A Saturday in February

Sitting alone in the isolated farmhouse, seventeen, nearly eighteen years old Tim Beale tried to catch up with his course work on the last Saturday of half-term week, but the noise and wind from the storm outside rattling the old farmhouse windows, distracted him and he couldn't concentrate on the work. Even on a February afternoon, it should have been light enough to see without a light, but the dark clouds made that impossible. Knock, knock. "Is that someone at the door or is it the windows?" Knock, knock, knock, knock. "Better check the door but who would be visiting in this weather? I didn't hear a car."

"Claire Phelps?" He viewed the drenched girl clutching the porch support pole to hold herself up. "What are you doing here?" and quickly remembering his manners, went on, "Come in, come in." She hardly made it inside the door before clasping his arm for support.

"Sorry Tim, I know I shouldn't be here but I need help and your house was the nearest."

"It's okay Claire, dad's not here and I'm not overly concerned about the old taboo and feud. Come and sit by the fire, you must be frozen to death after being out in this weather. Let me take your coat off ... Christ you've a bad cut on your leg." Tim spotted the rip in her jeans and the blood soaked area around it.

The feud started three generations previously. In the depression era, Oswald Beale found it necessary to sell ten acres of land to Benjamin Phelps, his neighbour, but only received a fraction of what he thought the land was worth. Unfortunately no one else wished to buy it and, desperate for the cash, he resentfully sold it. Forever after, he deemed the Phelps' thieves and frequently complained they stole his land. When things picked up a bit he wanted to buy the land back but Ben Phelps, Claire's grandfather, asked the current market value, fifty times higher than his buying price. The enraged Oswald even took his case to court but the judge decreed the sale lawful and the present selling price not unreasonable. Ben kept the land and Oswald continued to deem he'd stolen it from him. This further alienated the two families and a feud developed whereby no member of either family would set foot on the other's land without incurring dire consequences, a feud that lasted until the present time, with the disputed land now owned by Robert Phelps, Claire's father, as part of his farm. More recently, the local council earmarked the land for residential development in their five-year plan and with developers interested, its value rose astronomically. It added a spark to reignite and further aggravate the feud

"Don't take this the wrong way Claire, but you've a nasty cut on your leg that's bleeding badly and needs cleaning and bandaging and probably stitching and before I can do that, I need to take your jeans off. They're too tight just to roll up the leg and you need to get out of those wet things too before you get chilled."

"I know the cut's bad but my ankle hurts too and I can hardly stand on it and I should have it looked at in the hospital."

Nodding his agreement, Tim went to the phone. "Damn!" he swore, "When we get a storm it always knocks the phone line out for a while but it usually comes back when an overhead connection dries out. Dad and mum are in town shopping so I don't have the van and my mobile's bust, what about yours?

"Left it at home otherwise I'd have used it when I first fell."

"We'll have to do what we can here to make you more comfortable and you'll see how good I am at first aid. Let me take your wet things off first and hang them on the rail by the stove."

With blood oozing freely from the cut and her swelling foot, extremely painful, Claire felt she had no option but to trust Tim and reluctantly allowed him to remove her saturated clothes. She'd intended to keep her bra and knickers on but before she realised, Tim unclipped the bra and he pulled her knickers down with her jeans. Trying to be clinical and not stare at the beautiful, if bedraggled, girl, he examined the cut and the swollen ankle. "You definitely need hospital treatment but if you sit still for a moment I'll get some towels so you can dry yourself and a wide bandage to hold the cut together and staunch the blood flow." A minute or so later he returned and noted Claire looked very pale and only whispered her thanks for the towels. "Aaaagh!" she cried out when he lifted her foot to apply the bandage and saw how her foot had swollen.

"Sorry," Tim apologised and when he looked up, he couldn't help but notice her light brown pubic curls matched her hair and wondered what she'd be like in bed. His prick started to harden. However, he desperately thrust those thoughts aside and concentrated on wrapping the bandage around the wound and seeing her efforts to dry herself were quite feeble, gently took a towel and carefully dried her body without trying to stimulate her or himself. However, he noticed the hardening of her nipples and wondered at her thoughts.

"What am I doing letting a Beale see me naked and letting him help me? Dad will have a fit when he finds out. Still it feels nice and he's being a gentleman although I know he's looked at my sex and he's having a job to hide his erection. Is he going to keep me here naked until his parents come home or my clothes are dry? They'll take a long while because they are thick, winter wear and are completely soaked and they obviously don't have a dryer in this house. He's quite good looking and he's quiet in the classes we have together but up to now I've never dared to get close to him because of father's wrath if he found out. He looks fit and strong, but most farm boys are and he held me easily enough when he helped me in."

His mind appraised her body. "Nice tits, not large but firm. Never really noticed her before; she's always sort of in the background but I don't put myself forward either and I never get to go out much, not with farm work and school stuff." Tim again tried to push his thoughts away. "I can't harm her even if she is a Phelps and I doubt she'll want to see me afterwards anyway even if our parents allow it, which I doubt."

Her fears were unfounded. "I'll borrow mother's dressing gown. It'll be a bit too big but it will keep you warm and cover up the bits I shouldn't see," Tim grinned, "And I'll find a pair of her old slippers that might fit." In fact she had to wear an odd pair, one of hers and one of Tim's because of the swelling of her foot.

As the warmth from the stove penetrated to her bones, her spirits revived and for a while they sat chatting and drinking tea like old friends until Tim remarked, "Hey, we're supposed to be enemies but I just don't see it that way. Can we break with tradition and be friends?"

"After what you've done for me, I don't see why not." She stretched her arm and squeezed his hand.

"How come you were so close to this house?"

"Well I didn't arrange it to see you!" Claire's laugh took and sting from the remark, "I've been to Claverton and missed the bus back and rather than wait two hours, I decided to walk. The shortest way is the footpath through the woods and, although I knew it went across your land, it is a public footpath, so I took it. It had already started raining lightly but before I got to the woods it came down in torrents, my clothes were drenched and the path became a slippery mud bath. I slipped on that steep bit above the stream and twisted my ankle and caught my leg on the stump of a sapling. I hobbled a few yards and then saw your house and thought that even your family wouldn't turn me away. Fortunately, you were the only one in. God my ankle throbs."

"And it's swollen like a football and the blood's soaked through the bandage but I don't think it's wise to take it off and put another on."

"That's cheered me up!" Claire grinned when he apologised.

Nearly an hour later, Claire slumped and became light-headed and when Tim thought she might pass out, he sat close and put his arm around her to provide a modicum of comfort. Sensing the security, she rested her head on his chest and dozed. A movement woke her. Tim moved to look out of the window, "The storm's going over now and the rain's easing so mum and dad should be home soon. Expect the World War III to start then but I'll be on your side and insist on taking you to hospital. His assumption proved correct.

"What the bloody hell is she doing here?" Dick Beale roared when he saw the girl sitting in the kitchen. "You know well enough not to bring any Phelps on to my land. And why is she in your mother's dressing gown? Get her out of it."

"She's injured Dad, I had to wait for the van to take her to hospital, the phone's out so I couldn't call an ambulance. Her clothes are soaked and she can't walk."

"And I supposed you shagged the whore. That's all a Phelps girl is fit for. Get that robe off her and if you haven't shagged her, I will."

Tim stood between Claire and his father. "You'll not lay a finger on her Dad, she's in enough pain now so leave her be."

The argument raged for several minutes until, "CLANGGG!" Betty Beale slammed a heavy saucepan on the counter. The loud noise silenced the argument and brought the stand-off to an end. "Stop this row right away. If you so much as show her your prick, husband, you'll sleep in the guest room for the rest of the year. Can't you see the poor girl's suffering and that's not fake blood on her leg, is it? That she's a Phelps shouldn't make any difference when a person is in serious trouble. Give Tim the van keys and let him take her for treatment, as I'm certainly not going to let you go with her. Keep the dressing gown for as long as you need it Claire. You can tell us the story when you get back, Tim, I'm sure she must have been in a real mess to have called on us for help. Are any of her clothes dry enough to wear?"

"Only her knickers."

"Put them on her then, that will at least save her some embarrassment when the doctors examine her. And you can look the other way," she ordered her husband. Claire hardly had the strength to put them on herself and Tim carried her to the van and stayed with her during triage and X-ray and held her hand while the nurse stitched and dressed her wound. By then the hospital had informed her parents, Robert and Kathleen, and they arrived but knew better than make a scene. Their looks made it clear they did not like their daughter being with a Beale boy and certainly not holding his hand.

"Thank you for what you did for my daughter, Beale, but we can take over now," Robert said barely hiding the venom in his voice.

Claire held Tim's hand tighter and in a weak voice, replied, "Daddy, I want him to stay. Had he not been there and helped me, you'd have been visiting the mortuary. Let him stay for a while." The arrival of the doctor with the X-rays halted any further conversation.

"We have a problem with you, Claire. You have broken a couple of bones in your ankle and walking on it pushed them well out of place. Normally we'd set them and put your foot in plaster but with the cut on your leg needing changes of dressings, we cannot do that so we'll have to tape a case in place and keep you in a day or two and afterwards, you won't be able to walk on it for a while. I've arranged for you to go to theatre shortly so we can do the small operation to put the bones back in place." Turning to those at her bedside, "I suggest you all go home now. By the time she comes out of theatre and regains consciousness, it will be very late. Phone in the morning to see how she is."

"Keep away from my daughter, Beale boy," Robert hissed as they left.

"Don't be like that, Darling," his wife intervened, "You heard what Claire said, she might not be alive if Tim hadn't helped her and I want to find out what happened. We didn't get the story before they whisked Claire to theatre. Would you mind coming to the cafeteria for a few moments Tim please? Or does your hatred of us forbid it?"

"No, Mrs. Phelps, the hate is more my father's thing. Yes, I'll willingly tell you what happened and I know you also want to know where her clothes are because I guess you may think that we'd had sex. We didn't. Claire was in no state for anything like that and only a pervert would have taken advantage of her."

"We should be getting home," Robert grumbled. Kathleen held fast and insisted on hearing Tim's story and even paid for his drink and sandwich. She listened attentively as Tim related the tale but Robert sat sideways to the table and looked into space and at the finish only reiterated his earlier comment, "Thank you for what you did but keep away from her now, Boy."