The “penthouse” is actually a roof covered by a skylight, and it is breathtaking. The girls keep the lights dim and the stars are out tonight, thousands of them, despite the light pollution from the nearby city. There is a big, carpeted square in the middle with pillows to rest against. No chairs. Sam turns to his left. There’s a small pool, at the end of which is a round alcove and four naked girls, sitting on an underwater ledge, the water up to just below their breasts. Now a fifth, Apokni, comes out from the surrounding darkness. She jumps in at the deep end, emerges, and swims over next to N’Stange. “Come on in, Sam.”
There is no sound except the gentle bubbling of the water, echoing off the skylight above. He gulps. “I -- don’t have a -- suit. Just boxer shorts.”
“Don’t be such a guy,” the white girl with freckles (Number 3) says. She says to N’Stange, “It’s the same at the campus.”
“They’re afraid they might have tiny dicks,” Kathy says. “Their brains are warped by all that porn they watch.”
Apokni says, “Sam’s bigger than average. By quite a bit.”
Sam chuckles. “You know that’s not true.” Actually, he has no idea. All he knows is he’s not porn star size.
“You don’t want a big dick,” N’Stange says. “My boyfriend has one. Ouch!” Under the water she clutches her legs together and puts her hands over her crotch.
For a long moment the girls look at him. He sees a stack of folded towels to the side. Finally he slips out of his jacket and steps out of his shoes. Absurdly, he turns his back to them. What he really wants is to be alone with Apokni but then he thinks: Getting into a hot tub with five naked pretty girls!
Naked, he turns to them.
“Woo - hoo! Monstrous!” Kathy shouts, echoing.
“Don’t get that thing near me!” Apokni shouts. The other girls giggle.
“Will you stop that!” N’Stange says, playfully hitting Apokni on the boob.
Sam feels himself laughing as the freckled girl steps out and takes his hand, water dripping from her red pubic hair. “I’m Siobhan,” she says. She leads him in.
He is glad to get his lower body underwater, next to Apokni, who slides next to him and puts her arm around him and kisses him on the cheek. It was always nice in bed, feeling the length of their bare skins together, but this is another magnitude of sensuous.
The water seems plenty warm to him, but the tanned, blonde girl says, “Are we a bit too chilly?” This is the girl he saw running up the stairs when he first got to the lobby. She gets up to adjust the thermostat, nipples dripping as she bends over. There is a “1” above her butt.
“That’s Janice,” Apokni says. “Our supervisor.”
“Just another grad student,” Janice says, sitting back down next to her. “But I get paid about ten cents a week extra.”
Apokni says, “Note the amazing tan. She’s from Southern California.”
Sam says, “And now you find yourself in the Arctic.”
“Brrr!” says Siobhan. “I sometimes wish I was you,” she says to N’Stange. “You’ve been naked all your life.”
“I keep telling you, don’t be afraid of the cold,” Kathy says. She turns to Janice. “We were outside probably a total of -- what?”
“Only two hours, in total,” Janice says. “But you had the most, forty-two minutes.”
Apokni explains to Sam, “It’s Janice’s job to collate the MMU data when we knock off work at 5:30.”
Sam asks incredulously, “They make you run outside to that other building? It must be -- a hundred yards! And it was below freezing!”
“Minus ten Celsius, at four p.m.,” Janice says. “Less than that in the morning.”
“We can do it,” Kathy says “We’ve gotten used to it. I don’t even have to run anymore.”
“Mailgirls can get used to anything,” Apokni says. “Go -- Mailgirls!”
It’s like a high school cheer. The five Mailgirls, sitting in the circular tub, raise up one leg and touch each other’s pointed big toes. The sound of the water dripping off their heels echoes off the skylight.
“I’m used to being naked,” Janice says. “I grew up in San Diego. Or maybe I should say I grew up on the nude beaches there. It wasn’t that big a switch to go to Blanke Schande.”
“I still can’t believe it,” Sam says. “A college where all the women students have to be naked?”
“It makes us stronger,” Janice says. “And the guys learn to respect us. They can look, but they can’t touch.”
“So, you got your bachelor’s degree there?”
“Yes.”
“So did I,” Kathy says. “But I grew up where girls are supposed to freeze.”
“What?”
“Niigata. It’s in Japan.” For the first time Sam detects a slight accent. “It gets really cold there but the school uniforms are short skirts for the girls, with bare legs, even in the snow.”
“That’s hard to believe.”
“You can look it up. It’s so unfair. Boys get to wear nice long pants. And that’s not the worst of it. Tights are forbidden. Bare legs are required.”
“Why is that? It sounds cruel.”
Kathy shrugs her delicate shoulders. “It’s the culture. They think tights look tarty. A girl with bare legs looks more innocent. Even though old pervy guys keep passing us and giving us a hard look. We remind them of hentai characters.”
“What? Hentai?”
“It’s the porn side of anime.”
“Oh.” Actually, Sam knows quite well what hentai is.
“And what makes it worse is, on really cold days boys get away with wearing thermals, against the rules, but you can’t see them under their long pants. So, there we are in January, waiting for the bus, us girls freezing our little butts, our skirts blowing up and our panties showing, snow and wind hitting our frostbitten legs, knees turning blue, while the guys stand there nice and warm with two layers on, all covered up.”
“That’s horrible!” Sam says, though oddly he feels a bit turned on by the image. “It seems to me like you’d never want to be cold again. And now you’re here.”
“She volunteered to go up to the Alturas campus,” Janice says. “She was there almost the whole four years. In the mountains up near Idaho. Snow from October to April.”
“What!”
“The difference is,” Kathy says, “Growing up female in Japan isn’t something I signed up for. But as an adult I could sign up to be tough. I actually found it pretty easy.”
Sam turns to N’Stange. “And you -- you’ve been naked all your life? Don’t tell me you grew up in snow!”
The big black girl laughs, and her enormous breasts push ripples back and forth across the alcove. “Kind of. Altoona.”
“Pennsylvania?”
“Yes.”
“Your parents never put any clothes on you? Why? You didn’t want them to?”
“I don’t know. My family’s from Kenya and descended from chieftains. I was a special child, given a unique blessing at birth. I was supposed to live a life untouched by clothes, a life of purity.”
“HA!” Kathy’s shout reverberates throughout the dimly lit “penthouse”.
“Well, that’s what my mother told me. I was about six years old, and I came home from school and said, ‘Mommy, how come everybody wears clothes except me?’”
“Weren’t you uncomfortable? Or shy?”
“No, I was just curious about why, that’s all. I never felt any sense of modesty. In fact, when I was growing up, I didn’t see the point of using the bathroom. My parents had to keep telling me: don’t pee in the front yard!” She shakes her breasts, which slap against each other, and the tectonic waves of her mounds create another series of ripples. “As for the snow, it felt cold, but it never bothered me. I knew it couldn’t hurt me.”
Sam turns to Siobhan.
“You want my story? I grew up in Boston. I always hated clothes. Look at pictures of me growing up, I’m the kid wearing the least possible, at least if my parents let me get away with it. Little crop tops. Shorts. Barefoot, if I could, or just flip flops.”
“You would not be-lieve some of those photos!” Apokni says. “Walking down Boylston Street, with her friends normally dressed, and her in practically a bikini.” Sam thinks it odd that totally naked girls are talking about each other this way.
“To be honest, I applied to Blanke Schande because the idea of going around naked was a turn-on.”
“Yeah, that’s definitely not cool, not at Blanke Schande,” Kathy says.
“I found that out pretty quick. On orientation day, taking off my clothes with the other girls, and putting them in that big charity bin, that was a heavier experience that I was expecting. I realized it was time to become a serious person.”
“How do the guys control themselves, with you girls being naked around them?”
“They learn,” Janice says. “There’s no more sex than at any other college.”
“That’s hard to believe.”
“They can’t touch us, even when we ‘present’.”
“What?”
Janice looks to Apokni. “Think he can take it?”
“I think so. I only go out with strong men.”
The five naked girls stand up in front of Sam, water dripping off their hips and legs. And now they plant their feet well apart and with experienced fingers spread their labia wide. The pool has lights around the sides and Sam’s widened eyes take them in, one by one, the flickering redness of their womanly caves. Now with a coordinated glance the girls turn around, bend over, and spread their butts. Their anuses, well-lit, wink at the naked young man three times. Again all is quiet except for the bubbling water echoing against the skylight.
They turn back toward him and their laughter echoes at his awestruck face. Now Apokni pulls him out of the water. He is reluctant and his legs are bent and his hand tries to cover his crotch but it is useless.
“You have a lot to be proud of!” Apokni says. “Show us!”
The penis, predictably erect, points toward them. The girls clap.
Sam looks at Apokni with moist, distressed eyes. Then gradually he forms a smile to match hers. He stands upright, looking down at the water dripping from the plum-shaped glans. “Wow,” he says, as euphoria overcomes shock. Now, as he stands motionless, he bounces his penis up and down with his internal muscles which gets another laugh. He is in some kind of new heaven.
They dry off and Janice turns on a light. It turns out there is a little space near the edge of the skylight with pillows to lean against. Sam looks around. Despite the size of this place there are no chairs and no partitions. What looks like a huge mattress, or maybe several mattresses pushed together, is against the far wall. Nearby is a little kitchenette. On the other side, a shower and a toilet. Rudimentary and desolate, yet somehow luxurious.
They lean against the pillows. The girls have shed their towels though Sam stays wrapped up in his. It’s hard for him to get comfortable but Mailgirls are apparently natural floor-sitters. N’Stange, Kathy and Siobhan get out their laptops and do their assignments.
He hates to ruin the mood but he says, “Babe, I made reservations for us tonight, it’s a nice restaurant, Mexican.” Her favorite.
“Thanks but -- that means I have to wear clothes!”
Janice says, “I think we have a sheet kicking around.”
“I suppose that will do, if you can find one.” Apokni explains. “It’s like at Blanke Schande, we sleep here without sheets or blankets.”
“In the dorms on campus the girls’ rooms don’t have doors. Anyone can come by and look.” This is Janice, speaking from somewhere in back. “And the women’s bathrooms are out in the open.” She emerges with a folded up blue sheet. “The result? Young women with no body issues! Imagine that!”
Apokni looks at the sheet with reluctant distaste. As Janice folds it just so, she stands up and submits to it being wrapped around her and knotted at the back so that it stays secure. “Looks kind of nice,” Kathy admits. Sam says, “You think they’ll let her in like that?” “I think so.”
They get into the restaurant just fine, Sam fully dressed, Apokni in her “sheath dress”. With her little clutch purse and her natural way of carrying herself she looks like she is going to an awards ceremony. No one seems to notice her bare feet. Apokni orders a diet soda. Sam orders a margarita -- a slight disapproving glance from Apokni, but he says, “It’ll be just one,” and he keeps his word. Fortunately, the food is excellent. “These are the best enchiladas I’ve ever had!” Apokni says.
“There’s one thing I still don’t understand,” Sam says, in between bites. “Why do they need Mailgirls? Why can’t they email each other? There might be an occasional need to deliver a package, but five girls working all day?”
“Well --” She looks both ways and lowers her voice. “Janice thinks it’s because there have been big security breaches. A lot of stuff can’t be done by email any more. It’s done in hard copy and then scanned.”
“Odd that the -- TrapCo folks won’t tell you that. I tried to talk to that lady --”
“Mamie Grant.”
“Yes.”
“Didn’t get far, I imagine.”
“No.”
“We think Homeland Security is involved somehow. At least that’s Janice’s theory. That’s why they can’t say anything. Probably unnecessary secrecy. Another disease of the White Man. Like firewater.”
Apokni talks like this sometimes. Sam often tells her, “Don’t cite racial stereotypes, it makes you just as bad as them,” but he decides to let it go this time. Though she might be right about alcohol. He looks out the window, at the crusty snow in the parking lot, which half an hour ago Apokni had negotiated in bare feet, toes grabbing, tough and unafraid.
“And why do Mailgirls have to be naked? Is it something that this Blanke Schande place dreamed up?”
“No. Mailgirls existed independently of Blanke Schande.”
“Why have only female couriers? And why do they have to be naked?”
Apokni shrugs. In fact she almost shrugs out of her “dress”. She reaches back and re-does the knot. “I’ve heard that women have more endurance, blah blah blah, with us being naked they save on clothing and sneakers, blah blah blah. I think it’s just because some devious old pervy rich guy thought it up and it caught on.”
“That’s stupid.”
“Stupid things catch on for stupid reasons.”
“Not that I minded seeing five naked girls around me.”
Apokni smiles. She orders a side of tacos. Either she’s especially hungry today, or a life without clothing has increased her appetite. “Blanke Schande has Mailgirl internships in other places too. The really prize one is up in Regina.”
“What?”
“Regina, Saskatchewan.”
Sam laughs. “I didn’t know that’s how you pronounce it.”
“Yes, rhymes with vagina. I would love to get admitted into that program. I heard it’s the best. And -- it’s in the heart of Cree country. My people!”
“I don’t know how your people would react to naked Mailgirls. They probably think of --” Sam hesitates to say it.
“Yes, I know. Un-Patchy’s. Where taking off clothes becomes ‘dirty’.”
“And profitable.” He has heard that some girls at Un-Patchy’s pull in five hundred dollars a night.
“The money is also dirty.” Sam thinks: yeah, five hundred, in grubby soiled singles, fives, tens. A few twenties. That makes him smile: maybe the girls do the same thing Apokni does: whenever she gets a twenty dollar bill, she draws an arrow through Andrew Jackson’s head before passing it on.
Now the waitress, dark-skinned and with a Mexican accent, compliments her on her dress as she brings the check. They both laugh. “Where did you buy that? Qué bella!”
“I, uh, made it myself.” Sam is about to pay but he finds his wrist in a Cree death grip. Apokni gets a credit card out of her clutch and leaves a big tip.
They go back to the motel. Full of confidence, Sam from his experience in the pool, and Apokni just from being Apokni, and also being a proud nude Blanke Schande intern, they have the best sex they ever had. Once, twice, they are inexhaustible. When they wake up they go at it again, and Sam has to rush to get her back to TrapCo for the next day’s shift.
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