RETURN OF THE GOLDEN GOOSE

by Some Sort of Dog
 
 
 
 
 

Chapter 30:- All On A Sunny Afternoon


 
 
  "Is it getting hotter, or is it just me?" Lucy pondered as she ambled down the lane, plunging a hand into her cleavage to see that her two twenty pound notes were safe. There they were still, reassuringly clinging to her sweat-damp flesh. White dust from the pathway clung palely to her bronzed legs, and lay in a heavier coating between her thighs where her recent exertions had left her well and truly soaked.
What was his name? It didn't matter, she would know him again, probably. Just a quickie, it had been, but a hearty and athletic fuck. They had gone back into the pub to finish their drinks, grinning and blushing at the applause as they wandered in hand in hand. Lucy had sat on the boy's lap, but he was totally spent, and she gave up hope of continuing their liaison into the afternoon. They had parted with a soft, friendly kiss.
Her breasts bounced and jiggled heavily, the fat, puffy nipples thrusting against the damp material of the shirt. The yellow bra hung around her neck, useless now. She had tried in the pub toilet to get the bra back on, but she was miles too big. She wondered how she had ever thought it had fit this morning.
The little village swimming pool looked suddenly tempting. Lucy hadn't been heading this way on purpose, in fact, she had forgotten it was down this way. Without thinking, she turned off the path and went up to the gate.
 
 
  Kay heard the postman trying to shove something through the letterbox. After half a minute or so, she opened the front door and put him out of his misery.
"Sorry, love," he was a new postman, not the usual one, middle- aged, with glasses and a round friendly face. He thrust a handful of letters at her and placed a fat, bulky envelope on top. "It's too thick to go through. And it says Do Not Bend..."
She thanked him and closed the door, leaving the poor man stumbling dazedly away down the garden path, wondering if he had really seen what he thought he had seen. Kay turned the large envelope over in her hands, puzzling at the riot of rubber stamped messages and scrawled remarks that covered both sides of the envelope. 'Address Changed — Forwarded,' it said, then 'Not Known' and 'Try Waterstone???'. Down at the bottom, like a cry for help, someone had stamped 'Lost'.
"It looks like it's been halfway round the world to get here, who...?" Then she spotted the sender's name hiding away in there, and laughed. "About time, cousin!" Usually, she got about four letters a year, but she hadn't heard anything from her cousin since February, when she'd written to her about the wedding. Well, to judge by the thickness of the envelope, the American Archer was trying to make up for lost time.
She tugged at the flap, but it had apparently been opened and resealed with sticky tape. She had to take a kitchen knife to the envelope in the end, and out came the contents: a thick letter and another envelope, one of those stiffened ones they use for sending photographs. Intriguingly, it was marked 'Open only AFTER reading!'
Kay was tempted to open it straight away. She had never obeyed those instructions which said 'Do Not Open Until Christmas.' But the letter seemed to demand her attention. Grief, it must be fifty pages. Half a writing pad. She sat down at the kitchen table and glanced at the neat, precise handwriting.
Within a minute, everything else — ironing, housework, Radio 4 — everything was forgotten.
 
 
  "Kay?" Mrs Danby knocked again, then bent to holler through the letterbox. "You in there?" It worked, at last. She heard a movement inside the house, and her daughter-in-law opened the door.
"Oh, hi, Mum." She seemed distracted about something. And her eyes looked a bit puffy. "Sorry, I was ... come on in." She aimed a kiss at her mother-in-law's cheek, but missed by a country mile.
They walked through into the kitchen. "It's cooler in here, thank goodness. It's like an oven in that van. My knickers are sticking to me. Oops, sorry, dear!"
Kay hadn't noticed. "I'll put the kettle on. Or something cold, perhaps? I've got some iced orange juice in the fridge." She put the kettle on anyway and dropped about a dozen teabags into the pot.
"I brought your bras." Mrs Danby put a carrier bag on the table. "Only three, until we see how big you're going to get. She looked on in surprise as Kay opened the fridge door, took out a jug of orange juice and replaced it with the bag of bras. Then she took a couple of long glasses and filled them from the kettle. Even for a pregnant woman, this was eccentric behaviour. "Are you feeling all right, love?"
Kay sat down heavily. "Mum, could you sit down? I'm fine, but ... well, this could take a while."
Mrs Danby sat.
"You know my cousin in America?"
"The one you mentioned when you were doing the wedding invitations? Pretty name...?"
"Sadira, that's right. I said I didn't think she'd be able to make it? She's just told me, she can't!"
"Hey, nice timing!"
"I used to get a letter from her every so often. They used to come over here every couple of years, in the summer. Anyway, she's a couple of years older than me. So's her twin sister. Well, she would be, of course." Kay got up from the table and went through into the living room. "They're not identical, but pretty close to it."
Mrs Danby could hear her rummaging about, looking for something. She shrugged, emptied one of the glasses of freshly boiled water into the sink and helped herself to orange juice.
Kay resumed, her voice muffled as her search took her beneath the cushions of the couch. "We used to play together, until..." She came back into the kitchen with a bulging scrapbook, extracting a dog-eared sheet of newspaper.
"She started writing to me when she went to college. She's brilliant, just twenty-three. A doctor. Not a doctor doctor, she hates doctors. A doctor of sciences. Genetics. Anyway, this was her last June." She smoothed the newspaper clipping on the table, and pushed it across to Mrs Danby.
Mrs Danby picked it up. The headline said 'New Staff', and the picture showed a pretty, dark, slim, and completely flat-chested woman leaning against a sign. It surprised her: she'd never seen a female member of Kay's family with nothing up top at all.
"Pretty thing. I've never seen features like that." Pretty features, certainly, Mrs Danby thought, but a couple of the Archer characteristics were noticeably missing. She wondered what had happened to the poor girl. Not a reduction, certainly!
"Her twin sister Jasmine is a dancer. Well, one of those dancers. You know what I mean?"
"One of those dancers?" Mrs Danby raised an eyebrow. "Oh, you mean...?" She blushed. She actually blushed.
"That's right. But Jasmine — well, she's a bit of a bitch, actually — she used to be..." Kay gave up "...had huge boobs since she was a kid, but Sadira stayed flat as a pancake. She thinks..." she unconsciously patted the letter "...it's because she had leukemia when she was eleven."
That explained the photo to Mrs Danby — but not Kay's emotional state. "So what's in the letter? She decided to have one of those enlargements?" Mrs Danby glanced at the photo again. "Poor kid," she said quietly, then looked up at Kay. "I don't think they could make her very big."
Kay twitched — then picked up the letter and began to read. "March 27th —"
"As long ago as that?"
"It took a while to get here. It's been around the houses a few times. It probably went astray when I moved in with Rick, of course, and then she moved..." Kay took a deep breath and went on.
Mrs Danby listened to the apologies at the beginning, eyebrows raising at the oddly sad tone — and then Kay hit the body of the letter.
 
The bottom line, Kay ("or slightly higher," she said with gallows humor), is that my breasts are growing at four inches a day...

 
Mrs Danby took a single quick breath.
"...What?" she said in a very small voice.
Kay nodded.
Mrs Danby suddenly understood why Kay was having so much trouble. "That would..." She couldn't finish.
Kay took a breath of her own and continued.
 
I was a 32 when I started — in other words, that was the measurement around my chest with no breasts to stretch the tape out. Maybe an extra millimeter for the nipples. I was at 36 at the end of the first 24 hour period, then 40, then 44... I don't have a measuring tape right now, but judging from time, I've just crossed the line into the eighties.

 
"Eighty? After how long?" Mrs Danby collected a few more wits into a small pile. "Kay, how long did she keep going? How long could she keep going? She sent this in March. If she's gone on straight through..." The image wouldn't come.
"She posted it in April. Things had changed a bit by then. But she's still growing..."
Mrs Danby's eyes began to roll back. "But how...?"
"I'll read it, Mum."
Mrs Danby mutely nodded.
 
This sort of growth takes a lot of energy, and my body is demanding that power supply. My appetite and metabolism have increased tremendously, and nearly all of those extra calories are going to help make new cells. If I don't eat enough to power the growth, it starts taking energy from other systems — like the ones that keep me alive.

 
Mrs Danby suddenly needed some calories of her own. She jumped up, switched on the kettle, and began ransacking Kay's kitchen cupboard for tea-bags and sugar.
"They're already out," said Kay. "On the work-top. Shall I...?"
"Don't stop! You carry on reading..." The kettle shook in Mrs Danby's hand as she made the tea.
Kay found her place. Her voice had gone husky. Her throat was dry as dust.
 
So the only way to stop the growth is to find a cure. Otherwise, I'll just keep getting bigger, and the weight will continue to increase. My back is already injured: I'm taking a lot of painkillers to be able to move. Even without that, I've lost speed, mobility, but I got my dexterity back), the ability to type facing the keys... And if this continues long enough, then the weight will increase to a point where my heart and lungs can no longer support my mass...

 
"Oh, God! The poor child!" The tea slopped on the tablecloth as Mrs Danby put the mugs down.
Kay laid down the letter and rubbed her eyes. "There's lots more. About fifty pages of it." Even compressed tightly in Kay's fingers, the letter looked as thick as a small book. "She started writing it two weeks after this whole business started, a bit like a diary. Right through until the end of April."
Trembling, she picked up her mug. Then she began to read out loud.
 
 
  "Read that last page again..."
The bit about the money?"
Kay's hands still shook as she opened the pages out and touched the crisp paper of the bearer bond.
 
I never got to buy you a wedding present. Things just happened too fast - and even now, I can't exactly go out and shop just yet. So I'm going to wimp out a little. Your gift is attached to the back of this page. For the help you provided without knowing it, and all the summers together, and all the summers to come.

 
"$100,000! How much is that again, dear?"
"A lot. An awful lot. About sixty grand. I know she's explained everything, but I still can't get my head round it. I'll have to ring her. What's the time?"
"It's still early in America. They're hours behind us. Give them a chance to get into the office and have a cup of coffee or whatever they drink over there." Mrs Danby pulled the smaller envelope towards her. "Is this the picture?" She peered at it. It was smaller than the newspaper clipping had been. "I left my glasses out in the van, dear..."
Kay went to the drawer and fished around, emerging triumphantly with a large magnifying glass.
There was a brief pause while Mrs Danby did an impersonation of Sherlock Holmes, staring at the photograph intently. At last, she looked up at Kay, wide-eyed. Then as if she couldn't believe it, she took a look at the picture again. "Wow," she murmured softly. "Boobies! Serious boobies!"
Kay came around and looked over her shoulder. "She looks as big as Charlotte. Maybe even bigger."
"It's hard to say. She must be nine, ten inches shorter. I mean, look at young Lucy, how big she looks. Even so..." Mrs Danby shook her head, not believing. "Four inches a day. Not even Lucy...! Some of the girls ought to know this: it might make them feel a bit better."
"I don't really know who we can tell..."
"Sadira trusts you as to who you choose to tell. Not young Lucy, for a start!" She glanced at the letter. "I think I rather like her. Funny how you can like somebody you've never seen. Pamela and Jason as well. And now the names of Danby and Shaw are forever linked through the Archers. The arch-rivals of the foundation garment business. Poor Susan! 144 inches?" Mrs Danby became serious again as she flicked the picture between her fingers. "I'd like to see her on the Super Bertha."
She looked at the photo again. "That's Jasmine down there? They do look rather alike in the face. And they would have been the same in the bust for a few hours..." Mrs Danby could understand Kay's earlier shock. It wasn't easy to think about. "A 'dancer?'"
"That's what they call them. It sounds nicer than stripper somehow."
Back to the photo. "And that's Pamela..." Mrs Danby had years of experience at mentally completing patterns. "Quite a beauty! And then Jason, there..." and she started laughing.
"Mum?"
Mrs Danby wiped her eyes. "It's just so perfect! She didn't want to lose either of them, so..." She started laughing again.
"You don't think it's weird, Mum?"
"Do you?"
Kay didn't even think about it: she just shook her head.
Mrs Danby nodded. "They love each other and they're staying together. And their families saw they didn't have any choice, so they couldn't put up much of a fight." More laughter. "Not that anyone could take on those three... I would love to meet them one day!"
"Well, perhaps when they get themselves all sorted out, they can visit us."
A final look. "I hope so. Lord knows, that poor girl is going to need some decent bras by then."
 
 
  "Kay? Kay, are you home?" The side door was unlocked: Maggie pushed it open, leaned in, and repeated her call. "Kay, you got a minute?"
"I'm on the phone, Mags!" Kay yelled out. Just make yourself comfortable. I'll be out in a while!" A pause. "Maybe a good while. Are you in a hurry?"
"No problem, bags of time," Maggie called back, and headed for the kitchen. Kay wouldn't mind if she had a cup of tea while she waited. It would give her more time to think out her arguments. And the courage to put them to Kay. Wilma wanted Kay to pose again while pregnant, even in light of Kay's recent public exposure. Perhaps especially in light of Kay's public exposure. Maggie wasn't sure how Kay was going to feel about that proposal.
Kay's kitchen layout was entirely predictable: Maggie quickly gathered the ingredients and filled the kettle, then sat down to wait.
There was a thick sheaf of paper on the table, along with a smaller envelope.
"Been writing a book, Kay?" Maggie grinned to herself. Kay, the young woman of leisure, writing her memoirs! I Stripped On My Honeymoon ! Maggie moved the top sheet slightly. It wasn't Kay's handwriting. Too neat, too well-organised, too small.
It was the pencilled phone number at the top of the letter that caught Maggie's attention. Kay's extravagantly loopy scribble. At first, with the international dialling code, she thought it was Mr Cunis's number, but when she turned it the right way up, she realised it wasn't. Not quite. But whose?
She hadn't meant to read it, she really hadn't. It was somebody else's letter: it was snooping. But once she saw those words, she pulled the letter across, her hands trembling, and began to read.
 
 
  Kay came back out of the bedroom, shoving the antenna back into the phone with the heel of her hand. She hadn't meant to spend that much time on the phone with Sadira, not with the cost of international calls in the daytime — but her cousin had asked her number, told her to hang up — then promptly called her back. As well she might, with all that money! They could finally afford to do more than just write to each other.
She rubbed her neck as she hung up the phone. "Wow! Look at the time! Sorry about that. We got talking and time just flew by ... Mags...?"
Mags had her back to the door. Kay could see over her shoulder. Maggie was holding the photograph, staring at it, not moving.
The letter lay on the table, its pages scattered.
"Maggie!"
Maggie didn't seem to hear her for a moment — then slowly turned around, bringing the photograph with her so that her eyes stayed on it, unblinking, as she moved. "Kay?" She managed to briefly glance up. "It was just there. I saw it on the table..." Back to the photo.
Gently, Kay took it out of her hand. Maggie jerked slightly as it came free, reaching for it — then seemed to regain a measure of control.
"Maggie, you mustn't," Kay said urgently. "You can't tell anyone! It can't go into the magazine, please! You have to keep this a secret!"
"A secret?" Maggie said hollowly. It sounded as if she was speaking from miles away. "A secret, of course." Flat tones. Like an automaton. A recorded message. "Sure. I won't tell. I have to go." Maggie scraped her chair back from the table and stood up — then mumbled something incomprehensible.
"What?"
Maggie turned to face Kay. "Could I have a copy of it? The photo?" Her eyes were pleading. "Please, Kay?"
Kay looked Maggie up and down — and spotted the huge wet stain on the front of her trousers. You could hardly miss it. Oh, poor Mags! You just couldn't be mad at her. "Of course you can," Kay said sympathetically. "I'll get a copy for you."
Maggie held her hands a few inches apart. They were shaking. "A larger size?"
Oh, poor dear Maggie... "Of course! Come here! You poor old thing! Come on, you need a cuddle, you sweet love." Maggie was soft against her chest. Shuddering, she clung on tight.
"She's so... I couldn't help it..."
"Don't worry. It's all right. I felt the same way. Well, perhaps not quite the same." Kay laughed shakily. "She has that effect, doesn't she? Now!" She held Maggie by the shoulders at arms' length, grinned at her stunned face. "You'll be all right won't you?"
Maggie nodded. "I'm seeing Charlotte. At the Grill? Another hour. I s'pose I'd better be going..."
"Like that?"
"Like this?" Maggie followed the direction of Kay's smiling gaze. "Oh, shit." She bit her lip and blushed.
"I've got a pair you can borrow. Pants, too. Come on, we've got to make you decent for Charlotte, haven't we!"
 
 
  "Thanks for everything. The slacks. I'll let you have them back at the weekend." Maggie turned and headed for the hallway.
"Maggie!" She stopped and looked over her shoulder at Kay. "Haven't you forgotten something?" Maggie looked blankly at her. "What did you come for?"
"Come...?"
Kay smiled and shook her head. "You came here for something. Just a social call?"
"Oh, that. I was supposed to ask you something..." Kay waited. "Never mind. It'll come to me eventually. Or not. It really doesn't matter." Almost a whisper. "You will get me the picture?"
"You won't tell? Not a soul? Not even Charlotte!"
Maggie shook her head like a wet dog.
"I'll do it tomorrow."
Maggie nodded and went down the hall.
Kay heard her walk into the door twice before she remembered to open it.
 
 
  Maggie's knees were still knocking. She checked her make-up and made her way from the ladies' room across the restaurant. Eyes followed her, appreciating her lushly developed figure, the way she seemed to be radiating sexuality in some way.
"Nice slacks," Charlotte boomed mightily. "Have I seen those before?"
Maggie avoided her eyes. "They're Kay's. I ... spilled something on mine. A nasty stain."
"Lucky you're the same size. Well, almost, anyway!" She sniffed and giggled. "You'd better not tell me what you spilled on them!"
Maggie felt the blush creep down from her face to her neck and beyond. She dragged her thoughts back to her present surroundings. "You're not showing yet, Charlotte." Desperately, Maggie looked Charlotte up and down from the other side of the table.
Charlotte's reply made the cutlery rattle. Other customers turned curiously to look. "How the hell can you tell that, with these great whoppers dangling down to my knees? I could be eleven months gone and nobody would ever know. Apart from Daddy, of course."
Maggie glanced around nervously. The other diners looked away in a hurry. "Bad as that, huh? You haven't told him yet?"
"The time hasn't been right yet. I'll tell him sometime. Meanwhile, I have to be ready in case he turns me out on the street. Part of being ready is going to see Mrs Danby this afternoon. A couple of slightly larger bras."
"Ah, so you are still getting bigger, after all!"
"What did you think?"
Big! Bigger! Biggest! Until now? Maggie looked at her fingers, as if expecting to see Sadira's photo still in her hand. She lowered her voice. "I've always got room at my place. I can put you up until you find somewhere."
"Oh, thanks! I thought I was joking about it. Just you and me and Jacqui and the twins, huh?" Charlotte placed a hand on Maggie's. It was big and warm and comforting. "But maybe Jacqui would be okay with the kids for a few days. Thanks, Mags. If push comes to shove, perhaps. Thanks!"
Maggie remembered her mission. She blurted out the words. "You'll pose again, of course?"
"Looking like this?"
"Your last ones were our most popular layouts ever."
"Use the same pictures again, then," Charlotte growled.
Maggie smiled to herself. Charlotte would pose again, as soon as she found herself short of money. "As soon as you make your mind up, just give us a call, okay?"
"You cheeky little sod!" Charlotte boomed threateningly. She glowered round the room as if challenging the management to throw her out. Do you know who I am, my man? "Not so little, either, these days. Maybe I will move in with you after all. I can think of one or two games we could play with those things under your shirt."
There was a gasp from the next table and Maggie thought it was probably time she made her escape. "You know where to find me, Char," she said softly, getting up. "You must excuse me if I dash. Got to see our Duncan about Lucy's next session."
"Lucy? How is the little slut?" Charlotte bellowed. "Missing Maxwell?"
"Not so as you'd notice, apparently. According to Laura, she's an extremely popular girl around the village." Maggie edged away.
Charlotte raised her voice to compensate for the increased range. "She would be, the slag."
"I'm surprised you haven't sent a posse to take her back to the Big House under armed guard."
"We fforbes-Davenports know when we're beaten! You're welcome to young Lucy. Besides, I can keep Maxwell fully occupied all by myself. He doesn't need young Lucy to help keep him busy."
 
 
  "This afternoon, then? As soon as I've delivered His Lordship to the City, I'll come back here and stop just inside the stables. Have your bags ready in the stable yard. I'll load them in the car and we'll be off before they know we've gone."
"Ou, Short'ouse, you will steal the car?"
"Nah! We take the car to the station and catch the first train south. We'll walk into the station large as life and twice as handsome so the ticket collector will remember us. Then we get off at the first stop and catch the London train that goes back the other way, straight through the local station. Don't forget your passport, love!"
"You need ze passport for Scotland?"
"No. Not yet, anyway. No. Leave some of your stuff in your room, but make sure you take your passport with you. We've got to make them think we've gone south to catch the boat to France."
"France? But why should I wish to go back to France? My boyfriend would kill you."
"Jacqui. Read my lips." Jacqui watched Maxwell's lips closely. "We won't be going to France. We're going to Scotland. To Gretna Green. It's just in Scotland, just over the border. We can get married there. That's why your passport will be handy: it will prove you're who you say you are."
"And I will be Jacqui Maxwell?"
"Yep!"
"Ooh, Short'ouse!" Jacqui pressed herself closer to the chauffeur and plastered wet kisses all over his stubbled face. "You must shave. Should I shave you? I can shave you all over if you like. Then you will feel my bushy 'air against your naked balls. Bald balls, Short'ouse. You love my bushy 'air? You love my satch?"
"I love your thatch, Jacqui!" Maxwell slipped a hand up the nanny's abbreviated skirt and encountered her missing panties and all they would have covered if they had been present. He felt his hand vanish without trace into the bosky undergrowth. "This afternoon at three, Jacqui!"
"This afternoon. Three o' clock!"
 
 
  Lucy pressed her nose against the glass.
"How much is a ticket, please?"
"Fifty pence for a child."
Lucy didn't argue. She would happily be a child for the afternoon. "I came out without my swimsuit. Can I hire one?"
The ticket lady pursed her lips and looked disapproving of this wretched child who came swimming without a swimsuit. "I suppose you haven't got a towel either?"
"No, sorry."
"There's a deposit. Two pounds for the towel, and five pounds for the swimsuit. One-piece or two?"
"Two. And I'll need two, please. My top and bottom don't match."
"What do you mean, they don't match?"
"They're different sizes."
"What size are you?"
"My bottom's twenty-eight." The woman turned away and found a miniscule two-piece swimsuit with teddy bears all over it. "And what's the biggest size you've got?"
The woman looked at Lucy over her glasses. "Forty-four bust."
"I'll have to try it. It will be miles too small, but it might work."
The ticket lady snatched up a bikini with a pattern of flowers the size of cabbages and came over to the ticket window. For the first time, she peered out and got a close look at Lucy. All she could see was an innocent little face with tangled blonde hair and an improbable cleavage. There was money sticking out of it. For all the ticket lady knew, there could be ten thousand pounds in there.
"You're not a child," she accused Lucy. Her eyes had settled in disbelief on the bra dangling round Lucy's neck.
"I never said I was. How much for grown-ups?"
"A pound. That's twelve pounds for the deposits, plus a pound for the towel and three for each suit. Twenty pounds, please."
Lucy plucked a twenty from her cleavage and slid it through the hole in the glass. The ticket lady looked at it and held it up to the light. "Where did you get this?"
"You saw me," said Lucy happily. "From between my tits. That's why it's so warm. And damp. I'm sweaty down there. I'm sweaty in a few other places as well."
The ticket lady didn't believe she was hearing this conversation. She punched the ticket savagely and slammed it down on top of Lucy's various items of hired equipment. Lucy took it gratefully.
"The changing rooms are round to the left." She watched in horror- struck silence as Lucy undulated away. Six inches of breast was visible on each side of the girl's slender body. It bounced heavily up and down, left to right, not all at the same time. Her plump little rounded bottom twitched in a number of unrelated directions at once. What is this village coming to?
 
 
  Lucy emerged into the sunshine, feeling somewhat inadequately dressed. Her teddy bear covered bottom was reasonably comfortable, although at least two and a half bears were lost inside her capacious cavern and a further half dozen were lost to view in the crack of her bottom.
The crisis area was the bra. Compared to the basically yellow panties, the bra was predominantly pink with green and orange flowers all over the generously tailored cups. Generously, but not generously enough for young Lucy. But having paid heavily for the privilege of wearing this skimpy bra, she wasn't going to admit defeat. Acres of creamy flesh ballooned out between the cups, gallons more squeezed out underneath, kilograms oozed out under her armpits. The broad flowery shoulder straps cut deeply into the mounds. Each cup held little more than Lucy's areola, in fact, the chocolate brown edges of her moons loomed into view round the edges of the cups. Nervously, she pushed them out of sight with a finger.
Water splashed and thin screams echoed round the compact pool. Swimmers toppled and wobbled and dived into the sparkling blue waters. Bobbing heads ploughed up and down leaving creamy wakes behind them.
"What am I doing here?" Lucy wondered for the first time. "I could have gone home and cooled off under a garden hose."
Too late now, she was here, and she had better enjoy herself. These last few weeks, Lucy had become used to the reaction to her burgeoning figure. It usually took the form of instant stunned silence. Here, in the crowded pool area, with people doing many different things, instant silence wouldn't be possible. She achieved the next best thing.
As she swayed and rebounded out of the shadows toward the water's edge, attempting to restrain her breasts with woefully inadequate hands, those nearest to her glanced in her direction, looked away, then looked back again. Jaws could be heard dropping. A wave of silence spread out from Lucy, rippling like a Mexican wave around everyone on her side of the pool. One or two people on the opposite side caught sight of her. They nudged their friends and stared. Somebody fell off the diving board and sploshed awkwardly into the water in a tangle of limbs. The sound was almost deafening as the silence washed out around Lucy. The last to notice were the swimmers in the water. They became aware of the absence of noise somehow, and stopped swimming, popping out of the water like corks to see what was wrong. They saw Lucy's breasts.
Lucy had come here to swim. She decided if nobody was going to talk to her, she might as well go in the water. Her dive was less than graceful. The last time she had dived into a pool, there had been about forty pounds less hanging from her little girl chest.
"Ouch!"
Nobody heard her say it, as she was under the water by then. She kicked and plunged downwards before returning to the surface, buoyed up by her twin flotation devices. By the time she shook the water out of her eyes and pushed back her hair, there was already a great deal of Lucy visible on the surface. She became aware that people were starting to talk again. It was about this time that she realised she had better go and find the top nine tenths of her swim suit. After all, the ticket lady was going to want it back.
Somehow, she dived and began searching for it. No sign. It had vanished without trace. How could a bra that size just disappear in five seconds? She swam around under water. It had gone. Shit. You can't trust anybody these days.
She blundered to the side and heaved herself out of the water. Even as she emerged and rolled upright on the side of the pool, she realised she must be an impressive sight. No point in hiding it. She stood up and thrust her chest out proudly. Her areolae had responded, as had her nipples, to the change in temperature. The silence was now absolute. Lucy found her towel and wiped the water from her eyes. What the hell? She looked scornfully around at the appalled crowd, dropped her pants, and kicked them off. They flew away and landed with a satisfying splosh among one of the more disapproving family groups.
The ticket lady was very kind. She refunded Lucy's deposit in full.
"Here you are. Take it and get out!"
"But you can't charge me the full rate, I only had three minutes!"
"It's sluts like you that get perfectly respectable swimming pools a bad name."
"It's not my fault you didn't have a seventy-inch bra, is it?"
She stormed out, bouncing dangerously.
The ticket lady turned to her window, where an indignant crowd of middle-aged, middle-class women were demanding a refund on grounds of offended sensibilities. A police car swung into the car park of the swimming pool.
Lucy strode away, her head held high, her breasts brushing aside the undergrowth on both sides of the pathway at the same time. She arrived at the road outside her house just as the school bus pulled up and disgorged Donna with an armful of books.
 
 
  end Chapter 30