You Missed a Bit - It's Only Me from Across the Sea

You Missed a Bit

by It's Only Me from Across the Sea

The story is copyright © 2016 by "Its Only Me from Across the Sea". All rights reserved. It was first published in May 2016 on iomfats.org

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It's strange what you notice first about someone.

The other strange thing is that there's a time when you start noticing things. Before that time you're just kids.

At my Prep School there was a kid with one hand, my best mate. We were like puppies, playing happily together, play wrestling in our back garden in the holidays, too. Damn, that stump hurt if he got cross and hit me with it. But it wasn't what I noticed about him, nor his flaming red hair, nor freckles. They were just him. I just noticed that I liked him.

There was the fat kid with the single chicken pox mark on his nose. It didn't help, but it didn't hinder. He was the butt of our dislike because he just plain wasn't likeable.

Another had a collapsed cheekbone. We had to notice that. We'd been told on pain of being beaten that we mustn't mention it. So we didn't. Instead we played with him.

We had fat kids, skinny kids, hair of all colours, two African kids, three Indian kids, and a Burmese kid. No-one was good looking nor ugly. Not even Simon with his collapsed cheek and lopsided face. We were just kids, untroubled by anything except school and home.

We were aware of sex, in an early 1960s kind of way. I was 11 when I lost my virginity. I was also the only person present! Today that would be naïve. Then, that's how we thought. And we discussed it, make no mistake about that.

Ian told us that he and his older sister had sex. We believed him, but we didn't.

Ian and Paul went to the woods on their way home and had a regular rub-up session. See, we were naïve about words, too. No-one knew it was called wanking. Ian complained to us that Paul had peed on him instead of shooting sperms.

We giggled. At 11 I'd still not seen sperms anyway. I thought until way past then it was all about a special sort of pee, but wasn't clear on the details. I'm not entirely sure why I though Ian would have preferred sperms, and I am also not sure whether it was pee. But they didn't know either.

We talked about our willies, but didn't show them to each other. At 11 my foreskin was still finishing separating from my glans. I thought pee came out of the centre and sperms came out of a ring of still concealed tiny holes under the ridge that was just starting to show. There was no-one to ask except my school friends. They had no idea either.

We had books. They were useless.

Well, we had 'The Facts of Life – A Family Doctor Booklet' by Roger Pilkington MD, price one shilling, where sex was explained by banana fruit flies. We all had this, and giggled at it, but were none the wiser.

And yet, it didn't matter. And we still didn't believe it about Ian and his older sister. And, if it was true, why wouldn't he share?

I noticed, and wondered about, Johnny Groce's willy, which was much larger than mine, ours. He could be persuaded to show us in the changing rooms. It was impressive, in a 'gosh, that's a big willy' kind of way. It was short and stubby and fat.

I noticed one day when a boy a year older than I persuaded another boy to bend over, pull his cheeks apart, and show him his bottom. I was impressed, and curious. So were some others. This was rude!

All the way to my change of school as I turned thirteen I was precisely what I needed to be. I was a normal, silly, little boy, though very body shy. And I was also, as far as I knew, interested in girls, or the concept of girls, and the mysteries of that potentially intriguing body part, the cunt.

If Playboy hadn't airbrushed cunts out I might have seen one. We'd managed to find a copy of Playboy and smuggled it into school. It lasted two days before some goody two shoes little idiot told Sir about it. Sir confiscated it. We decided that Sir had never seen a cunt either.

We noticed that half of us were Roundheads – circumcised – and half were Cavaliers – not circumcised – and we, the Cavaliers, when we discussed rub-ups with Roundheads wondered to them how they did it. We knew they were at a disadvantage, and so did they. Harry said he rubbed the tip on his leg, which we wondered about since legs point downwards and stiff willies point the other way. But Harry said he made sperms, so we had to believe him.

We never noticed who was good looking, who was not. Later I realised Ian was cute and Paul was handsome, but that was a long time later. We never cared who was ugly. We were boys enjoying being boys. We noticed who was good at sports, football, cricket, running, that sort of stuff. We noticed who was good at school work. We revered those who were good at things, but never despised those who were poor at them.

We learned, by heart, 'On First Looking Into Chapman's Homer', by John Keats:

Much have I travelled in the realms of gold,
And many goodly states and kingdoms seen;
Round many western islands have I been
Which bards in fealty to Apollo hold.
Oft of one wide expanse had I been told
That deep-browed Homer ruled as his demesne;
Yet did I never breathe its pure serene
Till I heard Chapman speak out loud and bold:
Then felt I like some watcher of the skies
When a new planet swims into his ken;
Or like stout Cortez when with eagle eyes
He stared at the Pacific -and all his men
Looked at each other with a wild surmise -
Silent, upon a peak in Darien.

When tested, reciting it aloud, most of us couldn't get past the Deep Brown Homo, and collapsed in giggles, giggles that stopped us being able to 'remember' the rest.

We knew that those Homos did something that made their willies brown, and were pleasantly disgusted, for we were twelve, and boys. Homos we were not. They got brown willies. And bottoms, notwithstanding the interesting view with cheeks pulled apart, were, obviously, smelly and dirty and disgusting. Anyone only had to check for skid-marks to know that.

I touched mine once, though, to find out; my finger ended up dirty, smelly, and disgusting. And I'd wiped properly. But we only had Izal or Ibcol crispy toilet paper, which was great for Geography homework to put on maps and trace coastlines with, but crap at crap, so to speak. One had 'Now Wash Your Hands Please' printed on each sheet. The other didn't. It had the word 'Medicated'. At home we were posh, We had Bronco. It was De Luxe! Still had skid-marks, though.

We were, I was, innocent, despite trying hard not to be.

We changed schools when I was just 13, in 1965. I was no less innocent when I arrived at the huge Public School I'd allegedly been being prepared for by my Prep School. This was a big world, full of massive doses of airborne testosterone and face-borne acne, full of boys who looked like men and had deep voices, full of new rules, new faces, new things.

Term started a week into September, and it was bewildering. Almost no friends came with me from Prep School, and loads of other boys were new, too, finding our way, muddling through, getting into trouble for things we didn't know were wrong, being scared of the potential initiation ceremony that never happened because we had no idea what it was and that it wouldn't.

And we had to have showers after Games, and Games we had every day, including Saturdays. And I was body shy as shy could be. I may have had a willy, but the only person who'd ever seen it was Ian in a changing cubicle we were sharing at the public baths. And he'd grabbed it, yanked it, hurt it, and laughed at it.

A cock it was not. It was a tiny little thing, and was hairless. And I was sure everyone else was bigger and better. I'd seen Johnny Groce's. I was sure I was a freak. I wanted more puberty and now! He was a Roundhead, though. I wanted my Cavalier equipment to grow. I didn't dare be looked at or, worse, laughed at in the shower. So I skipped them.

About three weeks in we were changing in the boxroom for games. He wasn't in my class, he was in the B stream. I was in the A stream. I hadn't any friends yet, not really truly friends, not like Michael, my redhead puppy friend. I missed Michael.

I've not seen it before or since. We were all slightly built, and he was no different. And, when he took his shirt off, something that was a real pain because we had stiff detached collars, and collar studs and awful things to wear with our scratchy, grey, school uniform suits, when he took his shirt off there was the strangest thing.

My arms had that soft, sparse fluff most boys have. Because I'm very blond my arm fluff is very blond, too. I even have blond, well, yellow, eyebrows!

Barfield wasn't as blond as me. Not on his head. But his arms were blonder.

Barfield's arms had a tousle of long, blond, fine hair that you couldn't help look at. It was so long that you could comb it, and was thick, too. It looked as if it would be wonderful to stroke. And I was. My hand had gone to his forearm, as if with a mind of his own. I was? It was. It was so soft.

"They used to call me the 'Furry Animal' at my last school," he said, smiling. And those were the first words he'd ever said to me.

"I'm sorry." I was blushing. "It looks so beautiful. I didn't even know I was touching you."

"I rather like it. It's different."

"Wish I had it!"

"It's hell after a shower, though. I can't get dry easily. My back's a bit like it, too. Look." And he turned, and I looked. And it was, but the arms, his arms, were soft and a bit skinny, and silver-gold and furry and beautiful. "My front isn't, though."

As he said that he turned back, dropped his trousers and pants to be stark naked, and put on his rugby shorts, something I was still too shy to do without doing a weird dance with shirt tails pulled down. And he was right. The long, soft, strokable down was on his arms, a lot, his back, a little, and nowhere else. And I mean nowhere else.

At least my tiny and hairless willy wasn't unique!

Apart from that weird interchange that was, pretty much, all we said to each other that day. He and I were in the same year, so we hung out in the same area of the dayroom, and changed in the same area of the boxroom, but Barfield had arrived last term and already knew his way about. If 'sealegs' were a useful concept for our lives as day boys, then he had 'em and I didn't, yet.

That night my life changed.

The usual routine, home, a marathon in itself, starting with leaving school at 7 in the evening after we'd done an hour's homework, a bus into town, then a walk to the station, a train to my stop and a mile's walk home, supper, another set of homework, bath and bed. Followed by me-time, and my usual mechanical yet enjoyable task of making myself sleepy.

It had always been mechanical until that day. Into bed, sip of water, lights out, bedclothes pushed upwards, willy out and hard, and ten seconds later a panting oblivion until morning. I'd timed it once at seven seconds. And the joy, now of actually knowing what sperms looked and felt like, even though I had a teeny willy!

That night, something odd happened.

No, look, it was odd to me, that's all.

That night, the ten seconds seemed, somehow, more luxurious. My mind was drifting as I coaxed my willy to hardness in a whole second! But my hand was slower, my fingers were remembering, I think, the touch of the Furry Animal's arm. And the memory felt good. I'd done it slowly before. It wasn't a decision to go slow that night, but it felt right, seemed right. It wasn't a race that night.

As nature forced my hand to accelerate I swear I saw Barfield's face in my head. And it looked radiant. And I was thinking 'that's weird' as nature took right over and I went over the brink into out-of-breathness and sticky wonder. I know I fell asleep that night thinking how odd that had been.

Usually a rub-up was along the lines of 'how can anything feel that good?' That night I think I found out about sex, even though there was no-one else there!

Newsflash! The real name for a rub-up is having a wank!

That shows what my last school taught me!

One of the seniors was teasing another about 'wanking his little cock and thinking of his little sister', so I learned the word. Or I think I did.

Days of school routine dragged interminably. Barfield had become Furry Barfield or Furry Animal to just about everyone, though. Maybe he'd been that before and I hadn't noticed. It's strange what you do and don't notice.

I was noticing looks. That was new. I wasn't noticing beauty, I was noticing plain. I'd never noticed plain before, nor beauty. Plain was in the majority. And how can a 13 year old boy have round shoulders, greasy hair, and so much dandruff? We had several of those, and each of them had won a scholarship to here because they were good at work. But we had games every day. They must have got fitter, better, surely?

And they can't all have been skipping showers like me, so it stands to reason that the school carbolic soap and their hair must come into contact?

I almost took a scholarship. Wonder if... Nah, that's silly.

Most of us weren't gruesome like that.

I wondered about handsome. I started a list.

• Ian, blond, ears like an elf. Probably
• Paul, dark, almost olive skin. Definitely
• Furry, blond, slightly upturned nose. Possibly

Then I gave up. It was only in my head, and more than three was too many to count. I wondered what would happen if I'd written it down and it had escaped. Something told me that a list of good looking boys was a weird list to have.

I wondered if I'd be on my good-ish looking boys list?

Games wasn't always organised. If you weren't picked for a side, and I was on a basic shags side, the lowest of the low, then there were choices. These choices were inflicted on you. When I said 'choice' I meant Hobson's. And my choice that Tuesday was a cross country run, up the road to the golf club, up hill and down dale, to the race course at the top, then along to touch the tea hut, and back across a couple of roads we'd crossed already, to the golf club, and down the road and back to the house. We ran alone or with friends, on our honour to complete the course, and to run all the way.

People discovered to have no honour were sent straight back out to do it again. There was no honour lost in telling a prefect that another boy had no honour, thus honour was enforced, like the choice to do it in the first place.

Fit boys could do it in well under 20 minutes, very fit boys in well under 15.

I wasn't unfit.

I could do it in just over 26 minutes. Not 25. Twenty six.

I wasn't unfit, but I was useless at moving my legs fast.

What didn't help was that the ground was the chalk of the Downs, and, in the small valley bottoms, the grass had been worn away by golf shoes, and golf trolleys, and runners' feet and the slippery chalk mud was all that was there, especially if it was raining.

What helped even less was that we had to run in plimsoles and that plimsoles have smooth soles.

I set off alone, as early after lunch as I could. I wanted to get back and ahead on my homework. After games we had free time, and I had loads of homework to catch up on.

It would make a pleasant walk in dry weather, with a couple of border terriers and a friend to talk to. The ironically named Updown Hill went up to the Downs as a steady climb past expensive homes, and, after a quarter of a mile we turned onto the Downs. It was leafy at first and then downland grass, luckily just as our Geography lessons said it would be. On a sunny day it was impressive rather than beautiful, and the view from the top was wide. All of London was set out in the distance.

In that day's constant rain it was bleak. My hair was soaked, my shirt was soaked at the front at least, and my plimsoles, churning for grip, were coated already in chalk slime. And I'd already had to retie the laces, hidden somewhere in the slippery yuck. And then I'd wiped my hair out of my eyes, and neither hand had been clean.

Following which I measured my length, just missing the worst of the puddles.

I was wishing for all sorts of things including a thermos of hot soup as I picked myself up and heard running feet from behind me.

Feet which passed me at speed and whose owner laughed at me.

Today, I'd decided, was a day when I could no longer skip a shower. Getting warm and clean again overcame being shy as hell. And to be fair, my more than glimpse of Furry Animal's non furry equipment had told me all I needed to know. If he was that size and I was that size and he could shower and be naked in the boxroom, so, with a bit of bravery, could I.

A hot bath would have been nicer.

If only I been able to run fast the torture would have been over faster. Umpteen minutes later, honour satisfied, I peeled my sodden shirt off. At least it was no longer virgin white, the mark of shame on the Rugby pitch, scraped my shorts off, and found I'd forgotten to take my socks and plimsoles off first. After I'd solved that it wasn't worth trying a towel round my waist any more to preserve the modesty I was trying to lose anyway, so I carried it.

At least the showers were running. I didn't have to figure out how they worked as well as venture in for the first time. Four showerheads in row, no compartments, occupied by five or six older boys whose names I didn't know properly. And none of them looked about to get out of the way to let a mere junior get in.

I hung my towel on the floor with the others, walked towards the wall of tall, and found I was wet; hot wet this time. Seems the etiquette was just to let folk in. And one of them passed me a lump of school carbolic soap.

"Thanks."

"You look as if you need two," he said through the spray. "What on earth happened to you?"

"Fell over on the Downs."

"Fucking mud and fucking plimsoles!"

"Would be disgusting," said another.

"What?" he replied, perplexed.

"Fucking mud and fucking plimsoles, as an act of fucking, would be disgusting."

"Fucking disgusting."

"Fucking would be."

"Fucking would be fun. Fucking mud and fucking plimsoles, by contrast, would be gritty and rubbery."

I hadn't joined in, but this was fun. I was laughing. I wondered why I'd been shy.

"You missed a bit," first voice said, and pointed to my chest.

"Yuck, thanks."

"Lower down, too."

I giggled. "I'll get to it." Beats me how the mud had arrived all that way inside my shorts, but that is where it had arrived.

I wanted to stand there for ever, getting warm again, but a sudden inrush of others arrived. I'd no idea how they'd all get under the shower anyway, let alone with me there, so found a pipe to park the soap on and got out and dry and headed back to my locker.

At least I'd never need to be shy again. Everyone must've gone through the same stuff. This puberty lark sucks. They didn't tell us that in the Family Doctor Booklet, price one shilling! It would have been so easy. But maybe banana fruit flies didn't have showers in their schools. Anyway, I seemed to have been accepted by some more senior boys, quite a bonus.

Odd, though. I didn't mind having my muddy and perfect scale model cock pointed at by an older boy. Modesty vanished in one fell swoop. Actually, just one swoop. There was nothing 'fell' about it.

I didn't just not mind. I rather liked it.

And I realised I'd walked back to my locker with my towel over my shoulder, not round my waist. I made a decision then. No more Mr Shy Guy. Not only was there absolutely no point, I could reinvent myself at this new school, be whoever I wanted to be. And no longer being a shy, scared kid was part of that.

Back at my locker, Furry was changing out of his games kit. I decided to swagger, and tripped over. Landed on top of him. Dignified or what!

"I didn't know you loved me that much!" He was laughing.

I was blushing again. Had to cover it with silliness. "Just wanted you in my arms. Thought I'd get undressed early for you!"

"Idiot!"

"I could be your idiot if you play your cards right!" I'm still not sure where that came from.

"Gerroff, I need a shower."

"You can say that again!"

"Gerroff, I need a shower!"

The weird thing was I was starting to feel a rush of warmth in the gentleman's area. Do boys have a gentleman's area? That would never do. The warmth, not the decision about the gentleman's area. I'd never had that when Michael and I were wrestling like puppies. As I untangled myself I saw he wasn't as small as he'd been before. I wondered if he was having a warmer time, too. And why. I mean for either of us. The 'love me' banter was pretty normal stuff. It went on all the time between pretty much everyone. There was a weird homoerotic attitude in the school. I'd worked out that it was ok to pretend, but not ok to mean it. Or I thought I had.

So, nothing led me to expect, home having been slogged to, homework, which needs to be called 'prep', though what it prepared us for I had no clue since it was the same work as in class, what happened later.

Bath having been had despite an earlier shower, ablative absolute having been used to death previously in Latin prep, I was in bed, mulling over the events of the day.

Er, no. I was doing something else

All my wanking life, both years of it, since I was a sneeze over 11, wanking had been a wonderful, explosive, mechanical event. I'd even done it in lessons at Prep School. It was less convenient when juices started to flow, and I couldn't do it as often because it was either refusing to stand up straight or was too darned sensitive, but it was an act of pure sensation, not emotion.

And it made sleep come easily.

That night was unusual. I'd no idea it was going to happen. My hand had gone south while I was getting ready to go to sleep, and I'd started my usual routine, but slower this time. There was a doggerel rhyme I'd half overheard somewhere that stayed in my head, too. It ended:

"… There's a newt up my bum;
It nibbles at my prostate gland,
And bites it when I cum!"

I knew what 'cum' meant now. I'd not looked up what the gland was, but I'd remembered the fascination with the parted buttocks and the bottom. I confess it. I'd used a hand mirror and looked at mine almost at once after that. It was odd-ish, and interesting-ish, yet without an obvious entrance. That night, the bum having been scrubbed in the bath, my fingers roamed between my legs and found it.

I never knew that existed before. It was all dry and tickly, and interesting and entirely impenetrable. Obviously there was a way in, but that meant finding something in the bathroom. But, just touching the outside was fun. And my other hand went to work. Though more slowly than usual. This was something to savour.

And it was. Only, two things happened, apart from my nearly crushing my bum hand between my thighs. My ears heard 'you missed a bit, lower down, too' and my brain saw me entangled with Furry, and his arms and his face swam into my imagination and then the fireworks hit. And they were the best fireworks yet.

I was glad my parents couldn't actually read my mind. It must have been transmitting on loud and very clear.

And my stuff hit my chin, such as it was. Stuff, not the chin. Ewww. It almost went in my mouth. Which got me wondering what it tasted like. Weirdly I didn't use the small supply I had in order to find out. I kind of wanted to find out what someone else's tasted like. Which made so much sense. Not.

Thinking about other boys seemed odd, though.

So did the mixed bag of dreams that night, including one about kissing a boy, just a random one, no real face, but he was definitely a boy.

"Morning 'Missed-a-Bit'!" greeted me as I got to school the next day.

"I got it clean! All of it!" I laughed at him. "And I've got a name."

"Me too," he said. "Pete Grenville"

I looked at him for the first time above the waist. He was about six inches taller than me, with swept back red hair. I'd noticed the red in the shower, but in a different location, light freckles and an open smile. I liked him at once from his smile. I'd half liked him already in the shower. Odd, again, what you notice and how fast. I tried hard to remember my name. "James Hawkins."

"Hi Jamie!" I swear he was laughing, but not exactly at me.

"Ok, you can call me Jamie. Most folk seem to call me Hawkins. I'm already fed up with surnames only. It always makes me feel I'm in trouble." Pete had green eyes. I thought back to Michael and had no idea what colour his eyes were.

"You settling in all right?"

"Yeah. It's a choice, isn't it?"

"Is it?"

"Yes." This time I was definite. "You can either be frightened of the place, and being all junior again, or you can become part of it. I worked that out yesterday on my way home. I chose to be part of it. Starting today." I surprised myself. I hadn't known all that was in there when I opened my mouth.

"You'll do, Jamie. I like you already."

"Thanks, Pete. I just have to work out what I mean, I think." I was grinning from ear to ear.

"Did you know Grenville before you came here?" Furry asked me at break.

"Nope. Met him in the showers yesterday."

"Sorry, you did what?"

"I met him in the showers yesterday."

"You don't meet people in the showers!"

"If you say so. It was just before I fell into your arms and you started to declare your undying love for me."

"Ah... That... Well... I didn't... Did I?" He looked confused.

I'd no idea where this was going. Half of me was playing the fool and a weird new half was enjoying the strangeness of the conversation and the warm sensation at crotch level. I was starting to get hard. I mean I knew I was flirting, but I had no idea that he had been too, if he had. Something told me that it was a now or never moment. But what should happen now, could happen now?

"I wouldn't have minded if you had." That was almost safe. I could deny things if I had to. I felt we were fencing, not scoring points exactly, more finding out more about each other.

"Seriously?"

"Seriously. No-one can have too many good friends. And if someone loves you then they have to be the best type of friend ever, don't they?"

"I can't keep using your surname if we're to be good friends."

"I know what you mean. I like the idea of you being a furry animal, an' all, and the name's fun and suits you, but I'd much rather know your real name. Oh. Jamie. Me, I mean."

"You're weird, you know. I'm Jason. You can still call me Furry if you like, though"

It was very unusual. I'd never met a Jason before. I didn't know the name, nor like the name before, but it suited him. So I liked it from that point. "What would you like me to call you?" That seemed wisest.

"It's odd. At home I'm Jason, especially when I'm in trouble. Before I came here I was almost always Furry Animal. I don't really like my name in full. I'd like to be called Jay, I think, please?"

"Jay it is. Jay and Jamie." I don't know why, but I took hold of both his hands and met his eyes when I said it. Something meaningful took place, but I had no idea what. What I did know was that this boy, Jay, Jay Barfield, was important to me, suddenly.

Whatever meaningful was going on was interrupted by the second half of the morning's lessons. There was no bell to start them, just one at the end of lessons. We grabbed the books for the next two periods, and went in different directions, something left unsaid, yet not.

We didn't coincide all afternoon until we went to tea just after four. I was getting used to the very long days. The benefit of the school being mostly for boarders was that we had a late afternoon tea 'meal' after Games. It was really tea, too. Tea from an urn and bread and marge and red jam.

I'd kept my resolve in the shower department. Stripped naked, towel over the shoulder all the way to the shower room, filed the towel this time on the window catch missing the floor completely, showered, soaped, dried and changed back into the suit without a concern in the world, outwardly, anyway. Inside it was a bit scary, but you can't be a new you without doing new things. I did wish collar studs and detached collars would be abolished. Apparently they saved laundry costs for the boarders. The collars were washed more often than the shirts.

Jay and I went to tea together. Didn't talk much. Trivial stuff. Previous schools, that sort of thing. But there was something prickling away at me, and not just the scratchy wool of the suit trousers. It was building, slowly. It's not something you recognise the first time it happens.

Said Hi to Pete on the way back. Got a huge smile in return. He was walking in company. I heard one say "Is that your little boy?" to him, and his reply of "He could be if he likes." I heard laughter after that, but they'd gone.

"Do you like?" Jay asked me.

"I like him, not sure what this 'little boy' stuff is, though."

"Older boys get crushes on younger boys, some return it. Returned or not, if an older boy fancies you then the weird tradition here is that you are his little boy. And that's even if you don't like it, or him, or the idea, or whatever."

"Now I understand. I'd heard it around and hadn't worked it out."

"So, do you want to be his little boy?"

"That's not answerable, and you know it. By definition he has to fancy me and then it's a done deal by your rules."

"No, silly. I mean, if he did, would you mind?"

"Seriously? I've not ever thought about it. He's good looking and seems to be fun, and he likes me and I like him. And he's got a great smile..." I watched something changing on Jay's face. "But, like I said yesterday, Jay and Jamie."

"Really?"

"Jay, I'm not sure what's going on, but I like you a very great deal. I'm drawn to you. It's like I've known you for ever, not just here and the past few days..."

"...ve you!" The smallest exclamation I hadn't managed to hear. Or not quite hear.

"Did you just say what I think you said?"

"Don't hate me, Jamie. Please don't hate me?" His eyes were downturned.

"Why would I? I told you that yesterday. I think I do too. You, I mean." I dropped to a whisper, too. "Love you. Or I think I do. I haven't felt this feeling before."

"Oh. Wow!" Happy.

"Yeah." Comfy.

Weird, though, and quite unexpected. Both parts, I mean. Being told and telling him. I had no idea what to do.

"I don't know what to do next."

"Nor me. I'd rather like to hold you in my arms, but this is absolutely not the place to do that."

What we did do was to exchange phone numbers and addresses quickly because we were almost late for the afternoon roll call, followed by House Prep. No after Games lessons on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays. It was still a long haul home for me, though.

After House Prep we talked a little. Maybe both a little shy suddenly. I know I was. His eyes shone, I expect mine did too. I'd never kissed anyone, but I wondered about his lips. I wondered, too, about Deep Brown Homo. That just didn't describe this.

"Jay, do we dare hold each other?"

"Still prefects about. I so do not want to get caught doing that."

"Maybe tomorrow?"

I wanted to phone as soon as I got home. That wasn't going to work. The phone was in the lounge. We were posh, obviously. Other folk had living rooms; we had a lounge. Actually, we had a through-lounge. That made the rather bleak house nicer, and, presumably, posher.

The question I was wrestling with was love. That sentence would not have gone down well with any of my English teachers. Hmm, nor would the use of that adverb. We were discouraged from using adverbs. 'Good writing, Mr Hawkins, does not require an adverb.' Love isn't a question, and I wasn't wrestling with love. I'd have been quite interested in wrestling with Jay like I'd wrestled with Michael, but it seemed very different.

With Michael it had been silly fun on the back lawn, giggling and trying to get the upper hand. I adored Michael, but I didn't love him. He was just my best mate.

Jay seemed different, more... less...

No. I was different. Before Jay I'd been an ordinary small boy. I wasn't any bigger, but something inside had changed. That something was too big to contain. My heart wanted to explode. Something, something odd that started with my noticing his adorable long-furred arms, with my weird reaching out and touching him to stroke the fur, something was making me feel increasingly dizzy. And I'd not imagined anything like this before.

And, to confuse matters, I had a bit of that feeling towards Pete, too.

There was nowhere I could think of to be private during the day. School seemed to be designed like that. Classrooms were out of bounds outside lessons, there was no privacy in the boxroom, nor the dayroom. The most private places were the public places.

There was no easy scope to invite people home. There hardly any time, either.

And I wasn't at all sure what I wanted to be doing if I found somewhere private. I was as far ahead as liking the idea of holding Jay in my arms. I wondered how far ahead he was in what he wanted. Maybe he'd take the lead?

I guessed that, alone with Pete, he'd take the lead, but a bit faster than I wanted. If he was that way inclined, of course.

If only I knew what I wanted, what I wanted.

Bathed again and in bed, I investigated a bit more. In the bath I'd found a yielding when I'd been doing careful cleaning. I'd also looked up 'prostate' after the newt doggerel. Made a mistake at first and found 'prostrate', which was no help at all. The real definition wasn't too helpful either"

Prostate: an organ near the penis in male mammals that produces a liquid that mixes with and carries sperm

I had visions of someone playing the organ near my penis. Then I thought about them playing an oboe. Couldn't make up my mind whether I'd prefer hands or a mouth. Lordy where did that come from?

That apart, I wondered exactly where it was. Up my bum, obviously. So I was prepared. We now had one fewer in the box of Price's Household Candles, and the one I had now had a closely trimmed wick. It wasn't very big, diameter-wise, but it was a bit bigger than I was, though considerably longer, a whole five inches long. And I also had a very small amount from mum's pot of Pond's Cold Cream secreted about my person.

Secreted around the yielding bit.

Bedclothes back I applied the science of curiosity, aimed the candle and pushed quite hard. I'm not sure quite what I expected, but the candle going in very easily and suddenly was not it. Nor was the sudden and rather interesting hot pain and the sudden strengthening of my already hard cock. My eyes watered a bit, but out is where that candle was not going to be pulled. I'd shat bigger turds than this candle, so it stood to reason I wasn't damaging anything. And my cock liked it, whatever it was that was happening. So I helped it stay put.

Which gave me the very best one ever up to that point except the very first one.

And then I needed it out and fast. Which was another thing I hadn't expected.

Since good things come in threes, I hadn't expected to need the loo suddenly either!

At least that gave me time to think while I was waiting for nothing to happen for about ten minutes.

Queers, as we knew from Chapman's Homer as adapted by us, do things with cocks and arses. Shoving a candle up my arse didn't make me queer, but it gave me the most awesome set of sensations, but all 'shove it in and stretch it' based, presumably. No newts found anything to nibble, so there was more to it, probably. But nothing else was going up there that night!

The other thing was that it was back to mechanical. The sensations were so different that no-one's fur or voice or face turned up. This was a straight 100 yards sprint, from candle to finish line. And I think in under ten seconds, too. A British Indoor Record for candle stuffing, held by Jamie Hawkins.

I did try to go again when I got back to bed, having hidden the candle carefully. My cock was having none of it. It got semi-stiff and chuckled at me. Didn't matter. I had a whole new way to wank.

Should I be wanting to stick my cock up Jay's arse? Or up Pete's? That must have been in my head as I fell asleep, because I woke up in the middle of the weirdest dream.

I was in the woods, and there was a boy there I didn't know, with me, both in games kit, Him with his back to me, me with my arms around him, and my cock vanishing up the leg of his shorts to a nebulous in the dream but obvious when awake place, with him pushing back against me and one of us saying "So easy, so easy," again and again.

That was almost as good as the wank! I'd dreamt about sex! No trains and tunnels for me, oh no. Real live sex!

I wish I'd been able to go back to sleep and finish it.

It would be great to have been able to say that Jay and I found a private place to hug the next day at school. We did go to tea together. I'd managed to tell him on the way I was starting to understand about loving him, and how wonderful it felt, but it got crowded, and impossible.

The way back was better. "Jay, how often do you wank?" At my Prep School we talked about this stuff all the time, so it wasn't an unusual thing for me to say.

"As often as I can, at least once a day. More if I get the chance."

"Me too. I er..."

"You er... what?"

"I may have found a better way to do it."

"How?"

I wondered if I might be digging myself into a hole. "Would you like me to show you?"

He was quiet. I was afraid I'd scared him off a bit. Then, "Well, love and sex go together, don't they?"

I was all a-blush. "They do, and I love you. And I think I want to do more than just the holding you in my arms part that I haven't done yet. But where, how?" I wasn't planning a candle, that was too... impersonal. I was planning fingers, probably. And that dream. Only, actually, I was planning that he was the one behind me.

"I'd invite you home for lunch after Sunday chapel, but there's no privacy. I've got a kid brother and two kid sisters."

"Let me see if I can have you over on Sunday? I'm an only child. We can't let on to my folks, though."

"Wouldn't they know you're an only child?"

"Brat!"

"Yes, but I'm your brat! And yes, I know what you mean."

"If the weather's good we can go for a walk after lunch."

"And, if not, we can be very quiet."

"Jay?"

"Mmmm?"

"I don't want us to be only about sex, you know."

"Nor me. I really, really like you too, but I fancy you something rotten as well."

"I'm starting to be crazy about you, too."

It was lucky we were alone and no-one could overhear us. And being alone was unusual in a school our size.

"You can come. Bring a change of clothes. I can't ever wait to get out of these collars!"

I'd got it arranged. Jay and I would get a lift home after chapel finished at around eleven. Dad gave me a ride there and back on chapel Sundays. And Jay was invited to stay to lunch and to tea. We each had to get prep finished before chapel, or the deal was off. His folks had the same idea as mine when he asked permission to come.

"You're to come to ours another Sunday," he said. "Turn and turn about."

But Sunday was a couple of days away.

Our school days were very full. Friday I was on a cross country run again. I was a spare again from basic shags side 603. I didn't miss that much. I didn't like cross country, but at least 26 minutes of slogging round the Downs was better than traipsing to the furthest rugby pitch from the boxroom and fart arsing around for an hour or so before trudging back, and it meant I could get ahead on my prep in the spare part of the afternoon.

Running steps from behind. "Hi Jamie!" Pete slowed down to my breathless attempt at running.

"Hi (pant) Pete (gasp)."

"You won't get far like that." His voice meant it kindly, but it felt like a slap in the face.

"(Wheeze)!"

"Look, you seem fit enough," he was running backwards in front of me, and without either panting for breath or falling over, "but you don't move your legs right."

"'splain?"

"When you take a step you move them up and down, and quite fast. What you don't seem to do is reach forward with them."

"Show me?"

So he did. First a caricature of what he said was me, legs pumping but not moving forward much, and then an exaggerated long lope, something I hadn't realised I ought to be doing, at least the right version. No-one taught us this stuff ever, It was just assumed that we knew it. Just like football, cricket, rugby, the lot. "Try."

So I did. And he kept with me up to the top of the hill. And I ran a bit better. Not at first, but it got easier, except for the hill part. I could tell because I wasn't so out of breath. "Thanks, thanks a lot. That's helped. I wasn't ever shown before."

"S'ok." We were trotting side by side. "Jamie? I really like you. I mean a lot. I followed you because I wanted to tell you, talk to you. I mean a real lot, Jamie, a whole lot. I know I'm older than you and everything and I don't want it to worry you or anything."

"You want me to be your little boy, is that it?"

He looked nervous. Paused. "I don't think of you like that. Yes, in a way, but no. You're special. I was going to say you've got spunk, but I think you might misunderstand. It's a spark in your eyes, and you're dead good looking. And I overheard you and Barfield walking back from tea a day or two ago and I wondered if, whether, if you might like me a little bit, too. You smile at me as if you might?"

That was a big speech. "I, er, oh..."

"I've made a fool of myself, haven't I? Please don't tell anyone, please?" He looked about to burst into tears.

That did it. I already knew I wanted him a bit, and I felt sorry for him. "You can kiss me if you like, when we get to that copse." We were about 50 yards away. I didn't even feel disloyal to Jay. Jay I love, nothing could change that. Pete was a whole different thing. And I was up for it. And maybe Pete knew things it would take Jay and me ages to learn. And Pete was fun, and nice and I was in his arms and his tongue was in my mouth! And his hands were on my shoulders, on my back, on my bum. And I was rock hard, and pressing against him and I could feel his cock, hard against me, bigger than mine, but not enormous.

I hoped no-one was watching!

And I didn't care, either.

I felt like in my dream, the dream about the boy whom I didn't know, and about the games shorts, which I was wearing and so was Pete, and it felt raw and open air and daring, and very naughty indeed. Only I was facing him, not spooning back into him, but he still, somehow, had his cock up the leg of my shorts, and between my legs, asking to be let in, but not. As he gripped me closer still kissing, I felt him sliding between my thighs, back and forth, and I loved the power I had suddenly and gripped him tight with them and made him push harder.

And he was kissing me. Hard. And, in my head or my ears one of us was saying "So easy, so easy, so easy, so easy," as his cock exploded between my thighs and soaked me and the back of my shorts. And I loved it.

"Oh Jamie..."

"That was... unexpected." I was smiling, but needed something myself.

"Wait." and he knelt down and took me out of my shorts and into his mouth. It only took half a second, and was so intense I collapsed on top of him.

"Wow!"

"Yeah. You're quite something." His lovely red hair was soaked with sweat and his green eyes flashed at me. "I didn't mean to do that, not any of it. Where did you learn to kiss?"

"In this copse, a few moments ago."

"You mean?"

"Never kissed anyone before except aunts. And that never happened with an aunt. They don't have the equipment anyway."

"Do you still like me?"

"What's not to like?" And then I felt the cooling wet patch. "Except this part, that is. What do we do about my shorts?"

"We could sit you in a puddle?"

"Oh great. My first sexual experience with someone other than myself and I end up sitting in a puddle. How about 'no thanks'?"

"Or we could swap."

"That could work. Your shorts have that weird pyjama cord tie at the waist too?"

"Yup." And we swapped. "Damn. Yours are tight!"

"And yours are like a bloody great marquee! Thank god for the cord."

"Sorry, Jamie. I got carried away."

I still had his stuff all over my arse, and put my hand there. It felt interesting. Very interesting.

"Dirty little bugger." He was grinning. "I'll sort the shorts out. You'll find them on the pipes tomorrow. I could be in love with you, you know."

Which is when I found out I could love two people at the same time. It was just different with Pete and with Jay. Pete was my red haired adonis and I felt something raw for him, and Jay was my beautiful Furry Animal. I wanted the raw part with him too, but I also adored even the air he breathed out. And I thought I might be a bit of a tart. And liked the thought.

That dream was odd.

The candle came back into play that night. And, this time, I imagined it was Pete, and Jay, and Jay and Pete. But I knew what Pete's cock felt like, so it was more Pete than Jay.

It still gave me a surprise when it went in, but it turned really good really fast, and I thought I might have found a sensitive spot in there. Go Newts!

Maybe next time, Pete. Maybe next time.

And the open spaces of the Downs could be private, too. Who knew?

One does not mix with more senior boys in the dayroom. Odd how one can't help mixing with them in the showers, then.

While I wasn't mixing with Pete, and was mixing with Jay, he noticed I'd caught his eye. That is Jay noticed I'd caught Pete's eye. "You want to be careful, Jamie," he said in a half whisper. "He's got a bit of a reputation."

The thing was, I really didn't want to be careful. Pete wasn't so much older than me that it mattered, not in looks at least. I was finding out I was a sucker for looks. The things you notice again. Instead of just being surrounded by boys I either liked or didn't my mind had got complicated. Now there were cute boys, handsome boys, rugged boys, pretty boys, boys I liked, boys I didn't, and boys I had a special feeling about. In maths we'd just started doing set theory, and the Venn Diagram would have been very complicated.

Pete was in the intersection of handsome boys, cute boys, boys I liked, and boys I had a special feeling about. Later I'd refine that into boys I lusted over and boys I loved. My Furry Jay, an interesting concept in itself of a bird with fur instead of feathers, was in the set of boys I was so totally blind about that nothing else mattered. Even if he was ugly-fugly I adored him. His set didn't intersect with any other set at all. It wasn't in the same Universal Set, even. It was a set of one. I thought he was probably cute and handsome and pretty all rolled into one, though.

"He has?"

"I heard talk last term about him on the Downs with someone. It was all whispering and knowing looks and giggles."

Did I mind? "Well, I like him. He's been nice to me."

"Just be careful. I love you, but I don't own you. It's not as if we're married. I just wanted you to know."

"What did you hear?" Suddenly I really wanted to know. I tried not to let it into my voice.

"Nothing much. The other boy was older, and he's left now. And there wasn't anything much talked about. But someone saw them kissing, or said he did. No-one knew if he was jealous, shocked, lying, or telling the truth."

"Sounds like something and nothing."

"No smoke without fire."

"Interesting. Doesn't stop me liking him, though. He's nice." Time for a subject change. "You ready for tomorrow?"

"Should I bring anything? Mum thinks I should bring something for yours."

"That's up to your mum. Mums do what they like, they have mum-rules. You'd look a prick arriving for chapel on Sunday with a bunch of flowers or chocolates, though!"

"Shan't be doing that, then!"

"And I thought you loved me! Seriously, just real clothes. Though I'm starting to get used to the scratchy trousers."

I was daydreaming in Latin, wondering about Pete and whoever he was, up on the Downs. Seems it wasn't private after all. More care required. Pete was not coming home for the day, that was 100% certain. There's no way I'd be able to explain that to my folks. I was pretty sure the reverse was also true. Pete and I were to be a 'grab it while you can' thing and we had to be careful not to get... "Mr HAWKINS!"

"Yessir?!"

"Not paying attention. I asked you twice. What was the question?"

I took a stab "Use the subjunctive after 'ut', Sir?"

"Stupid boy. Fifty lines. Pay attention in future."

That meant queuing up at the Housemaster's office after lunch, getting the special lines paper, explaining why I'd been given them in the first place, 'Not paying attention in Latin, Sir.' 'See you do in future, Hawkins. I do not expect you to be writing lines.' writing them out, queuing up again to get them signed by him and then queuing up at the masters' common room to hand them in. And they had to be neat. And they had to be in Latin. Ah bollocks!

It all removed any time for talking to Pete, and to Jay, come to that. Almost made me late for Games, too. At least running down not to be late was easier now Pete had coached me a bit. I reckoned I could probably do the cross country in somewhere around 20 minutes if I wasn't interrupted by a panting redhead on the Downs.

Parents who try too hard are embarrassing. I think mine were probably embarrassing anyway, but they tried too hard too. Jay was carefully not embarrassed when asked about everything that parents always ask about.

Lunch was good. Wiener Schnitzel, and a cabbage salad and fried potatoes.

"You have unusual food," Jay said to me as we walked lunch off. "Loved it, though. And I can hardly understand a word your dad says. He speaks accent with a trace of English!"

"I must be used to the way he talks. I can't hear an accent. He's just my dad to me. He had to get out of Austria after Hitler took it over. Got all his family out, too."

"Your cock isn't Jewish, though?"

"Nor's my mum, so I can't be Jewish. And we eat pork! I think he's a Jew by race, not by religion. For what it's worth we're Church of England. Not that we go. School chapel's the most god I've ever had forced down my throat. And I mean ever. I like my cock the way it is, too."

"I do, too. Or, I think I do. I'm a bit worried mine's too tiny..."

"Same size as mine. I've looked! We might have to measure them." We'd reached the end of the road. Going straight on at the T junction took us into the woods at the top of the field, of 'The Field' as we'd always known it. I used to walk our neighbour's Red Setter for her, well, for me, there sometimes during the school holidays. It wasn't huge, but I knew the quiet places.

About 100 yards across the field we came to one of them. A sort of path into the trees concealed by blackberry bushes, it'd been a prior place of necessary wankage, so I knew it was private, and had a grass and moss covered floor.

"I've been looking forward to this, Jay. Just you and me, no-one else around. I don't really want to do anything. I just want to be close to you, maybe hold you in my arms. Whatever you'd like, really." I was looking into his eyes, holding both his hands. They seemed to change colour in the light. I hadn't ever quite been able to pin the colour down. Grey-blue today, with flecks of greeny-brown.

"What I'd like best," he said, looking right back into mine, "Is to talk to you, and snuggle a bit, and learn about you, and, just maybe, kiss you. I want to know who you are, Jamie Hawkins. I know you're not the the boy in Treasure Island. I'm falling deeper in love with you all the time and I want to know who with."

We sat, talked, held hands. I learned about him and his family and previous school. He told me about where he lived, and I told him about me, and my school, and the little my dad had told me about his history. And it was both ordinary and wonderful. I left out Pete and me on the Downs

"Please will you kiss me?"

And I did. I stood us up, held both his hands to do so, then held him in my arms and, gently, so gently, touched his lips with mine, then licked them with my tongue. This was absolutely not like the urgency I'd felt with Pete. Jay was to be savoured, wooed, courted. And I courted him with my small experience, the best way I knew, which was slow and gentle, and trying to be sensual, though I knew not how.

His lips opened a little, and I felt his tongue tip, and explored it with the tip of mine. It felt like waiting patiently for a Robin to take mealworms from my hand, while staying as quiet as possible.

The Robin pulled back and stayed just out of range of my lips.

"Wow. Just wow. I've been dreaming abut this, Jamie. I've been wanting to kiss you since the start of term, the first day I saw you."

"You're going to think I'm silly."

"I might." He had a pretty silly look on his face himself. "What about?"

"I hardly noticed anyone when I got here."

"I was like that last term. All too new."

"Zackly. That day I touched your arm when we were changing was the first time I really saw you. And I felt weird inside. Your fur is so wonderful and it's like an aura you have. I'm saying this wrong." I waited to catch my thoughts. I failed. "What I mean is, you're special in so many ways that I can't even see how good looking you are however long I look at you. I'm dazzled by you."

"Wow."

"I didn't expect love, not at school, not with a boy. Well, that's obvious since there are only boys at school. I mean I never expected to love a boy, and I never thought it would happen, and I never thought I'd be loved back..."

"No. Nor me." He leant towards me, and drew me in, softly. And kissed me like in the movies. His lips parted, his tongue joined mine in the middle, then in my mouth, licking my teeth. And one of his hands slid to my bum, and the other to the back of my head, and I wanted to be like that for ever, and learn to breathe through my ears.

My boy, my boy, my boy was all I ever wanted, needed. Peter Grenville had moved from exciting to surplus to requirements in two of Jay's kisses. "I love you so much it hurts. I wish two boys could marry."

"Would you, if we could?"

"In a heartbeat."

"You haven't shown me the new and exciting way to wank yet, either." He was laughing at me.

"That'll keep. Some things are too precious for sex."

"Yeah." He sighed into me, and held me tight.

And I found he and I were weeping, softly. "Good tears?"

"Very good. Yes, very good. I like your field and this place. And I like being us." He smiled. "I could even try to learn to understand what your dad says!"

"You are a total brat!" And I put my arms round him and kissed him on the tip of his nose. "Well, Jay Barfield, what shall we do now?"

"I want to stay here for ever, but it's not warm enough. Can we go to your room?"

Such a Sunday. I felt that nothing could ever top it. He was almost wreathed in sparkles, and I was grinning fit to burst, if you can burst from grinning, for the rest of the day. My parents noticed, asked me about him later. I told them I'd never had a friend that good before. No, not even Michael.

We'd sat in my room, talked some more, quietly, come down for tea when we'd been called, and enjoyed each other's simple company. Kissing was, somehow, not needed for the rest of the day. More than kissing, fun though it might have been, seemed unimportant. More getting to know each other was more important.

His dad came to pick him up after tea. More unusual food for him at tea, though. Whenever we had schnitzel we used the veal offcuts to make a veal jelly in a ring shaped mould, with slightly crispy onions in it, raw crispy, not fried crispy. We had it with bread and butter and a little lemon juice, cucumber and capers. It's not exactly English cooking, but very tasty.

"I'm yours." That's what I'd said as he got into his car, just loud enough for him to hear and no-one else. And I was.

I lay in my bed that night, refusing the deep temptation to touch myself. This had been the best day ever. It was a mixture of wonderful and strange. But that's what 'wonderful' means. It, I, were each full of wonder.

Monday, I went to school walked up to Pete and told him we had to stop because I had a boyfriend.

Except that didn't happen. He wasn't at school. I'd worked myself up into quite a state, too, anticipating doing it. I didn't want to hurt him. He meant more to me than I expected, more, now, than I wanted. But he wasn't there.

Jay and I managed to be together for some of the free time we had, but there wasn't much. There never was. It was as if Sunday had been a dream, except we'd both dreamed it together.

We weren't stupid, neither of us were. Nothing about us was to come out in school, but it was hard to be as though we weren't in love. And the first day after that Sunday day was an awful anti-climax.

My lines got signed and handed in, though; in Latin in Latin, so to speak. The week went well. Still no Pete.

Jay told me on the Wednesday he'd wanted to invite me for the entire non chapel Sunday coming up next, but that he had to go and visit relatives in Wolverhampton. I didn't even know where Wolverhampton was! Mind you, I didn't know where Scunthorpe was either, I just liked giggling at the name.

If ours had been a normal school we'd have been out of the place at about half past three each day, and had the rest of the day to ourselves, plus all of Saturday and Sunday, but ours did 7pm Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, 5:30 Tuesdays and Thursdays, and 4:15 on Saturdays for us first years. And fuck Sundays. And we could have been Jamie and Jay, Jay and Jamie, after a normal set of school hours. We'd worked out that we lived about five miles apart, but cycling over after school was out. Plus the weather was getting colder, and the nights drawing in.

"How was Wolverhampton?"

"I wonder, would you mind going and fucking yourself, please?"

"Been doing that all weekend!"

"Now that I'd like to see."

"I'd like to show you! When do we get the time?"

At the end of the week there was an announcement. Instead of a regular roll call taken by a prefect we had a Housemaster's Roll. "I'm sorry," he said, "to tell you all that Peter Grenville will not be coming back. He's under the care of the doctors. He's suffering from a nervous breakdown."

That didn't exactly ring true. Pete seemed the most normal, level headed, ordinary bloke of his year. Logic said that the round shouldered dandruff factories were more likely to have a nervous breakdown.

At least I wasn't adding to his troubles by ending what he and I had started. But I was still borrowing his rugby shorts. Mine had never arrived anywhere I could find them on the pipes. And his locker had been emptied. It was as if he'd never existed, apart from his shorts and the empty locker. And a rather interesting memory and a wet arse!

I'd miss him as a friend, though. I already missed him as a friend. There was no way that I knew of getting in touch, and, since I was going to give him bad news it didn't seem right. He knew where to find me, after all, if he wanted to.

Half Term came, with the Half Term Holiday. We got Friday all the way through Monday as time off school. And I was invited to Jay's. Not just for the day, but to spend the night on the Saturday. And my lot said I could!

He'd been very clever the way he'd arranged it. His kid brother was doing the same with one of his friends, but at the friend's house. That meant we could share a room! His room! I'd have his brother's bed. I was nervous as a nervous thing in a thunderstorm as I arrived, duly dad-driven. Mum didn't drive. Pity, because she couldn't have been worse at it than dad! He was dreadful.

The Barfields gave him coffee and Jay and I went up to take my overnight bag to his room. We ended up on his bed, fully clothed, just holding each other. I had tears, wet eyes anyway. "I'm with my boy at last," I whispered into his ear.

"And I'm with mine."

For the first time I noticed the scent of his hair, earthy, with a hint of soap. Shampoo was not common for us in the sixties. I saw his eyelashes, damp like mine, brown where his head was mousy blond. His eyes had changed colour again, greener that day, and more brown too. His eyebrows were very dark, oddly dark, where mine were a strange shade of yellow. "What are you doing?"

"Burning you into my brain. I want to have a picture in my head of you every day I know you. I want to be able to file each time I see you as a special day. I want to remember for ever how you look and smell and feel each day."

"Jamie Hawkins, you are a total nut. And I love you. Every inch of you."

"There's more than an inch."

"Says you. I might have to check that later."

"I think I'd like that. I've been thinking about it a lot, about you a lot. I want to learn how to make you feel amazing."

"Mmmm."

"The thing is, Jay, I want this to be special. No idea how, but I am seriously not up for a quick wank. If I said that might make me feel dirty about us, would I be making any sense to you?"

"I know pretty much what you mean. It's you I love; your body just comes with you. I can have a wank any time I want. I do. I do it quite a lot. And yes, I always think about you when I do it, and it feels better because I do, but that isn't 'it' and I want to be us, not a couple of boys who have a wank together."

I sighed. And I melted into his arms.

Supper time we had both his sisters there, his mum and dad, and his grandma. His mum was a great cook. We had her version of sweet and sour pork. No deep fried battered fat balls like you got on our rare visits to a Chinese restaurant, this was real food. They had a huge house, and a granny annexe over the garage for gran. After supper we played Monopoly and had fun, all of us. I was the top hat. I lost convincingly.

We had cocoa before bed. It's not a drink I'd ever got on with, far too bitter for me, but it went well with peppermint toothpaste immediately afterwards. And I managed not to burn my tongue on the scalding hot milk.

Usually I had a bath before bed. Not that night, but I wanted to be very clean for my beautiful boy, so I had an all over wash with soap and a flannel. We used the bathroom separately, very modest. Mum had packed brand new pyjamas for me, light blue cotton with dark blue piping, with the trousers held up with a pyjama cord. She'd also packed my dressing gown, dark blue with a gold motif on the pockets.

"You look a million dollars," Jay said as I came back into his bedroom, our bedroom. He was sitting up in bed wearing a red pyjama top. "Come in with me."

I took off my dressing gown and hung it on the hook on the back of his door. "We ought to mess both beds up?"

"We will, but please come in with me first."

"I know this sounds silly, but I'm suddenly very shy. I've been looking forward to this all my life and suddenly I feel awkward." The feeling of being a tart had evaporated, gone with Pete.

"And you think I don't? Keep your pyjamas on. They look fantastic. Just come in with me. I want you in my arms, Jamie."

"Hold on, because, once I come in I'm staying. Let me sort the other bed out first." I messed up the blankets, put the eiderdown askew, put a huge dent in the pillows with my fist, and joined him. "I want to sleep here, with you. Eventually." There wasn't a lot of room, but we weren't very large either.

Pyjamas and soft clean sheets made cuddling each other heavenly.

Minty breath, and Jay-scent was a heady combination. I was wondering about more when I felt his hands start to wander. And I matched him wander for wander.

"Is it ok if I touch you? I mean anywhere, everywhere?" Jay was whispering in my ear. "I've been dreaming about making love to you. I'm not sure what I want to do, but there's nothing out of bounds. Not with you. Even things I've been taught not to touch are fine if they're you and yours."

"Yes," I breathed. "But soft and slow and gentle. We have all night. And we need to be very quiet. May I do the same with you?"

"Of course, you sweet idiot! Of course."

Forehead to forehead, we lay on our sides, me on my right, he on his left, facing each other, noses just missing, hands stroking gently. It was a mixture of never wanting it to end, being so comfy as to be about to fall asleep, and knowing there was more, much more, once we were ready, if we were ready. Hands on sheer cotton pyjamas, through the cloth, was a sensation I hadn't known existed, and, much as I wanted hands on skin, skin on skin, didn't want to change.

I touched his lips with mine, just for a moment. "I don't know if I could love you any more than I do right now." It wasn't speaking, it was a breath, no more. And, without his actually moving, I felt him become closer to me, a sort of moulding in, soft yet strong, wiry hard to my touch, yet yielding in an inexplicable way.

"I never knew," he breathed. "I never knew anything could be this perfect."

Which was the last thing I remember before waking up, with the bedside light still on, the room all aglow with my boy in my arms, me in his, no idea what time it was and surprised to have been asleep at all.

I couldn't reach the lamp, and had no idea where the switch was anyway, and there was no way I could see my watch without moving. I could see two closed eyelids and hear little snorelets as my little Furry Animal slept, each of us entwined in the other's arms. My thoughts drifted and swirled. I knew my parents loved me, and I'd slept in their bed with them sometimes when I was little and woke in the night, but their snuggle was nothing like this one, yet it was all I had to compare it with. Theirs was enveloping, comforting. His was light and comfy and yet wild, somehow. A force seemed to come from him and linked him to me far more than his touch alone.

I wanted him to wake and yet I wanted him to stay in a fairytale sleep.

He stirred and rolled towards me, still asleep, and I moved onto my back, Jay somehow lying on my front, face to face, surprisingly light, yet solid, both legs between mine, cheek to cheek, pyjama to pyjama. I stroked his hair, long at the top, short at the back, as if he were our neighbours' Red Setter. The texture was all boy, yet the sensation was relaxing, as it is when you stroke a dog's head. He made little grunts and stirred, moving his hips gently, gentling his crotch into mine. And there were rock hard things that weren't a pyjama cord knot there. I wondered if he was awake, yet knew he was asleep, perhaps dreaming. I was almost holding my breath, except it's hard to do that when there's a building sensation.

His breathing shortened. He was writhing in my arms, and he pulled, pushed us together with a little "Nnnggggg!" and I felt a sudden warmth.

It wasn't hard to know what was happening. I kissed his cheek, wishing I'd got there, too, not caring about the damp patch.

An eye flickered open.

"Oh." Still out of breath. "I was having the most amazing dream..."

"You were, but it wasn't quite a dream." We were still face to face. I was still nail hard.

"Did what I think happened just happen?"

"Dunno, but I know what did happen." I kissed his nose. "You just made love to me while you were asleep. And it was very special."

"Wow." A pause. "Did I?"

"Feels like it to me."

"Did you?"

"Almost."

"Sorry."

"Why?"

"Coz I wanted the first time to be for you, not for me."

"It was."

"It was?" A pause, "But you haven't..."

"Don't care. S'not important. Would be nice, but this was lovely." And it was, and in a way I couldn't quite explain, even to myself.

"Oh Jamie. I love you so much it hurts."

"I think that may be a bit of me, sticking into you!"

"Shh. Don't spoil it."

"Would a kiss be nice?"

My answer was his lips on mine, his tongue in my mouth, and a spare hand moving towards my crotch. And electricity as he touched my cock, rock hard, straining to the sky. "Oh!" It only took a moment, I was so aroused. And his kiss made it better than anything, ever. And I mean ever.

That was years ago, and I remember it as if it happened last night. Jay and I often remember it together. Sometimes he tells me and sometimes I tell him. Our love's never grown less. We've been very lucky. Today we're married. We moved to an area where gay couples could adopt, something that happened way before marriage was legal, and we have two fine late teenagers, brother and sister, that Social Services didn't want to split, and we took into our hearts as primary school children. We'd expected to adopt a girl, thinking that placing boys with two gay men wouldn't be approved of, and Patrick came as part of the package with Ella, his younger sister.

They'd had a bit of a rough ride before us. The first year wasn't always easy. We won their hearts by respect and constancy. We know because they told us. We apologise when we're wrong. We've always treated them as equals whenever possible. They've grown into our hopes for them.

As far as we know they're happily heterosexual. That's their property. We told them when they were old enough to understand that some people fall for boys others fall for girls, and that, whichever they introduced us to, we'd love them the same and hope we liked then loved their chosen partner. Pat said "Dad, that's so gay!" and giggled. He teases us unmercifully about being a pair of poofs all the time. So does Ella. They tag team us! We adore them both.

We gave them each a number of packs of condoms of various types on their thirteenth birthdays with instructions to do what they liked with them, that there would always be more, and we didn't care if they made water bombs, balloons or used them for their intended purpose, but that sex must be safe, always safe. And those past their expiry date were not to be used for sex. Jay explained to them that, had we not been together and faithful to each other, one or both of us would be dead from AIDS, which arrived before anyone knew what it was or how it was transmitted, and killed so many or our generation. They each looked embarrassed. We would have done, too, way back when we were their age. But they listened. We might not have done.

School was torture. We hid our relationship all the way through, though a couple of close friends worked it out in our leaving year. It wasn't a queer-friendly place, not at all, despite the weirdness of the fashion for declaring one's adoration of a pretty younger boy.

A long while after we left I found out what happened to Pete Grenville. I was at an old boys dinner with Jay when Richard, whose brother had been head of our house at the time, said, knowing we were a couple, "You were lucky at school, Jamie."

"In what way?"

"Two reasons. First, you have Jay. I don't know if you know, but Jay was adored by so many senior boys. He was the object of so many boys' desires. You landed him. Second, I know you more than liked Pete Grenville, too, way back then. He was funny and popular. But he didn't have a nervous breakdown. He was expelled. He approached a younger boy in another house and suggested some 'fun' on the Downs. He was reported to the Housemaster, my brother was involved in it all since he was head of house, and he was told he mustn't come back. You weren't as private as you thought on the Downs that day. It got around. You were lucky you didn't end up with the same fate. Prefects were told to look out for boys being 'amorous'. You were watched, my brother said. No-one suspected Jay."

I'd told Jay very early on in our relationship about my Downs adventure with Pete, how I'd both loved and regretted it. He put his arm round my waist as Richard was talking and drew me in tight. "That's rotten," he said. "That could have been us, too. Imagine ruining a boy's life because of the person he loves."

A week or two later I managed to find an email address for Pete, sent him a really pleasant, but not gushing, note, and got an odd one in return. He told me that he was a grandfather now and wasn't the same person at all as he had been at school. I tried again. I felt sorry for him. Jay signed it as well. There wasn't a reply, but we tried. It sounded as if he'd been hurt very badly. He didn't deserve that at all. Jay and I thought he'd been very brave at school. And Jay knew he'd made me brave enough to be with him.

We swapped fur as we grew though puberty! Jay's arm fluff changed into short 'man-hair'; mine grew into a long pelt all over. We laugh about that when I can't get dry after a shower. We tried trimming mine once with clippers. Mistake. It went all spiky until it grew out.

Jay's hair darkened to a deep lustrous brown with a little grey at the temples. I've gone blond for the second time. We're both in our early sixties and hope to see loads of grandchildren. Or not if our kids turn out not to be heterosexual.

Our parents took a while to adjust to our being us. They accepted it finally when we bought our first house. I think they thought it was a phase. They knew when we were about three months into our relationship. They were wise, though. They decided to let it run its course. And it has. And they adore their grandchildren, the ones they expected never to have, and spoil them rotten.

Jay's brother and sisters accepted us quicker, especially his baby sister. She looked just like him then and does still. His brother bought us Donny Osmond's rendition of Puppy Love as soon as it came out. He knew I hated that song! He's still a brat today.

When we make love we're teenagers again.

And we still get messy pyjamas. We still wear the old fashioned cotton ones. When I got home and mum grabbed my bag to unpack she looked at the new pyjamas, somewhat stained, and asked about it. Oh embarrassing! I told her they were toothpaste stains.

The look she gave me said that wasn't very likely. So did her eyes, raised to the heavens.

We've our own washing machine now.

And that rhyme about newts makes complete sense now. It did quite soon after that Sunday, too. That was an interesting day!

This story never quite happened in real life. Some of the characters are painted from life. Pete existed, was a short term fantasy for me, but was absolutely not the boy expelled for propositioning another. He, too, was real. And I wrote him that email a few years ago and had the same odd reply. The conversation with 'Richard' happened, though not about 'Pete'

Jay and I never got together, though he was real. I loved him exactly as Jamie loved him. We would have made quite a pair. He seems to have been wholly heterosexual, though. He was truly adorable.

Names, have, of course, been changed. Mine, too. Locals will find a very similar school in a very similar location. If you want to find out what it was really like, watch the movie If...

My school was like that. Until the scene in the café at around half way it could have been a documentary. After that point it becomes surreal.

To email me, either click the link behind my name at the top of this story, or click or copy and paste its_onlyme@iomfats.org

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