The Michael Arram stories are now beginning to appear together at: http://www.iomfats.org/storyshelf/hosted/arram
This story contains graphic depictions of sex between young males. If the reading or possessing of such material as this is illegal in your place of residence please leave this site immediately and do not proceed further. If you are under the legal age to read this, please do not do so.
V
The boys followed the obsequies for poor Ramon at a distance. The funeral was in Houston, where his family lived. There was an unhappy scene at the requiem when the family denied Terry a place amongst the lead mourners, and there were some ugly words thrown at the gay section of the congregation after the service. It was only the powerful advocacy of Ramon's aunt, Mrs Fuentas, Andy's former housekeeper, that stopped further humiliations. Ramon's family had never come to terms with his relationship with Terry, and they were not in a forgiving mood. Terry was not even allowed to contribute to the gravestone. Andy told Ed that he was heartbroken and looked years older. He had not been allowed the normal mechanisms of grieving.
After the funeral, Terry went back to Los Angeles, to visit the places where he and Ramon had first met, and then Matt and Andy lost track of him. They confessed that they were a bit worried. They got back to London on Easter Monday, and Ed was summoned up to Highgate. Henry waved him off at Shrewsbury station, and he shouldered the burden of loneliness for a fortnight.
Henry had finally pulled off what his brother Ricky had failed to do, and wore down his father on the subject of an internet connection. In truth, the diocese had also leant on him, as all clergy were supposed to be on an e-mail directory. The archdeacon had got quite shirty with Dad. So, although Henry and Ed were apart for a fortnight, they were at least in close touch. Henry more or less had a monopoly of its use. His father was not enthusiastic about the web, and his mother soon lost interest in it. His big brother had gone on holiday to Ibiza with his new girlfriend, Mark Peters's eldest sister, Helen.
Henry applied himself to the new window on the world with his usual industry. Rothenia was bubbling with rumour and discontent. Henry was able to read the Rothenian news pages and blogs. It gave him an edge over the western media, which was taking little interest in the developing crisis. Regional elections in Husbrau had returned only Unity and RSDP MPs, squeezing President Maritz's coalition down to a minority of one, and the coalition was looking frail, as the RSDP's star was rising in opinion polls in the rest of the country. National elections were scheduled for the end of June and the Unity party was expected to sweep the board, giving the ethnic Germans the balance of power in Parliament, a development which would only enrage the RSDP further. A disturbing new trend was that gangs were deliberately targetting German businesses and schools to foster a further German backlash. The RSDP was suspected of being behind them.
It looked to Henry as though there were anti-democratic forces at work in Rothenia, which wanted to get back to the brutal days of the former communist dictator, Horvath. There were also disturbing rumours that cells of the former secret police were becoming active and were linked with the RSDP.
Henry often went to a particularly good blog site operated anonymously by a Strelsener with good contacts with the Maritz government and the Strelzen press. His view was that the Second Republic was finished. It had failed to be what Rothenia desperately needed, a government and constitution that all Rothenians could unite around. The awful alternative that too many Rothenians were willing to contemplate was a conservative, authoritarian regime. Going back to Papa Horvath!' was the blogline to that entry. We need Mama Flavia!' was the surprising next entry, a nostalgic reflection on the only truly unifying government that Rothenia had enjoyed in the days of the Elphberg monarchy. `Where are the Elphbergs when you need them?' The blogger said.
Henry had been startled to find that Will Vincent was mentioned a lot on these sites. His recent TV series on Rothenian history and its analysis of the stresses and strains over the centuries had displaced a huge wave of nostalgia amongst Rothenians for the old Ruritanian days. The blogger was actively encouraging this and he gave links to new monarchist sites that were opening up and gathering support as an alternative to the RSDP's grim solution. Henry pursued these with great interest, but found that the monarchists could only offer the unexciting prospect of the middle-aged Prince Humbert of Savoy, the pretender to the Italian throne, as a possible claimant.
Fritz was a good correspondent, although all he really wanted to talk about was his progress in getting inside the knickers of the unfortunate Maria, who seemed for the time being all too willing to cooperate. Fritz was touchingly confident that Henry would not tell on him to his brother and sister. His description of his first blow job was exhaustive and indeed exhausting. He also wanted to compare notes on Ed's technique in sucking off Henry and whether he came in Ed's mouth. Coming in Maria's mouth seemed to be the next great ambition of the precociously dissolute prince of Tarlenheim.
Trinity term began, and Henry was by now aching to be with Ed. On a warm and sunny late April morning, they made their restrained greetings in the sixth form block. It was very difficult for both of them. Kissing and hugging was not an option in school, let alone the other things which they desperately wanted to do. In the end it got too much. Henry dragged Ed into his carrel, jammed a chair against the door, covered the window with his prefect's gown and threw off his clothes. Ed was not far behind him, but then there was the problem.
How do we do it, Ed?' Henry whispered, There's no space to lie on the floor, and the furniture won't take the strain.'
Never mind that, got some lube?' Henry produced a small tube of KY he kept in his suit jacket in hopes. OK,' said Ed, slick me up and then I'll slick your bum, little babe.' Ed stood up behind Henry and made him squat on the desk. `Ooh, you look so sexy like that, as if you were going to take a dump.'
`Pervert,' smiled Henry over his shoulder.
`OK babe, I'm going to come up behind you, hold the back of your thighs, and you're going to fall back on to my very stiff dick.'
`What, you going to do me standing! Are you that strong?'
`We're about to find out. I worked out with Matt in his gym with his personal trainer. He was impressed with my abs. Now, Henry, go for it.'
Henry let his bum drop down until he could feel Ed's hot dickhead at his anus. He knew by now that if he got it at the right angle, Ed would just slide up into him. He felt Ed adjusting his position, and whisper `Now'. Ed rose as Henry fell. His dick engaged and Henry's own weight forced Ed's sizable member deep into him. It was all he could do not to shout with the mingled shock and pleasure. He found himself hanging in mid air, with Ed deep inside him held and balanced by Ed's powerful hands hooked under his buttocks, his legs up to his chest.
Ed was grunting with the effort, but seemed not to be in any danger of dropping him. And then the steady pumping began up into him. It was necessarily a short fuck, but it was blissful for Henry. The position in which he was held meant that his prostate gland was being powerfully stimulated. And as Ed was groaning his own orgasm into Henry's ear, Henry was stunned and ecstatic to find himself arching back against Ed's body and see several spurts erupt from his own dick over his study table. He had achieved an anal orgasm. As Ed let him drop to the floor, he could hardly believe the feeling of fulfiment that their coupling had given him. They kissed passionately before cleaning up and dressing. Before he left, Ed held Henry and simply stared into his eyes. `Babe, that was just the best. No wonder I love you.'
`Funny smell in here,' said David as he knocked on the carrel door and came in.
`Yeah ... must be the furniture polish.'
`Doesn't smell like furniture polish ... oh well. Henry. I've come to a decision.'
`You're going to make more of an effort with Rudi?'
`Huh. Be real. No, I'm going to join a gay support network online. I've already got three sites and I'm ready to register with one that's specifically for teens.'
`Oh ... great.'
`Thanks for the enthusiasm.'
`Sorry, Davey. No, it's good that you're doing this. I'm sure it'll help.'
`Yeah and I've also taken out a subscription to a gay porn site. It's totally amazing what these guys do. I'm blowing my nuts three times a day.'
`Aah, OK. Less socially responsible, but whatever turns you on. What if you get caught?'
`I'm using the wi-fi modem on my laptop, and deleting the logs. Should be OK providing no one walks in on me. Hey, why don't you come round one evening and we can wank off together?'
`Davey, somehow I should have realised there was a getting-Henry-naked subtext to all this. It is not going to happen. Enjoy your cyber sex.'
`Curses,' David said, but grinned very fetchingly, and reminded Henry as he did that there was part of Henry which very much wanted to be naked with Davey.
For a long while Trinity term was more tranquil than the term which had preceded it, but with exams and assessed essays all coming due, that was hardly a surprise. It was at the end of May that normality resumed, and the A2 courses commenced. There was also a new challenge that took Ed and Henry by surprise, although it shouldn't have. The lower sixth was herded into the lecture hall and the head of sixth began to go through the process of university application with the boys. They were taken through the UCAS process, and the online form filling. But so far as choice of university was concerned, they were told to get on with it. For most of the boys the choice was limited: Oxbridge, St Andrews, Bristol or Durham.
`We could go for Cambridge, babe,' suggested Ed.
Henry was less keen. `I'd be surprised if you didn't get a place, but I'm not so confident. Do we want to go to the same uni?' As he said it he looked up at Ed through his dark lashes. He was not surprised to see a look of shock at the idea of separating come over his lover's face.
Ed gathered himself. `It's together for me babe, or not at all. That's why Cambridge or Oxford would be best. We could be in the same town but in different colleges, and with plenty of social space around us.'
`Yes, Ed, I see that, but what if you got in and I ended up somewhere else, like, I dunno ... Cardiff or Wolverhampton. It's not an unlikely scenario. I'm not as academic as you.'
The boys also had to register course preferences in advance. Ed had already decided on History, but Henry was torn as to whether he would loyally carry on with his best A Level, Religious Studies, or not. Ed advised against it. `Theology in university is not RS, little babe. And remember last year, how you were a totally brilliant researcher when we were dealing with the case of Jed and Nathaniel. Dr Mac said you were a natural.' Eventually Henry compromised on joint History and Theology, although Ed insisted that he was making a mistake. David, as it turned out, was keen on St Andrews, and, when they talked about it, Rudi said that he had a hereditary obligation to go to St Johns, Oxford, academic home of the Rassendylls since the eighteenth century.
Rudi had calmed down a lot at school, so much was clear. But Henry had an idea that it was not that he had become acclimatised to Medwardine, but because he was being distracted by something else. He was often on the web till late at night in the study centre, Ed said, and he would disappear in a rush outside on his mobile.
`I think he's into online betting big time,' Ed suggested.
`You seriously think so?'
`Oh yeah. That would account for the tenseness. Maybe he's over his head in debt and is scared his mum will find out. It's what aristocrats do, isn't it?'
`It's not what Fritzy does.'
`No, well Fritzy seems to have the other aristocratic obsession ... sex. He's getting really tedious about him and Maria and their pubescent fumblings.'
No,' said Ed. That was over two days ago. He's now into Natasha, although despite his bravado, I think Maria dropped him rather than the other way round.'
The news from Rothenia was not good, although things were getting no worse. The country seemed to be holding its breath before the June elections, which would settle President Maritz's fortunes once and for all. Ed tested out Andy as to whether he would be allowed to go to Rothenia after school finished and stay with Fritzy and Helge. Andy did not say no, but was ominously reluctant to say yes either. Henry got a downright refusal from his parents, which was highly unusual. It quite upset him. It seemed that Dad had been advised by Dr Mac that it would be better for Henry not to be there this summer.
In the last week of May upper sixth studies began, and a new lower sixth was inducted into the block. It was an unsettling time for all the boys, and Ed and Henry quite frequently went off into the school grounds or into town to escape the raucous celebration of their new status by the ex Year 11s. It was as they were leaving one of the local cafés after a latté and a cake one afternoon, that Ed thought he caught sight of a familiar face above the heads of the crowded High Street.
`Henry ... that's Terry O'Brien!'
`Don't be daft. He's supposed to be in the USA. I don't see him.'
`Yeah, but you'd need a box to stand on. Come on. He's turned down Castle Street. After him!'
They pushed and manoeuvred their way through the crowds, but got inextricably caught behind a young mother with a wide double buggy. There was no way of getting past her other than impolitely. By the time they were at the Castle Street corner, there was no Terry to be seen, or anyone who looked like him. Ed was convinced enough of what he had seen to pull Henry down the street, and even check out the pubs. But there was no luck.
Discrete enquiries by e-mail to Ipswich and Highgate produced only the information that Terry was thought to be still in the States, but that he had said that he would eventually go down to his parents in Wiltshire.
That might explain it, Ed,' said Henry. He could be living with his parents and taking his mind off stuff by doing tourism. Medwardine's quite the tourist magnet, and he could reach us easily on a day trip.'
Ed was not convinced. `If he was coming to Medwardine, you'd think he'd remember we were here and say hello?'
Henry looked a little solemn, `It may be that in his condition of grief, avoiding people he knows could be his first priority.'
They looked sadly at each other.