Busted ( Microfiction )

Months after our first kiss, just after Cassie’s sixteenth birthday, her Father would return from work early and interrupt our first attempted sexual encounter. He had shot us both a very accusing glance and demanded to know what had been going on. We denied everything - well we hadn’t gotten very far; after some very energetic kissing and fooling around Cassie decided it was time. We had discussed losing our virginities at length, and wanted it to be special – this apparently was special enough. I was never a very good boy scout and as usual wasn’t prepared. Unprotected sex wasn’t an option regardless of how keen we were. So we began darting around the house trying to find something suitable. Unfortunately there were no condoms to be found upstairs in either her parent’s or elder sister’s rooms.
“What about the kitchen” she said,
“You want to have sex in the kitchen?”
“No - Maybe we can find something to put on you there”, she continued.
“What, like cling-film?” this was starting to ruin the mood, and as I walked into the kitchen I found her with a couple of freezer bags in her hands.
“What about these” she smiled,
“You must be joking” I said pulling on my T-shirt.
“Don’t be like that” she said, while kissing me and trying all she could to get her own way.
It was then we heard the key in the door, dashing back into the lounge desperately tugging on and re-arranging our clothes, my pockets stuffed with underwear, before throwing ourselves into the chairs at exactly the point her Father opened the door. After some heated words we waited until he had left the room, and then on Cassie’s insistence I slipped away, leaving her to deal with his bad mood.

The Bath-House ( Microfiction )

I entered the pool room of the Japanese bath house, through an airlock of glass complete with automatic doors. As a typical Englishman abroad I tried not to feel too uncomfortable standing there completely naked - its not like I’m European, well, at least not a rugby player. My sun-darkened face and forearms were in stark contrast to the rest of my pasty, pale body, which almost glowed as it reflected the lights. The dozen or so Japanese men present all stopped what they were doing. Conversations trailed off and the whole room fell silent as all eyes fell on me. Intimidating, maybe; making me self-conscious, definitely. Greeting their stares with a friendly, “Konnichi wa”, I looked for a spare shower bay to begin my public scrub down. Squatting on a small plastic stool I lathered up with one of the various gels available, before rinsing myself off with the hand held shower head. By the time I had finished, most of the men had moved to the outside bath. There were only a couple of men left and they looked like they were planning to make a move. I wondered if it was my hairy body that bothered the locals. The last chaps decided that discretion was the better part of valor and decamped from the main bath for the sauna. I was alone. The heat of the water was starting to lure me into a drowsy state.

To rouse me from my cosy stupor, and an unexpected 'black mood', I decided to take a dip in the plunge pool. I'd started to remember a night a three years before, brooding, alone, drinking a bottle and a half of good scotch like it was Lambrini, staring into the abyss, nothing to live for; all fear gone at last, feeling cosy, like this, before unconsciousness took me.

I dropped straight in, and, as my head dipped under the surface, I felt the icy cold water refresh me, stinging my skin. Sitting cross-legged on the bottom of the pool, I held my breath as long as I could.

It was good to be alive...