to tell Tiffany at least since we just met and all,” she had her cell phone at the ready, poised to shoot off a text message or throw it at him if needed.
“Butte Creek Canyon. And feel free to tell her you are not going against your will rather a ‘gorgeous giant’ has seduced you into trekking with him outdoors for the day,” settling the helmet in his lap he chuckled a little.
“You know, everything about this scenario screams serial killer, right? A large imposing man picks up a helpless coed and lures her into the woods for an afternoon of ‘fun’. I can see the headline now,” Jennifer quipped.
“Trust me, if I wanted to just abduct you I would have by now. Get on the bike,” his tone went flat. Repeating himself grated his nerves a little bit.
Jennifer sent the text and approached the bike. The gap between her body and his was only a few inches; she was so close she could almost feel his body heat. Reaching for the helmet between his legs she cracked, “Don’t be too confident about it. They say fat kids are harder to kidnap.”
Looked gripped her wrist again, a firm gesture not meant to hurt, but to get her attention, “I won’t tolerate you putting yourself down. Please, don’t say negative things about your looks. You’re a beautiful, woman.” He loosened his grip and brushed his hand over her skin as he released her, sending a rash of goose bumps up her arm and stirring the butterflies in her belly.
Jennifer, momentarily struck dumb, just nodded in agreement. She had been told over and over by friends and family not to make fun of herself. Apparently it wasn’t attractive to the opposite sex either.
She knew that a size 12 was by no means fat, but she had always been self-conscious about her butt and thighs being a little curvier than average. So she built a comedy act around her insecurities as a means of deflection. It never dawned on her that maybe some people interpreted that behavior as an attention grab and fishing for compliments until her cousin Joe, who was two years older than her, mentioned it. By then the habit was so ingrained it would slip out occasionally when she got nervous.
Climbing onto the leather seat behind Luke, he wrapped her arms around his waist and glanced over his shoulder at her, “Hang on tight,”
He fired up the bike and pulled away from the curb. Luke picked up speed when they turned on to Honey Run. To Jennifer, the wind in her face lifted her spirits and washed away some of the apprehension she was feeling about taking off for the day with a random guy. The thought still sounded weird in her head, but the exhilaration of being on the back of a motorcycle on such a beautiful day felt too good to question. Maybe being with Luke wouldn’t be a bad way to spend an afternoon.
Pulling off the road and parking the bike put a pout on Jennifer’s face. The ride was just too short. Luke let her linger attached to him for a moment longer before attempting to get off the bike, “Alright. Let’s go,” Luke untangled Jennifer from around his waist and unstraddled the bike, offering a hand to help her.
After undoing the helmet, Jennifer accepted his hand in getting off. Her feet didn’t quite reach the ground and she was not too keen on how graceful she may have been attempting to dismount on her own. As it was, Luke had to reach in to almost lift her off the seat. She may have gotten really well acquainted with the ground otherwise.
“Follow me,” Luke set off towards one of the trails that ran along the edge of the canyon.
Jennifer had been to Butte Creek Canyon a few times before as a child, but her memories paled in comparison to how beautiful the landscape looked in person. Trees, several stories tall, blanketed the countryside, shades of green and yellow decorated the countryside. The open air allowed for the breeze to circulate, allowing for a little relief from the summer heat.
Jennifer and Luke walked along the tr
ail in silence for a few minutes, just enjoying the landscape and fresh air until Luke seized Jennifer’s hand and veered off the path into the forest.
“Is this where the serial killer part happens?” she teased, only half joking. Her stomach knotted up with anticipation and butterflies. Instinctively she knew she was fine, the alarm bells weren’t going off and she was so hyped up being out in nature for the first time in ages, she just wanted to enjoy it.
“Ha ha, funny girl. This is a shortcut to what I wanted to do today,” he turned back and flashed a heart-stopping smile at her, distracting her long enough to stumble over a tree root, “Whoa!” She had pulled Luke down to the ground with her.
Mud caked the knees of her jeans and she cradled her right arm, the one she was being led by; she had wrenched her shoulder on the way down. Luke landed on his ass, completely uninjured, and was quickly back on his feet, “You okay?” he knelt down beside Jennifer.
The slightest movement brought tears to Jennifer’s eyes and made her wince, “I think I may have dislocated my shoulder,” she gently probed the affected area to discover that indeed the shoulder was out of joint, “It happens sometimes if I’m not careful… The remnants of an old volleyball injury,” she shrugged her good shoulder. It had been months since the last time this happened. She recovered quickly, but it didn’t make the feeling suck any less.
“Stay still. I’m going to put your joint back in place, okay?” gently Luke laid his hands on Jennifer’s arm and shoulder to feel for where the socket was, “This is not going to feel good. You want my belt to bite down on?”
“Nope. I’m an old pro, just get it over with,” she squeezed her eyes shut and turned her head.
Luke adjusted her arm into position, “On the count of three. Ready? One… two… three,” he popped her arm back into place.
Jennifer screamed through her teeth. The initial wedging of the joint back in to socket hurt like hell, but the pain quickly subsided and she could breathe again.
“Thank you.”
“Maybe we should go back. You really need to rest that arm.”
“No. Let’s keep going. I’ll be fine. This arm has given me nothing but problems since the tenth grade anyway, I’m not gonna let it slow me down. I just need to wear a sling for an hour or so, so it doesn’t dislocate again.”
Luke peeled his shirt off over his head and fashioned a make shift sling around her neck.
Jennifer’s breath hitched as he touched the sensitive skin around her neck. Luke looked like he didn’t have an ounce of fat on him. Her eyes explored over the planes of his chest. Luke was not overly hairy, but he did have fair amount of light brown hair covering his chest and arms. In a moment of what she deemed as lapsed sanity, she stroked her hand over his forearm, indulging in the contrast of the soft hair and the solid muscle.
Luke went totally still, like a deer in a hunter’s sight, and just watched. Her touch was feather light, almost as if she was wary about making contact. What was surprising was how Luke felt his stomach flip. He chose her, but something in the back of his mind made him think maybe there was some type of design he wasn’t aware of in making that choice.
“C’mon, kid,” he kissed her cheek. Just a chaste expression of comfort, nothing more, “We’re about half a mile from our destination. Stick close,” he helped Jennifer to her feet and guided her to his left side to protect her injured shoulder.
His senses were on high alert. Her falling normally would have been no big deal, but Luke wasn’t exactly the best liked of individuals, and having someone injured with him may prove a liability. There were so many people from his community gathered in the Paradise area that had expressed ill feelings toward him in the past that it was likely some of them had made their way over to the canyon for a run. Most of them wait for the cover of darkness to make their mischief, but it never hurt to be wary anyway.
“So tell me about yourself. We still have time to kill,” Jennifer was gazing up at him patiently waiting for a response.
“There isn’t much to tell,” Luke shrugged, “I have lived my entire life in Chico and the surrounding areas. I went to San Francisco for a couple of years in my early twenties with my band and when that didn’t pan out, I came back and became a welder.”
“What kind of music did you play?”
“Really bad heavy metal. We wanted so badly to be Judas Priest, but none of us had any actual talent,” he laughed, “A heckler heaved a beer bottle full of piss at my head and screamed that I couldn’t sing. Five stitches and a bender later, I finally believed him.”
“Gross. So you were the singer then?”
“Sing is really too strong a word for what I did. I would politely describe it as a midnight howl serenade.”
Jennifer giggled. Her laugh was so sweet, Luke thought he would do anything to keep hearing it, “What about you? Outside of volleyball what is there to know about Jennifer Armstrong?”
“Well, I don’t play volleyball anymore. Apparently you really need grace and coordination to play the sport and those are two skills I seem to have in short supply as you can see,” she pointed to her shoulder.
“I’m only here for the summer. I grew up in Paradise, but I go to college at Arizona State. I’m finishing up my Bachelor’s in Animal Sciences. I’m getting ready to apply for med school to become a vet. I want to work with injured wildlife,”
How appropriate. Luke thought, “Ambitious. I like it. It’s a good field to get into.”
Jennifer appreciated that he didn’t say he was impressed or looked at her surprised when she explained her chosen career path. Too many people in Paradise and even in Arizona always look shocked when she would tell them she wanted to be a doctor and not a dental assistant or a teacher. His tone conveyed respect as opposed to skepticism, which was refreshing.
“Why wildlife?”
“Excuse me?” she was still lost in thought.
“Why wildlife? You’ve chosen such a specialized field, I was curious as to why.”
“I find wild animals fascinating. Every summer we would road trip down to Lancaster to visit my grandparents. I would drive them crazy when we would get there to go to the sanctuary in Rosamond at least once a week.
I would spend hours talking to the handlers and vets about the animals – mind you I was ten at the time – and I wanted to know everything I could. That summer they had gotten in a rescue named Teddy, a wolf, and he became my favorite. He was sleek and powerful, everything about him came off as being Mr. Cool. I was so sad when he died a few years ago.”
Luke was giddy inside. He couldn’t believe his luck. He stared at this woman he just thought was intensely beautiful with her bright green eyes and breathtaking curves. Fate, heavenly design, whatever you want to call it, put him in the path of this woman. There was no way he was letting his perfect mate go.
“We’re here,” Luke announced. The falls stretched out before them, the river it fed snaked through the landscape, parting the trees, demanding its space to run before turning a corner and disappearing.
“Come with me,” Luke guided Jennifer to the grotto under the falls, “Mind the rocks,” the ground was slippery with algae beneath her flip-flops.
Luke sat on a boulder and removed his boots and socks. As he stood to undo his jeans Jennifer stopped him, “Are we going swimming? Is that even allowed here?” Luke was dangerously close to being naked, a thought that both enticed and freaked Jennifer out. She had to stall.
“Technically, no we aren’t supposed to go swimming, but does that matter? No one else is here. It’s just you and me. You can swim, right?”
The two of us alone, that’s what’s freaking me out! “Yes, but I don’t have my bathing suit,” suddenly gripped by modesty, she became concerned by what he would think if he saw her without any clothes on. All of her goddamn summer camp and gym class insecurities came back and flooded her system. She hadn’t ever had sex with the lights on and now her date for the afternoon was all gung ho about skinny-dippi
ng.
“Neither do I,” Luke’s eyes twinkled with mischief and mirth. He turned his back to Jennifer and dropped his clothes.
Jennifer choked and became more than a little turned on at the sight of his bare body. His naked torso was simply the sneak preview; she just got an eyeful of the entire fucking feature presentation.
“Last one in is a ‘fraidy cat” Luke teased and dove in. He broke the surface of the water a moment later with a whoop and a shake of his head, “That’s cold, whoa,” he wiped his face and blinked the water from his eyes, “Get in!”
Jennifer hesitated, but the sight of Luke naked in the clear spring was too tempting to pass on. She kicked off her flip-flops, tossed her makeshift sling to the side, and quickly shed her clothes down to her white cotton bra and underwear. She crossed her arms over her stomach, to cover herself and dipped a toe in.
The shock of the chill shot up her leg through the rest of her body, “You’re nuts! The water is freezing!”
Luke disappeared under the surface again for a moment and quickly materialized in front of her, “What did I tell you about hiding in front of me?” The water near her feet was the shallowest, maybe three feet deep, allowing Luke to get close and grab Jennifer around the waist, playfully tossing her in the water.
Jennifer squealed as she soared through the air and landed a few feet away ass first into the water.
The chill momentarily stunned her, taking her breath away. Her head came out of the water, “You shit!” she scanned the area and found Luke treading water a few yards away, laughing his head off. She dipped beneath the water and kick paddled her way over to him. Not quite trusting her arm, she relied on her legs to do the work.
Coming up in front of him she splashed water in his face with her good arm, “You jerk!” she said playfully before laying on her back and kicking up a powerful spray of water in his face before taking off.
Luke chased after her and the two spent the afternoon swimming and playing in the creek, just enjoying each other’s company and the warmth of the Northern California summer.