reality, I looked into the eyes of my best friend, who was still reeling with delight. I sat forward and pressed against him, taking in the smell of our mutual sweat and mingled ejaculate. I spoke first.

“That was the greatest thing we’ve ever done. Why haven’t we done this before?”

“Because,” he said, “we’ve never been here together before. I would never have thought to jack off with someone watching me, but here, things are somehow different. You’re my best friend and there’s no reason we can’t be totally open with each other. There’s no society up here to tell us what’s wrong or right. It’s up to us, and what we just did was one-hundred percent right in my book.”

We cleaned ourselves up with my T-shirt, put on our shorts and loaded the canoe. The lake was ours and we needed to find a place to camp for the night. Pushing off from shore, I saw a group of paddlers coming towards us from across the lake. They were the first people we’d seen in two days and I was suddenly glad they didn’t come along any sooner.

By nightfall we’d found our camp and set up the tent. I was making plans for later.

To be continued…