Chapter 4

Monday 16th December 1969 to Friday 13th February 1970

After our spat over the anniversary, I sensed there was something of a change in our relationship. It was impossible to pin down, but things were not quite the same. I couldn’t work out whether things were better or worse. She certainly hugged and kissed a lot more.

Penny stayed at the flat until the weekend, going shopping in Manchester for Christmas presents, while I toiled at work. We went to my parents’ house on the Monday before Christmas so that Penny could leave her presents and spend some time with my family. Kitty ragged Penny dreadfully about the weekend away, and Penny, bless her, took it in her stride.

On Tuesday evening I took her back to her parents’ place. Her father was working late – something he did regularly, and so I was subjected to mother’s distain without any amelioration.

Again the dragon offered no refreshment, but Penny ignored her rudeness and made me a sandwich and some tea, and I think, to irritate her mother, hung on my arm and cuddled up to me. Mother took one look and disappeared. I left the house with a scorching kiss from my girl, and a distinct absence from her mother.

Christmas fell on a Thursday, and in England Christmas Day and the day after (known as Boxing day) are public (known as Bank) holidays, and that year were followed immediately by the weekend (known as a ‘weekend’).

It was fun having my siblings around, and dinner on the day was as always delicious and overpowering.

It was on Saturday that I was awoken by the phone.

“Graham,” Penny begged, “please can you come and pick me up from home. I can’t stand any more of mother’s nagging and her lies. She’s ruined my Christmas.”

I had nothing else to do, and the trains would be scarce if they ran at all.

“OK,” I said. “I need to get dressed and then it’s about an hour.”

“Thank you, you’ve no idea.”

“You can tell me all about it on the way back, see you soon.”

When I arrived she was waiting outside the gates with her bag. She piled in and we were off. She vented her frustration half the time of the journey.

The essence was that her mother constantly denigrated me, said I was a philanderer and was seeing other women, badgered her to find a ‘more suitable’ boyfriend, hinted that she would be ‘cut off’ if she married me.

Penny said that the tirade continued all Christmas Day, to the extent that Derek told his mother to stop it or he and the family would be going home. The atmosphere was tense all the next day.

Penny said Ingrid was good to her, telling her that Derek got the same treatment when marriage was in the air for them. Mother did not want ‘foreigners’ in the family! Ingrid and Penny spent most of the time in Penny’s bedroom.

There was no mention of her father, so I assumed he kept well out of it. After all, he had to live with her when they all went home. It reminded me that he spent a disproportionate amount of time at work, and I wondered afresh about their marriage.

“You know I only have tomorrow off,” I said as we carried her bags up to my flat.

That’s OK,” she said cheerfully (her relief at leaving home was palpable), “I can look up some friends and I can be your housekeeper. I can cook, you know.”

We spent the rest of the day at my parents’ with my siblings, with whom she had made firm friends.

When we returned to the flat, she expressed her gratitude for her escape by stripping naked, kneeling before me, unfastening my trousers, unzipping, pulling my pants and underwear down, pushing me down on the sofa, and heavens above, taking me in her mouth.

I was shocked.

“Penny, you don’t have to,” I said, desperately hoping she would brush aside my concern, which she did. Wheyhey!

“Yes, I do,” she said, “I talked with Ingrid, and she said it’s not too bad.”

She bent to her task once more, and I couldn’t help feeling Ingrid had been giving instruction in technique, for she was giving a classy blow, no teeth. After a while I felt the gathering, and warned her.

“Penny, I’m close.”

She did not carry on, and I did not come in her mouth. She pulled off and brought me off by hand, allowing my spend to splash all over her breasts. It was intense, and when I stopped twitching, she let go of my cock and scooped up some of my semen onto her fingers.

“Ingrid told me to taste it,” she explained, and popped the fingers in her mouth. She looked puzzled, scooped some more and tried again.

“It’s quite bitter,” she opined, “catches at the back of my throat, but doesn’t taste of all that much. A bit slimy perhaps, like raw egg.”

Then she laughed and looked mischievous.

“Are you going to kiss me?” she asked with a knowing smile, and scooping up the last remaining globs of the stuff, stuffing it in her mouth. It was a challenge. She sucked her fingers and lifted her face for a kiss. I kissed her and tasted the bitterness on her tongue. I had tasted my own cum before (don’t ask!). I wouldn’t say it was pleasant but not unpleasant either.

She looked surprised. “Ingrid said you would refuse. Men do,” she said by way of explanation.

“I’d never refuse to kiss you, my darling. Not my favourite flavour, but edible,” I said smugly, “Not my first time either.”

She looked a little confused at that, but the expression on her face soon changed when I pulled her up, placed her by my side sliding off immediately to pull her to the edge of the cushion. I spread her and began to return her favour. It did not take long before she was groaning and moaning and pushing her mound into my face. I intensified my tongue work and she came in quick time.

“Oh, yes!” were the only understandable words, though the other guttural and squeaky sounds she emitted expressed her pleasure eloquently enough for me.

We filled two glasses with milk and retired to bed. She made a comment about the colour of milk and semen. She thought milk tasted better but wondered about the relative protein content. I couldn’t enlighten her on that one.

Next day we joined my family on a Sunday hike in the hills and then dinner at my parents’. Then home for some gentle oral loving – she swallowed; I kissed her after. She grinned.

The work days were short that week since New Year was on the Thursday, and though it would be some years before it was made an official Bank Holiday, for our practice it was another holiday, and the Partners gave us the Friday as well. No one wanted legal advice then anyway! Penny stayed in bed each morning, but cooked the evening meal for all three days.

“We are invited to a New Year’s Eve party,” she told me over dinner on Tuesday, “You remember Annette? Did Russian, shacked up with Solly? It’s at their place.”

It sounded fun, and Wednesday evening, New Year’s Eve, found us pushing an open door into a fairly large Edwardian house. It seemed that the couple shared the house with four other people. I got into a discussion about the future of computing with a bloke called Bill (not Gates, at fourteen he was too young to come to the party, and anyway he lived too far away), and when I left him, I could not find Penny.

Eventually, after ranging over the house, I saw her sitting on a sofa in the smaller of the back rooms, deep in conversation with a very good looking guy. The room was quite dark and she didn’t see me. However I could hear her and it seemed the guy was French and she was talking to him in that language.

The thing that intrigued me was that he was clearly trying to get off with her. The words I did not understand, but the tone and inflection, coupled with Penny’s flirty laughter, made it obvious. I wondered where this flirtation might lead, and stood back in the dark hall out of their line of vision. I watched.

He would touch her arm, her shoulder, push her hair over her ear as he talked. I’d seen lads at school and university seduce girls and he was following the script. It was when he put his hand on her knee that she stiffened and took it off. He apologised, but kept up the touching. The second time he put a hand on her thigh, and she immediately stood up and said something the tone of which left nothing to the imagination. At that I came round the corner.

“Ah, there you are darling!” I gushed. He bristled, she smiled.

“And oo ees thees?” he asked her, as if I were an intruder on his turf.

“Let me introduce you, Michel this is Graham, my boyfriend. Graham, Michel has been telling me all about his chateau in the Dordogne.”

We shook hands. He made it a contest. As he squeezed my hand hard, I brought my other hand up and applied a pressure point to his wrist and he let go, grabbing his wrist and wincing.

“Don’t try that again, pal,” I said nonchalantly, “or I’ll break your wrist next time.”

Penny looked confused at the confrontation, and Michel wandered off, muttering something Gallic, an insult, I was sure.

We saw in the New Year, kissed each other and an undefined number of other folk of the opposite sex. I saw Michel heading for Penny, and I was about to intervene, but she turned him down much to his confusion.

On the way home to my flat, she told me all about his pitch to seduce her, and how infantile she found it. I told her of his attempt to crush my hand in the hand shake, and the technique my father taught me to counter it. It seemed to bring us closer.

That weekend we played at being married, though without the full on sex – that went without saying. There was plenty of hand and oral though. She asked to be taken back to Liverpool on Monday, since I had taken an extra day’s holiday. We went to the Church and found there was a practice.

Penny was welcomed warmly, and I stood behind her. She re-introduced me to each member, most of whom worked in Liverpool and were older than we were, though one about our age was introduced who lived in the area, and was also at the College of Education that Penny attended, so he was more memorable: Martin Greaves. He was a good looking confident lad, I thought, and he knew it.