The first rays of sunlight streamed through the dense canopy of trees and flooded out across the open rock face. As the bright white rays of light reached out and warmed Henry's face he blinked his eyes to the early mountain morning. He breathed in the cold crisp air and filled his lungs to capacity. With a long slow exhale he felt an overwhelming sense of satisfaction, security even. He slowly opened his eyes and looked out across the vast Blue Ridge Mountains rolling away from his perch high atop this outcropping of rock. Henry hardly noticed the chill of the early morning or the slight dampness from the freshly settled dew. He felt more comfort and relaxation than ever before in his life. As the sun slowly began its accent into the bright morning sky, long thin shadows from the surrounding trees stretched across his rock. The leaves danced in the gentle breeze, which carried the slight hint of a campfire from below. The river in the gorge bottom far bellow was reduced to a subtle hum as its waters rushed over the rocks and falls.
Henry slowly sat up letting the thick wool blanket fall from his broad naked shoulders. He looked down on the peaceful beautiful visage of slumber, Lucy. She slept comfortably curled under the blanket oblivious to the new dawn and its beauty. Henry gazed over curvaceous form exquisitely outlined by the plaid of the blanket. He closed his eyes as he breathed in a deep breath remembering the night before, and carefully stroking the long soft tendrils of Lucy's blonde hair.
Henry was a stock analyst whose job stress had built to almost uncontrollable levels. The recent economic downturns and poor predictions for technology stocks had effectively transformed him into a crumbling basket of nerves. This was exacerbated by the recent and ugly break-up of his first marriage. To throw salt on the wounds his ex-wife's man-hating dike lawyer had provoked the normally calm and sedate Henry during the custody proceedings. Her questioning had sent him off the deep end into a tyrant of "fucking bitches," "heartless cunts," and a few "that slut should just fucking die and put the rest of us out of our misery" type statements that did little to impress the prim and proper female judge. The end result had left him with guarded visitation rights of his two young children. And just before this outing his bitch ex-wife had metaphorically thrown a can of Morton's salt into Henry's gaping wound of a life, by moving the kids to the west coast to live with her new handsome rich boyfriend.
After showing little sympathy and even some aggressiveness toward one of Henry's firm's oldest and richest clients about the investor's recent shelling in the tech market, Henry's boss had suspended him and booked Henry on a one week stress reduction wilderness adventure thing in the near-by Blue Ridge mountains. Henry grew up in a small town in those mountains and knew them well. In high school and college he was an avid rock climber and backpacker, hiking the entire Appalachian Trail from Main down to Georgia between his sophomore and junior years in college. Since graduating, Henry had gotten caught up in the economic boom of the 90's and lost sight of the outdoors.
He had met and married a trophy wife, squeezed out two beautiful kids and owned a loyal lovable mutt. He was living the American dream, until the markets turned and his wife fucked the neighbor. Now after ten years in the city Henry would return to the mountains of his youth for the first time. Only this was a different Henry, jaded, lost, and confused.
Henry drove his pristine new SUV up the winding roads to the lodge where his group would meet and head out for the week. It was a warm summer day and Henry actually was looking forward to returning to his homelands. As he pulled into the gravel lot he surveyed the collecting group of people he would spend the next week with. Two gentlemen struggled and pulled their large packs out of the trunk of their new BMW near the front of the logged lodge. They appeared to be in their early to mid fifties. By the way they interacted and touched each other, Henry felt sure they were gay partners. On the porch of the lodge a man in his early forties, trim and well dressed, talked loudly on his cell phone. That's when Henry saw her for the first time.
Lucy walked out of the screen door from the lodge onto the large covered porch. From the SUV, Henry could see that she was tall, her long legs stretched nicely, shapely from the bottom of her cut off jeans to the top of her worn boots. Her hips sloped gently into her tight waste and spread back to her amble breasts. Her voluptuous chest accentuated by the tight ribbed white t-shirt that could be seen beneath her unbuttoned flannel. Her face was round with bright cheeks and crystal blue eyes that pierced through the tiny strings of blonde bangs that covered her forehead. The rest of her dirty blonde hair was pulled back into a ponytail that bounced playfully off her head as she descended the front stairs and headed for his truck.
Henry was struck. He sat silently in his truck watching intently as this gorgeous woman made her way toward him. The quickly gathering sweat of his palms caused his hands to slide down the steering wheel. His mouth slightly ajar as he took note of the way her breasts bounced ever so slightly with each step. He closed his mouth and swallowed. Henry closed his eyes and shook his head; he had not reacted that way to a woman in years.
Tick, Tick, Tick. Henry opened his eyes to see this beautiful woman standing right outside his truck, knocking on his window. He reached forward and lowered the window, breathing the fresh mountain air that was sweetened by her soft scent as it rushed into his truck. He could not speak.
"You comin' with us, or are you gonna sit in that thing all week?" She jokingly quipped through a pleasant smile.
"Uh, yeah, I mean no. Hang on." Henry choked out these words sounding like a stuttering fool.
"Well get your pack, the rest of the group is ready to hit the trail." With that she walked back up toward the cabin.
Henry got out of the truck trying to shake it off as he grabbed his pack out of the back. He joined the others on the porch. The two men at the BMW were indeed gay lovers up here in an effort to rekindle their relationship. Rick, and Steve seemed like nice enough guys. Rick was very flamboyant which played quite humorously to Pete's reserved nature and quick wit. The cell phone talker from before, Jim had been sent up here by his employer much like Henry. Only Jim was a snobby city boy, who did not want to be here. Out of the cabin came Jackie a larger, older woman who had come up on vacation. She was almost as round as she was tall and had a very bubbly personality. Her husband had just left her for his twenty year-old model secretary and she was out to prove to herself she had more adventure in her than cussing at the little league soccer coach on Saturday afternoons. Lucy would be their guide. She was laid back mountain girl through and though. It was all Henry could do to gather enough concentration to keep the drool from leaking out over his lower lip as Lucy expertly laid out their course and a few simple ground rules.
Soon enough Henry found himself following Lucy up the trail away from the cabin, followed closely by the others. He barely noticed the forest off to either side or the initial steepness of the trail as he could barely tear his eyes from her perfectly rounded ass swaying up the trail ahead. He melted in the sound of her soft southern drawl as she recounted some history of these mountains and explained what the group could expect to see along the way.
A few hours into the hike, Henry couldn't help but to begin to notice the strength of his legs starting to fail. The reaming members of the group had slowed their pace and were lagging further behind. Henry and Lucy had begun conversing. As the trial passed they talked about their pasts and hometowns. As it turned out Lucy had grown up near Henry going to the rival high school of Henry's alma mater. As they talked and laughed mostly at Henry's stumbling nervous words at first, Henry felt his tongue begin to reduce to a normal size. He was sure it had swollen to epic proportions when Lucy had first turned around to him to ask him where he was from. Henry soaked in as much of her contagious laugh a looked to catch as many glimpses of her beautiful smile as possible.
They walked out over the top of a pass between two peeks and looked out over a grand view of the ancient mountains. Henry stood right next to Lucy, his arm just barely brushing against hers. As they touched for the first time, Henry held his breath slightly. Lucy almost instantly raised her gentle hand and laid it on his shoulder. Her touch sent chills down his spine as she pointed to the peaks outlining the horizon. Henry turned to her face as she looked at him. Their eyes met and locked. Henry could feel himself melting into her gaze. Neither spoke as they looked longingly at each other. Somehow they knew without words what the other felt. A strong connection had been made.
