“FUUUUUUUUUUCK!!!” She would have screamed it out loud, if she could have been sure of not being heard. As it was, she screamed it deep into her heart, where it burnt, scraped, and dug, till she folded up double on her bed with anguish.

She looked again at her phone.

Sorry, love. It’s over.

Four words. She stared at them again. She did not cry. For she was not sad as such. Nor even angry. Just in pain, bereft, despairing.

She lay back on her bed trembling, fists clenched against breasts. And in her abandonment, she pondered. She knew how she had got here. But, though she did not know how to escape, she knew what she wanted. She had wanted to, yearned to, for ages. And now, more than ever, she needed it – and now she was free.

She thought again. Now, or another time? It would be harder once she got home, because too many people would find out. So it was now or never.

Now.

She tiptoed out of her room and down the staircase, so as not to wake her neighbours. Out the front door, round the quad, past the porters’ lodge, into the town. It was dark and deserted, but warm. The college ramparts and chapel spires made soft silhouettes against the midsummer sky which, even at this deepest time of the night, harboured a tiny glimmer of not-quite-blackness from over the horizon.

As she walked, she saw that the town was empty.

She paused. This wasn’t a solution, was it? This was not wise.

But this was what she had wanted for so long. Freedom to do this – to go where her mind had gone so often. In a day’s time it would be too late. So, just this once. And then it would be all right. It would be different. Wouldn’t it?

She knew where to go. She had seen them there before. And so she walked onward, through the town centre, past colleges, over the river, across the Backs, along one of those footpaths heading west out of town, over a pedestrian bridge across the motorway, up a small hill, till she could see the grey skyline of the town behind her, distant, crenellated and proud, ruined only by the brutalist outline of the library tower.

She paused again. She knew this was not wise. But she wanted it. Oh God, how she wanted it.

“‘Appy Anniversary, luv!” Reg beamed, as he sat facing his wife over the candlelit remains of crêpes suzette. Pat had a sympathetic round face, graced with a gentle grin which five pregnancies, two miscarriages and a menopause had not managed to efface. Though older than Pat, Reg was still relatively slender, and his hair was not quite all grey.

“Thirty year!” sighed Pat. “Where ‘as it all gone?”

“Remember when we met, down Mosborough way – ‘oo was it, our Jackie’s birthday?”

“An’ you were too shy to dance – but I made you!”

“Well, you were prettiest girl in t’ room, weren’t you?” Reg grinned.

“Oh, long time since I were pretty...” sighed Pat wistfully.

“Rubbish!” replied Reg. “You’re still pretty: there’s just – ‘ow do I put it – more of you!”

“Tha can bugger off, Mister Blagg!” Pat chided him mockingly. “If you want your payback, you’ll ‘ave to do better ‘n that!”

“Payback? What payback?” replied Reg, with an exaggerated air of innocence.

“Gi’e o’er, Reg, I saw you slipping that little blue pill int’ your wallet.”

“Oh, rumbled again,” groaned Reg.

“Go on then,” smiled Pat. “You’ve wined and dined me and listened to me wittering on about nowt all evening, you deserve it.”

“Shall I get t’ bill then?” grinned Reg enthusiastically.

“Before I change me mind!” laughed Pat. “But you’d better tek that pill first – otherwise I’m going to be disappointed!”

They laughed.

“Can’t we turn ‘em off?” asked Pat, as she removed her underwear.

“Oh, you know ‘ow much I like to see you, luv...” remonstrated Reg, as he took off his boxer shorts.

“Well, I don’t think I’m much to look at me,” pouted Pat.

“Y’are to me,” said Reg firmly, putting his arms gently around his wife, feeling her breasts squash against his slightly saggy chest.

“Well, you’re biased!” said Pat.

“‘Course I am. And just as bloody well! Don’t you want an ‘usband who biased toward you? Or would you rather I be out ogling all t’ young tarts instead?!”

“All right then, luv. Just turn off t’ big light, leave t’ little one on,” said Pat, as husband and wife lay down, drawing crisp sheets and blankets up over themselves.

It was there, down a country footpath, that Georgina knew she would find them. And now, at last, she sensed their voices carried through the gloom by the gentle summer breeze. It was too dark to see how many there were in the little wood tonight – but she heard two or three male voices first, clearly foreign: maybe some Eastern European fruit-picking lads out for some fun.

“You suck my cock,” commanded one of the Slavic voices through the darkness.

Georgina froze. Was he calling to her? Had she been seen? She waited, trembling.

“Me also,” came a second voice – also male and foreign, but higher pitched.

Georgina heard a thump, as if of knees on damp soil, the sound of a pair of zippers being unfastened, and a squeal from a third person – female, young.

The two men were egging the unseen girl on now: “Two cocks, bitch – you like?” The girl was responding with gulps and squeals, apparently struggling to work out how to pleasure two penises simultaneously without choking.

Georgina’s heart was pounding with excitement, nervous but eager to join in with the glorious debauchery taking place somewhere out there. The girl was clearly getting into her stride now: “Oh yeah, d’you like it when I suck your big dicks?” she spoke from the dark woods – clearly a local, by her accent. “Want me to take ‘em all the way down me fuckin’ froat?” she spat, followed by a short gurgle as she presumably did just that.

Georgina stood listening, transfixed.

Pat continued to chatter, for at least the next thirty minutes, whilst Reg held her softly in his arms, gently stroking down the length of her back (“Ooh, that’s nice, darling, do that some more!”), softly squeezing her ample buttocks, running his finger down the moist crack of her bottom to tickle the hindmost wisps of her pubic hair, feeling her nipples tickling his chest. Pat continued to talk about her day, about her friends, about her job (“down t’ Co-op”), and about their grown-up children – and Reg nodded and grunted the odd “hmm”, basking in the vapid but cheery loveliness which, he reckoned, he must have fallen in love with all those years ago.

“I worry for our Porge, though – don’t you, luv?” said Pat, as Reg pulled her closer, enjoying the tender sensation of her nipples rubbing against his, and feeling his penis begin to stiffen in response. “I mean, I’m as proud as you are of ‘er an’ all – especially when you consider what she’s gone through. But I don’t think things are right between ‘er and ‘er Ron. You know, I saw ‘im t’ other day down Crystal Peaks, and ‘e practically avoided me. And whenever I ask ‘er about ‘im she avoids t’ subject.”

“Well, it must be ‘ard keepin’ up t’ relationship at that distance, you know. But ‘e said ‘e’d wait for ‘er. And she’ll be ‘ome reyt soon, don’t worry...” Reg could feel his penis slowly rising and nudging against Pat’s public hair, and he kissed her. Shutting his eyes, her lips felt as soft and moist and young as they had over three decades previous – and he remembered her youthful slender beauty, her young firm breasts, and her winning smile which had swept his heart away all those years ago.

“I’m not so worried about ‘im, Reg,” replied Pat, in-between her husband’s kisses. “It’s ‘er. I don’t think she’s being ... faithful – you know?”

Georgina’s heart was now pounding with lust. “This is what I want,” she thought, as her hand reached under her skirt, pushed her moist panties to one side, and found her cunt. It was already wet, and two fingers slipped inside easily. “Fuck,” she muttered under her breath. “That’s so fucking good...”

With her pleasure came a new defiance. “You can’t hurt me anymore, Ronnie,” she spoke in the silence of her mind across the 150 or so miles which separated her from her imagined interlocutor. “You dump me, and I fucking dump you. I’ve got twenty-four hours left here, and I’m gonna spend them fucking whoever I want, however I want – and I don’t give a shit what you think.”

Placing her bottom on a large tree-stump so she could open her legs wide, Georgina began rubbing her clit hard, whilst listening to the debauchery taking place somewhere out there in the dark woods. The unseen threesome had clearly changed positions now: the girl was squealing, “Oh yeah – little man, you fuck my cunt now. And big boy, you keep fuckin’ my mouth, go on, ram that fuckin’ cock deep in– mmmfff...” Her tirade of filth was suddenly cut off, presumably by “big boy’s” cock being brutally rammed into her face. Georgina heard a loud gagging noise, followed by the girl screaming, “Oh yeah, you dirty motherfucker, make me fuckin’ choke on that big co–aargh!”