Rufus was checking his e-mails when he heard a knock and Magnus put his head round the door.

"I was just going to have a wank, but it'll keep till later." Magnus knew that if his little brother had said that he was in a good mood and he wasn't really disturbing him.

"You know when you did that thing at dinner with the sauce and the bread roll? Were you trying to tell us something? Like Michel gave you a blowjob?" Rufus slowly shook his head in a non-committal way. "That you gave Michel a blowjob?" The automatic blush reaction gave Rufus away. "Uh, uh!" said Magnus. "I thought something must have happened and the reward is that Cinderella is going to the ball."

"Nothing. You know Hugo. So long as his little world is fine, so's he. But I think Michel Ledivin pierced the bubble of his ego…"

"No, that's the trouble," giggled Magnus. "There was no prick involved," and the pair of them roared with laughter. In their amusement Rufus forgot to tell Magnus about his broom cupboard experience, but in both of the twins' minds that had been eclipsed by the forthcoming weekend in London.

At that Magnus and Rufus heard some footsteps on the stairs and a bedroom door slam.

"The wanderer returns," said Magnus. Both boys made their way along the landing and went into Magnus and Hugo's room to behold dressed in tee shirt, cut offs and sandals, the drowned rat. Hugo scowled at them as they burst out in a renewed fit of giggles, but the cold and the rain had taken all the fight out of him. He was reduced to finger gestures.

During the following week leading up to Thursday Rufus became more and more excited. So much so that he achieved little and suddenly realised how much there was to be done before he could go off to London with Michel Ledivin mid-Friday morning. Hugo and Magnus largely kept out of his way because he was verging on the intolerable. They had their own furrows to plough, anyway, perhaps not the best of metaphors in their case.

Finally Thursday dawned and Rufus was first up that morning, although his exam results would not be available until 9 am. There was an embargo until that time. He had the choice of going into school and celebrating with all his mates. Toby and William would be there. The alternative would be to download them from the net. The school sent out e-mails to each of its pupils. He decided to compromise. He would wait at home until the e-mail arrived and then cycle down to school to celebrate. As he had told his mother the previous week, he couldn't have failed everything, mainly because he already knew the marks from his course work and was just waiting for the final grade to add to the A* he already had for maths after taking it a year early.

Rufus was standing naked in front of the full length mirror on his wardrobe's sliding door, feet apart, hands interlaced behind his head. He was waiting for his morning wood to go down so that he could go and have a pee, but it was taking its time today. That didn't matter. He had time on his hands. His balls felt tight. They always did first thing, but then he couldn't weigh them in his hand and jiggle them around. At least they didn't disappear up inside his body like some of those of his fellows at school on a cold day. He loved his dick. He was a show-er rather than a grower. It was a modest length, long and thick enough to be significant, but not oversized to be grotesque or make him look a freak. Still, he had never had any complaints from his partners during fun time. He watched as his dick got harder and the foreskin peeled back leaving his glans bright red and gleaming. It hurt because he wanted to pee, but it was a pleasurable pain and he knew it would go away once it was soft enough to pass water. He'd have a wank in the shower until he realised that he should perhaps save himself for the weekend, or perhaps one of his schoolmates might be in a playful mood and they could go off to one of the hidey-holes where the faggers (smokers) encountered the wankers. He suddenly had a great feeling of lust for William and Toby, singly or together. That did not help the predicament with his stiffie. His eyes wandered upwards, fleetingly gazing at his nipples, firm and erect, nicely delineated on his chest, the size of a 10p piece. William knew how to lick and suck them in a way Toby or his brother couldn't. Anyway, the mood the last two were in all they wanted to do was to clamp clothes pegs on them. He'd taken his sixpack and innie for granted. He looked at his face. Rufus had started to shave, but could leave it to once a week without looking too scruffy. He would shave before he went off with Michel and take his razor with him as he didn't want his chin to feel like sandpaper against Michel's cheeks. He looked at the freckles surrounding his nose. He accepted them as part of being ginger. They were no big deal, even though they were far more prominent in summer. He looked at his mop of red hair which again he accepted as part of his appearance. It made him stand out in the crowd, although that could be a disadvantage at times, particularly when he was being naughty. He hadn't had it cut since before his examinations and he realised that over the summer he had taken on the appearance old of an English sheepdog or a character from Asterix the Gaul . He was proud of his Viking red hair along with his ginger pubes. He had got through the piss-taking at school by laughing along.

Thinking about his hair had taken the pressure off his dick and he could now go into the bathroom and relieve himself. He returned to the mirror on his wardrobe and continued the self-examination, not so much out of vanity, but as a form of inner contentment and an appreciation of how fortunate he was in life. 'Just add ten A stars to that mind and body and I shall have reached perfection.' Then he noticed he had a zit coming on his nose. 'Must get rid of that before tomorrow,' he thought, rushing to his dressing table for the Clearasil ointment. 'Nothing there to squeeze at the moment.' He disliked having zits and blackheads and did everything he could to avoid them, but when they did occasionally appear he savoured the orgasmic feeling when he squeezed them, as they burst and splatted all over the mirror.

Rufus showered and dressed – tanktop, cut-offs, thong and sandals. 'If that doesn't cause at least one prick to twitch, I don't know what will,' he thought, admiring himself in the mirror again. He checked his package. Dead centre as he liked it. He tolerated dressing on the left, but for him dressing on the right was just plain unsightly, bordering on the obscene. He turned round and looked over his shoulder. 'Mm, that's nice. I like that. Just a peek of my bare arse cheeks.' Then another thought struck him. 'When I was blowing Michel last week, he didn't have any pubes. He obviously likes it smooth down there. After his bondage adventure with his brothers his pubes had just grown past the designer stubble stage. I think I'll shave mine off too. It always makes your dick and balls look bigger 'cos there's no bush for them to hide in. I'll put up with the itching when they grow back… or maybe I'll keep them shaved. See what the pubic… I mean public reaction is first.' He was pleased with his little joke.

Rufus was ready to meet the world. His parents were stirring. He could hear the shower in their en suite . He listened at the twins' door. There he could hear the bedsprings creaking in a regular rhythm. 'Hmm, Hugo must had got over his pet from last night, then. Note to self: get them the WD40 from the garage,' and he started giggling to himself.

Rufus went down to the kitchen and started preparing the cafetière so that the coffee would be ready for when his parents appeared. 'Always worth gathering a few brownie points,' he thought. If all went well today, he could be up to £200 richer. His parents had offered £10 per A grade with a bonus of £10 for every A*. The bummer was that it was nothing for any other pass grade and -£10 for each fail. 'I don't think I need to worry about a minus.' A levels were on a different tariff, but it was going to be an expensive summer for Mr and Mrs Lindstrom.

Mother and father were pleased to find that breakfast was set out and the coffee was ready. They just had to decide what they wanted eat. Carl wanted to disapprove of the way his third son was dressed, but could not bring himself to do so. He could not resist staring at him, back and front, and wishing he'd had clothes like that when he was Rufus's age. He confined himself to a "You won't get cold dressed like that, will you?"

"You will text us your results as soon as you get them, Rufus, won't you, dear?"

"Sure. I'll get them off the net at home here, but I've got to wait until nine."

"They're awake, but I don't think they'll be down to breakfast yet," and he left it at that, mainly because he was trying to suppress a giggle."

The parents went off to their places of work, leaving Rufus with an hour to kill. He switched on the wireless, but Chris Evans did his head in. He pushed a button. Radio 4 – talk, talk, talk, politics, politics, politics. He pushed another button. The DAB tuner's screen showed Classic FM, or Claasic FM as it was rebranding itself, but he'd caught the commercials, something about a London female model who'd always had a yen to become a dairy farmer and was able to thanks to a loan from Barclays Bank. 'I should cocoa,' he thought. He pushed another preset at random. The dulcet tones of the announcer followed by some pleasing orchestral music. He looked at the screen: BBC Radio 3 Petroc Trelawney . He left it playing and went up to his bedroom to fetch his copy of GY magazine. He came back downstairs and made himself comfortable on the settee. He could not settle to reading any of the articles, but kept leafing through the magazine looking at the pictures. It fell open at the centrefold. 'I recognise him,' thought Rufus. 'Where have I seen him before?' He turned the page to look at the details. 'Gabriel Thomson. No!' He read a little further. ' Plays Michael Harper, the gay son of Ben and Susan in the BBC comedy My Family . Asked about his own sexuality Gabriel refused to comment, but said he felt quite at ease playing Michael. ' Rufus drooled over the full frontal. 'What a loss if he isn't.'

Rufus looked at his watch. Five to nine. I'd better switch on the computer. He went back upstairs. sitting there as the iMac went through its booting up sequence. At last the home page came up.

"Oh, shit!" he exclaimed. "Why today of all days?" He reread the message screen. ' Hi! Virginmedia is carrying out some essential maintenance in your area. Our service will resume as soon as possible. '

Rufus gathered up some things including his wallet, listened at his brothers' bedroom door to see if there was any movement. None. He ran into the kitchen, scribbled a note and went out to the garage to get his bicycle and he pedalled as fast as he could to school, getting a wolf whistle as he passed a building site. He tried to see where it had come from, but cycled over a pothole and could only just regain his balance and somehow prevent himself from falling off.

He found very few of his contemporaries at school, most of them having elected to receive their results by text or e-mail. He wished he had chosen text. However, it meant that he didn't have to wait very long in the queue. The Director of Studies and the Examinations Officer were sitting at a desk in the reception area next to a computer. When he reached the head of the queue, he was handed a sealed envelope and mechanically congratulated on his results. He walked out into the quadrangle where the others were gathering and impatiently tore at the envelope.

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The Sins of the Father

by N Fourbois

Chapter 18