Chapter 95

After a cheerful and chatty breakfast, Julie and I took Mum’s Mini to the factory so as to be there by eight; the twins were going to be making their way to the station a little later, so as not to have to cross London in the rush hour. We left them with the washing up; they laughed and said that they were happy to be of use.

(Crikey, that does date me! I do fondly remember the good old days when, outside the rush hours of 7.30 to 9.30 a.m. and 4.30 to 6.30 p.m., it was actually not unpleasant to drive or take the underground across Central London – it seems to have become a 24-hour zoo since then, and I have to consciously pick my driving up a couple of gears whenever we go there – I firmly believe that if you even attempt to stop when the traffic lights turn to amber, you’ll get seven or eight impatient vehicles straight up your backside, all blaming you for actually obeying the Highway Code! And the motorbikes – I’ve driven in both Rome and Paris, and let me assure you that in my humble opinion, neither of them are in the top spot for bikers ignoring all the rules... )

Jen and Hamish were quickly out in the yard to welcome us as we parked the Mini next to the caravan; Jen whispered that she’d had a very lonely night with just her in her bed, and hoped that I’d make it up to her later.

“Didn’t he sneak in with you? You’re slipping!”

She smiled wryly.

“We talked about doing it, but then realised that the others would have wondered why there were sounds of passion coming from my room when the twins aren’t here and I should be alone, so we decided we’d better not risk it. They’re now pretty well used to putting up with the sounds of Sheila and I coming loudly, but it would have been too suspicious with Adrian away.”

It was my turn to chuckle. I could just imagine those two winding up their more sedate caravan-mates by making it quite clear how much they enjoyed sex. I wondered if Claire and Rebecca were taking advantage of any extra interest from their boyfriends, Chris and Doug – they didn’t seem anywhere near as sex-mad as our lot.

“Couldn’t you have controlled yourself for once, or got him to gag you with a sock or something?”

She grinned, her expression a mixture of cheekiness and total honesty.

“Well, I wasn’t sufficiently sure that I could keep quiet, even with a pillow over my face! We’ve managed a couple of swaps in the last fortnight since the others arrived, but it’s been a long while since we had a whole night together, too long! So I didn’t trust myself just to cuddle him, and if we had got started, then once wouldn’t have been nearly enough!”

I grinned back at her. I could easily imagine just how much she’d missed sleeping all night with her boyfriend. Having often witnessed them at it, I agreed with her assessment that she’d probably have got completely carried away and made some serious noise, no matter how good her initial intensions. I knew from my own experience the previous year, when I had shared a bedroom with Sheila all summer, how much more excited Julie and I had got whenever we could sneakily steal some ‘us’ time in bed together (Malcolm and Fred were well used to hearing sounds of passion from the girls, just as we chuckled whenever we overheard Vee squealing in ecstasy or Sian huffing and puffing her way to a climax! The only difference was that we knew exactly who was taking them to orgasm... ).

We had a good day at work; the new people had knuckled down and were decent company. We certainly didn’t regret our decision to sign up for a few more days wages; Julie and I were ‘holidayed out’ and more than ready to get back to doing something instead of lazing about, as pleasant as it had been. The music on the radio wasn’t too bad – we were getting a bit tired of ‘The Stylistics’ and “I can’t give you anyyyyything, but my love” and Rod Stewart with “Sailing’“ but Jasper Carrot’s “Funky Moped” was quite fun the first few times. Oh, and I almost made Julie blush when I stared meaningfully at her while they were playing Billie Jo Spears’ “Blanket on the ground“! Jen just grinned and nudged Hamish in the ribs.

As Adrian had requested, Julie and I nipped out to the phone box outside the factory gate when we’d eaten our tea to phone the twins to check that they had arrived home safely. Their Mum picked up the phone, and seemed really chuffed that we’d taken the trouble, so we scored plenty of brownie points there, and reassured Mr & Mrs Carter that we were still serious about their children. It was of course a white lie, but it kept their parents off the twins backs about finding boy/girlfriends.

Then it was back to work, trying to get through the boxes of vegetables as quickly as possible, so that we could finish early and get on with the more important business of catching up with our other lovers after more than a fortnight apart.

As I podded the last few boxes of broad beans, I mused on how things had worked out this way with my sister, and enjoyed recalling a few of the very pleasant times we’d shared.

I’d known her all her life; she’d been a great little sister as we grew up and we’d been friends always, and then almost two years earlier we’d discovered the real intensity and the mutual physical expression of our love, on our parents’ picnic blanket, here in the very hayfield we were about to revisit. Then we’d been apart for a while as she settled into University, followed by meeting up regularly in the eighteen months since I’d spent a knackering but hugely enjoyable energetic 24 hours in her room at Reading on my way back to Cardiff after New Year 1974, in our first incestuous sexual marathon. In the privacy of both the twins’ flat in Bristol and in her Hall of Residence in Reading, we’d made amazing love, had hot passionate sex, and, best of all, had the joy of waking up truly close.

Okay, it was indeed very pleasant to also be able to sneak into her bedroom at home and love each other, but nothing like as good as when we could take our time, and in the morning have another go. It was also pretty damn wearing on the nerves knowing that our parents were just down the corridor, and that if we were caught, I would be disowned and thrown out of the house – but my mother would probably keep my ripped-off bollocks as a souvenir. Our folks had been pretty decent allowing us to sleep with Julie and Hamish, but we felt constrained doing that, not wanting to cause upset with loud noises of passion late into the night.

Not quite three weeks earlier, with only the six of us in the caravan, Jen and I had spent the night together thinking that it was pretty much the last time that we’d ever get to make love; with me moving up to Teesside there wasn’t going to be much scope for getting together very often, and even less opportunity for unrestrained passion.

We were both a bit miserable about the impending end of our love-making, as we agreed that we had something very special after living the whole of our lives together. That last night had been loving, celebratory, tender, emotional, athletic, and overshadowed by our imminent parting. It made me understand the meaning of the term ‘bitter-sweet’. We’d both shed a few tears that our easy contact and frequent meetings were coming to an end. I knew that I’d very much miss the physical side of expressing my absolute and undying love for my sister.

Then, on the way back from our summer holiday in Cornwall, Julie had done some research on the British Rail timetables for the Winchester services, and discovered that Reading was even more convenient than Bristol, so it turned out that I would still be seeing Jen regularly; well, as often as I could afford to pay the full fare. So, to our great delight, our days of sibling love were most certainly not yet over.

Tonight was going to be a joyful and unexpected bonus, just for the love of each other, and a chance to celebrate our reunion with some great love-making.

As we’d often said during the quieter and reflective periods of our Six Musketeers weekends at Caledonia Place, we were getting the best of all possible worlds – love, sex, friendship, and sowing some wild oats, without the risks of jealousy, deceit or emotional upset. We’d all learned from each other, hadn’t been afraid to ask / tell our partners what they / we wanted (once I’d got over the initial hurdle of shyness), and our ‘fun sex’ was pretty much just as good as our ‘making love’ because we were such good friends. It wasn’t all about sex, either – we went out as a group and did things together, walking, going dancing, to the pub, eating out, shopping, to concerts, films, theatres – just like a normal group of good mates of both sexes. There was no jealousy; my groan as I emptied my balls into Sheila or Jen was just as much a compliment to the sexual attractions of my partner as were Julie’s moans and squeals of delight as Hamish or Adrian brought her to yet another orgasm. When I heard Julie climax with one of the others, I just felt happy that she was having such a good time. After all, it was Julie I was going to marry, as soon as she was an established teacher, Jen and Hamish were as good as engaged already, and we were all confident that the twins would soon find life partners as soon as they were set in their careers. And until then? It was all good fun between friends (and siblings).

That Friday night in the hayfield beside the Mini was just as memorable as the evening before, when we’d been reunited with the twins. Now it was Jen’s turn to get pinned to the picnic rug by Gustav, and Hamish’s duty to fully satisfy my girlfriend before we headed home to bed. Not that Jen was at all passive about being pinned down – she was bucking back up at me so hard that it was a moot point who was the fucker and who the fuckee...

I was almost worried that Dan the night watchman at the factory would report the screaming noises to the police as somebody getting horribly murdered, but I was pretty confident that it wasn’t quite loud enough to penetrate his senses as he concentrated on his ‘Racing Post’ and his mug of tea. Now, if it had been a Sunday night and he’d just been reading a whole load of over-dramatised sensational stories about adulterous vicars, thieving bank managers, murderous young thugs and so on in his copy of the ‘News of the Screws’, then his mind might have processed the noises he must have heard, less than a mile away from his little hut. Though, knowing Dan, he probably had the doors and windows tight shut so as not to attract flying insects to the light.

Despite her screams sounding more as if she was being outraged than pleasured, Jen enjoyed it so much that it wasn’t many more minutes before she had got Gustav up again and was bouncing up and down, squealing out her delight each time he hit a good spot. A yard from us, my girlfriend was making similar noises to encourage her honorary brother as he methodically stroked in and out of her in the doggie position for their second time. Absence does indeed make the heart grow fonder; Julie had also missed Hamish, and I could tell that she was very much enjoying their reunion.

We were ALL smiling as we got dressed to head for home. It had been really good to be able to let go and enjoy our passion without worrying about anyone hearing us. And two such couplings almost one after the other was always something to appreciate.

Even better, once again I got to spend the whole night with Julie in my own bed, and we even managed a quiet and gentle early morning physical expression of our love before we had to get up.

When, on my way to the bathroom, I looked in on Jen and Hamish in her bed to check that they were awake, the expressions on their faces clearly told me that they too had very recently reconnected – I just hoped that Mum couldn’t read us quite that well! Luckily she was either concentrating on cooking breakfast, or didn’t think it worth passing comment – after all, she and Dad had said that we could sleep with our other halves. I had a sneaking suspicion that their own love life had been rejuvenated now that we were no longer living at home; there was certainly more physical contact between them than there had been when we were teenagers – or perhaps I was more aware of it.

“Will all four of you be back tonight?”

“Please, Mum. No idea what time, though, with the good weather harvesting is really cracking on. Probably late.”

“Oh well, I’ll see you when I see you. You’re almost certainly going to be hungry, so I’ll do you some supper!”

“That gets you a goodbye hug from all of us!”

Laughing, Mum happily submitted to four hugs; she was of the type who was delighted with us having a ‘significant other’ as a way for her to gain two more ‘children’ – though from the way she behaved with the twins, four more would have been even better! Catriona was exactly the same, which was probably why she and Mum had hit it off so quickly.

It was indeed a very long Saturday at work, and as it was almost dark when we cleaned up and knocked off, we talked about giving the hayfield a miss, but Jen pleaded that she and her boyfriend needed a good vigorous ‘no-holds-barred’ session because they’d had to keep the noise down for the past couple of weeks. The love of my life and I weren’t going to turn an opportunity down, so we duly turned right at the factory gate.

Julie and I started off gently with a little bit of ‘soixante-neuf‘, unlike the other two who were straight at it, with one of Jen’s legs perched up on Hamish’s shoulder. They certainly were going for it, egging each other on with cries and moans. It was very clear that they’d really missed being able to make noisy and passionate love once the four strangers had moved into the caravan. They were finished before we were, but even in the gloom as we pulled our clothes back on, I could tell that Jen was much happier with life after having scratched her itch properly with her boyfriend.

To our surprise, Mum and Dad were both still up when we got home; they said that they’d been out for a quiet Saturday evening drink at the pub and had met some friends there. We all had a cup of tea and some pork pie with mustard, with a couple of extra slices of toast to fill us up, before heading to bed; Julie and I were too knackered to do any more than cuddle and fall asleep. Somehow I suspected that my sister might be able to find some last reserves of energy before she let her boyfriend go to the Land of Nod.

The phone rang at the unusually early hour of seven thirty on Sunday morning while we were all finishing breakfast before the four of us headed for the factory. Mum was already up from the table getting some more milk out of the fridge, so she went into the hall to answer it. We could only hear her side of the conversation.

“Hello Ian, this is an unexpected pleasure, how are you?”

“Oh dear! That IS a problem!”

“Yes, I’m sure they would. They’re almost ready to leave, anyway. How many are you short?”

“Do you want Tom and I as well? We’ve nothing else arranged for today.”

“Yes, it’d be no trouble to pick up Muriel on the way, no trouble at all. We’ll be as quick as we can. Bye for now!”

Mum came back into the kitchen, poured herself a top-up to her mug of tea, and sat down again.

“That was Ian Johnston, asking if you four would mind working a very long day today. He’s got a real problem, and of course I said that we’d help out. I shouldn’t laugh, but the schoolchildren met up for a barbecue last night, and they’ve all got food-poisoning, so he’s really short handed, and is getting Muriel to come in as well. He did say that it might be a long day for all of us. You don’t mind, do you, Tom?”

Dad chuckled.

“Bang goes mowing the lawn and then leisurely consuming a couple of cans of IPA sitting in a deckchair admiring the stripes! Never mind, Jon can do it tomorrow when I’m at work. The mowing, that is, not the drinking of my precious beer.”

“You aren’t at work tomorrow! It’s the Bank Holiday! Anyway, Jon will still be covering for Adrian because they won’t be back until Tuesday.”

“Oh, I’d forgotten. Great, then it looks like I’m free for a bit of showing these kids just how easy it is!”

The four of us headed off in the Mini, Jen driving, to get down to work. Mum and Dad followed a few minutes later, picking up Muriel Johnston on the way.

It was actually a real blast, that day. Yeah, for a Sunday there were loads of deliveries to be processed, but with the four of us, the other four students from the caravan, my folks, the Johnstons, Mavis and her husband Mark, and a few others who Mr Johnston had managed to rope in, there was some amazing banter and the hours just flew past. Mum, Muriel Johnston and Mavis slipped away at twelve and quickly knocked up a cold meat salad for lunch, which only took 20 minutes to eat, and then we were back to work. With no smoke breaks (unlike the schoolchildren), a ten-minute break for a cup of tea at four, and a (tinned) steak and kidney pie with fresh broad beans for tea, we were all finished by half-past eight. I was mega impressed with the oldies – they were indeed far more productive than the schoolkids.

Ian Johnston offered to buy us all a couple of pints at the Darby and Joan, but we all wanted to get home and in the shower. Mum and Dad headed off first, telling us to use the factory changing room showers, and we got home at quarter to ten to find them in their jim jams with the kettle on, and sausage and scrambled egg on toast for supper.

Because the schoolkids had suffered food poisoning, they weren’t allowed back at work until they’d completely stopped throwing up or staying very close to a toilet, so on the Bank Holiday Monday, we did it all over again. Dad spent much of the day teasing Jen and I about actually getting paid for doing something so easy; we refused to rise to the bait as we knew that he was just kidding us. He did have the grace to say how impressed he was that we’d stuck at this job for three summers; I think he realised how monotonous it could get, even with Mavis’s cooking to brighten up the day. He also complimented Julie and Hamish – they knew already that he liked them, but they also earned his respect by showing that they were hard workers. Of course, he was blissfully unaware of the fringe benefits we enjoyed by sharing a caravan and each others beds, which along with the spending money we earned, made it all a very worthwhile use of our summer holiday.