6-6Everyone who has been bullied dreams that, when they leave high school, everything will change. Everyone lives in hope and likes feel good stories where the nerd gets the girl in the end. As we say at Victims Anonymous, “My name’s Sam, and here’s my story”:

My last year at high school was a shit year. I wasn’t popular to begin with, wasn’t good looking, wasn’t trendy, had zits. And on top of that, I had lots of shit happen in my life, all in that same year. My mum walked out. Well, it felt like she was abandoning us, but really it was dad and I who got chucked out and she kept our flat and her new lover. We moved to a small mid terrace in a rougher neighbouring borough. And because it was my last year, I couldn’t swap schools so I had a really long walk to and from school all through that final winter and spring. I wore all this pain on my sleeve and became grouchy and unpopular and drifted away from what friends I had, and none of the girls were interested in me. And I had zits.

But despite all that shit, I did well enough at my O-level exams to get into six-form in my new borough. My dad, who wasn’t a big drinker really, put some effort into being social and got friendly with some builders in our new local pub and that got me a summer job mixing plaster. It was back-breaking work but a few weeks real hard labour muscles you up in ways a gym never will and the builder charm and confidence really rubbed off on me too. It was always an early start, on site by 7, but with a “liquid lunch” down at the pub and, because I was with a bunch of builders, I was served and nobody let on — they thought it was a funny secret that that their scrawny labourer was under-age. I spent a good part of my wages on rounds but I learned a lot of self confidence doing it. So you can stop feeling sorry for me now; I did. You know where this is going. I’m going to go to a six-form where nobody knows me, and as a man not a boy.

Around rolled the first day of six-form. I left the house and went to the end of the row and turned right. The bigger road was full of a steady flow of kids, some in groups and some alone, in the same uniform heading towards my new school. I slotted myself into a gap in the stream.

Basically I noticed all the girls. I couldn’t help it. No boy can help it. I was addicted to looking at girls. In front of me, for example, was a girl. I carefully kept pace so I wouldn’t catch up. She had really toned long pale legs and a short mini-skirt. Her blouse was baggy and she had a heavy satchel over one shoulder. London kids always carried their bags over one shoulder, even if the bag had two straps. She was clutching a big binder. She looked weighed down. She was quite tall and I guessed she must be in the six-form. She had long fuzzy blonde hair. It was a very light blonde, almost white.

I kept my head down and tried to keep a constant distance from her long legs and wiggly little bottom.

The new school was quite near and we were soon there. I got out the little map I had received in the post and tried to work out how to get to the form room. It wasn’t hard, and I didn’t stop to talk to anyone. The quad was full of kids chatting and catching up, waiting for the bell, but I didn’t know a soul so I went straight to find my new form room.

The classroom was in a portacabin on the side of the games field. Most of the six-form was in a cluster of portacabins near the games field, away from the high school. We only had to go up to the main school building for science subjects.

Feigning confidence, I went straight in. It was half full. I made a bee line for the free seat in the far back corner. People watched at me. Everyone else had been to the high school together, and I was the only new boy.

Some chatty giggly girls came in and sat down in the back row. The girl who sat down beside me turned and introduced herself as Helen. Helen had golden curly hair, probably permed. She had an open smiley face and bright brown eyes and a gap between her two front teeth. She wore a tight blouse over her amble bosom and her school tie was loose and her blouse top buttons undone to show generous cleavage. As she lent towards me to talk my eyes were sucked in and she basked in my attention. She started to point out and name everybody as the room filled up.

In high school the bad boys had sat at the back, as a rule, if it was free seating. Some teachers decided who sat where but mostly it was free seating and so there was a pecking order. I had never sat in the back row before. But not a lot of bad boys went on to six-form so the bad girls were promoted to back row sitters and I, the new boy, the unknown quantity with the confidence of someone who had been shoveling sand and cement all summer, had gone and sat myself there. I had been advertising my presumed confidence and dominance. Inside, if I’d stopped to think about it, I’d have been petrified.

Helen was mostly interested in introducing me to all the girls in the back row. But I saw that, sitting up the edge away from the window in the seating reserved for the nerds and misfits, was some fuzzy blonde hair I recognised. Was that the delicious wiggly bottom I’d followed to school? My curiously was piqued and I overcame my shyness and pointed and asked who she was.

Helen said dismissively “that’s Alice.” and was going to go back to telling me all about the girls in the back row.

Katie, the girl beside Helen who was trying to join in, giggled loudly and said “Flat Alice you mean! The Ice Queen?”

Katie was just a loud indiscreet kind of girl. Helen seemed a bit pained, and brushed it away “she’s very good at skating. She competes,” to which Katie, obviously enjoying the gossip, giggled and said even louder “No, it’s because she’s a frigid bitch!”

I was scared everyone could hear us. I sensed that everyone was listening. My ears burned. So I asked who our form teacher was going to be.

I got my answer pretty quick. In walked Mr Davis. He was a short but powerful man with thinning hair. He effortlessly commanded respect. The whole room hushed. He put down a pile of papers on his desk, turned to the class and, in a clear Scottish accent, welcomed us to the six-form. He looked around and his eyes settled on me. He told me to stand up, which I did, but I didn’t have to introduce myself and say anything because he did all that for me. Everyone then chorused “hello Sam.” and I sat down.

I was glad I hadn’t had to talk; I don’t think I’d have been able to talk loud enough for anyone to hear.

Mr Davis was also our maths teacher. Those not taking maths — you picked you subjects for A-levels — left and some new kids from other forms came in. I stayed put in my corner seat. Then we had our first maths lesson, which went until lunch. That was different from high school; at A-level you only took three subjects but the lesson slots were often a lot longer.

My first lunch was pretty lonely. I found the cafeteria using my map. I didn’t have any friends to hang out with. This was uncomfortable, but not half as uncomfortable as being at my old school surrounded by bullies. There were so many kids everywhere that it was hard to spot anyone. I didn’t see Helen nor Katie’s gang, nor Flat Alice nor anyone else who might be in the six-form. I probably wouldn’t have dared go up to them anyway. It was a nice day and I sat outside, waiting for the afternoon lesson on physics to start.

That night my dad took me down the local to celebrate my first day at six-form and ask how it went. I told him it went great. He told me it’d take time to make friends and work out who the shits were. I guess he saw through me a bit, but being in the pub with the builders and my dad really kept my spirits high. I wasn’t going to be a push over so quit feeling sorry for me.

The next day I went to school again, slipping into the stream of kids between two groups. I went straight to the back corner of the form classroom, realising that the bunch of boys who sat in front of me didn’t look so friendly. I guess they didn’t like that I was getting in with Helen and Katie and the back row?

Helen seemed really nice. Sure she liked me ogling her boobs, but she liked that kind of attention from all the boys. She was a flirt, but she was also kind and considerate. She didn’t have a mean bone in her body. She was way out of my league, but I guess she didn’t know that on account of nobody knowing my history. The back row girls knew all the other boys who had gone on to six-form from the high school and they weren’t really their type. Most of the back row girls had boyfriends who were a year or two older and had left school and were working or looking for it. I think Helen had a boyfriend, although she carefully kept it ambiguous. But Katie kept gleefully implying it.

That lunchtime I looked at my map for somewhere to explore as something to do. I went to the library. The library was in the main old school building and had high stained glass windows. It was almost deserted. I went along the rows of shelves, full of boring books.

And there she was. That magnificent long fuzzy blonde hair. It had to be Flat Alice. She was sitting hunched over her open binder, writing. I walked around her table and stood in front of her and cleared my throat. She looked up. She had small delicate features and high cheekbones, eyebrows so blonde they almost didn’t show and very light blue eyes. She had a few zits but real girls do. So do boys. Hell, I had some zits.

I could sense she was different. I could sense she was special. She seemed approachable, she seemed genuine. It was a vibe she gave off. We were two outsiders.

I introduced myself and asked if we were in the same form. Then there was silence. She hadn’t said anything. She hadn’t answered my question. She was looking at me like I was mad. Finally she reached out a hand to shake mine, saying “Hi, I’m Alice. Yeah we’re in the same form. Is there anything I can help you with?” She said it in that tone she’d use when showing first-years around on an open-day. She looked just the type of respectable teenager who’d be asked to show first-years and their parents around on open-days.

My builder bravado kicked in.

“Yeah, actually, there is. Can you show me where the cafeteria is please?”

She kicked up the responsible student attitude a notch and looked seriously concerned, muttering soothingly about how it was awful I hadn’t been shown around properly. She started to give directions, but I played dumb and pleaded “Can you just show me, please? It’ll be easier.”

Easier? Who was I kidding? She didn’t seem easily convinced but in the end the responsible student closed her binder and stood up, hugging it.

“Follow me.” she said and I did.

We marched side by side across the quad towards the cafeteria. The rush had died down and it was only half full. She was about to turn away when we reached the door, but I asked her if she wanted to eat with me. She just stood there, saying nothing, until I pleaded “Please?” She caved in, and she went sat down at an empty table while I got my lunch of sausage, baked beans and chips.

I sat down across from her. She sniffed her nose up at my plate. “How can you eat that muck?”

I started to explain the mechanics of knifes and forks like I was some kind of wit. I asked what she was going to eat. She opened her bag and plucked out some neatly wrapped sandwiches. She started to describe the school schedule as we sat there. She just talked and talked. I figured it was her kind of defensive mechanism. I listened to her, hanging on every word.

Wednesday morning I had to run past a couple of groups of kids to catch up with Alice who was walking alone to school. She didn’t pay any attention as I caught her up, but when I said “Hi Alice.” she turned, alarmed, saw it was me and calmed down.

She seemed defensive, but at least she talked back. I said we must live quite close, and she smiled weakly and didn’t offer any hints of where exactly she lived. And by now we were at school and we headed together to our form room.

Helen was bubbly and chatty as always and we talked telly, with Katie and the others trying to chime in.

Then that lunch time I rushed off to the library. It was empty. I was a bit gutted and was a bit overwhelmed with a loneliness. But, nothing better to do, I stood outside by the door and waited. Alice was coming across the quad towards me.

“Are you stalking me?”” she asked.

From the tone and neutral face I couldn’t tell if she was joking. I asked if she wanted to eat with me.

She countered coolly “You aren’t going to pretend you can’t remember where the canteen is again, are you?”

I fished some sandwiches out of my bag and held them up swinging in front of her face. She suddenly cracked an unwilling small smile as though she couldn’t help herself.

“Oh ok.” she surrendered, sounding exasperated, like I was a naughty puppy, and she led me off across the game field to some benches on the far side.

We walked in comfortable silence. When we sat and ate, I started to ask her about herself. And little by little she dropped her guard. Alice is actually Norwegian, although her mum had moved to London when she was very little and she didn’t remember much. Although she spends all her summers in Norway visiting family and loves it, London is ‘home’ now. Her real name is Erika, but Alice is her English name and she likes it better; I should call her Alice. Her mum was a young mother and her dad didn’t stick around and that’s one of the big reasons why they moved to England, for a new start. That and that the English really need dentists! Alice’s mum was a trained dental nurse. Alice’s hobby is ice skating, which comes naturally on account of her being Norwegian, and her mum is the instructor in the local rink. I just kept asking questions and Alice kept answering and all this came tumbling out. I don’t remember that we ate any sandwiches.

Then Alice looked at her watch and said we had to get to lessons. It was a bit early I thought, and I said there was no rush. But Alice jerked her thumb over her shoulder, indicating towards a copse at the bottom corner of the games field, and said “The Posse will be finishing their fags and coming back soon and it won’t be good for us to be seen together” as explanation.

Obviously the hard kids went and smoked in the copse at lunch times. We hurried across the field towards the six-form portacabins.

I rushed to the school gates at home time too, thinking Alice would have to pass through them to go home. Yes I was forcing my company upon her. No I didn’t think about it that way. All I could think about was Alice. I was already infatuated. And so we walked home together too.

I had a crush on her and alone with her I was feeling brave. I worked up the guts to make a move: I asked her if she wanted to go down the high street after school tomorrow. She tentatively agreed. It was all going so fast. At high school I had been so moody, bullied and socially awkward that I had never ever spent any time with any girl ever. And yet now I was coming out of my shell so fast I was at risk of doing something really stupid. I should have been thinking about things from Alice’s angle, knowing how it is to be an outsider on the edge of school life being pursued by a horny new boy, but I couldn’t. But luckily it was turning out ok — I think she was warming to me, warming to having a friend.

We agreed to bring a change of clothes to school so we wouldn’t be in uniform. Then we got to the top of my road and I pointed out where I lived, but she didn’t offer directions to hers and I didn’t really want to pry. Alice seemed on her guard and value her privacy. But it kind of felt like we had a date. At least, in my mind, we had a date.

So, of course, that evening and at school the next day my mind was only on going down the high street with Alice.

And then after school came. We met at the school gates but then ducked back into the sports block to change out of our uniforms. There were separate changing rooms. Alice came back outside in a thin baggy rusty red wooly jumper, a tartan mini-skirt and black leggings. She was wearing vivid red lipstick. She was transformed! Still carrying a bag and hugging a binder, she looked every bit a mature college girl easily.

I steered her towards home. She pointed out that it wasn’t the way to the town centre, but I assured her I knew that. She seemed doubtful, half distrusting, half nervous, but she followed with me anyhow. I stopped outside our local. I don’t know really why I did this, why I’d brought Alice there. Now Alice looked really nervous. She bit her bottom lip. She looked invitingly vulnerable. She looked gorgeous.

I opened the door and she stepped inside. It took a couple of seconds to adjust to the darkness. Right in front of the door was the bar where the landlady Brenda stood, cleaning glasses. I went up to the bar and ordered a pint. Brenda was still cleaning a glass “And what will your girlfriend be having, Sam?”

Alice said sharply “We’re just friends!”

Brenda didn’t miss a beat and asked again “And what will your friend be having, Sam?” Brenda thought it funny.

Alice asked for a coke. Brenda asked me if that would be a rum and coke. I nodded. Alice seemed a bit shocked, but she kept quiet. I put it on my dad’s tab and we took our drinks around the side into the salon. It was mid afternoon and it was quite quiet, almost empty.

We sat in a booth next to each other on a bench seat sipping our drinks. Alice asked me if I drank a lot, and asked how the landlady seemed to know my name. I kind of talked myself up a little bit, but a bit of me never wanted to lie nor exaggerate to Alice, so I kept it real.

Alice’s cheeks flushed almost immediately; this was very clearly the first alcohol she’d ever drank, and the first pub she’d ever been in, and the first naughty thing she’d ever done!

Suddenly Alice looked up across the salon and froze. She looked shocked. I followed her gaze. It was Mr Davis and a lady friend sitting in a booth against the opposite wall, kissing.

“That’s Miss Brady, the Geography teacher!” Alice whispered.

“They are enjoying themselves.” I laughed, disinterested.

“But they’re married!” Alice whispered back indignantly.

“Well that’s ok then!” I couldn’t see the problem.

“Not to each other!” Alice clarified.

Ah.

At that moment Miss Brady glanced up, saw us watching them, and pushed Mr Davis away. They hurriedly tried to adjust and straighten their clothing. I raised my pint to them in salute, brave on the outside and panicking on the inside.

So here were two under-age school kids caught drinking in a pub by two teachers caught having an affair by two school kids in a pub … I now realised that neither pair wanted this to become public. I pointed this out to Alice, and she seemed ever-so slightly reassured, but she was still really uncomfortable. I think she was more worried what the teachers thought of her than what she thought of other people I guess.

To break the tension I suggested to Alice that we play pool. She hadn’t ever played pool before so I promised to teach her. So we got up and took our glasses over to the pool table, slotted in ten pence and racked up. Then I broke and, when it was Alice’s turn, I stood behind her and reached around her to show her how to hold the cue and line up and strike. The smell of her shampoo was intoxicating. The beer I’d drank, and it being my local, was giving me my a mega dose of my cocky builder charm, at the same time as I was so sensitive to every gentle touch of our bodies, brush of her hair, as I guided her.

Our game was going slowly. That suited me. I forgot about the teachers. And then Alice needed to go powder her nose and I pointed out where the ladies was.

After Alice left another movement in the bar made me remember we were not alone. Miss Brady was following Alice to the toilets and Mr Davis was heading straight for me. Obviously they were taking this chance to straighten us out one-on-one.

Mr Davis came over and asked if I came here often. I nodded. I had my builder bravado and it was my local and it was outside school hours and I had only been at the school a couple of days so I didn’t have any ingrained fear of him. He seemed to be casting around for something to say.

“Nice to see you with Alice.” was all he came up with.

I grinned.

“Nice to see you with Miss Brady.”

Mr Davis sucked in his cheeks. He didn’t know how to say whatever it was he needed to say.

I guess this awkward conversation was taking longer that it seemed, because the girls were already heading back towards us. Miss Brady and Alice arrived at the same time. They had obviously been chatting but when they reached us there was another pregnant pause. And then my builder bravado kicked in and I suggested a game of doubles.

Alice tried to escape by pointing out she couldn’t play. Mr Davis tried to say they really ought be going. And Miss Brady jumped up and down with excitement and said it was an excellent idea and so it was settled. It turned out Miss Brady had never played either, so a reluctant Mr Davis had to coach her too! I guess Miss Brady had been watching Alice and I intently earlier. I swear Miss Brady was wiggling her butt and pressing back into Mr Davis and doing everything to tease him. Even Alice was lightening up, the danger over and the rum and coke working their magic.

I figured I had pushed our luck far enough for one day and, as soon as the game finally finished, I said to Alice that we’d better be off. Alice reluctantly agreed, and we left the pub and turned towards home.

Alice suddenly stopped dead in her tracks and looked really scared. “My mum is going to smell smoke! She is going to want to know where I’ve been!”

Alice seemed distraught. I cast around for a solution. Suddenly, quick as a flash, I saw a way out. I suggested she change back into her school clothes at my house, and she could keep her trendy clothes at mine ready for our next outing. Alice jumped at the chance.

So I let her into my house. Dad and I live in a tiny mid-terrace house, two up two down. The front door opened straight into the living room which had a black and white TV and tired old sofa and a pair of armchairs. The walls were chocolate brown in best 70s style.

As soon as we were in the hallway Alice thrust the binder at me. “Here, hold this.” Then she asked where the toilet was.

I told her and she took her bag and went and changed. She emerged a six-former again. She came up to me, grabbed her binder and hugged it, and stood in front of me, a foot apart.

“Thanks for today, it was, eh, interesting.” she said with a lop-sided grin.

“Don’t forget you’re wearing lipstick.” I said as she turned and let herself out.

I should have kissed her! Was she waiting for it? Should I have tried? What had she meant with Brenda, ‘Just friends?’ I beat myself up and shouted at myself all evening.

The next few days we went to and from school together and lunched together. I was in heaven. I fancied Alice so much and I was spending so much time with her. I loved watching her, I love hearing her talk. We’d sit on a bench at lunchtime and I’d just keep asking silly questions and she’d fall for it every time, flowing into long detailed answers whilst I just drank greedily from her aura.

It was Friday, the end of my first week, and we were walking home together. I asked her what she was doing on the weekend. She was training ice skating. Suddenly she got excited as though the idea had just come to her: would I like to come ice skating with her? I said I couldn’t skate. She said it was ok, she’d teach me. And so, my heart skipping, we arranged to meet the next day after lunch at the rink.

We met by the entrance. With the recent success in the Olympics, ice skating was in the popular eye again, but that warm August day it wasn’t very popular in my town and the rink was almost empty. An old man sat in the ticket office and greeted Alice and talked to her like good friends. He let me slip in for free.

Alice was wearing another thin baggy wooly sweater, mini-skirt and leggings. She had her own skates at the rink. She helped me put my loan pair on and led me out onto the ice.

Immediately my feet went in opposite directions and I almost collapsed. Alice found it all very funny. Very slowly she led me around the rink. She would stand in front of me, holding each hand, and drag me forwards by wriggling her bottom so she moved backwards. Her long fuzzy blonde hair was like a halo around her smiling beaming face and I was mesmerized by the pattern her wiggling bottom traced, its zig zagging path burned into my retina.

Suddenly Alice let go of me and turned. She accelerated instantly and was off around the rink with an elegance and efficiency that made it look effortless. As she reached the far corner furthest from me she did a simple jump and spin without slowing down and was onwards around the rink until she came up behind me again and skidded to a halt exactly where she’d started seconds before. Her cheeks were flushed from the sudden exertion in the cold air. And then she grabbed my hand and tried to get me to skate some more. She did these laps every so often. She said she was keeping warm. I was in awe.

After our skating we walked back and before she realised it she had led me back to her house. She was giggling, saying I was more like Bambi than Dean. I was a bit put out and embarrassed. Everyone was talking about Torvill and Dean. She stopped, pointing out that she lived here. This terrace was a bit posher than my terrace and the houses seemed a little bit bigger. She squeezed my hand and thanked me for skating with her. She laughed and called me Bambi again. My face must have fallen. She lent in and whispered in my ear “Don’t forget, Bambi was a stag don’t you know?” in a fit of giggles and then she turned and bounded up her steps to her front door, several at a time.

I walked home elated and lost. Had she been giving me hints and encouragement? Were we still ‘just friends?’ It wasn’t so far home.

On Monday I had to wait by the end of my row for Alice to come into sight. We walked together, side by side, close but not touching. Alice said matter-of-factly that I was invited around to dinner Tuesday night. Apparently the old man at the rink had told her mum about me and Alice’s mum had thought it would be nice if I came round for tea. ‘Just as a friend’, Alice added. I went from elation to devastation in a split second. But I tried to put a brave face on it.

At six-form you normally take only three subjects. Some take four. And so you have several empty slots on the schema. You are supposed to spend these empty slots in the six-form study rooms where you sit and work, or talk quietly and pretend to work, and there’s a teacher there to take the register so you can’t skip it. I had a empty slot and I sat in the sun on the benches outside the study rooms waiting for that teacher to arrive.

This time it was Mr Davis supervising. He saw me sitting alone outside and paused on his way in.

“No Alice today?” he asked conversationally.

I said she had biology. I stood up to follow him in but he put his arm around my shoulder and joked “ah, you just help her with her biology homework eh?”

I stifled a giggle and he laughed loudly at his own joke and at my embarrassment, and I joined in. So we went into the study room with his arm around my shoulder, laughing.

After study period it was lunch time and we tumbled out into the quad sunshine. Helen and Katie and their gang — they called themselves Katie’s Posse — cornered me. Katie, always loud, asked how I was so pally with Mr Davis.

“Oh I’ve met him down the pub.” I said, my chest puffing out at the boast that I went to a pub!

Almost as quickly I got this sinking feeling that this was a rumour that could easily get me into deep trouble. But The Posse cooed; I was a bad boy and that excited them.

Helen asked what I was doing for lunch. I looked around; Alice was heading straight for us.

“Alice!” I called, as much to attract Alice’s attention as to answer Helen.

Katie smirked incredulously “Flat Alice? Why the fuck do you waste your time with her? What’s she do, blow you?” and The Posse fell around laughing like that was the funniest joke in the world.

I looked wildly around. Where was Alice? Had she heard? I couldn’t see Alice anywhere. One moment she was almost with us, the next she had disappeared.

I heard a quiet voice, Helen’s voice, asking “Do you love her?”

I think Helen had a romantic side and liked to play cupid. It was the kind voice of a friend, of an ally.

I felt sick. I pushed my way through The Posse ignoring Katie’s grabbing attempts to hold me back. I went searching for Alice but I couldn’t find her. I guess she’d had years of disappearing and hiding at school and was expert at it.

We met at the school gates at home time. Alice’s eyes were puffy. I went to put my arm around her but she pulled away as though stung. But she seemed a bit pleased that I’d waited for her. On the way home she told me she’d skipped lessons and hid all afternoon in the sports block. I was quiet. I wasn’t really equipped for comforting her and didn’t know what to say.

Tuesday we went to school, lunched and came home from school together as normal. It was routine now and Alice would search me out. I was really enjoying having a proper friend, which kind of complicated things as I also had the most tremendous crush on her and it was growing all the time. I wasn’t sure if she thought about me like that, if she noticed me like that, if she liked boys, if she wanted anything. I was getting an uneasy feeling that we were ‘just friends’ and that I was destined to follow her around forever, watching her date other boys and try and comfort her each time she was dumped and always being in agony inside. I don’t think a boy and a girl can be just friends. One or the other always wants more. I wanted more. I wanted it all.

As we parted on the way home Alice smiled and reminded me to be at hers at 6. It wasn’t like I’d forgotten. I had been nervously looking forward to it all day!

————————

I walked slowly up the steps to her front door and rang the bell. Alice opened the door and invited me in. She was wearing a very short little halterneck black dress with black netting arms embroidered with black roses. Alice was so slender but the dress hugged her like a glove. Her breasts pushed out like two little Christmas puddings. Her hair had been brushed and tamed a bit and she was wearing eye shadow and bright red lipstick. I think the pink flush in her cheeks was genuine, not blusher. She looked absolutely completely stunning. She looked so mature. She looked like a beautiful young lady. She was smiling nervously, her head slightly cocked and her eyes sparkling. She was so alluring.

The house was so different from mine. There was no carpet, only a herringbone wooden tiled floor and strategic rugs. The front door opened into a hall with the front room off to one side and ahead at the end opened into the kitchen-cum-dinning room. Alice’s voice came from the kitchen “Is that Sam? Show him through.”

It wasn’t Alice, but it sounded just like her.

Alice walked towards the kitchen and I followed. Her tiny little bottom wiggled like I’d watched on that first day. I hadn’t thought about it much since as I’d started to walk beside her rather than behind her, but I was powerful reminded of it now. She had a wonderful bottom. I was infatuated with her, every bit of her, and somehow being behind her gave me a chance to ogle more blatantly than if she could see my face and where my eyes roamed. It was liberating to get the chance to watch her walk from behind.

The kitchen was brightly lit and modern looking, and the dinning area beyond only lit by candles. The smell of food was fantastic. And there, chopping a salad on the side, was Alice’s mum.

Alice’s mum was similar to Alice in so many ways. She was the same height and build with blonde hair and blue eyes. And yet in so many ways, she was slightly different. Her hair was ever so slightly darker and straighter, and her brow ever so slight more pronounced. She looked so young, like she was Alice’s older sister. She was dressed quite normally in tight jeans and thin baggy wooly jumper. She introduced herself as Anita. She sounded just like Alice.

Alice was all dressed up, looking very girly. Her mum looked completely casual. There were candles. Her mum was with us. I wasn’t sure if this was a date or not. I sure felt romantic. It felt like Alice was making a special effort and I was excited. Was this more than just friends?

We sat, the three of us, on a small table and ate. Alice and I sat opposite each other and Anita sat on the end, between us. Anita sipped red wine. The lasagne was absolutely wonderful. Anita’s cheeks went red like Alice’s had when she had the rum and coke, and I guessed that Anita wasn’t a regular drinker either. The mood was so light. Anita got me to tell all about how I lived with my dad and what I was studying and what I wanted to do for a job and everything, and Alice tried her hardest to change the subjects and tell her mum off for asking embarrassingly personal questions. I really enjoyed it. I enjoyed seeing Alice so comfortable and alive and joining in the conversation. Anita was playful. I thanked Anita for the dinner, and Anita laughed and said I should thank Alice as Alice had cooked it! I was floored. Alice looked so embarrassed. Not knowing what to say next, I gathered up the plates and started washing them up.

Alice and her mum started talking quietly. It was like they were singing. I couldn’t understand a word. It was, I now know, how it sounds when they talk Norwegian. It sounds like singing. From their body language, Alice was telling her mum off for embarrassing her. They sounded so happy when they were singing but their body language said they were were arguing and Alice was trying to dissuade her mum from doing something rash.

Anita suddenly broke off their conversation and looked up and said loudly in English “Sam, Alice and I were wonderin…”

At that point Alice tried to cover her mother’s mouth up with her hand. They struggled for a second and Anita batted away Alice’s arms and carried on despite the protest.

“We were wondering if you would like to dine with us on Thursday too?”

My heart stopped! There was nothing I wanted more!

“And perhaps your dad would like to join us?”

Alice tried to shut her mum up again but it was too late, Anita had said it. And so it was. Anita looked triumphant.

After I’d rinsed the plates Anita came over and told me to just leave them. I tried to insist, but Anita plucked the cloth out of my hand and that was that. Alice shyly came and asked if I wanted to see her room.

Alice led me upstairs. I had dreamed of being led upstairs by Alice, but in real life it was a million times more exciting. Her bottom was so close I just wanted to reach out and touch her. There was another landing, with a bathroom midway and a front and a back bedroom. The back bedroom was Alice’s. She gently pushed open the ajar door and flicked on the light.

“What do you think?” She asked nervously, biting her bottom lip.

“I think you are a beautiful lady and the best cook in the world and I want to marry you!” I don’t know where that answer came from. It tumbled out so quick I hadn’t had time to even think it before it blurted out.

Alice blushed really deeply.

“Not me, silly, the room.” she said meekly, gesturing around.

But I could tell the compliment had landed. I was elated. I had just proposed to the girl I fancied. The only girl in the world I fancied. The only girl in the whole world I ever thought about.

I looked around the room. It was quite small, and very tidy and very Alice. It had been her room a long time. The wallpaper was still pink. There was still a poster of a horse tacked to a cupboard door. And then here were things that seemed more like the teenager Alice such as a makeup desk with mirror and a thousand tiny coloured jars and equipment, and a poster of The Who. There was a tape player with twin decks. There was a shelf along the wall over the little bed with lots of tapes and books on. I moved closer to see what kind of music she liked. They were all mixes recorded off the radio, with band names in Alice’s tiny tidy handwriting down the spines. And then at the pillow end there were some books. I moved closer. They seemed to all be Mills and Boon and Jane Austen.

I reached out to pluck one from the shelf. Alice launched herself at me, grabbing for my outstretched arm to pull it back away from the shelf. I kind of instinctively swung my arm away from her but she had grabbed my cuff and I carried her with me. She spun, tipped, overbalanced over the edge of the bed, and landed on her back spread eagle on her duvet with me tumbling down on top of her.

She was giggling “You can’t read my diary!”

I guess her diary was on that shelf. She suddenly stopped smiling, her eyes searching mine. Her fuzzy light blonde hair was spread out like rays of the sun on her pillow. I forgot what we were talking about. I lent in and we kissed.

Our lips touched. It was electrifying. I had closed my eyes. We just stopped, paused, our lips pressed lightly together, not moving, thinking about the sensation of our touching. I’m not sure how many days we just laid still, joined at the lips.

There was a loud cough, like someone deliberately clearing their throat, from the door. Alice and I sprang apart as though electrocuted. Anita was standing in the door way, leaning on the door frame.

“So you’re ‘just friends’ are you?” she said stifling a laugh.

Alice was beetroot red.

“No, mum, it’s not what it looks like!”

That kind of hurt me a little bit.

“I haven’t got you into trouble, have I, Alice?” I asked her.

Suddenly Anita was loud and aggressive from the doorway.

“You’d better not get her into trouble, young man!”

Alice looked shocked.

“Muummm, that wasn’t the kind of trouble he meant!”

Alice pushed me right off her and got off the bed.

Anita said “I think we’d better all go down stairs. I’m not sure I trust you two alone.” and winked. She said it with a playful calm nice voice that completely defused the situation.

We all went down stairs and sat and watched their colour telly. Anita sat in an armchair and Alice and I shared the sofa but sat at opposite ends. I wasn’t about to try anything with Anita there. I didn’t dare say anything or do anything. Alice stared solidly at the telly. I tried to see what she was looking at without seeming to be staring.

Then at 9 Anita said I’d better be getting home and she went into the kitchen leaving Alice and I to say goodbye. Alice seemed embarrassed. We both started to apologise together. I asked her if I was still invited to lunch on Thursday and Alice said she thought I was. She looked like she wanted the sofa to swallow her up. I told her I had had a great time and she was an excellent cook. I didn’t dare say she was beautiful again. I got up and let myself out, leaving Alice sitting still on the sofa still staring at the telly.

I had kissed Alice! But she had pushed me away afterward, disowning me. So many mixed messages. I was gutted. But I was infatuated and I wasn’t about to quit.

On Wednesday in the form room waiting for roll call the boy sitting next to Alice started asking her if she was going out with me. His name was Roy. He was taunting her, bullying her. All the rest of the class were laughing at Alice’s discomfort. I jumped up to go thump him but Helen instantly intercepted me, grabbing my arm and pulling me back down into my seat.

“I’ve got this.” she said quietly.

The whole classroom hushed and fell completely silent as Helen rose and walked up the aisle, stopping between Roy and Alice. She leaned down to whisper in Alice’s ear. Alice shook her head but Helen whispered more and Alice got up, her bag on her shoulder, clutching her binder, and came back down the aisle to sit in Helen’s place. I could see the tears welling in her eyes. Alice looked distraught. I wanted to hug her but all my limbs were switched off and I couldn’t move. With Alice seated, Helen turned very slowly and deliberately to face the boy. The whole class was silent, watching and waiting for the storm that was about to break. Helen, tiny little Helen, pointed a finger accusingly at the boy and said “If you ever tease Alice again I will make sure no girl in the forth ever sucks your tiny little cock ever again!” There was a vindictive certainty in her voice.

Then Helen spun around sharply and sat down in Alice’s seat. The class erupted into clapping and whistling and laughter and Mr Davis walked in. It took a few seconds for everyone to realise he was there and the noise to die down. He looked around the room, noticing the agitation from the boys and the changed seating arrangements. Everyone was now dead silent. He just said “Settle down, settle down” as though we were still talking and then carried on as though nothing had happened, but his eyes lingered on me, searching, as roll call ended.

So now the whole school thought we were going out, and we went to and from school together and ate lunch together and laughed and had a good time but I was scared that Alice just wanted to be friends. We hadn’t spoken a word about our kiss. We hadn’t touched or anything since. She seemed to be saying “We’re just friends” in every movement. I was gutted, sad, alone.

On Thursday my dad was dressed up in a suit to come with me. He seemed to think this dinner thing was a great idea. I wasn’t so sure. I tried to tell him that Alice and I were just friends. He just smiled.

The door was opened by Anita. She was wearing a short black halterneck dress with netting arms. Her small breasts stood out like two Christmas puddings. She was wearing Alice’s dress! I was a bit shocked. We were ushered in and dad was introduced. Anita led the way through to the kitchen and dad went ahead of me, saving me the anguish of watching Anita’s sexy little butt wiggle as she walked like Alice.

Alice was slicing the salad. Alice was wearing a thin baggy jumper and very tight jeans. Her hair was tamed and she was wearing eye shadow and bright red lipstick, and her cheeks were naturally blushed.

We sat and talked. The grown-ups sipped red wine. The Spaghetti Bolognese was fantastic. It was mostly the grown-ups talking. Anita’s voice subtly changed and sounded more and more Scandinavian, more and more seductive, as the meal progressed. My dad complemented Anita on the cooking. Anita said that Alice had cooked. My dad gathered the dishes. It was deja-vu!

Alice tugged me into the front room. She slumped onto the sofa giggling. I whispered our parents seemed to be getting along really well.

“Well my mum has a terrible track record.” Alice joked and giggled some more.

I asked about the dress and Alice confided that it was actually her mum’s dress and she’d borrowed it on Tuesday but her mum wouldn’t let her borrow it again this time. They were a bit short in the dress department; they only did thin baggy wooly jumpers normally. They had contemplated buying another dress but Thursday had come so quickly.

There was the scraping sound of chairs being moved in the dining room. The noise of conversation and laughing came closer. Anita and dad paused in our doorway, looking in like they were checking up on us. They explained they were just going down to the pub, they’d be back real soon, they promised. Anita and Alice sung something in Norwegian. It was their secret language. And then dad and Anita left, the door swinging shut loudly behind them.

Alice and I turned to each other, our eyes sparkling. I asked what they’d said. Alice giggled as she told me how they’d reminded each other to be good girls. I wasn’t sure if they needed reminding or if they were having a naughtiness contest.

Then there was silence. There was distance between us. I tried to think what to say or do. I wanted to inch along the sofa towards her. I wanted to be near her, kiss her, hold her. Alice was staring fixedly at the telly, which was off.

I said hesitantly, “Alice, I really like you…”

“I like you too, Sam.” Alice said quietly.

Were we more than friends? Did I have a chance? I didn’t want to lose Alice and fuck this up. I’d invested so much time and energy into befriending Alice and I was scared that if I scared her off I’d be left with nothing and no-one and be alone again. There was silence.

“Everyone at school thinks we’re going out.” I said.

It was just a statement of fact. Alice nodded, a tiny nod almost invisibly small.

“Eh, would you like to?” I said so quiet I could hardly hear it myself.

“Like to what?” asked Alice.

I guess she knew but was just wanting to make doubly certain there was no misunderstanding.

“Would you like to go out with me, Alice?” I asked meekly. I was dead nervous. I felt a cold sweat. Everything hinged on her answer.

Alice nodded, a tiny nod almost invisibly small.

“Was that a yes?” I asked meekly. I just wanted to be make doubly certain there was no misunderstanding.

Alice shifted in her chair and we were suddenly much closer. She looked really nervous and uncertain.

She said “I’ve never done this kind of thing before.” and started making quiet excuses. Her nervousness was infectious, my builder bravado was ebbing away.

“Can I kiss you?” I stammered.

Alice nodded, a tiny nod almost invisibly small. I leaned in and pecking her on the mouth. She stopped talking and we sat quite still, our eyes locked on each other and our mouths just an inch apart. I don’t think she knew what to do. She suddenly lent in and pecked me quickly on the mouth back.

We kissed and cuddled all evening. Eventually Alice sat straddling my lap facing me as we kissed and kissed. The kisses were just locking of lips, no tongues, but they were intense. Alice’s leg muscles were so strong it felt like she was pulling me into her even though she was sitting on me. My erection must have been pressing into her crotch the whole time. I could feel it. Alice must have been able to feel it. She didn’t say anything.

Alice leaped off my lap when the door clicked. It was late; dad and Anita had been down the pub until closing time. They kind of almost fell through the door, giggling and shushing each other.

I wasn’t sure if dad had just made a really funny joke or if Anita was just drunk. Either way, I’m sure Anita was drunk. They looked from my face to Alice’s and back again. Anita asked if we’d been good, and Alice brazenly lied and said we’d been watching Top of the Pops.

“Oooh, did Alice show you her dance moves Sam? Alice always dances to Top of the Pops.” and then Anita did some swaying sensual dancing that was actually very good. Alice was getting even more embarrassed.

My dad took me home. He asked me on the way home if Alice and I were still “just friends”.

I played it cool and didn’t let on. He commented on how I was washing more regularly, had started shaving, had been keeping the house tidy, as though these were random unrelated things. Of course it was because I was preparing in case Alice ever came to reclaim her clothes she’d left at my house. When I got home I looked in the mirror and saw my face plastered with pretty perfect little red lipstick pucker marks! Dad and Anita must have seen them; they must know.

I didn’t wash my face that night. I lay awake all night, still, on my back, my eyes wide open, reliving the cuddle and kissing. My erection was desperate but I couldn’t bring myself to relieve it; it felt so inadequate and impure to touch myself alone now that I had Alice.

I tried to hold hands with Alice on the way to school but she shrugged me off and said we’d better keep all displays of affection private. She had been hiding from the world for so long that was the only way she felt comfortable. I went along. At least it was clear that she wasn’t going to pretend that last night never happened, tell me that we were still “just friends”.

That was the day it came to a head with the boys. That morning when I got to the form room the boys were already there, and I had to push my way past their outstretched legs to reach my seat at the back. The room fell silent, watching, as I slowly fought my way through. Alice and I were sitting apart in our normal chairs again today. I was feeling awful for Alice, but I couldn’t imagine Helen sacrificing her back row seat indefinitely.

Just as I reached my seat Helen put her hand out to block me sitting down. She said clearly, and the room was dead silent so everyone heard, “They’ve put tacks on your chair.”

I looked down. It was subtle, but there were needle-like spikes sticking up. I looked around asking who did it. There was just mirth and laughs.

Deep down high school came flooding back. I was scared, alone, cornered. And then a small part of me snapped. I wasn’t a push over any more. I’d spent the summer mixing plaster and I had some muscle now. I walked deliberately up the aisle towards Alice. The silence took a new deathly depth. The legs across the aisle instinctively shrank back as I approached; the bystanders suddenly didn’t want any part of this fight. Alice looked really scared. The boy sitting beside her, Roy his name was, tried to look brave. But I had a strange sensation. I could tell he was shitting himself. I’d never had that feeling ever before. I’d never had anyone scared of me. I moved like nothing would stop me. Nothing dared stop me. I reached Roy and grabbed him by the tie. He just sat still, not moving. He was staring straight ahead. I suddenly didn’t know what to do. But I was angry, really angry. The words, the threat, just came spilling out without thinking, “I’m going to find you, alone, and kick your balls off.”

Mr Davis walked in. I don’t think he heard my threat, but he saw me gripping a petrified Roy. He saw the pale white scared faces of the rest of the class. He saw Alice crying. I think in that moment he saw everything, how it really was. I just pushed Roy back into his seat and, still fuming, walked slowly deliberately threateningly back to my seat and sat down gingerly on the edge of the chair. Everyone was watching me. Mr Davis was watching me. He didn’t say anything. There was a long scared silence and then he did roll call.

That lunchtime the whole school was abuzz with the fight. The Posse were all gathered around me like cheerleaders. The crowd was pushing me inexorably towards the centre of the quad. I could see Roy being pushed by the other boys towards me. Everyone wanted to see the fight. The whole school, all years, seemed to fill the quad. Everyone was chanting quietly, insistently, together, “fight! fight! fight!” Except Alice.

I couldn’t see Alice anywhere, no matter how hard I looked and stared around.

And then there was a clearing in front of me, with Roy on the other side. I realised this was it. I had to fight. If I bottled out now, I was sunk forever. And I could smell Roy’s fear. I was now the top dog, and Roy had already lost the fight in his head. I went in for the kill and punched his lights out. It was all over so suddenly that there was just silence and confusion. Roy dropped to the ground as though he was thinking it a merciful chance to stop the fight at the earliest possible opportunity.

Suddenly everyone dispersed. There was no excitement and anticipation now; the fight had happened, almost nobody had actually seen my rapid punches, and now everyone felt vulnerable and didn’t want to be around when the teachers intervened.

I looked around me. Roy was being dragged off by the boys, and The Posse had closed in around me. Suddenly I felt very very scared and vulnerable. But Katie was bucking the trend and cooing, and Helen was determinedly dragging me to safety from right under Katie’s nose.

We found Alice on our bench on the far side of the games field. The Posse were with me, them heading to the copse in the corner as they always did.

“Oh you should have seen your man,” they cooed, “he knocked out Roy with one punch!”

They all talked at once and gave conflicting accounts of the blows I’d given. Alice seemed shocked and horrified.

I sat down beside her. Katie was telling everyone how next time we should fight here on the games field where the teachers wouldn’t see so I could really finish Roy properly. Only Helen asked how I was feeling. I asked The Posse to leave us. It was weird being the only boy, surrounded by so many excited girls. But I was secretly scared. I was scared there would be more fighting. I was scared because this could end up with me having my head kicked in. As Katie’s Posse strutted off towards the copse I heard Katie telling them, “She must be blowing him!” and cackling.

Alice couldn’t believe what I’d done. She was a strong pacifist. I tried to explain that I’d been bullied enough at high school and now I’d snapped. I tried to appeal to her, but she couldn’t see that this fight had to happen. She pointed out we didn’t actually know it was Roy who had put the tacks through my chair.

She said she didn’t like ‘this Sam’; she didn’t want to go out with ‘this Sam’.

I cried. I sat beside her and sobbed and apologised. She put her arm around me, comforting, and I think this was the only public display of affection and touching she ever showed me in public. Perhaps The Posse were watching.

I didn’t feel like a hero when Alice and I went solemnly home from school.

It was Friday night and dad took me down to the pub. Fridays and Saturdays were always a bit busier and rowdier in pubs. A local pub is like a communal living room the rest of the week, but Friday and Saturday nights are party nights.

We were sitting in a booth with some locals when dad, just lifting a glass to his mouth, glances up and sees something that makes his face light up. He nudged me and, having my attention, nodded his head in the direction of the bar. I followed his nod. There, standing by the bar with glasses of coke in their hands, were Alice and Anita! They were both wearing thin baggy wooly jumpers, eye shadow and red lipstick. Alice had a mini skirt and tights and Anita was wearing very tight jeans. Alice looked grown up. They looked like sisters. They both looked so hot. The whole pub was inspecting them, expectant, hopeful. They were looking around for somewhere to sit.

Dad got up and hurried over to them, pointed out our table, and guided them to me. He got the locals to move to make space for the ladies. The pub slowly got noisy again. We sat for a moment in silence, but it was a comfortable silence. Then Anita, with a slight Scandinavian accent which is always more pronounced when my dad is around, tells the story of how she brought Alice to a pub for the first time tonight, bringing her to the pub that she’d only been to once and that was last night with dad, and when they’d got in the landlady had asked Alice if she wanted her usual!

Alice was now so red she was going to die. Dad and I laughed like drains. Then Anita asked how come the land lady knew her and Alice sang something in Norwegian and it was their time to laugh. Dad asks them what they are drinking and Anita says “Two of the usual.”

She then sipped hers and almost spat it out.

“It’s alcoholic!” she spluttered, looking at Alice shocked and almost angry.

Then, realising the silliness in expecting anything else in a pub, we all had a good laugh again.

I heard my name “Sam!” being called out from the corner and there were the builders, raising their glasses in toast to me. It was my turn to turn beetroot red. I guess to the rest of the pub it looked like my dad and I had brazenly picked up two random attractive single young females, or something like that.

We walked the girls home at closing time but they left us on the corner and there were no kisses. My dad whistled as we walked the last bit home. He was as smitten as I was. It’s kinda weird for dad and son to be dating mother and daughter. It was convenient, but also embarrassing. And what if they split up, fall out, fight? Will I still be allowed to date Alice? I was full of uncertainty, but I was also too busy thinking about the softness of Alice’s skin, the way her eyes sparkled when she laughs, the smell of her hair, to think too far ahead.

I heard later that something else happened that night in the pub. A couple of older kids recognised Alice from high-school and were slagging her off and debating whether to tell on her being under-age when one of my builder buddies overheard them. He pushed between them, ‘lent’ on them, and gave them a ‘word to the wise’ talk. They drank up and left. That was Gus’s thing, ‘leaning’ on people. He even did it to friends. He liked to put his gorilla arm around you and then gently let you take his weight so your legs started to buckle. It was kinda lucky I hadn’t overheard them instead; I don’t think I’d have solved things, rather made them worse and probably got a beating and lost Alice in the process. That thing with Roy was a one-off and I wasn’t really equipped for fighting.

Saturday I knew Alice’s skating times and I slipped in to watch from the stands just as her practice session was drawing to a close. She was doing laps with jumps and pirouettes in each corner. It was very repetitive but also very elegant and effortless and beautiful.

Anita was standing with a cluster of kids down one end. She was obviously giving them a lesson. After a while she looked up and saw me in the stand. Anita waved at me, and then called Alice over to her. She pointed up at me in the stands and Alice left the ice and clambered up to me. She pecked me on the mouth and asked what I was doing. I told her I was watching the most beautiful girl in the world skate. She pretended to scan the ice looking for that girl. I asked her if she wanted to go down town after practice and she said yes. So that’s the first time we managed to actually go down the town centre together.

I had half a mind to buy her a dress, and we went into the big department store. We were looking around dresses but she was hard to please; they were mostly not her size, and I was secretly out of my depth and out of my wallet. I suspected that the Christmas pudding bust in Anita’s dress was mostly padding. I didn’t care. Alice did pick out a t-shirt that she told me I just had to buy. I couldn’t see how it was any different than any of the t-shirts I already had, but Alice was sure it looked a lot better on me so I really didn’t have a choice.

We approached the tills. We had to go near the lingerie section to get to them. I jokingly asked, “if I brought you underwear, would you wear it?”

Alice giggled. She found discussing underwear with a boy embarrassing. My builder bravado was fending off my embarrassment so I pushed the point. Alice conceded she might, although she wouldn’t promise. I pointed out an entirely random thong, it was just the item of underwear nearest to hand. I asked Alice if she’d wear that. She giggled to bits and went very red and said “maybe,” very quietly.

We got closer to the tills. Suddenly, Alice stopped laughing. She looked shocked and scared, like a deer in headlights. She was staring at the tills and the cashier was staring at us. Alice pushed the t-shirt into my hand and said she’d meet me outside. She turned and fled. I guessed she knew the cashier. Not many the girls from high school had gone on to six-form. Or perhaps it was a Saturday job?

I wasn’t too bothered. I was feeling bold. With Alice gone, I quickly went back and grabbed the thong. Then I went to the till.

The girl was young. She was our age. She seemed very professional. She asked if I wanted the thong gift wrapped and I said yes. She asked me if I was going to buy a matching bra; I looked a bit uncertain, and she laughed and said Alice wouldn’t need one. Then she seemed to realise the enormity of what she had just said and went very pale and started to splutter an apology. Then she shut up, wrapped the thong and I paid in silence. I went out of the shop feeling angry, but managed to calm myself before going back to Alice.

Sunday I watched Alice skate again. Skating competitively was a lot of repetitious practice. But I was infatuated and wanted to watch all I could. Alice wanted me to learn to skate so we could compete in the pairs categories together, but it was a silly idea. The best bit about Alice’s practices though was that she would listen to her walkman on the way to and from the rink. She never brought the walkman to school, it was too valuable. But Alice needed the walkman when she trained so she could hear the music she was dancing and skating to. And so, on the way to and from the rink, she would hold the headphones between us so we could both listen to her mix tapes. We were almost touching. Sometimes we brushed together. It was almost open affection in public and my heart raced.

On Monday I asked Alice if she wanted to go play pool after school. So we finally went back to my house where she’d left the change of clothes. She went into my bedroom to change. It was the first time she’d properly been in my house —and the first time she’d been in my bedroom— and she went in and shut the door with the bang. I had washed everything; washing was one of my chores now I lived with dad and I had put Alice’s clothes through with the rest so they were nice and fresh and clean. In fact I’d generally tidied the whole house and kept it clean, expecting Alice to see it some time soon. It wasn’t nearly as modern as Alice’s nor as fresh, but at least it could be clean.

I’d already slipped the gift-wrapped thong into the bag too. I stood outside the door waiting to see what happened.

I heard a squeal from inside my bedroom. The door banged open and Alice flew out and hugged me. It took me a moment or two to take in what she was wearing. She was wearing a nice clean thin rusty red wooly jumper and … nothing else! Alice had jumped into my arms and wrapped her strong slender legs around me. My hands were holding her up, one hand on each arse cheek. I was in heaven. I was in shock. I asked her what she was wearing.

“My new thong, silly!” was her answer.

I moved my hands around a bit more as we kissed and, sure enough, there were the flimsy thin straps of the thong. She wasn’t completely naked. The part of me that was getting braver asked “if I buy you underwear, will you wear it?” to which she replied “yes!” and covered my face in small pecking kisses. I continued “and if I don’t buy you any underwear, will you wear any?” and she just giggled and pushed away from my chest and said “slow down, I’m not that kind of girl!”

She was setting limits and I was taking notes. Alice hopped down and went back in to finish changing. I realised how little attention I had paid to the feel of her cheeks, the tautness, the sexiness. I had been too busy looking for fabric to soak in the feeling.

I forget who won pool. Alice wore the clothes home; there was nothing to hide from Anita any more. That evening, as I masturbated, I tried to remember the feel of her wriggly bottom but it was just a blur of indistinct memories.

School was going better. There was no repercussions from the fight. Roy and the boys kept well away from us. The Posse accepted that Alice and I were an item and let us be. Alice and I were gently getting closer. As autumn dragged on we were on cloud nine, young, infatuated, first love.

One thing that was not racing along though was the sex part. Alice was extremely reluctant. She was a keen kisser and we discovered tongues. She was a keen cuddler, and we discovered that she could hold herself to me while I stood using just her long strong skating legs wrapped around my waist. But I never got my hands inside her clothes, never got to touch her breasts, never got to get closer than a thin wooly jumper away from the forbidden fruit that beckoned me. As proud as she was to display her legs, her best assets, she was equally embarrassed by her chest, and her clothes stayed resolutely on. She sometimes whispered enticingly that she was wearing ‘the thong’, but I never saw nor touched her lovely arse cheeks again. My balls were permanently blue. We’d cuddle and wriggle on the bed, our hands roaming each others backs, and each time she felt my erection pressing into her for too long she’d giggle and push me away, accusing me accurately of just thinking about one thing.

Then one day after school she brought me back to hers because she wanted some help with some ‘research’. She was all coy and giggly when she asked me. We didn’t normally go to hers. We’d been going to mine after school regularly, and kissed and cuddled on my bed before dad got home, but never to hers.

She let me in and led me through to the kitchen for a glass of water. Then, looking more refreshed and courageous, she led me upstairs to her room.

The room was unchanged from our first kiss. She bent down and opened the bottom draw. She took out a girly magazine. Not that kind of girly magazine; I mean the kind of magazine that teenage girls subscribe to. It contained the normal tame relationship advice that young girls who read Mills and Boon and Jane Austen want to read.

Alice opened it on a bookmark. She was always very organised, even this kind of ‘research’. It was an article describing how to estimate the length of the male organ from other body measurements. There was even a little outline of a man with labeled lengths and formula you could plug measurements into. The diagram of the man was missing any actual genitalia.

Alice fished out tape measure and asked if she could measure me. I told her it would cost her a kiss. I wasn’t quite sure what she was going to measure exactly, but I was very excited. I figured this could be the first step towards some physical intimacy.

Alice measured my forearm. She wrote the number on the diagram. Then she kissed me. Only she didn’t kiss my lips, she kissed my forearm. Then she tried to measure my upper arm, but my school shirt was kind of in the way. So I took it off, bearing my chest. She measured my upper arm, wrote down the number and then kissed my shoulder. Then she measured around my chest, wrote it down, kissed me on the chest, and so on. She took all kinds of measurements. Distance from ear to shoulder, then a peck on the neck. Distance from arm to waist, then a kiss. She started to tug my trousers. I was extremely hard and we had trouble getting my jeans down because my y-fronts were tented. She measured the length of foot, and kissed it; the length of my lower leg, and a kiss. She was working her way up towards my middle.

I was terribly excited. She measured and kissed my inner thigh. I was laying, almost naked, on her bed, and she was leaning all over me taking measurements and placing light pecking kisses.

I looked at her diagram. It was obvious most of these measurements were not required, that she was making this up.

She got to my groin. My penis was so hard I could feel a draft where the material was pushed away from my legs making a gap she could surely see through.

And then she poked it. She prodded my penis. It swayed and she laughed.

She stood up. She told me I could put my clothes back on now. She thanked me for assisting her with her research. I asked her if she wanted to measure my dick. I was so excited, so hopeful, I really wanted to display myself for her. I wanted her to measure it, and then kiss it!

She laughed like it was the funniest joke in the world. She pointed out that that was the one thing she didn’t need to measure, she could extrapolate its size from the length of my forearm and feet! She got up and threw my jeans at me and told me to get dressed before her mum came home.

But we did kiss extra passionately after that. I felt a lot closer to her, even if we hadn’t yet shown each other everything. She had kissed my inner thigh; she had prodded my willy!

I asked her how big she thought I was, and she did some sums but wouldn’t tell me. She started teasing me that boys were so insecure about that and that we should strive to be loved even if we were small. I felt a bit belittled; I didn’t think I was that small, but I actually had no idea first how big I was and second what was normal. I expect Alice’s magazine had all the details.

Dad would often go out in the evenings. He was dating Anita. I don’t know where they went or what they did, but he was very happy. I hadn’t seen him this happy ever before. Alice wasn’t going to let me spend my evenings with her alone though; she knew what I wanted and she kept telling me to do my homework instead.

The last warmth of summer had lasted into the autumn and it could still be sunny and warm in the day, even if the evenings were colder as the nights drew in. Dad surprised me one Saturday by declaring that him and I were going off for the weekend. He got his motorbike out of the lockup and I rode pinion to the coast.

Dad had booked a room at a little inn on the coast road overlooking a little beach. One room, two separate beds and, luxury, an on-suite little toilet and sink. It was lunchtime so we went down to the bar for food.

And in walked Anita with Alice in tow! The moment I saw the girls a lightbulb lit in my head. Of course! Dad and Anita had arranged a nice little naughty weekend and Alice and I were along as a double date!

It wasn’t quite like that. Dad and Anita were trying to keep things clean and safe. The inn only actually had two rooms and the girls booked into the other, sharing. The idea was more a relaxing time together by the sea. It must have been quite confusing to the locals, trying to work out if we were a family, whether Anita could be the mum, who Anita was the mum of, and were Alice and I brother and sister.

Alice was just as surprised as I was. She hadn’t been told it was a double date weekend either. She looked very happy though. We went for a stroll on the beach. It was too cold to swim but the sun shined and, despite the breeze, we didn’t really need coats. I tried to slip our hands together but Alice kept pulling away. Even here she was embarrassed to hold hands in public, to kiss in public. But I found that if I walked really close so our arms just brushed together, our hands just touched accidentally the whole time, she let me get away with it and didn’t pull away. She kept looking at me from the corner of her eye and smiled all the time, fighting back a giggle like we were sharing a secret joke.

The village was basically just a strip of houses, the inn and a post office and grocers on the coast road by a the beach. It was lovely and tranquil and we had it pretty much to ourselves. Dad and Anita also walked on the beach but went in the opposite direction, away from us. I noticed they were holding hands but nothing more than that.

That evening we ate at the inn. I brought the first round and got pints for dad and me and rum and cokes for the girls. Anita and dad seemed a bit uncertain about the drinks angle and warned us to take it easy. We got along great.

By the end of the evening dad and Anita had kissed clumsily a couple of times and Alice had felt so uncomfortable being around them that she had dragged me off to the pool table. She could play pool now and, like everything she did, she did it really well. But tonight she needed coaching and I lent over her and helped her line up the shots and pull back the cue. We were quite giggly.

When the last game was over, and our glasses were empty, time had already been called at the bar. It was time for us to head to bed. Anita and dad had already gone up. We followed.

On the landing it was clear that something was going on. You know what was going on. There was muffled love making sounds coming from the girls room and the ‘do not disturb’ sign was on the door. Alice was panicking. Where was she going to sleep now? Even I, with drinks inside me, knew this wasn’t planned; this wasn’t what dad and Anita had had in mind at all. They had just lost control and not thought this through.

I suggested Alice stay in my room with me. She was defensive, unsure. I pointed out there were two separate beds. I found myself promising that nothing would happen. I guess I meant I wouldn’t make her do anything she didn’t want to do. Finally, she agreed.

There was an asexual anticlimax as we got ready for bed. Alice insisted that I turn around and not watch as she slipped out of her wooly jumper and jeans and jumped quickly into one of the beds. Then I stripped down to my y-fronts and got into the other bed. I hadn’t insisted she turn around, but she had looked away anyway. Then we turned off the bedside lights and it was quiet and dark. I was listening for the slightly sound, the slightest movement.

A few seconds later I realised that we hadn’t said good night. So I said ‘good night’. A muffled drowsy ‘good night Sam.’ came from the other bed. And then, suddenly, Alice asked for a good night kiss! I was really taken aback but very willing. At first we tried to lean out of our beds and meet across the divide between them. But we couldn’t reach. So I seized the initiative and jumped out of bed and went over to Alice. She was under the covers and I was sitting on her bed leaning over her from outside the covers. The good night kiss was long and involved tongues. I caressed her hair. I didn’t want it to end. Alice rubbed my shoulders and asked if I was cold. I said it was alright. She told me not to be silly and pulled back her covers so I could slip in with her. And so we were now sharing a narrow bed, underneath the covers together and kissing the longest most passionate good night kiss ever.

My hand slipped down and felt her naked arse cheek. I asked disbelievingly if she was wearing anything. Alice giggled and said she was wearing the thong. I felt around and found the tiny thin straps and we kissed even more passionately.

I was actually content to let things be. I was prepared to do anything to spend the night in the same bed as Alice even if the price of that was to do nothing. I was so elated and happy. We pressed together. We ended up me laying on my back with Alice cuddled up tucked up under my arm with one leg across my groin. She must have felt the tent in my y-fronts. It had often come between us before while we cuddled and we’d never mentioned it, just ignored it and pretended it wasn’t there.

We weren’t that tired. We became wide awake. We talked about what might happen if my dad came back to his bed and found us in it. Alice giggled when I quickly nipped out of bed to put the ‘do not disturb’ sign on our door handle. We talked a bit more, speculating if dad and Anita would marry, and how weird that would be for us. My hand cupped an arse cheek and I was content.

Somehow the conversation came around to the thong again. I asked again “if I buy you underwear, would you wear it?” She giggled and said of course and that I was silly. She declared she’d only wear underwear I brought her. Perhaps she hadn’t realised what she had just said? For some reason I just did the crazy thing that I was always careful to avoid: I slipped both hands up inside her t-shirt and quickly unclipped her bra! She was shocked and asked me what I was doing. I said that I hadn’t bought it for her. She laughed. The mood lightened and she let it lay there unclipped. I ran my hand up and down her back, on the outside of her t-shirt, excited to feel the new sensation of no bra strap intervening.

I asked her if it was a nice bra. I asked her to describe it. She played along, and before long she gently lifted her shoulders and then, pulling one strap through each arm hole in turn, took the bra off without taking off her t-shirt. I couldn’t quite understand how she’d managed that. She dangled it above me. I could just about make out its outline in the faint moonshine filtering in around the curtains.

I reached up and felt it. It was a very hard thing with padding and intricate embroidery. I said it felt nice. I was intrigued by the padding. But all the time I was really trying to feel Alice’s exposed breasts pressing against my chest through her t-shirt. Alice threw the bra onto the other bed. We settled down snug, sighing contently. But we couldn’t sleep. We were too excited, being so close and so naughty.

Alice asked me if I would wear underwear she brought me. I told her I would. Then, bravely, I started to tug down my own y-fronts. Alice’s hand flew to her mouth to stifle a shriek, and she asked me incredulously what I was doing. I told her that I couldn’t wear them because she hadn’t brought them for me. She giggled and kissed me to muffle her laughter. She was playing along so I slipped up her t-shirt. She raised her head so I could take it off. She was giving me permission. Now Alice was topless and I was naked and we were laying under the covers in a tiny bed in a seaside inn and our mum and dad were bonking in the other room and we could still sometimes hear their muffled moaning.

I was running my hand up and down the side of her torso. Alice liked that. I could feel a slight extra softness at the top of the stroke where her breasts were. The side of her breasts. I was so sensitive to every touch and so was she. I moved my hand slightly so it came inwards at the top of the stroke to touch more of her breast, but she immediately moved my hand to its previous path. Her breasts were off-limits. So after some more stroking I focused on heading south and squeezing the cheek at the bottom of each stroke. Alice was really enjoying it and our kissing grew in intensity. Without breaking the kiss I half sat up and Alice rolled onto her back and I came back down on top of her. She wrapped her legs around me as my willy jabbed into her knickers. She came up for breath and said I was going to ruin the thong. I solved that by sitting up and pulling her knickers off. She put her legs together and lifted her bottom to assist me. And that’s how, in so many steps, we ended up naked.

I laid her back down and positioned myself on top of her. Her breaths were hurried. I hugged her shoulders and she held my face in the palms of both hands, holding my lips off hers. In the faint light I could just make out the glistening sparkle of her eyes as she looked into my face. She said, hearse and nervous “I haven’t done this kind of thing ever before.”

“Me neither” I said. Then I added “Alice, I love you.” I meant it.

What I really meant was that if this was as far as we got, I wasn’t going to abandon her. She grinned and said “I know, silly.” and we kissed with lips so wide open they hardly touched, our tongues entwining in the open air as we gulped in hurried breaths.

My dick slipped between us up onto Alice’s stomach. I pulled back my hips slightly, trying to get the head back and down for another attempt. I wasn’t thinking. I was acting instinctively.

Then I was struck by a sudden fear: what if I got Alice pregnant? Alice could somehow feel my sudden hesitation. She asked me what was wrong. I asked her if I should run downstairs to the gents and buy a condom; I knew there was a machine there.

Alice laughed. She explained in hurried whispers that, the day after we had first kissed on her bed and her mum had caught us, her mum had taken her to a clinic to get on the pill. Anita was worried sick that Alice would make the same mistake that Anita had made. Not that Alice was a mistake, of course, but that really babies had to wait for a serious long-term relationship and commitment and things and Anita wasn’t going to let Alice take any risks.

That chat had kind of killed the mood slightly, but more kissing and stroking brought back the passion and Alice slipped her hand down between our tummies to guide my penis in. It was the first time she had touched my penis and it was a wonderful sensation. Lined up, Alice suddenly squeezed her powerful thighs and pulled us together, connected. The head of my penis was in Alice. It was wonderfully warm and wet. It wasn’t in very deep. We were still, holding each other tight, watching each others faces in the dim moonlight.

I asked Alice if she was alright. She was. It seemed the most natural thing in the world to be talking as we lost our virginity together. I asked if she was ready. She was. I pushed. She pulled her head up off the pillow to kiss me and, as I pushed her head back down into the pillow she squeezed my bottom with her legs again and pulled me in even further, screaming into my mouth. And we were now still, pulling each other together as tightly as possible, connected as deeply as possible. Our foreheads were pressed together and I could feel the knot in her brow. Her finger nails dug into my shoulder blades. I kept still. Our tongues found each other and we kissed and then, breaking, both started to giggle.

Then I slowly started sliding in and out. It felt exquisite. We started necking as I pumped slowly in and out. Alice ran her hands through my hair and pulled my head tight into her neck. Her hips were rocking in time to my strokes and we moved together, coupled, as though one animal. I could feel how tight she was. I could feel how she seemed to grow to let the head past and then contract behind it to hug it and hold it in tight. I felt how wet she became. I felt how warm it became. I sped up. Alice was moaning. I was panting. It was actually hard work. There was no way I was slowing down, no way I was stopping. And then, quickly, my balls began to tingle and I had the growing elation of pending orgasm. Alice could tell things were climaxing and she started to pump me in and out using her legs wrapped around me. My hands were cupping both her arse cheeks. We were pulling ourselves as close together as humanly possible on every in stroke. And the tingling grew and the sperm surged and fired again and again deep into her. Alice gripped my arse so tightly with her legs I couldn’t move. Every pulse of my penis fired more sperm deep into her.

We giggled. And we kissed again. We lay there, our foreheads pressed together, saying nothing, listening to each others panting breath and feeling our hearts beat so fast. She just held on tight, not letting go until eventually I’d diminished so much it slipped out with a plop. Alice giggled again and said ‘mmmmm’.

We shifted around so I was laying on my back again with Alice tucked under my arm with her leg up across my limp willy. There was so much oozy juice from both of us leaking and seeping everywhere that we got stuck together as we fell into a deep content sleep.

It was quite early in the morning when I awoke. Alice was sitting up in the narrow bed beside me, looking out of the window at the sea in the morning sunrise. She had opened the curtains. She had the covers covering her upright chest so I could only see her pale violin-shaped back and the gently pert cushions of her arse cheeks. My bared chest felt cold. That was probably what woke me up. I sat up beside her. She turned, grinned, and kissed me. I pushed her shoulders back so she was laying on her back. She had instinctively brought the covers back with her to cover her chest. She complained with a grin that she’d been watching that sunrise. I pulled down the covers to expose her breasts. They were magnificent. They were tiny but they were intoxicating. I loved them. I instinctively put my head down to suck on them. She pushed me away giggling. I loved her giggle. She reached out past my head and cupped it and pulled it back up to her face. Alice laughed and told me to keep my eyes up here, on her own face. Then she lunged up to plant a peck kiss on my lips and, laying down again, said “I love you Sam.”

I just replied “I know that, silly.”

I pulled the covers right off, exposing us both. She went to reach for them but then gave up. We then looked each other over for the first time ever. Her breasts drew my eyes like magnets. I wanted to touch them, cup them, pet them, kiss them. I held back. I looked at her flat little tummy, her mound, her soft light blonde fuzzy public hair, the maroon skin of her pussy folds visible through the light fuzz. She was staring at my cock. My cock was rock hard, gently slapping my tummy in time with my heartbeat.

I turned back to her face and we kissed and embraced and, with her hand for guidance, I nestled back between her legs and found her pussy and slipped in. I think the anticipation had been foreplay enough. We slipped together quickly effortlessly painlessly.

We smiled at each other. We just studied each others faces as we pumped together, getting faster and faster, closer and closer. Alice’s legs wrapped around me and held me tight, crushing my hips and smashing us together. Alice’s head flew back and her back arched and she shuddered. Then she shuddered again. Then, gulping for breath, she lent back into me and we kissed deeply. She let one of my hands seek out and cup her smooth soft breast briefly. We started to rock together again and I felt the tingle building and then I was shooting rope after rope of sperm deep into her. We smiled and smiled as we sucked in oxygen. She cupped my face in the palms of her hands and we just kept kissing and parting, kissing and parting until I had gone limp and we slipped out with a slurp.

That morning at breakfast we met dad and Anita. The girls sat at the table and sang excitedly in Norwegian as dad and I went up to get the plates from the bar. Anita was holding her hands out with her index things apart, rather like a fisherman describing a small catch. Alice was giggling and trying to silence her mum and make her stop. Dad and I were quiet, walking with a silly spring in our step and grins on our faces. We went back to the table carrying the Full English Breakfast on the plates. Anita looked up and, as way of explanation, said they were just ‘comparing notes’. It was obvious to dad and Anita that Alice and I had ‘done it’ too last night. They had seen the sign on our door. They saw our embarrassment, our glow, our closeness, our glances at breakfast. It was obvious.

I stole the ‘do not disturb’ sign. We could really use it when we got home.

That sunny Sunday morning dad took Anita for a tour along the coast road on the motorbike. Alice and I took a walk along the beach and stopped in a sand dune gulp, sheltered from the wind and quite alone. We just lay there in the weak sun knowing we were unlikely to burn so late in the year. Alice took her jeans and jumper off and lay on our straw mat with just a t-shirt pulled down over her knickers to preserve her modesty. Luckily I had shorts with me, and lay there with my shirt off. I lay there watching Alice, knowing what was under the t-shirt, knowing that she was mine and I was hers. We were too tired to do anything, too content, too sated to have the uncontrollable urge. And besides, Alice wasn’t into public displays of affection.

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