I Never Said I Loved You
by Rafael Henry
Chapter 2
There were times when Anders caught a later train back to Teignmouth due to a sport commitment or his twice-a-week music thing or some other after-school activity, and the same for me. I could stay late at school in the homework room, a space dedicated to those boys who had transport problems and wanted to do their daily homework at school before returning home. Andersson didn't finish until six-fifteen on Wednesdays and Fridays. But by and large we managed to co-ordinate pretty well on the homeward leg. On the outward journey, we were always on the same train.
I was ready that first morning when the door bell rang with the smiling Anders there on the door step, and we were never late for our train. Being quite early in the morning we always had seats to ourselves. The first few journeys passed with little conversation, Anders sitting opposite me, thoughtful, shooting me occasional glances, and then looking away through the train window. I preferred to look at him rather than any of the alternative views, and I'm sure he had quickly worked that out. Then one morning he looked distinctly odd. The previous morning he had slipped his shoes off and sat opposite me with his feet up on the seat, cross-legged, knees wide apart just like we sit on the gym floor listening to instructions from the PE teacher. He had presented me, quite deliberately, I'm one hundred-per-cent certain, with a view that gave my tummy one of those familiar little turns. A few seconds later his feet were back on the floor. It was an image that was to dwell in my mind for some time. Anders was still of an age when boys were not required to wear long trousers for school, especially in summer time.
'Are you ok Anders?' I asked.
No answer, just a solemn, anxious even, face looking out across Dawlish beach. The next morning, as I opened the train door for him, he asked if he might sit next to me. Of course I agreed. That feeling again. I sit next to the window. This way he has a choice and is in control. What he chose to do thrilled me beyond measure. He sat himself down close to me, close enough for me to feel his body touching mine. Then I can feel him leaning against me, and the gentle weight of his head on my shoulder. I didn't dare respond in the way I desperately wanted to until the following morning. Then I did. More than one other passenger could see us but I didn't care. He leaned forward to make space behind his back for my arm. As I tightened my hold around his back, I felt his face push into my neck. His mouth was on my bare skin. I watched through the window of the train as the Devon landscape rushed past, unable to move. There were a few boats moored in the Exe estuary, Exmouth clearly visible in the warm morning haze on the other side of the wide expanse of water. It's a fabulous sight, with the dappled sun reflecting off the grey water and seabirds and their eerie calls everywhere. I looked up to see if anyone had noticed. I'm sure they had noticed, and a woman with the morning paper on her lap was still looking our way. I looked back at her. She smiled. Perhaps she understands.
We always sat in the same seat in the last of eight coaches, London bound. We saw the same people on the station platform each morning, and rarely did someone we didn't recognized board the train. One morning someone did. Our seats were mostly doubles, ours with a double opposite and no table between the two. I saw a man walking down the platform towards our end of the train looking through the windows before he chose the part of the train he preferred. He chose our door. Whether he had seen us waiting on the platform earlier and followed us down, I don't know. He got on at our door and sat down opposite Anders and I. He was smartly dressed and looked like he was heading to an office somewhere, maybe all the way to London.
'Morning.' He says smiling brightly as Anders and I stared back at him. Anders is already in his usual position tucked in nicely next to me with his arm inside mine, and a decent length of bare leg, increasingly tanned by summer term outside activities, resting against mine.
'Morning.' We reply in unison.
The man, in his thirties I thought, kept looking, to the extent that I was becoming embarrassed by his attention, although I sensed that I wasn't the main subject of his prolonged glances, but Anders and his expanse of bare thigh, knees wide apar, no doubt unaware that he must be showing more of his upper thigh than he should be, and probably even more. I'm sure a lot of people look at Andersson with his distinctive head of platinum fair hair, teasingly unkempt. It's the sort of hair, quite fine, that demands fingers to be run through it. I felt Anders head turn into my shoulder, and in so doing closed his legs. Good. I looked back and the man was still looking, and smiling benignly.
'You look like good friends.' The man says after a long silence.
'Yes; I think we are. Thank you.' I replied and looked away towards the fleeting village scape as we passed through Topsham. At S. David's Station we get off, Anders hauling his bag onto his shoulders, as I do mine. The man lowers his newspaper to watch the usual routine of twisting the door hand to open it. As I close the door with the usual sharp bang, I notice he is still watching, and gives a little wave of his hand as we turn and walk away. I'm wondering if we shall ever see him again, and indeed if we want to. My tummy turned over at the thought. I think I must be different.
The next day Anders was unwell and kept at home for the day, so I was on the train alone. The same man appeared just as he had the day before, sitting on the opposite seat to mine, and this time, no Anders. Close to our arrival at S. David's, I stand up between the seats and reach up to pull my bag off the luggage rack immediately above the window, and I'm aware that my legs are almost touching the man's knees. I realise now how vulnerable this position made me, but I had no choice. I didn't look down as the man reaches forwards and touches my leg. I kept my hands on my bag on the rack above my head and I didn't move while the hand moved upwards and inwards and gripped my genitals through my trousers quite firmly. Then the hand relaxes and begins a rhythmic and gentle squeezing of the entire handful. I froze in shock. It lasted several seconds while I stood there as he continues to fondle me. My first thought was not about the sensation I was receiving, but the fact that I had let him do it. Off the train now and walking quickly along the platform to the main exit, a little breathless, my mind raced through what had just happened. This event remained in my mind all day. The man was nice enough, good-looking too. I'm sure he meant no harm. After all, I let him do it didn't I? I could have brushed his hand away and shouted at him but I didn't. It was my fault really, not his. Perhaps, when I stood up like that, he thought it was an invitation? Yes, it was my fault. In some way I must have sent a signal to him. And there was something else too. Walking along the platform towards the station exit, I put my hand in my pocket to feel myself briefly. I'm still partially aroused.
The next morning I woke up early and gave in to a fantasy, as I often do when I wake up in that kind of a mood.
Anders fails to appear again, but the man on the train has. Sitting opposite me as we pull out of Teignmouth Station, he lays his newspaper on his lap and looks at his hand, his thumb uppermost. Then, with his fingers underneath and his other thumb on top, he makes a gesture that leaves me in no doubt about what he is suggesting. I look at him as he smiles back at me. There is no one else in our coach.
'Well? May I?' The man says.
He stands up and sits down next to me, his newspaper now spread over his lap and partly over mine too.
'Would you mind if I do? Probably easier for you.'
Of course I don't mind. I leant back a little, quickly do what I have to do, undo what needs to be undone, and watch. My penis is hard now, swollen and pink, and incredibly. The fondling becomes something more now. I look down feeling the sensation rising towards its peak. By the time we draw into Dawlish, it's over. I turn my head towards the window, my eyes closed. That feeling. I love it. A distraction now. Anders appears in front of me, naked, pale skinned, smiling. Anders I love you. I do. I love you so much. Please kiss me again, my sweet love.
My alarm clock brought me back to reality, the here and now, the sorting things out, what I had done some minutes before. It was all over, uncontrolled and so good, this time and every time it seems. I run the tips of my fingers around my tummy just like I did with John that first time he let me, fascinated by his scented achievement. Through my cloud of guilt come thoughts of Anders, and whether he will be going to school this morning. Will the man on the train be there today?
Andersson's mother had 'phoned at seven thirty to say that her son was still not well enough to go to school that day, but could they meet for a coffee later that morning? Something had come up.
There was no sign of the man on the train that morning. As I walk past the windows of the train in the moments before it will glide out of S. David's Station, City of Exeter, I do not see the man who gave me my illicit pleasure this morning, in my waking dreams. But on the homeward journey he's there again as I close my eyes and drift into my imagination. In the almost empty train……
'Hello again.' He says, smiling from his seat.
'Hello.' I answer, looking up from my book and turning towards him.
The man angles his head towards the aisle. He wants me to follow him. I do. He opens the door to tiny water closet just a few feet from where we were sitting, and closes the door and turns the lock. I turn to face him. I feel his hand invade my trousers, and then the skin of his hand is around me, inside now, a firm hand between my legs, and fondling. I look down and watch as I rise to his touch. He exposes himself to me. I'm shocked at what I see. He tells me what to do, and I do it. It's quickly over for him, his creamy slime cleverly captured into a square of linen with my own watery seed. More air please, more air! The landscape tears past the window but I'm not seeing it. When I look up, the man has gone. There is just a void, and a blank and frozen mind. The present gradually forms as reality becomes clear once more.
I saw my friend Paul at Break time, ten thirty. We tell each other everything, even our most private thoughts. He laughed when I told him my story. Lucky boy he said.
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