FOY inc -1- Found on the Beach

I woke up naked on the beach with a cold surf playing with my toes. I jerked my feet up out of the icy water. “What—?” I began to say but my throat was clogged with phlegm and maybe sand and I ended up trying to cough it all out. Rolling over to get my hands and knees under me, I pushed off the sand.

A fiery orange sun peeked over the water—morning? I didn’t know but it felt like morning. I noticed right way though, several strange things. A mass of blond hair fell immediately around my face, tangled and dirty, when I turned over. I tried to push it out of the way but there was so much of it. Even when I sat up, it hung past my waist, as golden as the sand.

And something on my chest swayed when I moved. I looked down, not understanding what I was seeing. Two large globes hung from my chest like mammary stalactites. Huh?

Neither observation seemed right or natural. I knew I didn’t have long hair or generous breasts with pink areolae and nipples that crinkled in the cold. “I’m—,” I tried to say but another coughing fit took me. I threw up a little bit, a salty, almost soupy taste, and the liquid disappeared immediately into the sand. 

I glanced toward the water, an ocean? It tasted like an ocean. The horizon blurred in the distance, but I knew it for a big empty ocean of loneliness. Somehow, I had been alone out there, hopeless, just drifting. It was good to be on land, as strange as things seemed at the moment. But I shivered, still feeling alone.

Something cold touched my hip, startling a shriek out of me. I tried to turn to see—only a dog.

“Albert!” someone called.

The dog looked off in a direction that might be where the call came from. A curly-coated buff-colored animal, I tried to remember what it might be called—what kind of dog it was. “Nice dog,” I managed to say and it came up and licked me in the face where I crouched on all fours at almost the same head height as the dog.

I spluttered as the doggy tongue found its way into my mouth. “I’m—no—you—don’t!” I protested.

“Albert!” the hidden voice called again.

I repeated the name, “Albert, stop!” I tried to make a command of it.

“Uff,” said the dog, nosing my shoulder. A tail wagged against my flank. “Ruff-uff,” the dog insisted, backing up and dropping into a play stance. I realized that, to a dog, my all-fours crouch might look similar.

“There you are,” the mystery voice said, closer now and I started to turn toward the sound. “You’ve found a friend, have you, Albert?”

The dog suddenly took off in a frenzy, running in a wide circle around me to the source of the other voice. I turned my head further, shaking it to get the hair out of my view so I could see who might be talking to the dog.

A large dark-haired young man dressed in grey sweat pants and a hoodie smiled at me. He moved closer, close enough that he stopped being blurry. “February fourth is an odd day for sunbathing,” he said. He looked toward the rising sun, “Kind of early, too? It’ll be warmer in a few hours. Albert and I come out here at dawn for exercise.”

“I’m not—you—?” I stammered. I’m naked, I thought. I seem to have breasts and he’s a man. I tried to sit back on my heels and use my hands to conceal—things. It felt awkward and I almost fell sideways on the sand but I was too dazed and confused to be embarrassed. It just seemed right to try to cover myself.

The dog collided with his master’s legs, then continued the grand circle, yipping and wuffing in a subdued way, as it approached me again. “Stay!” I said. Wasn’t that what you said to a dog to get them to stand still? I felt tipsy, as if I’d had a drink or three too many.

“No, Albert,” the man commanded. He stepped forward, squatting in front of me with a hand out to keep the dog away. “I’m Gordon,” he said. “Where are your clothes?” he asked looking around.

I remembered something. “Boat?” I said, nodding toward the ocean. “Water. Cold.” I knew I sounded like an idiot but thinking was hard. Especially with this guy looming over me. Who started making men that big? Besides, I couldn’t remember any more details of my situation and it almost hurt to try.

He stared at me a moment as if he did not quite understand. “I was on a boat,” I said. “Then in the water but it was so cold.” Same info, a little more grammatically presented.

“Okay,” he agreed. “I get that.” He stood and pulled his hoodie off over his head. “You can wear this while we get you some help.” He held the garment out to me while trying to look away. This wasn’t going to work. I couldn’t move to take the offering.

He had to help me put it on, my arms flaccid and non-cooperating. They wanted to keep me covered up but were inadequate for the job in the first place. I tried to help but my efforts mostly amounted to grunting and whimpering.

After he got the hoodie over my head and down far enough to cover the huge globes on my chest, I was able to move my arms effectively and find the sleeves from inside. Released from manual restraint, whatever the absurd masses were resumed jiggling and wobbling with every movement.

In the middle of this he had asked only one question. “Are you a—dancer?”

It seemed out of context. I certainly wasn’t dancing at the moment. Well, maybe part of me was. I shook my head a tiny bit.

Then he maneuvered to pull the long blonde hair out of the hoodie so it lay along my back, tickling the backs of my thighs. I let him, not resisting but not helping. Because? Because it just seemed like something that couldn’t be happening. Where in the world had all that hair come from? And something else distracted me.

I stared at his bare chest right in front of me, slightly blurry from being so close. It was wide and muscled, with dark man-nipples and curly black hair above a stomach ribbed with more muscles. A trail of black hair went down from a deep navel to disappear inside his sweats. I looked up at him as he pulled the hoodie down past my waist. “You’re beautiful,” I said, I have no idea why.

He laughed and blushed. “So are you, eh?” he said. He tried to help me to stand but it turned awkward until he just picked me up and stood me on my unsteady feet. The sweatshirt fit almost like a dress, down to mid-thigh and the sleeves were several inches longer than my arms. This guy was much bigger than me and I felt tiny beside him, like a ten-year-old standing beside an adult.

The dog wriggled and woofed around our legs as we stood there, the man holding me up because I felt about to collapse again. My front was sort of mooshed against those hard abs of his and my face in his chest hair.

“I’m Gordon,” he repeated.

I nodded, rubbing my face on his stomach. “I know you, you’re Gordon. We just met.” Inane, but my brain was still refusing to work normally. How many had I had at whatever party I’d been at? Some party. I’ve heard of people losing their heads but a whole body? How careless of me. I made a noise suspiciously like an hysterical giggle.

He laughed, guiding me to turn around and start walking toward a line of bushes. “What’s your name?” he asked.

I recovered enough presence of mind to stare at him, but my confusion kept me from making any sort of reply. Who was I? Damned if I knew…. And my jiggling, swaying flesh inside the hoodie was such a strange sensation that I barely heard him speaking to me

“You have a name?” he asked again.

“Everybody has a name,” I said. Sure, no doubt about that. Yep, got that one right. I nodded several times. Whee?

He chuckled. “What’s yours?”

I shook my head and shrugged, producing more odd movements that almost caused me to stumble. There was something wrong with my legs, too. They seemed to be jointed wrong, off to the side instead of straight down. 

And my arms, I didn’t seem to know what to do about them. Letting them swing, they struck my hips every time I took a step, so I held them in front of me, elbows bent, hands hidden in the sleeves of the hoodie. And still I couldn’t walk straight. 

I had to move my hips in a different way to walk, almost like rowing a boat. Had I ever rowed a boat? I must’ve done so, a physical memory so vivid I could feel the strain in my shoulders. But had I ever walked with hips so wide before? I knew that I hadn’t. 

I would have fallen several times if Gordon hadn’t held me up. I leaned against him, like a drunk who’s found a convenient lamppost, surprised at how comforting his size and solidity seemed to be. “How tall are you?” I asked for no reason I comprehended.

This amused him again. “One hundred ninety five centimeters,” he said. “Or six-foot-five to Americans. Are you an American?” he asked.

“I think so,” I said. What else would I be? I squinted but there was only one of him. Centimeters? What were those? Still, six-foot-five sounded very tall, I decided.

“You don’t remember your name or whether you’re an American citizen?”

I shook my head, frowning. “Bridge?” I said. Was that some part of my name?

“Bridget?” he guessed. “Is your name Bridget?”

Still frowning, I pointed something out, “That’s a girl’s name.” Obviously.

He laughed out loud. “You’re a girl,” he said.

I shook my arms and pushed the long sleeves back from my hands, then pulled the neck of the hoodie open so I could look inside at the globes wobbling there with every stumble. I didn’t feel anything moving against my thighs, either—though I couldn’t see down there. Important things were missing.

“I am a girl,” I said with wonder and confusion.

Gordon laughed again.