Your Ticklish Beach Trip (Patreon)

A few weeks had passed since your visit to the Petersons.

It, like the one before, stayed on your mind.

The events played over in your memory.

You brushed it all off like nothing, as if such an experience was as casual to you as it was to them.

You tried to be cool about it, thinking that maybe doing so would keep them calling you back.

But every day, it all kept coming back to you like a dream.

Elements of the evening resonated in your memory, swirling like fireflies.

The taunting.

The devious insistence that you had become a part of the family, more as their ‘toy’ than their babysitter.

This certainly was how it felt.

And of course, the tickling.

You were left surprised once more at their means of family bonding at your expense.

You had also left with more cash in your pocket than you’ve ever carried at one time, which was obviously a plus.

In inviting you to partake in their ticklish activities as a family, they managed to shock you again with just how ticklish you could be.

Or maybe it was just how good they were collectively at tickling.

Like it was an art or a skill one could improve on.

You still couldn’t tell.

Probably a good bit of both.

But what was lost on no one…

Not the kids.

Not the parents.

And especially not you.

Was that you didn’t seem to mind indulging their ticklish activities.

Over the previous times, both of them, you left smiling and thinking fondly over the time that you spent with them.

As if you had just as much fun as they did.

As if you enjoyed being their self-described ‘tickle toy’.

Being so content, and even pleased, by such a notion was almost stranger than the Petersons themselves.

Either way, one thing was clear.

However it would happen.

Whatever you’d have to do.

You wanted to go back.

You needed to go back.

Anyway you could.

~~~

When the Petersons eventually reached out to you again, Spring Break had just begun.

It always seemed to sneak up on you.

While you were excited for a break from school, you never managed to make any definitive plans for the break.

Many of your friends scheduled trips with their families.

While your parents worked, and being without a car, you would just be confined to hanging out at home for several days, which still seemed preferable to being at school.

But when Mrs. Peterson called and invited you along on a trip to the beach, you were quick to agree to tag along.

She explained that the trip would last the whole week and that they were heading to their private beach house for the stay.

Mr. Peterson and their youngest, Caleb, would be away for most of it, so it would just be her and the girls.

The idea of a last minute trip and a week with the Petersons got your heart racing.

You had never been so impulsive before, but something about the Petersons brings out a more adventurous side of you.

Before you knew it, you were sitting on your front porch with a large red suitcase fully packed next to you.

You opted for a sky blue tee shirt and a pair of white shorts for the day.

A pair of gray Converses stayed loosely tied against your feet, coupled with a pair of clean, white ankle socks.

There you sit and wait.

You check your text messages every few seconds.

You make sure that the plan was, in fact, for you to wait instead of going to their place first.

You’re early, however, so you get comfortable.

You cycle through your normal collection of social media apps.

You watch a few short videos.

You play a few of the mobile games you have for when you get especially bored.

All the while, you keep an eye on the road in front of your house, scouting for Mrs. Peterson coming to pick you up.

After about half an hour, you look up to see Mrs. Peterson’s red SUV start to pull up.

She waves at you from the open driver’s side window.

Even before she’s parked, you can hear the girls in the back cheering excitedly to see you.

You smile and stand, watching the car pull up and park in your driveway.

She honks the horn twice, despite seeing you clearly.

You grab a hold of your suitcase and roll it down the driveway toward the back.

Mrs. Peterson looks out the open window and smiles.

“Good morning, sweetie,” she says as you come closer. “You ready for an adventure?”

“I hope so,” you say back.

You hear the loud squealing of the girls from behind her.

You roll your suitcase to the back of the SUV and open the hatch door.

Mrs. Peterson steps away from the driver’s seat to help you with your bag.

A bright yellow tee shirt with a bumblebee buzzing around a flower clings to her frame.

Blue jeans hug her hips.

Even as a woman with three children, Mrs. Peterson still manages to be just as youthful as she’s ever been.

She has never looked a day over forty for as long as you’ve known her, though you know that she’s at least forty-five.

She shoots you her familiar smile that’s equally as warm and welcoming as it is playful and mysterious.

“It’s good to see you again,” she says. “We were so happy to hear that you could come out with us.”

“Of course, thanks for inviting me,” you say back.

You lift your suitcase and slide it inside next to a few others, some beach bags, and a few other loose items.

“Hey!” Thea, the eldest, calls out from the back seat.

You smile and wave.

“Hiya,” you say back.

She shoots you the toothy grin you remember so well.

Addison, the younger daughter and middle child, squeezes in behind her.

“You ready?” she calls out with a giggle. “We have cookies!”

“Cookies!?” you answer back, exaggerating your enthusiasm for their amusement.

“Yeah!” they reciprocate.

Mrs. Peterson laughs.

“Yeah, we’ve got a little bit of everything back there,” she says. “Come around, let’s get you settled in.”

You come around and open the door to the back seats.

There are two rows, each taken by one of the girls and a plethora of toys and games and snacks.

Thea sits in the second row.

She's already beckoning you to sit next to her.

Resembling her mother in nearly every way, Thea smiles wide and waves for you.

Her perpetually sunny mood is almost infectious.

She wears a light purple tank top, a frilly skirt, and flip flops.

Her sand-tinted hair pours down her slender shoulder and back.

Addison smiles more modestly at you from the third row.

Bearing more of her father’s features, her hair curls naturally, but glows a brighter yellow like her mother’s.

Freckles scatter across her nose and cheeks where a pair of thin framed glasses sit.

She's always come off as more reserved than her older sister.

She waves at you too, but can't compete with Thea's enthusiasm.

You decide to sit next to Thea to make things easier, assuming as well that Addison might enjoy the personal space more.

"Alright, slide over," you say to Thea. "I'm coming in."

Thea cheers and makes room for you.

You sit and buckle your seatbelt.

Mrs. Peterson closes the door and comes back around to hop back in the driver's seat.

"We're gonna have so much fun!" Thea cheers.

Addison hangs off the back of your seat to get closer.

"Alright, everyone ready?" Mrs. Peterson says, buckling her own belt.

You and the girls give enthusiastic 'yeah's.

Mrs. Peterson adjusts her sunglasses and proceeds to pull out of the driveway.

~~~

The ride quickly becomes an eventful one, a whole Spring Break's worth of entertainment on its own.

The girls and their mother sing to the songs that play on the radio.

They share snacks and catch you up on everything that's going on with them.

You talk about everything that can make for engaging conversation.

Recent movies, television shows, and current events all get laid out in length.

You and the girls talk about how school is going while munching on cookies and Goldfish.

Addison occasionally falls quiet to read a book while laying down in the back.

You and Thea pair pods to watch videos on your phone.

The drive to the beach is a relatively calm and easy one.

The scenery out the window is far more natural than the highly trafficked route to and from school.

You appreciate the rare beauty of it all while enjoying the upbeat energy of the Peterson family.

Of all that happens, the topic of tickling seems oddly absent.

Surely they can't be into only that alone, but how it can be such a mundane activity for them that they don't bother bringing it up rings as peculiar.

You certainly thought a lot about it since associating with the Petersons, but it's almost like they don't.

At least not until about halfway through the drive.

“Hey, you cheated!” Thea says, nudging you slightly. “There was no ‘Q’ word back there.”

“It said ‘quaint’,” you argue. “‘Quaint… Acres’, or something like that.”

“You don’t even remember,” Thea says.

Even arguing, she always seems like she’s having fun with whatever she’s doing at the time.

“Addy, did you see it?” Thea asks.

“I didn’t see anything,” Addison says from the back.

“Yes you did,” you say. “Don’t lie, like you all did with that stuffed turtle that one night.”

The girls giggle.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Thea says cheekily.

She gives your side a little poke.

You squeak and giggle slightly.

Even expecting it through the whole ride sitting next to Thea, she still manages to surprise you with it with a sudden tickle.

“Ahhh hehey!” you say.

Thea smirks with devilish delight.

Addison grins and leans in closer.

Mrs. Peterson steals a subtle look in the rearview mirror.

Nervously, you chuckle and scratch a little at your neck.

“Cheaters need to be punished,” Thea says, cocking one eyebrow.

“But I didn’t cheat,” you argue.

“And liars get punished more,” Addison says, hanging over the edge of the seat.

You grin, anticipating their next moves.

The idea of being tickled once again so ruthlessly by the tickle-obsessed family fills you with a strange mix of excitement and dread.

You’ve come to enjoy the experience, but know just how ticklish you are and how merciless they can be.

Before you can argue your point more, you see Thea’s hands diving toward you.

She pinches your side and claws her other hand against your ribs, subjecting that entire half of your body to her ticklish glee.

You shriek.

First in surprise.

Then in play.

Followed by waves of laughs and giggles that ring from your mouth.

“Naaaahaaahahahahahaa!!! Theaaahahahaha!!” you laugh.

You try to bat her away, but the impish grin that stretches across her lips seems to seal your fate.

“No blocking,” she says. “You’re our tickle toy remember?”

“I did not agree to th-aaaahahahahahahaaaa!!” you start again as Thea pinches your side once more.

Your torso buckles over.

You pull against the seatbelt holding you back.

Your arms try to defend against Thea’s small, determined hands, but she tickles far too quickly to keep up with.

She giggles playfully and unrestrained.

You laugh along with the tickles, both liking the play and wanting it to continue and also cautious at how distracting you may be to Mrs. Peterson driving.

You do have to be the responsible one, after all.

“Staaahahahap!!” you say before catching a short break. “Naanaeeheehee your mom…”

Mrs. Peterson chuckles.

“Honey, I’ve got three kids,” she says, listening in. “I’m used to too much noise. You guys have fun back there.”

You’re already warm in the face and breathing harder.

What tickling you’ve already endured was teasing at best and only lasted a few seconds.

Thea quickly takes her mother’s permission and continues pinching your sides.

She reaches over you to get the other, leaving you twisting and squealing in your seat.

You clench up as you squeak with more ticklish laughter.

“No no naaaaahahahahahaaahaa!!!”

Your laughter rises, as unrestrained as Thea’s freely tickling fingers.

She gleefully basks in the opportunity to take full advantage of you being right next to her.

You feel her skinny fingers clawing at your sides, leaving you twisting and trying feebly to protect the areas.

“Heehee tickle toy!” Addison says from behind, watching closely.

Thea’s hands seem to be able to expertly trace your midsection for all the best tickle spots, as if she knows them better than you do.

She has certainly adopted the near sadistic enthusiasm that you remember her mother having when tickling you.

Her laughter to your ticklish reactions is genuine and constant.

It’s clear by how much fun she’s having that she has no intention of stopping anytime soon.

“Staaahahahahahaaaaap!!!” you giggle and squirm in place.

The seat belt holds you down and back slightly.

Any quick lunge forward snaps the mechanism in place, further binding you to the seat.

Your hands keep trying to fight hers away, becoming more effective at doing so the longer the tickling continues.

“Nuh uh, tickle toy, you gotta let me,” Thea says.

She plunges all ten gnawing fingers into your belly.

You voice cracks as your fluttery giggles rise to real laughter.

Both girls laugh and tease your ticklish disposition.

“Naahahahahahaha! I don't haahheekkkkahaha!!”

Your face begins to burn more.

The ache in your belly from laughing so much, a sensation you remember staying with you from your Peterson experiences, starts to return.

Thea’s fingers begin scribbling lightly over your shirt.

You’re amazed at how such light touches can tickle so much, but the devilish teen seems to know well of what she is doing.

“Coochie coochie coo!” Thea says while giggling. “You’re stuck with us now. We’re gonna tickle you all week long!”

You shake your head while trying to bear the sensations rushing through you.

You squirm in your seat, your hips trying to twist her fingers off of your belly.

She quickly switches back to your sides and ribs.

“Stahahahahahaaaapaahhh!!” you cry out.

Addison giggles from behind.

“I wanna play too!” she says.

Thea thinks for a moment and smirks.

She pulls back, giving you a moment to catch your breath.

“Mom should have packed the play cuffs,” Thea says. “Check the blue bag.”

Addison rummages through various bags in the seat behind you, just out of your vision.

Wh-what… what are you getting?” you ask.

“Don’t worry about it,” Thea answers.

“You all play nice back there,” Mrs. Peterson says.

“We are,” Thea calls out.

Addison pops back up and holds up something just behind your head that gets Thea’s attention.

“Great, now…” Thea starts before looking at you. “Hmmm… how about you hold your hands up just behind your head?”

“Why would I do that?”

“Because we’re having fun,” Thea says. “And because I’ll tickle you and won’t stop until we get there.”

“But you’re going to tickle me anyway,” you say.

Thea smirks cheekily.

“You don’t… know that…”

“I absolutely do,” you say, chuckling at her terrible attempts at lying.

“Come on, please?” Thea asks.

“Please please pleeeease,” Addison adds from behind.

You sigh.

You know they won’t stop asking, despite not putting up much of a fight against them.

You give in, both to make them happy and because you know that Thea wasn’t wrong.

It is fun.

You can’t deny that.

But you also know that the Petersons’s ticklish activities have tendencies to go to lengths you don’t expect.

“Fine,” you say.

You lift and bend your arms up.

Thea adjusts herself as Addison comes closer, both within the confines of their seat belts.

You feel Addison's hands on yours.

Metal cuffs snap and tighten around them next.

Thea helps Addison attach them properly.

You know they’ve just handcuffed you, this comes as no surprise.

Still, your heart starts to beat faster.

You feel the cheap metal press against your wrists and how little you’re able to pull your hands apart.

“There we go!” Addison says, leaning up right behind you.

“Alright, so you got me,” you say. “I can still…”

You try to pull your arms back down, but clang to a stop with virtually no security.

You pull again, feeling the headrest behind you jerk you forward.

You pull once more, but nothing still.

You feel that the chain connecting the cuffs is caught just below the headrest behind you.

You try to free yourself, but can’t move in any way that would allow you to lower your arms.

The girls giggle watching you squirm.

“Heehee, got you now,” Thea says.

You smile nervously.

“Okay, yeah, you got me,” you say. “You can let me out now.”

Thea shakes her head.

“Nuh uh, we got you right where we want you!” Thea says.

Her eagerness only holds out for so long before she launches back into another frenzy of tickles against your sides.

You sequel back into a flurry of giggles and laughs, twisting side to side as the seat belt and now the cuffs hold you in place.

“Nnaaaaheheheeeheehahahaaa!!! Knaahahahahack it off!!” you cry out.

Thea’s tickling fingers dive into your midsection freely, unhindered by any attempts to push her away.

She giggles wildly between squeezing your sides and dancing her fingers over your belly.

Through the hysteria, you feel Addison sliding up closer behind you.

She too giggles and reaches over the seat.

Her hands come down to the base of your bound, upstretched arms.

You barely have time to react in your current ticklish haze before it suddenly becomes worse.

Ten more scribbling fingers press into your armpits, unable to be anything but completely vulnerable.

“No no nooaaahahahahaahaaaahaha!!!” you squeal, your laughs bursting louder and quicker.

Addison giggles along to your reactions right in your ear.

Thea, spidering her fingers around your navel, snickers and taunts.

“Awww, you can’t handle getting tickled by two little girls?” she asks.

Her hands switch tactics randomly, keeping you guessing and unable to tune out the sensations.

Addison tickles with a surprising amount of skill and experience, scribbling her fingers into the sensitive hollows of your pits with an energetic swiftness.

You shake your head and bellow out laughter.

You pull at the cuffs holding your arms up.

You twist in your seat, unable to avoid the tickles no matter how you move.

Minute after minute passes.

The tickles pour through you from both areas, leaving you squealing like a child younger than them.

“Ohhhhahahahaha gaaahahahahahahad!!!” you cry, a wide, albeit exhausted smile stretched across your face.

The girls tickle with a childish persistence, intense and unending.

“Tickle, tickle tickle… heeheheehe,” Addison teases in your ear.

Their jubilant giggling alone is enough of a taunt without the phrases they had likely picked up from their parents.

Mrs. Peterson turns down the radio to listen.

“Not too much, girls,” she says. “We still want to have a good time.”

“We know, mom,” Thea says.

You don’t know exactly how long the tickling has gone on for, but you do know how long it usually takes to get you to the point you’ve reached.

Your breathing has become heavy and challenged by the laughter forced out of you.

Your belly, chest, and jaw all ache.

Tears form in the corners of your eyes.

You feel warmer than you were before the tickling started, leaving sweat to start beading against your forehead.

Your laughter rises to a desperate tone.

It certainly isn’t as hard as it could be, but the Peterson girls definitely know how to take any amount of tickling to near unbearable degrees.

And yet, despite reaching your limit, you still cannot deny to yourself having fun with being their designated ‘tickle toy’.

“Ohhhahahahahakaayyyy!!! Okaaahahahahayyyy!!!” you laugh and squeal, pleading for rest.

Mrs. Peterson pipes up first.

“Okay, girls, that’s enough,” she says.

“Awww, but mom, we just started,” Thea says.

They didn’t.

“Girls,” Mrs. Peterson says with more authority in her voice.

Both girls goran a little and stop.

Thea sits back in her seat while Addison stays hanging off the back of yours.

You take the moment to catch your breath, your cheeks burning slightly.

You rest your eyes and maintain a weary smile.

“See? That wasn’t so bad, was it?” Thea asks.

“Uncuff me now,” you say, your serious tone betrayed by a soft chuckle.

“Say you had fun,” Thea says.

You roll your eyes.

“Okay, I had fun,” you admit.

“Good!” Thea says, perking up.

The girls unlock the cuffs and let you rest your arms.

You breathe a sigh of relief.

“But we’re gonna tickle you a lot more later,” Thea says.

“Yeah,” Addison adds. “Mom packed more stuff for us to play with.”

You smirk and shake your head.

“I… well, I had a feeling you might,” you say.

You look up to Mrs. Peterson and meet her eyes in the rearview mirror.

She grins at you, her eyes hiding behind darkened shades.

~~~

Your trip brings you first to the Peterson’s personal beach house.

While it isn’t immaculate in size, it’s still large enough for both you and the whole family.

Plus the fact that they have a whole vacation house of their own anyway is impressive enough.

Your visit there is brief, really just a stop with which to unload the car, refresh yourself from the drive, and to get ready to go down to the beach just outside the back door.

The girls insist on doing so almost immediately after parking.

You don’t mind, it’s not every day you get to enjoy the beach.

You put on one of the bathing suits you had packed.

You put a few of your own things into a beach bag and meet the others by the back door.

Mrs. Peterson had put on a two-piece in which to sunbathe, garnished with a light, flowy shawl thrown over her shoulders.

She carries a large, filled-out beach bag slung over one shoulder

Thea had also put on a two-piece.

It is blue with little yellow flowers and is about one size too big for her.

Addison wears a red one-piece, flourished with a striped skirt-like frill around the waist.

You meet them by the door, carrying your own bag and a towel hung over the back of your neck.

“You ready?” Mrs. Peterson asks.

The girls give an excited ‘yeah’ once again and rush out on the back patio.

The deck leads into a short flight of stairs that feeds into the sandy shore below.

You look out on the ocean and soak in the sight of it all.

Waves gently caress the damp strip of sand at the shoreline.

You can smell and taste a subtle hint of salt in the air.

The sand appears so white and clean, rolling dunes stretching far on both sides.

A seagull caws almost musically as it flies above.

The girls run out onto the sand, leaving you and Mrs. Peterson trailing behind.

They find an area to claim for their belongings and begin setting it all up.

You see a few other people out enjoying the pristine weather.

They walk by in pairs, lay out in the sun on towels, and play in the shallow water.

You and Mrs. Peterson lay out the rest of what you’ve brought.

You stretch a towel over a spot of your own.

You lather your arms, legs, torso, and every other exposed area with sunscreen.

Mrs. Peterson does the same with her daughters before doing so for herself.

“You going to go out in the water?” you ask Mrs. Peterson.

She chuckles.

“No, I don’t swim,” she says. “But feel free to do whatever you’d like.”

The girls make up a small bag, pulling several things out from their mother’s.

You turn to them.

“What are you guys going to do?” you ask.

“We had this idea that we thought would be really funny,” Thea says.

Her tone is rushed and eager, her hyped mood on full display.

Addison stood by her, smiling sweetly.

You chuckle.

“Yeah?” you say. “What’s that?”

“We’re gonna bury you!” Addison says.

You recoil a little.

“You’re gonna what now?” you ask.

Mrs. Peterson laughs, finishing rubbing sunblock down her arms.

“Poor phrasing, Addy,” she says.

Thea and Addison point to a section of the beach that looks clean and vacant.

Thea holds onto the bag that the two had made up.

“In the sand,” says Thea. “We saw how to do it online.”

“It’ll be fun!” Addison says, grabbing your hand and pulling you along.

You let the girls take you to the section, not putting up much of a fight against their minimal strength.

You look curiously at both of them, unsure of what it is they have planned and why they seemed so eager to do it.

“I guess you’re burying me, then,” you say.

You take another glance back at Mrs. Peterson, who watches passively.

“Yep,” Thea says.

She takes a couple of plastic shovels from the beach bag and hands one to you and Addison.

“We gotta dig the hole first,” Thea says.

“I have to dig my own grave?” you ask.

Thea giggles.

“Noooo, just a hole,” she says.

She and Addison quickly get to shoveling sand out of the spot.

You humor them, as you always seem to do, and go down to your knees, helping them dig out the hole in the sand that they had started.

Before long, you all make it long and deep enough to fit a whole person.

Thea and Addison step back to admire it.

“That should be good,” Thea says.

“Okay, now get in,” Addison says, looking at you and pointing at the whole.

You laugh.

“This all still seems like you’re going to kill me,” you say jokingly.

“No, no, it’s just something we saw,” Thea says, only vaguely reassuring.

You look back down to it.

“You’re not going to leave me there, are you?” you ask.

They shake their heads, still grinning.

You sigh.

“Alright, fine,” you say.

You lay down in the sand.

It’s warm against your back.

It actually feels kind of nice, like a temperate bed in which you could fall asleep.

Once you’re flat on your back, the girls work quickly in shoveling the sand back on top of you.

“Not the face though,” you say.

Thea scoffs.

“Obviously,” she says.

Bit by bit, the light, grainy sand piles on top of your body.

You quickly feel the weight of it packing you down.

The girls cover your chest, stomach, waist, and legs, tamping it all down firmly.

Within minutes, you are just a head sticking out of a mound of sand.

Thea was nice enough to push some up under your head to act as a support for your neck.

It’s strangely comfortable.

In trying to move your arms and legs, an intense sensation of immobility comes over you.

The weight of the sand leaves you unable to raise your arms, push yourself up, or shift your legs much at all.

You chuckle nervously at their antics.

“Alright, alright, you buried me,” you say. “It’s funny, now let me out.”

The girls giggle as they stand over you and watch.

Their impish laughter is dreadfully familiar.

“We haven’t even gotten to the good part yet,” Thea says.

She and Addison hurry back over to the bag they had brought over, effectively out of sight.

You try to look around.

You can’t see much beyond the large, marshmallowy clouds floating through the sky, but you can still hear them laughing among themselves.

“What’s the ‘good part’?” you ask.

You feel the girls come down to your lower half.

You’re unable to get a good view, but you quickly realize something else about your predicament.

They had packed sand on top of your entire body except your head… and your feet.

You can move them freely, waving them side to side and curling your toes as such, but the weight of the sand keeps you from being able to move your legs, leaving them completely exposed and vulnerable.

In realizing this, you immediately piece together what they plan to do.

“No,” you say out loud. “Don’t you dare.”

You play along with the scene they’ve constructed, more embarrassed than reserved about what’s about to happen.

“What?” Thea asks knowingly. “We’re not doing nothing.”

“No, but you’re gonna…” you start before pausing.

“‘Gonna’ what?” Thea asks.

“... tickle my feet,” you say more quietly.

“Okay!” Addison says.

A sudden surge of tickles shoots up from your feet below.

While you had expected that they would, it still comes as a surprise made worse by your inability to see them.

You scream slightly before being swept into light, fluttery laughter.

“Naaaaghhhggaaahahahaaahahaaa!!! Shhhteeeehahahahahahahahahapppp!!” you laugh.

Twenty tickling fingers deviously feast on your especially sensitive soles.

Your head shakes side to side.

Your feet wave and flex at random to avoid the tickles, but cannot compete with two mischievous ticklers to a foot.

As much as it tickles right away, it becomes abundantly clear how little you can move.

No matter how violent your reactions could be, nothing you do so much as budges the sand holding you down.

“Heehee tickle, tickle, tickleeeee….” Addison says.

“Nothing you can do, tickle toy!” Thea adds.

You don’t know who’s at which foot, but it doesn’t matter much.

One unleashes all ten fingers against your arch and toes at once.

The other holds your foot still with one hand while the other scratches freely across your sole.

Your laughter soars out into the open sky.

You can’t see much about who might be around watching you, yet another unknowable element adding intensity to your predicament.

Regardless, you can’t help but laugh out loud as the girls release their ticklish punishment against your hyper-sensitive bare feet.

“Aaaaaahhhhhhggghhahahahaha!!! Nnanhahahahahahaa!!!” you laugh.

You can only laugh.

You can move in no way that matters.

Your feet are fully at the mercy of two very eager ticklers.

You are sure that Mrs. Peterson can hear and see you, and that she’s likely sitting back watching her girls have the time of their lives, tormenting your helpless feet.

Their small fingers wildly scribble and scratch away at your soles.

They can slip all around your toes, freely working underneath and in between each.

They manage to tickle every single spot of both of your feet several times over in a matter of minutes.

All the while, you can only lay back and take it all, unable to free yourself from your sandy tomb.

You squeal and shriek, finding your ticklishness worsened by being blind to their methods.

You can still see the tops of the girls as they work on torturing your vulnerable feet.

Their joyful laughter is unending and their smiles communicate a fun they don’t intend to stop anytime soon.

“Did we bring the other toys?” Addison asks.

“Yep, let’s get them!” Thea says.

Addison keeps both your feet quite preoccupied as Thea turns to rummage through the bag.

You can’t see what she pulls out right away, but she doesn’t hesitate to show you.

Thea stands above you holding a feather in one hand and a small hairbrush in the other.

Addison continues to scribble her fingers over your soles while Thea lets you see the tools that they brought.

“Heehee, you remember our toys from last time, don’t you?”

You nod as you laugh.

“Nnnaaahahahahaaaa!!! Yeeehehehsss!!”

“These were your favorites, weren’t they?” she asks.

She chuckles before you could give an answer, going back down toward your feet.

Impatient as always, Thea doesn’t wait to get started.

An explosive burst of tickles erupts from your mouth in untamed laughter.

A surprisingly strong hand holds your foot still while a plastic-tipped hairbrush scrubs viciously against your sole.

“NNAAAAAAAHAHHAHAHAHAHAAAAA!!! SSTTTAAHAHAHAHAHAAAAP!!!” you scream.

Your screams of laughter do nothing to earn you mercy.

They only encourage the girls to further your ticklish torture.

The feather enters soon after.

Its persistent swiping against your sole isn’t as bad as the brush, but it still worsens the tickles pouring up through you.

One foot falls victim to the brush’s hard, aggressive tickles.

While the other endures the devious feather’s playful swiping.

Even over your own screams, you can still hear the girls enjoying your ticklish suffering.

“Heehee you can be as loud as you want out here,” Thea says.

“Coochie coochie coo!” Addison teases.

Both tools get used in constant rhythms and both only become more effective over time.

The brush scrubbing against your soft, delicate sole only makes it more sensitive with every pass.

The feather slips in between your toes, sawing and tormenting the most fragile of nerves.

Your screams of laughter grow more desperate over time, just a few seconds.

“AAAAAAHHHHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAA!!!! IT TI-AAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAA!!!”

The girls know well how sensitive and ticklish your feet are.

They continue playing with them as if they’re their most favorite toys.

“I want the brush!” Addison says.

“Okay, trade ya!” Thea replies.

The brush and the feather switch feet.

You’re not sure why, but something about it tickles so much more.

The feather had merely teased the nerves that are being ruthlessly tortured.

While the brush had brought a lot of sensitivity to your sole which responds well to the feather’s light touch.

“GGAAAAHHHAHAHAHHAAHHA!!! STAAHAHAHAAHPPP!!! STAHAHAPPPP!!” you scream.

The tickling begins to compound on you, wearing you down.

It starts to become hard to breathe as you endure wave after wave of devastating tickles against your feet.

Minutes pass, far too many for you to keep track of.

Eventually, the girls pull away.

You soles glow bright pink and hang limp beneath the bed of sand holding them down.

You lay your head back.

You struggle to catch your breath.

Sweat trickles past your eyes.

A subtle breeze against your feet makes them jerk a little.

The girls stand and watch you slowly recover.

“Fun, isn’t it?” Thea asks.

You don’t know how to answer.

Conceptually, and a little in practice, you do find it kind of fun.

But you’re far too ticklish to endure all that these girls consider ‘fun’.

You know your limits.

You pant through the heat and exhaustion.

“A-are… we… done here?” you ask, trying to get them to start digging you out.

“You girls having fun over here?” Mrs. Peterson asks, walking over.

The girls cheer energetically.

“Yeah!” they both exclaim.

“Well, that’s good,” Mrs. Peterson says.

She looks down at you and smiles.

“Thank you for keeping them entertained,” she says casually.

You’re still breathing too hard to speak clearly.

“They got you all tampered down, huh?” Mrs. Peterson asks, walking down your body. “Clever.”

“Wanna tickle too, mommy?” Addison asks.

Mrs. Peterson gives a soft chuckle.

“It seems you girls have put these feet through plenty of tickles,” she says.

They giggle.

As does she.

You breathe a relieved sigh.

“But I suppose I’d regret having you stuck like this and not taking advantage of it…” Mrs. Peterson says.

Your eyes widen.

Your heart begins to race again.

You watch her ease down toward your feet, her hands just out of sight.

“Pl… plea….” you start to beg.

“Don’t be dramatic, you can take a little more,” Mrs. Peterson says.

The girls stand by and watch, encouraging their mother, who looks over your feet like a cat eying a captured mouse.

She kneels in the sand next to them.

She lightly traces a single nail in an S shape from the ball of your foot all the way across the arch down to the heel.

The light, subtle touch isn’t as unbearable as what the girls put you through, but it leaves you in quivering suspense as you squeal and giggle through it.

“Aaaahhheeheeheeee!” you laugh.

Your foot twitches a little.

She does it again just to watch you shudder with anticipation.

“So cute,” Mrs. Peterson says.

She gives your other foot a quick, unexpected tickle, causing you to gasp into another flurry of giggles.

Mrs. Peterson’s touch is far more delicate, yet somehow also more devilish than the more violent tickles.

It leaves you giggling on the edge of laughter.

You know that at any moment a tidal wave of tickles will burst through you.

That Mrs. Peterson is capable of some of the most unbearable tickles you’ve ever experienced.

And how she leaves you waiting is almost torture in itself.

As if she leaves you fighting the urge to ask for it just to end the suspense.

But Mrs. Peterson doesn’t keep teasing you for very long.

“Mmmm, sorry, they’re just too cute, I gotta…” she says.

All ten of her nails start scraping and spidering rapidly against your arches.

You find your voice exploding out of you as a scream of ticklish laughter.

“AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHAHAHAHAHAHAA!!!!” your voice resonates all through the beach.

Five devilishly crafted nails to a foot,, each scribble quickly and methodically against your soles.

Mrs. Peterson snickers as the girls giggle, loving the show.

Her style of tickling comes off as experienced and sadistic, fueled by the furocity of your laughter.

Each little swipe seems perfectly placed to achieve the largest of reactions out of you.

Each skitter is made to torture, not tease.

And even that is Mrs. Peterson playing around.

She laughs and comments to make it all worse.

“These feet are just too cute to not be tickled all the time,” she says.

Her focused scribbling traces around your sole, devastating every delicate nerve along the way.

Her nails paint your feet with tickles.

You try to wave them away, but she anticipates your instinctual movements well.

The girls keep laughing and showing no mercy at their mother’s display.

Your head swims as you start gasping through your laughter.

Mrs. Peterson stops for a moment and lets you breathe.

In doing so, you almost don’t recognize what she says.

All you hear is ‘hold them back’.

You feel the girls’ hands on your feet once again, only they’re not tickling.

They each push your toes back with their palms, stretching out your arches and further immobilizing your most ticklish spot.

You shake your head, unable to comprehend much more than that in the moment.

You try to beg, but nothing intelligible comes out.

“Good, just like that,” Mrs. Peterson asks. “Now hold them still.”

You have barely caught your breath from the previous tickling before Mrs. Peterson unleashes another, more destructive wave of tickling tearing through you.

She focuses all ten scribbling nails, five to a foot, right at the base of your toes.

Your shriek, your voice breaking as your laughter echoes over and beyond the dunes.

“AAAAAAHAHHHHHHHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHA!!! SSTSAHAHAHAHHAHAHAGGGHHHHHHHAHAHA!!!!!”

You try to thrash away, but what makes the tickling exponentially worse is the inability to move your feet at all.

The girls hold your toes back, pressing so many sensitive nerve-endings against the surface of the skin.

They hold your feet perfectly in place for their mother to inflict wave after wave of tickles against them.

The girls laugh along, amused at how your feet struggle and how much they’re able to keep them still.

“Mmmm, such soft feet…” Mrs. Peterson says, her nails skittering right at the base of your toes. “If I wasn’t so nice, I could probably tickle for hours. You’d like that, wouldn’t you?”

“NNNNAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHHAHA!!! MMAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!!” you cry out feverishly.

Mrs. Peterson’s habit of switching between a responsible mother to a good friend to a friendly sadist is something you could never get used to.

You can’t even answer.

You can only laugh.

And laugh.

And laugh.

Quickly, however, the aching returns.

Your chest and jaw hurt.

Your head begins to feel light and dizzy.

Mrs. Peterson can tell by the dwindling tone of your laughter that you’re reaching your limit.

She pulls back.

You heave for air.

Sucking in hard, your lungs cannot even fill to satisfying amounts.

You pant and groan tiredly.

Mrs. Peterson stands over you.

“Alright, girls, that’s enough for now,” she says. “Remember what we talked about.”

“Know when to stop,” they both recite.

You feel that should have been several minutes ago.

The two girls begin removing the sand holding you down.

Even when you could lift yourself up, you still continue to lay, reserving your energy and still catching your breath.

Mrs. Peterson comes over with a cold bottle of water.

She holds it gently against your forehead, letting the chilled moisture soothe your rising temperature.

“You okay, sweetie?” she asks.

You manage to nod.

“I… th-think…” you say.

“Good,” she says. “Here.”

She helps you sit up.

She hands you the bottle of water.

You unscrew the cap and nearly chug the whole thing.

The girls had run off to go play in the water.

All that had gone down was treated to them like a game to be picked up later.

Mrs. Peterson, however, is much more tender and understanding in the aftermath.

“Sorry if that was too much,” she says.

You take a beat.

“I mean… it’s… been worse maybe…” you say.

You manage a small, weary laugh.

She chuckles and looks away.

“I’m glad you think that,” she says. “Because you’re with us all week… and it probably will get worse.”

She shoots you a wink and walks back to her towel.

You sit in the sand.

Her voice resonates in your mind and sends a small chill down your spine.

And a minor pit of dread in your gut.

And a smile to your face.