Chapter 12

The projects finally started. Olivia and Andrew were doing one of the projects together but there had been too many applications for the other obvious structural engineering project and he had not been lucky in the lottery for places. So they were going to have to cope on their own for one of the projects. He figured they would be okay. Andrew went and spoke to his Director of Studies, Professor Cannon, about his second choice. Most of the faculty and nearly all of the Fellows at Trinity had no idea about his Computer Science degree. What Andrew wanted to check with Cannon was whether it was okay to undertake the software project given he had a degree in Computer Science. It took Cannon a day or two but he came back and said it was okay. The project had a different emphasis and neither the University nor the Department had any objections. He never said it out loud but there was definitely an undercurrent of ‘this is Cambridge, not the Open University’.

It was probably good for the two of them to work on something separately, just to remember that they could. The projects were challenging but it was the group aspect that always made him concentrate. Group dynamics can change from group to group and even day to day. He and Olivia were two of a group of three for their structural project and the third person was a quiet guy from Northern Ireland, Martin. He was as big a geek as they were and the whole project was simple. Not effortless for they all put in a lot of effort. But the inter-group dynamic was earnest, focused on exceeding every benchmark, and there was no conflict. They had healthy debates but there was no rancour. Straightforward.

Unlike several of the other groups. What had Rollie said? Demonstrate leadership but don’t drown out everyone else. Make sure everyone gets a chance to be heard. Several of the groups had problems with a dominant personality. As Suzanne had talked about with her course and group situations, it was those that knew the least that often tried to talk the most. Olivia and Andrew lucked out with Martin, but in a different way he lucked out with them. The make-up of groups could be so arbitrary.

That Andrew had a degree in computer science was a significant boost for his other project but not nearly as much as he had thought or hoped. It had been three years since he had studied any computing and it was a subject that was growing and evolving at a frightening speed. They were again in a group of three and had to work first as a group splitting the design of some software so that each of them wrote a third of the code, testing their individual skills before challenging them as a group on the integration of the software. Once they had produced working code they then worked individually and spent the rest of the project dealing with change requests from an imaginary client to see how each of them incorporated new ideas, altered routines.

That group dynamic was odd at the beginning because the other two group members, guys Andrew didn’t know at all, were really defensive. And he didn’t understand why. It was not until well into the second meeting between the three of them that he got fed up with their attitude and antics and asked. They were called Dave and Chris by the way. They were expecting Andrew to be an arse and so were pre-emptively being arses instead. Why? Because he was top of the year, or thereabouts. This was Cambridge, everyone had to be smart just to get through the gate but Andrew belatedly realised that he was not as anonymous as he thought he was.

It was another example of missing social cues, or just being blindly self-absorbed. In many ways his life was easy. But it was easy inside the bubbles of studying and examinations. Someone external kept score and he did well. But dealing with people was the exact opposite of that. Since his recovery from cancer Andrew had met a lot of people, and made some incredible, long-term friends. But he had also wandered blindly through life constantly being amazed at human nature, and often not in a good way. He had been a naïve boy and young man. Even now there were moments, such as this one, where he would be confused. Chris and Dave were worried Andrew would be a know-it-all arsehole and being arseholes first was their defense mechanism, and they were also envious of his success. When he realised this it gave him a moment of doubt. It made him question his ability to understand people, to discern things like this. With the two of them self-interest overcame both sides of this divide. There simply wasn’t time on the project to let this fester. They were never going to be friends, they were never even going to be friendly, but they needed each other to get through this and so everyone stepped back and they got through the project. But the inter-group issues cost them marks in the overall assessment. A lesson to be learned.

Andrew went down to London and saw Ara both weekends after the projects started. The first of the two trips Pedro and Justin came too, they needed an evening away from studying. Pedro seemed stressed by his upcoming finals and fell out of his tree badly. Justin and Andrew had to help him back to the car. After a solid tactical chunder before they drove off Pedro slept all the way back to Cambridge and there was no need for an emergency stop on the way. Justin had gone easy and so the two of them chatted away as they negotiated their way out of London and up the M11 back to Cambridge. The second weekend Andrew went down on his own and he and Ara spent the day in Chelsea. They got off the Tube at Sloane Square and headed down King’s Road. They passed the Duke of York’s Barracks and Andrew looked with interest to see if there was a TA Royal Engineer regiment listed on the regimental boards at the front gate but there was no sign. Once he had finished rubber-necking at the barracks he took in his surroundings. The memory that was strongest was the ambush by the two Sloane Rangers nearly three years earlier. They had reminded him of Ara in background, they were her peers, but now three years later as he walked through Chelsea with Ara beside him Andrew realised he was a different person.

“What are you thinking about Andrew? You had one of your far off gazes.”

He shrugged and told her the tale of meeting the two women in July 1983. And how at the time it made him question his confidence and leadership.

“You make them sound so fearsome.”

“That is the thing, they were not. It was the attitude that got to me. Casual superiority, something like that. Plus they assumed any man would want to spend time with them. I don’t know, just walking here with you brought back some of those memories.”

“You get very introspective and down on yourself at times Andrew.”

‘True, but my innate nature is shy. It is something that I am much better at than I was as a teenager but it is not natural. Maths, engineering, science, they are all natural to me. I don’t have to think about things it just makes sense to me. Even business does to a surprising extent. But nobody can be perfect at everything, even good at everything. For me it is dealing with people in a natural but confident manner, particularly when I first meet them. I can play the grumpy bastard without difficulty and keep people at arm’s length that way. But it goes back to Old Andrew, pre cancer Andrew, I find it difficult to strike the right tone. Let people down gently, things like that. Am I making any sense?”

“Yes you are. It is insightful to know that you can’t be good at everything. Has the Army not helped?”

“Oh without question. First CCF and now the OTC have made a huge difference. It is my group activity. The place where I hang out with a bunch of people.”

He talked about how command and leadership had been automatic most of the year. What he was talking about was the difference between in charge of something, such as a group of soldiers, versus social mingling, networking, mindless chitchat. Andrew knew he was still shit at that second scenario. But the day was too nice for his endless angst and he parked it and focused on Ara. They had dinner south of the river and walked for hours and miles. It was a wonderful day. They both had parked the issue of sex between them and accepted that it was going to happen but had no idea when. Now Andrew was happy enough to continue to go slow with Ara because he had an outlet for his lusts in Merry. As he drove back up to Cambridge the thought crossed his mind as to what Ara was doing to obtain relief.

He didn’t see Meredith that week until the Thursday night when her final exam was over. Like he had been she was tired and she came over to the College but all she did was collapse in bed and lay asleep on his shoulder for twelve hours. At the end of exams their bodies needed to recharge. The following morning found Andrew with a hungry Meredith. Hungry for food but also hungry for him. They fucked, ate and then fucked again. And with a joy that couldn’t be faked; nothing to do with the other person but everything to do with the last exam being over. It was one of the best aphrodisiacs of all. ‘Yippee, no more exams’ will do wonders for your ardour. Or Meredith was horny, it was one of the two. Town was going to be chaos that night as a large number of courses had finished their exams. Boilers were dangerously in the red and hundreds of students were about to let off steam. Andrew went swimming to avoid the whole thing and think about the following day.

That term, the whole year, had been full of contradictions and Andrew had been very typically male. He and Suzanne had rekindled what they had and were getting closer and closer. Ara had also started to get closer and closer, complicated by the fact that neither of them was ready to initiate sex again. So he had these two women where all his questions were about the future. Meredith was complication free other than for his psyche. He was not sure it said about him that he was writing to Suzanne every week, visiting Ara regularly but upon his return to Cambridge he was jumping into bed with Meredith. He was telling no lies of commission but the lies of omission were growing weekly. And all that ignored the slutting around either side of Christmas with Lilja, Chiara, Renee and Jeanne.

Then there was the end of exam ‘surprise’ for Helena. During his exams and during hers Andrew still went to her room and made sure she was not just awake but out of bed. It was such a part of his routine that it was automatic now. In the gap between the end of his exams and the start of hers he had sat and had dinner with Helena several times. She was just as stressed as the rest of them and had not found a Meredith equivalent to relieve her stress. Helena had talked several times both at the end of second term when she invited Abi into their bed, and during third term, about experimenting. Andrew was the safe guy she could confess some of this to, but nothing came of it. It was one thing to talk about it, it was quite another to actually have the conversation with another person, the third person you are inviting into bed.

Which was where Andrew had lucked out with Meredith. No judgement, no hang-ups, willing to try anything, and now extremely excited about Saturday night. But what he had to do was convince Helena to join them. Meredith was going to wait in his room and he had to lure Helena into their clutches. It was that conversation that he was playing out in his head. Andrew was really excited, worse even than Merry, about the possibilities for the evening. He had been taken aback how excited even the limited interaction between Renee and Jeanne had made him. He had met Jeanne two days before and hardly knew her. It was Renee that had excited him. To do something like this with two people that he knew well just turned Andrew on every time he thought about it. He needed to stop thinking about it for 10 minutes to be able to leave the pool and get changed without embarrassing himself. There was something about it that just sparked something in him. He shivered with excitement.

The next day there was no sign of life from either of them until after lunch, fragile described their first few hours that day after the end of term blow-out. But water, aspirin and food worked its usual miracle cure. Andrew told Helena he needed to speak to her after dinner and asked if he could come over to her room about 7.15. He ended up going for a run he was so keyed up, it was back to 14 year old hair trigger mode and he needed to calm down. 7.14 finally arrived and Meredith let him leave the room. She said she had to change but Andrew couldn’t get to see the outfit until he brought Helena back to the room. They were both going to look like fools if Helena threw him out and slammed the door in his face. He hesitated before Helena’s door but then knocked confidently.

“Come in, its open.”

Helena shouted through the door. He walked in and found her lying on her bed.

“I must have dozed off. Tired after last night. What did you want to talk about Andrew? Is everything okay?”

Andrew sat beside her on the bed and threw away all the clever lines he had cycled through.

“Everything is fine. I came to ask you to come over and join us in my room.”

“What for?”

He didn’t say anything he just smiled at her. Her look when she realised was textbook. Her face showed so many emotions all for just a fraction of a second. But then Helena’s face blanked and she looked at him coldly.

“I don’t think that would be a good idea.”

She let him hold her hand but gave no sign of cracking.

“What are you afraid of?”

Her hand was snatched away.

“I am not afraid Andrew. You have misinterpreted pillow talk. I think you should leave.”

Andrew smiled sadly and leaned down and kissed her gently on the cheek. This had always been the more probable outcome.

“I’m sorry. I was trying to fulfill your fantasy for you. Goodnight Helena.”

Remember the build-up to Moira and Andrew finally having anal sex? And the dick-softening scream of pain that shattered that dream? There was no scream but the soft dick part was true.

“Andrew wait a second.”

Helena got up out of bed and padded over to stand in front of him.

“It was too abrupt, you startled me. Use that mind of yours and paint me one of your word pictures. Seduce me you bloody engineer.”

The big old brain took a second or two to kick into gear. Andrew spun Helena round and swept the hair away from her neck. The first light kiss made her tremble.

“Do you know why I want you to be there? The number one reason why I want you to be there, I need you to be there, are your eyes. Those incredibly expressive eyes. The eyes that can command me with just a look. I want to see those eyes as Meredith kneels behind you like I am right now. I want to see your face as her fingers trace their way across your chest. Your nipples tingling in anticipation of her touch. I want to see her mouth nuzzle and caress your neck, just as I am right now. I want to watch your body experience all that, and so much more. But I need to see your mind deal with this. Helena Innes being fucked as another woman kisses and caresses her. I want to watch you resist, not give in to the hedonistic desires coursing through your body, but most of all I want to watch at the very moment when you surrender to your mind. Not to your body. I want to watch your mind reach out and grab it. Seize it. Embrace it. I want to see the look in your eyes as you push me away, fling Meredith down on the bed and dive in. I want to hear the moan, the scream that Meredith makes as you conquer her. I want to hear her moan of desire turn to frustration as I plunder your body, dislodging you from your succulent treat. I want you to experience everything, ask for anything, demand it all.”