More Fish in the River
by Feangol
This story was written as an experiment and as "therapy" at a time when I was at a cusp in my life, and I'd realised that closets are pretty lonely and started inviting other people inside. Some of those people drew my attention to the handle on my side of the door, and I've taken a few peeks outside.
Special thanks to It's Only Me from Across the Sea for hosting this story, and to him and my friend Flopot for encouraging me to do it!
This story contains explicit descriptions of sexual acts between the characters in it. Although the characters are teenagers who may be below the age of consent in the country or state where this is read, nothing written here should be taken as approval of, or encouragement for, sexual liaisons between people where such liaisons are either illegal, or objectionable for moral reasons. Although this story does not include safe sex practices, it is everyone's own responsibility to themselves and to each other to engage only in PROTECTED SEX. It is a story. Any resemblance to real persons is purely coincidental. Nothing represented here is based on any fact known to the author.
The story is copyright 2001 by "Feangol". If you copy the story, please leave the credits, and the web address of http://www.iomfats.org present, and also the email address of feangol@hotmail.com. I'd love to receive feedback.
Chapter 6
I didn't sleep well that night. I'd had a great day with Luke, and things were going really well. Then I'd spoiled it all. My dreams had been wracked by guilt and anger at myself. I awoke in the worst mood ever, the occasional twinge from my bad leg sending me from frustration and anger into self-pity and disgust. I'd already been excruciatingly rude to my mum before I left the house, and I slowly cycled the route to school barely looking where I was going as I rode through the park. I almost ran over a stupid dog that came barking up at my bike, and when its owner reprimanded me and not the dog I told them using as many four-letter words as I could remember, and as much volume as I could muster, just what I thought of owners who didn't control their animals in a public park. I took some small pleasure that my tirade seemed to sink home and certainly made me feel somewhat better for a short while. As I neared school, and therefore Luke, I slipped back into my fugue, and the uncharacteristic incident with the dog woman was added to my list of things to feel guilty about.
I walked down the corridor to my form room taking some small delight in shouldering a second year boy who tried to walk through me. I repeated it on another small lad sending him flying, and immediately felt ashamed and helped him up and apologised. Great. Yet another person on the planet who thinks Sam Cooper's an idiot. I realised the guy was actually crying a little bit and I'd obviously hurt him. I apologised again and asked him if he was ok, and as I looked at his face with concern realised he was actually quite cute. He assured me he was fine, and accepted the mars bar I dug out of my lunch with a smile. I proceeded more carefully down the corridor feeling, if possible, more of a complete arsehole. As I approached my form room my reaction to the boy sank in, and I kicked the door open, perhaps to prove that I was just as macho and male as anyone else in the room.
"Ooh tough guy" said Will Chapman, failing to impress me with his own tough guy routine.
"Fuck off Chapman", I said, turning my back on him as I unlocked my locker.
"Fuck of yourself you faggot" he replied, with masterful eloquence.
The interest level of the room instantly focussed on our little area. I was more than capable of standing up to Will in a physical fight, but as he rarely actually got under my skin in spite of his best efforts, I tended to just keep my head down and ignore him. This morning really was not the time for Will to notice me, and his choice of insult made all the difference to me. I'd been putting up with stupid insults from him for a couple of years now, and I guess I'd been collecting them like Chris collected football stickers. I'd just reached a full book of stickers now.
I spun round and with the momentum of my turn hit him a good hook on the side of his jaw, and he fell back onto some chairs, and rolled off to the floor.
The room was silent a moment, then a few of the boys began congratulating me, while others gathered round Will and helped him up. Immediately the righteous anger and satisfaction I'd felt were replaced by a sick feeling in my stomach as I realised I'd made someone else cry that morning, and it wasn't quite 9 O'Clock.
Shortly our form tutor Mr McCloud came in, and although he could clearly see that Will had been crying, and had a red mark on his face, chose not to say anything. Will was known as a mouthy boy, and I suppose McCloud decided he'd got whatever he'd asked for. I was relieved as we were dismissed without comment, although part of me wanted to be punished.
The rest of the mornings lessons passed reasonably smoothly, and I was relieved when we were let out for lunch break finally. As I walked into the dining hall with my lunch tray I saw Luke sitting on his own and, after an internal debate, went over to him.
"Hi," I said sitting down, and putting my food on the table.
He looked up and smiled, but it wasn't his usual electric grin. My self esteem was about as low as I thought it could get, until he stood up.
"Look, I got to go," he said and picked up his tray and walked away.
I was really hating myself now. I picked at my food, and unable to eat very much decided I had to apologise to Luke. I'd obviously pissed him off yesterday, and it was chewing my insides up that I'd made him feel bad. And that he might not like me any more.
I spent about twenty minutes walking around the school, and my bad leg was starting to play up again. I sat down under a tree out the front of the main school building, feeling utterly despondent. I was moping there for maybe ten minutes when Chris showed up.
"Jesus I've been looking for you all over" he said.
"Hi" I said, in a flat tone.
"Wassup? You ok Sam?" he asked, concerned.
"Yeah sure, just had a bad morning"
"I heard about you and Chapman. Nice one!" he said.
"Yeah I suppose. He had it coming to him I suppose."
"Yeah" said Chris, obviously disappointed that I wasn't feeling more bloodthirsty about the whole event. "Well anyway you all ready for Lurrrrrve this weekend?" he asked.
"What?" I yelped.
"Hello?? McFly" said Chris, rapping me on the head like in the film. "Judy Parsons? Sam Cooper, super stud?" he said, in a sarcastic tone.
"Oh right yeah sure." I said. I really couldn't get very enthusiastic about this. Judy had failed to occupy my every waking moment for the past week. Something else to feel guilty about.
"She's coming round at 2:30pm ok?" Chris said
"Yeah sure... um great" I said, trying to sound interested.
"You're not nervous are you?"
"Ah yeah nervous. A bit anyway" I said. Seeming pleased he'd got to the bottom of my detachment, Chris proceeded to regale me with what was going to happen on Saturday.
Chris was a good friend, we'd more or less grown up together. We'd occasionally drifted apart, he being obsessed with football and girls, and I suppose I got a little bored. We usually enjoyed our time together but he was a bit more of a "lad" than I was. He was very loyal, however, and we usually looked out for each other, albeit in a very back slapping greenie-spitting fashion.
I sat back and half listened to the crude exploits that Chris anticipated for me on the weekend and admired the grounds of the school. An excellent grounds-staff maintained the lawns and gardens in first-rate condition. The layout of the paths was sensible, unlike those in the park which meandered hopelessly leading people to make their own muddy and worn tracks. The school paths - whether by design or by evolution and acceptance over the years - took the shortest route between any two points that people wanted to travel between. This meant that the lawns were unscarred, and the flowerbeds developed without harm. Football was restricted to the pitches, but pupils were allowed to walk and sit on the grass and enjoy the environment, as I was doing now. I felt a little calmer than I had earlier, but I was still feeling pretty down.
The bell rang, drawing us back into afternoon lessons, and bringing my concentration back to Chris' pep talk. I reluctantly allowed myself to be drawn into both against my will. That afternoon I got home not remembering a thing about my cycle ride, and after I'd got a drink out and sat in front of the telly my mum asked me if I wanted to talk.
"What about?" I asked.
"Well I don't know darling, its just you were obviously upset about something last night and this morning. Did you have an argument with Luke?"
Oh god, mums are amazing. I swear if the military employed mothers to handle things, they could do away with multi-billion pound satellites and spy networks.
"Something like that" I said, then regretted it. Mum didn't like me talking to her in "that voice".
"Well, do you want to tell me what you argued about?" she said, ignoring my sulky response.
"I'm not even sure mum. I'm just such an idiot" I mumbled.
"You think you did something to upset him?" mum asked.
"I think so" I almost whispered, feeling the tears building up.
"Well have you tried apologising to him?"
"Its not that sort of thing mum" I said, feeling a tear roll down my cheek.
"Oh. Well the best thing to do is to talk about it if you can. You obviously like him a great deal, you hardly stopped talking about him since last week, and he certainly has shown he really likes you."
She was obviously a bit confused, but I didn't need to be told I liked him: that wasn't the problem at all. I liked him too much, and I wasn't sure if he did really like me anymore. I suppose she thought I was angry at him. When she said that it was the last straw, and I shook my head and ran up to my room and threw myself on my bed and let the tears come.
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