August 17th, 1969

Loki surveyed the scene in front of him, miles of farmland swallowed in a delightful sea of half-nude bodies, music, and mud. Sweet-bitter earthy smoke hung in the air, the scent permeating everything, stinging his nostrils. Around him, people danced, swaying and writhing, lifting their arms. Flowers hung in women's hair, their brightly coloured garments making them seem like part of a kaliedoscope. Everyone was loopy and happy, peacefully rebellious, in an interesting way, with their mood-altering substances and free love-this was a new term that the god was learning. He'd been approached by many people, both women and some men, who seemed interested in having casual sex with him. He'd declined, though he'd certainly considered it. Loki was more concerned with simply observing these...colourful surroundings. He'd always had a habit of visiting Midgard, when the other realms began to feel too stifling. There was always something going on here, a wheel always in motion, almost too quickly. Oh, but he liked this feeling in the air, the fresh glimmer of change, the faintest hint of chaos round the edges. This world smelled new. Glorious bunches of mud-covered heathens praising the sky. And he quite like the music, too.

Then, like an apparition out of a dream, he saw her. Loki wasn't sure what it was specifically that caught his eye. Perhaps it was everything, all at once. She was a remarkably pretty girl with a long tumble of wavy dark hair that fell around her shoulders, flowers tucked between the strands by her ears. She was wearing a long, loose sundress pattered in a swirl of turquoise and magenta and violet. When she danced, the material moulded against her curves so that he could glimpse the outline of her body beneath: a lovely form, with particularly impressive breasts. Beaded necklaces hung around her her neck, her wrists were adorned with bracelets. As he watched her swaying sensuously back and forth, something inexplicable responded inside of him. Then their eyes met, and she smiled her full lips. Then, she waved.

It had been an amazing few days. Darcy Lewis, 'DarcyLou,' as she was nicknamed by her friends Jane and Erik, who she had come to the festival with, made her way through the swarms of people and up to a slightly less occupied part of the grounds. She was alone here for the first time: Jane had gone off to try and wrangle Erik, who had a habit of taking too much acid and stripping off all of his clothes. Though she knew she shouldn't wander too far, Darcy'd always had a strange knack for finding her way around, and she had memorized where their campsite was. She had a deep urge to explore, to absorb as much of these few summer days into herself as she could. Pausing for a few minutes, Darcy watched the crowd, then looked towards the stage and felt the music come flooding across as if reaching right for her. Someone passed her a joint and she took a hit before passing it along. Soon the warm, hazy buzz spread through her body, making her languid. A few feet away, a couple were embracing, their mouths joined in a kiss. Darcy sighed, feeling a small twinge of loneliness. Then she turned, and saw him. Her breath caught in her throat like a trapped bird.

Damn, but he was beautiful: tall and lean with sculpted cheekbones, a high forehead and luminous blue-green eyes. His long black hair fell in inky waves to his shoulders, and he wore a pair of brown pants and an emerald green shirt that was halfway opened to reveal the pale muscles of his chest. Maybe it was the pot, but this man definitely seemed...otherworldly to her, like he had stepped out of a dream. And he was staring at her in a very interested way. Darcy raised her hand in a little wave.. He just smiled at her, a devilish and charming grin that made her stomach flutter. Oh boy, she thought to herself, he could be trouble.

The tall and lovely stranger moved closer, graceful and serpentine. ''Hello,'' he said.

''Hey,'' she replied.

'Are you liking the music?'' he asked, and Darcy could detect an accent in his smooth, deep voice. English, maybe?

''Oh yeah, it's far out,'' she answered with a nod, still swaying, her skirt swishing around her ankles. ''I love it here, I don't want it to end.''

''Well, everything must end eventually,'' he told her.

Darcy nodded and sighed, looking up and seeing clouds clustering in the distance, threatening rain. ''True.''

Something compelled Loki at that moment, something that he would never feel again. It made him want to slow the day so that he could seize more of it, because he could suddenly feel the moments slipping too rapidly past him. He took the girl gently by the hand and led her away from the crowd, off to a fairly secluded area by a copse of trees. There he pulled her against him and kissed her, loving the taste of her soft, sweet mouth. She made a sound in her throat and kissed him back eagerly, leaning into him. He delved his hand beneath the fabric of her multicolored dress, cupping her bare breast, rubbing his thumb over her nipple, making it harden.

Darcy's mind reeled. Was this really happening? She hoped that it wasn't a dream. Her stranger certainly felt real; solid and large as he enveloped her. He smelled wonderful, spice and incense, like that temple she'd once visited in Kathmandu with Jane, only better, more mysterious.

She was laid down on the ground, her hair spread out all around her as she looked up at him. He undid the front of his pants, pulling out his cock, smiling at the way her big blue eyes widened at the sight. ''This is for you, my lady,'' he said, stroking himself with a smirk. ''Do you like it?'' She gave a swift nod in response. ''I think you'll like it even more when it's deep inside of you,'' he whispered.

Loki pulled her dress up, revealing her naked, wet pussy beneath. Finding her with his fingers, he played with her, gently stroking her folds then discovering the swelling little pearl of her clit, which he toyed with, making her tremble. She arched her hips, communicating a need for more. Off in the distance there came the rumble of thunder. The rain began to fall as his cock pressed inside of her, filling her deep. He began to move, their bodies rocking together as he held her hips. She was warm and slick and welcoming. This had been a pleasant visit indeed, the god mused, looking at the voluptuous woman writhing beneath him, seconds from orgasm. Then she started to come, in a breathless quivering of limbs; she locked her legs around him, crying out as she threaded her fingers into his hair and tugged. He quite liked her response, the sensuality of this girl had worked a strange kind of magic over him, and Loki soon found himself similarly overtaken by a surprisingly strong climax, spilling himself deep into her body.

He rolled off of her and lay beside her on the grass; they lingered and breathed like that quietly for a little while. Then he propped himself up on an elbow and looked at his flower child, the vibrant fabric of her gown clinging wetly to her body, hanging half off her her, one of her breasts and her thigh exposed. Her skin shimmered with droplets of water. ''Rain is quite becoming on you,'' he said, and she blushed.

Darcy reached up and toyed with his hair, running the dark, wet strands through her fingers. Rain was quite becoming on her handsome stranger too. Her pussy tingled at the memory of how he'd felt inside of her, and she felt very greedy, hungry for more. She took his hand and brought it down between her legs. ''I'm getting wet again,'' she said boldly, ''and not from the rain.''

He seemed pleased. ''So you are,'' he purred in reply, rolling over onto his hands and knees in front of her body, bending down to bring his mouth against her. Darcy gave a little start when she felt his mouth on her clit, sucking at the small nub, flicking it with his tongue, sliding two of his long fingers up inside of her as he did so. She cried out shamelessly as she felt another orgasm starting already, one that started at the tips of her toes and rolled all over her body like a wave.

Loki liked doing this, actually, he knew that he was good with his tongue and the taste and feel of a woman was always an intoxicating thing, they were all different and unique. He'd pleasured more than a few Midgardian women this way over the centuries during his various visits, and they never failed to come for him within minutes of his mouth on their quims. This girl was no exception, but for some reason her reaction affected him more deeply, maybe it was the way she seemed to feel it so wholeheartedly, as if she was allowing him to taste part of her soul. Licking her had gotten him hard again, he realized, and once she was able she sat up and noticed this too.

Darcy crawled over to him. ''Let me,'' she offered, wrapping her small hands around his cock. She took a minute to simply explore the length, giving him a few experimental strokes, watching the tug and pull of skin, cupping his heavy, full balls in her hand, making breath hiss between his lips, then a deep, satisfied growl from low in his chest. She decided to stop teasing him and so she kneeled down and wrapped her lips around him, moving her head as she sucked the massive organ, allowing as much of it into her throat as she could without gagging. She varied her technique a little, moving from slow to fast and back again, occasionally using her hand as well as her mouth. She really wanted to feel him come, to lose control, she wanted to taste him on her tongue. She got her wish, his hips began to jerk, his cock grew even stiffer and then he made a sound between a moan and a growl as she felt his seed spurt. Pleased, Darcy kept her mouth on him, swallowing what he had given her.

The thunderstorm seemed to be ending. She didn't want to leave this place, suddenly, this wet ground and mud, the trees above her, and him-him she wanted to keep, just have their bodies here joining over and over again, music in the distance. Heat and rain, August forever, never succumbing to fall. The afternoon was creeping on, she knew.

''That was lovely, darling,'' the beautiful man said, smiling at her.

''You're lovely, darling,'' she replied, with an answering smile. But then his wavered abruptly, until it had almost faded away.

Darcy sighed. She knew this would happen. She suddenly felt cold, wanting to shiver in her rain-soaked dress. ''Hey, man,'' she said, in what she hoped was a casual tone. ''I get it, it's alright.''

''What's alright?'' he asked, raising an eyebow.

''You're leaving.'' She pulled one of the sopping flowers from her hair and a few petals fell to the ground. ''This is just fun...''

He nodded. ''Yes, I am leaving. But so are you. We're all leaving. Tomorrow, all of this will be over. The music will stop. The magic will end, and the earth will forget as the world spins on. This day, the next, a hundred years, it's nothing. It's a heartbeat.''

''But I won't forget,'' Darcy said stubbornly, though a tremor passed through her at the haunted expression on his face. ''I'll have the memories. I'll know we were here.'' And she doubted her body would ever forget what he felt like. That, she would remember until she day she died.

He smiled thinly, and the look made it seem as though she were staring at him through foggy glass. He stood and took her hand, helping her to her feet. They left the trees and walked back over the grass, still back a ways from the rest of the crowd. Then they sat together and listened to the song that found its way to their ears. Darcy began to rock her head back and forth in time with it.

''You look like you can feel the music beneath your skin,'' Loki remarked.

A wide smile leapt to her mouth. ''I love music. It's like religion to me.''

''Everyone has their gods. Music, sex...there's quite a lot of worship to be done in this place.''

''Yeah,'' she smiled. ''Well.''

''Where are you from?'' he asked, suddenly desperate to know something about her. He was determined not to learn her name, because that would make her seem too real, but he craved a small detail to file away nonetheless.

''Nowhere, really,'' the girl said with a small shrug. ''I was born in Michigan. My parents died a few years ago, and so I left. Hitchhiked around for awhile.'' The smile on her face grew. ''That's how I met Jane and Erik. They were from UCLA Berkeley-he was a professor and she was a Phd student-they both studied astrophysics. Waaaay far out stuff. They picked me up in Phoenix and I've been with them ever since. Erik's on sabbatical now and Jane's helping him write a book. We've been charting stars all over the country, all over the world, too. I got to see India, and Nepal. And the British Isles, and Greece, and Norway. It's incredible...I've seen so much of the world, all because I went out wandering, not really trying to get anywhere. Stuck my damn thumb out and here I am. Makes you kinda believe that there's something bigger out there. Fate, or whatever.''

Her hand crept over to his and held it. Loki felt startled by the contact, then relaxed and laced his fingers through hers. He felt her heart beat, felt the two of them suspended against the muggy near-evening. After a little while they returned to the spot beneath the trees and he fucked her again, once, and then made love to her, despite his better judgement. There was witchcraft in the summer air, and he blamed this for the slip. Then when she nodded off for a moment, he left, disappearing into the night. He'd already lingered too long, gotten too close, and he would suffer for it, he knew.

A love bite on her neck and the smell of incense hovering on her skin, that was all Darcy had of her nameless stranger when she opened her eyes and saw that he was gone, the only proof that he hadn't been a dream. She made her way back to the camp, feeling a strange mix of joy and terrible loneliness beating like wings deep in her chest. Something had changed inside of her, she would never be the same. Jane and Erik were sleeping but she stayed up all night and into the morning, so she was one of the few awake and present while Jimi Hendrix played the national anthem. Slowly everyone else began to get up, to gather themselves as the spell broke. Tired and muddy, they all went home, packing everything up and staggering back into the world.

Darcy settled herself in the back seat of the van, resting her head but still not wanting to close her eyes. ''You're so quiet,'' Jane remarked.

''I've got music in my head,'' she replied.

The scientist nodded. ''I dig.''

She looked back only once as they drove away, until the farmland faded from view and they were on some highway.''Where do we go now?'' Darcy asked after a moment. Beside her, Erik had begun to snore.

Jane shrugged. ''West again. California, New Mexico...we'll definitely stop in the desert for awhile. I keep dreaming about the desert. Best place to see the stars.''

Loki could have gone back, he knew. Could have found her again, touched her one more time. But the years fled past, and she grew older, no longer the sweet young maiden that he'd met on that day. And then, as if in an instant, she was gone. The god had learned this, when sentiment overtook him and he finally looked, only to discover that she was no longer among the living. Like the earth forgetting the imprints of feet. Like music stopping and summer dying. All thing ended, he knew that. He'd told her so, but still, he had not been ready. It was foolish to think he ever could be ready. He still had the memory of lips and flowers and rain, a ghost forever hovering on the edges of his mind.