Chapter 1

When Paul woke up at dawn, he soon realised it was going to be yet another hot, stuffy day. He loved the summer, but the weather sometimes made him wish he lived in a cooler country. Cooler weather-wise, that is. Living on an island in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea might sound idyllic to many, but the hot weather nine months out of 12 sometimes got on Paul's nerves. The high humidity did not help matters any.

At least, there was the sea.

The island of Malta is only 26 kilometres across, at its widest, so the sea was always less than a 20-minute drive away, wherever you lived. And "the island of Malta" is in actual fact an archipelago, with the main island of Malta lying some 60km south of Sicily, its smaller sister island of Gozo just 1.5km to the North, the even smaller uninhabited island of Comino between the two, and a couple of other rock-size outcrop islands.

The country had been a British colony until 1964 and ever since then, tourism was its main resource. With the clear sea, sandy beaches, world-renowned diving spots and some of the oldest Neolithic remains in the world, it is no surprise that tourists flock to the island like penguins on a march. And the fact that the vast majority of the 400,000 population are friendly, outgoing people who speak moderate to good English, makes it even more attractive to tourists.

14 year old Paul was thinking of tourists too as he lay down in bed that July morning. But his thoughts were not on the effect of tourism on the local economy. His mind was focusing on the effect of a certain tourist on his mind and parts of his body. He had met Kayla the day before at the beach and had been in a turmoil ever since.

She was 16 years old, Paul recalled, but did not seem to mind that he had wanted to spend most of the afternoon with her. She was there on a two-week holiday with her parents, and was staying at a five-star hotel in the north of the island. They were from England, and Paul had been able to keep up a lively conversation with her, seeing as how most of his father's family lived in England and he had visited there often. His father was English but had settled in Malta after he married Paul's mum, who was Maltese to boot.

Now, lying in bed waiting for his mum to call him for breakfast, Paul thought back on the day before and as the image of Kayla in her tiny bikini re-entered his mind, he started feeling funny all over, and his cock started getting a little hard again. He did not fight the feelings; he had come to enjoy them, especially when he rubbed his hard penis with his hands until he shot. He knew about masturbation, and did it frequently, usually while thinking of some actress he saw on TV, some girl at school, or one his more good-looking teachers.