Out: A Schoolboy's Tale

by David Brining

  13: It's Raining Men

  THURSDAY 23rd October. I'd committed to going with Paulus to house-swimming after school. The purpose of the session was two-fold. First, we were trying out for the Murray House swim-team then having a life-saving lesson. I really wanted to get that badge. I thought it would be useful though I hadn't yet figured out how. As for Poorly, he wanted to get in the school swimming team.

  Willie set our English homework to write a review of tonight's BBC broadcast of Taming of the Shrew with John Cleese. Yay. Watching telly. Great homework, right? But Shakespeare? On the telly? Give us a break. It was even on the front cover of the Radio Times, Cleese in this beard and Shakespearean costume. Anyway, Barney went ballistic about the 0/10 Chemistry test I'd done, said he'd be writing to my parents about my attitude and put me in detention. Humourless fucking twat. Everyone in the class laughed. I told him I couldn't do it. He just said there were a lot of things I couldn't do, weren't there? Well, fuck him. I had a brilliant lunchtime clarinet lesson in the Purcell Music Room sight-reading this B minor study on page 39 of the Demnitz book, this Gade Humoreske I'd played for Grade 4 and absolutely nailing the Brahms F minor sonata so that Martin Angus nodded enthusiastically as I let the final, four-beat D fade away. I snoozed through Wingnut blithering on in RE about some loser sitting cross-legged under a tree somewhere in India for like a trazillion years whilst Gray doodled a new version of Piggo on the back of my hand then, discussing Liverpool's 1-0 win over Aberdeen and Bayern Munich's utter trashing of Ajax in the UEFA Champions' Cup with Maxton, beetled off to French.

  Benjy seemed tense, tired and strained when he arrived ten minutes late. This grace-period at the end of the day was the perfect cue for a massive paper-fight but Benjy, of course, went absolutely ballistic when he saw his classroom floor littered with balls of screwed-up A4, calling us a bunch of irresponsible louts and yelling we would stay after school to pick up every scrap of rubbish with our teeth. Yeah, yeah. Whatever.

  ''Thanks,'' muttered Paulus who, inevitably, had not joined in despite being pelted by me and Gray and being called a saddo by Maxton. ''Now we'll be late for swimming.''

  ''Quiet, Paulus,'' snapped Benjy, ''Books open, page 114, get your heads down, get the exercise done, and don't open your smart-alec mouths again.'' Anticipating, he held up a warning hand. ''Breathe through your nose, Peters.''

  I laughed approvingly and shut up. Clever to head that one off. Benjy was usually all right with me, even though he'd once said I mangled the French language like 'a horny, yowling cat desperate for a bunk-up with Mrs Cat (dramatic PAUSE like he's on Strictly) in a bag.' The entire class had split their sides, and Broody nicknamed me Horny Cat for a while. So all right, we'd trashed his classroom but he'd really gone off on one. It wasn't like him to yell and scream, and we didn't like or respect teachers who did. We liked teachers who met us on our terms and in our own way, with the kind of world-weary humour judiciously laced with sarcasm that we used with each other. We liked teachers who understood us, enjoyed our company and, when we pissed them off, 'cos we were teenagers and would piss off Jesus, outwitted us mentally because they were older than us and had seen it all before. Those teachers we admired tremendously. Those teachers we'd work for. Those teachers we'd trust and follow as they led us through their courses. Teachers like Beaky and Cedric, Hellfire and Bunny. Teachers who believed in us. Teachers who respected us. Teachers who liked us. The bond between us and them became unbreakably strong. Teachers who tried to dominate us, like Barney and Herbie, generally failed. Teachers who tried to work with us generally succeeded.

  A sudden, deafening hammering interrupted this idle meditation and I realised with a start I hadn't even started the transposition of the text from present to past. I guess most hearts skipped a shocked beat when Frank Gallagher burst in and whispered something urgently into Benjy's ear. Benjy's expression hardened. Scrambling to our feet, we glanced at each other, suddenly concerned, as Gallagher, pausing at the door to tell us, calmly and cheerfully, that a prefect would come and in the meantime, get this bloody room tidied up, you little animals, and Peters, you slob, do your top button up, led him away by the elbow. A buzz of speculation erupted as we set to work, Seymour, who'd turned 16 on Tuesday, holding up the waste-bin like a basketball-hoop and inviting us to take turns at getting a paper ball into it.

  ''I reckon he's been arrested,'' said Gray.

  ''Why? What do you think he's done?'' said Stewart.

  ''I caught the words 'hospital' and 'baby','' said Paulus.

  ''Well, that's it,'' said Gray. ''He's got some silly tart up the duff, hasn't he? Next thing he'll be run out of town by the angry husband.''

  ''You said he was gay,'' I recalled, ''Because he wears hair-gel.''

  ''I know,'' said Gray in disgust. ''At his age. I mean, he must be thirty at least!''

  ''Well,'' said Maxton, ''Whatever it is, I feel sorry for him. He's got Frank lavishing care and attention on him. That's enough to make anyone wish they were banged up.''

  I wondered who the prefect would be as I popped a paper-ball into the waste-bin and earned a round of applause. Not Rose. Anyone but Rose. I aimed another paper-ball, calling 'hold it steady, Kev' as Leverett showed up. Bollocks. I meant anyone but Leverett. Less than happy that his free period had been interrupted for a bit of baby-sitting, he chucked this black ring-binder onto the desk and scowled at me.

  ''Bloody hell, Peters. What're you playing at?''

  ''Mr Gallagher told us to clear up,'' I said cheekily, ''But he didn't say how.'' I plopped the paper ball deftly into the bin and smugly acknowledged the applause of my class-mates with a half-bow. Leverett just yelled at me to sit down and do my bloody collar up or he'd slam me in detention, the mardy-arsed twat.

  ''What happened to Benjy?'' asked Maxton.

  ''I told you,'' Gray maintained. ''Long arm of the law finally caught up with him. Man with hair like that, it was only a matter of time.''

  ''Shut up,'' growled Leverett, throwing himself into Benjy's chair, ''And get on with your work. Page 114, I believe.'' God, he was a moody bastard.

  I settled into my Maths prep so I could get Maxton's help but he was wrestling with the French, which was actually a piece of piss. It was some picture-story called 'La famille Leclerc part en vacances' with three comprehension questions per picture, stuff like 'Est-ce que c'est loin?' under this picture of a ruddy great road-sign reading '115 km.' Still, the road-sign matching exercise on page 110 was fun, like the buying petrol role-play on page 112. You never knew when such info might come in handy in real life. Unlike rearranging these formulae, which wouldn't ever. I mean, like EVER! I felt my brain melt as I stared at the questions:

  '1. Re-arrange the formula d=fhs to make f the subject.

  2. Re-arrange the formula A = bh to give h in terms of both A and b.

  2

  3. Re-arrange each formula to give the letters in bold:

  a) t = prsb) s = 3rtyc) k = a2bcd) V = 1/3π r2 h.' I mean, why?

  ''What's up, Peters?'' snarled Leverett.

  ''I can't bloody do it,'' I snarled back, frustrated.

  ''I'll help you,'' Huxley volunteered.

  ''Blimey, Adie,'' said Maxton, ''It'll turn your hair white. He's got a brain like a Swiss cheese-plant. Full of holes.''

  Pointing out it was either Swiss cheese or cheese-plant but not both, I told him to shut his face then Leverett told me to shut mine and I listened, frowning, whilst the class swot talked the class turnip patiently through these examples. God, it was sooo boring. I was infinitely happier à la station-service. At least I knew what they were on about.

  When we finally got out, Leverett having retained us whilst he inspected the floor with a like a fucking microscope, I dragged my sports-bags from my bottom-row locker, thanked Huxley for his help and headed off with a still-grumbling Paulus. As we left the main building for the swimming pool, we were joined by Leo Trent and Richard Sutcliffe. I quite liked Sooty. Though he seemed a bit sull
en, his nose was too beaky and his eyes too close together, he was a promising cricketer and seemed a decent actor. But a bit too Captain Beaky for me.

  Stop, I yelled inside my head. Sooty Sutcliffe? Stop. He's bloody fourteen.

  ''What's this about Goddard being caught by the Fuzz?'' Leo demanded.

  ''That'd be painful,'' I joked, ''Caught by the fuzz. Not that you gaybies have any yet.''

  ''No,'' said Sooty excitedly. ''Apparently some coppers came for him, tooled up like they're going to bust up a crack-den on a council estate. Apparently he yells 'You'll never take me alive, copper,' smacks one in the nose and legs it down the corridor.''

  ''Gallagher rugby-tackles him.'' Leo took up the story. ''Has to sit on him while the other copper's going 'Eat floor, scumbag, or I'll blow your fackin' knee-caps clean orf, you slag'.''

  ''Then they drag him off to the piggy van,'' says Sooty, ''An' he's swearing to go round their piggy houses, kill their piggy children and eat their piggy livers.'' He's even acting it out.

  ''Fuck's sake,'' I said, pushing open the changing-room door. ''Like with fava-beans and a nice Chianti, eh? Where did you hear all this shit?''

  ''Mark Gray told us,'' said Sooty, dumping his bag on a bench, pointing his fingers at Leo and crying we'll never take him alive while Leo snorted like said pig and fired back.

  Mark Gray. Never one to let the truth stand in the way of a good story. No wonder he wanted to be a lawyer.

  ''We were there, son.'' Paulus unlaced his shoes. ''Frank came in, spoke to him then led him outside. He said something about 'hospital' and 'baby'. So that's what it's about.''

  ''Son?'' I said, hanging my grey shirt on the peg with my sweater and taking off my shoes and socks. ''How long did you sit under the tree to become a wise old greybeard? Does Wingnut know? He'll drone on about you in some boring lesson, the Endless Enlightenment of Poorly Paulus.'' Paulus slammed his fist down on my bicep. ''Ow, you twat! You've got a fist like a rock.'' I rubbed my smarting upper arm. It really hurt, the twat.

  ''Shit!'' Leo howled with delight. ''So it's true! He has got some bird up the duff.''

  ''I always thought he was gay,'' Sooty remarked, ''On account of the hair-gel.''

  Oh boy.

  ''Afternoon, lads.'' Jacko popped his head round the door. ''Any more coming?''

  There were two skinny second-form gimps and some lardy-arsed third-former changing shyly under their towels in the corner. I half-expected one to dive whimpering into a cubicle. I despised such self-conscious little wimps. I mean, we've all got one, for fuck's sake. Just 'cos yours is a Tommy Tiddler…

  ''I think Alex Hartley's coming, sir,'' said Sooty.

  ''Oh God,'' I muttered, stripping off my vest. ''He'll have to partner the Podgemeister.''

  Leo spluttered.

  Jacko's blue eyes crinkled a little. ''I'll put him with you, JP, if I hear any more of that talk. He has an eating disorder.''

  ''You mean he can't stop, sir?'' I asked innocently, unfastening my belt.

  ''It's a disease actually, for your information, Mr Peters,'' said Jacko.

  ''Yeah, it's called Greedy Bastard-itis.'' My trousers fell down my thighs.

  Leo howled, thumping his knee. Sooty guffawed. Even Paulus cracked a smile.

  ''Just because your ribs look like a garden-rake, Peters,'' Jacko said, walking away as Sooty, Leo and Paulus laughed some more. I wouldn't care, I scowled, but none of them were exactly heavyweights.

  ''Except,'' said Leo, nodding at my salmon-pink slip, ''In the trouser department.''

  Paulus, cackling, added ''Supermite, eh? The Bionic Maggot, ha ha.''

  As I slapped his bare shoulder then chased him up the length of the changing room towards the showers, whipping him with my tie, Sonning, in his stripy blue-and-gold blazer, and Rose, in his charcoal suit, appeared in the door and moved towards the pegs.

  ''Hey, Mark,'' I cried, Paulus forgotten, ''You look like a stick of rock.''

  ''Better than having a brain like a rock, JP,'' Sonning returned. ''Nice knickers.''

  ''Though not much in 'em!'' cried Leo, who was now sitting stark naked on the bench rooting in his bag for his trunks. Red as a Man United shirt, I told him to shut up.

  ''Hope you haven't forgotten them,'' said Rosie.

  ''Aye, like you did your socks,'' I added teasingly.

  Ali's eyes met mine across Leo's blond candyfloss hair. Was that a twinkle of humour in those deep teal pools?

  ''Oh,'' said Leo, ''Soz, JP. I meant to bring them back. I even washed 'em.'' His voice took on a tone of pride. ''In real Fairy Liquid.''

  I slapped my forehead and called him a spaz as the others laughed. With a ringing Klingon victory-cry, Leo pulled his trunks from his bag. 'They' were this sparkly, spangly pink-purple thong which resembled a cheese-wire.

  ''What the fuck are those?'' said Sonning, pausing in his shirt-unbuttoning.

  ''Yikes,'' cried Sooty, slipping into blue trunks. ''They're so gay. Who chose them?''

  Turning my back and quarter-erection slightly away from the older boys, I slid off the salmon slip, conscious of Ali's eyes boring into my backside, conscious that the tan I had acquired during the summer had now faded from bronze to a faded pale biscuit, like a piece of paper left out in the sun too long. He had his shirt off and I thought I might've been staring at his smooth, hairless chest again.

  ''I did,'' said Leo indignantly. ''I think they're really cool. Don't you like them?''

  ''They belong in a stripper's boudoir,'' said Ali drily.

  Quivering with laughter, I tugged up my own trunks, red with a white knot-motif.

  ''Nice trunks, JP!'' called Sonning. ''Haul on your bow-line, eh?''

  Now it was their turn to laugh at me. Merriment bubbled into Alistair's face.

  Leo was squeezing himself into his cheese-wire, twerking like said stripper. He had a pale, fragile-looking body, a tight bubble-bottom, absolutely no hips and a dusting of golden pubic hair. His alabaster chest was narrow, his nipples small, and his waist like a wasp's.

  Face the colour of a first-class stamp, I turned away. Why the hell was I staring at Leo Trent? Because his dad said he might be gay? Because he was amazingly cute with the body of Cupid? Because otherwise I'd be, like, staring at Ali Rose's boy-bits?

  ''Shine a light!'' Leo exclaimed. ''They're really tight and scratchy.''

  You could also see every bulge and bump.

  ''Blimey, Leo,'' said Paulus, ''You are such a tart.''

  ''Don't get your dive wrong,'' said Rosie, pulling on these really sleek, black, mid-thigh Speedos, ''Or they'll slice your boy-bits off. We'll find your winkie floating on the water.''

  Everyone laughed again, then Jacko returned to hurry us up. We trooped out, still laughing and teasing each other, enjoying companionship and the blokey banter, until we reached the white-tiled pool and its blood-red surround. Surveying the rolling, unnaturally blue 25 x 10 metre expanse of heavily chlorinated water, we decided it looked very cold. This might not be so much fun after all. Settling my blue goggles and gritting my teeth, I launched into a good, clean racing-dive, and surged upwards near Paulus, who was shivering on the edge in these tight, tiny pine-green Speedos, the soles of his feet just touching the water. Paulus too was skinny and sharp-boned but he was a little taller than me, so seemed stringier, longer-limbed, more coltish, you know? He was also quite hot. I gulped and tried not to look at him.

  ''What's it like?'' He glanced at the gimp hovering indecisively at the top of the steps.

  ''Well,'' I said through chattering teeth, ''It's warmer than usual. You still have to watch for the icebergs but at least you don’t have to break the surface.''

  ''Sarcasm doesn't suit you, JP,'' said Jacko. ''Get going. Two warm-up lengths, favourite stroke.''

  I couldn't resist the oldest quip in the book, ''Well, that'd be breast-stroke, sir,'' and took off in a steady front-crawl.

  ''Keep your legs straight!'' bawled Jacko. ''What're you waiting for, Andy? Christ
mas? Go.'' He smacked Paulus on the shoulder. Paulus slid into the water. ''Leo! Sooty! Go.''

  They bumped knuckles, crowed 4D's Klingon war-cry, ''Heghlu'mekh qaq jajvam,'' today is a good day to die, then, one after the other, swallow-dived into the pool.

  I was nearing the wall, consciously keeping my hips up and my arms close to my head. Touching the wall with my fingertips, I rolled into a perfect racing-turn, one hand on the wall, feet up for propulsion, and made it back in what I thought was a good time.

  ''What the hell were you doing with your arms, JP?'' barked Jacko. ''You're flailing around like some bloody washerwoman.''

  I heard Leo's familiar hyena-howl of laughter mingle with Rosie's silver-bell tinkle.

  ''Two lengths' back-stroke. Go.''

  Getting my feet up on the wall, I launched myself into the air, landing back in the water with a small splash, and was away, staring at the ceiling, arms working like windmill blades, my shoulder muscles beginning to loosen.

  ''Your hips are still wobbling about like that washerwoman, Jonny!'' called Jacko from the side of the pool. I muttered something rude and straightened my body-line.

  Leo and Sooty were in this widths relay-race against Sonning and Rose, screaming and shouting at each other, Leo dancing on the pool-edge and yelling encouragement at Sonning, Rose, beside him, urging on Sooty. The three gimps were splashing about in the shallow-end. Paulus was sitting on the top step, shivering violently, stifling a sneeze and scrutinizing the sole of his right foot for possible verrucas.

  ''I thought you said it was warm. It's freezing. An' I’m coming down with your cold.''

  ''Do something,'' I suggested, splashing water at his flat, smooth stomach. I actually felt energized. ''Move around a bit.'' Demisting my goggles, I surface-dived to the tiled floor.

  Ali and Leo, battling head-to-head, were being screamed at by their team-mates. Jackson, equally animated, was yelling advice. Then he saw me watching.

  ''Ready for your lengths, JP?''

  ''I've done 'em, sir.''

  ''Four? You call 'four' lengths?''

  Sonning was shrieking Leo's name now. His twiggy arms were thrashing the water, his matchstick legs kicking, slightly ahead of Rosie, whose head, twisting, broke the surface for air. I saw his mouth open for a tremendous gasp, then he plunged under again, but Leo won by a half-metre and promptly went mental, dancing in the water with his arms aloft like a boxer while Sonning bawled 'well done, Lion, well done' and Jacko clapped enthusiastically.

  ‘’Well done, all of you,’’ he cried. ‘’I think we found our relay team.’’

  Sonning hauled Leo's light body out of the pool. It reminded me of apple-bobbing.

  ''He must weigh next-to-nothing,'' Paulus muttered.

  ''Five stone?'' I reckoned. ''What's lighter than featherweight? Atom-weight?''

  ''JP! You know that washerwoman I mentioned? Less gossip, more lengths!''

  Bollocks. 20 lengths, 440 yards, 500 metres. Jacko had some crazy notion that I would be a decent long-distance swimmer. He thought I had this inner determination, this steely will, this inexhaustible reserve… fuck knows why.

  ''Andrew! Shouldn't you be doing a length of butterfly or something? Individual medley didn't include shivering on the steps last time I checked the rules.''

  Swallowing a mouthful of water, I coughed a laugh.

  The first ten lengths were fine but by the twelfth I was beginning to tire. Everything seemed to be coming from my shoulders and my arms were starting to feel heavy. I wondered why I was doing this when I could be at home reading a book or watching Scooby Doo, anything but this. I forced my leaden arms to move. The cold was starting to seep through my skin. My trunks stuck to my buttocks like clammy cling-film. I shut out my thoughts, that this was pointless lunacy, that I should stop and rest, and instead counted lengths, counting every stroke, sixteen, sixteen, sixteen, sixteen, then seventeen, seventeen, seventeen, seventeen, counting with the rhythm, then this weird mantra-chant broke out in my brain, eighteen, two to go, eighteen, two to go, eighteen, two to go…

  Touching the tiled trough for the final time, I clung on grimly, uttered a rattling cough and spat out a load of water. Pushing my goggles up on my forehead, I ducked my head under the surface, floated for a moment then dragged myself up the steps, chest heaving with exertion. Limbs reduced to jelly, I stumbled towards Jacko and the stop-watch.

  ''Good effort, JP,'' he said. ''23 minutes 16. Come next week, one lunchtime perhaps, or on Tuesday afternoon with Andy and we'll try to get you to a minute a length.''

  I panted incoherently as he told me to take a break and get a drink. Still gasping, I collapsed on a bench, stripy blue towel round my shoulders, to watch Paulus swim a length of back-stroke and Leo thrash a length of fast front-crawl. In slow-motion, Ali passed, so gracefully, like a dancer, and his legs were so slim, especially in those sleek thigh-hugging shorts. Man, I had to get some.

  ''You look knackered,'' he said, tossing a black rubber brick into the pool.

  ''Fucking right,'' I panted, clutching the towel over the gold cross on my sternum. ''Still, personal best.'' Smiling, he dived after the brick.

  For life-saving, we were split into pairs, Sonning and Ali, me and Andy, Leo and Sooty, the two gimps together and Hartley with the chubby kid.

  ''Yikes,'' muttered Paulus, ''Jambo's gonna drown.''

  After two minutes of treading water, Jacko got us to swim a width underwater. I got halfway across before my protesting lungs gave out. Still, I made it further than Paulus. Leo swam the whole width without surfacing once and bounced up and down on the other side waving two fingers and calling us losers. Then we had to tow each other a width by getting a hand under our partner's chin, sculling backwards with our free hand and kicking with our legs. I messed it up immediately when Paulus kicked me by accident and I let him go so we switched and Paulus tried towing me. We got halfway when a water-wave slapped my face and made me splutter. Leo and Sooty, obviously, were brilliant. Bloody water-gaybies.

  ''What a balls-up!'' roared Jacko as Paulus yelled I was 'such a spaz'. ''Change partners. Andy with Mark, JP with Rosie.''

  The moment I had been secretly dreading yet secretly wishing for had come.

  ''Sir,'' said Ali, ''I can't.''

  ''Nor me, sir,'' I glowered. ''I'll go with Sonning.''

  ''You'll go with Rose,'' snapped Jacko irritably.

  ''But sir…'' said Ali.

  ''You're a senior prefect, man!'' growled Jacko. ''Act like one.''

  Facing him in the water, I adjusted my goggle-strap.

  ''So, Alistair, you gonna drown me then? Like the sick freak I am?''

  His eyes narrowed slightly. ''Shut up. Just breathe out and let yourself sink.''

  ''I knew it,'' I said, ''You hate me so much…''

  Muttering 'shut up' again, he forced my head under the water. As I spluttered a protest, he flipped me onto my back, cupped his left hand under my chin and took my upper body onto his. I could feel his skin against mine and suddenly I couldn't breathe properly and it wasn't from the water but from the touch that had sent the now-familiar tingle of excitement racing through me, set my heart on fire, sapped the strength from my limbs and sent a surge of fire to my groin. I settled back on his chest as he sculled across the pool. His soft stubble scraped my shoulder and I heard him breathing in my ear, warm, rough, rasping gasps. I wondered if that was how it would be when he made love to me. Oh boy. When he made love to me… Closing my eyes, I wallowed in this moment. I wanted to stay like this forever. Suddenly, sadly, we reached the side and he dragged me from the water, lifting me by the hips, touching my hips. I trembled as I flopped onto the blood-red floor and felt him manipulating my limbs like I was a broken Barbie doll.

  ''Play dead,'' he said, his voice oddly harsh.

  I opened my eyes. ''What?''

  ''Pretend to be dead. I've got to do the A-B-C.''

  ''Like this?'' I froze my expression, mimicking rigor mortis.

 
''No,'' he said, struggling not to smile.

  ''Oh. Like this?'' I let my face fall sideways, mouth hanging open, tongue lolling out.

  He didn't reply, then I heard him laugh. I squinted up at him. His eyes were sparkling.

  ''Stop pissing about,'' he said, miming compressions on my chest.

  ''Ow!'' I said.

  ''I'm not even touching you. One. Two. Three. Four. Five.''

  He pinched my nose and then leaned towards me. Mouth-to-mouth. With Ali.

  Oh boy! Best day ever!

  His eyes darkened with hunger, desire, love, everything raging together, everything so intense. For a moment, angels hung between us, barely breathing. Time froze. I stared into his soul and saw the truth. I parted my lips for the contact that was coming. It was coming. But instead he flipped me roughly into the recovery-position. I yelled ''ow!'' again, genuinely this time, and called him a twat as he cried ''Finished, sir!'' I could see an erection in his trunks.

  ''Good work, Ali,'' said Jacko, walking down the line of rescuers and rescued, yelling at Jambo to pound the fat boy's chest.

  I heard Jambo saying something about not wanting to lose his hand in the flab as Alistair breathed into my ear that he had to flip me 'cos I had this massive erection.

  ''So've you,'' I grinned.

  ''Shit,'' he spluttered, and dived over me into the pool.

  Everyone was fairly exhausted when we returned to the changing room, even Leo, but, as I peeled away my trunks and stood under the hot, reviving shower with my bottle of supermarket-brand shampoo and felt the circulation returning to my limbs, I felt really happy. We were friends again and, it seemed, he still wanted me.

  ''Thank God I'm out of those.'' Leo tossed the spangly Speedos across the showers.

  ''So 'm I,'' I murmured hungrily as Ali prowled towards us wrapped only in a towel.

  Leo shot me this quizzical glance and splattered camomile and acacia honey Timotei over his butter-coloured curls. ''You're glad I'm out of my trunks?''

  ''What? No.'' I slapped his shoulder. ''You gay or something?''

  Leo, laughing, said ''Yes. Aren't you?''

  ''No, you stupid little twat,'' I snarled, ''Of course I'm not.''

  Leo simply laughed again, swivelled his body in the shower-spray and started warbling in a falsetto Sheena Easton's 'Modern Girl': ''She don't build her world round no single man, But she's gettin' by, doin' what she can, She is free to be, what she wants to be, 'N all what she wants to be, is a modern girl.'' Stupid little twat.

  ''So, Leo,'' said Alistair, taking the place beside me, ''Are your jewels still in the same place or have they migrated north?''

  Leo fiddled with himself for a moment and said everything seemed to be there, and did anyone want to double-check?

  ''Just so long as they're in working order, eh, Jonny?'' Ali gave me a wink.

  ''I'll find out tonight,'' said Leo chirpily, soaping himself, ''In my bedtime wank.'' He was erecting in front of us and didn't seem to care.

  Tearing my eyes away from Leo's thin pencil-stub penis, I watched white steamy foam streaming down Ali's lean frame. He was using Wash 'n' Go. Man, I had to get some.

  ''Look,'' he said, running a hand through the wet, bruise-black hair. ''I'm sorry about that Saturday. I behaved like a jerk.''

  ''Yes you did,'' said Leo smartly. ''You were a total cunt.''

  ''Leo,'' said Ali impatiently, ''Go play with yourself while the grown-ups talk.''

  Leo's face took on this sly, foxy smirk as he blew us a kiss and paraded through the changing room wiggling his hips to 'I'm sexy and I know it' and summoning Sutcliffe whilst the showers hissed around my head. Ali seemed so much bigger than me.

  ''Didn't know you were a Christian,'' he said, touching the gold cross on my chest.

  ''Yeah,'' I said, ''But I'm not as serious as I used to be. I got fed up with being told how everything I want to do is a sin.''

  Alistair grunted. ''Like what?''

  ''Oh, you know,'' I said airily, ''Drinking, sex before marriage… blimey, if I have to wait that long, I'll never get it. Have to settle for masturbation, and that's even more sinful.''

  That silvery laugh switched on parts of my body I would rather it hadn't. I so much wanted to gaze at his groin but, knowing what that would do to mine, I kept my eyes fixed on the wall-tiles and tried to think about something else, Maths, rugby, God, God knows what.

  ''Look,'' he said, ''I am sorry. I was upset, confused and scared. It's pretty intense, this stuff, isn't it? I'm not sure what I should feel any more.'' He sounded so tired. ''It's really confusing, don't you think?'' I wasn't sure what he meant. Did he mean love? Or realising you fancy another guy? ''Anyway,'' he squeezed my arm. ''Can we start over? I really want us to be friends.''

  ''You were so mean to me,'' I said. ''You called me horrible names.''

  His eyes saddened. ''I know, and I'm ashamed of myself. You're the best thing in my life. I didn't mean to hurt you. It just came out badly.''

  I had to give him another chance. His heart was breaking before me. My eyes softened and, returning the squeeze, I felt the last trace of straightness vanish like a soap-bubble. Skipping onto the tiles, I wrapped my towel round my waist and said ''Starting over.''

  ''Love that mole.'' He tapped the side of his neck. ''You know you've got one on your left shoulder-blade too?''

  I grinned. ''You shouldn't be looking!''

  Paulus, sitting on the bench in a white slip and vest, jerked his head towards the showers. ''So it's true then.''

  ''What is?'' I replied defensively.

  ''You and Rosie.'' He ran this Adidas speed-stick inside his smooth, hairless armpits.

  ''Fuck off,'' I said. ''Where did you hear that?''

  ''Something Wilson said. And Gray. A few people.''

  ''Well,'' I said, ''It's a load of bollocks, Andrew.''

  Paulus nodded at the tent in my towel. ''What's that then?''

  ''So I get erections in the shower.'' I hoped a little light laughter would cover my embarrassment. ''Don't you?''

  ''Not when I'm in the shower with other boys,'' he said, narrowing his chilly blue eyes. ''I saw the way you were looking at each other in the life-saving class. You were about to kiss.''

  ''Bollocks,'' I laughed uneasily, ''Anyway, why were you looking?'' About to add 'you great poof,' the words died in my throat.

  ''If I saw it, others might see it too.'' He buttoned his white shirt thoughtfully. ''Be careful, J. People see, people talk. People don't know stuff, they make it up. Look at the newspapers. Look at Goddard. His wife just had a baby but that hasn't stopped people inventing stuff. Never let the facts stand in the way of a juicy story.'' Squinting down at me, he slipped into his blazer and said ''You're my best friend. I'd hate to see you in someone else's story.''