David's Final Graduate Year Ch. 01

Chapter 42 Simon

The gay freshman

My first few weeks in Camford were very hectic. I had fallen in love with the place on the day in April when I stepped off the train on my way to an interview at St Boniface's College. It was a beautiful spring day, and the leaves were already showing signs of emerging on the trees as I walked into the town from the station. Although the medical tutor had made me a provisional offer over the phone when I had contacted him, he said that he needed to verify my exam results and that I had to be interviewed by him and the Senior Tutor and references taken up.

There were three people at the interview, the third was the Chemistry tutor, Dr DC. When asked why I had made an application outside the UCCA system at this time of the year, I had to explain that after my A level exams, and before the results were published, I had been asked to leave school before the end of term because I had been caught making love to a boy a year younger than myself on school premises. I was also told that provided that I did not take up the place that I had been offered at a medical school in London for the following October, nothing more would be said about the matter, and nothing ever committed to writing. They said that they did not want to blight my future, just to delay it, "until I had got a bit more sense" as they put it.

I told the three dons that I had conformed exactly to what I had been asked to do. I had turned down at once the provisional offer of a place at St Mary's Hospital Medical School, and reconciled myself to working in a supermarket and attending the local tech college part time after applying to different med schools the following October, with a view to beginning a year later. When the A level results came out in August, everyone except myself was surprised to discover that I had straight 'A' grades in chemistry, physics, biology and mathematics, and distinctions in the special papers. Up to that point, I had never considered Oxbridge or Camford as places to study until a young man from St Boniface's came to sing at a recital of our local concert society, and he had suggested that it would be good for me to consider one of the ancient universities. The picture he had painted of Camford made it sound, I thought, like a grown-up institution, which would judge people on academic competence rather than using the petty behavioural criteria that some schools used.

The Senior Tutor asked me to step outside for a few minutes. I did so and was soon recalled, to be informed that they were making me an unconditional offer of a place to study medicine via preclinical study in physiology, starting that Martinmas term. "We appreciate your frankness over a teenage indiscretion," he said, "and we are sure that your academic promise will be an asset to this college, and look forward to seeing you next term." I said to them that when the list of matriculated students was published that I wished my school to be recorded as my local technical college, (where I was a part-time student doing A level Further Mathematics while I stacked shelves in the supermarket), and not the school where I had been in the sixth form. No way was I going to give that institution any credit for my academic achievements.

I was about 16 when I realized that I was gay. The school I attended was coeducational and most of the boys I knew were interested in girls, whereas it was very clear to me that I was only attracted by boys. Unlike a lot of teenage boys, I had no doubt that I was, in the terms that they used then, a deviant. My homosexuality was never a matter for doubt. In the second-year sixth, I experimented with a number of boys at school. I never touched a boy under 16, so basically I was limited to those in the first-year sixth form. I had one close friend in my own year, and we sucked each other off a few times. It was easy with him, because my mother knew him and we were allowed in my bedroom, but he was not gay and soon lost interest.

The younger boys were more of a problem. I fancied several of them, but as I was not friendly with them, there arose the age-old problem of schoolboy sex: to start a relationship and keep it secret requires either bullying or bribery. Bullying was out of the question, so I had to resort to bribery to get my way with them. The problem was, the bribe (which could not be money) had to be big enough to let me seduce them, but not so big that questions would be asked when the present was seen by their parents and friends. In the end I only got my way with two of them, and then it was only blow-jobs. Buggery required more care and opportunity than was available to me.

The incident that got me sacked was with boy number three. The kid was sucking me off in the gym changing room, when we were caught at it by one of the teachers. The matter was handled very skilfully by the head, who did not broadcast it among his staff and did not contact my mother. I did not dare tell her, and to explain my rejection of the London med school place, I had to make up a story that I needed an extra A level to be certain of getting in. (I got an A grade in it, by the way). My mother was a widow, and I could not conceive of what her reaction might be when the time came to tell her that I was gay. I delayed doing anything about it before I left home in the hope that I might ultimately find the right man to settle down with. She had never been as possessive as many lone mothers are towards their sons, and indeed I got myself tattooed without any comments or objections from her.

The young singer David Scarborough who had performed the beautiful tenor arias at the Guildsham Music Society concert, the boy who had encouraged me to apply to Camford, turned out to be in the college choir at my chosen college of St Boniface's. I had rather fancied him from the time that I first saw him, as he was tall and athletic, with long blond hair and an expressive face, and indeed I had drunk coffee with him in my room two nights before. After our first college sung evensong of the term, he talked enthusiastically about the choir and tried to persuade me to join the Camford Bach choir. Then came the surprise: he introduced me to his boyfriend, a tall dark-haired guy who was a sort of don, who ate dinner, not with us, but on high table. So the guy I fancied was gay but spoken for! Moreover his friend looked as if he would not put up with anyone making a pass at his boy, though that would not necessarily discourage me if I decided that I wanted him!

Chapter 43 Jon

Doubt or jealousy?

On the first Sunday evening of term we went to evensong in Chapel and then as usual ate at separate tables in Hall. David introduced me in the beer cellar to the new choir member that he fancied. The boy was, I gathered, 19. He was slightly shorter than David, still with a teenage skinniness, with longish brown curly hair and a good baritone voice. The more I looked at him, the more puzzled I got as to why David found him so attractive. There was something about him that worried me. I was pretty sure that he was gay, but I totally failed to see the attractive arse that David had banged on about. My prick remained obstinately limp, even when I was gazing at his crotch. However, unlike my lover, I tend to judge with my head rather than my dick.

I did not stay in the SCR for coffee, nor did I go for coffee to Ed Bairstow's rooms, although he invited me. Ed is the College chaplain, a very amiable, enlightened and shrewd cleric. Instead I joined the choir in the JCR, just in time to leave with them for the Lion, the pub round the corner from Boni's that had a massive trade during term time, and long lean periods during the vacations. Simon, the new guy came along with the rest. I noticed that he kept throwing lecherous glances in the direction of David, who sometimes smiled back at him. I couldn't help wondering what might happen between those two boys. If they wanted to indulge in a bit of 69, I would not worry unduly unless David failed to tell me about it, but although he was young, and probably inexperienced, I was mistrustful of Simon Mitchell. If he decided to trawl the gay pubs of Camford, heaven knows what sort of diseases he might contract. By the time of this story, gays in the US West Coast region were starting to contract mysterious immunological failure and dying from otherwise curable diseases. No-one except certain fundamentalists had any idea of the cause of the immunological failure, and only they were certain that it was divine punishment for unnatural behaviour. In England a prison chaplain had died of a similar condition, with hideous implications about what chaplains got up to with the prison inmates.

I let David and Simon chat over a pint of beer and talked to Laura, the rather sweet girl who was the closet nympho who had seduced David the previous year. I just hoped that he would not fall into a similar trap with Simon. Laura was in her final year, and although she was very discrete, I was sure that she had probably been shagged by all the men in the choir in the course of the previous year! To my relief, I was obviously not her type, but she was shrewd enough to comment on the looks that David and Simon were exchanging. "I should watch out for that young man" she commented, "he looks predatory as well as lecherous, and he's got his eye on your boy." "Yes, I had noticed," I said. "I'm not sure whether I should warn him off before anything begins or wait till he makes a move. Basically, I think I should wait. If he's academically ambitious, he will have plenty of work to keep him busy."

Chapter 44 David

A proposition and an encounter

At the beginning of November, Charlie Crabtree called me into his office. "How's the draft paper getting on?"

"It's nearly finished. All I need is an afternoon in the library to check some references for the methods section. It's too late today, I'm setting up an experiment at the moment."

"How long do you reckon the reference checking will take?"

"About an hour."

"Then meet me after tea-break tomorrow. I'll take the manuscript home and check it over tomorrow night. But I also want to talk to you tomorrow about your future."

At 4 pm the next day, which was a Tuesday, I tapped on Charlie's open door. "Hi" he said.

"Here's the draft manuscript," I said. "I'm afraid it's longhand. I couldn't get time on the computer to type it out."

"No problem, your handwriting is easy to read" said Charlie, "I'll look at it tonight. The main thing that I wanted to talk about is your thesis and what you are going to do when you finish."

"How much more do I need in the way of results to be sure of getting the degree?" I asked.

"About six months more bench work, if you don't run into any setbacks, i.e. about one further paper." he said. "But assuming that the thesis goes OK, and five months should be long enough to write it if you've had four papers accepted, then we need to discuss your future."

"Yes, I know," I sighed. "I have a lot of problems about that. First, Jon finishes his post-doc job about that time, and he might decide to move on, as he's unlikely to get a university post without a track record of getting research grant money. He might just get a college fellowship, but he's not sure that he wants to fill his life with teaching. If he moved, I would want to go with him. In addition to getting finished in the lab and writing my thesis, I've got two singing competitions next summer, which I am very keen to do, and I have to ask myself whether a total career change into professional singing might be the best thing to do. I would have to start off in the chorus of an opera house, but it would be a regular job. It's all quite difficult."

"Well, I have what you might think is a bizarre proposition to make to you. My wife has had a very tempting offer of a part-time job, starting next October, but we both feel very strongly that there should be someone at home to look after the children, especially in the school holidays. Moreover, I plan to take six months' study leave next year to write a major grant application, which if successful would enable me to offer you a postdoc job, effective in about 18 months time. So I want to ask you if you would consider a year's job as a paid male nanny to keep an eye on the kids, who both like you very much.

"You could eat with us for free or go home and eat with Jon. Sometimes we might need you in the evenings, but you would in that case be able to stay overnight. It would give you plenty of time to practise your singing, and we would guarantee to give you time off for lessons, competitions or gigs. During the study leave, I plan to spend some time abroad, and I would be happier if my wife had a man in the house, and because you are gay, I feel quite confident that she would be safe with you around. In that situation, you might have to spend the night at our house more frequently, but not every night. We could offer you about £2K for the year, plus any expenses.

"There would be some domestic chores, but not many. We have a cleaner, who will also do the laundry, but you would have to be able to cook meals for the children and also for my wife and myself on the days that she works, and a few odd jobs like shopping and bed-making, and taking Martin to school and fetching him in the evening. Emma walks to school on her own, as it's just down the road. You would work full time for three days per week and just occasionally a Saturday or Sunday. If your thesis isn't finished by the time that you start, you will effectively have two days a week full-time to get it finished. However in the school holidays, you would have to be around every day from 3 till 6 pm"

I was, to say the least, somewhat amazed. "I need to discuss this with Jon," I said. "The biggest problem would be the cooking. My experience and skill in that area is VERY limited."

"There's plenty of time for you to decide."

I came out of Charlie's office to find a visitor waiting for me. It was Simon Mitchell. By now it was 5 pm. "Have you time to come for a drink?" he asked.

"Yes, I guess so," I said. I knew Jon would be tied up with a tutorial until 6 pm, and we had arranged to eat at he Sparrowhawk, our local pub, afterwards.

"Where would you like to go?" he asked.

"We'd better go to the Whale and Wheelbarrow," I said, as it was quite near the science complex. When we got inside, I said to Simon, "What would you like to drink?" He replied that he didn't mind, so I got two pints of XXX's bitter, a pleasant, well hopped, 3.5% abv beer, and we sat down in a corner. "How are you settling in to life in Camford?" I asked.

"I'm loving it," he said. "You were quite right suggesting that I should come here. It's the kind of grown-up place that I would never have dreamt of. No-one torments you if you are gay."

"I didn't know that you were gay when I advised you to come here," I said, "but because of 'don't ask, don't tell', Camford has been gay-friendly for years."

Like his hair, his eyes were brown, but they were not as alluring as Jon's. Why was I comparing him with Jon? He was several years younger than me, and though still a teenager he did not have that sweetness that younger boys had. He's after sex at all costs, I thought. He doesn't give a fuck about love. He just wants dick! This feeling got stronger when he reached out and got hold of my hand.

I looked at my watch. "I will have leave in about 20 minutes," I said, "and I need to go for a pee." I gently disengaged my hand, stood up and went to the gents.

I had just finished and was shaking my tool, when Simon sidled into the room, turned me round, my tool still hanging out of my fly, and kissed me ravenously. Mechanically, I opened my mouth, and his tongue entered it like a shot. He ran his hand over my arse and kissed me again, even more roughly. No words of love or grunts of pleasure escaped his lips. Before I knew what was happening, he had dragged me into a toilet stall and locked the door. He then pulled his pants and briefs down to reveal a hard rampant tool, the foreskin of which was rolled back by his erection. "Suck me, please," he said.

"Not unless you take your shirt off!" I said.

"OK," he replied and removed his shirt. To my disgust, the whole of his torso from collar-bone down to crotch was covered in lurid tattoos. How could anyone want to be treated by a tattooed doctor? I thought. And how could a cathedral chorister get himself degraded by such bodily decorations? Still, there was nothing the matter with his dick. There were no piercings or rings, and it was a decent manly size, so I knelt down and began to lick it and to nuzzle it. It smelt a bit of stale sweat, but no man can avoid sweating, which is partly why Jon was so keen on 'Storing pour homme.' Altogether I gave him a treatment that would have sent Jon crazy, but he seemed not to respond, not even with a grunt of satisfaction. He came very quickly and discharged a good dose of spunk into my mouth. I was not very keen on the taste and swallowed it hastily. I stood up and he began to pull up his pants and zip up the fly. "Thanks," he said in a casual way, and he unlocked the door.

We walked back to our table and finished our beer. I looked at my watch. "I must be off," I said.

"OK, see you around," he replied casually, without any further sign of interest or affection. I headed off to meet Jon, decidedly underwhelmed by the encounter. I certainly felt no desire to have sex with him again, and hoped that he would feel the same way. I also hoped that academic pressures would cool his sexual ardour by giving him something else to occupy him. Ten minutes later, I was sitting with Jon at a table for two in the bar of the Sparrowhawk. I told him about the encounter with Simon in the pub toilet.

"What has made me totally disillusioned with him was the fact that there was no indication on his part of anything at all except a desire for cock. He never smiled or gave any indication of happiness or satisfaction, and even his kisses were devoid of any tenderness or affection. And the fact that he was covered with the most revolting tattoos was the biggest turn-off that you can imagine. I can't imagine how I ever can have thought that he was cute. I hope that he's lost interest in me, because I don't want to see him undressed again. Oh, Jon, I wish I were not so attracted by teenagers. Why should I ever want anyone but you?"

I then went on to tell him about Charlie Crabtree's proposal for the next academic year. "I'm very doubtful about the proposal unless I can get my thesis finished by then. The job is so fragmented that I think that it would delay getting the thesis finished quite seriously. On the other hand, it would provide a secure temporary job while we were deciding about both our futures. What do you think, Jon?"

"My darling faggot-boy, I'm not at all sure that you are cut out for the job. You can't feed those kids fish fingers and instant meals all the time, and sausages and omelettes are only good for an occasional meal. Moreover depending on when you start, you will still be just under 25 at least for some of the time, and so you'll be driving the Crabtrees' car with age-loaded car insurance, which will cost either us or them an arm and a leg. Your current annual premium to drive the 4x4 is more than they will be paying you for a year's work! If they think that they are getting a nanny on the cheap, they have not thought through all the implications. As for my future, if I don't get further post-doc money and/or a fellowship, there are plenty of other jobs that I can do in Camford or at Ixton."

"Such as?"

"Administrator of the Men's Fitness Centre, which will be finished by then."

"But you don't know anything about sports management, and there isn't enough time for you to do a training course. How about YOU taking the nanny job, if the kids liked you, and me getting a chorus job, either full-time or as casual at an opera house?"