Saturday after A level results day – well, that could only mean one thing – another party at James’ house.
I sat on the edge of the pool with my legs hanging over the side, watching my friends enjoying themselves. I’d covered my scar with a bandage to stop it getting sunburned, but the doctor had forbidden me from getting my arm wet, so I was relegated to the role of observer.
Amy, however, was not holding back. I’d been trying to hide a semi, ever since she’d changed into her swimming gear. She was wearing a red halter-neck bikini, which showed off the gentle swell of her breasts and the graceful curve of her neck. Her muscles were toned after a summer of horse riding and her figure was striking. True, my girlfriend didn’t have Becky’s washboard stomach, but she was certainly giving her a good run for her money. I have to admit feeling a few twinges of possessive jealousy as the two of them turned heads.
But it was her personality that had changed most dramatically. Scarcely three days earlier, Amy had been firmly in the grip of anxious despondency. She’d convinced herself that she was going to miss the grades that she needed for university. Now, all the pressure had been released – she’d thrown off the weight on her shoulders and more. No one at our school had ever come in the top three nationwide in an exam, no one – ever. That was an achievement that not even her Cambridge-bound boyfriend could outshine. Amy was letting her hair down for the first time in six weeks, maybe the first time in her life, and was absolutely unafraid to show it.
Eventually I became too hot and beat a retreat to the shade by the house.
Stijn flopped down on the chair next to mine. “Not drinking?” he said, indicating the glass of water in my hand.
“Nah,” I said, “still off alcohol – waiting for my final scan on Monday. I couldn’t even have a sip of champagne on Thursday night!”
Stijn looked across to the pool, where Amy (on Lauren’s shoulders) was shrieking with laughter as she wrestled Becky (on James’).
“I can’t believe that’s Amy Norton,” he said. “What have you done to her?”
“Nowt to do with me,” I replied, “it’s those horses at the Stables. Her sense of balance is so good, she can stay on anyone’s shoulders, even Danny’s.”
“Bet she rides really well,” he quipped, nudging my good arm.
“That’s for me to know and you never to find out,” I bantered back. I hoped I would find out, but a small part of me wasn’t sure I would.
We were quiet for a bit, a silence that stretched to become awkward. I could sense that Stijn wanted to talk, but didn’t know what to say or how to say it.
“How are things with you and Rachel?” I asked.
He paused, as if considering whether to brush me off with a wise crack or glib comment. “Actually Jake, it’s not so good,” he said.
I nodded thoughtfully and encouragingly, but inside I was a little shocked. Rachel and Stijn were the first boy and girl at school to have got together. They were the perfect couple and they were going to get married – everyone knew that.
“It’s over three years now,” he said slowly, “and, well, it’s great, but also… also something’s missing.”
“Missing?” I echoed gently.
“You know, I was watching the two of you earlier – you and Amy,” he continued, “I think it’s the first time I’ve properly seen the two of you together – as a couple I mean. You’re so in love with each other, it’s really amazing to see. After everything the two of you have gone through, it’s, it’s just incredible.”
He paused. “And then I thought, well Rachel and I used to be like that, but maybe now the spark isn’t just fading, maybe it’s been gone for a while.
“Don’t get me wrong,” he continued, “we get on really well, and it’s great fun to be with her and the sex is awesome, but sometimes, sometimes I wonder if we’re really fully connecting, deep down. I don’t know if Rachel’s a fuckbuddy who I like to hang out with, or if she’s actually my girlfriend.”
He paused, thinking. It was clear he didn’t want me to interrupt.
“You know, I’m looking around, we’re about to go to uni and I’m wondering if I should get to know someone else. I don’t know what I’m missing, if I’m missing it.”
He paused again, as if disappointed in himself.
“I’m sorry, that sounds awful doesn’t it. I feel like such a disloyal shit.” He looked downwards, a little ashamed.
“No, that doesn’t sound awful,” I said. “Everyone has doubts in a relationship, it’s normal.”
“We don’t really talk,” he continued, “not properly. I mean we say that we love each other, but if one of us had a problem, would we trust each other enough deep down to be completely open, completely honest?”
I nodded. For much of the summer, I’d felt the same way about Amy. It wasn’t until about three weeks after the attack that we’d been able to talk about it, but not in any particularly deep or meaningful way. Even now, the pressure of the police investigation was still a strain, but our exam results had arrived just in time to be a giant sticking plaster. Amy was enjoying herself that afternoon, but underneath the issues hadn’t gone away. She was still having the counselling.
“You know, I look at you and Amy,” he said, “and you’ve had such an awful experience, but the two of you have supported each other through it so well.”
“Actually Stijn,” I said, “I’m not sure we have.”
Now it was his turn to be surprised.
“Really?” he said.
“Yeah,” I said. “It’s been a really hard slog since the Prom. I’ve had to get better and we’ve both had to come to terms with what happened, both as individuals and as a couple. That’s been really difficult. Then there’s been the police investigation – that’s been really intrusive for Amy, especially with all the allegations at school. Plus all the gossip that’s running around – a lot of it pretty unkind towards her.
“We were together what, two and a half months, people were only just finding out and all of a sudden we’re both under more pressure than we’ve ever experienced before. It got so bad, Amy went to stay with her grandparents for a week, just to escape from it all.”
I sighed. “It’s taken a long time for us to start to talk about what happened. We’ve been struggling to find our way in the dark. I still don’t really know if it would be better for us to be together or apart.”
“Oh Jake,” he said, “I’m sorry.”
“We have good days and bad days. This week was tough up until Thursday morning, very tough, but now we’re on a high with exam results. But who knows how long that’ll last.”
Stijn looked at me again. “What are you going to do?” he asked, “about you and Amy, I mean.”
“I don’t know,” I admitted. “Part of me wants to be very selfish and just make sure that I focus on getting fully recovered by the time I go to Cambridge and not to worry about anything or anyone else. A lot of me wants to believe that Amy just needs time and space to come to terms with everything herself. Part of me wants us to really work to get through it together. And sadly, part of me believes that while the two of us are a couple, the reminders will be too strong and the only way for us to put things behind us, is to split up.”
Stijn put his arm across my shoulder.
“But the worst thing,” I said choking up a little, “is that I can sit here and tell you this, while we watch her splashing around having fun in the pool. But I can’t say that to her myself.”
“Fuck Jake, I’m sorry,” Stijn said, looking a little uncomfortable. “I didn’t mean to bring all that up.”
“That’s alright,” I replied. “Everyone thinks the same way – my final hospital appointment is on Monday and I should get the all clear to drive – so then I’m fully recovered. But I’m not, it’s all the mental stuff that takes longer to heal. It’s the same for Amy, she wasn’t physically injured, but she’s been having counselling to get over the trauma too. She’s had it worse than me – she was with me in the ambulance, when I was out cold. I hardly remember anything, but she can play the whole thing back in her mind, minute-by-minute. She won’t forget Ritchie smashing me over the head with that bottle – ever – and I don’t blame her.”
“I’m sorry Jake, my whinging is nothing compared to what you’ve gone through,” he said humbly.
Rachel heaved herself out of the pool and crossed the patio to us.
“Hey guys, nice bromance!” she teased, indicating Stijn’s arm still across my shoulders. She slumped down in a chair next to her boyfriend.
“Well done on your grades for Cambridge, Jake,” she said.
“Thanks,” I replied. “And you two will be in Warwick and Birmingham – what half an hour from each other at most?”
“Yeah,” Stijn said. “It’ll be good to be close to each other.”
I drained my glass and set it on the table in front of me.
“I’m going to go get some water. You want another one?” asked Stijn.
“Yes please,” I replied, pretending not to have seen the surreptitious looks that had passed between him and his girlfriend.
Stijn stood, “back in a minute,” he said.
“I’ll give you a hand,” said Rachel and the two of them slipped in through the patio doors into the house.
I looked at the time on my phone. Half three – they were starting early.
–
I looked across the patio from my vantage point in the shade. There was someone who I hadn’t expected to see at the party, but who I really wanted to talk to. He’d been with some of the others, but now he was on his own, looking a little shifty, sending nervous glances in my direction.
I looked over to the pool. Amy was enjoying herself too much to be paying attention. I took a deep breath, stood up and walked over to him. He looked up and swallowed anxiously.
I extended my hand. He looked apprehensive, but he accepted and shook it.
“Hello Billy,” I said.
“Er, hi Jake,” he replied.
“Mind if I sit down?” I asked.
“No, sure,” he said, shuffling nervously across a little on the bench.
“I just wanted to say thank you,” I said.
“Thank you?” he squeaked in surprise.
“For what you did at the Prom,” I explained.
“Please don’t take the piss Jake,” he said, “I fucked up, I should have stopped him, but I didn’t. You got hurt bad, real bad. I’m sorry.” He looked across at me with wide pleading eyes.
“I’m not taking the piss,” I said. “You didn’t fail anyone. I’m thanking you, from the bottom of my heart.”
He looked up at me, suspicious, frightened even.
“You saw I was bleeding badly, so you took off your shirt and you made a tourniquet with it. I could have lost a lot of blood before the ambulance arrived, but I didn’t because of what you did. Then you stayed and helped the police find Ritchie, before he could harm himself or anyone else.”
“But anyone would have done that,” he said.
“No,” I said, “a lesser man would have panicked and run away.”
He looked at me again, tears were starting to well up in his eyes.
“Come on,” I said, “let’s go for a walk.”
We stood up. I put my arm on his shoulder and we walked down to the bottom of James’ garden, pushing past the row of tall conifers to the scrubby area beyond – the same place where I’d found Danny paralytic on the night of the cast party, four months earlier.
We sat down on the old bench. Billy fished in his pocket for a packet of cigarettes. He lit one and drew on it nervously. He’d been fighting hard, but the dam broke and he dissolved in floods of tears.
“I’m sorry,” he said, attempting to dry his eyes on his sleeve, “I’m such a pussy.”
“No, you’re not,” I said, “not at all. You’ve had as much to deal with since the Prom as Amy and I have. It’s hard – I know it is – things are as fresh and raw as they’ve ever been.”
He looked up, relief in his eyes – someone understood what he’d been going through.
“I’ve replayed that night, every minute of it, over and over,” Billy said slowly, calmer now. “I’ve stayed awake for so long, thinking how I could have stopped him, how I should have stopped him.
“He was so angry,” he continued. “I’ve never seen him so angry. I tried to calm him down. I gave him more vodka – I thought that might help. But he just got worse.
“He said he was going back for you, going back to deal with you.” Billy’s voice was beginning to crack again. “And I didn’t believe him, and then, when I realised he really was going back to hurt you, it was too late. I ran after him, but it was too late.”
“Billy,” I said, “I don’t think you could ‘ve done – you couldn’t have stopped him. He’s not well, Ritchie isn’t – he’s sick – all that’s coming out now. He could have done far worse to one of the girls – he almost did a fortnight ago.”
Billy drew on his cigarette again. “I didn’t know,” he said, a little sheepishly, gesturing with his hand. “I mean, I saw him smacking some of them on the arse a couple of times, but that was it.” He looked up at me a little frightened. “I didn’t know about the other stuff Jake, I swear. I swear I didn’t.”
I nodded – I believed him. Ritchie used him to deal out threats and humiliation – he was his stooge, his minion – not a friend. Pushing and shoving was the most Billy was capable of. The Head Boy would never have involved him in his predatory activities. Spiking drinks and slipping hands up skirts – those were things that Ritchie might have done with Ross – he’d never have let a snivelling lackey like Billy tag along.
Billy nodded. “He really hated you, right from the beginning. It wasn’t that fucking cricket match, he was a dick to you for at least a year before that all blew up.”
I nodded. “Maybe it was just because we were such different people and the things the two of us felt were important were so different. He couldn’t ever understand what made me tick.”
Billy paused, considering what I’d said. “You just got under his skin by being you. You didn’t give a fuck about anything he did, who he was or who he wanted to be. You saw through his bullshit – we can all see it now, but you realised way back,” he said ruefully.
“I think he wanted James, Stijn, Nick, Ian to be part of his club,” I replied. “He couldn’t understand why someone like James, who lives in a house like this, with a brilliant lawyer for a mum and a successful businessman for a dad, would want to piss around in the mud on a farm with me, Lauren and Danny! But the more Ritchie tried to prise us apart, the closer we were. He never thought he’d end up having that fight with James.”
Billy took another drag on his cigarette.
“I was such a prick,” he said pitifully. “I just wanted to suck up to him, I thought I was being clever. And I hated you, because you weren’t scared of him or me – you just got on with being you, no matter what we did. I hated you so fucking much.”
“But what you did after the Prom,” I said calmly, “that wasn’t hate.”
“No,” he replied slowly, “that wasn’t.”
We were quiet for a bit. He took a couple more slow draws on his cigarette.
“Do you remember – at the Prom, when we’d all just arrived and we were having our photos taken?” Billy asked. “And you saw me on my own, and you kind of grabbed me and asked if you could have a photo with me? And you said that we’d look back as old men and wonder why we’d hated each other so much?”
I nodded. He took his phone out of his pocket and found the picture. Two blond-haired, eighteen-year-old boys, in smart dress suits and black bow ties were standing together, smiling as best friends: Billy and me.
“Look at us,” he gestured to the photo. “That’s when it hit me, how fucking pointless it was. There were students around me, who’d be mates for the rest of their lives. And what did I have? I’d been such a cunt to everyone that no one cared about me. And Ritchie couldn’t give a fuck either. Then, the one guy in the school I hated more than anyone, asks if he can have a fucking photo with me.”
He buried his head in his hands. “I’ve been such a fucking arsehole, Jake. How could I be such a fucking fool?”
I didn’t really know what to say – I certainly hadn’t expected Billy to end up in floods of tears when I’d sat down next to him barely five minutes earlier. I put my arm across his shoulder again.
“If it makes you feel any better,” I replied half chuckling, “I really hated you back! I think I hated you more than Ritchie, because I knew you were only doing it to suck up to him.”
“Er thanks,” he said sarcastically, “that really does make me feel better.”
“I don’t hate you now,” I said. “I really don’t. I mean that sincerely. That’s what I wanted to tell you.”
He looked up at me again, “you don’t?”
“No, I bear you no ill will whatsoever. When I needed you, you were there for me and that’s more than I’ve ever done for you – far more than I’ve ever done for you. That’s why I wanted to thank you. That was the night the true Billy came through, the one that didn’t give a flying fuck about what Ritchie or anyone else thought of him. You acted instinctively to do what was right.” I paused. “You might have saved more than one life that night.”
Billy looked up at me confused.
“I was out cold on the ground,” I explained. “I couldn’t protect Amy, he could have…”
I heard my voice trailing off. I’d never discussed that outcome with anyone, but it had kept me awake almost every night since the attack.
Billy looked alarmed as the full horror flashed through his mind. He shook his head, trying to banish the image.
“Billy,” I said gently, putting my arm around him again “we all fuck up – no one’s perfect – no one. Sometimes you can keep on fucking up for so long without realising. But then someone points it out, or maybe you realise – but it’s not the fucking up that’s important, it’s how you react when you know – what you do next, how you deal with things. And that night and ever since, you’ve done absolutely the right thing – that’s the true Billy in you. The good guy, the guy with the good heart – that’s the Billy you’ve been hiding for so long.”
He gave me a strange look, a wary look – suspicious perhaps that I might know him better than he knew himself. Maybe he just didn’t believe me. He shook his head slowly again and looked away, despairing into the distance.
“Now you’re off to Durham for uni, you won’t know anyone up there – it’s a fresh start,” I continued. “It’s the same for all of us – new faces, new friends – school will be a memory, no more than that. You’re not going to turn a corner and find yourself bumping into Ritchie, me or any of us. You can be who you are, with no one judging you on who you were or who you wanted to be.”
Billy nodded slowly. “Yes, a fresh start,” he said quietly. He looked down again at the photo on his phone of the two of us. “A fresh start,” he repeated.
I stayed with him at the bottom of the garden for a little longer, then he made his excuses and left to go home. I waved him off on his bike as he set off down the road.
“And the one thing Billy, I didn’t tell you,” I said to myself, “was the real reason Ritchie hit me with that bottle. That was the night that you stood up to him for the first time. You were the last faithful lieutenant. That was the night, when the person he’d taken for granted for the past seven years and whose loyalty he thought he could never lose, came to my aid.”
–
Amy and I stayed outside as the shadows lengthened across the lawn; the others had already headed inside to get changed.
She sat sideways across my lap, her legs extended across the wooden slats of the bench.
“Is that cigarette smoke?” she said, sniffing my polo shirt.
“I was talking to Billy,” I explained. “I’ve got another top in my bag – I’ll change when we go inside.”
“Oh? I didn’t see Billy,” she replied.
“Yeah,” I confirmed. “He came after lunch, but he didn’t go in the pool. He was here for an hour and a half, maybe two hours.”
“And you hadn’t seen him since the Prom?” she asked.
I shook my head. “No, I should have met up with him earlier, but, I dunno, I just didn’t. But I should have thanked him for what he did, long before now.”
Amy nodded. “And I expect you enjoyed catching up as well,” she said.
I nodded, a little intrigued.
“You know, I didn’t realise you were such good friends,” she continued. “You’ve never really mentioned him at all. If you hadn’t been in the play together, I wouldn’t have thought you’d have known each other.”
I gave her a slightly confused look.
“It’s what he said as I was getting in the ambulance. He asked me to look after you and said you were his true friend and that you meant a lot to him. Something like that anyway.”
“Oh,” I said, trying to hide my bewilderment.
Amy gave me a suspicious look. “Am I missing something Jake?” she asked slowly. “You weren’t best friends a long time ago who had a massive falling out?” She paused. “He’s not one of your cousins, is he?”
I laughed.
“No, Lauren’s my only cousin, I promise. Unless there’s a secret in my family I don’t know about.”
“Go on, Jake” Amy said gently. “Tell me about you and Billy. There is something back in the past, before I joined the school, isn’t there? What happened between you?”
I nodded, a little unhappily. Amy could do it too now – she, Mum, Lauren – they all knew when I was trying to avoid saying something. My mind was an open book to the female inquisitor.
“I suppose I should start from the beginning,” I said. “You know Ritchie and I never hit it off – we hated each other right from the word go. Even when we were eleven, he was a colossal, arrogant twat. But almost everyone loved him, especially the girls.”
Amy nodded.
I sighed. “I suppose I was an easy target, you know, the farmer’s son and all that. They used to grunt and make animal noises, hold their noses as if I smelt of cowshit. Then, as we got older, they used to say I fucked the sheep.”
“Oh,” said Amy, a little surprised. “And what about Lauren?”
“Uh huh,” I said wryly. “Incest too.”
“That’s not what I meant. Didn’t they bully her?”
“They tried,” I replied, “but I’m not exactly sure what happened. She dragged Ritchie into the bathroom at school one day and flushed his head down the toilet. No one ever dared take her on after that.”
“Oh! But how did she manage that?” Amy asked surprised. “Didn’t Ritchie fight her off?”
I shook my head.
“No, Lauren’s always been very strong,” I explained. “She was taller than me until we were almost sixteen. I can beat her at arm wrestling now, but only just.”
“But they didn’t leave you alone after that?” Amy asked.
I shook my head again. “If I’d have gone running to Lauren any time anyone was a dick to me, it would have made everything ten times worse. ‘Jake being protected by a girl!’ You know what teenage boys are like! Maybe if I’d have done the same that would have been the end of it – but I didn’t fight back like Lauren did.”
“And what about Billy?” Amy asked. “How does he fit in?”
“So Ritchie got clever,” I explained. “After the Lauren incident, he realised he needed someone to do his dirty work for him – that was Billy. It was sad really, because Billy could see if he didn’t do what Ritchie wanted, he’d get it instead of me.
“And if a teacher ever appeared at the wrong moment,” I continued, “it meant Ritchie’s fingerprints could never be found – in fact he could even make it look like he was breaking things up, like some fucking United Nations Peace Envoy.”
Amy stroked my arm gently.
“Anyway, there was some cricket match at school – we were thirteen or fourteen. They’d made Ritchie captain of one of the teams and he’d been going on in the changing room about how good at batting he was and how he was going to get a century – some shit like that. So first ball, first over, James bowls and Ritchie hits it straight into my hands – out for a duck! It put him off cricket for the rest of his life!”
“And what about you?” Amy asked.
“Well, that was the night I went home with my sports kit covered in brown paint,” I said. “It was meant to match the colour of the manure at the farm – that was Billy’s artistic interpretation. He said I needed camouflage.”
Amy looked horrified. “And what did the teachers say?”
“Well it was the usual reaction,” I said, a little angrily. “Faults on all sides, a silly schoolboy prank out of control – blah, blah, blah. Billy and I had to wash the school minibuses together as a punishment.”
“Hold on,” Amy said. “You got punished because Billy covered you in brown paint?”
“Yes, I’d dared him to do it apparently. Ritchie backed him up!”
“And what about your friends, what did they say?” Amy asked. “James, Danny and Stijn?”
“Well that was the thing,” I replied. “It had been brewing for a while, but that was the straw that broke the camel’s back: James overheard Ritchie boasting how he’d got Billy to throw the paint over me and the two of them ended up having a big fight in the playground – him and Ritchie.”
“Oh no,” said Amy sounding a little horrified.
“Well, James always claims it was Ritchie who started it, but Ritchie said it was James. I don’t know – I wasn’t there – I was washing minibuses with Billy. James went to remonstrate with Ritchie and then it got out of hand.
“Anyway the teachers appeared right at the moment when James had Ritchie on the ground in an armlock. Ritchie’s mates all immediately pointed the finger at James as the aggressor, so he got excluded for a week. Ritchie walked away scot free.”
“And was that coincidence – the teachers arriving when they did? Or did someone know when to call them?”
I laughed. “So Ritchie claimed to his mates that he’d planned it all along – to lose the fight to get James suspended. But I don’t think that was true – the fight wasn’t arranged in advance – it was just chance the teachers turned up when they did. James beat him fair and square.”
“And what happened when James came back?” Amy asked.
“Our whole year group split down the middle, or not quite the middle,” I replied. “You were either friends with Ritchie, Ross and Billy or you were friends with James, Jake and Danny. You couldn’t be both. James didn’t talk to Ritchie again for almost two years.”
“Like the Montagues and the Capulets,” Amy said quietly.
“Well it wasn’t that bad,” I replied. “More like the Cold War, with the odd scuffle in the corridors. We didn’t ever need an airlift though!”
“And did it get better?” Amy asked. “The cold war, I mean.”
“Slowly, very slowly,” I admitted, ignoring the opportunity to make a joke about the Berlin Wall coming down. “James and Ritchie reconciled about two years ago – it was the rugby that bought them back together.”
“And you and Ritchie?”
“He hated me before and he hated me afterwards,” I replied. “And by the time he’d patched things up with James, we were serious academic rivals.”
“And the rest of the school?”
“Having to focus on GCSEs helped,” I explained. “But even now you can still see the split – sciences verses humanities – we almost don’t mix. They go to the Sixth Form Centre to revise, we go to the town library. That’s why you didn’t really know who I was, for what – your first two terms?”
Amy nodded again. “I understand now,” she said. “I thought it was very odd. I thought it was the usual jocks and nerds thing, but then James and Stijn were the rugby players – they were your friends.”
I nodded.
“But why didn’t the school realise?” she asked.
“The school never did anything. They had a divide and rule strategy. As long as we weren’t killing each other, they didn’t care. They’d bent their thought processes so far out of shape, they thought it was healthy competition.”
“The official line was always that Jake and James were the aggressors, Billy and Ross were the innocent victims and Ritchie was the peacemaker. I was written off as a farm boy who’d leave school at sixteen to milk cows and tend sheep, James was going to play rugby and, I dunno, Danny was going to open a joke shop. We didn’t matter.
“Then our GCSE results came through – the dozen or so from the town library knocked it out the park. We’d just got our heads down and done it – my grades were the best in the school and James and Stijn weren’t far behind – in fact the two of them beat Ritchie. We proved to everyone and to ourselves that we weren’t the ones causing the trouble.”
“So things changed after that?”
I shook my head. “Not really,” I said. “Some of the teachers had begun to realise that year – the good ones. That’s where the science and humanities split came from. Mr Gregory, our science teacher was the best, he could see what had happened and he encouraged us. And I’d had a bit of maths tuition outside school, so that helped too.”
“Yes, you’ve mentioned your maths tutor before,” Amy said.
“Yes, Mr Matthews was great,” I replied. “I was so demotivated by everything at school, but he kinda made me believe in myself. He was the one that convinced me that I really was one of the best academically; I’d never have applied to Cambridge otherwise.
“And some of the others started going to him as well. We were paying him, of course, but he undercharged us so much. I think he just enjoyed it – it was either us or fishing. Plus, he’d taught at a girls-only school for most of his career and he just saw us as a group of bright, hard-working lads, who got on well and wanted to support each other.”
“And Ritchie?” Amy asked.
“Ritchie was untouchable – our GCSE scores were never going to change that. The fact he’d dropped a few grades was just shrugged off – apparently the exams couldn’t recognise his genius, or some bullshit like that. He was always going to be Head Boy.”
“But Oxford rejected him,” Amy said quietly.
“It was the shock of his life,” I continued. “The school should have told him that his GCSEs weren’t really strong enough, but he thought he could win it all at the interview. He was the expert manipulator – he could charm anyone. But the professors saw through him – they realised he was a bullshitter with nothing to back it up. And after that, everyone else started to talk – they realised he wasn’t invincible too. Of course, me getting into Cambridge made it so much worse – that definitely wasn’t in the script!”
“I’m sorry Jake,” she said, “I had no idea. I mean Frankie said that you and Ritchie were mortal enemies, but I hadn’t realised it had divided the school so badly.”
“Well Frankie was one of the ones who tried to bridge the divide,” I explained. “She was good friends with Lauren for a long time. Then she started going out with Ross and, well, he made her pick sides.”
“Ross was horrible to her,” Amy said, a note of melancholy in her voice.
“He treated her like dirt,” I agreed.
“What an awful mess!” Amy despaired, shaking her head. “How could I have been so blind to all of this?”
“I should have told you a lot earlier,” I said. “As soon as the Police were done with us, I should have explained. I’m sorry. I didn’t.”
We sat silently for a long time, watching as a blazing sunset lit up the evening sky. Amy knew everything now, everything. There was nothing I hadn’t told her. We were such a fucked-up bunch of kids.
My phone buzzed in my pocket. I swiped across the screen, holding it up behind her. There was a message from an unknown number.
‘Hi Jake,’ it read. ‘This is Billy. Thx 4 what u said earlier. U taught me more about myself in 1 afternoon than I evr learnt wi Ritchie. Am at peace 4 1st time all sumr. I no I don’t deserve u as a m8, but I wd lk 2 mt up wi u again. Maybe when we r back frm uni @ Xmas? All the best 4 Cambridge – u rly deserve it. Thank u.’
I smiled.
“Who’s that?” Amy asked.
“A friend,” I said.
She scowled at me.
“I probably shouldn’t show you,” I said, “but, go on, read it.” I handed the screen to her.
Amy scanned through the message.
“Well I don’t know what you said to him,” she said. “But whatever it was, it must have been profound.”
“I guess we forgave each other for a long feud,” I replied, a little glibly.
“Will you meet up with him at Christmas?”
I nodded. “Yes, I think I’d like to. He’ll be a new man then. He’s a new man now.”
Amy kissed me on the cheek.
“You’re an amazing guy, Jake,” she said quietly. “To have gone through all that and to have achieved what you have – you’re so strong. Anyone else really would have gone off to milk the cows and tend the sheep!”
“I’m not amazing,” I said, “I’m just lucky. I’ve got a group of a dozen close friends – Danny and James in particular – and we were willing to stick together through everything. Then, beyond our parents, the people that mattered believed in us, believed in me – Roger the vet, Mr Matthews, Mr Gregory – they inspired me – it didn’t matter about the school after that – we could almost go it alone.”
“You are amazing, Jake,” Amy insisted.
“You’re amazing too,” I said, kissing her gently on the forehead.
She blushed and shook her head.
“I remember when I first met you,” I said sincerely. “I think it was your eyes – they were so bright. On the outside, you were this quiet, shy girl – the angel with the beautiful singing voice. But inside, there was this strong, passionate woman burning within you – I could see it, I could tell.
“Everyone says you’ve changed so much,” I continued, smiling, “asks me what I’ve done to you! But I haven’t done anything – it’s just that they can see now, what I could see a long time ago. You’re a sweet, red rose that’s burst into flower; a radiant sun to light up the sky. You’re beautiful and amazing and I love you so much.”
I kissed her again and held her tightly against me. I was in danger of getting hard.
“Come on,” I said. “Let’s go inside and have something to eat!”
“Will there be anything left for us now?” Amy asked.
“Probably not,” I replied. “But it’s OK, I hid a pizza for us earlier.”
“Oh! Where did you put it?” she asked, flashing me a bright smile.
“In the fridge,” I replied. “They’ll never look in there!”
–
Amy and I slipped out of the back door of James’ house a little earlier than we’d originally planned. It was just before eleven and the sky was fully dark. Amy’s curfew was midnight and, although we’d promised her mum that we’d take a taxi to her home, walking would give her time to sober up a little.
I hadn’t really been conscious of Amy drinking that much during the course of the evening, certainly no more than anyone else, but she was clearly more than a little ‘merry’ as we turned out of James’ driveway and began walking down the gentle hill towards her house. She always became rather giggly after drinking alcohol, partly a consequence of her relative lack of familiarity, but I also suspected that she liked pretending that she was more drunk than she actually was.
It was somewhat chilly. The wind was picking up and the possibility of light rain had crossed my mind when we’d elected to walk. I was keen to pick up our pace, but Amy wanted to dawdle, chattering away and analysing, overanalysing the other couples at the party. For the first few minutes, her speculation, rumour and gossip were fairly charming, but as our walk lengthened, I began to get a little irritated. I was well aware of which of my schoolmates had slept with each other, and who still carried a torch for whom, but I’d never particularly cared about any of that stuff. I felt distinctly queasy about discussing such matters, but Amy didn’t seem to notice any irony, if that’s what it was. She’d integrated relatively poorly and most of this old news was brand new to her.
Inevitably, when we were still at least five minutes from her home, the clouds burst and the rain started to fall. I looked around for shelter; there was a small children’s playground on the other side of the road and, although it was dark, I could see a big beech tree in the far corner.
Amy was almost oblivious to the fact that she was getting wet, and she made a play of resisting me as I lead her across the road and under the tree.
“Oh Jake!” she giggled, “Are you trying to seduce me?”
“No,” I muttered through clenched teeth, “I’m trying to stop you getting drenched.”
“Oh Jake!” she giggled again, clinging tightly to me under the tree. She started to unzip my rain jacket, slipping her hand inside.
“Oh get off,” I hissed testily, pulling her hand out and zipping the jacket back up.
Amy wanted to play. Having been denied access to my chest, she slipped her arm lower grasping my cock through my chinos.
“Mmmm,” she purred, “what have we here?”
I felt myself begin to stiffen, unable to control the flow of blood.
Amy felt it too, “I think he likes me,” she said, beginning to stroke me through the fabric.
I was fighting myself now, not just her. I felt the urge to push Amy to her knees, to whip out my cock and to thrust it down her throat.
“I like him too,” she teased.
I regained control, and gently took her hand in mine, removing it from my crotch.
“Look Amy,” I said calmly, “I love you so much, but we can’t do this here. We’re in a children’s playground in full view of the road, anyone could walk by and see us, we could get arrested!”
The seductress had other ideas. She held my hand between hers, bring it up towards her face. She opened her mouth wide and began to suck on my middle finger.
“Fuck Amy,” I gasped, my cock standing fully at attention.
I pulled my finger out of her mouth, but she held on and moved my hand down her body. She lifted up her flimsy short skirt, guiding my fingers underneath and inside her panties.
She was wet – very, very wet – and not from the rain.
Her voice dropped to a whisper. “Can you feel how much I want you Jake? Can you feel how wet I am for you?” She grasped me again through my shorts. “I want you so bad, I want your cock so much. I want you now.” Her voice was getting louder now as she was becoming even more excited. “I want you Jake,” she insisted. “I want you your big hard cock. I want to suck you. Please Jake, I need you, my big stallion!”
My brain and balls fought. The rational side won out.
“Look Amy,” I said, pulling my hand away again. “You’re drunk, we’re in public and, assuming we don’t get caught, we’ll wake up tomorrow morning with heads full of regrets.”
“But I want you, I need you, I’m ready for you,” she persisted, reaching down again and pulling my hand back to her crotch, extracting my middle finger from my fist and slipping it under her panties again.
“Can you feel me?” she whispered. “I’m wet for you Jake. That’s how horny you make me!”
Her eyes danced excitedly.
She pushed my hand a little lower and I felt my fingertip brushing across the opening to her vagina.
“Can you feel that Jake?” she asked, a slutty smile spreading across her face. “Can you feel how open I am for you? Go on, it’s OK. Push inside me. Let me feel you!”
I was shocked. Now Amy was begging me to finger her for the first time a fucking children’s playground!
“No Amy. I’m not going to,” I scolded. “I’m not doing anything to you under this tree or anywhere else in this playground. Where’s your self-respect gone? I love you. You’re my girlfriend, not some cheap whore.”
“Oh Jake,” she complained in disappointment, “you’re such a prude!”
The rain was easing up now.
“Come on,” I said, “let’s get you home and get you to bed.”
“Ooh!” she giggled excitedly.
“No Amy,” I insisted, “your own bed without me in it. I have to sleep downstairs, remember?”
And with that I grabbed her hand and pulled her back to the road.
–
Five minutes later, Amy unlocked the front door as quietly as she could and we crept inside. The house was in darkness; fortunately no one was waiting up for us. We kicked off our shoes and hung up our coats.
I guess after declaring her amorous intent in the playground, I’d expected things to heat up quickly again. Amy did follow me into the sitting room, helping me to position the airbed and to spread out the sleeping bag, but then she gave me a perfunctory goodnight kiss and disappeared swiftly upstairs.
I shrugged to myself – perhaps she was regretting her earlier antics? I stripped down to my boxer briefs and grabbed my toiletries bag from my holdall, then tiptoed as quietly as I could down the hallway to the downstairs bathroom, using the light on my phone to guide me.
There wasn’t a huge amount of room under the stairs in Amy’s house. The sloping ceiling meant that I had to stoop virtually all the time and the mirror above the basin was so low, that it was simply impossible to see my face in it, without almost folding myself in two or kneeling on the tiled floor.
I finished brushing my teeth and stood looking at the reflection of my arm. The scar, ten centimetres long or so, still looked a little tender. Maybe it was just the lighting accentuating the colour.
I flicked off the light in the bathroom and tiptoed back down the hallway to the sitting room. I slipped past the door, trying not to let the light shine out and up the stairs too much, closing it as quietly as I could behind me.
I looked up to see Amy standing before me. She was wearing a pale pink lace nightie, which flowed gracefully over her curves, reaching her upper calves. Her dark hair cascaded over her shoulders. I gasped. She was beautiful.
“Do you like what you see?” she asked bashfully, pulling the hem slightly and twisting around so I could admire the garment from all angles.
“Wow!” I said, “You look stunning!” I crossed the floor and pulled her mouth to mine in a long sensuous kiss. I could feel myself getting hard again.
“Someone’s excited,” she whispered, her hand moving to the bulge in my boxer briefs. “I can’t believe how big and hard he is,” she smiled, feeling my length through the black fabric.
“That’s your fault,” I said, “you really turn me on!”
“My fault?” she asked, turning on her innocent schoolgirl face. “But all I did was come downstairs to give my nice young man a goodnight kiss! It’s not my fault you’ve got all hot and horny.”
“And you didn’t want to get me hot and horny?” I asked in mock incredulity.
Amy shook her head.
“And when you were splashing around in the pool this afternoon in that tiny red bikini, you weren’t trying to tease me?”
She shook her head again, but a bashful smile was creeping across her lips.
“I saw you looking at me,” I said, “I know what you were doing. You were thinking about my big, hard cock all afternoon, weren’t you? Weren’t you?”
She nodded now, guilty.
I ran my hands down her back and squeezed her buttocks firmly. She yelped with delight and her eyes danced with excitement.
“You are so sexy!” I whispered into her ear.
She grasped my cock more firmly in response.
“You’re so hard!” she giggled. “Touch me Jake!”
“But your mum’s upstairs,” I protested. “What happens if your family wake up? We can’t even lock the door.”
“Oh Jake,” Amy growled in frustration, “you are such a worrier! We’ll just have to be quiet won’t we!”
For the second time that evening my brain and balls fought. This time my testosterone-fuelled feral instincts won out.
I reached down and slipped my hand under the hem of her nightie, letting my hand search out the heat of her sex. I ran my finger lightly along her slit, feeling her wetness. Amy’s eyes widened as I made contact.
“Can you feel that Jake?” she asked. “Can you feel how much I want you?”
I nodded. “You’re so wet!” I grinned.
“It’s all for you Jake. It’s how you turn me on!”
I bent my head so that my mouth met hers. We kissed passionately. Our tongues sliding past one another as our breath began to quicken.
I grasped the hem of her nightie in both hands and pulled lightly upwards. Amy responded, raising her hands high above her head as I lifted the garment clear.
I pulled her to me, feeling the softness of her breasts crushing against my chest. We kissed again.
Then she dropped to her knees in front of me, yanking down my boxer briefs.
“My, you are simply divine!” she exclaimed, wrapping her hand around my rigid cock, inspecting it closely and inhaling my scent. She placed a single kiss midway down my shaft and was about to do more, but I pulled her upwards again.
I wanted her first.
I spun her round and she began to rub her perfect, pert bottom against my shaft. I swept my hands across her flat stomach, moving up her body to cup her perfect breasts. She moaned gently as I placed a line of kisses down her neck.
“You’re so beautiful,” I gasped.
“Oh Jake, I love this,” she sighed. “Your hard body and your muscles against me like this!”
I began to slide the fingers of my right hand along her slit, feeling the ridges and fold of her sex. I collected some saliva in my left hand and began to gently spread it slowly round her nipples.
Amy moaned in delight. “Fuck Jake!,” that feels so good!”
She reached behind me to grasp my buttocks with her petite hands and pulled my hips forwards, squeezing my hardness more tightly against her bottom. She sighed again in delight.
I bent forwards to kiss her and she mewed into my mouth as I pinched her nipples more firmly. I nuzzled her hair, then whispered into her ear, “I’m going to pick you up.”
I bent down and swept her off her feet, cradling her gently as I carried her to the air mattress in the middle of the floor.
“I love it when you do that,” she smiled.
I glanced across at the door to reassure myself that it was still fully closed. Her mum and stepdad were asleep in the room immediately above us. We really would have to be very, very quiet.
I stood up again to fully remove my boxer briefs, then knelt next to her as I bent over to kiss her again. I put my hand out to steady myself, but the mattress gave way beneath it, jerking Amy’s body towards me. That wasn’t going to work.
I moved to the bottom of the airbed, between her legs, and began to kiss up the inside of her calves, lifting her knees as I did so. I felt the cool smoothness of her skin brushing against my cheek as I neared her sex.
Amy pushed herself up on her elbows. “Jake, no!” she hissed. I looked up at her, my mouth inches from her pussy. “You can’t do that,” she protested. “You know how much noise I make, we’ll wake everyone up!”
I knelt up, looking around for something to muffle her sounds. I leaned across to my holdall, pulling it towards me, retrieving the polo shirt that I’d removed a few minutes before. I’d only worn it for a couple of hours; it wasn’t too smelly.
I folded it roughly into quarters, creating a squarish pad. “Stuff that in your mouth,” I said, tossing it to her. She nodded compliantly and folded it again, biting into it with her teeth.
I pulled her a little way down the mattress, so that I could lie on my front on the floor. Then I lifted her hips and placed my pillow under her, hooking her legs over my shoulders.
I kissed the inside of her leg again, nuzzling against it, feeling the heat of her sex against my cheek. I placed a soft kiss on her mons and took her hand gently in mine to reassure her. Her soft, pink lips opened into a perfect diamond, a flower in full bloom, aching for me alone. Even in the dim light I could see the beads of her arousal glistening before me – she was beautiful. I reached forwards and ran my tongue up the length of her exposed slit.
Amy hissed in delight and squeezed my right hand.
Encouraged, I flicked my tongue again across her lips, savouring the sweet, metallic taste of her nectar. I moved my left hand around to spread her more fully, revealing the beauty of her womanhood.
I closed my lips over hers and pulled softly. I heard Amy’s stifled cries and felt her bring her hand to the back of my head, encouraging me on. She began to buck her hips as I continued to tease her, her breaths becoming shorter and more frantic. As her movements became more intense, I felt the brush of her clitoris. I held still, offering her my tongue for her to thrust against, letting her direct me to where she wanted me to go.
She ripped the polo shirt from her mouth and pushed my head back. Concerned, I looked up at her, worried I might have hurt her.
“Jake,” Amy whispered. “I want to feel you inside me. I want you to push in, with your finger.”
“Are you sure?” I asked.
She nodded.
“Can you show me?”
I took the middle finger of my right hand and placed it in my mouth, trying to coat it as liberally as possible with my saliva. Then I offered it to her and she moved me down towards her opening.
“Just really gently,” she whispered. “Let me kiss you into me.”
I felt the tip of my finger slipping inside her as she guided me, gazing lovingly into my eyes. I think I was expecting more resistance, she was snug certainly, but not tight. A warm moist glove, gently surrounding me – smoother than I’d anticipated.
Amy’s eyes widened.
“Does that feel good?” I asked cautiously.
She nodded. I was all the way in now, my other fingers were curled against her. I held still and kissed softly across her stomach, watching her, watching me.
“It feels so different you doing that,” she said. “So much better than if I do it on my own!”
I smiled at her. My fingers were certainly longer and thicker than hers, but that wasn’t the point.
She held me lightly by the wrist and began to pull me out of her again, stopping when we reached half-way, then she changed direction again. She repeated the process five or six times, then released me to continue, moving her hands to cup her breasts. I heard her moan again and I bent my head to kiss her mons.
“Oh Jake, that’s fantastic, please more!” she gasped.
I began to lick across the top of clitoris, as I continued to move my finger in and out of her, increasing my pace a little. I could feel her channel offering less resistance as she became wetter. I saw her shove my shirt back into her mouth to stifle her yelps, which grew in intensity and pitch as she began to shake with excitement, driving me onwards.
Finally Amy arched her back, stretching her neck backwards, then suddenly she bent forwards, crushing me between her thighs and pulling me even more tightly to her. I held my finger inside her as she slowly relaxed. She smiled weakly at me, exhausted, incapable of speech.
I lay down on the floor next to the mattress, holding her hand as she luxuriated in the afterglow of her orgasm. I was about to turn off the lights so that we could go to sleep, when I felt her reach for my cock. She began to work me with her hand.
“Jake!” she whispered excitedly. “You’re still hard!”
“It’s OK,” I said. “We don’t have to do anything. We can just go to sleep if you want.”
She didn’t answer, but instead turned onto her front and began to edge her way down the air mattress, which rocked violently as she did so.
“Oh Jake,” she growled in frustration, “this bed!”
“It’s meant for sleeping on, not gymnastics,” I shot back.
“You’re going to have to stand up!” Amy commanded.
I obeyed as she knelt before me on the carpet.
She began to lick my rod from base to tip, making short lapping movements with her tongue as she gently cupped my balls.
“I think he likes me,” she giggled. She licked up to the tip, then curled her tongue around my glans.
“Ah, you’re so dark and red!” she wondered aloud. “He’s so hard!”
Amy opened her lips and took my tip delicately into her mouth. She looked up at me, pleading with me to allow her to continue. I stroked the side of her chin tenderly.
“Fuck Amy!” I gasped. “That looks amazing!”
She wiped a trace of saliva from the corner of her mouth, then looked intently at my cock for several seconds.
“Are you OK?” I asked anxiously.
She nodded. “I just want to try something!” she whispered conspiratorially.
Amy stood and I bent down to kiss her on the lips. Then she led me by the hand to the sofa. She knelt on the cushions as I stood in front of her.
She ran her hand over my chest, playing with the thin, wispy curls with her fingers.
“I have a better view from up here,” she giggled.
She kissed across my abs as she tweaked my nipples with her hands. I felt my cock rubbing against the underside of her breasts.
“Oh, hello,” she said, looking down towards my erection. “I think your willie wants to play with my breasts!”
I felt her dribble a little saliva onto my tip, before rubbing me against each of her nipples in turn.
“Ah,” she gasped, “that feels so good. I can feel how hot and hard you are for me!”
I brushed the hair away from her face, and watched as she wrapped her breasts around my cock and began to slide them up and down.
“He’s playing peekaboo with me!” she smiled.
“That feels so nice,” I replied.
“I’ve got you all nicely wrapped up,” she said. “All cosy and warm in my breasts!”
I gave a couple of little thrusts against her, then stopped, feeling a little guilty that I was somehow degrading her by humping against her like that.
“Oh Jake, that felt good,” she gasped. “Do it again!”
She looked up at me with big, pleading eyes as I stroked her cheek. I inserted the tip of my thumb into her mouth and she bit down gently. I gasped. Then I began to rock my hips slowly, feeling my shaft moving under her fingers and between her breasts.
“Does that feel good to you?” I whispered.
She nodded and maintaining her grip on my thumb with her teeth. I picked up the pace, making sharper thrusts, bucking more violently now.
“Fuck Amy,” I said, struggling to keep quiet, “that feels so good. Your breasts are amazing.”
Amy wrenched her mouth away, spitting out my thumb. “Go on Jake,” she urged, in as quiet a voice as she could muster, “fuck my tits, go on, fuck my tits!”
I redoubled my efforts as I moved against her, feeding my cock between her breasts. She pressed firmly down on my shaft with her fingers, as her warm softness surrounded me.
I was beginning to tire a little with the effort of thrusting forward while maintaining my body in a slightly unnatural position. Perhaps Amy was becoming uncomfortable too.
I felt her hands leave her breasts and reach round around my buttocks, then she fell on my cock with her mouth, bobbing her head up and down, allowing me to straighten up a little. I placed my hands on the back of her head, guiding her tenderly in time with my movements.
Amy was beginning to choke, but still she forced her mouth down over my cock. Loud enthusiastic moans and yelps emanated from her throat as she slurped and wretched.
“Fuck Amy,” I groaned. “That’s so good!”
Suddenly she pulled off me. I held still, watching as she sized me up. She was working out the best way of taking me, planning her approach, strategic, determined, single-minded. She got off the sofa and knelt down on the carpet again, holding my shaft and inch or so from the tip, pulling it downwards slowly towards the horizontal, as if testing its springiness. She licked my glans a few times, trying to coat me with as much saliva as possible.
Preparations complete, she crouched lower, straightening and stretching her neck. Then she opened her mouth as wide as it would go, engulfing me, pushing slowly down my rod. A slow, determined movement. It reminded me of a snake dislocating its jaw to swallow its prey, pushing forwards inexorably.
I felt the end of my penis beginning to push down her throat and she began to choke again. I put my hands around the back of her head to pull her gently backwards or at least to stop her advance to let her breathe, but she batted me away as soon as she realised what I was doing.
She had about two inches to go now and the noises in her throat were beginning to get louder. I could feel her saliva pooling around my cock and beginning to bubble from the corner of her mouth.
She pushed onwards, beginning to wretch, engaged in a battle of wills between her body and mind, driven by lust and love. Her face was reddening as the tip of her nose reached my pubic hair. Then a final push and she closed the gap, looking up at me, almost desperate for my approval, her wide eyes beginning to water with the effort.
“Fuck that’s hot!” I hissed at her. “You like that don’t you Amy? You like having my big cock stuffed down your throat, don’t you, don’t you? You’re going to make me cum if you do that much longer!”
She wrenched herself off me, gasping for breath, her chest heaving as her lungs fought for air. She gripped my shaft tightly with both hands, beginning to stroke me again.
“Jake,” she urged as she picked up the pace, “I want you to cum. I want you to cum all over me. I want your cum on my face. Cum on me! Cum on my face!”
I ripped her hands away, gripping myself instead with my right hand. I slapped her cheek with my cock. “You want it? You want my cum Amy?” I taunted her as quietly as I could.
She nodded and licked my slick glans again.
“Please Jake, please Jake! I want it, I want it!” she demanded – a child pestering for sweets at the supermarket.
A surge of testosterone flooded through me as I began to stroke faster and faster. Amy tilted her head back, closing her eyes, her mouth open and her tongue half extended.
I roared as quietly as I could, consumed by my orgasm. Ropes of cum spattered over her face, draping themselves from her chin to her forehead, little puddles collecting around her eyes. Sightless, she gripped my buttocks again, guiding her mouth back onto my shaft, licking me clean, hungrily sucking the remaining cum from me.
I pulled away and bent down to pick up my polo shirt. I pulled her to her feet, then gently wiped the spunk from her, allowing to open her eyes again.
“Wow Jake!” she whispered, amazed. “You came so much!”
I bent down and kissed her, tasting my seed in her mouth, feeling the stickiness of her lips. Then I picked her up and carried her the few short paces to the air mattress, laying her out on her back.
I kissed my way up her body and lay down beside her, stroking her hair. We cuddled for a bit until I got up to turn off the table lamps. The she turned on her side to give me more room as I covered us with the unzipped sleeping bag, and I lay behind her with my arms around her, my soft cock resting against one of her buttocks.
“I love you Amy,” I murmured into her ear. I held her as she fell asleep, watching the gentle rise and fall of her chest.
–
I slept lightly, waking a couple of times during the night, afraid of pushing my girlfriend out of the bed. I’m not sure if she woke, she didn’t seem to. A little before six, the dawn light began to peep through the gap in the curtains. I kissed her shoulder and then shook her awake.
“Hmmmmm?” she said sleepily.
“Amy, you need to go,” I said. “Everyone will be awake in an hour.”
“Hmmmmm?” she said again, not taking on board the likelihood that we were going to be caught together by her eight-year-old stepbrothers.
“You need to go upstairs and sleep in your own bed for a bit,” I said.
She turned to face me and then kissed me. Her hair was crumpled and in disarray, but she looked even more beautiful.
“I love you Amy,” I said, trying to prompt her to get moving.
“I love you too,” she said dreamily.
I got up off the mattress and stretched, pulling on the boxer briefs that she’d removed the night before. I knelt before her, pulling her up into a sitting position.
“Come on!” I whispered.
We stood and embraced, then I helped her to put on the pink lace nightie.
“Thank you,” she said. “Last night was amazing, it really was.”
“It was mind-blowing, I love you so much,” I replied.
We kissed again, a long slow deep kiss, sensual and tender.
“Jake,” she said quietly. “I’m ready. I want us to make love. I want to have sex with you.”
“Are you sure?” I asked, a little startled.
She nodded, “Please – it’s time.”
“Amy,” I said sincerely, “I’m ready too. I want this as well.” I kissed her again. “But we can’t do this now.”
“No,” she said. “Next weekend, they’re all going away. We’ve got two nights here on our own!”
We embraced again and I felt an intense love for her welling up inside me. We held each other for a few minutes, then we kissed again before walking together to the door to the hallway. I watched her disappear as she tiptoed quietly up the stairs to bed.