Chapter 14: The Roberttones Debut

Opening Night at the Mirage

Late January, 1974

January 1974 continued to have a mixture of hot sunny days, interspersed with the odd thunderstorm. The four of us – David and Gina, Cathy and I went swimming and snorkelling on some of the sunny days; at least when Cathy wasn’t working at Mrs Francis’s. I went with David and Gina one day by myself, but Gina seemed to find far too many opportunities to make blatant sexual suggestions to me when David was snorkelling by himself, so I managed to find excuses not to go when Cathy couldn’t accompany me.

With our opening night fast approaching, we increased our rehearsals, and on the day before opening – Friday the 25th – we had a full dress rehearsal in the main room at the Mirage. Actually, we spent the whole day and all evening there setting up and rehearsing. A friend of Phil and Tommy’s, Hugh arrived early with a whole bunch of sound gear; microphones and cables, speakers and a mixing panel. He also had this huge open reel tape deck, and we spent the morning getting the microphones positioned properly, sound levels set, and everything ‘just so’ until Hugh was finally satisfied that the sound quality would be as good as it could be. We also climbed up on ladders, adjusting the various stage lights so that we would look as good as we sounded. At least, that was the theory.

After a quick take away dinner, we had a bunch of our friends join us in the audience – I had asked Cathy, David and Gina, and my father came along as well to listen to us. The others had invited a bunch of people as well, so we had an audience of about forty or fifty people. We ran through the complete program, just as if there was a full audience there, complete with a break after every 45 minute set. Hugh made a few adjustments after the first set, but he seemed pretty happy with the sound setup.

At the first break, Cathy came up to congratulate me, giving me a kiss and saying how great we sounded. My father was pretty impressed, too, surprised that I was able to sing as well as I did.

We finished around midnight, and my father drove me home. I had probably sung about a third of the songs, but my voice wasn’t sore. I was feeling completely exhausted, as it had been a full on day with us on the go for over sixteen hours.

I slept in on Saturday morning, not getting out of bed until around 9 am. My father was just leaving to go up to South West Rocks to spend the last few days with the rest of the family before returning home on Monday, so I had the day to myself. After making breakfast, I was just thinking about going for a swim when Cathy arrived.

“How’s my famous musician this morning,” she said as she came through the kitchen door. “You were fantastic last night, in some of the songs, I felt like you were singing it just for me. How’s your voice this morning, not too sore?”

“No, it’s fine, not sore at all,” I replied. “I guess all the practising over the last few weeks has made it stronger than it was when I first started. But some of the songs, that’s how I get the right feeling for them, imagining that I am singing just to you. You don’t mind, do you?”

“Mind?” she exclaimed. “Don’t be silly, I love it that you would think that way. Now, what plans did you have for today?”

“Well, I thought about just relaxing this morning, I haven’t been up all that long,” I replied. “I was just thinking about going for a dip in the pool when you got here, are you interested? Unless you don’t have your swimmers, that is.”

“Hmmm, do you think I would not want to go swimming if I didn’t have anything to wear?” she replied. “That would be a first for us.”

She dropped her bag on the kitchen counter, and started to look through it.

“I guess your father has left for the coast?” she asked, and I nodded. “Good, because I have some more photos for you.”

She pulled out a thick envelope from her bag, and took out the contents. There were a bunch of photos, each in a plastic sleeve.

“These were the ones we took the other day,” she said. “I have put them in archive sleeves, so they will keep properly. Do you have a good place to keep them?”

I looked through the photos; the quality was excellent, even to my untrained eye, Cathy’s skill at taking and developing photos had improved dramatically over the last month. She had also developed some close ups of her pussy, the detail was crisp and clear, showing the folds of skin and her clitoris, and the wetness all around her vagina. She even took one showing her sliding a finger inside her. I was getting quite aroused just looking at them.

“There’s more, too,” she said, showing me another set, these in colour. “I set up the camera the other night to take some photos of me peeing in my pants. I went all afternoon without peeing, so there would be a decent showing when I actually did it. Having the motor drive, and the remote shutter release helped – plus I borrowed some professional flash stuff for it too. What do you think?”

The photos were really great; the first one showed her wearing some tight pink hot pants – actually, the hot pants filled the photo frame – with her legs slightly apart. The next one showed a small, darker spot right over her pussy, which then grew rapidly over the next few shots. The last two showed her pants completely soaked, with streams of pee flowing down the insides of her thighs and from the crotch of her pants.

“They look fantastic,” I said to her. “How did it feel, taking them?”

“God, it turned me on so much,” she replied. “Look at the last two.”

These showed her with her pants off – probably around her ankles, and the crotch of her panties pulled to one side – completely soaked, by the way – and two fingers inside her vagina. The second one showed her fingers almost all of the way out, and they were coated and glistening with her juices.

“Wow, you must have been really turned on,” I said. “I didn’t think you could get two fingers inside?”

“Well, I have been trying that over the last few weeks,” she admitted. “You know, just so it won’t be so tight when we, you know...”

“I guess so,” I said. “But it does stretch when you are wet, and I am sure you will be really wet when we do it...”

“Yeah, I do stretch a lot, I even got three fingers in the other night,” Cathy said. “But that hurt a little, I didn’t leave them in for more than a few seconds. Anyway, do you like the photos?”

“I sure do, the ones of you peeing are really sexy,” I said.

“Make sure no one finds them, too,” she added. “And keep them flat, and somewhere dry, so they will last properly.”

I would have to find a good place to keep all of the photos, now that the Roland would be moving between my place, the Mirage, and Tommy and Phil’s for rehearsals, I would have to find somewhere else. I had several large folders that I kept all of my music in, I could easily slip two or three of these envelopes in one of those behind a bunch of older music.

We went to my bedroom, and I pulled one of the large folders from the bottom of my bookcase. The envelopes fitted easily into it, and with the sheet music on top of it, there was nothing out of the ordinary about it.

“I’ll bring some more archive sleeves for the other prints, too,” Cathy said. “Just don’t stack lots of heavy stuff on top of them.”

“Now, do you feel like a swim?” I asked her.

“Sure, that would be great,” she replied.

While Cathy peeled of her clothes, I undressed, and pulled my swimmers on. Grabbing some towels, we headed up to the pool. We spend a lazy two hours swimming and lying in the sun, with lots of kissing and cuddling as well.

By the time lunchtime came around, we had both had enough swimming and sunbaking for a while, so we went back inside to make ourselves some lunch.

“What time do you have to be ready?” she asked me.

“Paul’s picking me up around five,” I replied. “I have to iron my shirt, and have a shave and shower, of course, but that won’t take me long to do.”

Just as I had finished eating, the phone rang.

“Will? It’s Lori here,” the voice at the other end said after I answered the phone.

“Oh, hi there, how are you?” I said.

“Great, I don’t have much time to talk; I just wanted to wish you all the best for your opening night performance. I was hoping I would get you before you had to go,” Lori said.

“Thanks, that’s nice of you to think of me,” I said. “It’s Lori, ringing to wish me good luck,” I said out loud to Cathy.

“Is Cathy there with you? Can you put her on once we’ve finished talking?” she asked me.

“Sure, so how have things been?” I asked.

“Well, not bad, pretty relaxing. A bit boring though, it would have been fun if you two were up here as well. Anyway, I don’t have much time left on the call, you play well, and enjoy yourself, and promise me you’ll let me come along next Saturday?”

“Sure, unless they boo us off stage, and throw tomatoes and rotten fruit at us,” I replied.

“They’ll love your performance,” she assured me. “Now, remember I love you, and I’ve been thinking of us every night, when, well, you know.” She made a kissing noise on the phone. “Remember that when you are singing. Is Cathy there?”

“Sure, I’ll put her on. I love you too, Lori”

Cathy spoke briefly to Lori, and then hung the phone up.

“That was nice of her to call you,” she said. “But I think she has been missing you, both of us in fact.”

“I guess so; there probably isn’t much to do there except lie in the sun and swim,” I said. “Plus be with Janelle, I don’t think there was anyone else around our age, not from what she said earlier.”

“Yeah, several weeks up there with Janelle would be a bit much to take,” Cathy said. “If it was just you and her, she would have killed you with sex already!”

“Humph!” I snorted. “I would have to agree to that first before she got to try anything, and I wouldn’t be likely to do that.”

“So, you wouldn’t like to suck on her big tits?” Cathy teasingly said.

I just shook my head.

“No? Not even slide your prick between them? You seemed to enjoy that last time, if I recall,” she went on, ignoring me completely. “Or what about going down on her, a nice wet hairy pussy would be a change from my smooth one. I bet hers gets even wetter than mine, and she could squat on top of your face, and you would have to keep licking and sucking her until she was satisfied.”

“Cathy!” I called out. “Stop that!”

“But I know she would want – actually, demand – you fucked her all the time, at least six times a day, and probably twice more at night, don’t you agree?” she continued.

“Look, stop that,” I said. “I don’t care what Janelle may want me to do to her, I just don’t want to. I’m pretty sure that all she wants is the sex; nothing more than that, and I just don’t want to do that with her. Now stop going on about all that, I was wanting to do some piano practice, and you will get me too distracted!”

“Oh, is the idea of fucking her big boobs and hairy wet cunt turning you on?” she said, reaching over to squeeze my prick, which despite my protests was getting harder at the thoughts Cathy’s words were creating. “I can tell it is, you are thinking about Janelle fucking you to death!”

“God, stop that,” I said, pushing her hands away from me. “I may be thinking about it – how can I not, the way you are going on – but I don’t want to do it.”

“Ok, I’m sorry,” she said, still laughing softly. “But it’s so easy to tease you about that. Now go on, do your practising; I’ll clean up in here.”

I adjusted my erect prick inside my swimmers to make it more comfortable, and went over to the piano. I wanted to run through a bunch of scales and finger exercises; I needed to start practising for the next grade exam, even though that was several months away. Besides, it was a good way to keep my fingers and hands loose and supple.

I had run through maybe thirty minutes or so, when Cathy asked me if I wanted a cool drink.

“Sure, that would be nice,” I replied.

She put the glass of fruit juice on the top of the piano, and I felt her hug me from behind; she had removed her top, and was brushing her breasts lightly against my skin.

“Do you like these, or are you sure you wouldn’t prefer Janelle’s larger boobs?” she asked me softly. “No, don’t stop playing, I just want to do this and listen to you play.”

It made it harder to concentrate on what I was playing; and I missed more than a few notes until I concentrated on my playing, and not on the sensations of Cathy’s breasts brushing against my skin. After a few minutes, I decided I had done enough exercises, but as soon as I stopped playing, Cathy spoke again.

“No, you need to practice more. How about some songs, where you sing along? Not too loudly, you need to keep your voice for tonight. Come on, it’s to help you concentrate. Maybe think about Janelle’s boobs if you want to; pretend it’s her big nipples rubbing against your back.” She didn’t want to give up with the teasing.

I decided to try a piece I had been working on over the last week or so, Nat King Cole’s “Unforgettable”. We hadn’t tried it yet in the group, I wanted to get the vocals right first; it wasn’t easy matching his smooth, easy vocal style.

I played the opening chords, and Cathy pressed her breasts more firmly against my back, and started to massage my chest with her hands. It certainly made playing and concentrating rather difficult, and I was starting to feel a bit uncomfortable as my prick was now become rather erect. I didn’t want to draw attention to it by reaching down to adjust myself, though, as I knew that would immediately attract Cathy’s attention to my state. Quickly swallowing, I start to sing the first few lines.

Cathy pressed herself against my back, and slid a hand down to my crotch.

“Oh, so something has had an effect on you,” she said, as she stroked my erection through my shorts. “Was that the sensations of my breasts against you, or are you still imagining Janelle’s breasts are pressed against you?”

She made me miss a few notes, and I swore under my breath.

“Now see what you made me do?” I said. “How can I practice like this?”

Cathy ignored my comments, and unbuttoned my shorts, pulling my erect prick out from where it was constrained in my swimmers.

“You mean, how can you practice with a big stiffy?” she joked. “Maybe it is thinking about those big boobs of Janelle’s, or her hairy wet pussy more likely.”

She moved around from behind me, and knelt on the floor next to the piano stool. She licked the head of my prick, running the tip of her tongue along the crease in my glans, and licking the tiny drop of pre-come that had appeared. She then placed her lips over the head, and sucked me as she bobbed her head up and down.

“Would you prefer her wet cunt to be doing that?” she continued teasing me. “I wonder how tight it would be? Not as tight as mine would be, I’m sure. But it would be still hot and wet and tight, wouldn’t it?”

“God, Cathy, why are you going on about Janelle?” I groaned. “You know I don’t want her that way; don’t you.”

“Silly, of course I know that,” she replied. “I just love teasing you about it. Besides, even though you don’t want her that way, I can tell thinking about that – thinking about her hot wet cunt sliding over your throbbing cock – turns you on. Shit, even saying that – ‘Janelle’s hot wet cunt sliding over your throbbing cock’ turns me on. I’ve got all wet describing it to you!”

She squeezed my prick, and licked another drop from the tip.

“Actually, that is something I really want to see, close up, too. I want to see what it would look like with your prick sliding into a vagina, how the lips would spread apart, and just how it would open up when the head slides inside. I reckon that would be an incredible turn on.”

“I’m sure Janelle would be happy to let you watch if she could fuck me,” I replied.

“I bet she would, too,” Cathy said. “But all that hair might get in the way, it would have to be someone with a shaved pussy. Besides, that means you would be fucking her, not me. And I want to be your first one. Maybe after we make love though. I wonder what Lori would think of that?”

“She may not want you to watch, not that way,” I replied. “Now, if you are going to keep that up, I had better get off this seat, and take the rest of my clothes off.”

“And I want you to take the rest of mine off, too,” she said. “Although my crotch must be dripping right now, at least it’s just my bikini pants; I can rinse them in the pool.”

She stood up, and pushed her bikini pants down, and inspected the crotch.

“Yeah, completely soaked, all wet and sticky,” she added. “Come on, let’s go to your room, I can’t wait much longer!”

I stood up, and pushed my shorts and swimmers to the floor. Taking hold of my erection, Cathy led me up the hallway to my room, grabbing our towels on the way. She spread a towel on my bed, and lay on it, her legs wide apart. I quickly lay down next to her, kissing her while my fingers stroked her wet pussy.

“Oh, that’s so good,” she sighed.

I lowered my head, so I could kiss and suck her breasts as I continued to stroke her pussy; my fingers spreading her smooth lips apart, sliding around in the wetness between her lips. Her clitoris was already swollen, and I rubbed my fingers in tiny circles around it. Cathy moaned softly, clenching her hands each time I pressed my tongue against her clitoris.

“Oh yes, lovely,” she groaned softly, pressing my hand firmly to her pussy. “That’s so good, the way you suck my breasts as you rub me.”

I rolled back on my side, moving my wet finger in a lazy circle around one of her hard nipples.

“I love sucking your breasts,” I said to her. “You have such incredibly sexy breasts.”

“Sexier than Janelle’s boobs?” she asked.

“Much sexier than Janelle’s” I assured her.

“Good, that was the right answer,” she jokingly said. “Now you roll over on your back.”

I did as she said, and Cathy sat up on the bed next to me. Wiping her fingers over her wet pussy, she started to stroke my prick slowly, squeezing it slightly as her fingers moved up the shaft.

“When you are about to come, let me know,” she instructed. “I want you to come over my tits, if you would like.”

“Sure, I love doing that anyway,” I replied, and closed my eyes and concentrated on her rubbing me.

Cathy had become very good at stroking my prick; she seemed to sense just how firmly and fast to stroke; and it didn’t take long before could sense my orgasm approaching.

“I think I’m going to come soon,” I warned her.

She let go of my prick, and lay down.

“You let me lie on the towel, and straddle my stomach,” she said.

Once in position, she resumed stroking my shaft, and rubbed the swollen head over her nipples.

“I want to feel you come on my tits,” she said out loud. “Cover them with your spunk for me!”

I gritted my teeth; I could feel the orgasm building. Then, with a loud groan, the first spurt of come shot out, covering one of her nipples.

“Oh, yeah, do it,” she encouraged.

As Cathy continued rubbing my prick, I shot more spurts of semen over her breasts. Cathy aimed my prick so each breast got its share of come. When I had finished, she released my prick, and I rolled over next to her on my bed. She rubbed my come around her breasts, and then licked her fingers clean.

“I love it when you do that,” she said. “It’s all warm and sticky, and I love your taste.”

“I love doing that too, it makes it really erotic,” I replied.

“Can I ask you something,” she said to me after a minute. “When I was going on about Janelle, did that start to turn you on? I won’t be mad with you if you tell me it did.”

“Um, actually, yeah it did a bit,” I confessed. “Not that I want to do anything with her, but you were giving me all these sexy images, I can’t help how my body reacts.”

“I know, it turns me on talking about things like that with you, too,” she said. “Not that I want to see you doing any of that with her, well, not for real, I mean, it’s fun to fantasize about it all, but I wouldn’t like you to do things like that with her. Not seriously, I mean; we can still have fun, all four of us, but perhaps not like we did that day on the boat.”

“No, I think she would want to do more that I would be comfortable with,” I said. “I don’t know, maybe I’m misjudging her or something. I mean, she’s still a friend and all that, and just because you, Lori and I are now lovers, I mean, we shouldn’t exclude Janelle as a friend, at least.”

“You’re right, I guess,” Cathy said. “Actually, some of the things I have said haven’t been fair to her. Maybe we just need to talk things over with her, should the situation arise again. I mean, she is a good friend, and has been a good friend to me ever since I arrived here. It’s not right to be unkind behind her back like that.”

“Yeah, you’re right there,” I said. “Actually, I feel a little bit bad about some of the comments I have made about her. I mean, it’s not like she’s slutty, not like Jenny Adams, or even blatantly trying to show off like Gina. She is a good friend of all three of us, and she just wants to belong. So, are you and Lori going to tell her about what’s happened?”

“Um, I don’t know,” Cathy replied. “I don’t think Lori has said anything, but it’s not fair to keep her in the dark, but I don’t quite know how to tell her. It’s not like she will be disgusted with us, she’s not like that. But she will probably expect to be included in the arrangement, and she will no doubt say ‘well, if the two of you can share Will, and each other, why not me as well?’ And I don’t know how to answer that.”

“But I thought you knew the answers to all of these love and relationship things,” I said, half-jokingly.

“Me? I know hardly anything about all that stuff,” she replied. “Maybe we will have to talk it over with Lori. Anyway, with school starting back next week, maybe the situation won’t arise. Now, let’s have a shower and clean up.”

We had a nice long shower, and I got dressed for the evening. I practiced the piano a bit more, and then Cathy had to head back to her place. Her father would be bringing her up to the Mirage later, she had arranged to take a bunch of photos of us playing, we would get some as publicity photos, and some were being sold to the Manly Daily for an article in Thursday’s entertainment section of the local newspaper.

After she had left, I played around on the piano for an hour or so until Paul arrived to collect me. I was wondering how we would deal with Janelle; in fact, I still wasn’t sure how the three of us – Cathy, Lori and I - would handle our complicated relationship once we were back at school. If Cathy thought she knew hardly anything about love and relationships and all that, I knew next to nothing. When Paul arrived, I was still as confused as ever.

The others were already at the Mirage when Paul and I arrived, and we made one final check of our equipment, the sound gear and the lighting. We ran through the lists of songs in each of the sets, and made sure everyone knew how the night would progress, at least, if everything went well.

We were happy with all the details, and went back to the kitchen to eat dinner – one advantage of the gig was that we get to eat the same food as the patrons; although not at one of the fine tables though.

Just before seven, we looked out into the main room; the tables were half full, with people drifting in all the time. Finally – the minutes seemed to drag like hours – it was 7:30. We made our way to our positions on the stage, and Hugh bought the stage lights up. After the sounds of the initial applause died down, Tommy started the introduction.

“Good evening and welcome to the opening night at what will soon be the premier place for entertainment in Pittwater – the Mirage Ballroom. We will be providing the music tonight, for those who don’t know, we are Brian Roberts and The Roberttones, and we hope...”

As arranged, I interrupted Tommy’s introduction.

“Well, actually, we are just the Roberttones. I just had a call from Brian, unfortunately he has been delayed – car problems of some form, but he promised he would try to get here as soon as possible.”

There was a nervous muttering from the audience, and Tommy continued.

“Well, that can’t be helped. Still, we will do our best,” Tommy said.

He then started to introduce us as we went into the first song, “Till There Was You”, with Tommy taking the lead vocals.

When the song was finished, there was loud applause from everyone in the room. I looked around at the others; we were all grinning from ear to ear. With the spotlights on, it was difficult to see clearly out into the audience, but it looked like all of the tables were full.

We continued with our first set; Tommy and I sharing the lead vocals as arranged, and after three quarters of an hour, we took our first break.

“Well, what do you all think?” Tommy asked us. “Do you think they like us?”

We all thought it went well; there were no major mistakes, we flowed well from one song to another, and already quite a few couples were up dancing. As I sat down at the piano for the start of the next set, Cathy was at the side of the stage with some cameras.

“You are fantastic,” she said. “Everyone loves the playing, and people think your singing is great, too.”

She blew me a kiss before moving back to the side to line up some photos.

The remainder of the evening passed in a daze; maybe the adrenaline or the excitement of actually performing made everything seem slightly surreal. I knew we performed well; there were no obvious mistakes, and the crowd kept clapping and cheering us on. During one of our breaks we had a brief interview with the Manly Daily reporter; she was interested in our background and why we were interesting in the style of music we played, given how young we were.

Cathy appeared again at the last break, and we had a long kiss before she said she had to go home. I promised to call her the next morning when I woke up, and she said to wait until lunchtime, since she would be developing all of her photos in the morning.

After the last set, when we were packing up our equipment, the manager came up to us.

“You guys are fantastic,” he said. “I never thought it would be as popular as you were; hardly anyone left all night. You are a fixture here, ok?”

This was really good news to us. Not that we were worried that we would get sacked after only one night, but the fact that the response to us was so enthusiastic was a real ego booster.

“Did you get any comments from people?” Tommy asked him.

“Well, the main thing I heard was people really enjoyed the chance to dance,” he replied. “And the way all of you seemed to share the interaction, people said that it was obvious you were really enjoying yourselves, and the reflected in the music. The only thing I could suggest is to make some of the pieces – particular the good dance ones – last longer, maybe put in an extra instrumental section or two. Would that be possible?”

“Yeah, sure, we can work on that for next week, I’m sure,” Tommy replied. “Plus it will give Will and I a chance to rest our voices a bit, too!”

“Anyway guys, here’s your money,” he said, counting out a bunch of twenty dollar bills. “If tonight is any indication, I may be able to increase your rate, certainly if we keep getting a full house with people staying and drinking until the close.”

We finished packing up our equipment, buoyed by the night’s results. Afterwards, once we had loaded up the equipment into various cars, we talked briefly about extending some of the arrangements. After a few minutes discussion, we came up with a list of six songs – the ones that seemed to be the most popular, and divided them between Phil, Paul and I to work out longer arrangements that we could practice next Saturday.

“How’s your throat feeling,” Paul asked me as we drove home.

“Um, it’s a little stiff, a bit scratchy,” I replied. “I guess I’ll have to see in the morning, but it doesn’t feel too bad. It was much worse after our first rehearsal in December, and I only sang for an hour or so then.”

“That’s good,” he replied. “Your voice has really come on in the past month, I reckon with some proper lessons, you’ll be better than Tommy; you can certainly hold some of those longer notes better.”

“That’s cos I don’t smoke,” I replied. “That tobacco smoke can’t be good for his breathing.”

“Yeah, but you try to tell him to quit!” Paul said.

At my place, he helped me carry my equipment up the driveway, then headed off for his place. I carried the boxes into my bedroom, but it could wait until the morning to connect things back up. Right now, I wanted a long shower, and to collapse into bed. However, once in bed, I couldn’t fall asleep; the excitement of being up on stage performing was still there.