J. H. P. Cash, 367

When I Were Nowt But a Lad 14

When I first discovered, early in the next term, that Robert had taken Andy into his bedsit on his own I was uncharacteristically jealous. Well, I say "discovered" but, in fact, both Andy and Robert could hardly wait to tell me. Not in a gloating way (except perhaps a little on Andy's part) but really just as an exciting point of information. They, I think, expected me to be enthusiastic and interested. Instead, I sulked a little.

Dab told me fairly sternly, but with a smile, not to be "such a complete spaz-mong-git-wog". I stopped myself from reminding him about his feelings for Steve a few years before.

Out in the real world "gay liberation" was just starting to mean shagging as many men as possible, but I was moving right ahead into the backlash, agonising about the nature of an "open relationship". Not, of course, that I thought of it that way. And not that I was really "agonising".

"Did you bum him then?" I asked Robert.

"Yep!" he grinned.

"Nope!" said Andy when I asked him later. "No way!"

"I don't mind you seeing other boys, but we have to be honest with each other if this is going to work for both of us," I didn't say when I went back to Robert. No, I just said, "Andy says you didn't."

"I did bum him!" Robert insisted. "Only, well, not much. Just put it in a little bit really."

"It hurt like buggery!" said Andy when I then returned to him and he admitted that there had been an attempt.

"Durrrrh!" I said (using the pre-Simpsons equivalent of "D'oh"), "It was buggery."

"Nah," said Andy. "Doesn't count."

Do I even really want to go into my feelings here? A little, yes. As I see it now, Robert was my first "affair". He was a sweet guy as well as a decent and smooth monitor. I was oddly proud of how conscientious and caring he was with the new boys in his dorm (well, apart perhaps from his, um, behaviour with Andy, although that was really quite caring too). Our Housemaster had made a good choice for Junior Dorm monitor. Those companionable times when we were simply together in his bedsit, both doing our own reading or work, were warm and quite precious (although much less frequent than they had been the previous year). But I didn't love him. I liked him, admired him, enjoyed being with him and, to coin a phrase, the sex was great. But I didn't love him. Having probably given you the impression that I was a little bit of a slut, you may be surprised that I mention "love" at all. Well, I was easy, but not shallow. I didn't, at that time, think about whether or not I loved Robert, I just realised a little later, when I did love another boy, that I'd not loved him.

My point is that I don't want to pretend that I was heart-broken by the possibility that Andy might usurp me in Robert's affections (and bed). But I was just a bit miffed. Not least because I was the one who had first got Andy into Robert's bedsit to begin with.

I decided that I should concentrate more on my transition to Big Boy status. One wouldn't, by convention, reach this status until the Sixth Form, but I'd always been a fast mover. I'd got in with Guy before Dab had made a move, and I wanted to consolidate my advantage. Guy was, it seemed to me, an under-valued asset in the marketplace. Because he was quiet and a little delicate and, in his early days at the school. prone to burst into tears quite often, he wasn't generally regarded as a "hot sprog". But he was.

He had blond, tightly curly hair (think Botticelli cherub, hair-wise). The curls were so tight that in later years he was able to grow a sort-of mini-Afro, at a time when that hair-style was popular. He had a pale face, and so looked delightful when his cheeks flushed red, as they often did. His body was pale too. That very British, milky paleness which can look a bit strange but which, on the right boy, can be so much more attractive than a tan. He was small for his age, but perfectly in proportion. Compared with the wiry. lightly-muscled Andy, Guy's body was perhaps a little unformed as yet. But he was slim (rather than thin) and so important features of light definition could be discerned, despite the paleness. His body was still, at 13, virtually hairless, apart from a wispy patch of blond pubes just above his cock. His cock was small and, when stiff, still pointed straight out from his body, unlike Andy's, which curved tightly up into his tummy.

What stopped Guy, despite his looks, from being considered a "hot sprog" - his timidity, his modesty and his apparent fragility - made him, for me, all the more attractive. With Andy, his cheeky confidence was what was most horny (apart from everything else about him), but it was Guy's very lack of confidence that really drew me to him. You just wanted to hug him and protect him. And fuck him, of course.

The next time I visited Junior Dorm I sat on Guy's bed rather than Andy's. On the side that Andy's bed was on, so that I could still chat to both of them. As we talked quietly I dropped my hand down beside Guy's near leg, over the covers. I began stroking his leg with the backs of my fingers. Guy shifted slightly and pressed his leg back against my hand. It was my left hand and so my strokes were less assured than they might have been. We'd all gone quiet. Andy turned away from me in his bed, laying his head on the pillow as if to go to sleep. I got up and walked round to Guy's right side, sitting so that I could use my right hand. I reached over him and rested on my hand in a way that allowed me to stroke his leg again, this time with my thumb. When Guy again shifted to push against me, I moved the hand so that I could run my thumb over Guy's groin. I could feel enough to tell that he was hard.

I pulled down the sheet a little with my other hand, then reached in and touched him gently through his pyjamas. He reached out and put his hand in my lap, searching for my stiffy. It wasn't as if he hadn't seen me or felt me before, but now he whispered, "You're hairy."

"Not very," I replied. I was 14, but still not that developed.

"Compared to me you are," Guy said slightly disconsolately.

"It's OK," I said, running the tips of a couple of fingers around the fine hair above his cock. "It's nice. I like it." And it was nice . Very nice. And I did like it. A lot.

I was happy just to be there gently playing with Guy's hard little cock and smooth balls, feeling his less-sure hand on my own cock. It was too dark to see his face properly, but I could tell that he was looking up at me. I pulled down the covers a little further and reached in to unbutton Guy's pyjama top.

"What are you doing?" he asked.

"I want to feel you... touch you, I mean."

"You were!" he giggled.

I ran the flat of my hand across his chest and down to his tummy. "OK?" I asked.

"Uh huh." Guy said. I pulled at the cord of his pyjamas and pulled the flies wide. Now I could run my hand right from his balls all the way up to his chest and neck. I ran my hand over each shoulder. He sighed and turned slightly, pressing his lower body against me where I sat beside him. At 13, He was at that lovely stage when the simple pubescent excitement of sex is heightened by the beginnings of real lust. To hear that sigh from the slightly timid, quiet boy was so lovely. For the first time since I'd last been in bed with Dab I felt a real tenderness mixed in with my lust.

"Shove over," I said. "I want to get in."

"You can't, people will see!" Guy protested.

"So what? We were always in each other's beds when I was in North Dorm. Come on. Please."

Guy's hand was still playing with my dick. I rubbed his chest. "Please? It's cold out here. It'll be nice, cuddling."

Guy shifted over slightly to the far side of the bed. I unbuttoned my own pyjama jacket and slipped in beside him. Our tummies and chests met and I nuzzled into to Guy's hair. I breathed in and sighed out, pulling him to me. When he relaxed and reached round to put an arm over me I sighed again.

"What?" he said.

"Nothing. You just smell nice."

"Do I?" Guy asked, as if surprised that anyone could smell nice. "What do I smell of?"

Damn! I couldn't think. "Um, you, I s'pose."

"Silly!" said Guy, giggling.

I licked at his ear: "You taste nice too!"

We were neither of us naked, but there was enough bare skin for our embrace to be sweet and sexy. I began to grind my hips, rubbing my cock against his. Guy responded, gasping, almost as if surprised by what his body was doing.

"Noisy!" he warned as the bed springs creaked. But we didn't stop. For the first time I felt that I was... not in charge, exactly... but that I was leading. I moved down a little so that I could lick and kiss at his neck. He moved his hips a little more strongly, his arm tightening around me. I felt as if I was going to spunk any second, just thrusting against the sweet boy. Not quite jaded yet, then. I disentangle us and slid down to lick his balls. As he had not done when I sucked him in his study, he put a hand on my head. I was stroking both my own cock and his but, as Guy's hips tensed, I took his dick in my mouth. His hand tightened in my hair. His spunk was the thin stuff I remembered from the previous term, but quite plentiful. I loved it. Even Andy's spunk was quite thick and gooey. Guy's took me back to an earlier time, when I'd first started enjoying tasting and swallowing spunk. The taste was delicate, not strong and richly bitter like Robert's.

Thinking back now, I can quite imagine that I saw my slightly younger self in Guy. "What?" you might be thinking, "the Northern Region Junior Cocksucking finalist?" But, you see, I was in fact, throughout my time at school, a well-behaved boy in day-to-day life. Nice, polite, hard-working, helpful, friendly, I rarely played up in class. I was indeed a bit of a "suck-up", though not one of those really creepy, unsubtle ones. Perfect ink monitor material, basically. At first I'd been as timid and fretful as Guy could still be sometimes. Yes, I was a dirty little boy too, once I got the chance and discovered my true talents and calling. And I think that part of me hoped that, while caring for and protecting Guy, I could wake a similar lust in him.

But I wasn't going to rush it. I wanked myself off, savouring Guy's spunk in my mouth, and spurted onto the knee of his pyjamas. I knew that Guy would probably be feeling a little strange in the aftermath of coming - wondering perhaps whether he should have allowed this. I felt ever so slightly guilty myself. He was so young looking, so sweet. But I didn't button up and dash away, as so many boys did. I re-tied Guy's pyjama cord and then my own, moving up to snuggled against him. I pushed my face next to his and he didn't move away. I kissed his cheek and asked, "OK?"

"Mmmm," he said, uncertainly. Perhaps thoughtful again.

I kissed him again. "It's alright, isn't it?" I really did want him to say if it wasn't. But I really didn't want it not to be.

"S'okay," he said, more confidently. Then he turned and gave me a little kiss. "S'smooth!"

Well, at least his careful considerations had reached an interim conclusion. We both laughed quietly.

"I know what Andy means, now. About how it's better doing it in bed," Guy noted.

"'Tis, isn't it?" I said, thinking: "Even better in a bedsit."

That was one problem with being a precocious Big Boy. Many, in fact, by now, all but four Sixth Formers had bedsits. Of course you didn't have to have a bedsit to have a Little Boy, but it made things a damn sight easier, and, as Dab had pointed out to me during my first term in Big School, they widened the options for the sex you had. I'd been spoilt, perhaps, but I didn't want to have to fuck Guy in his bed in the Junior Dorm. I wanted to be able to do it in a little comfort and privacy.

But I'm getting a little ahead of myself now. After what I regarded as our first "proper" session, I didn't want to push Guy too fast. He was too sweet a boy to risk losing by scaring him off. Before, I had usually allowed my partners to dictate the pace. Now that I was playing the Big Boy with an inexperienced Little Boy, I understood that I had a greater responsibility as well as a little more control.

"Urrrh, your stuff's on my knee!" Guy said, half-laughing, rubbing the soiled pyjama leg against mine and against the sheet.

"Are you two done then?" asked Andy from his bed. The light from his torch flicked briefly over us. "Alright, Guy?" he asked.

"Fine, thanks!" Guy giggled. I realised that Andy had been watching out for his little friend. That was sweet, but I slightly resented the interruption of our snug post-coital intimacy. Guy made movements indicating that perhaps my time was up, buttoning his pyjama top and shifting away from me slightly. I got out of his bed and kissed his forehead. Andy tutted and sighed. I imagine that he rolled his eyes. As I crept out of the dorm I looked back to see Andy leaning over to Guy's bed, no doubt checking out what had happened.

I hadn't actually told Dab about having had Guy in his study just before Christmas, but now that we'd had a "proper session" in bed, I told him that Guy was not only pretty, but hot too. Dab was gracious in defeat. He didn't exactly shake my hand and say "Well, done old chap! The race is to the swift. The best man won." No, what he said was, "Great! So you reckon I might get in there, then?"

"I thought that Nick Davies had finally succumbed to your charms, Dab?" Charlie objected.

"So? I can be a Big Boy and a Little Boy at the same time, can't I?"

"I really don't know the finer niceties of your funny little games, Dab, but no, sure, go for it! Be a Medium-sized Boy as well, come to that. See if I care." Charlie smiled benignly at as both.

Then he surprised both of us by saying to Dab, "What about that little Giles sprog, if you go for the pretty-pretty sort?"

Dab and I laughed triumphantly. "You do look! You do!" I crowed.

"Don't be ridiculous," Charlie smiled. "It's just that Dave Chamberlain was going on about him in our Greek tutor group the other day. Before Toodle arrived, of course." Charlie was taking Ancient Greek 'O' Level but the ordinary curriculum and timetable no longer really provided for the teaching of Greek at 'O' Level, so Charlie attended extra tutorials with Sixth Form 'A' Level candidates with our Housemaster, a Classics teacher. "Apparently Giles is of interest to your sort, and not unappreciative of the attentions of older boys. But I wouldn't know, of course." Charlie smirked at us.

"Doesn't studying Ancient Greek help you to understand the attractions of the ephebe, then Charlie?" Dab asked.

"Well, for a start, ἔφηβοι were older adolescent youths, usually older than us, not your barely pubescent Little Boys; and, for another, you lot make far too much of the ancient Greeks all being bumboys," responded Charlie. "And, for an end, why should I bother mooning over some little (posh accent) "Giles" when I have this..." He held up the centre spread of last month's Mayfair.

"Because you might actually get to have a little fun with Giles?" I suggested.

"Thanks. But no thanks," said Charlie, briefly kissing Miss December, as invited to by the mistletoe she held over her Santa hat, and then turning back to his desk and searching out "Readers Letters".

"Hmmm.... Giles," mused Dab.

Two days later Dab was knocked unconscious by a clash of heads in a hockey match. Properly unconscious; flat out for about 5 minutes. I went with him to the local hospital for a check, then Dab was put in the School "Hos" for overnight observation and a couple of days' rest. The "Hos" was a large building with several wards, built in the days when public schools still had fairly regular epidemics of 'flu and the like, causing them to be quarantined and having to care for many ailing boys at once. For some reason the main downstairs dorm was fairly full of sick but still noisy juniors and Dab was in a small ward by himself upstairs. I took up his pyjamas and wash kit from the House, and found him lying on a bed, still in his Games kit, asleep. I went to ask a nurse if I should wake him so that he could change into his pyjamas, but it was deemed best to let him sleep on. I put his stuff on the next bed and sat briefly to look at him.

I had been a little panicked when he had been lying unmoving on the ground after the accident. Although the other boy involved had dropped to his knees after the clash, he had recovered immediately, standing up and rubbing his head. For a few minutes, until he stirred, I had stood back from the concerned huddle kneeling around him just feeling frightened and helpless. In the ambulance and at the hospital Dab had remained groggy and slightly incoherent. I was surprised when they had not X-rayed him.

Now, reassured that he would be OK, I allowed myself to acknowledge how much I cared about him. And that he was still pretty hot.

When I visited the next day, Dab was sitting up in bed reading a Whizzer and Chips comic. "God," I said, "you must have brain damage after all."

"It's not often you get an excuse to read this stuff at our age," he responded cheerfully. "And, anyway, it's really interesting, 'cos by the time I get to the bottom of a page, I've forgotten the start of the story, so I can read it all over again."

This sounded worrying to me, rather than merely "interesting".

"It's OK, it'll come back, they say. I can remember all the old stuff. Then I don't remember anything from the second half of the game 'til I woke up back here last evening. And now I just can't remember stuff that's going on." He looked at the lunch tray on the bed next to his, the main plate and pudding bowl empty. "I know that I must have had lunch. But I don't remember eating it."

I had brought up his everyday uniform clothes for him to wear when he was discharged. I went down the end of the ward to hang them in a wardrobe there. When I got back to his bed Dab said, weakly, "Who are you?" and then laughed when I looked shocked. "You div, he said. "'Course I know who you are! But when did you get here?" I thought that he was joking again, but he wasn't. He'd genuinely forgotten, in the few minutes I'd been at the other end of the ward, that I'd come to see him. But I still wasn't sure. I picked up the lunch tray and took it downstairs to the kitchen. I gave it to a Jane and said that I thought I'd save them the trouble of going upstairs just to get one tray. (Yes, "a Jane". All female domestic staff at the school were called "Janes" and all male workers "Daves". You didn't actually call them "Jane" or Dave" as individuals, but those were the collective terms. Don't ask.)

"Thanks, luv," she said, "but, actually, you could just have put it in the dumb waiter in the ward. That's what it's for."

"Wanted to see the nurse anyway," I replied.

"Oh, don't disturb them now. They're just on their lunch break themselves now. Give them half-an-hour."

That's what I wanted to know. I decided to cut Games, for which I was already late, and plead hospital visiting as my good cause if challenged later. I now felt safe that no one would be coming unexpectedly into Dab's ward.

I returned to the ward and Dab greeted me by saying, "About time you got around to coming up to see me!" I looked at him suspiciously. He was playing this up, I was sure.

"I was just here a few minutes ago." I protested.

"Oh, right, were you? Sorry, that happens all the time just now. Did I tell you about the comic thing? How when I..."

"Yes, you did," I interrupted. Looking the stack of old comics on his bedside locker I said, "Going to take you a while to get through those, if you've been on that Whizzer and Chips all morning."

"Whizzer and Chips?" Dab asked, looking at the front page. "Oh yes!"

This was too much - he was really pushing my credulity. I took the comic from his hands and pulled down his top covers. Right down to the end of the bed. Then I undid his pyjama bottoms. Even as he raised himself to help me pull them down, Dab whispered, "Do you think it's safe?"

"There's no one up here. We'd hear them coming up the stairs..."

Dab's dick wasn't suffering from amnesia. It remembered just what to do. I bent over and started sucking. Dab unbuttoned his pyjama top and urged me to join him on the bed. I ignored him, but ran by hands up his torso as I continued sucking. Dab's cock tasted stronger than I remembered, the smell of his crutch quite heady. I wondered if he'd washed since his accident, but realised that the splatters of mud that were on him yesterday had gone. Perhaps a bed bath? His cock was now noticeably bigger than mine, and his body noticeably more developed. But, then, he was 16. When he spunked in my mouth, I noted and loved the contrast between his healthy globs of warm, sticky goo and the watery spurts Guy had offered. I enjoyed Dab's spunk just as much, but I enjoyed the difference as well. As I stood, Dab reached for my crotch, but I just pulled up his bedclothes and left the room without a word.

Well, it's rude to speak with your mouth full.

I walked quietly to the top of the stairs and listened. Apart from the childish noise of the kids in the dormitory down there, all was quiet. I walked to the end of the corridor and looked down at a games field that lay directly under the window there. The Lent Term was hockey term, but rugby continued as well. I watched a practice game with no interest whatsoever, tasting Dab's spunk in my mouth. I checked my watch. Five minutes - time to go back.

I walked back into Dab's ward. He was reading the same copy of Whizzer and Chips again. He looked up and before he could say anything, I opened my mouth and showed him his spunk.

"Fucking hell! What are you doing? Did you walk all the way up here with that in your mouth?" He looked really shocked, even a little upset.

"You really don't remember?" I asked, swallowing.

"What?"

"I just sucked you off five minutes ago!"

"I wondered why my pyjamas were round my ankles," Dab laughed.

"If you can't remember coming, do you reckon you could just spunk and spunk and spunk?" I asked.

Nah," Dab said, "your balls would still know, wouldn't they?"

"We could try and see. I'm cutting Games anyway...."

I took the Whizzer and Chips out of his hands again.