In which Henry buys some chocolate and Jeremy makes a decision.
Kevin
Next morning I went round to visit the Microbes. Somehow we’d got away with not having any homework to be done over the holiday, and so there was nothing for me to work on with Jason, but I wanted to see how they were spending the holiday. Not doing very much, apparently.
“We’ve been shopping,” Jason told me, “to get some new stuff for school. I don’t know why – it’s not as if I’m ever going to grow out of the stuff I’ve already got.”
“Yes, you will,” I assured him. “You can’t be a Microbe forever.”
“He can if I can fix it that way,” said Luke, grinning. “I’ve been online, trying to find some drugs that stop people growing, and if I find any I’ll be slipping them into his food for the next ten years. It’d be brilliant if I was the big brother for a change.”
“But I don’t treat you like a kid brother any more, do I?” said Jason.
“Only because you know I’ll beat you up if you try! Anyway, there are drugs that can delay puberty, apparently, but I don’t think anyone except a proper doctor can get hold of them – so you’re lucky, Jase! So far, anyway. There might be more stuff I just haven’t found out about yet.”
“And I hope you never do,” commented Jason. “It’s bad enough being the smallest kid in the class – I don’t want to end up the smallest kid in the school when I’m sixteen!”
Oddly he didn’t actually look as if the prospect bothered him that much, although of course he probably knew that Luke wouldn’t ever find anything that could do that, and even if he did he wouldn’t be evil enough to use it.
“I might not even need drugs,” said Luke. “If I keep doing what I did yesterday your balls will never grow anyway.”
“What was that?” I asked.
“He won three games in a row,” Jason told me. “He said that deserved a special punishment, so he took me up into the attic and tied me to one of the beams. He’d made me change into my Speedos first. And when I was tied up he went down to the kitchen and came back with a load of ice cubes, which he stuffed down the front of my Speedos. Then he went away and left me for half an hour.”
“Ouch,” I said, imagining it. “How did it feel?”
“Guess. No, don’t bother, I’ll tell you – it was fucking horrible.”
“He looked well funny when I went to untie him,” said Luke happily. “I pulled his trunks down first, and the ice had almost completely melted. And his bits had all shrivelled up, so they were way smaller than mine. I’m going to do that to him again next time he loses, and if I do it often enough, maybe they’ll get used to being tiny and stay that way.”
“Yes, but what if he does it to you?”
“He won’t, because he’s crap at most games, so he’ll never beat me. I’m class.”
Jason didn’t seem too worried about that prospect, either – in find he was actually smiling. Or perhaps he’d thought of a game he was better at than Luke was.
I stayed with them for the rest of the morning, playing various video games (but without penalties), and I was aware that something had changed since my first visit. They’d always seemed to get on pretty well with each other, and occasionally Luke had teased his brother, but there had never been any doubt that Jason was in charge. Now that had completely changed: they seemed more like equals, and not once did Jason tell his brother to do something – instead he asked if he wanted to, or something. In fact if anything it seemed more like Luke was the older one. It was a bit odd, but since they both seemed perfectly happy with things the way they were I didn’t see any reason to ask questions.
My mother got back that evening, and we stayed in on Friday and Saturday – Father also came home late Thursday night, so it was the first time we’d all been together since gran hurt her leg. And actually, even though it had been sort of fun looking after ourselves, I was glad to have them back – that house did seem kind of empty when Chris and I were the only ones there.
“Did anything interesting happen while I was away?” my mother asked over supper.
Chris and I looked at each other.
“No, not really,” I said. “Chris talked me into helping out with his football team, and that’s been fun – and I’ve made a few new friends, too. In fact one of them is coming to stay next week – if that’s okay with you, of course.”
“I don’t see why not,” she said, and so over the weekend she called Jeremy’s mum and gave the visit the thumbs up with her. I was quite looking forward to that, because I hadn’t had a friend to stay since… well, not since I left primary school, anyway. Both Mark and Colin had stayed over with Chris a few times, but that wasn’t really the same thing.
Once we had the go-ahead I spent a fair bit of time online with Jeremy sorting out the details. I thought I’d probably have to take the train to his place to collect him, as I’d done for his first visit, but he said I wouldn’t need to do that because he’d have the money for his fare. I guessed that meant that Kenton had stopped pinching his money, but he said he’d prefer to tell me about it face to face, and so I didn’t push.
Sunday came and I could have stayed in bed – it was Easter Sunday, so there was no football today – but there were Easter eggs waiting for us, and that was incentive enough to get up and go down to breakfast at the usual time.
“I think you should give yours to me,” suggested Chris. “Now that you’re growing up you have to be careful what you eat, and chocolate will give you spots.”
“Then I’ll have to get spots,” I said. “Let’s face it, they’re not going to make a big difference to my chances of pulling, are they?”
“You never know. Maybe they’ll open a blind school nearby…”
This led to a play fight which, to my surprise, I actually won.
“Weren’t you trying?” I asked afterwards, helping Chris to his feet.
“Oh, I was trying. Looks like all that football training and running up and down touchlines has built up your muscles a bit. You’re still too skinny, but if you keep working on your muscles, maybe you’ll find a boy who’ll be able to see past the glasses.”
Once again that was unusually supportive for Chris. Perhaps he was still feeling a bit guilty for sending me to Dwayne and the others, but maybe it was just that we’d got closer together while our parents were away. It was nice, either way.
Mark came round on Sunday afternoon as he had threatened, though I actually didn’t mind sharing one of my smaller Easter eggs with him. I managed to get him on his own for a bit by challenging him to a game of chess and, as I had hoped, Chris watched a couple of moves and then wandered off to find something less boring to do.
“So?” I asked. “How did it go with Danny?”
“Really well. I don’t think he’s ready for anything too much just yet, but he says he thinks he’ll get used to the idea eventually. But he definitely likes cuddling, and so do I, so we had a really nice half-hour or so in bed. And we’re hoping to be able to go camping next half-term, and if we do that we’ll be able to sleep together – obviously we daren’t do that at either his house or mine, and in any case my bed’s far too small. But in a tent with a double sleeping-bag… that’s definitely something to look forward to.
“It’s weird, because I’d never have guessed what he’s really like from seeing him at school – there he wanders round on his own and he never smiles, but on Thursday he relaxed completely and smiled all the time. He’s got a good sense of humour, too. Thanks for getting us together, Kev.”
He looked over his shoulder at the door to make sure nobody was around, and then he leant forward across the board and kissed me on the cheek.
“No problem,” I said. “As long as you keep me informed about what you get up to I’ll consider that payment enough. Well, that and maybe a proper kiss a bit later.”
“There’s going to come a time – at least, I hope there is – when I’m not going to tell you or anyone else what we do,” he said. “But I don’t mind giving you a proper kiss later.”
And so he did, up in my bedroom after we’d finished the game.
We spent Monday indoors watching old films on TV and nibbling Easter eggs. We didn’t all sit and watch TV together very often, but then it was the first weekend the whole family had been at home together for about three months. Father would be jetting off to Dubai or somewhere in a day or so and then things would feel completely back to normal, even though I still sometimes wished that he did a nine-to-five job instead. Still, both Chris and I were used to his long absences by now.
On Tuesday morning I caught the bus into town, got off at the Town Hall and set off down the hill to the railway station, but halfway down the hill I heard someone call my name. I looked around and saw Henry on the other side of the road. He waved, waited for a gap in the traffic and hurried over to my side.
Most of the kids at school – the cool ones, at least – bump fists when they meet, but Henry put out his hand and shook mine like an old-fashioned English gent.
“Morning, Henry,” I said. “Still wearing the shorts, I see.”
“Of course I am! I promised, remember? So where are you going?”
“I’m meeting someone off a train – or I will be in about twenty-five minutes. Why?”
“No reason. I’m here to do a bit of shopping. Do you want a Coke or something?”
“Well, okay then, if you’re buying.”
He went into the sweet shop a little way back up the hill and came out with a couple of cans and a bar of chocolate, and then he walked me down the hill and into the park whose entrance is opposite the station. We found an empty bench and sat down.
“Thanks,” I said, taking one of the cans. “So, how are Freddie and Lee getting on with their Forties thing?”
Henry
“Rather well, actually,” I replied, breaking a bit off the chocolate and passing him the bar. “We found some old coins and even a couple of notes in the attic, so Freddie thinks they’ve got everything they need. If the weather stays nice they’re going to put the plan into action tomorrow.”
“And do you think they’ll actually manage to fool anyone?”
“Not unless they find someone completely gullible. But I expect they’ll have fun with it anyway. Want a bit more chocolate?”
“Well… to be honest I’ve been stuffing myself with Easter eggs for the last couple of days, and if I eat too much of it my brother might turn out to be right. He says that too much chocolate for a boy of my age is likely to make me all spotty.”
“I don’t think that’s true at all,” I said. “I don’t think chocolate gives you spots. What gives you spots is if you don’t wash properly, and that isn’t likely to happen to me because there’s normally someone supervising me when I wash – at least, there is during term time.”
“What, teachers, you mean?”
“No, the boys in my dorm – I explained last time, remember? They treat me as if I was about nine years old, and of course little boys of that age have to be supervised when they wash or they won’t do it properly. At least, that’s what they tell me. So they make sure I wash thoroughly, behind my ears and everything, and if I don’t do it properly I get punished.”
“I thought you liked getting punished?”
“Well, yes I do, normally. But the punishment for not washing properly was going to be having to lie in a bath of cold water for half an hour, and I didn’t think I’d like that at all, so I made sure I washed thoroughly. Actually it’s seemed really odd, getting washed on my own since the end of term. I still do it properly, though, because I want to be able to eat chocolate without getting spots.”
“You could always try getting Freddie to supervise you instead,” Kevin suggested.
“Well, yes, and I have tried – and not just for the washing, either, and to be fair he’s stood in nicely in a couple of areas. But of course he doesn’t live with me, so I only see him now and again, and even when he has been there he hasn’t wanted to… well, do what the boys at school do. Freddie likes me too much, you see, and he’s afraid of hurting me or upsetting me. And I can’t explain to him why I want him to, because if I do he’ll think I’m completely insane, and then he won’t want to come round any more. I mean, I don’t even understand it myself, so how can I explain it to someone else?”
“Well, you’ve explained it to me,” he pointed out. “And like I told you, I can understand bits of it, if not why you want to be properly hurt and stuff. But I suppose that would be quite easy to arrange: if you do end up at a different school, just pick the biggest kid you can find and insult him. That ought to get you hurt badly enough to put you in hospital!”
“No, that’s not…”
“I know,” he interrupted. “Seriously, I do. You don’t want to be beaten up: you want to be used for sex, because that makes you feel good as well. I get that, Henry – but it’s still weird. Sex isn’t supposed to be about one person making someone else do stuff, even if the person on the receiving end enjoys it. Sex is about sharing and being close and wanting to make each other feel good, and if you could find a friend who really likes you and wants to try stuff with you, I’m sure you’d find it far better than what happens to you at school at the moment.”
I didn’t try to argue because I knew I wouldn’t be able to explain. Of course I understood that what Kevin was talking about is the way it is for most people, but it was never going to be like that for me. I was born strange, I think. For me, the way things were at school was just about perfect, and I couldn’t even begin to imagine just being in a one-to-one relationship of the sort Kevin was talking about.
“Henry,” said Kevin, when I still didn’t speak, “I want you to know something: I’m gay. So I know a bit about being different, and about thinking differently about sex from the way most of the boys in my form think about it. And, like I said to you before, I’ve been in the position of being made to do things – sex things – that I wouldn’t have done otherwise, and like you I found that some of it was okay, or even fun. But I like it a lot better when I share stuff with one of my friends. Maybe you haven’t had a chance to try that yet, or maybe you don’t even want to, but… well, obviously it’s up to you to do things the way you want to. But if you ever find yourself in a position you’re not happy about, don’t stay there – and if you ever need to talk to someone, you can always talk to me. Okay?”
“All right, and thanks,” I said. “But the thing I’m most worried about at the moment is not having anyone to... well, you know, tell me what to do – if I have to go to a different school next year. Still, it might not happen, I suppose, and in any case I’ve got one more good term to go through first, no matter how badly I mess up the exam.”
And that was true, at least – Piers Farringdon, the senior boy in the dorm, had told me that he was going to spend the holiday thinking up lots of ways to make sure that I’d never forget my final term, and I was definitely looking forward to discovering what he had come up with. So, even if the long term future looked uncertain, at least in the short term things would be interesting.
We finished off the chocolate and then Kevin gave me his email and Skype addresses in case I wanted to talk to him. He still seemed a bit worried about me, which I thought was nice of him, considering that he hardly knew me. Then he got up and headed off towards the station. I stayed where I was: I was only in town to do a bit of shopping, and there was no hurry about that, so I finished my drink and sat back quietly.
I thought about what Kevin had said, especially telling me that he was gay. That’s not something you would tell just anyone, and even though he knows that I do sex stuff with boys, it doesn’t automatically follow that I’m going to be gay when I get older. All right, I suppose it’s likely, but even so… which made him telling me rather important. I’d thought all along that I could trust him, but the fact that he was prepared to share something like that with me simply reinforced that trust. I decided that if I ever did need someone to talk to – and I quite possibly would if I failed my exam – he would be first in line.
It was a pity Freddie wasn’t prepared to do more. He’d made me suck him once more, but whenever Lee was around – and that was most of the time – he seemed reluctant to do anything more than spank me. I know Lee’s a bit more… innocent, I suppose, although since Kevin taught us about sex he really shouldn’t be any more. But he still doesn’t seem comfortable with it, and so I suppose Freddie thinks it best not to do a lot while he’s there. Oh, well, I suppose it won’t be long before term starts again…
Kevin
As I walked across the road to the station I found myself worrying about Henry. I’d told him that I understood the way he is, and I did, at least to a certain extent. What I couldn’t understand was the fact that he was apparently so happy with things as they were that he didn’t want to consider changing. When Mark had first started making me suck him and so on I quickly discovered that I didn’t mind it too much, but if someone had offered me the choice between carrying on like that and having a genuine boyfriend, it would have been no contest.
Perhaps Henry had such a low opinion of himself that he didn’t believe anyone would ever want to be his boyfriend… but then I didn’t think anyone would ever want to be mine either, at least, not unless I had an eye transplant, and I still didn’t want to go on being used by other people. Oh, well, I thought, all I can do is to offer him a friendly ear if he needs someone to talk to, and I’d done that, so I supposed it wasn’t my problem.
The train arrived right on time, and Jeremy came into the ticket office, where I was waiting, almost as soon as it stopped moving. He gave me a huge smile, which made him look positively gorgeous, and if there hadn’t been other people about I don’t think I’d have been able to stop myself giving him a long hug and several kisses, even though that would probably have driven him straight onto the next train south: who wants to be kissed by Myopia Man? As it was I managed to restrain myself from doing anything more than smiling back and asking if he’d had a good journey.
“Not bad,” he said. “It seemed a bit slow, but of course last time I did the journey you were with me, and I expect that made it go faster, because we were talking all the way.”
“So how come you had the money for the fare?” I asked, leading him out of the station and back up the hill. “Was Kenton feeling generous enough to give you an Easter present?”
“Well… sort of. I’ll tell you about when we get back to yours, though, because… well, I’d sooner not talk about it in public. So, is your friend Danny going to be around while I’m here?”
“Afraid not. He’s Jewish, and he’s celebrating Passover with his family all week. But he and I have been teaching Mark to play – well, to play better, anyway – and he might be around if you get bored with playing me all the time.”
“I won’t get bored with playing you,” he assured me. “You might get bored with losing to me all the time, though.”
“Like I did in the school match, you mean?”
“That was only because I was too worried about Kenton and his mates to concentrate. You were just lucky you didn’t catch me on a normal day!”
We went on talking about chess and other trivia on the bus home. When we got there I introduced Jeremy to my mother and then took him up to my room and closed the door.
“Okay, tell me about Kenton,” I said.
Jeremy knelt down and looked under the bed.
“Just checking for microphones,” he explained.
“There aren’t any, or cameras either, thanks to you. So..?”
He sat next to me on the bed. “We had a long talk about it, and we’re sort of friends again. We’re not quite back to how we were before… well, before, but I think what you said to him – about it not being a choice for me – changed his mind a bit. He’s still a bit wary, but it looks as if he missed us being friends, and that’s now more important to him than me being gay. So he’s stopped taking money off me. Actually he’d only spent a bit of what he’d taken off me before, so it turns out I’ve still got a bit saved up for the summer, because even after we’d bought our tent there was still some left over.”
“What tent is this, then?” I asked.
“A little while before… well, we found this really good spot to build a den, and we’d just about started it when… Anyway, it turns out that Peter kept working on it, and he showed me what he’s done with it a few days ago, and it’s really good. And we thought that if we got a small tent we could probably camp overnight there, so we looked around to see what we could afford, and Peter found someone selling one – so it’s second hand, but it’s just about perfect, because it fits inside the bigger den nicely. So on Friday night we slept in it. We had supper at home, because I don’t think either of us can really cook very well, and we didn’t have a stove anyway, but then we went out to the tent. Peter made me get undressed once we were inside because he still likes teasing me about… you know, not being very big, and then when it got properly dark he dared me to come for a walk in the wood with nothing on except my shoes. So I did – it wasn’t that cold, and anyway the one thing about it being dark is that nobody’s likely to see you – not like when you were there and he made me go all that way in daylight.
“But it’s pretty scary in the wood at night – you can hear all sorts of weird noises, and you start to wonder exactly what sort of animal might be making them. Anyway, Peter started getting nervous before we’d gone very far and he wanted to go back, but I more or less embarrassed him into going a bit further. We made it all the way to the old railway before turning round. I did get scared when I thought we’d got lost, but Peter had brought his torch and we found our way back to the tent in the end. And when we got back he said he thought I was really brave to go all that way at night with nothing on. So I said ‘I knew I’d be okay because you were with me,’ and I could see that he liked that. Anyway, we sat around and talked for quite a while, and it really was like it used to be – except for me not having anything on, of course, but I’d got used to that.
“Eventually we got into our sleeping bags and went to sleep, and I slept really well. Next morning when he woke up he said he had an erection, and so I offered to suck it for him, and he actually asked if I really didn’t mind before he agreed – so I really don’t think he’ll make me do it again if I decide I don’t want to. Anyway, I made sure he enjoyed it, because it felt so good being almost-friends again that I honestly don’t mind sucking him sometimes if we can stay on good terms. And afterwards he said that he won’t mind me being gay if I’m going to make him feel that good, so I genuinely think we’re basically okay again.”
“Good,” I said. “That’s really great, Jeremy – except… well, I suppose this means you won’t need me any longer.”
“What? Of course I’m going to need you! Unless… well… if you’d prefer for me not to…”
“Don’t be stupid,” I said, firmly. “Of course I want us to go on being friends. Even if you and Kenton start to spend most of your spare time together again like you used to, I hope you’ll still have time to come and visit me sometimes. Who am I going to thrash at chess if you’re not around?”
“Bets?” he said.
“Let’s just play a few games and see,” I suggested, and so we went down to the study and started playing – and that was the part of the day I’d been particularly looking forward to, of course, because it allowed me to sit across the table from him and just look at him – and even if it didn’t help my game much, it was most definitely worth it. Perhaps it was because the problems he’d been having with Kenton were now behind him, but he looked a lot more relaxed, and somehow that made him look even more stunning. Once again I heartily cursed my useless eyes: if it hadn’t been for those damned glasses I really think he might have been interested in me.
We didn’t stop properly at lunchtime: instead we took a quick ten minutes while I popped into the kitchen and made us both some bacon sandwiches – with the bacon cooked properly, of course, the way I knew we both liked it…
Jeremy
“Hey, these are really nice!” I said. “You remembered how I like them!”
“It’s how I like them, too. Oh, I’ve got ketchup, if you want some?”
“No, thanks, I like them just like this. Thanks, Kevin.”
The break in play gave me a chance to have a proper look at Kevin. He’d taken his glasses off to give them a quick clean, and he looked really good without them – I wondered if he’d been working out, because he didn’t look quite as skinny as I’d thought. If he kept doing whatever it was that he was doing, by the time I finally reached puberty he’d look absolutely amazing – although I was sure he’d have been snapped up by someone else long before that. God, it was so unfair!
But even if we were only going to be friends it was still good – after all, I hadn’t exactly been awash with friends before, and now I had one who could even understand about me being gay, and that was priceless. And he could make awesome bacon sandwiches, too…
We went on playing various sorts of chess for a couple of hours after lunch, but at that point Kevin’s mum more or less chased us out of the house, telling us it was a really nice day out and we shouldn’t spend the whole day cooped up indoors – in fact she sounded almost exactly like my mum. So Kevin took me for a walk, and it turned out that the area around his house was not all that different from where I live – fields and woods, mostly. And it was nice just being with him and not having to worry in case I said the wrong thing, because by now I’d just about worked out that nothing I was likely to say was going to stop us being friends.
We wandered about for an hour and a half or so, and when we got back to the house we found that Chris had returned from wherever he’d been earlier. I was a bit nervous about meeting him again, to be honest, and I hoped he wasn’t mad at me for stopping him telling his brother what to do, even though he hadn’t acted at all that way on my previous visit. But actually it turned out fine, and as soon as he got a moment to talk to me on his own he thanked me again for telling him what had been going on. Apparently I’d been right, and he really was a good brother after all.
We spent a while playing video games with him, and he was pretty good, so I didn’t win very often and neither did Kevin, but it was still fun. And we actually ate supper sitting at the table instead of off of trays in front of the TV. Kevin’s father wasn’t there – apparently he’d gone to the Middle East on business – but Kevin’s mum said that when they had guests they should still eat properly at the table, and actually I sort of liked that. The only time we all sat down at the table at home was for Sunday lunch, so this made a nice change.
After supper it was more video games, some TV and more chess, until eventually Kevin said that we ought to think about going to bed. He led me upstairs past his room and a little further along the corridor.
“This is your room,” he told me. “There’s a spare pillow in the cupboard if you need a second one. The bathroom’s the next door on the right. If you need anything, give me a shout.”
He said goodnight and went out. Well, obviously I’d known this was going to happen, but as I sat on the bed and started to get undressed I found myself wishing that Kevin’s dad wasn’t quite so rich: if they’d lived in a smaller house, one without a spare bedroom, maybe I would have had to share Kevin’s bed…
I sighed, put my pyjamas on, dug into my bag for my washing kit and went along to the bathroom to clean my teeth, and once I’d done that I went back to my room, closed the door and got into bed. But I found it hard to get to sleep: for a start, it was too quiet. At home I could usually hear the murmur of the TV downstairs after I’ve gone to bed, but this room was probably too far from the lounge for me to hear it even if Mrs Stratford had it on. And the bed felt strange, too – yes, it was comfortable, but it wasn’t my bed. And after about half an hour of wriggling about and trying to get comfortable I gave up, turned the light on and got out of bed. And at that point I thought ‘To hell with it’.
I opened the door and marched down the corridor to Kevin’s room. I paused, took a deep breath and then opened the door and put my head into the room.
“Kevin?” I said, “Are you awake?”
“No,” he said, sleepily.
“I don’t believe you.”
He fumbled for his bedside light and peered at me blearily – obviously he wasn’t wearing his glasses.
“Sorry, Jeremy,” he said, sounding a bit more alert. “What’s wrong?”
“Well, I… I’m not really used to sleeping away from home, and it’s a bit quiet in that room, and…”
I took another deep breath.
“Look, I know this is a bit of a cheek, but… do you think I could sleep in here with you tonight instead?”
He didn’t answer straight away, and I thought he was probably about to make some scathing comment about little kids and how feeble they are. But instead he said, “Well, sure… but I haven’t got another mattress or anything, so unless you just want to sleep on the carpet you’d have to share my bed. Is that okay?”
“Oh, God, yes!” I said.
“Okay, then. Except… could you give me a moment? See, I’m not wearing any pyjamas.”
“Don’t worry about it,” I said, stepping into the room and closing the door behind me. “I really don’t mind at all if you’re just sleeping in your pants.”
“Well, actually, I’m not wearing any pants either.”
“Ah. Well, I still don’t care. Budge up.”
He moved across to the far side of the bed, and I promptly removed my pyjamas and got in next to him.
“Now neither of us is wearing any pants,” I said. “That’s fair, isn’t it?”
“Yes, I should think so,” he said.
“Good. Now you can turn the light out again and we can find out if we’re going to be able to sleep like this.”
“I won’t mind too much if we can’t,” he said, turning the light off.
“Nor will I,” I replied, wriggling closer to him.
“Jeremy… are you sure this is what you want?” he asked.
“I’m sure,” I told him. “I couldn’t be surer.”
“But… I mean… Look, I know my glasses make me look a dork…”
“No, they don’t. God, Kevin, I wish you’d stop worrying about your glasses, because with or without them on you look great. I just wish I had a bit more to offer you, but if you can hang on for another year or six, or however long it takes me to hit puberty… well, maybe then you won’t find me quite so immature.”
“Is that what you think I think? Bloody hell, Jer, you look absolutely amazing, right here, right now.”
“Yes, but my dick’s pathetic.”
“No, it isn’t. Do you really think you have to have a massive dick to be attractive? Trust me, you don’t. Even if yours never grows another millimetre I’ll still think you look stunning, and anyway that isn’t going to happen. It’ll grow, and probably quite soon, but if you think that’s all I’m interested in you couldn’t be more wrong.”
“Really?”
“Yes, really. And in case you don’t believe how amazing you look, I have some fairly concrete evidence for you. It got that way the moment you got into bed, and if you move this way a little further you’ll be able to check it for yourself.”
“Me, too,” I admitted.
“Now that’s not so easy to believe,” he said. “I think maybe I ought to check… bloody hell, you’re right!”
How I didn’t faint when he touched me I’ll never know, because it was about the most incredible feeling I’d ever had. The only problem was that he was even closer to the edge than I was, and I’d barely taken hold of him when…
“Sorry,” he said, turning on the light and reaching for the box of tissues beside the bed. “But at least now you know that I meant what I said about the effect you have on me.”
And it was true that the evidence was pretty hard to argue with.
“Fair’s fair,” he said, once he’d cleaned up. “Your turn.”
And he took hold of me and rubbed it for thirty seconds or so, which was all it took to get me into the same state, though sadly without any liquid evidence. It was still a phenomenal experience, though.
He turned off the light and snuggled close to me, putting an arm around me.
“I wish you’d said something sooner,” he said. “I was convinced you hated my glasses so much that you’d prefer death to being seen with me.”
“You dick,” I said. “How could you think that?”
“How could you think I’d care about you being a late developer?” he countered. “We’re the same age… when’s your birthday?”
“September the twenty-fifth.”
“Then you’re actually about seven weeks older than me, because mine is November the eighteenth,” he said. “And if we’re the same age there’s no reason why we can’t go out together… I mean, if you want to, that is?”
“Of course I want to!” I said.
“Great! Then that’s all that matters. Of course you’re going to get taller and stronger when you reach puberty, whereas my eyes aren’t going to get any better, so I’ll still be wearing the glasses when you look even more like a Greek god than you do now, but if you can put up with that, I’m certainly not going to argue.”
“Good. And you’d better not.”
He cuddled me a bit more and it felt better being in his arms than I had ever imagined it. I felt comfortable and happy: I actually had a boyfriend! And he didn’t care about my lack of development!! I fell asleep, still not really able to believe how lucky I was…
Kevin
I woke up to find Jeremy asleep with his head against my chest. I still couldn’t believe how lucky I was: not only did I have a stunningly beautiful boyfriend, but apparently he didn’t care about my glasses!
I stroked his hair gently for a while until finally he began to stir.
“Morning,” he said sleepily
“Morning,” I replied. “I can’t get over how beautiful your hair is…”
He looked up at me.
“Or your eyes,” I went on. “Or your nose, or your lips… I wonder if they feel as soft as they look… Please can I find out?”
“I don’t see why not.”
So I pulled him up so that his head was level with mine and kissed him gently on the lips, which turned out to be every bit as soft as they looked. He slipped his arm round me and wriggled a bit closer, in the process inadvertently letting me know that one part of him at least was pleased to see me.
We nuzzled together for a while, and then he drew back for a moment.
“Would you like me to show you what Peter taught me to do?” he asked.
“Well… yes, obviously – but only if you’re sure you want to.”
“Oh, I want to.”
He wriggled down into the bed, and over the next twenty minutes or so I discovered that Kenton had been a very good teacher. And after I got my breath back and Jeremy had reappeared beside me I told him so.
“Well, I’d say you’re almost exactly the same size as he is,” he told me. “The difference is just that you’ve got a bit more hair. And by now I know exactly what to do to make it feel good for him, so I’m glad it works for you, too.”
“Trust me, it works,” I said. “And now I’m going to show you what some of Chris’s friends have taught me.”
“Okay,” he said. “Just remember that I’ve never had this done to me before, so be careful!”
“Don’t worry,” I said, ducking down beneath the duvet.
If mine was the same size as Kenton’s, it turned out that Jeremy’s was almost identical to Silvio’s, minus the hair. I didn’t intend telling him this, though: I didn’t think he’d really want to be told that he was the same size as an eleven-year-old, or that the eleven-year-old had some hair. But it did mean that I’d had practice on something of this size, and Silvio had seemed happy with my efforts…
So, it turned out, was Jeremy, although possibly that was partially due to this being his first experience of it. But he seemed thoroughly happy with the result anyway, to judge by the way he hugged me and kissed me afterwards.
“Does it always feel like that?” he asked.
“Well, if it felt good, I hope so. But I won’t mind practising with you a few times until you’re sure.”
We cuddled for a bit longer and then got up, got partly dressed – I put on my boxers and jeans, he put on his pyjama trousers – and went and had a wash. Afterwards he diverted to his room to collect the rest of his clothes, and once he got back to my room we put on the rest of our clothes except for our shirts.
“I think we need to try something first,” I said, dropping my shirt on the bed.
“What’s that?”
“I think we ought to see if we can cope with the height difference. Put down that shirt and come here.”
It isn’t hard to manage a difference of less than four inches, of course, but any excuse… So he stood in front of me and tilted his head up a little, and I stooped slightly, and like that we are able to kiss with no trouble at all. Of course, I thought we ought to have a thorough check, and so we put our arms around each other and hugged, kissing at the same time.
And right at that moment the bedroom door opened and I heard Chris’s voice.
“Hey, Kev,” he started, “after breakfast we’re… going… ah. Sorry.”
I looked up and saw Chris standing in the doorway looking a bit embarrassed. And right next to him, staring open-mouthed in my direction, was Colin.
*****************************
So finally Kevin and Jeremy have removed their blinkers and got together... but now there's a rather large fly in Kevin's ointment: how is Colin likely to react? All will be revealed in the next chapter.
I'd be slightly surprised to discover that you don't yet know my mail address, but just in case it's passed you by, here it is again: gothmog@nyms.net
Copyright 2013: all rights reserved. Please do not reprint, repost or otherwise reproduce this or any part of it anywhere without my written permission.
David Clarke