I experimentally opened one eye, as the sound of the beeps slowly seeped into my consciousness. The room was pitch dark, with heavy curtains blocking out the night. The strange world I'd just been dreaming about began to recede away, and became increasingly difficult to focus on, as the beeps seemed to grow in their persistence.

I stretched out an arm and tried unsuccessfully to stifle a yawn in time, before the ceaseless beeping of the alarm clock finally caused me to bring a hand down on it. Fumbling around, the clock continued to beep in defiance of my best efforts, until my fingers eventually found the snooze feature, and pressed it a few times for effect.

The vividness of the dreamland I was waking up from was already fading into a patchwork of greys. In only a few moments, the real world - in all its inky-blackness, had full hold on me. I sniffed a couple of times, and then open and closed my jaw twice in an ultimately futile gesture at removing a pasty dryness from my mouth. Nothing for it, I thought to myself, time to get up. I instinctively reached for the light switch over my bed, and belatedly closed my eyes as the light sprung into life, and snuffed out any night vision I may have had.

With a couple of blinks and a muttered curse to myself, I then leaned over and gave the alarm clock my full attention.

The clock was silenced for the moment at least, and reverted to just blinking back the time at me: 4:30am.

"Middle of the night." I whispered to myself, under my breath. "Why the hell did I set the..." I didn't finish the question though. A single, overpowering image swam obediently into my memory, and that image was all the answer and motivation I needed. Rachel. That's why I'd set the clock for the middle of the night.

As my eyes opened wide, the full impact of what that meant was about to happen made my heart leap from a sedate resting rate to a brisk jog. I pulled back the covers of my bed, and slipped out. Naked, my penis was beginning to swell at the promise of what was to come, and I found myself verbally instructing it to take it easy, at least for the time being.

I stumbled over to a chair in the corner of my bedroom, where I'd had the foresight to place some clothes, and quickly slipped on some boxers. A pair of long, comfortable walking trousers were draped over the back of the chair. The shop I'd bought them from said the colour was "asphalt", although I tended to always think of them as "dark grey", but I liked how they went with the blue t-shirt I'd also left lying on the chair.

I quickly pulled the t-shirt on, and was halfway through getting one leg of my trousers on too when the small matter of the weather outside raised its ugly head. It wouldn't do for it to be raining right now, I thought, or for it to be blowing a gale. It would be nice if Rachel got wet, I admitted, but I wasn't wanting any help from the clouds on that score.

With only one trouser leg on, I immediately hopped over to window, struggling with the second trouser leg while also seeking assurance that waking up at 4:30am hadn't be a wasted effort. Triumphantly inserting my foot into the second trouser leg, I yanked the trousers up and flung the curtains open, not bothering about the zip or a belt.

A clear, night sky calmly awaited me. An occasional cloud lingered perhaps, blocking out a few stars here and there, but other than that, the scene outside was one of dancing moonlight rather than rain or wind. I breathed in deeply, and was then surprised to find myself shaking slightly. The weather wasn't going to stop what was about to happen. Nothing was.

I stood stock-still for a couple of minutes, standing in front of the open curtains, looking out of my second-floor bedroom on to the street below. No-one disturbed the peace, and the only sign of movement was the occasional cat patrolling it's territory, or heading back from hunting rodents in the bushland behind us. It slowly occurred to me that my trousers were still open, but while I wouldn't say I was embarrassed by that, it at least brought me back to the mission at hand. I walked back to the chair, grabbed a pair of socks, and then made my way to the door, pausing only to grab from my wardrobe an empty backpack that hopefully wouldn't be empty for long.

As I reached the door, I had to pass a full length mirror, and I stopped for a moment to make a self-appraisal. The man who stared back at me was in his late thirties. A short burst of light brown hair graced his head, and he stood a respectable 180cm high. For much of his life, this man had been what you might charitably have called "slightly overweight". However a recent epiphany, and a healthy dose of sheer bloody-mindedness at the gym, meant that for the first time ever his stomach was nice and flat. His chest was no longer sunk-in, and there was the genuine trace of muscles pushing through the material of the t-shirt. I smiled, and the man smiled back.

Throwing the backpack over my shoulder, I bid the man in the mirror farewell, and headed down the stairs to my waiting car.

"Wish me luck." I said, to no-one in particular.

*****

It was a just under a five minute drive from my house to the park, where I'd agreed to meet Rachel. I passed only two other cars on that journey, and as the park came into view, I was also relieved to see that only one car was currently there, waiting under the only working light in the car park. From a distance I could tell it was a sedan, and I already knew who it's single occupant would be as I carefully pulled in beside it. Jumping out, I walked around to the driver's side door of the other car, and kneeled down.

The occupant let the door window slide down, and I found myself face to face with a relaxed-looking Rachel. She gave me a mischievous smile, and simply said "Hey there."

I smiled back, and nodded at the backpack that was lying on her passenger-side seat. "Got everything you need?" I asked, teasingly.

"Not yet, but I soon will do." she replied, letting her gaze drop down over my t-shirt and rest finally on the now-noticeable bulge in my trousers. "Wasn't sure you were coming." she breathed.

"Wouldn't miss this opportunity, Rachel." I responded, half-laughing. I then stood up, and opened the door for her. Rachel stepped out, and into the pool of light that the overhead street lamp afforded us.

She was beautiful. There was no more honest appraisal of Rachel than that. I'd never directly asked Rachel her age, but I had a fair idea that she was also in her late thirties. She may even have made it into the early forties already. That said, while I couldn't have definitively told anyone Rachel's age, what I was absolutely certain of was that she spent all of her years taking extremely good care of herself.

Slightly shorter than myself, Rachel's straight red hair ran down to just under her shoulders. Her

sparkling green eyes had a naughty glint to them, and as I took in what she was wearing, I was reminded again that she certainly knew how to make the most of what she had. Her c-cup breasts may not have been the most prominent around the suburb, but the way that she fitted them into her tight, white running top was a master-class in simplicity and desire. The top had very short sleeves, and the top didn't quite make it's way all the way down to the shorts, allowing the briefest hint of skin from a perfectly toned stomach.

The shorts she had chosen for this early morning walk were red, matching her hair, and the material wasn't figure-hugging. I was momentarily disappointed at this, until she gave me a wink, walked over to a knee-high fence that separated the car-park from the actual park beyond, and set about doing some light stretches. As her hips moved, the material moved with her, gracefully dancing around her backside and upper thighs. The effect was memorising, and I lost myself for a moment, imagining my hand following the same path as that material.

I grudgingly snapped out of it though, and joined her at the fence.

"So," she said, looking at me, "still happy with the playing conditions of our little walk?"

I nodded, and leaned into a calf stretch so as to partly hide the slight red flush that I felt building in my cheeks.

"Good." she said, happily, and went back to retrieve her backpack.

The 'playing conditions' were simple enough. We walk, we talk, and occasionally we toss a coin. Whoever wins the coin toss gets to take an item of clothing off the loser. The clothing goes in the winner's backpack. Repeat as necessary. We'd mapped out four vague waypoints on our walk, including the car park. Considering the amount of clothing we'd both had on, and the fact that we had to walk to the end and back again, that meant one of us was guaranteed to end up naked at some point. I closed my eyes for a second, and reflected on the exact consequences of that. Depending on exactly how many coin tosses were left when one of us did lose our last item, a nude night time stroll might be the least of the loser's worries.

She returned with her phone as well, and made a show of indicating an app that she'd had installed. "Coin toss." she said, "Heads or tails." She demonstrated the app a few times, and it quickly became evident that you simply had to touch the screen for a coin to magically rotate on the screen, before settling on either a head or a tail. I surprised myself again, as I felt a well of nervousness begin to build up inside me with each coin toss Rachel demonstrated.

"Happy?" she asked, tilting her head to one side and - whether accidentally or deliberately - managing to puff her chest out inside her straining top.

"Very..." I said, half croaking. "I mean, yeah, sure..." I tried to say the last bit with slightly more 'cool male charm' than I'd managed with my first effort.

"Great!" Rachel paused and then looked out on to the park. "I reckon it's about a twelve minute walk to the end of the path, so how about we set the timer for four minutes?" she smiled at me again, with another one of her irresistibly mischievous looks. "We can toss twice at the far end." she winked, and playfully bit her lip. God, she was hot.

I nodded my agreement, not trusting my voice to not break, as she placed her hands behind her head, and twisted at the hips. I'd seen some people do that to warm up. She was certainly warming me up.

"Well then." she continued simply. She picked up her phone again, and hovered a finger over the app's interface. "Shall we start?"

I looked at her, and then at the app, and then back at her. Her smile slowly broadened as I hesitated. I began to grow aware that seconds were ticking by and I hadn't actually said anything. Steeling myself, I squared my shoulders, looked her straight in her gorgeous green eyes, and called it. "Heads."

Without looking at the app, Rachel pressed her finger to the screen, and the coin began it's animated trajectory. She didn't even bother to look at the screen, and kept her eyes locked on mine. She let my own reaction tell her the result of the very first coin toss. It was, irrefutably, irreversibly, 'tails'.

I sighed, closed my eyes for what felt like the tenth time, and opened them yet again to find Rachel holding a hand out, with a light laugh escaping her lips. Early days, I reminded myself, early days. Nevertheless, I reached down, undid my belt, pulled it out of the loops on my trousers, and ceremoniously handed it to her. She took hold of it, and for a few seconds, neither one of us let go.

She didn't try and grab it from me. She seemed more than happy for me to feel slightly uncomfortable, and to play through a dozen different scenarios in my head. I knew the odds of being discovered were low, and the odds of winning an unimpeded view of Rachel's stunning body were still worth it.

Finally, resigned to my initial set-back, I let her take control of my belt. I watched it disappear quickly into her backpack, and I noted the hungry look that she gave my trousers. She pointed a single finger at the top of my trousers, and I knew what she was asking. The belt wasn't quite enough, there was still a little extra payment to make. I took the zip of my trousers in one hand, and slowly worked it all the way down. Thankfully, the trousers were just tight enough that the belt had been somewhat redundant anyway. Even with my zip undone, and the top parts of my trousers slightly folded back to flash a thin strip of my boxers underneath, the trousers still protected my modesty. From a distance at least. Early days, I repeated, still very early days...

****

Rachel and I walked through the park, and talked. We'd been friends for several years now. I'd worked with her then-husband for a while before he'd introduced us, and we formed a nice, albeit distant friendship.

That friendship had taken a sabbatical for a while when her husband had finally admitted to himself and his family that he was gay. I couldn't pretend to know exactly what that revelation would have felt like, either to himself or to Rachel. More than once I half-wondered whether Rachel's stunning beauty, both physically and intellectually, might have caused even greater stress on him when he realised who he was. I steered clear of both of them for a while, not really sure on how to act. I heard second-hand that he and Rachel had separated amicably, and that their children, well into their teenage years now anyway, had ultimately accepted it. They probably didn't want to think of their parents having sex anyway.

That's the way things stayed for a while, at least until a few months back. We ran into each other while going for a walk in the park one sunny afternoon. Having make some slightly awkward small talk, we somehow then re-connected and our friendship grew. Rachel was happy again, and I was getting into some semblance of good shape. We'd started going for walks together, ostensibly to ensure that we both made sure the other got out and exercised. We covered a lot of topics on those walks, and gradually we felt comfortable talking about more and more personal matters.

That had culminated two nights back in a short, brief, and potentially life-changing snippet of conversation. Rachel had fallen quiet for a few minutes, and I was about to ask how her kids were going at University, when she suddenly piped up.

"Have you ever... have you ever thought about, showing off... more of who we are?"

"What? You mean like public speaking."

"Well," Rachel replied, pausing as if to consider both what I'd said and the next line of enquiry, "certainly I was thinking about the public part." She looked at me for a moment with a need in her eyes I hadn't often seen. "Do you think I'm beautiful?"

"Sure." I said, not wishing to argue against a mass of overwhelming evidence.

"I feel beautiful too." she paused again. That could easily have come across as conceited from anybody else. From Rachel though, it seemed like the belated realisation of something that was absurdly self-evident. She then cast an appraising eye over me. "You're not bad looking either." she conceded.

"Thanks", I added drily.

"I haven't taken many risks in my life, you know." Rachel continued. "Safe job, nice family, good house, every day is nice and comfortable."

I decided against raising the issue of the whole 'gay husband' thing and settled for seeing where this went.

Rachel's talking quickened now, as if she was trying to get something out before she lost the confidence to do so.

"I want to take a few risks. You're a nice guy. I trust you, mostly. Maybe we could take some risks together." she bit her lip, and I was once again reminded of just how sexy my thirty-something friend could be when she wanted to be.

Rachel fell silent again for a few minutes and we continued our walk uninterrupted. As we neared the turn-around point, where we'd start heading back, she then said. "I have... an idea... on how to spice up our walks." Boy, did she ever have an idea...

****

The moonlight bathed the park in a soft glow as we made our way along. Every now and again, a lamp shone overhead, creating little pockets of scattered bright light.

Rachel practically had a skip in her step as she made her way along the path, and I could see my belt bounce around in her backpack. We'd been walking for a few minutes now, and mercifully we seemed to have the park to ourselves. We lived in a quiet enough suburb, and I was trying to convince myself that any slight embarrassment I felt due to walking around with my zip undone was harmless and would ultimately go undetected.

We were chatting about some minor trivial details of our work days when Rachel's phone suddenly sprang into life. With a girlish giggle that was at odds with her age, Rachel quickly turned off the timer on her phone, and spun around to face me. Her eyes were alive with excitement, and she wordlessly handed over the device, waiting expectantly. Having been the loser in our first round, I was slightly more apprehensive, but the sheer vision in front of me inspired me to press on. After all, I was one coin toss away from those shorts being my property.

I looked enquiringly at her, and Rachel seemed lost in thought for a second. Just as I was about to prompt her again, she looked straight at me, and called "Tails."

Fine, I thought. It's due for 'Heads' to show anyway. I tapped the screen once, and again Rachel stared deeply at me as my own reaction betrayed the app's response. Even before I'd said anything, Rachel broke out into a small round of excited applause, before coughing discretely, and holding out her hands. The damn thing had come up 'Tails' again...

Damn it, I swore under my breath. I looked hard at Rachel's red shorts, almost willing them to come off anyway. Eventually, Rachel's insistent ahem'ing interrupted my novice attempts at telekinesis, and I looked at her seriously. "I take it you're enjoying this?" I asked.

Rachel giggled again, and pointed at the very noticeable bulge around my crotch. "I know you certainly are!" she said, happily.

I couldn't help smile at that and, nodding my head in acknowledgement of a temporary defeat, I grabbed my trousers in both hands, and slide them down to my ankles. Rachel gave a small round of applause again, and I stood back up and gave a slight bow. "Thank you, thank you." I said, and then returned to the serious business of taking off my shoes so that I could totally remove my trousers. That task completed, Rachel and I again went through the ritual of me slowly handing her my clothes, without entirely being able to let go. Rachel was more insistent this time, and it wasn't long before I saw her stuffing my trousers into her bag again.

"Well," Rachel said, with mock concern tinged with an element of caring relief, "at least your belt isn't alone any more!"

As the fact began to settle in that I was now standing in the middle of a public park with only a t-shirt and boxers on, I couldn't help nervously look around. Part of me knew that no-one else would be around at 4:45am in the morning. We'd been walking for 4 minutes already, and seen absolutely no-one. Still, I was now getting progressively jumpier at any sound that breached the serene silence of the night. Rachel theatrically reset the timer on her phone, and then briefly inspected me. She tut tutted at my black boxers, and said they simply didn't go with my blue t-shirt. "They'll have to go obviously, a complete fashion disaster." she said, with a big grin. I politely disagreed, and suggested I was looking forward to seeing if her bra and panties matches. I feared they wouldn't, and would similarly have to be removed.

Rachel winked again, and then started along the path. Casting one more look behind me, so as to ensure that no-one else was now following us, I then broke into a quick jog to catch up. Rachel looked up into the night sky with a carefree expression on her face, and resumed our ordinary, every-day conversation as if nothing else had happened.

********

The crisp night air was beginning to give me goosebumps on my legs. I consoled myself that should we - by some bizarre chance - run into someone else at this strange hour of the morning, then my boxers might look like running shorts from a distance. I was less sure how my erect penis figured into that illusion, given it was thrusting defiantly out of my boxers and straining at the material.

"You know I've been working at compartmentalising my life." Rachel was saying, in what was gradually transitioning from dialogue to monologue. "When Dave left..." Rachel stopped, and looked away for a moment, and then shook her head slightly before seeming to refocus. "When Dave left, I threw myself into work. Everything was about the job. Lisa and Mike are at University, so I needed something to distract myself..."

I looked at her, welcome for the distraction from my current clothing setup, and gave what I hoped would be seen as an understanding smile.

Rachel gave a faint half-smile back and then fell silent for a short while, as we both walked on into the depths of the park. The area we were in had a large open playing field on our right hand side, while trees lined our way to the left. The playing field had goal posts at either end, and I laughed at myself when I realised I was half-expecting to find some one training there.

"I started walking more just to get out of the house, away from email, away from my computer." Rachel continued abruptly.

"Well, I'm glad you did." I replied, indirectly acknowledging that this was how we reconnected as friends.

Rachel smiled broadened, and she waved a hand in the general direction of my boxers. "Yeah, I'm glad I did too!"

She took in a deep breath, and then surveyed the scene around us. We were about two thirds of the way along the path now. We'd soon reach the other end and turn back. As if realising what this implied, she stopped in her tracks and held up a hand for me to do the same. She extracted her phone from a tiny pocket in her shorts, and checked on the timer. With a dramatic flourish, she counted down from five with the fingers of her raised hand. As her fist closed, the timer's alert split the silence in the empty park, and she swept her arms apart. "Ta-da!" she exclaimed.

I half-laughed at the performance, but any thoughts of a full laugh were stifled by the fact that this was a crucial point in our walk. I was down to two items of clothes. We still had two coin tosses at the turn-around point, and then what promised to be a very long walk back, with three other coin tosses to survive. If I reached the turn-around point in only my boxers, then the return trip promised to be very chilly, very naked, and with the imminent threat of further penalties. After all, I could only lose my boxers once.

Rachel switched her phone over to the coin toss app. "You're call." she reminded me.

I tried to look confident, even as I unconsciously crossed my arms across my t-shirt, as if to block any attempt to remove it.

"Heads." I called.

Rachel tried to do her previous trick of simply staring at me while the virtual coin flew on the screen. This time though I held her gaze, and resisted the urge to look down at the screen. Rachel and I kept looking at each other, long after the coin had probably landed. As the seconds past by, we were both struggling to keep a straight face, and as the corner of our mouths twitched with suppressed laughter, Rachel was the one to break first. Throwing her head back, she started to let out a victory cry, before then looking down at the screen. In an instant her victory cry switched to a semi-disappointed "Nooooooo!". She jumped in the air, and then went down on her knees, as she held up the phone for me to see. Curling up into a ball, she hid the nervous excitement that was suddenly all over her face.

Heads! Finally, the tide was turning. I waited for Rachel to get her nervous laughter under control, and stand up. Somehow, the sudden tinge of impending embarrassment she exhibited just made her seem even sexier.

It was my time to hold a hand out expectantly, and I impatiently clicked my fingers.

"Okay then, how about you hand over those shorts. Or would you prefer I take them?"

Rachel pretended to act surprised at that last comment, and put a hand to her mouth in mock horror. "Well, I suppose you've been good enough to fill up my backpack." she then reasoned, "It's probably only fair I give you a little something."

This time I noticed that it was her turn to cast a quick look around her. Trying to cover a sudden swell of nervousness with a show of bravado, she made a point of turning her back to me. Then, grabbing the side of her shorts, she simultaneously bent at the waist while easing the shorts down. I later wondered if she heard me whisper "Oh. My. God." to myself, as a pair of light green panties hovered into view. Rachel's walks weren't the only exercising she did, if the flexibility she showed was anything to go by. Rachel kept her ass up in the air as she slowly pushed her shorts all the way down to her ankles. Then, maintaining the pose, she delicately removed her shoes so that she could finally slip the shorts off entirely.

While all this was going on, I didn't say a word, and became slightly light-headed when I managed to forget to breathe. There was no other way to describe Rachel's ass other than to refer to it as stunning, and when the shorts were finally off, she gave a quick wiggle while still bent over. The effect was mesmerising, and as she turned back to face me, there was suddenly a palpable tension in the air. Her cocky grin started to shift into a shy smile, and as we silently stood opposite each other, we each saw excitement, confusion, nervousness, willingness and fear all compete for attention in the other's eyes.

After a minute that seemed like an hour, I stuck out a hand. "Thanks." I said, silently cursing myself for not coming up with something far cooler to say.

It seemed to do the trick though, as Rachel gave another light laugh, and threw the shorts at my head. I caught them, but was left with her shorts pressed against my face. I wasn't sure how sports shorts could be made to smell nice, but she'd managed it. After spending a seemingly indecent amount of time smelling her shorts, I then casually unhooked the backpack from my shoulders and deposited my first prize for the night.

I pointed an hand down the path. "Ladies first." Rachel smiled sweetly at that, and pivoted on the spot. "No need for the timer this time." she added airily, "we'll be at the turn-around point soon."

"Fair enough." I agreed. "And since you were so concerned about my belt's loneliness before, I'm sure you'll be keen to let your shorts have some company..."

Rachel openly giggled at that, and gave me a cheeky look before starting down the path. I followed close behind. I wasn't scanning for random strangers any more, I had something else entirely more interesting to focus on in front of me.

****

Rachel was gliding along the path now. Her hips swayed from side to side, and she seemed to be using her nervous energy to almost dance her way to the turn-around point. I could see the excitement in her face, even though we were the only people in the park.

It would be close to 5:00am by the time we made it to the turn-around point. With a couple of stops along the way, it would probably be around 5:20am by the time we got back to the cars for a final coin toss. Twin thoughts were competing for my attention: the first being that "4:30am" was way too early for any early-morning joggers to be awake; the second being that "5:30am" was a worryingly reasonable time for early-morning joggers to start surfacing.

"You know," said Rachel as she spun around and checked out the stars over her head, "I used to go for runs in the moonlight when I was at University." She closed her eyes, as if re-living something. "Of course," she then acknowledged, "I tended to do it fully clothed..."

Rachel proceeded to skip down past a series of low bushes, and rounded a corner in the path. Clapping her hands, she pointed excitedly at a park entrance in the distance that signalled their turn-around point.

"Yay!" she said, with an infectious girlish enthusiasm. Pointing directly at my t-shirt, she began to sing the tune to 'The Stripper'.

"Ease up there, tiger." I had to say, "I think we're about to find out whether your bra matches your panties!"

We still had a short way to go before the path ended at another road that helped ring-fence the entire park. In an entirely unhelpful manner, an inner voice reminded me that this was a prime opportunity to run into someone else. That realisation was intruding on my fixation with Rachel's backside, when Rachel continued the conversation.

"Want to guess what my favourite subject was at University?"

"Well, since you completed a major in 'Actuarial Science', I'm going to have to go with 'Actuarial Science'" I responded.

Rachel immediately went "Bzzz'ed!" and shook her finger admonishingly. "No. Guess again."

I looked her over, and strained to remember our past conversations. "Psychology?" I hazarded a guess.

Rachel went "Bzzz'ed!" again and spun around to face me. "Nope. Not even close." she then fell silent for a moment and looked up at the starry night sky. "It was Art History, actually. I did a few classes one year, really loved it."

We were getting closer to the end of the path and the road on the other side. As I stared ahead, a faint swooshing noise broke the silence that had otherwise enveloped us, and twin beams of light heralded the arrival of a car. My eyes widened in concern and anticipation, and I could even see the otherwise seemingly-confident Rachel tense slightly. The car's headlines grew brighter for a few moments, and then the vehicle in question hovered into view. We were still twenty metres from the road, and despite the vulnerability I felt, realistically the driver wasn't going to see us. Not this time at least. Nonetheless, both our pulses seemed to quicken considerably, and were left at their elevated rate even as the car drove on by. We exchanged a nervous smile as the car continued on its merry way, and the sound of the engine began to recede into the distance.

After a few moments, we both then realised we'd stopped dead in our tracks. We continued to look at each other for a little longer, before I half-laughed, and forced myself forward.

"So," I opened, seeking to re-start the conversation, "Why didn't you major in Art History?"

It was Rachel's turn to let loose a half-laugh. "Well you see, the career prospects for Art History and Actuarial Science are ever so slightly different." she gave a mixed smile, and for a split second the smile seemed to be tinged with regret. "Hard to afford a good house to raise a respectable family in a nice, safe suburb." Rachel held eye contact with me for a couple of seconds, and then turned away to kick a couple of leaves off the path. "And I was nothing if not a 'risk minimiser'."

Casting her eyes down at a pair of clearly-visible, green panties, she then reached over and extracted her phone from her backpack. Looking up with a sly grin, she then added "... back then."

We'd reached the turn-around point. The path emptied out on to a generic road, dotted on one side with houses. No lights shone from those houses, yet, and the only source of illumination that competed with the moonlight was an overhead streetlight by the park entrance. By unspoken mutual agreement, we positioned ourselves just outside the pool of light on the ground.

We both looked up and down the road, and felt the twin emotions of relief and regret jostle for space as we realised the road was empty.

Rachel bit her lip playfully, and waved the phone in front of me. "My call?" she asked.

"Your call." I agreed, taking the phone. I selected the coin toss app, and then found myself staring at it, with my finger hovering over the interface. I must have been standing like that for a while, visualising two highly contrasting fates that we were a split-second away from, because Rachel had to audibly clear her throat twice. The second time finally succeeded in dragging my attention away from the image of the stationary coin.

"Ahh... I said, 'Tails'." she reminded me, with an expectant look on her face.

"Oh, yeah, sorry." I mumbled. Hesitating for a only a second longer, I then pressed my finger against the screen, and the virtual coin leapt up on it's animated journey. I actually closed my eyes this time. I didn't need to open them either.

"Yes! Yes, yes, yes, yes, YES!" Rachel exclaimed, I could hear the light dancing of her feet on the ground in front of me, and she even treated me to a victorious 'whoop whoop', as the realisation of what had just happened settled in my mind.

'Tails'.

Sighing, I opened my eyes. Rachel was the living embodiment of happiness at this point, and had already slung her backpack off her shoulders, expectantly.

"Come on, let's see that chest of yours. You've been talking a big game about going to the gym recently, let's see what dividends it's paid..." she said, with a smirk.

There was no point in delaying this, I thought. The longer I stood here, the more chance there was for another car to come along, or for an early morning runner to make an inopportune entrance.

Grabbing the t-shirt, I quickly pulled it over my head, accompanied by Rachel's enthusiastic encouragement. Bunching the t-shirt in one hand, I then threw it at Rachel, who appeared to be giving me the same critical look-over she may once have given to a respectably old piece of art. She gracefully caught the offered t-shirt, and then carefully placed it in her backpack, while she seemed to consider her review.

"Not bad." she said, "Not bad at all... looks like rumours of your gym visits have not been greatly exaggerated after all." she gave me another wink, and I found myself unconsciously crossing my arms in front of my chest to obscure the view of my man-nipples.

"That said," she continued, with a fake weariness, "this bag is getting heavy." Indicating the backpack full of my clothes, she placed the back of her hand on her forehead. "Had I known I'd have to carry everything back to the car, I'd have lifted some more weights at the gym this week!" She then starred openly at the one piece of clothing I had left on, and seemed to visibly brighten.

"Good job there's not much left to put in there then, isn't it." Reaching over, and taking the phone out of my hand, she then finished with "... and to think, we've still got four more coin tosses to go ..."

I muttered something about the tables turning soon, but she merely gave me a huge grin in return.

"Now," she said, "if you're looking for actuarial advice, I have to say as your friend, the risk is high." she stopped and put her hands on her hips. She gave me her best, 'serious professional' look, before continuing. "The risk is very high. Very, very high. In fact, ..."

"Yeah, yeah." I said, interrupting her flow, and quickly gesturing at the phone in her hand. "Two coin tosses here, remember? It's my call, so before you get too comfortable in that running shirt, how about we see if the next coin toss is a 'Heads'?"

"My my, look who's in a rush to ditch the boxers. Okay then big boy, lets...".

For the second time in less than a minute, she stopped in mid-sentence. This time however, I wasn't the one interrupting her.

"Let's what?" I started, before realising that she wasn't looking at me any more, but at something over my shoulder. Turning around, I instantly saw what had grabbed her attention. Down the straight road, perhaps over a hundred metres away, a silent figure moved into and out of the light cast by another streetlight. I strained by eyes urgently, trying to assess who this intruder was. It was hard to tell if the figure was male or female, but they were definitely speed-walking towards us. They may have seen us in the distance, but at least the moonlight would partly cover the state of my clothing for a few more moments.

"Come on!" I said urgently, heading back into the park. Rachel grabbed by arm though, and shook her head. Nodding down at the phone, she tapped the screen and the coin toss began it's fifth journey. She had to be kidding, I thought. Looking back at the rapidly approaching figure, I guessed we had less than forty seconds before she was by our side, and even less than that before what we were doing became evident.

Looking down at the screen, this time around the coin toss seemed to take an order of magnitude longer to complete. The animation flipped between 'heads' and 'tails' over and over and over again. In those precious few seconds, I'd already placed my hands on my boxers, ready to whip them off, ready to then hot-foot it back into what I hoped would be the sanctuary of the park. It didn't even bare thinking about what would happen if our speed-walker decided to head into the park as well.

Then, all of a sudden, the coin toss stopped. It took me a further three seconds to process what the result had been.

'Heads'. The coin toss was a 'Heads'.

"Hey..." I said, "that's... that's what I picked!"

Rachel was already ahead of me, and was cursing with an disbelieving expression on her face. She looked over my shoulder again, and seemed temporarily caught between two possible courses of action. Then, realising that time was not her friend, she took hold of her t-shirt, yanked it off over her head in one fluid motion, and began to run backwards in to the park. She waved the t-shirt out in front as she backed away from the street, seeming to use it as an enticement for me to follow her. I didn't need any further enticement to follow her, not with the approaching footsteps of the speed-walker beginning to echo in my ears.

Rachel's face was a contrast of excitement and embarrassment as we made our way into the park. She beckoned me further and further away from the road, tangling her t-shirt just out of reach in one hand, while holding her backpack with most of my clothes in with the other. We were about fifteen metres away from the road when the speed walker appeared in the pool of light that we'd stood next to only moments ago. The figure how revealed themselves to a woman, perhaps forty years of age, and in entirely sensible walking gear. Our rapid retreat into the park had apparently grabbed our attention, as she was looking our way with a confused look on her face. Thankfully though, she must have decided it wasn't worth the risk to find out exactly what we were up to. Powering along, although with her focus fixed on us, she continued on her journey along the road, and we were left with the park to ourselves.

As the middle-aged woman finally receded into the distance, Rachel broke out in a nervous laughter, and I heard her say. "Oh my god!" several times as she finally came to a stop by a tree. We stood there for a minute or two, wondering if the other woman would suddenly re-emerge, backtracking to sate her own curiosity. She didn't though, and we both welcomed the chance to catch our breath.

Now that the immediate threat was seemingly over, I was at last able to turn back and survey my winnings. Reaching out, I took possession of Rachel's white t-shirt. After a few attempts to coax her out of the darkness of the tree foliage, she eventually stepped back on to the path, and I successfully answered my earlier question. With the moonlight now painting her supple body in a soft light, I could see her firm c-cup breasts nestled snuggly into a light green sports bra.

"Perfect match." I said, complementing her on the bra and panties combination.

"Why thank you, kind sir." she said, doing a small curtsy. Her infectious grin broke out again and, nervously yet unbidden, she placed her hands behind her neck, and pushed her shoulders out, so that I had the best possible view of her bosom.

Through the material of the sports bra, I fancied I could make out the trace of her nipples, and I thought ahead to what the next three coin tosses had in store for us.

"Well then..." I said, struggling for words somewhat, "how about we start heading back then?"

Rachel nodded her head in agreement, and slung her backpack over her shoulders, stopping only to make a show of setting the alarm on her phone to four minutes.

"Four minutes." she said, simply. "Four minutes..."

[To be concluded very shortly in "Rachel's Dare, Part 2"]