on the laying of ghosts - part i

lest we forget those who layed down their dignity in our search for a cure to adolecsence

My parents moved to Scotland when I was eleven years old. To the middle of nowhere, our nearest neighbour was the game keeper who lived a half mile away. I was the only English boy in school, so it wasn’t particularly easy, and I’d also come from an all boys school, so girls were a foreign country as far as I was concerned. The upshot of which was that I was a very late developer. Obviously I knew you could do other things than just wee through ‘it’, but I could never see how I might get the opportunity to find out if I couldn’t even speak to a girl without fear of imminent seizure.

I was seventeen when I had my first date. The ‘my mate fancies your mate’ grapevine worked for me. She was short, pretty, and she had very large breasts, and all of my friends agreed that I’d done remarkably well. They also had a strategy. (Apparently it was okay to confer on these things, and since they all seemed vastly more experienced than me I was happy for the advice).

Our date was fixed for the cinema in the nearest large town, Ayr. We met outside the cinema, and I managed to stutter through the helloes and dutifully pay for the tickets. I was immensely proud and embarrassed in equal measure when she held my hand and sat us in the back row.

Now I was wearing a duffle coat, and it was very, very warm, but it was okay as it was a prop in the great strategy that we had developed in the lower 6th common room. I asked her if she’d like a drink, which she did and I excused myself to go back to the kiosk. I bought the biggest cup of Kia Ora orange they had, and a tiny bag of Revels with the money I had left (I wasn’t mean, just stupid) and toddled off to the toilet. Half of the orange went down the loo to make room for the half bottle of vodka that one of my conspirators had bought from the off license near the school (strange isn’t it, how there’s always one seventeen year old in each class who looks as if he could body double for Magnum?). The duffle coat was the only thing I owned with pockets big enough to smuggle it in.

She took the cup and held it when we got back to the seat, and I avoided any awkward conversation by feeding her the Revels, I think I remember her spitting one out, it was probably the coffee cream. The film began (no, I’ve no idea what it was) and when she occasionally passed me the cup I took tiny sips

Slowly, slowly, oh so slowly I put my arm around her shoulders. I don’t think I needed to have been so discreet as she leaned forward slightly to make it easier – and we sat for what seemed like a very long time with my hand resting on her arm and going gradually numb. Slowly, Slowly, oh how slowly I walked my fingers down her arm, (I had to make a move before rigor mortis set in), waiting for a shrug, any sign of disapproval, and finally sort of twitched my arm sideways with a "oops, 'scuse me" so that two of my fingers suddenly plopped onto her breast….and, my word, beyond all hope, not a murmur, in fact she’s snuggling, I’m sure she is.

I moved my whole hand and cupped nowhere near her whole boob. This was amazing, beyond my wildest dreams, I was in the back row of the pictures with a real girl who I’d scarcely managed two sentences with and she letting me fondle her breast.

I’m afraid that excitement got the better of me. I moved my arm out from behind her and she shifted backward in her seat with a little moan, holding on tightly to the cup with both of her hands and thighs. I needed room to manoeuvre. Her top pulled to one side (when I tried really hard) and her bra came up over her breast. I was fascinated, engrossed beyond any inkling of decent behaviour. I inspected it from every angle, visually and with both hands. Her top moved to the left too so that she was completely revealed. Now I still had a suspicion that there were bones in girl’s breasts, that the nipple was actually the stopper on the end of a bone that was connected at the other end to the rib cage (for support you see). But the scientific method never lies and I was delighted to find that the whole thing was soft and squidgy. (Except, remarkably, for the little bit in the middle which was beginning to mimic the eraser on the end of a pencil).

God knows how long this sordid examination went on for, but it must have lasted for the whole film. It was many moons ago when every feature ended with a rendition of the “Queen” before the lights went up fully. Dark figures began to rise from the seats in front of us, it was a much more gentile world even then, others passed by on the way out.

I was in complete panic, the young lady didn’t seem to care less. I tried frantically to put everything back where it came from but they seemed to have a developed a life of their own, expanded somehow like styrene foam, and nothing seemed to fit properly anymore. Every time I managed to push one bit of her incredible boobage into place, another popped out.

As the lights came up fully I did the only thing I could, I covered her with my duffle coat and we sat there, patiently until all of the other customers left.

It became apparent, when we were alone, that far from being a happy, willing participant in this encounter, she was in fact in an alcohol induced stupor. Kia Ora must have never tasted so good and there was only a half inch left in what had been two pint cup. I tried desperately and in vain to wake her up, then had a rummage around under the duffle in a last desperate attempt to put back that which I had so inelegantly released.

But the cleaners came, so I ran away. And went home on the bus.

We never spoke again, but I heard through the grapevine that we’d had a pleasant, but boring night, and that I wasn’t really “her sort”