was that sign of fall that begins almost imperceptibly. He retreated to where I stood and we watched the tree gather momentum and fall to the ground with an echoing crash. It is always a dramatic moment and I found myself gripping his arm as the tree hit the ground. He looked at me. I kept a grip on his arm and said how brilliantly he had brought it down between the two blackwoods.

He released a held breath and said ‘yep’, looked at me and grinned. “Always a rush”, he said.

“Yes, I said, I always need a short walk after I’ve felled a tree. The adrenaline.”

“Me too, he said, shall we?”

Feeling so comfortable with this man I asked him if he would like a toke on a joint to which he readily agreed. We walked to the creek and sat on a large stump in the sunshine as we shared the smoke. He admired the place and said how the bush was his element. I told him how, when I had first arrived here to find my peace, I would strip naked and walk through the bush allowing it to scratch my skin, sometimes drawing blood and feeling that I was becoming one with it and shedding the life I had lived before.

He understood that he said. “The sun on your body feels so good,” and standing up, handed me the joint and pulled his shirt off over his head. I caught my breath with a sharp intake and he laughed. “O.K. your turn” he said.

“What?” I foolishly replied.

“Stand up,” he said.

I did and he loosened my shirt and lifted it over my head. I was stunned and he laughed again. “We’re two of a kind,” he said. “I felt it when I arrived, the way you greeted me. Something. Just like that. I knew. Now I want to see you swing an axe, I want to see those muscles ripple!” I was amazed that this was actually happening and my astonishment made him chuckle all the more. “Come on, he said, giving me a shove. To work!”

We walked back to the ute and he took out two axes which we carried to the fallen tree. “We’ll axe the limbs off, he said. Good for the body. You first.”

I swung the axe and cut into a stout limb feeling my body respond to the upward thrust and the blow of the cut. I kept at it until I took the limb off, clean. I straitened up and eased my back. He stepped up to the tree and began on the second limb while I watched his body flex and relax, the muscles working with each stoke. Magnificent. He finished and walked to me.

We were both glistening with sweat. He dropped his axe and pulled me to him and our upper bodies clung together. Sweat mingled and there was a delicious, lubricated movement of muscle on muscle. We pulled apart, stared into each other’s eyes and came together again. Hard body against hard body. I pulled away and ran my hands over his chest and abdomen, my cock throbbing in my jeans. As if in answer his left hand found my crotch, which he pressed hard while his right arm drew me back to him.

“Still like to walk naked in the bush?” he asked.

“Lets!”

We drew apart and watched each