Chapter 1

You know, I should have expected trouble the moment Cecilia stuck her head around the door of my office and asked, "Stew, are you busy?" I'd known her for many years by then, and Cecilia turning up always tended to mean there was trouble in the pipeline for me.

Let's think, as I remember the first time Cecilia dropped me into the shit was back in school. Word went around the school that Cecilia Anderson had been making whoopee with someone in the sports equipment store. They weren't actually caught in there and, as far as I know, no one seemed to have any idea who the guy had been. This wasn't really much of a surprise to me, because I knew something that the staff and most of the other kids in school were ignorant of. Cecilia preferred girls!

How did I know that? Well, I'd walked into my cousin's house one day and discovered the two girls, Cecilia and my cousin Emily in flagrante delicto. Embarrassing for a twelve year old boy, but highly educational. Disappointing as well, because I had hoped that Emily and I were going to become a little more than the kissing cousins we had been up until that time. I later worked out that I had been a handy rumour spoiler and used by both girls.

Let's be truthful about this, Emily had been all over me for a good few of years by then. Whilst we'd been younger, the families didn't seem to mind. But as puberty started to raise its little head, I think the parents began to worry that Emily and I could be getting a little too attached to each other for what they termed as decency. Attempts were made to separate us as much as possible. And then Cecilia turned up and solved the problem for them.

Cecilia and Emily had become friends at school and very soon Emily's parents were encouraging the friendship to the point of ridiculousness. Their plan, I suppose, was to insert a chaperone between Emily and me. Very soon the two girls were spending nights at each other's houses and they were always together at other times. If only Emily's or Cecilia's parents knew what was really going on! Christ, I'd have loved to be a fly on the wall if they ever found out.

But the two girls must have done a fine job of hiding their true relationship with each other from their families and almost everyone else as well, although there were the odd remarks made by some of the bitchier girls at school. Needless to say it took me some time before I realised that the two girls, whether intentionally or not, had used me very cleverly. Regretfully the scenario was to be repeated many times over the next few years.

Right, back to the debacle at school. The rumour had started and then, the next thing I know, I'm dragged up before the head-teacher and threatened with expulsion. Who the hell put the word about that I'd been in that storeroom with Cecilia god only knows. But with hindsight I can make a guess or two. Denials by Cecilia and myself that we even liked each other were completely ignored. Someone had mentioned the name Toomey, and there were only two Toomey's in the school: Emily and myself.

Back in those days, adults didn't even contemplate the idea that little girls could be as bent as a nine-bob-note. But fourteen year-old boys were assumed to be randy little shits who couldn't be trusted as far as you could throw them.

It's strange how people's minds used to work back then; they always said that girls matured - in all senses mentally and physically - quicker than boys. But if that was so, how come I got a final warning and a week's suspension, whilst Cecilia got sympathy for being abused by a nasty little pervert?

Right. Let's jump ahead a few years to my college days. I still had a very soft spot for Emily in my heart; I suppose I always will have. She had grown into a very beautiful young lady by then, although still attached at the hip to Cecilia to my knowledge, who had also developed a figure and looks that no guy would sneeze at!

Honestly it was a pretty strange situation for me to find myself in - well, strange as far as most folks would think. I truly believe that I was the only person around that college who knew that Emily and Cecilia were - as we so nicely put it nowadays - gay or lesbian and an item.

Ah, well, they hid it very well and I've got to admit they were still using me as cover. I took both girls out a number of times on double dates with friends of mine. The mugs that I dragged along were warned explicitly not to try anything on with my cousin Emily or they'd answer to me. It was a threat that wasn't taken lightly by anyone!

I would always escort Cecilia. Snogging was allowed for appearance sake, and Cecilia would certainly grind her tits and crotch into me on the dance floor. You know, sometimes I thought the girl had an evil streak in her; she knew exactly what she was doing to me. Look, dyke or not, when a young red blooded man gets a female body like Cecilia's grinding itself against him like that, I'd challenge any guy not to rise to the occasion.

Cecilia would get that evil little grin on her face, and I'm not going to repeat the comments she used to make to me. Evil, I say, and maybe a bleeding sadist as well.

Unfortunately for me both Emily and Cecilia attracted the attentions of quite a few of the guys at college and around town. Exactly what the girls used to say to those guys I don't know. But it appeared some of the guys who asked them out on dates got the idea that I had something to do with them being turned down.

More than one of them came up to me and asked what I told the girls about them. Shit, half the time I didn't know the guy from Adam. But they were certainly not happy with me and, on too many occasions, I was forced to get physical with them. Look, being the youngest of three brothers, I'd learned how to look after myself; both my brothers were trouble and I started catching stray bullets way back in my primary school. You know the idea; if you can't beat the older brother in a fight, thump his little brother.

It wasn't too long before I found myself almost on first name terms with the local magistrates and with a not very enviable reputation as a hooligan who was always looking for a fight as well.

In a strange way the reputation wasn't that much of a hindrance actually. It kept me out of a lot of strife in my later teenage years. I chose not to mix with people who were of the more disreputable type; now that sounds like a contradiction if ever I heard one. But you know, I didn't hang around with guys who were into nicking cars, taking drugs and the like. Shit, I'd be the first one the coppers went for. I had no intention of doing time.

Well, the girls apparently covered their sexual preferences very well all through college and then the pair of them went off to university. I wasn't quite that good an academic student, so after college, I struck out and joined the workforce where I soon found myself working for the service department of a multinational photocopier manufacturer who'd recently moved into the British market.

It turned out to be a pretty nifty move actually, kind of like getting in the lift on the ground floor then going up with it as the company's British operation grew.

The big boy in the industry, whose name by then had almost become the generic term for photocopiers, had thought they had things all nicely sewn up. But technology was moving on quite quickly in the photocopier industry; other manufacturers (mine included) were getting into making smaller and cheaper machines. New ones were coming onto the market almost by the day.

The company I worked for went in for these smaller machines in a big way and sales took off. At that time big organisations ran large expensive departments, dedicated to supplying all the duplicate documents needed. But getting anything copied was a slow and time-consuming business. With these new machines, almost any office could suddenly have one tucked into a corner.

At the same time as sales grew so did the service department, it seemed to get bigger by the day. Some of the Yank engineers, having done their stint and set up the service department in the UK, wanted to go home again and as an early starter in the firm I found myself on a fast track to promotion to a nice area manager's job.

The only problem was it meant moving to another town. No real trouble for me as the company offered a generous relocation package and helped me find somewhere nice to live.

It wasn't all that long after my move, I was getting myself straight in the flat and I suppose word must have gone around the family about it. My folks came down one weekend and mother enthused about the place. Dad told me I was being sensible getting on the property ladder and buying a place of my own instead of renting.

Anyway I was just getting into living the bachelor lifestyle when I got a telephone call from Emily. Having finished her degree, she was coming to town for a month's induction course with her new employer. As her new employer's office in town wasn't that far from where my flat was located, she claimed she was looking for accommodation. I told Emily that she was welcome to stay at my flat for the month and then I had to end the conversation; I had a date to get to.