Come-In (Part 1)
Jule walked in through the front door of the Wellness Center and smiled at the girl behind the front desk. A few people sat nude around the soaking tub in the courtyard. She had a few minutes before her astrology appointment, so she stopped to browse the bulletin board in the lobby. There was an upcoming forest bathing retreat in the Preserve. Naturally, she thought. A punky “concrete remediation” workshop in a former industrial part of town, BYO crowbar. Nice. A summer pottery studio sale at the college.
And then an emerald green flyer that caught her eye:
Dry is over
if you want itCome out to the first Fern River Come-In,
a veritable flood of beautiful humanityFern River Institute of Art
with Maaike & Peter
Jule’s interest was piqued. She had heard rumours about the couple’s visit earlier in the summer, and all the circling speculation about what they might be planning. Next to the flyer was a handwritten sign that read “Come-In connections — find the others”, and beneath that a bunch of notes on colorful scraps of paper pinned to the board.
Student 21 looking for anonymous crew
Sapphic horde ride or die
Male 54 ISO openminded companion
Stiff bator for same
Fem 30-something Virgo. New to town
and hesitant, join me?
Jule unpinned the last note and looked at the back. There was a local number written in tidy digits on the mauve paper, which she copied into the back of her notebook. Virgo huh? she thought as she turned down the hall for her appointment.
“Do I plan to go?” Eva asked with an incredulous laugh. “I am too old for that much excitement!”
Ash laughed along, leaning on the teak bannister at the foot of the stairs. “I’ve been thinking about it. I just don’t think I’m up for braving it alone.”
“You won’t have trouble finding someone,” the elderly woman said, looking her tenant over. Ash was wearing a breezy high-necked halter top, which accentuated the inverted V of her large, wide-set breasts.
“I posted something at the Wellness Center. Hopefully I get a bite.”
Eva smiled warmly. The girl doesn’t quite grasp her appeal, she thought.
Juro sat down at the picnic table across from Luc, swinging his bag to rest on the bench beside him. It was a sunny afternoon, and the two friends had agreed to meet for lunch in the shade of the campus eucalyptus grove.
“Sushi today?” Juro asked, looking hungrily at Luc’s lunch.
“The chef at the hotel hooked me up this morning.”
“That has to be the best job in town. Free room, chill schedule, horny guests, hot boss.”
Luc rolled his eyes and picked up a slice of tuna with the chopsticks. “Have you heard about the Come-In thing next month?”
“It actually sounds awesome,” Juro said as he pulled a sandwich wrapped in waxed cotton out of his bag and took a bite.
“I’ll go if you join me.”
In the middle of July, the Plectrum ran an op-ed by Maaike. “The first Fern River Come-In will overwhelm, for an ecstatic moment, whatever boundaries separate individual from individual, private from public, and erotic from profane,” she wrote with characteristic flash. The title of the piece was “Ecstasy comes in August”.
At the Fria café, patrons clustered around tables devouring the 300-word column. Janie & Em talked quietly across the bar, having already read it twice each.
“Will they do it inside the museum?” Janie wondered aloud. “That has to be a no-no from a conservation perspective.”
“Yvette says they’ll do it right out here in the sculpture garden.” Em waved her hand toward the doors propped open with rough blocks of marble. “And down on the River Steps. I suppose they’ll lock the gate to keep kids out.” Em worked an internship with the museum’s curator on Fridays, and had the inside scoop.
Through the open door of the café, a statue of a sleeping nymph draped in a flowing tunic was visible in the afternoon sun.
“Join us among the muses,” an enthusiastic student read loudly from the op-ed, “beside the gripping current of the city’s vulvic river.” His companions cheered.
Janie widened her eyes at Em. “This is going to be so much fun.”
(Continued in Part 2)