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Luke at University Pt. 01

By: WittePiet



[This story continues 'Luke's early years.' All persons and institutions in the story are fictitious. Some places are real, others are fictitious.]

Chapter 13

Buckingham College, Camford

As I stood there on the pavement in Buckingham Street, looking at the golden-yellow stonework of the seventeenth-century frontage of the college, beautiful in the October sun, I began to re-evaluate the city in or near which I had spent most of my life. I tried to see it through the eyes of most eighteen-year-olds who had set foot in it only once or twice before. I was struck with its beauty, albeit impaired by the masses of cars, buses and bicycles that passed through it daily, and was thankful that I was joining a community going back hundreds of years. I picked up my suitcase and went to find my room allocation.

My room was rather old-fashioned. It was a first-floor room in the second quadrangle of the college, in the centre of which was an eighteenth-century fountain, surrounded by a flower-bed. It was a duplex room of the type commonly allocated to freshman students: a shared spacious sitting room/study with two desks, and two separate single bedrooms opening off. Each bedroom had a washbasin, but no toilet. Consequently, it was fairly universal practice after a night's drinking to use the washbasin to piss into. The room shared a bathroom, which had two toilets and two showers, with two other similar student rooms on the same level of the staircase, for a total of six students. My roommate had not yet arrived, so I had a choice of bedrooms. I unpacked my suitcase, put the bed-linen etc. into drawers in my chosen bedroom and my clothes in other drawers. 

I then went out and did what dozens of freshman students have traditionally done at universities over the whole land, I went into a men's outfitters and bought a dark green hoody, embellished with a Buckingham College crest. The days of college scarves and ties were gone in those early years of the twenty-first century and hoodies were in. The college crest (armorial bearings) was: 'argent, a pile inverted gules encircled by a ducal coronet, between two bezants.' This was intended to symbolize the ducal foundation of the college, but it was evident if you had the right kind of mind (a dirty one) to see it as a symbol of fellatio! The motto beneath the armorial bearings, 'Virtus virilis' (manly strength or virtue) could also have a gay interpretation.

In 1623, to mark his elevation by the king to the Dukedom of Buckingham, George Villiers, regretting his lack of a university education, had founded Buckingham College. 'The handsomest-bodied man in all of England,' as a contemporary described him, was an appropriate description of the founder of what became notorious as a gay college. King James VI/I had taken a fancy to Villiers from the moment of their meeting in 1614, and while there is not a lot of strong evidence, apart from a hidden passage linking their bedrooms, he was almost certainly James's lover. 

This association of the college with man-man sex was never forgotten. College accounts from the Restoration era record fines and rustications of undergraduates for supplementing their beer money by soliciting as rent boys. In the eighteenth century there was a series of scandals about sexual relationships between the fellows and teenage undergraduates. The prudery of the Victorians led to attempts to sweep this reputation of the college under the carpet, particularly after Section 11 of the Criminal Law Amendment Act 1885, commonly known as the Labouchère Amendment, criminalized sexual acts between male persons ('gross indecency'), and it was the better part of a century before this injustice was removed. In the twenty-first century, the resolute determination of both the Governing Body and the undergraduates not to admit women students, reinforced the gay reputation of the college. 



Chapter 14

The first few weeks

I was of course extremely interested to see what my roommate was like. It was the next day before he turned up. He was quite attractive-looking, but seemed very quiet and reserved. He had short, crew-cut dark hair, was very tall (a good 2 metres), broad shouldered and pretty muscular. I hoped that he would not be into rowing, rugby or boxing, and was relieved when he said that was not a sporty type. He told me that he was reading chemistry. It was not easy to get him to talk, I had to smile and make a big effort to get him to say very much. I asked him if he swam, and he said that he was very keen on swimming and hoped to get into the water at least once a week. I was pleased that we had at least one thing in common.

I will skip over the first few days in which the freshmen were recruited to various college and university clubs and activities, and just relate that I joined the chapel choir. My new roommate, whose name was Thomas Appleton, did not tell me about any new activities that he was going to try. His taciturnity decreased somewhat after the first week, and we started going into dinner together. Most evenings before dinner we had a drink in the college beer cellar and after his first drink, Tom always became much more communicative. 

My choice of two languages to study meant that I had a much more hectic timetable than most humanities students. I had two tutorials per week, one in French and one in Italian. These were not always one-to-one tutorials, often they were small groups, and in Italian involved students from other colleges. The assignments were not always essays: sometimes they were translation exercises. The tutorials also were varied, with conversation classes and interpreting classes, as well as essay reading and criticism. We were expected to attend a selection of lectures: some of our own choice, others heavily recommended by our tutors, and were expected to read at least five books per term. This meant that I spent a lot of time working in our room, whereas Tom was out at lectures or lab classes most of the day, which was a happy arrangement. 

You might wonder why I had chosen such a relatively obscure discipline to study at university level as Italian. There were a number of contributing factors. Firstly, my mother had studied Italian and lived in Italy, second, my unknown biological father, the man responsible for my Mediterranean complexion, had been Italian, thirdly both my fathers spoke the language, as of course did Uncle Marcello. But the most influential factor is what happened when we were young. After the adoption of Cathy, my parents were essentially confined to the house in the evenings for several years with two young children. At that stage they already spoke quite a lot of the language already, having been to a summer school in Emilia-Romagna. They asked Marcello if he knew of an Italian tutor who would come to the house and give them language tuition. Of course Marcello did know such a person and for five years they both had weekly lessons in Italian. As a result of this, whenever they were in Marcello's company they spoke Italian, and in order to practise, they spoke it between themselves at home. They did this a lot, and we kids started to pick up bits of the language, and before long could say a lot of everyday words and sentences. I missed these conversations when I was at boarding school, and when I got into the senior school and found that I could study Italian to both GCSE and A Level, I jumped at the opportunity. I felt very strongly that if both my fathers could speak two other languages apart from English, when they had both been educated as chemists, I should have no problems doing the same when the languages were my main field of study.

My fathers had another language too, the language of gay endearments, which used to embarrass me when I was in my early teens, but as I got older and discovered that I was gay myself, I began to appreciate their use. Dad used to call Pop 'stud-boy' and Pop used to call Dad 'fag-boy'. Along with more usual terms like 'love', 'darling', 'Ganymede' and 'pretty youth', they seemed to me, as an adult, perfectly normal terms for a man. They did not use such terms in public, of course.

I was a keen and conscientious student, so I was not aware of any great need for sex that could not be satisfied by a good wank, and my social life was quite low key. I did not feel the need to chat up my fellow students during dinner, though I did look round at them appraisingly. On Saturday mornings I went swimming with Tom, and got the chance to see him undressed. He looked pretty good, but I did not feel any desire to make advances. We used to go to the Camford Olympic Pool, because Tom could not afford to join the Men's Fitness Club. My parents had paid for my membership as soon as I became eighteen. They had been instrumental in getting the Club started, and Pop had contributed a million towards its construction costs, and he sat on the committee. I used to go there at lunchtime on my own a couple of times a week and swim twenty or so lengths. If I had been looking for sex, it would have been a good place to go, because it had been designed to be gay-friendly. Occasionally, if he was free at lunchtime, Pop would join me in swimming. Although now in his early fifties, he was extremely fit, though I could easily have overtaken him if we had been swimming competitively. I sometimes wondered if the gay regulars at the Centre thought that I was his male toy-boy rather than his son! One evening a week I had choir practice, which was always followed by a session at a nearby pub. The choir's repertoire of music was very limited by the lack of women's or boys' voices, and placed a heavy reliance on tenors, and those rare species, male altos. I regretted that I had not inherited Dad's tenor voice (then it struck me, could I have inherited such a thing from him? My Y-chromosome was Italian! But that may merely reflect my poor knowledge of genetics.) 

After a culture-starved couple of weeks, I persuaded Tom to come with me to see an Italian film at the Rialto on a Saturday afternoon. Saturday dinner in Hall was always a cold meal, as it was the kitchen staff's night off, so we signed out of dinner, and after the film, went out for dinner at a Chinese restaurant. Tom was not affluent, and was, being a Yorkshireman like Dad, careful with his money, but hungry students got a good meal at the Hang Zhou Restaurant. To my surprise, Tom said how much he had enjoyed the film, and could we go regularly to the Rialto each week. I assented enthusiastically, as I did not find going to concerts or the cinema on my own much fun. To my disappointment, there was of course no hand-holding with Tom, as he seemed to be rather straight, or maybe just inhibited. But he did go out with his fellow chemists on Friday nights after Hall. 

My parents had ensured that I had been properly educated in the matter of beer. Although I had not been one for visiting pubs under age, Dad and Pop had trained me to drink proper cask- or bottled-conditioned beer, which is unpasteurized and contains live yeast. To my delight, Buckingham College beer cellar stocked two kinds of traditionally brewed and served beer, and I spent my first month at college educating Tom to enjoy proper beer. No-one, male or female, likes beer the first time that they taste it, and practice and proper education are essential to learn to appreciate beer fully. Moreover, Dad had told me where in Camford I could get Belgian beer, and Tom and I explored the amazing variety of bottled beers from Flanders and Wallonia in the comfort of our college room. I was never short of money. My parents made me an allowance of £1000 per month, to pay for my food and clothes, drink and travel, but they paid my accommodation costs separately. I spent quite a lot of my allowance on beer, and Tom was quite happy to drink whatever I offered him. I was really buying his company, I suppose. We developed the habit of spending an evening each week visiting Camford's numerous different pubs and trying out their beers. With a drop of alcohol inside him, and it really did not have to be much, Tom became a different and much more likeable person. We soon became good friends. This was evidenced by the fact that we both felt able to fart in each other's company without any embarrassment or giggling. 

Chapter 15

Honorary fellow 

Normally Honorary Fellowships are conferred by a letter and certificate through the post and confer merely a title and the right to dine on High Table. But because Pop was actively teaching, and therefore on the college payroll, Dr Dan C and the President of St Boniface's felt that the certificate should be handed over in a personal ceremony and it was decided that a Sunday Evensong in chapel was a suitable occasion. So after consultation with my parents, the first Sunday in November was fixed for the presentation. Dad, Cathy and I were also invited to attend. So I gave my apologies to the Buckingham organ scholar for my absence from evensong on this special occasion, and took my seat next to Cathy in St Boniface's chapel, and after the sermon, the President handed the certificate over to Pop, with a two-sentence speech. Dad had put on his M.A. gown and joined his old choir for the evening, though he had not sung with them for nineteen years. They even got him to sing the solo part in the anthem ('This is the record of John,' by Orlando Gibbons). At the end of the service, our fathers stayed to dine on High Table, and I took Cathy out to dinner at a reserved table at the Venezia. 

We didn't mind being left out of the party, because it was not really a family occasion. I always spoke Italian when we visited the Venezia and I ordered a bottle of Chianti, and let my sister have a couple of small glasses with our excellent three-course meal. She was now in the sixth form and hoped to go to Oxbridge to read mathematics and computer science. She had outstanding GCSE marks and everyone expected her to do well. Like me she could speak Italian, but much less fluently. Unlike me, although attending a segregated school, she had a number of boys chasing her, which surprised me, because although she was very attractive (as far as girls can be attractive: but that's the gay in me speaking!) I would have thought that she might be stigmatized as a swat. But girls are much more competitive in a girls' school. Wisely, she went out with several boys and did not show a preference for any individual. I escorted her home from the restaurant before riding my bike back to college.



Chapter 16 

E-mail from l.c.scarborough@buckingham.camford.ac.uk to j.singleton@bonif.camford.ac.uk

Hi Pop

Just a note of thanks for the invitation to your Fellowship presentation. I am glad that Boni's has finally shown its appreciation of the cash that you have drip-fed into their finances over the years. Let's face it, the Gov Bod doesn't give a toss about the quality of your tutorials over the last 15 years. Only the students themselves and Dan C know the value of your teaching, as of course do I (in a different sphere). But I know that you do not want to become known as a substantial cash donor to the college, so your teaching is a good pretext to disguise the award. And at least they have now given you a teaching room of your own.

It seems silly to be sending an E-mail that could go across the world, to you who live 10 minutes walk away, but writing expresses more definitively how grateful I feel about what you and Dad have done for me over the last 18 years. I know that Dad has always considered that you are the most important and influential person in his life, and I know exactly how he feels. I know too that you like to keep a very low profile, so that whereas someone in the public eye like Dad can get a C.B.E, you don't get much opportunity to learn how much what you do is appreciated. But it IS appreciated and the country as a whole is a better one for your environmental work, and the men of Camford are great beneficiaries of the Fitness Centre that you in effect created with your funding.

Things are busy here, as well as the French and Italian, I am also your 'conjugating and declining grammar boy' (in the words of Sydney Smith) because I have a paper in Latin and one in Greek in my first-year exams, and I must pass them to get rid of them and concentrate on the French and Italian. 

I have not (yet) fallen in love, so I can get on with my work without distraction. My roommate is a nice guy, we get on well and go out together a couple of times a week to swim or see a film or drink, but he is either deadly straight or unbelievably inhibited, and I don't want to upset him by making any advances, and no way do I want to invite him home to meet you!

Give Dad my love when he gets home from Antwerp.

Love

Luke. XXXX

Chapter 17

An interesting newcomer

My most interesting classes were my Italian group tutorials. There was a majority of female first-years in the class, which generally consisted of a dozen undergraduates. Had I been straight, it would have been a wonderful chance to meet intelligent unattached girls. Instead, in my first session of the term, I looked with great interest at the boys, with some disappointment. None looked bedworthy and most of them were as shy and withdrawn as myself or Tom, and I wondered how our tutor would ever manage to get a conversation going that was not monopolized by the girls, and usually a minority of them. But Dr Lorenzo Cagliari was very skilled at handling us. A rota was established and he made certain that in each session, every person made a vocal contribution long enough for him to assess his or her progress. There was a range of skills. Not all students had been able to learn Italian at school and some were starting from scratch. Others, like myself had done A levels and were familiar with the basic grammar, although we usually had very limited vocabularies. 

Half-way through the Martinmas term, Dr Cagliari split us into two groups, meeting at different times, and this proved a great success. Our progress speeded up rapidly. One day to promote discussion in the more advanced group that I was in, he brought along a native speaker, a young man with a darker skin like my own, who was a Ph.D. student in the Music Department. He was introduced to us as Nicolà Aspergini, and he asked us to call him Nic. He was very attractive, with longish black hair, about 1.8 metres tall and weighed I guess about 75 kilos. I immediately fancied the guy. He was slim, not very muscular, with a nice rounded arse and an interesting bulge in the crotch of his stylish designer jeans. I estimated his age to be about twenty-five.

One respect in which I do not resemble the Scarborough men is in my interest in clothes. I think I must have inherited that from my Italian biological father, and of course I have a rather more generous income to live on than Dad had in his student days. Moreover, Pop who has always been a stylish dresser, has encouraged my interest in more expensive clothes by footing the bill whenever I asked him. This was something that Dad did not agree about. Dad felt that I should learn to live on a shoestring, but that is his Yorkshire roots manifesting themselves. People from Yorkshire love to talk about the hardships of their youth! But please do not think that I was always buying clothes. I did not wear designer clothes every day, I wore the same items as most students, though perhaps of a rather better quality. And although the college did provide a quite expensive laundry service, it also provided washing machines, and most of the time I used these facilities. I certainly did not take my washing home for Dad or our cleaner to wash! The labour-intensity of running two homes, in Camford and in Ixton meant that since our birth, our fathers had employed a cleaner in both places.


Luke at University Pt. 01



At one tutorial session, Nic Aspergini asked if any of us fancied going to see the Italian film at the Rialto. It was rather short notice and the other five students in the group had previous engagements, but I said yes, I would go. I will be frank: this was because I wanted to get to know him better. I had no idea what his sexual proclivities were, or whether he would adhere to the rules and not make any advances.

We met outside the Rialto on a Wednesday afternoon, when there are no classes. The film was an early black-and-white film directed by Michelangelo Antonioni, 'La Signora senza Camelie' (The Lady without Camellias). We each bought our own ticket and took our seats near the back. The cinema was very quiet, perhaps a dozen spectators. The film was good, although, as with all foreign films, it was difficult to concentrate on the dialogue and avoid reading the subtitles. At one particularly tense piece of action, I gripped the armrest between the seats with my right hand, only to find that Nic immediately placed his hand on top of mine. I relaxed my grip on the seat, and he immediately took my hand in his. When I did not remove it, he turned sideways and quickly and cautiously planted a kiss on my lips. No further action took place, and when we left the cinema, I thanked him for his company and said that I had to meet someone in half-an-hour, and regretted that there was no time to go for a drink. "Maybe next time, then," he said. I shot off back to college, my mind in a whirl. Maybe he really fancies me, I thought, he certainly now knows that I'm gay.

I wished that I could talk about my experience with Nic with someone, but I could scarcely raise the topic with Tom, as he appeared to be so straight. At the end of term, we each had our college Progress Test, which Camford colleges put their undergraduates through each term. It took the form of an oral test with our tutors, though some tutors used multiple-choice tests instead or in addition. They were a useful tool to monitor of our work and the college used them too to see if we were eligible for a scholarship. I passed mine successfully and Dr Cagliari said that I was in the running for a scholarship if my performance did not deteriorate.



Chapter 18

Civil Partnership 

Since I had left choir school four years earlier, we had reverted to my parents' old practice of going to Loxton for Christmas, but this year, my grandparents came to Ixton for Christmas and the New Year. My Uncle Jeroen was now married with a family and living in Switzerland, so he could not join us. The reason for this change in our arrangements was the Civil Partnership Act of the United Kingdom Parliament, which took effect in England on 21 December 2004. In Camford there was a massive waiting list of gay and lesbian couples wishing to be legally united as soon as the law permitted. Bookings had been taken by Registrar's Offices for several weeks before. Among others, the Provost of M College and the Gibbonsian Professor of Sculpture had decided to come out of the closet and make honest men of their live-in boyfriends. 

Pop and Dad had sent out invitations to a very select group of guests to attend their ceremony at Camford Register Office on 31 December 2004. Basically they were the same persons who had been present when Uncle Edward conducted their Commitment ceremony in the prayer room at Rockwell's Barn on the same date some 20 years before (my grandparents, Uncle Tim Ingledown and Edward), although Uncle Jeroen and my mother of course were absent. Also present were my sister and me and Marcello and Caterina. The two legally required witnesses were myself and Uncle Edward. My fathers signed the register in their new surname of Singleton-Scarborough and since my sister and I had arranged to take the same double-barrelled surname, I signed with my new name. Dad and Pop then changed their commitment rings from their right hand fourth digit to their left hand. Photographs were then taken by several of those present. My parents both wore the same shirts and ties that they had worn twenty years ago, but they had had to have new trousers, because, although they were both very fit, they had put on some weight round the waist! The movement of the diaphragm that operatic singing demands had led in Dad's case to some hypertrophy of the abdominal muscles.

After signing the register, we all adjourned to the function room in the Sparrowhawk, the pub where my parents had eaten dozens of meals over the last twenty years, which we had booked for the occasion and after yet more photographs, we sat down to an excellent meal and drank large quantities of Prosecco, the fizzy Italian wine that my parents love. Tim and Edward both gave short speeches wishing the newly legalized pair a happy future, and Dad replied with the following speech: 

"Friends, it is so wonderful to see you all here on this happy occasion. When I was Luke's age, I thought that legal recognition of gay partnerships would never happen. Today the union of love that has brought our two children into our family has finally achieved legal recognition. Jon and I both thank you all for all that you have been to us and have done for us in the last twenty years. I thank God for all of you and pray that our children will grow up as happily as we have. We just regret that Jon's mother cannot be present with us today, but she always says that the weather in England in December will kill her! We're sorry too that my little brother Jeroen and his family have not been able to get here from Switzerland, but we send him our good wishes, and we will of course E-mail him some photographs." 

My grandparents and Caterina sat with tears of joy running down their faces.

"Dad, please sing something for us," said Cathy. Dad stood up and sang 'Dalla sua pace' without any accompaniment. Then coffee was served and we all then piled into a hired bus that took us back to Rockwell's Barn, dropping Marcello and Caterina at their house on the way. We arranged with Uncle Tim that the four of us would meet him in London on January 2, to sign new wills for our parents and me and to finalize the arrangements for Cathy's and my name changes. Then we set about seeing the New Year in.



Chapter 19

Extract from the 'Camford Express' of 2 Jan 2005 

'Civil Partnership 

Scarborough-Singleton: On 31 December 2004 at Camford Register Office, D.M. Scarborough, C.B.E., M.Chem., M.A, Ph.D and J. Singleton, M.A., Ph.D., F.R.S.C.'

This press notice was a compromise between Dad's determination that my parents' partnership should be made generally known, and Pop's insistence that his name should never appear in the media in case his wealth should become publicly known. His huge donation to the Camford Men's Fitness club, for instance was on record as coming from a trust under his and Tim Ingledown's joint control.



Chapter 20

Wills and money

My parents had had, over the last few years, to keep a careful eye on their tax and inheritance situations, and this had necessitated several remakings of their wills. Now after civil partnership, which had invalidated their previous wills, it all had to be done over again, to take advantage of Inheritance Tax laws and the fact that I, as an heir needed to make a will for myself. Cathy was not old enough to make a will. All this activity was important, because in addition to Pop's large personal fortune, Dad was now a substantial earner, with fees coming in in all sorts of different currencies. Uncle Marcello had long since ceased to be his agent, and his bookings were now handled by a reliable woman agent, strongly recommended by Marcello, called Evelina Jackson. 

Tim Ingledown would now handle the financial affairs of both of them including their pension contributions, except for Dad's professional fees. Tim's wise trusteeship had vastly increased the value of Pop's property portfolio, and had ensured that the three other ventures of Pop's, the Afforestation Trust, the drystone walling repair trust and the Camford Men's Fitness Centre were all financially secure. The Fitness Centre in fact had been such a success that there was a waiting list to join, and an extension of the facilities was being considered. Dad and Pop had also launched a venture into the social services area, a counselling service for homosexual Christians, which was not expected ever to become financially self-supporting, and would always require support by committed donors. 

My will was complicated because I had not yet determined my future, and had to make provision for any partner or children that I might have and provide a destination for the ultimate beneficiaries in the event of me dying childless and partnerless. In that situation, my estate would go to Cathy or if she predeceased me, to her children. If she left no children, half of the estate was to go to Uncle Jeroen's children and half to Buckingham College.



Chapter 21

News of Mark

Before it was time for me to move back into college for the Candlemas term, I was writing a series of letters on my laptop to banks and other organizations about my change of name, when the phone rang. It was a call from Mark, my boyfriend in my last year at school, and we arranged to meet at a local pub. "How are you getting on?" I asked him. 

"Fantastically!" he replied. "In my first term, I've bedded two first year boys and been bedded by a second year!"

"Oxbridge must be a hotbed of gays!" I said, "When you say bedded, what do you mean?" 

"Well, with the first two boys, I just sucked and was sucked, but I let the second year boy fuck me." 

"So, is the first fuck as painful as they say, or are you ready to do it again any time?" 

"When I told him it was the first time, he was fairly gentle and asked me to stop him if the pain got really bad. But he used lots of lube and stretched my hole with his fingers, and after he'd got in, it was OK." 

"I hope he used a rubber. There's still a lot of HIV around." 

"Oh, yes he did."

"You've not tried doing it yourself yet then?" "

"No, and I'm beginning to wonder if I'm a natural bottom." 

"I think you would know from your feelings for these guys what you wanted. If they filled you with lust and the desire to fuck the shit out of them, then you're a top, but if you felt a desire to submit, then you're a bottom." 

"How about you, Luke? Any hits?" 

"Not yet. There are two possibilities, but I need to go carefully. I'm not really after cock, I'm after a relationship with someone who shares my interests, even if one of the interests is getting laid."

We were sitting in a hidden corner of the pub, and so Mark put his arm round me and kissed me on the lips, and said, "But I'll never forget that you were the first!" We agreed to keep in touch via E-mail.



Chapter 22

A visit to a gay pub

The Candlemas term soon began, and Tom arrived back from Yorkshire more inscrutable and taciturn than ever. I asked him if he had had a good Christmas, and he just said, "It was OK, I suppose." I was at a total loss to understand him. He did not show any inclination to go out with girls. He was always ready to go out with me unless he had work commitments. In spite of his reticence, I found myself becoming increasingly interested in him. When he unwound, he had a charming smile and an excellent sense of humour and I began to fancy him seriously, but disciplined myself out of fear of spoiling our comfortable friendship. It was my birthday in the second week of term, and we signed out of college dinner and I took Tom out for dinner at the Venezia. We got through a bottle of Barolo betwen us and went right through the menu: antipasta, pasta, main course, dessert, followed by espresso and Marsala, and went back to college happy and full of food.

On our weekly visits to the Camford Olympic swimming pool, we usually swam twenty 50-metre lengths. I found it particularly difficult when we showered afterwards. Tom had a lot of darkish hair on his muscular chest and flat belly, with a prominent hairy treasure trail down his belly to his pubic hair, which was abundant, and out of it his long but thin tool dangled enticingly. There was no hair on his back and shoulders, to my relief, but his arse and legs were very hairy. He had good muscular legs and big feet. I was also pleased to discover that he was free from tattoos or body piercings. The idea of sex with any boy with a 'Prince Albert' on his cock did not appeal to me. I, in contrast was a about 5 cm shorter than Tom. My hair is intensely black, worn rather long, and I have a darkish, mediterranean skin colour and a big 'five-o'clock-shadow' problem. I weigh about 70 kilos, which makes me skinny for my height. My tool is quite long and thick, and my legs are long and not very muscular and my arse and back are hairless. My arse is small and rounded and my hips are narrow. When we were under the showers, I had to think hard about my work or the anthem that I was learning for the choir, and avoid looking at Tom, because it was a desperate fight to avoid an erection. Most of the time I was half erect, but fortunately, if he noticed, Tom did not comment.

Tom and I resumed our previous term's practice of going out to one or more pubs one night per week. In about week 4 of the term we went to a pub that we had never visited before, in the town centre near the theatre. We went in, and I took a seat while Tom went up to the bar to buy the first round of drinks. To my surprise, a guy with a ring in his nose walked up and sat on the bench seat next to me and put his arm round my shoulder. Such a thing had never happened to me before, and I realized that we were in a gay pub! I looked at this guy and said to him, "What do you think you're doing?" Before he had chance to reply, Tom came up carrying two pints of the local brew, West London Bitter. I must have looked extremely embarrassed, but I had no idea how to get rid of this guy. "Hello," Tom said, "what can we do for you?" 

"I was just asking your friend what he wanted to drink." 

"Why do you suppose that he wanted you to buy him a drink?" Tom asked, "He's with me and here is his drink. Do you think that we came in here in search of a pick-up? We just want a quiet drink." The guy did not stand up or withdraw his arm from my shoulder in spite of the attempts I was making to release myself. "Look, please leave us alone to get on with our drinks." The man reluctantly stood up, removing his arm, to my great relief. Tom put the glasses on the table, and the soliciting character still had not moved away, so Tom bent across and whispered in his ear, "Piss off, he's mine." Having heard it spelt out, albeit untruthfully, the guy finally got the message and left the premises. 

"Thanks, Tom" I said, "he was an awkward customer. I hope we don't meet him outside when we leave." 

"We'll go out at the same time as another group of people," he said, and we settled down to enjoy our beer. There was an amazingly assorted clientèle in the pub. We could spot actors from the theatre, quite a few discreetly dressed elderly men, some of whom might have been dons, the usual collection of tattooed, leather-jacketed, unshaven young men on the prowl, and a number of student types, some wearing GLBT T-shirts, among whom I recognized a couple of Buckingham men. Although we did not exactly relish the company that we found ourselves in, we had another couple of pints each, and left the pub by tagging on to a group who were leaving, and slipped away and headed for the Lion, a pub just around the corner from Boni's. Here we took it in turns to go to the toilet. We had not dared to go for a piss in the gay bar for fear of some kind of assault. We were probably being paranoid, but violence seems to be associated with randy gay males.

In the Lion, we had another pint and then went back to college. "Do you want some coffee, or more beer?" I said to Tom, "I've got some bottles of White Shield in my cupboard." We split a 500-ml bottle of the beer between us and sat on the sofa. Tom took a swig of the beer, burped loudly and boldly put his arm round me. 

"Thanks for getting rid of that guy," I said. 

"Think nothing of it" Tom said meaningfully, "I would do a lot more for you than scare off a lecherous gay looking for a pick-up." 

"You know, I heard what you said to him as he was leaving," I said. 

"Did you?" he asked, "I wish it were true! You're not mine, but I want you." 

To my total amazement, he pulled me to him and kissed my lips. "Let's talk about this tomorrow when we're both sober," I said. It was now nearly midnight and we were both rather drowsy. I cleaned my teeth, muttered a few incoherent prayers, and fell into bed. 



Chapter 23

Sleeping partner

Within a few minutes I had fallen into a deep sleep. It was broken about 2 am by a need to piss, and the washbasin came in useful again. 

I got back into bed and fell asleep, only to be wakened about an hour later by someone getting into bed beside me! It was of course Tom. He snuggled up close to me in the narrow single bed and put his right arm round me, pulling me on top of his naked body, face upwards. He grasped me with both arms and kissed my ear, before he fell asleep with me in his arms. It was a cold night and the warmth of his body made me feel sleepy myself and I soon dozed off. 

I awoke about 7-30. I had forgotten to set the alarm clock the night before, but it did not matter, as my first lecture was not till 10 am. I gently disengaged myself from Tom's arms and went and pissed in the washbasin, farting noisily as I did so. "Better out than in!" said a voice from the bed, and there was Tom smiling sleepily at me. "I hope you didn't mind me getting into your bed, but I got a bit cold in the night after getting out for a piss." 

"It's a good job we were both only half awake," I said, "otherwise you would have been in serious danger of rape!" 

"It's only rape if the victim doesn't consent!" he said ambiguously, without spelling out what he would have done if I had tried it. 

"If we're to get to our lectures comfortably," I said, "and allow me time for a shit after breakfast, we need to be in Hall at 8-30. Are you coming for a shower?" I pulled the sheets off him and told him to get his clothes. We went to the bathroom, which was free, and we turned on the hot water and squeezed into a single shower cell. We both had massive hard-ons, but we realized that there was not much time to fool around, and in any case the bathroom door did not lock (only the toilet stalls locked). However we were able to wash each other's hair and soap each other down, playing particular attention to each other's genitals! Clean, dry, shaven and dressed, we went into breakfast, and I for one was amazingly hungry considering our alcohol intake the previous night.

It was very difficult that day to concentrate in my lecture on the sonnets of Petrarch, and a later lecture on the language of Rabelais, although more interesting, also failed to hold my attention. I was totally mystified how a man who had been almost stony in his demeanour to me in the six months that I had known him should now suddenly be getting possessive, when nothing had passed between us except for a few kisses the night before. Thomas Appleton had a lot of explaining to do, and I could not help hoping that the explanation would be as sweet as his behaviour to me the night before. I had a French tutorial in the afternoon, and fortunately all I had to do was to read my essay to my tutor and discuss my conclusions. By 4 pm, I was through with classes, and went back to our room. I knew that Tom's lab classes finished about 4 pm, and I hoped that he would come straight back to college. 



Chapter 24

Tom and Luke make love

I felt my pulse begin to race as I heard footsteps on the stairs. I heard the sound of a key in the lock and Tom came into the room. I was sitting on the sofa. He hung his coat on the back of the door and came and sat beside me. At once I spread my arms and wrapped them round him, smiling tenderly. "If you want me, I'm yours!" I whispered, and kissed him on the lips. 




Luke at University Pt. 01



"I've wanted you ever since the day I arrived," he said and kissed me back passionately, almost violently. "But Yorkshiremen are not forthcoming about their emotions, and I couldn't be sure that you were gay. Especially when I saw you trying to fight off that guy in the pub, I wasn't sure about your sexuality." I started to undress him, beginning with his shoes and socks. As I pulled them off, he said, "When I found that you had money, I thought that you would be able to buy anyone you wanted, so why should you be interested in me? Besides, I'm not very sexually experienced. Most of my teenage years I spent burning with unrequited lust for straight boys." 

"But just by coming to Buckingham, you were sending out a gay signal!" I said. 

"You might find this hard to believe," he said, "but at the time that I applied, I didn't know about Buckingham's gay reputation! I was the only boy from our school who was considered Camford material, and no-one told me about its history. I knew I was gay, and I felt no desire to sit across the table from girls when eating meals, and I have to admit that I thought I was more likely to meet a man that I fancied in an all-male college."

"It was just the opposite for me," I said, "my two fathers both thought that I should go either to Winton, as I had been a choirboy there, or to Boni's which is their old college, and certainly not to Buckingham with its gay reputation." 

"TWO fathers?" 

"Yes, my parents are two gay men. I was adopted at the age of one year, and my sister was born to a surrogate mother. One of my fathers is my biological uncle, I was the bastard son of his sister. My other father is the biological father of my sister. They were a bit disappointed when I told them I was gay. They had hoped that sometime I might give them grandchildren." And I showed him the newspaper clipping of Chapter 19.

"You've come out to your parents, then?" 

"Yes, it was very easy for me of course. They could scarcely have disapproved! Have you come out at home?" 

"No, I don't know how to do it. I decided to wait till I had a better idea of what sort of a gay I was going to be. I'm pretty sure that I want to find the right man and settle down in a permanent relationship. But there seem to be so many gays who just want to fuck around, and I decided that I need more sexual experience. What about you?"

"I've not had much sexual experience, just with one boy at school. But my religious belief won't allow me to fuck around. Any relationship I have has to be one that at least potentially leads to a permanent union. And it might just be with you! When we were at the Olympic Pool, in the showers, didn't you notice the hard-on that I had every time I looked at you? I was dead scared that if you were straight you would get the wrong message! But we need to get to know each other more, both personally and carnally!" and with that I started to take my clothes off. 

"Don't do that! Let me do it!" said Tom, and began to pull off my trainers and socks. 

"Do you know," I said, "no-one would ever believe that we slept together last night without any sex!" 

"I was too drunk to do anything but get close to you!" Tom replied. "There's nothing like a drink for removing inhibitions!" he said as he pulled my shirt over my head. He started to kiss my neck and shoulders. He was a much better kisser than Mark had been. I realized that, though I as yet did not know much about him, I was falling in love. 

"Yes, I've noticed how much more human and relaxed you are after even just one drink. Why are you so uptight?" 

"That's a long story," he said, "best kept till we know one another better!" By now we were both naked and could look at one another properly, rather than sneaking sly glances, as we had done hitherto. Looking at Tom, what I saw pleased me mightily. His fully erect dick was a good 18-20 cm long, and smooth rather than lumpy and veiny. He was busily engaged in nibbling my right nipple. He would get hold of the hair round it with his teeth and gently pull the hair. The slight pain made both my nipples stiffen. Then he started to move his lips down between my nipples and across my belly till he reached my belly-button, where he started kissing and nuzzling again, as he followed my treasure-trail across my belly and reached my pubic hair. All I could do at that moment was to rub my hands through his hair, down his shoulders and back and rub his furry posterior, which felt like heaven. My cock was rock-hard and oozing precome. He started to lick the precome off the glans and began gently to nibble my rolled-back foreskin. I was transported with bliss. Mark had never had this effect on me. How, how could this dour northerner stir up such feelings in me? The next minute the head of my dick was in his mouth and he was running his tongue all over it. I groaned with pleasure and tenderness. "I love you, stud-boy Tom!" I said, as he pushed my tool deeper into his mouth. Although he could not speak, his face flushed with pleasure at my words of love. 



Chapter 25

Continuation in the bedroom

When I came out to my parents, Dad gave me a book and ordered me to read it. What I read became the basis of my life, as it always had been of his. The book was 'Spiritual Friendship' (De Spirituali Amicitia) by Aelred of Rievaulx, a famous twelfth-century monk, and later Abbot, of the Cistercian monastery of Rievaulx in Yorkshire, and probably one of the most holy and distinguished men that the great county of Yorkshire has ever produced. (The other was Alcuin). I could have read it in the original Latin, but Dad gave me an English version.

As a man of his time, Aelred inevitably had to deprecate the carnal aspects of man-man love (after all, monks have to swear to chastity), but he was the first Christian writer that I know of who could affirm in the strongest possible terms, the spiritual value and enormous strength of love between two men. My deep faith, always nourished and supported by both my fathers, could only justify sexual relationships between men based on mutual love. Any other relationships are casual fucking about, and that struck me as the last resort of men who are desperate for physical contact. But it is clear from reading Aelred that physical contact is nothing without love. It's also obvious that physical contact is not necessary for deep love between men, and I think that most men, especially the old and the young, have personal experience of loving their male friends, without any suggestion of sex in the relationship. But nevertheless, I think that it is built into the male psyche that the best and strongest love is that which is sealed and reinforced by sexual relations. 

But why am I philosophizing when, you, the reader, want to know what happened on the sofa? 'Get on with the sexy part' I can hear you saying. 

I said to Tom, "I don't want to come just yet, and you've brought me pretty near, let's go and get on my bed." We went into my bedroom, I spread a big towel on top of my bed and lay on it on my back. I got Tom to straddle me facing my feet and bend forward to suck my dick, while I rimmed his arse, which was conveniently in my face. It was delicious. His sweat felt fresh and sweet and I licked the hair in his crack and chewed the sides before thrusting my tongue up against his sphincter. I had to push hard to enter the tight ring, but his position helped a lot, and I stated to explore with my tongue. It was not long enough to penetrate deeply, so I resumed playing with the sides of his crack with my lips. I began to run my lips over his arse-cheeks, one at a time and I heard him grunt with pleasure. He was chewing my man-stick with great enjoyment, and I started to push it further into his mouth. I grabbed his hips, one in each hand and as he tried to swallow my cock, I suddenly said to him, "I'm gonna come," and shot a substantial load of jism into his mouth. I couldn't see what was happening at the lower end of my body, but Tom turned round and I could see man-juice dripping out of his mouth as he tried to swallow it all. He pulled his right leg over my body and turned himself round. I could see him savouring my ejaculate, as he slowly swallowed it. He then bent and began to kiss my lips so that when I opened my mouth I could taste my own spunk. 

"Rub yourself on my belly," I said and put both my arms round his waist and pulled him down on top of me. He continued to kiss me as he wriggled and rubbed his stone-hard cock against my belly. After perhaps a couple of minutes of unique warmth and closeness, he came and shot his load over both our bellies and chests. He lay for a minute or so in the sticky mess, before rolling over and lying beside me. "Thank you, stud-boy Tom, you're a wonderful lover," I said and rubbed my face in the sticky fluid on his chest and began to lick it. "You taste good!" I said, "I've never had a sexual experience as good as that before! I love you so much." 

"And I love you!" he replied, "I've never been rimmed before, and it was wonderful! I never thought that anyone as sweet as you could ever want me. No-one has ever gone to so much trouble to be nice to me since I came to Camford, very few even have ever talked to me as an intelligent human being. Not even my colleagues in the lab spend much time talking to me. And I am the only first-year chemist in the college, so except for you, I've no-one to sit next to at dinner. You're the only person, man or woman, in this town who has shown signs of wanting my company. I was sure that there must be something wrong with me, maybe I smell bad or something." 

"You smell delicious!" I said, "you smell like the nicest man who ever walked this earth! Fresh male sweat really turns me on. But if you have any doubt about your personal scent, we can do two things. First I can give you a good soapy scrubbing in the shower, and secondly you can use this deodorant and shower gel that I got from my parents. It's an age-old gay perfume devised in the seventies by a well-known Belgian parfumier called 'Storing pour Homme.' The fashion for it has long since disappeared, but it is still expensive. A lot has happened in the gay world since the nineteen-eighties. If you use it, it may or may not give you self-confidence, and it will also tell the more knowing men in this college that you're gay. That might lead to undesirable consequences of course. When my father was a student at Boni's, and like you he was a Yorkshireman who read chemistry, he would only wear the perfume at the weekends, because he said it shrieked out 'poof' to anyone who recognized it. But now that he is a sort of celebrity, he doesn't give a toss that everyone knows he is gay, and it didn't prevent him getting an honour from the Crown. My cofather, who introduced him to it, uses it as well. 

"I've never tried to use 'Storing pour Homme' myself, but if you like it and want me to, I will. In fact, I'll do anything that you want me to, because I love you. We'll start by getting you membership of Camford's Men's Fitness Club. It's much more convenient to be able to swim in the centre of the town, rather than having to get on a bike or bus to get to the Olympic Pool. There is a long waiting list, but I can pull some strings to get you to the top of it, and I will pay the subs for you each year. Please DON'T think that I'm buying you. You can say no to anything I say, and I won't love you any the less!" 

"Luke, my darling boy, I don't give a fuck what else you give me or do for me, as long as you give me your own sweet self. I need your love, it's essential to my self-respect in this town. Now you're mine I can go on. I had almost decided, in spite of having flogged my guts out to get here, to give it all up!" 

"Tom, that would have been mad! Camford is a wonderful place and the next four years are going to be the best years of your life. You will never be bored, never lonely and never have time on your hands! We must find some activity other than work and sex for you though. For a start, you go out with your fellow chemists on a Friday. What do you do together?" 

"Mostly we drink and talk shop." 

"Do any of your colleagues bring their girlfriends along?" 

"Yes, several of them. It is a mainly social get-together." 

"Well, why not take me? You can introduce me either as your roommate, or as your boyfriend if you want to come out. Think carefully about that: you might get some unpleasant reactions. But speaking personally, I would love for us to be regarded as an item in college, even if not in your department. And please wear 'Storing pour Homme,' it's a love-token from me."



Chapter 26

E-mail from l.c.singleton-scarborough@buckingham.camford.ac.uk to j.singleboro@bonif.camford.ac.uk 

Cc. to d.m.singleboro@opsingnet.net 

My dear fathers 

It has happened! I have MET SOMEONE. I did not have far to go, he is my college roommate, the one whom I told you was either straight or inhibited. It turns out that he was inhibited. I am in love, and it makes me feel wonderful. 

As for him (his name is Tom, by the way), he has been transformed. Falling in love has restored his self-confidence, which because of his inadequate social skills had just about ebbed away and he was considering quitting his course, he was so lonely and unhappy. I will bring him to meet you one weekend when you are both at home, and if you really want to appraise him, we can all go in the pool together naked! 

I'm not yet ready for a lifetime commitment, but certainly I want our relationship to continue for the forseeable future, and that future may turn out to be lifelong. Once I had broken through the steel-hard barrier that Tom had erected between himself and Camford, he turns out to be an amazing person, well-read and with a great sense of humour, and every evening I look forward to seeing him.

The boy does not have a lot of money, but does not want me to buy him presents or favours. He just wants me! Dad, he's a proud independent Yorkshireman like you! One thing though I am determined to do for him is to get him into the Men's Fitness Club, and to pay his annual subs. Pop, please can you try and arrange that? We've been going to the Rialto together on Saturdays for weeks now (carbon copies of you two at our age?), and now we'll be able to HOLD HANDS! I know that you will both utter warnings about neglecting my work, and I promise not to do that. I know that Dad always said that his undergraduate work improved with regular sex, and I am certain that that will apply to Tom. As far as I am concerned, anything that I can do for him will make me happy. Maybe there's something of Aelred in that. 

Your literally loving son,

Luke. XXXX 



Chapter 27

Integrating a loner into college life

Our relationship deepened over the remainder of the term. Tom and I did not sleep together. The college single beds were OK for sex, but inadequate for two normal-sized men to sleep in without one or other falling out in the night! I was better at getting up in a morning than Tom was, but his classes tended to start earlier than mine, so he had to get up. When my alarm clock went off in a morning, I would go into his bedroom and gently kiss him awake. It was the most tender and humbling experience of the day for me, and I could see that Tom loved it too. 

His new self-confidence made him almost assertive. That barrier of reserve had vanished, and almost daily he would initiate some form of lovemaking. What was so delightful to me about his lovemaking was that he took total control. He seemed to know exactly what he was doing and it was wonderful to be able to lie back and let him have his way with me. I had never realized that lovemaking could be as sweet as Tom made it. In his arms, I felt safe and happy. His very touch brought a thrill of affection, as well as an intense desire to feel his weight on top of me!

By now we were both conscious of the imminence of university exams at the end of the Pentecost term, and the necessity to do some revision over the Easter vac, as teaching would continue for most of the Pentecost term. I asked Tom how he had done in his Progress Test, and he said that his tutor had told him that he had done OK, but that he (the tutor) said that it was difficult to give him more information because there were no other students in his year to compare him with. Not a very helpful comment, I felt. It sounded to me as though Buckingham had hired a junior and inexperienced tutor/lecturer in chemistry because of the small number of 'hard science' students in some colleges in that decade of the century. So I asked Tom how he felt he was coping, and he said that he had not had to struggle with anything, and he thought that he was OK. I made a mental note to get Pop to talk to him. Pop would soon suss out Tom's competences and be able to offer useful help if Tom needed it. 

I said to Tom that he was welcome to spend some of the Easter vac with me at home, either in Camford, or better, if we did not need to use library facilities, at Rockwell's Barn. It was impossible to remain in college, all undergraduates were chucked out for the conference trade, which the colleges need to supplement their income. I said that he could stay with us for free, providing that he shared my (queen-sized) bed. He giggled and said that it was almost like being paid for sex. I said that if he really wanted to get some intensive work done, lovemaking would have to be limited to once per day! But he gratefully accepted my offer. 

We had not yet 'gone all the way,' not out of disinclination, but because we both wanted to understand each other's bodies better first. We started to discuss our likes and dislikes, and I found to my amazement that Tom liked classical music, especially singing. He showed me his iPod, and he had a huge amount of vocal music, particularly opera. One evening he played me one of his favourite tracks: Mozart's tenor aria, 'Il mio tesoro.' I was astonished. "Do you know who is singing that?" I asked him. 

"One of my favourite tenors. He's got the same name as you, David Scarborough." 

"He's got the same name as me because he's my father!" I said. "You knew that I sing in the chapel choir. Didn't you put two and two together?" 

"But he's not your biological father, so how can you inherit any musical skill?"

"My mother is his sister, so I do have 25% of his parental Scarborough genes. If he'd been my biological father, I would have had twice as many. But it's great that you like music and singing. We must go to some concerts together. I'll see to the tickets." 

"No! I'd love to go with you, but I can pay for my own tickets. I'm not poverty-stricken, just careful with the pennies!" 

"Just a minute. Play that track again and try singing along with it. I'll write the words down for you:

'Il mio tesoro intanto, andate, andate, a consolar/

E del bel ciglio il pianto, cercate di asciugar...'

"It's pronounced 'Cheelio, chercatay, ashyougar.'"

"Why? I can't sing!" 

"How do you know? If you can sing in tune, you are good enough for the choir, particularly if you sing tenor." 

"But I'm not religious, I've never been in a church in my life."

"Evensong is a very simple service of singing, readings, a sermon and prayers. You will enjoy it if you are participating in the singing. The C of E, especially in Camford, is full of people who just go to church for the music or the liturgy. They are not necessarily good Christians!" After much persuasion, he did as I asked. He had a very pleasant tenor voice, and could sing in tune. I rang the Organ Scholar on my cellphone and asked him if he had time to do a quick voice test on a potential choir member. "Tomorrow at 5-30, if he can manage that time," he said. So it was fixed. 

By 6 pm the next day, Tom was the latest recruit to the Buckingham College Chapel Choir. I was delighted. It was another opportunity for him to get out of the circle of isolation with which he had surrounded himself. 




Luke at University Pt. 02



 [Ch. 01 should be read first]



Chapter 31 

Easter vacation 

Since grandmother Singleton was now pretty elderly, we always stayed in a hotel when we visited her in Nice at Easter. We did not think that I had known my boyfriend long enough to introduce him to her, so there was nothing very novel about our visit that year. I did of course tell her about my new relationship, and her reply was similar to that of Cathy, "Not ANOTHER gay in the family!" My grandmother enjoyed being taken out for walks in the park or along the sea-shore, and always enjoyed being taken out to dinner at a fancy hotel. She doted on Cathy and me, and had forgiven Dad and Pop for being gay after they had given her two grandchildren. She was now too old to have toy-boy relationships, but she was just as outspoken as her granddaughter about sex and relationships. I found it difficult to envisage what she might think of Tom. 

In accordance with our usual routine, we went to the English Church on Easter morning. We enjoyed our brief stay in France, even though I was missing Tom already. I saw our stay as an opportunity to improve my spoken French, which was only just up to the demands of university level study, so I went on my own to the cinema several times to see films without English subtitles. On Easter Monday, I got an E-mail from Tom which read as follows:

'My darling Luke, 

I am missing you terribly. Will it be OK if I come to Ixfordingworth on Thursday? My train gets in at 15-25, would it be possible for someone to meet me, as I am bringing back a lot more luggage than I took when I left? A lot has happened here and I am anxious to get away from here as soon as possible. There are things that I need to discuss with you, especially about the summer vac! I will need to get a job. I hope that you are enjoying things on the Riviera. 

Love Tom XXXXXX'

I felt both uneasy and curious when I read this, but I answered it promptly, having checked with Pop that he could drive to Ixfordingworth to pick up Tom.

We flew back to Bristol on the Wednesday and drove into the city to drop Dad at his hotel in Clifton, where he would be staying for most of the time during the run of 'Così fan tutte,' and then continued to the M5 on the way back to Camford. Next day, Pop and I drove to Ixfordingworth to meet Tom's train. On the way, I took the opportunity to ask Pop as a special favour to give Tom a mini progress test, to see how his chemical knowledge compared with Pop's first-year St Boniface students.

Tom came staggering off the train with two large suitcases and an enormous back-pack. The two of us relieved him of some of his burdens and we stowed them in the car. On the way to Ixton he explained why he had brought so much stuff with him. "Basically this is about one-third of all my possessions. There are none left in my father's house, and I will never be going back there! The rest of my things are safe at my sister's house." 

He then told us the story of his feckless widower father, subsisting on state benefits and held in thrall by a series of equally feckless women, culminating in one who was an out-and-out bitch, who had just been about to throw all Tom's possessions away. "I'm not exactly homeless," he said, "because my sister has given me a room, but I don't feel that I could live there in the summer for three months without a job, and the chances of doing even supermarket shelf-stacking in that town are pretty slight. So I've got to find a summer job here or in Camford and somewhere to live!" 

At this point, Pop stepped into the conversation. "Tom," he said, "I will be able to find you a paid job for two months in the summer and as far as accommodation is concerned, you will be able to live here or in Camford or on the job. The nature of the job depends on me giving you some aptitude tests. Do you agree to that?" 

"Of course! I'll agree to anything that will give me a paid job and a roof over my head." 

"You know that you will always be guaranteed a bed wherever Luke is, but we all know that you need to pay for your keep!" 

"He's a big lad, Pop, and has a big appetite!" I said with a knowing grin, at which we all started to giggle, though Tom did blush slightly. 

"But, Tom," said Pop, "you must not let any anxiety about the summer put you off preparing for your exams. At the moment, they have to be your first priority, so don't worry, we will take care of you in the summer!" I felt like kissing my cofather out of gratitude. Anxiety about the future was the last thing that Tom needed at this stage. 







Chapter 32 

The end of virginity and the vacation

Next day, Pop called Tom from his books and took him into the small sitting room. Tom was gone for about an hour and came back with Pop. "Tom will have no difficulties with his exams," said Pop, "he's better than six of my eight first year chemists. I think the Buckingham tutor, whom I don't know, is not very skilled in giving him feedback. I think we may be able to get him a job in one of my trusts, or perhaps at the Fitness Centre. It'll probably be at the minimum wage, but he'll only be paying us for his board. You'll need some kind of occupation too, Luke, unless you get a paid job in Italy." Tom looked very happy, and I knew very well what would happen that night! 

We had another family weekend, with walks, swims and trips to the pub. Pop cooked us some excellent meals, but on the Saturday Tom volunteered to cook us dinner. It was a revelation to all of us. My stud-boy produced a three-course meal with garlic mushrooms followed by a fish pie with vegetables and ending with a fruit crumble made with fresh rhubarb purchased from the farm shop in Ixton. Pop opened a bottle of Verdicchio to follow the Prosecco, which we often drank before a meal. Both Cathy and I were deeply impressed, and Pop even more so. I could see Pop wondering if Tom was going to repeat his own undergraduate years in the late seventies of the previous century.

On the Monday, Cathy went back to school and Pop moved back with her to the flat in Camford. They left on the Sunday evening, leaving us with the house to ourselves. Reluctantly we knuckled down to a week of revision and reading, rather than a riotous twosome of drinking and sex. However, we had earmarked the Tuesday as a special day, in which I was to lose my anal virginity. 

Tom obviously wanted to make an occasion of it, but it needed more preparation than it would if we had been in Camford. No question of takeaway food or ringing up for flowers to be delivered! The only way stud-boy could make it special was to contact a firm of caterers. He phoned around and found a firm that could deliver at 24 hours notice, and arranged, without telling me of course, a special meal to be delivered at 5 pm on the following day. 

On that special Tuesday morning, I disengaged myself from Tom's sleepy grasp, got out of bed and stood looking out of the window. The Ixfordshire countryside was awakening to spring. The late April sun shone on the distant woodland, not yet having reached warmth sufficient to disperse the spring mist. The trees were showing traces of green. Tom approached me from behind, stood beside me and put his right arm round my waist. His touch triggered a sensation in me that seemed like a slow electric shock. I felt the warmth of his breath on my left ear and a shiver of delight, anticipation and overflowing love spread over me as I turned to face him and got enfolded in his embrace. I kissed him repeatedly and found myself melting in the warmth of his passion. No matter what that day might bring, I knew that I wanted this man for life, that this was not merely sexual coupling. "My own wonderful boy, my lovely Luke," he whispered, "you are the only person in the world who loves me! My whole being is yours, not just for today, but for ever!" I had never known anyone so hungry for love as Tom. It made him talk in a way that I could never have expected on the basis of our short intimacy. I reached round him and clasped each of his buttocks with my hands and pressed myself as closely to him as I could. After a few hard kisses, we breathlessly released one another and grinned when we saw each other's hard-ons.

We shaved and showered and had a good breakfast, toast with scrambled eggs with a few prawns, cooked by me. I wanted to us take a turn in the pool, but Tom said no, it might make us tired. After breakfast, I took Tom into the study/library and showed him a locked bookcase with a wooden door. "That's my parents' porn collection!" I told him. "They don't know that I know where the key is! There was no internet when they were our age and there was strict legal control over printed pornography. Pop on his frequent visits to Paris used to visit all the bookstores on the 'rive gauche' and come back with many works in English that were unobtainable here, due to the obscenity laws. There's one particular book that I want to show you." I reached to the top edge of the bookcase and pressed a concealed knob. A small door opened, and I pulled out a key and unlocked the bookcase. I withdrew a book in a faded green binding and showed it to Tom. 'Sodom, or the Quintessence of Debauchery by John Wilmot, Second Earl of Rochester.' "This is supposed to the most obscene book ever written," I told him. "It's a five-act play in verse in which King Bolloximian commands his court to have nothing further to do with women, but from then on only to fuck men. It's not nowadays particularly hard to come by: you can buy it from any online bookshop. The line I particularly want to mention is where the king says: 

'Pockenello for a mate I'll choose/

His arse shall for a minute be my spouse.'

I'll let you have the pleasure of reading it after this afternoon!"

At noon, we had a sandwich for lunch and then adjourned to our bedroom and took off the garments that we had on. We lay on the bed and Tom rubbed his face in my hair. "I love your hair," he said, "and I'm glad that you've started wearing Storing pour Homme. By both wearing it, we are marked out as an item. You have no idea, coming from a close and loving family, how awful it is to have no-one to love. Apart from keeping in touch with my sister, I can now forget about my home-town and all the people there except Mr Silverdale. You fathers have both been so good to me. Instead of saying goodbye to you when you took up with me, they have taken me into your family. I will always be grateful for that." 

"Pop knows all about alienation" I replied. "He lost his father when he was seventeen and has never been close to his mother. She never showed him any deep affection and when he met Dad and took him to Nice to meet her, she tried to get Dad into her bed! Next year, we'll take you to meet her. She's a bit old now for fucking, so you won't be in any danger. But when he and Dad got together, Dad's parents took Pop into their family, and that's why the two of them have done the same for you!" 

Our foreplay lasted an hour or so, during which time we took small sips of Marsala to prevent any tension building up. Neither of us of course had had much previous sexual experience, and apprehension can have a disastrous effect on male sexual performance. We had both read on the internet exactly what to do, and our mechanical needs had been thoughtfully provided for us by my parents, but it was now a question of translating cold digital text and images into hot, loving carnal reality. 

Tom began to make love to me. He had started with my hair, and slowly moved down my neck and shoulders to my chest, where he began to nibble my nipples. As each stiffened in response to his attention, he moved to the other. Then he moved steadily down my body, kissing and nuzzling, until he reached my belly-button. He spent a lot of time poking his tongue into its hollow before continuing along my treasure trail until he reached the hair round my cock. I was transported with delight at all this loving attention. Nothing that Mark had done to me had felt like this. I threw my arms round Tom and kissed him passionately on the lips before letting him return to my crotch. 

By now we were both rock-hard and oozing precome. "Are you ready?" he whispered to me. I nodded and he began to unwrap a condom and unroll it over his rampant dick. I lay back and spread my legs wide open and he squeezed a large dollop of lubricant gel on to his fingers, and inserted first one, then two, and finally three fingers through the sphincter ring, stretching it gently. I squirmed a little when the first finger went in. When he pushed two fingers in, it got a little easier and he was able to stretch me somewhat by pulling his two fingers apart. The third entry with three fingers became again a little uncomfortable, but again he helped to stretch the muscle and mitigate any pain that I might have. I marvelled at how he seemed to know exactly what to do. In no way did he do anything upsetting or unpleasant. Then he spread lube over the condom on his dick. 

When he had me well lubed up, Tom said, "I think the first time I had better do it in the doggie position." Accordingly I climbed off the bed and stood beside it with my arse in the air. "Please, Luke, tell me if you feel any pain and I will stop immediately." He gently inserted his well lubricated rubber-covered projection between the cheeks of my arse and began to push gently but firmly. After what seemed eternity he pushed through the sphincter and I felt a considerable degree of discomfort as he entered my gut. "Just relax," he said, "it won't, I hope, hurt any more." He rested inside me for a minute or two and I found that the discomfort had worn off, and that the presence of this large object inside me was not unpleasant. 

"Okay, stud-boy" I said "you're in, and it doesn't hurt any more, so feel free to get going with your buggery." He enwrapped my body with his arms, folding them over my belly and he began to fuck me. The lubricant was extraordinarily effective and he slid in and out of my back passage with considerable ease, taking care not to slip right out. I now felt Tom sweating with exertion and the sweat was dripping from his chest and armpits over my back and down my arms. It felt delicious. The whole operation of course was prolonged because of the fact that neither of us had very much seed inside us. We were pretty well dry after four days of frequent sexual activity. Eventually, though, Tom speeded up and with a loud cry came violently into the prophylactic inside me. He immediately started kissing my shoulders and spine, and as his cock softened and began to slip out of my hole, his kisses moved progressively down my back. 

When he was fully out, he lifted me bodily back on to the bed and slipped the condom off his dick. "Tie it in a knot so that it doesn't leak, we've got to keep the sheets clean," I said. He obeyed and hopped on the bed beside me and began to kiss my mouth. I rolled over on top of him and started to kiss him in return, before starting to rub my rock-hard dick against his hairy belly. He put his arms round my hips and clamped his hands one on top of each of my buttocks as I continued to rub his belly with my prick. After a delicious few minutes, I came and shot my small cargo of fuck-juice on his belly, kissing him violently as I did so. I lay there for some time, feeling secure in his warm and loving embrace. I then rolled off him and lay on my back breathless beside him. "My darling Tom, you're so good to me. I'm so glad that I am yours. You're everything that a man could want! You're as good in the bedroom as you are in the kitchen!" 

"Luke, you're exaggerating! You've got a lot more talent than me. And you find it easy to get on with people, and I don't. Even if I had had your parents and upbringing, I would still have been a nerd." 

"You've learnt to cope with rejection and hardship, whereas I have had an easy and comfortable upbringing. Still we have one thing in common, and maybe that's the bond that unites us: we both have no mother. But how did you learn to fuck like that? I can't believe that you've never done it before! You were absolutely brilliant!" 

"It's only what I read on the internet. No-one has ever wanted to do it to me or with me!" 

"But most men when fucking only think about themselves, and you were thinking of me all the time, I know that, even though I couldn't see your face." 

"Yes, next time I'll fuck you lying your back and then we can see each other. But doggie-style is the easiest to get in and unlock the treasure-house. Thank you for being such a sweet bottom. I hope there are going to be a lot more next times!" 

I gave him a final kiss, climbed off the bed and got a flannel from the bathroom. I cleaned up our bellies and disposed of the condom, wiped us both with a towel and said, "A drink is called for: Prosecco or White Shield?" I have mentioned White Shield before. It is a beer brand that had been through a bad phase, having been brewed by several breweries who did not have the skills to produce a quality product, but at the time of this story its brewing had returned to its home town of Burton-on-Trent, and it was now fast recovering its iconic status as a flagship bottle-conditioned beer. 

"We'd better have Prosecco" said Tom, "I love White Shield but it always makes me fart H2S the next day, and I don't want to stink the bed out!" 

"It's the yeast reducing the sulfate in the hard Burton water," I explained. "As a chemist, you should know all about that, even though sixth-formers are no longer allowed to work with H2S." 

We always kept a bottle of Prosecco in the refrigerator, so I went and fetched it, opened it and poured us two glasses. Tom sipped his wine and started reading 'Sodom.' Half an hour later, the doorbell rang from the street level door. I went to the door-telephone and answered it "Ask the delivery man to wait a couple of minutes," said Tom "while I come down and get it. I've ordered us a special meal to celebrate your loss of virginity!" Tom put his tracksuit trousers and top on and went down in the lift to collect the delivery. It was a large cardboard box. The box contained some precooked scallops, sweet and sour pork with rice, a salad, tiramisu, a pre-chilled bottle of QmP Mosel wine and a packet of coffee mints. 

"Tom, you're a thoughtful genius!" I said. "It would have been totally inappropriate to go to the pub after the experience that you have just given me. We need to be alone together for the rest of he day."

"These things just need heating in the microwave," he said, "so let's get dressed and tuck in. If you're feeling lazy, I can feed you!" 

What I was beginning to think of as 'our' bedroom was spacious enough to have a table in it, so I laid it for our meal and opened the wine as soon as we had finished our Prosecco. Tom came in, still naked, as I was, carrying the dishes with the scallops. "I would love it if you could feed me with the first course," I said, "but then I can eat the rest on my own!" Tom cut each of the scallops into small pieces and fed them to me one at a time, pausing from time to time to eat one himself. "This is the ultimate in erotic decadence!" I exclaimed with a grin, "It makes me feel like Cleopatra or Lucrezia Borgia! You are so sweet to me!" 

"You deserve it after letting me commit the foulest of unnatural acts on your helpless body!" he replied, joining in the spirit of repartee. We both giggled. Then we pulled on our underpants and T-shirts and sat up at the table to enjoy the rest of the meal.

I found it difficult to analyse the basis of my attraction to Tom. Apart from being more muscular and less skinny, there was little about his body or face or hair to distinguish him from any other healthy young man of eighteen. It was not because of his home conditions making me feel sorry for him, because he had not revealed those to me until after I had fallen for him. It was the way that he looked at me and the way that he held me that made me feel as if there was an indissoluble bond between us. And it was a constant thrill to be finding out new things about this reticent, secretive boy. And he wanted me SO much. Not only that, but he needed me. Without me he could quite easily do something stupid, like leaving Camford. He desperately needed a good exam performance, pitting himself against the brainiest nineteen-year-old chemists in England, Etonians, Manchester Grammarians, the cream of the private education system. If my company and my body could bring him comfortably through the exam ordeal, he could cruise the next three years to a first, a Masters and a Ph.D. Pop assured me that the talent was there, Tom just needed to discover it for himself.




Luke at University Pt. 02



We spent the rest of the week very quietly, not much sex, but lots of cuddling, exam work in the mornings, a walk in the afternoon, sometimes ending at the Jellycotes Arms for a drink or a meal or both. On other days, Tom cooked us a simple evening meal. On the Sunday we packed all our necessaries into the 4x4 and Pop, who had come from Camford for the purpose, drove us to Buckingham College, where we unloaded our baggage and bade him farewell. 





Chapter 33 

The Pentecost term begins

The first thing that happened when teaching began was that my Italian tutor advised me very strongly to go on a four-week language course in August in Emilia-Romagna, and I registered for it at once. The course was residential with accommodation costs included in the course fee. I would have to meet the cost myself, but that was of course no problem. I knew that I could not be with Tom, as he needed to work. I decided to contact my grandfather and ask him for my mother's address. Now that I was eighteen, I had the right, if I chose, to meet her. Grandad gave me the address without demur. It was in a small town near Verona. There was no telephone number and no E-mail address, and the surname Mascagnoli was Italian. 

All my enthusiasm was concentrated on my Italian studies. I was much less enthusiastic about my French. Fortunately, the minor language would take only 30% of my time in the second year and would be dropped altogether in my final year. But nonetheless I had to pass three papers in my first year exams in French and another three in Italian, along with single papers in Latin and Greek. 

Nic Aspergini renewed his attentions. He invited me personally to go to an Italian film with him, not one that Tom and I would have chosen. I agreed to go with him one afternoon provided that we only spoke Italian. At least then I had some sort of excuse for accepting his approaches, but it was a pretty feeble excuse, because one doesn't talk much at the cinema. My problems with speaking Italian, and even more so with French, were my lack of self-confidence in keeping a conversation running. 

Nic got more intimate than mere kisses on this second occasion. In the darkness of the cinema he reached over and unzipped my fly. He slipped his hand inside and began to grope me. Having reached my cock, he began to fondle it. Of course it began to stiffen. Then he kissed my ear and started to massage my cock. By now I was unsure whether he would try and suck it, or merely wank me off. Then my mind clicked in. What was I doing? This was folly! I was being ruled by my senses rather than by sense. If anything happened, I would not be able to tell Tom, because every time he and I came here, he would remember it and it would sour, if not destroy, our relationship. Yet if I didn't tell him, I would be guilty of deceiving the man I loved. I got hold of Nic's hand, gently removed it from my fly, zipped the fly up, got up and left the cinema. 

After much thought, because nothing had actually happened, I decided not to tell Tom anything about the incident, because it might undermine his confidence in me at a time when, because of the imminent exams, emotional injury, whether or not it was slight, was to be avoided at all costs. Prompted then by my guilt feelings, I was specially affectionate to him that night and left him dropping off to sleep in postcoital contentment. I also fell asleep quickly, relieved that I had just avoided doing something very stupid. 

Tom's singing got steadily better with regular practice, and he began to unwind to our fellow choir-members, and joined in the chat and banter over Sunday night dinner in Hall. The following Friday, I went with Tom for the first time to his pub evening with his fellow chemists. He had decided at this stage not to declare himself gay, but just to introduce me as his roommate. Even so, I noticed that one or two significant glances were exchanged by some of those present. The group consisted of about a dozen people, including one or two hard-drinking women students, and one or two girlfriends. At first, the major occupation seemed to be drinking. I eyed up the men with some interest. Several of them seemed even more nerdish than Tom, and were obviously drinking hard to conceal their poor social skills. 'Why do some scientists have so much difficulty interacting with their fellow-humans?' I wondered. I noticed one or two of the female chemists eying me up, but I studiously ignored them. I began to understand why Tom had few friends among the chemistry students. However, as the evening went by, the drinking slowed down and the conversation got more interesting, as people lost their inhibitions. We talked about politics, sex, religion, sport, and even about current events. 

Tom and I continued our weekly pool, cinema and pub visits, and half-way through the term Tom's membership of the Men's Fitness Centre came through. Pop told me afterwards that while there had been no vacancies in the 18-25 age category, there were two vacancies for the more expensive over-25 membership. I agreed with Pop that I would not only pay Tom's membership, but would pay the difference between the two membership tariffs for the guy who was at the top of the under-25 waiting list. In this way, I reckoned that the unknown guy would not have been disadvantaged by Tom jumping the queue. 





Chapter 34

Tom's birthday

Early in June, it was Tom's nineteenth birthday. I went into a card shop to buy him a birthday card, and found one of a type that I had never seen before, obviously designed for the teenage market. It said in big letters on the front 'To my Boyfriend' and inside there was a slightly sloppy, but not inappropriate message. 'Hello, big, sweet lover-boy! Happy birthday!' I gave it to him when I wakened him on his birthday morning, and on opening it, to my amazement, he burst into tears. He reached out with both arms as he lay in bed and pushed his wet face against mine. "You are so sweet, my own faggot-boy! I still can't believe that you're really mine!" he said. I could scarcely realize how much had happened between us since my own birthday only six months before, and especially how my grimly monosyllabic roommate had started to show real emotion. Apparently he had only received one other birthday card, from his sister. Not even one of his other four sisters had bothered to send a card.

I insisted on treating him to dinner at the Venezia, as I had no idea what I should give him for a present. I had bought him a Buckingham College hoody like my own but a size bigger, because I didn't want to get him anything like fancy designer clothes or jewellery unless he really wanted such things, so I took him out to eat and during the meal I gave him a USB memory stick with some MP3s of my father's songs that had not been commercially released on CD. It included that wonderful aria sung by Tito in Mozart's 'La Clemenza di Tito' 'Ah, se fosse intorno al trono.' Dad was due to appear in that role at Glyndebourne later in the summer, and then it struck me: I would get Dad to get me two tickets for a Saturday performance of the opera as Tom's birthday present! I knew that artists had access to tickets that were not available to the general public. 

We had a wonderful evening. As I poured the wine, I sneaked a look at Tom, and the look of love on his face as he sat opposite me was reward in itself. Adoration radiated from his face and must have been evident even to the waiter, who grinned at me conspiratorially. (Most of the waiters at the Venezia were Italian trainees, come to improve their language skills and to get some experience serving in other EU lands. I often wondered if I disappointed them by always talking to them in Italian). It filled me with a huge sensation of tenderness for this inscrutable guy. What emotional depths lay behind the dour and impassive face that he usually presented to the world! We got through a bottle of Prosecco, a bottle of Valpolicella and a three-course meal. As the evening proceeded, the look on my stud-boy's face got more and more lustful. I bet even the waiters could read his mind!

We wandered back to college discretely hand-in-hand, and I knew exactly what would happen when we got in. The door to our room was no sooner closed than he grabbed me, put his arms round my shoulders, and started to kiss me violently. "I know what you want for your birthday!" I said, disengaging myself for a moment from his lips. "You want my arsehole!" I let myself melt in his demanding arms. 

The Venezia had a dress code, so it took us longer than usual to get our clothes off, as ties and suits had to be removed and left on the sofa. I spread a towel on my bed, unwrapped a condom and handed it and the lube to my lover, who was standing there with his rock-hard dripping tool. I lay on my back on the bed and spread my legs and Tom knelt between them. He rolled the rubber on to his prick, put my feet over his shoulders and began to spread gel on my perineum and in my crack. He gently prised open my anal sphincter with his gel-smeared fingers and stretched it slightly. I had piled up pillows behind me, and I lay back on them and let him have his way with me. He thrust into me faster and more deeply than he had ever penetrated previously and the desire in his eyes was intense. But once he was well inside me, he slowed down and bent forward and kissed me gently and ever so sweetly. "Keep going!" I said as I ran my hands over his hair and shoulders and caressed his hairy chest. He gently resumed his fucking movements and his eyes got a far-away look as he slid in and out. After a few moments, he started to pant and breathe deeply. 

"Luke, my darling, I'm gonna come!" he muttered as he climaxed within me. I reached up and pulled him down on top of me and clung to him as his stiffness subsided. The warmth of his body filled me with contentment as his cock slipped out of my rear end. He rolled off me and lay at my side, "When I fuck you," he said, "I get a feeling that something in addition to spunk is being shared between us, something totally non-physical, like love, maybe." 

"I think it's more than that," I said, "I think's it's something sacramental, sent by God. Anyhow, whatever it is, it shows that we are soulmates and not just two queers having it off. I love you so much, Tom. I wonder how the domestic bursar, or whoever does college room allocations, knew to put us to share a room."





Chapter 35 

The first year University exams

The following Saturday morning we made our first visit to the Fitness Centre together. Although public smoking bans had not then been introduced in England, the Fitness Centre had been, for obvious reasons, smoking-free ever since its opening in the early nineteen-nineties. Tom was fascinated by the way that the changing rooms were laid out. Both the swimming changing area and that for dry sports were laid out in a duplex arrangement. Opening off a central locker room were two separate changing and shower areas. The one on the left had changing cubicles with doors, and separate shower cells for use by modest straight men, about 20% of the clientèle. The one on the right had a pair of facing rows of bench seats running down each side of the room and two rows of unpartitioned shower heads arranged in the same way, for men who didn't give a shit about being seen by other men naked or getting undressed, which comprised the other 80% of users, a significant number of whom were gay. Non-gays of course had to put up with being scrutinized by other men, but it was heavily frowned on for any direct approaches to be made. Anyone who felt self-conscious in the showers could of course shower in his swimming trunks or even in a jock-strap. There was nothing about the arrangement that could not be found in any military establishment. I warned Tom not to stare too much, in case he got an erection, but in fact it was usually possible to see at least one person with at least a partial erection! Most men are at least mildly interested in other men's male equipment, and while it may not be true for women, for most men, gay or straight, size does matter, at least to some extent. 

The pool of course was not as spectacular for length-swimming as the Olympic Pool, being only half the length, but what it lacked in length, it gained in convenience of situation, and male cameraderie. Many of the members swam daily and got to know one another well. It could get crowded at busy periods, which could make it difficult for men who were not undergraduates or unemployed. 

Because of the shortness of Camford terms, teaching continued in all faculties until the end of week seven, allowing in my case just one week clear of contact hours before the exams, which for me began in week eight and continued into the first week of the vacation. Tom was luckier in his revision time, his exams did not begin until the first 'vacation' week and continued into the following week. 

Before we knew it, my first exam was upon me. It was the Latin literature and translation paper and as I had been learning Latin since the age of seven, it did not pose  problems, so it was a good exam to begin with. The rest of the papers of course were more of a challenge. During the exam period, Tom and I had some kind of sex each day, although often it was a gentle suck or a 69 session. I had a problem after my last exam, which was an Italian paper. All my fellow students were going out to get sloshed, Tom could not come with me, as he had an exam the next morning. So I joined my colleagues alone, but refused to go beyond a comfortable five pints (just under three litres). In spite of my abstemiousness, it was a good evening. Because a majority of the Italian students were girls, it was not the type of event in which we ended up so drunk that we rolled vomiting into the gutter! Most of us just got comfortably drunk, and it was just after midnight when I got back to college. Tom had already gone to bed, and after a visit to the bathroom, I muttered a few hasty prayers before collapsing into bed. It was another week before Tom's exams were finished, and I was able to join him on the chemists' post-exam booze-up. That showed all the signs of degenerating into a disgusting all-male drink-and-then-puke event and we left after five pints.

Buckingham was not a very popular college with the conference trade, and they let us stay in our rooms until the end of July if we wished, but we decided to move our things to Rockwell's Barn two days after Tom's last exam. He was due to start a job at the Fitness Centre at the beginning of August for six weeks as a holiday replacement, doing pretty well any job that did not need specialized training. Pop had fixed this up, with the understanding that should Tom give satisfaction, he would be hired each year. For that, he would have to live in the flat in Fountain Street. I would be in Italy for the whole of August. 

The exam results were due at the end of July. We had both arranged to meet our respective tutors to try and get some feedback on our performance. The lists of exam results were posted in the Examination Building and we were there in good time to see them. We had both passed, and subsequently our tutors told both Tom and myself that we had been awarded college scholarships on the basis of our performance. Scholarships were only given for the very highest academic achievement, the equivalent of a first class in the final exams. The money involved was only slight (£300 per year), but the prestige was enormous. We were members of the college establishment, entitled to special longer gowns, the right to wear a surplice in chapel and best of all, a college room with en-suite facilities. Tom's tutor, who seemed rather surprised at Tom's success, had told him that his contract was expiring and that Tom would have another tutor in his second year, which we both felt was a good thing. 

To be honest, I was more thrilled with Tom's academic success than my own. I am sure that Pop had doubts about Tom's college tutor's competence, and Tom with his unjustified sense of inferiority, which his tutor had totally failed to recognize and deal with, had achieved his academic success exclusively from his own efforts. No-one had even helped to smooth the path for him by sympathetic attention. My tutor, Dr Cagliari was a total contrast. He had every one of his students carefully weighed up, and knew all their strong and weak points. Men such as him are the reason for the success of the Camford one-to-one tutorial system. Tom's success in his exams had done him good. I noticed his increased self-confidence in the way that he made love to me. While still loving and considerate, he was visibly growing in dominance, and there were times when I wondered if he might be taking our mutual jokes about me being a sex-doll a bit too seriously. I had not yet raised the matter, but I was sure that I did not want to be a permanent bottom, and sooner or later I would need to take my turn at doing the fucking.

We made the slightly unusual decision to apply for a duplex room, as we had had in our first year, but with an en-suite bathroom. As it turned out, there was only one such room in the college, so we were lucky to get it and to know that we could also keep it for our third year. My parents were delighted at our scholarships, although Pop maintained that it was only what he expected. He said that Tom had all the makings of a brilliant chemist, and hoped that he would go on to become a 'proper' research chemist in three years time. As both my fathers had done chemical research training, but had never become career researchers, they hoped that Tom would do things differently. They were classic examples of how one's future life can turn out quite differently from that envisaged by themselves as teenagers. Both had started their curricula vitae with an impressive list of scientific publications that had ceased abruptly as they had got involved in other jobs.





Chapter 36 

Italian visits and a big surprise

Our plans for the summer were now complete. My sister had a part-time job in a Camford store and Pop was keeping house for her and Tom in Fountain Street. At the beginning of August I was flying to Italy for the Summer School at Trabizona, and Tom would start work at the Camford Men's Fitness Centre. Dad would start a six-week season at Glyndebourne, with short spells at home between performances. In mid-September, all four of them would fly to Italy and take up residence at a house owned by my parents in Montecatini-Terme, where I would already be living after my course, hopefully doing some kind of part-time job. From there, Dad would set off with a small group of English singers on a tour of Northern Italian cities singing items from Monteverdi's 'Eighth Book of Madrigals.' The rest of us would have two weeks holiday, bathing in the spa waters of Montecatini-Terme, Tom and I fucking like rabbits, before returning to Camford with Pop for the new term. We were also planning a few visits to La Scala in Milan. 

On August 1, I arrived at Valerio Catullo-Villafranca airport in Verona, and took the train to Trabizona in Emilia-Romagna, at whose university the Summer School was being held. It was a very long-established course, which had been attended by my parents while Dad was doing his Ph.D. It had the usual broad spectrum of students, from every country in Europe and some from Australia and North America, with every level of skill from total beginners to experienced and advanced learners. There was a rigid rule that all conversation, apart from the odd sentence, among the students, was to be in Italian at all times. I was finding it very difficult to forget Tom. We were divided into groups according to our levels of linguistic skill, and I was in the top group, which was extremely demanding. Although the work was intensive and interesting, and the company good, my stud-boy was in my mind too much of the time. We exchanged E-mails regularly, and he was also missing me, but he had work to do and the company of his coworkers was not very exciting. Most of them were fitness-obsessives. 




Luke at University Pt. 02



What most worried me was that a number of the men on the course, especially the older ones, up about 35, were very attractive. And because I was in Italy, I was wearing some of my more stylish clothes, which definitely attracted attention. I decided that there was safety in numbers, so on the relatively few occasions when we had more than a couple of hours free, I made sure that I was not left alone in the company of one man, particularly if he was attractive. It's difficult for a man to flirt with a man, without letting things go further, as my experience with Nic had shown me. 

After two weeks of the course, there was a single weekend free of any commitments. On the Saturday, I got the train to the small town near Verona, and sought for the address of my sister that grandfather had given me. It was Via Guglielmo Marconi 78. I found the street on the town map outside the station. It proved to be within walking distance of the station. I set off and soon located it. It was a large house with an archway going into a courtyard. Across the yard I saw a door with a number of bell-pushes. I found one with the name I had been given, 'Mascagnoli.' I pressed the bell and a voice answered. "Cerco Signora Mascagnoli" I said. "Chi è?" was the reply. "Luke Scarborough" I answered, using my birth surname. "CHI?" they asked again. "Scarborough Luca" I replied, this time in the Italian style of giving a name. There was a click and the door opened. I stepped inside. 

After the brilliant sunshine outside, it seemed very dark. A teenage boy came down a wide staircase at the far side of the dark hall, and said to me "Veni." I followed him up the stairs and we reached a sort of well-lighted gallery. On the wall was a mirror and our two faces were visible side-by-side. I was shaken. The boy looked just like me, even to the dark line of pubescent facial hair on his upper lip, which had so upset me when I was his age! I think he was a bit surprised as well, but then he grinned and said in Italian "This way." He led me to an apartment door and we entered straight into quite a large room, where a very attractive lady in her late forties was sitting and a little girl of about ten was playing in a corner. 

I looked hard at the woman and she looked hard at me "Sei mia madre?" (Are you my mother?) I asked her. All the conversation was in Italian of course.

She smiled. "Sì, e tu sei mio figlio Luca" (Yes, and you are my son Luca). The teenager, who must have been about fifteen, gasped in amazement. 

"You never told me that I had an elder brother!" he said.

"No, because your father forbade me ever to mention that you were not his son!" 

"Whose son am I then?" the boy asked. 

"Your father's name is Mario Contadino, and he is also the father of Luca here. I have never seen him since you were born. I don't regard him as your father, the man that you call 'mio padre' is your father, just as I regard my brother Davide as Luca's father." 

This scenario seemed to be getting as bizarre as the parenthood of Figaro in the opera! "What is your name then?" I asked him. 

"I am Mascagnoli Alessandro," he replied. 

"Buon giorno, fratello Alessandro!" I said, and shook his hand. 

Then I went and put my arms round my mother and kissed her. Her eyes were full of tears. "It's so good to see you!" she said. "I can see that my brother has made a good job of bringing you up." We spoke in Italian, so that Alessandro could understand.

"Dad has been a wonderful father to me, even though his job has kept him away so much. Most of the time my sister and I were looked after by Dad's partner Gionata Singleton. I don't know whether my grandfather has told you, but last December, after twenty years, they entered into civil partnership, so my parents' union is now officially recognized. We all changed our names, so I am now Luca Singleton-Scarborough. Have you followed Dad's career at all? He's going to be Italy in September for a short recital tour, singing Monteverdi madrigals. We shall all be staying at a house that my parents own in Montecatini-Terme, Dad, Gionata whom I call Pop, my sister Caterina, and my boyfriend Tomaso. I'm afraid that, like my fathers, I'm gay. Tomaso and I are first year students at Collegio Buckingham, Camford." In spite of us speaking Italian, I wondered how much of this conversation Alessandro could follow. "It would be wonderful if we could all meet up." 

"That rather depends on how my husband reacts. So far he has not encouraged me to contact any of my family."

"Mamma, I want to meet Luca's family!" said Alessandro. "Luca, let me introduce you to my sister, Bianca." He beckoned the little girl, who ran up and kissed him and then shyly extended her hand to me. 

"Buon giorno, Luca!" she said. "Mio nuovo fratello!" (my new brother). 

I put my arms round her and kissed her. "Mia nuova sorellina!" I replied. 

"What happened with Mario Contadino?" I said to my mother, "I thought that you would never see him again after what he did to you." 

"I'm sorry to tell you that four years later, just as I had completed my doctoral work, I met him again, and the same thing happened. He charmed me into his bed and begot another child." 

"He must have been an incredibly attractive man," I said, "to have fooled you twice. And lucky with his time of the month too!" This is not the sort of comment that one would normally make to one's mother, I suppose, but our lack of acquaintance meant that I felt that I could speak frankly! She blushed, and so did I. Fortunately Alessandro was old enough to hear a conversation of this type, although I expect he found it extremely embarrassing. 

"A few months later I met Massimo," she continued. "I fell for him at once. He was so sweet, he was happy to marry me straight away and accept Alessandro as his own son. A few years later, we had our lovely daughter." 

"I can understand now why he didn't want to talk to Alessandro about his parentage. I hope that I have not created a problem by turning up like this, particularly the effect it may have on Alessandro. Maybe I should go, and disappear from your life once again." 

"No! I could have sent Alessandro and Bianca outside to play. I WANTED them to meet you and hear about Alessandro's parentage. Family is family, and Massimo will be the first to agree that his children should meet their long-lost brother. I hope that you can stay and meet him. He should get home about 4 pm." 

"I can stay as long as you like provided that I can catch the last train back to Trabizona." 

"What are you doing there?" 

"I'm on an advanced Italian language course at the university." 

"Oh, yes, I went on it myself in the nineteen-eighties. So you're studying Italian like I did. I have to compliment you, you speak it very well!" 

"Mamma, is Luca not Italian?" 

"No, Sandro, è Inglese, come sono."(he's English like I am). 

"Well, I had big incentives to study Italian. Both my fathers are obsessed with everything Italian. They both went on courses to learn it, and used to speak it to each other when my sister and I were little. Dad's singing teacher, Marcello Fabioni is Italian. His wife Caterina is my godmother. We only drink Italian wines, we eat regularly at an Italian restaurant in Camford. We even have an Italian house in Montecatini-Terme. The only people in our family not to be involved in the Italian thing are my sister Caterina and my boyfriend Tom. Cathy is Jon's biological daughter by a surrogate mother, but as you know, we are both adopted. One thing though: we don't like Italian beer! But even Tom has learnt to drink and enjoy Prosecco!" 

I was impressed with Alessandro. He was much more self-confident and chatty than most English boys of his age. I turned to him. "What do you want to be, Sandro, when you get older? Do you want to study at University?" 

"Yes, I want to study engineering." 

"Good choice! Where would you like to go? Roma? Bologna? Trabizona? Camford? You could come to Camford if your English was good enough."





Chapter 37 

The Mascagnoli family

About 4 pm, we heard a car drive into the courtyard, and a few minutes later, a very handsome middle-aged man, slim, fit and smartly dressed, came into the room. Sandro ran up to him saying, "Pappa, this is Luca. He's my new brother!" Hardly the best of introductions, I felt, considering the awkward circumstances of Sandro's birth. In fact, I nearly died of embarrassment at the thought of what I might have precipitated by my visit. Probably the last thing that Massimo Mascagnoli wanted was raking over the circumstances of an old and unhappy occurrence. I was sure that he had been looking forward to sitting down to a plate of pasta and a glass of red wine. My thoughts must have been reflected on my face, as I could feel from the flush of blood in my cheeks. I stood up and looked him in the face. He must have noticed my resemblance to Sandro, because he smiled and looked me up and down appraisingly, noting my Armani jeans. 

My mother also stood up and crossed the room to stand beside me. "I'm sorry for the surprise visit," I said, "but I had no phone number, and this was the only weekend that I was free from commitments on my course in Trabizona." Unlike the children, he was well aware of my existence, even though we had never met. He recovered rapidly from his surprise and welcomed me with a handshake. 

He kissed his wife. "Dorotea, can Luca stay to dinner with us?" he asked smiling, before he addressed me.

"Yes, please, Mamma, let Luca stay!" said Bianca, jumping up and down and hugging her father.

"Of course!" said my mother. "I haven't seen Luca for fifteen years, I'm not going to push him out of the door now!" 

"So, Luca," said Signor Mascaglioni "What are you doing in Trabizona?" 

"I'm on an advanced study Summer School for students of Italian, Signore" I said. "I'm studying Italian at Camford University." 

"Isn't that what your mother did?" 

"Yes, except that she studied in Oxbridge, not Camford." 

"Your Italian seems pretty good to me!" he said. "What do you hope to do when you've graduated?" 

"I don't know," I said, "but I will try to get a job in Italy. I like it here. The problem is that I'm in a relationship, and what I do may be determined by what my boyfriend wants to do. I'm gay, like my two fathers, you see." 

Shortly after this we sat down to a lovely meal of lasagne al forno. My mother was bubbling with happiness and even her husband was smiling. As for my new brother and sister, they were chattering away to me with great abandon, asking me about my parents, where I had to tread very carefully about their relationship, while explaining that I had been adopted by them, and they asked about my sister and my boyfriend. I told them about how Tom had been thrown out of his home and had to come and live with us. We all had a wonderful evening and about 11 pm I left to catch my train back to Trabizona, promising to come again the following afternoon. 

That Sunday was the only day on the month-long course that was completely free. I finished the small amount of written work required for the Monday, then attended mass in the nearest church. My familiarity with Italian made it easy to follow the service, though as a non-catholic I could not receive the sacrament. The nearest English church was in Bologna, which was too far away. 

I then caught the train and had another wonderful day with my newly-found second family. I found myself confessing to my mother how much I was missing Tom. She smiled and said how nice it was to hear a man saying that. No Italian male, she said would ever admit to missing his lover. I said that maybe she had been unlucky with the first man in her life. I thanked her for the money that had arrived annually on my birthday, said how much I had appreciated it, and how sorry I was that I had not been able to acknowledge it. 

We all went out and walked round the ancient walls of the town, and stopped for a gelato, which we ate sitting on a seat on the wall-top gazing at surrounding countryside. I enjoyed talking to the children. Bianca was very chatty and sweet and I said that when she was old enough to travel alone, she should come and visit us at Ixton. We exchanged addresses, E-mail addresses and mobile phone numbers before I left, rather earlier than the night before. 



Chapter 38 

E-mail from l.c.singleton-scarborough@buckingham.camford.ac.uk to d.m.singleborough@opsingnet.net 

cc. j.singleborough@bonif.camford.ac.uk, t.appleton@buckingham.camford.ac.uk

'Dear Dad, Pop and Tom

You are about to be astounded by what I have to tell you. So sit down, pour yourself a stiff drink and read on. But Dad, do NOT read this before a performance, or you may well mess it up! 

I got my mother's address from Grandad before I left for Italy, and last Saturday I went to visit her. She is happily married to a very nice, well-off businessman called Massimo Mascagnoli, and they have two children. So I now have another sister, Bianca aged 10 and a brother, aged 15. But the big shock is that the brother, Alessandro, is not Massimo's son. His father is Mario Contadino, who is also my father. Mother had a SECOND fling with that worthless wop just after she finished her doctoral work, and once again managed to get a bun in the oven. Fortunately, while she was pregnant, she met and fell in love with Massimo, who at once married her and brought up Alessandro as his own son. 

They are all wonderful people who were very welcoming, even though the event must have been a shock for both Massimo and Sandro, especially the latter, who was told the truth about his father for the first time. So I have a full brother and half-sister that I never knew about! Please will you break this news gently to Cathy as soon as you can! I don't want to make a secret of it. Please let Grandma and Grandad know at the same time, and thank Grandad for giving me my mother's address. I have Italian phone numbers, E-mail addresses etc. and when you are all in Montecatini-Terme next month, we must all meet up. It will be a momentous occasion! 

Your ever-loving, but still amazed son, 

Luca. XXXXXX' 





Chapter 39

Interlude at Glyndebourne

The rest of my stay in Trabizona went uneventfully. I met a few interesting people and collected a few useful E-mail addresses, although I felt in the end that as far as speaking was concerned, I had learnt more in the weekend with my new family than I had learnt in all the rest of the stay, but I did learn a lot about Italian life and institutions. 

Before I went on to Montecatini-Terme, I flew home for one weekend in early September for Tom's late birthday present: the trip to Glyndebourne to hear my father sing the title role in 'La Clemenza di Tito.' Tom had never been to an opera. I don't suppose that I would have been to many either, if I had not had a singer in the family. But I had in fact seen quite a few, in Bristol, Birmingham, Covent Garden and Sadler's Wells. But the annual Glyndebourne Festival Opera season is something quite different. The opera house is attached to a country house in glorious parkland in Sussex. It is a very upmarket occasion, with many people going for social rather than musical motives. 

To please my boy, I pulled out all the stops. We did everything absolutely properly, a dinner suit was hired for Tom, a lavish picnic hamper for two was purchased, the weather was warm and kind (not always the case in an English September), a hotel room had been booked months before for an overnight stay in Lewes. We had a wonderful time. My father excelled himself in his new role, and the superb music of Mozart at his latest and most creative best (the opera was first performed only twelve weeks before he died), sent us (and the rest of the audience) nearly swooning at its beauty. I told Tom that this was an opportunity that he would never have again, because 'Clemenza' is only performed once in a blue-moon, perhaps because of the demands that it makes on the singers. We sat on the grass in the garden in the long interval with lots of other couples, some doting like ourselves, some casual, eating our picnic paté and cold chicken salad and tiramisu and drinking Prosecco. 

At the end of the last act, the audience went crazy with its applause, Tom was nearly in tears with delight. We were invited to Dad's dressing room where we drank champagne while he removed his makeup, complaining bitterly about its effect on his skin. "I'm staying at the same hotel as you lads, the Lewes Vacation Station," he said, "so if you care to wait, I'll run you back to Lewes. I sang better tonight, because I knew you two were in the audience. I always sing better when my family is present! I won't buy you drinks when we get back to the hotel, because I know that you will be in big rush to get to bed. I know exactly what it's like to be away from the man you love for a long time, it has happened to me regularly for the last 25 years. It's only the fact that the job I do brings so much happiness and satisfaction to people that prevents me packing it in here and now and spending all my time with Jon. But there is a compensation: coming back together after an absence always makes the lovemaking much more enjoyable than routine fucking!

"Are you two planning to get engaged in the near future, or do you consider yourselves too young?" 

"Not for a year or so at least," I said, "to give us a chance to see how we get on in our studies, and to get some idea about future jobs. You know that neither of us wants to live on your and Pop's wealth, we want to make our own careers." 

Before long Dad was ready and drove us back to the Vacation Station (a ridiculous name for an hotel chain), where we bade him goodnight. We put the order card for room service breakfast to be served at 10 am on our door, and I locked it. As I did so, I released an enormous fart. Tom grinned. "You'd better make sure that you clear out all that wind before I start to shag you, or you'll blow me out!" 

"Maybe I should visit the bathroom," I said, "I may be gone for some time!" I returned ten minutes later feeling nice and empty, my gut ready to be filled with meat! We removed our dress clothes and carefully put them into boxes. Tom's would have to be returned to the hire shop the next day in Camford, and he was going to take mine home with him, as the next day I was going straight to nearby Gatwick Airport to fly to Pisa.

We had less sleep than usual that night. We were both absolutely on fire with love and desire for one another.

I said to Tom "Let's have a gentle shag now, then sleep, but get up early in the morning. I want to ride your dick, if you would like that. But not tonight, I'm too tired." I surrendered myself to his loving arms before seeking release to unroll a condom on to his cock. I handed him the gel and lay back on the bed so that he could open me up and lube me well. My sphincter muscles had stiffened and tightened a bit in the month or so in which I had not been penetrated, and I was longing to feel Tom's manhood inside me, so he spent some time preparing me. He was so sweet and considerate. Many men would have just banged it in without any thought of the pain or discomfort that they might cause. How lucky I was to have found him. 

He kissed me passionately on the lips and on each nipple and then on my belly-button, then on the tip of my rapidly stiffening dick, then on each ball. He sucked the head of my dick briefly before approaching my hole. He stuck his tongue in for a moment, before following up with his prick, which he pushed gently until it popped inside, giving me a slight twinge of pain that swiftly wore off. When I relaxed, he started fucking movements, slowly and gently, his hands on my hips, my legs over his shoulders. "Thank you my darling lad for this wonderful evening. Your Dad's singing nearly sends me crazy. And you've no idea how much I've missed you!" he said. "I need you to love me, I need you always to be with me, supporting me with your loving. Without you, I feel lonely, desolate and vulnerable." 




Luke at University Pt. 03



 [Earlier chapters should be read first]

[In one respect all my stories are unreal: they lack the element of violence that creeps into many events involving man-man sexual relationships. Although this is a shortcoming which I acknowledge, I make no apology for writing soft and romantic (as well as highbrow) stories that make the reader, as well as myself, feel happy, even if the language is crude in places.]

Chapter 41

Luke and Tom's second year begins

When we got back to England, Cathy had already resumed school. She was now in her last year and would be doing A Levels and application to Oxbridge, with other universities as a second string. 

Pop very kindly came to Rockwell's Barn and helped us in the 4x4 to move our stuff into our new college room. The contrast between the move this year and the previous year was striking. Then I had been dumped on the pavement outside Buckingham and left to fend for myself. Now not only had I a lover carrying some of the bags, but Pop solicitously assisting! We greeted the head porter cheerily as we collected our keys and headed for our new room in the eighteenth-century part of the college. To our surprise, the room had been redecorated rather attractively, and secondary double-glazing installed, making it warmer and draught-free. There were comfortable window seats at the base of each of the big first-floor windows. The en-suite bathroom meant that we could both use it at the same time if we wished. 

The big news both at home and in the University was the appointment of Uncle Edward as Parker Professor of Ecclesiastical History, which carried with it attachment as Professorial Fellow of Sanguis Christi College, so he would be leaving Boni's, to the great regret of Pop and Dad who would miss their frequent Sunday night High Table evenings. Pop and Dad would still dine in Boni's regularly, but the absence of their old friend would be deeply felt, and the college would be looking for a new chaplain. 

In Buckingham, Tom and I could now dine at formal dinner each night if we wished and could whoop it up with the choir in Hall after Sunday Evensong. There was almost always an air of alcoholic celebration by the choir after our hard work singing the Sunday office. Tom and I created a small stir among our choir colleagues when we turned up at the first evensong of the term in our new surplices. I have to admit that Tom did look slightly awkward in his surplice, which is not a very macho garment, but I loved him for insisting on wearing it.

Buckingham was a small college with only around 100 undergraduates in each year. The Hall for instance would only hold 200 persons at a sitting. The college's intention was to expand its graduate student number, which was cheaper as it was not essential to provide graduates with accommodation. At that time, the college had 100 or so graduates on its books. The buildings consisted of two large quadrangles joined together, one dating from the seventeenth century, the other from the eighteenth century, and there was no space for further building. It had always been a poor college, unable for example to help the Royalist cause in the Civil War, until the twentieth century, when the militantly gay, wealthy, enormously popular modern artist Paul Zebedee, an alumnus, left the college £10M when he died of an infection following AIDS in the late nineteen eighties. In modern terms such a sum does not go far, but it had been wisely invested in city centre property in Camford, and brought in a significant and relatively secure and stable income. One of the conditions of Zebedee's bequest had been that the college should remain a men-only institution, and that such a policy should be enshrined in the college statutes. This of course seriously offended the radical feminist movement, but it was clear that nothing could be done to upset the condition except Parliamentary intervention, which was not forthcoming. 

Buckingham had basically two types of undergraduate. There were the aesthetes, the most intelligent students who made the biggest contribution to the position of Buckingham in the academic 'league table' of the colleges. Many of this group were gay. The other type consisted of the hearties, the muscular, sporty, hard-drinking products of English 'Public' schools, of whom only a very small proportion were openly gay. They were into rowing, rugby football and other rough sports, rather than men. They were archetypal heterosexual alpha males. The aesthetes did not feel threatened by them, because when sober, the hearties were always polite and well-mannered. It goes without saying that the two groups did interact to some extent, but really only sexually! This of course is a crude oversimplification, but serves to summarize the college. It is however a big strongpoint of the collegiate system that Buckingham could hold the loyalty and commitment of both these two disparate groups, and neither Tom nor I ever felt uncomfortable anywhere in college. In making the distinction of course, it was very important not to go by appearances, since while my slight and skinny build fairly characterized me as a member the aesthete group, Tom looked from his hairy muscularity much more like a hearty than an aesthete. It was not of course possible to know how much sexual activity actually took place in college, and the bedders (lady bedmakers) were very discreet, even if occasionally they had to deal with messy situations. The 'young gentlemen' were nearly always generous with their end-of-term tips for the bedders.

Tom was making great strides as a singer, and one quiet evening I produced a piece of paper and asked him to sing what was on it without accompaniment. It was the words and music of Dad's favourite encore item and his personal gay anthem, 'Dear pretty, pretty youth' by Thomas Shadwell, set to music by Henry Purcell. I knew that it would appeal very strongly to Tom, because of his attachment to my father.

'Dear pretty youth, unveil your eyes,

How can you sleep when I am by?

Were I with you all night to be,

Methinks I could from sleep be free.

Alas, my dear, you're cold as stone:

You must no longer lie alone.

But be with me my dear, and I in each arm

Will hug you close and keep you warm.'

He loved it and sang it faultlessly. "You'll definitely NOT be singing that in the choir!" I joked. That academic year, we had a new Organ Scholar, and he was keen to make the choir better known, by performing in Camford outside the chapel and even by short tours of the choir round parts of Europe. Years ago, my father had been deeply involved in such activities in St Boniface's, but then it had been mainly tours in Northern Europe. The new organ scholar was looking at Italy or Spain. 

It was only at this time that I realized that Tom and I would not after all be able to occupy our new room for two successive years, because my third year would be spent at an Italian university, as an obligatory part of my degree course. I had decided to opt to go as an Erasmus student to the University of Bologna, for a number of reasons, the main one being that it was the oldest university in Europe, and possibly in the world. The Erasmus scheme allows free interchange of university students within the European Union. As we both had four-year degree courses, rather unusual in Camford, it was decided that Tom would move into the flat in Fountain Street and share it with my parents for that year. By then, Cathy would be at University. When five of us were in the flat, it was overcrowded! He and I would move back into college for our final year. When Dad was off on tour, Tom and Pop could either cook for one another or share their loneliness over a beer and a meal at the Sparrowhawk. That, I thought, should stop Tom relapsing into the lonely depression of his first Camford term, which might happen if he were living in a single room in college.

Although it was impossible for either of us to get a good night's sleep if we shared a narrow college bed, that did not prevent us after daytime or early evening sex from cuddling up together in bed to talk. I told Tom that although my parents never of course talked directly to me about their sex-life, they did at times let odd facts slip. Pop told me once that before he came to faith, and was still an atheist, Dad would frequently argue with him about belief and would even, as he put it, preach to him in bed. I told Tom that although I too would like him to come to belief, I was not good at preaching in bed! Tom's reply was to kiss my hair and caress my chest. 

Although, as I have said, Dad's family is very kissy-kissy, a phrase I first heard my grandfather use, no-one could kiss me like Tom did. For a person who claimed to have no sexual experience, his lovemaking skills impressed me enormously. More and more I was realizing how good my choice of man had been. Instinct is often a better guide to choosing a partner than conscious deliberate choice! Besides, sharing a room with another man without intimacy is difficult, and if only one of the two is gay, nearly impossible. Looking round in college, even I, with my poorly developed sense of gaydar, could see several men who were obviously items with their neighbours or roommates, and Buckingham being the college it was, no-one found it strange or worthy of comment. 

One of the results of Tom's summer job at the Men's Fitness Centre was that he was enrolled as a temporary employee, rather than an intern, or a casual worker, the understanding being that he was a regular August holiday relief worker. This entitled him to the employee benefit of using the facilities for an hour on a Tuesday after the Club had closed at 9 pm, even when he was not actually working. Employees were also allowed to bring one guest, providing that he was male. So most Tuesdays found us with perhaps ten or a dozen others using the pool for that hour. Most of the male employees who invited guests to this after-hours event were gay. Indeed one wondered if it was a place to which they invited the men that they had picked up. It was probably not advisable to visit the toilets during this period. There was inevitably some sexual tomfoolery in the showers after the swim session, but there was a definite terminus at 10 pm when unbribable security guards came round and rapidly saw all the pool- and fitness room-users off the premises.



Chapter 42 

Academic topics

In the preceding couple of years, Pop had taken on an additional tutoring job, this time in the Chemical Laboratory rather than a college. The failings of the twenty-first century school educational system, and the complexities of the Camford dual admission system, meant that many first- and even second-year chemistry undergraduates without A Level mathematics had weak numeracy skills, and Pop had been recruited to teach these otherwise very bright teenagers some essential techniques in the field of mathematics that had been neglected at school level. They seemed to know very little for example about logarithms, which are essential in any understanding of thermodynamics and the concept of pH. As a direct result of this job, in the course of the previous year Pop had become acquainted with a handsome, very intelligent post-doc called Colin Vaughan, who was anxious to get some teaching experience. As soon as Pop heard on the grapevine that Buckingham was looking for a chemistry tutor at junior fellowship level, he urged Colin to apply for the job. The appointment had been made urgent by the fact that the first year intake at Buckingham included five men wanting to read chemistry. Colin was offered and accepted the job just before the beginning of the Martinmas term.

When we arrived in college, Tom found waiting for him a note from Dr Vaughan asking him to attend a meeting with him and the new first year students for coffee in his shared college teaching room on the first Wednesday of term. Colin Vaughan was a Camford chemistry graduate, so he was well acquainted with the tutorial system and its workings and knew that understanding of the individual skills and needs of each of his supervisees was key to successful undergraduate teaching. At the meeting the six undergraduates were told that they could expect to continue with Colin as tutor until they graduated. The third and fourth year chemistry students would continue to be taught by the emeritus Fellow whose retirement had precipitated the emergency appointment of the rather inexperienced man who had taught Tom in his first year. After coffee, the first individual sessions for the six men was fixed, Tom being the first on the Friday of the same week. 

Normally, Colin would hold his tutorials in his office in the Chemical Laboratory, not in college. He used Tom's first tutorial to find out more about Tom as a person, then to check out his competences as a chemist using material from the first year of the course. Tom told me how different the encounter had been compared with his unsatisfactory experiences of the previous year. Colin had asked him about his home life and his interests and social activities. Tom said he wanted an assurance of confidentiality before answering. He said he did not want details of his life to be spread round the college. He told Colin that gays, in which Buckingham was rich, are notorious gossips. This was another example of how he had changed. Asked about his life a year before he would just have clammed up and refused to utter a word! Receiving the requested assurance, he reminded Colin that they could not address one another by their first names, even though he was about to disclose personal information. Camford has a rigid etiquette that must be used in all contact hours between faculty and undergraduates, in which formal address, (Mr, Miss, Dr, Professor etc.) must be always be used, both for teacher and taught, however well the parties might know one another. It was sometimes difficult to maintain this discipline in the informal twenty-first century, but the reasons for it are obvious.

Tom told Dr Vaughan that his mother was dead and that he no longer lived with his father, but with the parents of his boyfriend, who had offered him a home when his father's fancy-woman had thrown him and his possessions out. He said that he had a permanent relationship with me, who shared his duplex room in college. Asked about his interests, he said swimming, drinking beer, foreign-language cinema, classical music and the college chapel choir and (although this is scarcely credible) he added "Oh, and sex with my boyfriend of course!" and grinned knowingly. I nearly collapsed with embarrassment when he told me! "I liked this guy so much, he seems really approachable, he had promised not to repeat what I told him, so I saw no reason to be evasive!" Tom told me. 

"What happens if, knowing that you're gay, he makes a pass at you?" 

"It's more than his job is worth, we know that! Besides, we don't know that he is gay. If we meet him at the Fitness Centre, then there's a good chance that he's into men, but in the meantime, I have to assume that he's straight." 

"He's an attractive guy though. If he'd been a few years younger, I would have called him beautiful, but he's a bit too mature for that description." I wondered if Colin Vaughan's appearance, rather than his skills as a chemist, was what had made Pop first notice him.





Chapter 43

Classes, social life and a big disappointment

You will not have failed to notice that for several long chapters there has been no explicit sex. You won't have to wait long now, it will come within a few pages. So please be patient and enjoy the story. If you're male and your prick is hard in anticipation, don't stop to give yourself relief now. If you're female, do whatever you need to do to feel comfortable. 

The term continued. I had chosen some interesting lecture topics for my second year. I tended to be particularly venturesome with French, which has never excited me as a language, so I chose topics like 'The problem of anglicization of modern French' and 'The development of French in francophone Africa.' I was more cautious with Italian, and stuck with more run-of-the-mill topics like 'The poetry of Tasso' and 'The literature of the Risorgimento.' Dr Cagliari, though more formal in his approach than Dr Vaughan, continued in successfully motivating and stimulating us. Tom's second year concentrated heavily on lab work. He had lab classes of up to six hours on four days per week, and on most of those days also a lecture either at 9 am before the class or at 5 pm after the class, so I very rarely saw Tom during the day. 

Tom and I had a similar pattern of weekly activities together as in our first year. Tuesday evenings we had an hour in the pool at the Fitness centre, Thursday evening was chapel choir practice, Friday evenings we went drinking with Tom's fellow chemists, Saturday mornings we went swimming, we ate out of college in the evening, and then went on to the Rialto, if they had a decent foreign language film. On Sundays, I would be up early to take the sacrament in Chapel before we went in to breakfast. It was the only day that I did not act as Tom's alarm clock! If the weather was good, we might go for a walk before lunch, for example along the towpath of the Camwell to a riverside pub called the Carp at the village of Stubbington. If the weather was wet, as the bedders did not come in at the weekend, we might spend the morning making love. Sunday night involved singing evensong before drinks in the beer cellar and dinner in Hall. I was usually able to get my tutorial work done during the day, but some evenings Tom had to work on his and we could not go out together. In this way, the term went rapidly. 

One Sunday it rained cats and dogs. After breakfast we went back to our room and Tom went into the bathroom for a shit. When he came out, he found me undressed, lying on his bed. "Do you have to do any work today?" I asked him. 

"No," he replied.

"Come and talk then," I said. He got on to the bed beside me, still dressed. "You know how much I love you. There's something that I want to ask you. How long have we been fucking together now?" 

"It will be about seven months since that first time when we had the scallops and Mosel wine," he replied, and nuzzled the hairs on my chest. 

"I'm not asking for it right now, I said, "but would you mind if sometime I took a turn at being top? I know that I've got a pretty big dick, and that initially I would have to take care to be gentle, but I really want to fuck you sometime soon. I'm just as much a man as you are! I've not been in a rush to ask you, because I wanted you to get your self-confidence fully developed by your demonstration that you're as good, in fact better, than any of those private school prats." 

"My darling Luke, you should have asked me before. You've got so much money that you can give me anything I ask for. How could I refuse when you ask for something from me? I've often wondered why we've never tried it with you on top. When do you want it? Now?" 

"Not right away. The rain has eased off. Let's go out and buy some takeaway food. I've got some really delicious Belgian blond beer. Then we'll settle down, lock the door as if we were out, drink a bit and then shag a bit and then eat a bit! It won't be the big event that my deflowering was, no silk sheets, no fancy food, but what the fuck, we've got each other, and that is the all-important thing. I'll put some clothes on and we'll go to that useful Morisco Supply convenience store and get some nice cold food!" 

There were few people on the streets. A few bedraggled tourists looking for somewhere to have lunch huddled up under umbrellas and a few miserable-looking cyclists struggled through the deep puddles spreading across the road. We got the food and returned to college. I locked the door and we undressed. I poured us a glass each of the Estivale beer. It was delicious. Tom put his arms round me and kissed me firmly but chastely on the lips. "My sweet fag-boy," he said, "even if anything goes wrong today, remember that we are soulmates. Nothing can hinder our love for one another. You will always be mine and I will always be yours."




Luke at University Pt. 03



I burped loudly and began to make love to him. I kissed his chest and nibbled his nipples. My kisses moved up even into his armpits, where I savoured the mingled fragrance of sweat and Storing pour Homme. I moved my mouth down his side to his hips and then across his belly and ran my lips through his treasure trail. When I reached his pubic hair, I felt my dick, which had been strangely sluggish, finally start to stiffen. I rooted in his bush for a few minutes before moving downward and licking his balls. He grinned with delight. I took his cock, limpish as it was, into my mouth and felt it hardening under the contact with my lips and tongue. I began to work upon it with my lips. Tom responded in his usual enthusiastic fashion by gently and not too rapidly making fucking movements with it. "I'll come back to your dick later," I said, after withdrawing my mouth. 

By now my own prick was stiff enough for me to unroll a condom onto it, which I did before reaching for the tube of lube. This of course was a totally new experience for me. I had never tried to apply any lube before, so there was a certain element of novelty in it for me as well as for Tom. As he lay on his back with his legs wide open and his feet on my shoulders, I pushed my lubricated forefinger gently between the cheeks of his arse and pushed it through the sphincter into his hole. It felt warm and soft and moist in there. He giggled gently. I withdrew my forefinger, lubed up a second finger and gently pushed them inside Tom. I pulled my two fingers apart in an endeavour to stretch the muscles of his sphincter. Then I pushed in index, second and third fingers into his hole and rotated them gently. By now he was well lubed and I turned to apply some lube to my rubber-covered dick. To my dismay I discovered that it had collapsed into softness! I was in a state of near panic. What could I do now? I had got the poor boy into a state of excited anticipation and now I couldn't get it up! "Tom," I said "I can't do it!" I started to cry tears of frustration. 

Tom sat up and took me in his arms and began to kiss my wet face gently on the lips and cheeks. "My sweet boy," he said, "remember what I said ten minutes ago. We're soulmates, not sex machines. I will always love you." 

"I got you all excited and lubed up, and then I let you down!" I muttered miserably as I kissed his sweet face. 

"You worry too much!" Tom replied. "It's not unique. It doesn't make you any less a man, not being able to get it up. Thousands of men have the same experience every day! Usually it's you who quotes things at me! Now it's my turn. Listen to Ben Jonson's translation of Petronius:

'Doing, a filthy pleasure is, and short;

And done, we straight repent us of the sport:

Let us not then rush blindly on unto it,

Like lustful beasts, that only know to do it:

For lust will languish, and that heat decay.

But thus, thus, keeping endless holiday,

Let us together closely lie and kiss,

There is no labour, nor no shame in this;

This hath pleased, doth please, and long will please; never

Can this decay, but is beginning ever.'" 

Sadly, I removed the condom. My manhood dangled, shamefully soft, between my legs. I renewed my attention to Tom's cock. "I'm not going to frustrate you as well as myself," I said tearfully, and began to work on his manhood with my mouth. I put all my effort and care into giving him the best blow-job of his life! After a few minutes of bliss, my boy came with a shout and shot a good dose of white blood into my mouth, and I swallowed it greedily. 

Tom kissed me tenderly. "I'll cut up some pizza into small pieces and feed you!" he said. "Wise old Petronius knew that there were other things in sex besides fucking. We'll try again in a day or two when your apprehension and feelings of humiliation have worn off."

I whispered to Tom between mouthfuls, "Last time you fed me, we were celebrating your successful penetration. Ironically, this time you are consoling me for my failed penetration!" Nevertheless, we enjoyed our lunch in bed, and consumed a further bottle each of the Estivale before I made coffee. My parents had given me a superb Italian coffee machine to install in our room. 

The weather had dried up and in the afternoon we walked along the banks of the waterways between the colleges that made Camford seem like a little Venice. As the time of evensong approached and we headed back towards college, I took Tom's hand and said "My wonderful Tom, thank you for being so understanding. That's because you're a man. Men know how their masculinity can let them down and are understanding and sympathetic, because they know that it could happen to them tomorrow. Women are much less sympathetic and can be almost harsh and unforgiving if their man can't oblige when they want it. I'm so glad that I'm gay. I'm even more glad that you're gay too!"

I put all the energy I could into singing that night, and couldn't help the odd feeling that Tom's loss had been God's gain. We ate with the choir in Hall and went out to the pub with them after dinner, as if nothing had happened, which of course was the case!

When Dr Cagliari resumed our advanced conversation tutorials, I found to my relief that Nic Aspergini was not involved. Apparently Nic preferred first-year students, who might be more venturesome in responding to private invitations! The native speaker for our second year was a girl postgraduate doing a Ph.D. in sociology, called Luciana S. She used to do surveys with us sometimes, but we were not a big enough group to get statistically significant data from, so mostly she would discuss with us the results of other surveys. Once she had us discussing the results of a survey into student suicides in Camford. The data suggested that over the previous twenty years, while the absolute numbers of student suicides had increased proportionately with the overall increase in matriculated student numbers, the number of suicide cases involving students who were known to be homosexual had decreased spectacularly from 67% to less than 20%. We discussed at some length the possible reasons for this. Some of us felt that the change was due to increased permissiveness and so was socially undermining, but most of us including myself felt that it was an indication of a societal change that looked more kindly on minority groups. I was impressed by this tutorial approach, which seemed much more suited to university-level learning than discussions about characters in books or or how to go about buying an Italian train ticket. And no foreign student of Italian wants to discuss Italian politics, although the non-political antics of Signor SB gave us much scope for entertaining discussion.





Chapter 44

A magic pill

The following week, we carried on with our usual activities, but I had a tutorial on the Wednesday afternoon, and Tom remained in our room, working on an essay or something. I came in about 4 pm and Tom said to me "Feel my crotch, Luke!" In amazement, I did as he said. His cock was as stiff as a ram-rod. "I've got the solution to your erection problem," he said. He showed me some small yellow almond-shaped pills. "I took one of these just before lunch at 1 pm," he said, "and since 3 pm I've been like this. Hopefully it will go down before I need a piss! If you take one about 5-30, by the time we've finished dinner in Hall, you'll have a massive solid hard-on! So after dinner we'll be able to fuck like rabbits all night. I had to try it on myself, to make sure that a 10 mg pill worked without side effects. It does!" 

"What is it?" 

"It's called Tadalafil, and it is the answer to impotent men's prayers." 

"I hope it works," I said gloomily. 

After dinner we returned at once to our room and I made us coffee. "Lets watch some porn on your laptop, to put us in the mood," Tom suggested. We undressed and sat side-by-side on my bed with our arms round each other and watched a feature-length movie involving black guys with big dicks sucking and fucking one or two beautiful young white guys. Like most porn movies, there was not much story, but there were a few prick-raising scenes. They certainly served to get us both hard. After only half an hour or so, we both felt unbelievably randy. It was difficult to avoid dripping precome on to the keyboard! I had not wanted it so much since Glyndebourne! 

Tom shut up the computer, put it on the bedside table and lay back and opened his legs with an inviting smile on his face. I lubed him up just as carefully as on our previous attempt, and he passed me a condom, which I rolled on rather awkwardly, as my dick seemed bigger than I had ever known it. Certainly it was iron-hard and ready for business. Tom grinned at me sweetly and invitingly. This guy certainly knew how to make love! "Come on there," he whispered, "get to work with that monster cock and fuck the shit out of me! Come on, fuck me!" I gently pushed my dick into his wide open crack and tentatively pushed against the ring of his entrance-hole. "Harder!" he whispered encouragingly, so I started to push hard, and felt the muscle open up around my rubber-ensheathed virility. He grimaced, but I continued to push, my dick still gratifyingly hard. Suddenly it seemed as if all resistance had gone. My rampant tool had entered his gut. He still looked uncomfortable and had started to pant heavily. 

"Am I hurting you?" I whispered anxiously. 

"It's OK," he said, "just slow down and hold it there for a minute or two." I did as he said. The tight grip on my dick was somehow quite enjoyable. 

After a couple of minutes, Tom had visibly relaxed and was smiling at me. I tentatively wriggled my stiff appendage, and discovered that it could move fairly easily. The lube had done its job. I grinned at him and muttered, "Here we go!" and started to make slow and gentle movements of my dick in and out, taking care not to go too far out, or too deeply in. "That's fine!" he said, so I speeded up my fucking movements and there followed some minutes of blissful enjoyment. I watched Tom's face, and he was smiling happily, so I knew that all was OK. I have no idea how long it was before I came, but eventually the great climax hit me and I uttered Tom's name quite loudly, as my load of seed shot into the rubber. 

"My sweet, lovely boy, I love you!" I said, as, still hard, I gently withdrew from his hole. "Did the earth move?" I asked with a grin. 

"It was a bit uncomfortable when you first got in," he said, but after that it was fine! Now I know what it's like to be buggered! Great fun! Somehow, I don't think that you are going to need the Tadalafil any more. Still, we have four more pills in case of emergency. Just as well that we have enough, they cost me a small fortune! But it was worth every penny to see your happy face when you finally got inside me."

"Oh, Tom, only you could be so kind and thoughtful. You knew what that failure cost my self-esteem. Let's rest for a bit and have some more coffee, then we'll do 69," I suggested. 

"OK, my love," Tom replied, "but I was only repaying you for the trouble you took to give me back my self-esteem when I came to Camford so lost and lonely. That first time that you took me to the Rialto, I would have loved to put my arm round you and kiss you all night. I can scarcely believe that it's just over a year ago, the most wonderful year of my life." He started to kiss my chest as I lay beside him, on the edge of the narrow bed. I let him deploy his beautiful kisses on various parts of my body for a few minutes and then slipped off the bed and made us two more cups of coffee. I grabbed the duvet and wrapped it round us as we sat side-by-side on the bed (by now it was November, and getting quite cold). When we were warm enough, I lay on my back and Tom climbed on top of me facing my feet. We were both still rock-hard. I took his slimy dick into my mouth. I had seen the precome oozing copiously from his cock when I was buggering him. He took the tip of my trouser-monster into his mouth. No way could he ever get it all in! But he concentrated on the rim and my foreskin. We spent a most enjoyable ten minutes or so enjoying each other's dick before first Tom, then I, shot our loads into our partner's greedy mouth.

We made love twice more before I staggered away sleepily to my own bed, as happy now as I had been miserable in the previous few days. I slept through my alarm clock and it was nearly 8 am before I kissed Tom awake. While we were queuing in the servery for our breakfast, I whispered to him, "No sore seat, I hope?" "No, I'm fine," he whispered back. After breakfast, I shuffled, unshaven and five minutes late, into my 9 am lecture, still euphoric in the recovery of my manhood.





Chapter 45

The drinks party

The so-called drinks party is a favourite mode of formal entertaining in Camford. There is no need to involve kitchen or caterers, no problems of drunkenness, as glasses are small, no problems about finishing, as everyone present needs to go and eat. (The eleventh commandment is, 'Thou shalt not live on vol-au-vents alone'.) The Provost of Buckingham gave a small one late in November to welcome the six new scholars to the establishment of the college. Present were just himself and his wife, and the six of us turned up punctually at the Lodgings clad in suits and ties at 6 pm, knowing that we would be out in time for dinner at 7 pm. 

It was an interesting experience, because neither Tom nor I knew the other four scholars, even though they were all second year men. Interestingly, we found that the other four had also not previously known one another. It seemed as if the college Scholarship Committee had selected students from totally unrelated disciplines. In addition to ourselves, one was studying classics, one engineering, one agriculture and one mathematics. The Provost was very friendly and explained that we had been elected to a very elite club. Apart from the privileges that we already knew about, we would be invited to a free Scholars Dinner with free overnight accommodation in college, every five years for the rest of our lives, the five years being counted from the date of our election as scholars. After about four glasses of sherry per head, a few nibbles, the odd vol-au-vent and a lot of general conversation, we six undergraduates exchanged room and mobile phone numbers and arranged to meet once a term for a drinks session in the beer cellar.

As we went in to dinner, Tom and I were busy speculating whether any of the other four scholars were gay. We did not have much to go on, but I reckoned that the two most likely candidates for gayness were the classics student and the mathematics student, because they were both wearing expensive suits, the other two boys, like Tom, obviously had bought their suits from a high street multiple store, better known for its food than its sharp tailoring. 

Term was now drawing to an end, and that meant a multiplicity of pre-Christmas musical events. The Chapel Choir gave a public concert in the last week of term, an Advent carol service, with a few solo items from 'Messiah.' This was the organ scholar's first new venture, and it was a great success. The chapel was full, with supplementary seating in the antechapel, not normally used to accommodate worshippers. 

Tom and I both of course had Progress Tests on the last Friday of term. We both satisfied our tutors, who said that our work was up to the standard expected of scholars, which considering the time that we spent drinking, swimming, watching films and shagging, we found was rather satisfying, particularly as there were no university exams that academic year. We locked up our unrequired possessions, as there was a conference in the college in the New Year before term began, and moved our other chattels to Rockwell's Barn.





Chapter 46

A Christmas visit to Loxton

That year the family was able to revert to its usual practice of spending Christmas with Luke's grandparents at Loxton, the small northern town where David, Luke's mother and his Uncle Jeroen had been brought up. His grandfather was approaching retirement from his job of CEO of a local authority, but was as shrewd and lively as he had ever been. Luke's grandmother, who was Dutch by birth was, as usual, her own sweet self. David had warned his son that Tom would probably be closely scrutinized by his grandparents, who took very seriously the prospect of additions to the family. Apparently, as well as Jon, Uncle Jeroen's fiancée had had to undergo the 'third degree' by Grandma and Grandad. Massimo Mascagnoli never realized what an ordeal he had escaped!

The 4x4 was fully loaded with the five and their baggage, but driving was much easier for such a journey than train travel. Jon and David took it in turns to drive, and the party left Rockwell's Barn on 21 December at 9 am, and after a short break for lunch, reached Loxton just as it was getting dark, about 4 pm. The Scarboroughs had a huge house and did a lot of entertaining, so the addition of Tom was no strain on the facilities. One concession to age on the part of Mrs Scarborough was that she had daily help in the house, a lovely lady called Connie who lived quite close and had become a friend of the family. She was a childless widow, and spent as much time in the Scarborough house as in her own. Luke's grandparents had tried to get her to move in over Christmas, but she preferred to sleep in her own bed. It was a source of regret to Luke that he had seen so little of his grandparents since he went up to college. 

Tom and Luke were given the twin room that Luke's parents had first occupied on the top floor of the three-storey house, before they had been allowed a room with a double bed! They were then given the interview programme for Tom, which would take up a whole day. Luke was more terrified than Tom was about the grilling that he was to undergo. Mr Scarborough was of course a very experienced interviewer, interviewing new employees several times per month, so at least he knew how to set people at their ease. 

He began by spending an hour with David and Jon. He said to them that the situation was rather different from when he had interviewed Jon all those years ago. Jon was considerably older at the time that he had become engaged to David and had a lot of financial and administrative experience. Mr Scarborough wondered whether Tom was old enough to be able to take on a committed role in the family. Jon said that he was convinced that Tom was an academically brilliant student who was having difficulty adapting to an environment totally different from his home background. He felt that his association with Luke could only be to the benefit of both of the boys and that he personally was wholeheartedly in favour of their relationship ultimately becoming permanent. David said that he had asked the boys about an engagement and they had replied that they did not want that for at least another year. Both men were convinced that the two boys were deeply in love with one another. 

During this time Tom was waiting in the hall and got talking to Connie, to whom he had been introduced the day before. Connie did not remember Jon's grilling by Mr Scarborough, but well recalled that of Liesbet, Jeroen's Swiss fiancée. She told him that Mr Scarborough was a much more sentimental man than he appeared, and put his children's partners through this interrogation process, not to frighten them, but to assure himself that they were the right person for his son or daughter. Of course they always had been the right person and Connie shrewdly pointed out that intelligent persons had intelligent children, who usually, though of course not always, wanted to bond and breed with other intelligent persons. She said that although she had not known Luke's mother, she reckoned that Dorothea had known all along when she got pregnant that her family would never want her to marry the worthless man that Luke had been told was called Mario Contadino. She advised Tom not to panic and to be totally honest, even if that meant being indiscreet or tactless!




Luke at University Pt. 03



Tom was then summoned into Mr Scarborough's presence. He said to him, "Tom, you are perfectly entitled to tell me to get lost. You are of full age, and perfectly free to make your own choices in life. Nothing I can say or do can prevent either of you from making your own decisions. But you and Luke are both young, you may have more than 60 years of life before you, and the severing of deep emotional ties such as your and Luke's love, if it should happen, could lead to emotional damage that could scar either or both of you for life. I feel that we have a right to protect our grandson and you from such an eventuality by asking you both always to remember the seriousness of the deep emotional commitment between you. I am not asking to be reassured about your love for one another, I don't doubt it, I am just warning you that you must always bear in mind that any breakup between you could have lifelong adverse effects! Now tell me a bit about yourself." 

Tom explained that he had lost his mother a few years before and that all his problems had followed from her death. After it, his father had just collapsed into a nonentity, being taken over like a zombie by a series of scheming, designing and ultimately worthless women to the complete neglect of the growing boy. "If you missed your mother so much," said Mr Scarborough, "why do you then seek support and love with a man rather than a woman?" 

"I knew that I was gay long before my mother died, and in any case I did have help and female support from my very dear sister Liz. It was a big transition for a teenager to go from a town where I had worth only in the eyes of two people, to a city where I knew no-one, and where no-one seemed to want to know me. I had no idea how to start making friends. Only your grandson took the trouble to befriend me. In spite of the fact that because of his money he could have had any man or woman in Camford as friend or partner, he chose me! He may have felt that by buying me beer and taking me to the cinema he was buying my friendship, but the reason that I never refused his company was that I was deeply in love with him long before he knew it. Many afternoons when I was busy in the lab, I longed to see his happy face. I am happy now in Camford, and it is all due to him. I have no permanent home, except what he offers me. His parents have been unbelievably kind to me in giving me a home and getting me a vacation job, and I know that whatever becomes of me in the future, I want to be with him!" 

"I haven't yet mentioned the subject of money. You probably know that Luke is the joint heir to a large fortune. Suppose that money suddenly disappeared, and he was left penniless and let's suppose also that he suddenly became disabled and unable to work for a living. Are you convinced that you would support him both financially and in the home and not walk away from your commitment?"

"I would do anything and everything for him, including laying down my life, if it should prove necessary. I would nurse him in sickness, support him in immobility, care for all his needs and those of any family we might have, without regret and without complaint. I would never lay any claim to money from him or his family. When I get my degree, I intend to work to earn my living. I would be ashamed to be thought of as a kept boy, just there to satisfy Luke's sexual needs and living a comfortable life at his expense." 

"Tom, I've arranged with my wife to talk to you this afternoon. It will give her and you a chance to get to know one another better. Is that OK? Then when I've talked to her we'll have another word tomorrow. Thank you very much. You could easily have told me to mind my own business, and I know that nothing we say will change your and Luke's intentions." 

That afternoon Mrs Scarborough invited Tom into the kitchen and offered him a cup of tea. They sat down at the table and Mrs Scarborough said to him "Tom, have you ever been in love before?" 

"No," he replied. 

"How then do you know that this is not just an adolescent crush, that will disappear within a few months, as so many teenage affairs do? Don't you think that you need more experience of life and need to meet more people before entering into a lifetime commitment? Most couples who marry in their teens end up separating within twenty years, often much less." 

"Well, we are not doing anything irrevocable at this stage, we are not even getting engaged. We know that we are not old enough to tie the knot for life just yet. The intention is there, but if after another year or more of life together we find that we are not suited, then we could split up. But I can only speak for myself when I say that I will not change. Your grandson has done for me something that only one other person in the world has done, he has given me self-respect and self-worth. That is the greatest thing that could ever happen to me, and only he could have helped me through such a black period as I was going through after getting to Camford. The fact that he has given me himself as well is a wonderful bonus, which has added love and happiness to gratitude and self-respect. I loved him and wanted him from the moment that I first saw him, but when I found out about his money, I never even considered that he could want me. He could buy anyone and anything he wants, if he so chooses. Instead he chose me! Of course, I'm grateful to be so happy, but it wasn't his money that made me want him, and I never dreamt that he would say yes when I asked him to be mine! Even that was a sort of accident. We were both rather drunk, and we had strayed by accident into a gay pub and I had to deal with a guy who was making unwelcome advances to Luke. When we got back to college he thanked me and I admitted that I wanted him as my own. Next day, he said yes. And we were both cold stone sober by then." 

"Tom, you are a sweet boy! I can quite understand why Luke loves you. I hope the two of you find that you can make a go of life together. Both of us approve of you. My husband will talk to you briefly tomorrow, after which we can concentrate on enjoying Christmas together." 

Tom and Luke went to bed early and lay talking for some time in their separate beds before Tom climbed into Luke's bed and snuggled up beside him. "I know that I shouldn't care a toss about what your grandparents think of our relationship, but they have both given me a lot to think about. I know that I want to be with you for life, but I wonder what you think. Suppose that you met a really beautiful girl that gave you an instant hard-on and filled you with lust? Suppose too that she said that she wanted you to give her a child and that she would live with both of us as a threesome. What would you say? You know that I would want us to bring up a family. Would you say yes?" 

"I would ask you first whether you were prepared to share me with her. If you were, I would do it, but if you were not, I would refuse. Remember that a woman in such a triangle has the perfect right to expect to be fucked by both men, and not just by one! I could never leave you for a woman. And I could never marry a woman and forsake you, so if I married her and carried on with you, I would be making a false promise before God 'to forsake all others.' I couldn't do that, so there would be no marriage and our children would in any case be bastards. Some people consider that word offensive, but I have no objection to the word because I am one myself! Just give me a cuddle, stud-boy. You know how much I love you." 



Chapter 47

Christmas and afterwards

The next morning my grandfather called Tom and me into his study after breakfast. He poured out three cups of coffee. "Tom," he said, "I've talked to my wife, and on behalf of us both, I welcome you to the family. We were both impressed by your frankness, your obvious deep love for our grandson and the happiness that you have brought him. We have the greatest respect for you both as men of integrity and intelligence and Tom, we offer you our love. Just one warning: if you let Luke down we will not forgive you easily. We don't need you to tell us that it won't happen, we are just warning you of the consequences in the unlikely event of it happening. We expect you both to come and stay with us next summer." He stood up and after shaking hands with Tom, he kissed him. We're a very kissy-kissy family," he said with a grin, "and I hope that whenever Luke kisses me, you will do so too. And that goes for my wife as well. Please let me see you both kiss each other. Be as passionate as you like, I won't be offended." We kissed and we were!

"Sir," said Tom, "after Christmas, if the weather stays good, I want Luke to come with me for a brief visit to my home town so that he can meet my sister and my only friend there and so that we can bring back some things that I am going to need in Camford or Ixton. We may have to stay overnight, as driving over the moors in darkness at this time of the year is asking for trouble. Luke's Dad is happy for us to take the 4x4. His insurance will cover the vehicle being occasionally driven by Luke, though it cost him a hefty extra premium."

Tom's first Christmas with us was a wonderful experience. Cathy in particular seemed to enjoy his company enormously, and I was so glad that they got on so well. I felt in a way that I had let her down by taking up with a boy rather than a girl, who would have been company for her. I did something that was perhaps a bit unfair of me. Dad had agreed to sing without fee in the Loxton Choral Society's annual performance of Händel's 'Messiah' on December 23, and I told Tom that he couldn't go unless he came with us to church on Christmas Eve for the midnight Eucharist. He agreed readily, to my surprise. As usual, my father sang magnificently to a packed hall, and the applause afterwards was thunderous. As usual Tom was on his feet but could not shout and stamp as he would have liked to do, because an oratorio is not a pop concert, even if Tom wanted to treat every event in which my father sang as a pop concert! He came to the mass, and we held hands throughout the service except when we were singing, and we had a kiss-and-cuddle session before putting out our bedroom light at nearly 2 am. 

After breakfast we all exchanged presents. Tom had bought me a small gold cross on a chain to wear under my clothes, which I put on immediately and, perhaps to Cathy's embarrassment, I then kissed him gratefully. I had bought him two designer silk shirts, in bright colours, one green, the other yellow. On Boxing Day we all went for a long walk, calling in at the local pub, the White Elephant, for a drink before returning home to cold turkey and salad.

On December 27, Tom telephoned his sister and Mr Silverdale, his old chemistry teacher, to check that we could come and see them the following day. Having received affirmative answers, we set off in the 4x4 the next morning. It was a fine dry day and the journey over the top of the North Yorkshire Moors was brilliant. We arrived at Tom's sister's in time to take her out for lunch at a country pub. She was very pleased to see her brother and kissed him affectionately. Tom then introduced me. "Liz, this is my boyfriend Tom. You, he and Mr Silverdale are the only people that I love!" I held out my hand to Liz, but she ignored it, put her arms round me and kissed me warmly. "My, you're a nice cuddlesome boy!" she said. 

I grinned in embarrassment. "Your brother is a big enigma!" I said in reply. "It took me weeks to thaw him out and get him to talk about himself, and months before I realized how much I loved him. Every day I find out something new about him, every day I struggle to get rid of the bushel under which he hides his light. I love every hair of his head and every sinew of his muscles! He helped me regain MY self-esteem when I once let him down. He's become a scholar of the college, which means that he is no slouch as a chemist, and he's got an excellent tenor voice that he has never used until now. He's tough, resistant and sometimes quite dominating, but above all he is so sweet. I am so lucky to have found him. He's good in bed as well!" (I said that deliberately to make Tom blush, and he immediately obliged.) 

Liz grinned, "You're down-to-earth like me!" she said. 

"I wouldn't dream of trying to fool you about our relationship," I said with a grin. "We're both enormously lucky to have found one another. And my parents have been so good about welcoming him into the family. Tom's always assured of a home with us when we're not in college." We had a very enjoyable lunch, marred only by the fact that I could drink very little as I was driving. We went back to Liz's house and packed up the car with the items that Tom wanted. 

In the evening we went round to see Tom's old chemistry teacher, Mr Silverdale. His wife told us that in the nine months since he and Tom had last met, her husband had started to respond to chemotherapy, and was considerably better. Certainly, he was glad to see us. 

"Mr Silverdale," said Tom, "I want you to meet my partner Luke. He is the one who has taken over where you left off, in turning me back into a normal human being. Without the two of you, I might as well have been dead! I love Camford now, Buckingham is a wonderful college, no-one calls me a queer or a dirty faggot. I can get on with my work, and Luke can with his, and we go swimming together and to the cinema and Luke has got me to join him in the college chapel choir. No-one ever told me that I could sing!" 

"I ought to thank you sir," I said, "for getting Tom into Camford in the first place. Without you I would never have met the man with whom I want to spend my life! It's not going to be easy for the two of us to find jobs that suit us both in the same place, but it's a few years yet till we have to make such decisions, though we will be apart for nine months next year, when I am in Italy. However, I am working on my family to look after him! 

"He has improved enormously in self-confidence, though I am still hard at work, as I told his sister, trying to get the chip off his shoulder and his light to shine out from under the bushel. He's a great guy and my parents and sister both love him already. He knows how much he owes to you now that he has got a scholarship, and is recognized as an elite student. My cofather, who is a chemistry tutor at St Boniface's College reckons that Tom is one of the best first-year Camford chemistry undergraduates of the current year, and his scholarship demonstrates that he is superior in abilities to a lot of the products of Eton, St Paul's or Manchester Grammar. But to me, he is just the sweet guy that I love! It wouldn't be appropriate to give you details, but his abilities and skills extend much further than chemistry!" 

Tom by now was scarlet with embarrassment. "Look at him!" I said, "I bet that you have never seen him blush before! That's because he had not yet met me. There was an iron barrier, which he had erected himself, to cut him off from the sneers and insults of the world. I've made a hole in that barrier, and the essential Tom shines through."

"There's one other thing that I owe you, sir," said Tom. "You taught me to love classical music. Luke's other father is David Singleton-Scarborough, the tenor, a man whom I have worshipped for years. Luke took me to Glyndebourne in September for my birthday, to hear his Dad sing the title role in 'La Clemenza di Tito.' My best birthday present ever! I had only heard him on CD until I met his son." 

Mr Silverdale smiled wisely, "You were my big consolation in a dump school, Tom" he said, "and now you are my success story, ample repayment for years of unrewarding school drudgery. You have a great future in store for you, and I hope that I shall live to see it." 

When we left, I took Mrs Silverdale on one side, making sure that I was out of Tom's earshot, and gave her a card with my phone numbers and E-mail addresses on it. "If at any stage, to help his recovery or to prolong his life, your husband needs expensive drugs for treatment that the NHS will not provide, just get in touch with me. The money will be forthcoming." 



Chapter 48

Winter intimacy

Overnight the weather deteriorated. Snow began to fall and was quite significant by the time that we left for Loxton. Not being an experienced driver, I was a bit apprehensive. There were long queues of vehicles heading south over the moors, and progress got slower and slower. The road-holding qualities of the 4x4 were excellent, so I had no fear of skidding. The snow on the road got thicker and continued to fall heavily. "We'd better prepare for the worst," I said to Tom. "The most essential things are that since we have inadequate footwear, we can't leave the vehicle, even if it gets stuck in the snow. So we need things to keep us warm: blankets, thick coats, bedding, anything to insulate us. We need water to drink, and empty bottles to piss into. We can't run the engine to keep us warm, or we'll either run out of fuel or flatten the battery. Any food or snacks we might have will come in useful. We have a big advantage over ordinary cars: we are higher, with bigger wheels and can cope with fairly deep snow. We must stop, preferably in a car park or layby and get everything that we need out of the boot of the vehicle on to the seats, so that it's accessible to us if we can't get out for deep snow. We need gloves and woolly headgear to help us keep warm. We've got water, and as luck would have it, two empty one-litre PET lemonade bottles. I've also got a couple of bars of chocolate." 

"There are some blankets in one of my suitcases," said Tom "and a duvet, if we can get at them. My mobile phone is fully charged. Look, there's a layby. Let's pull off and move the cases." 

We did as Tom said. We moved the suitcase with bedding into the back seat of the car, and got the water bottles and empty bottles out of the boot into the car. Then we continued along the road. Although it was only mid-afternoon, darkness was beginning to fall. The road began to climb more steeply. No road-markings or catseyes were visible, and the number of cars got fewer. We even saw a few cars stationary at the side of the road. The few road signs that we saw were not illuminated and difficult to read. Tom said, "We'd be mad to carry on in this. The visibility is dreadful. According to the map, there is a building at the side of the road a short distance ahead. Let's pull off beside it and see if we can shelter with the car." After a few minutes we saw a large building to the right of the road. It was a huge derelict barn, and by pulling up our vehicle close beside it, we were sheltered from the driving snow, which was blowing across the road. "Let's pull in here," he said, "and make ourselves comfortable for the night. You can phone your parents and tell them that we're OK, but will not turn up till tomorrow." 

I got Dad on the phone and explained what had happened. "Stay where you are till morning!" he said, "unless the snow threatens to cover your vehicle." 

"We're sheltered here, unless the wind changes," I said, "and the snow is easing off. But the visibility is very bad, and we've got to wait until daylight."

I have never known 16 hours go so slowly. We got the duvet out of Tom's case, snuggled up together and wrapped ourselves up in it. Fortunately, the front seat of the 4x4 was a bench seat. We put gloves on our hands and scarves round our necks and woolly hats on our heads. We kept reasonably warm, except when one or other of us had to partially unwrap us to piss into an empty lemonade bottle. We did not dare have the car radio on for long, but we were able to hear the weather reports. The snow had ceased to fall, but night driving was impossible when you could not see the edges of the road. Tom's iPod was fully charged and we listened to its total repertory of vocal music. Eventually we fell asleep. We slept fitfully and time dragged. We knew that it would not be light until 8 am at the earliest. Because of our love for one another, the experience was quite sweet. Even if we had just been friends rather than partners, we would have been intimate by the time that night was over. We knew that we needed each other's warmth, that neither of us, in Donne's words, was an island. We could feel each other's heartbeats, the movement of each other's chests as we breathed, the muscular effort that one or other of us made when we needed to fart. In some ways we were closer together than when we were fucking.