The French Lesson, Part 4

by The Scholar

"Postcards!"

"Yeah, you already said that."

"Oh, well, I can't think of anything else."

Simon stood, head leaning forward, as he studied the sheet of paper in front of him. He was using my bunk as a desk and I lay across the bunk, on my side, leaning on my elbow and propping my head in my hand, as I watched him. He looked up from the sheet of paper he had been studying and stared past me to gaze out of one of the dormitories windows, idly sucking on the end of his pencil, deep in thought.

If I could have captured that moment on film it would have been a photograph to cherish for the rest of my life. The sun shone through the window directly onto my best friend, as if God, himself, had wanted the world to see that angels really did exist and that they didn't all have wings, or carry harps, or wear long, white, flowing robes.

At that moment, Simon's blue eyes sparkled like sapphires in the sunlight, his blonde hair falling in disarray like spun gold framing his face and I took in this awesome sight - his cute, button nose, his lips moistened by his tongue when it absently snaked out to lick them, as he removed the pencil from his mouth. He looked down once more at the sheet of paper before lifting his head to look straight into my eyes and when he did that my breath seemed to be drawn directly from my body in one sudden, sharp exhalation.

"Guess that's it, then," he grinned.

I quickly inhaled. I needed the air back in my lungs before I could respond, which I did with a rather croaky, "Yeah!" and a slight cough.

Simon moved, picked up the sheet of paper and stepped away from my bunk to sit on his own directly below me; and the moment was gone.

I pulled myself up from my laying position and threw my legs over the side of my bunk and jumped to the floor before taking a seat on the bunk below next to where Simon sat.

"Should help get some kind of favourable grade," said Simon, without looking up.

"So what we got?" I asked.

"Tickets, flyers, guidebooks, labels of anything and everything, postcards and any other type of ephemera," read Simon from the sheet of paper.

"Sounds good to me," I said.

The list was our plan of action - stuff we could use in the diaries that we had to keep of our trip and we figured that by illustrating them with those items we were showing both an interest and a willingness in the task we had been set and, with a bit of descriptive writing, we could, we believed, give an adequate account of our experiences.

"Well, we'll see how it goes," replied Simon. "Now come on, or we'll be late for breakfast."

Simon jumped up and headed for the door and I quickly followed.

"Where are we supposed to be going today?" I asked, as we entered the large dining hall of he hostel in which we were staying.

"Rouen," was Simon's one word reply.

"What do we know about Rouen?" I asked, as we took our places at one of the tables.

"You mean, what do Iknow about Rouen?" Simon grinned, reaching out for a box of cereal with which to fill the bowl in front of him.

"Well, okay, fair enough, what do youknow about Rouen?"

"You really ought to pay more attention in class, you know."

"I try, but I can't get my head around history, you know that."

"Listen, I'm not going to give you a history lesson about every place on the itinerary, you know, there'll be enough of that when we get to these places."

"Well, fine, I know all about Rouen, anyway."

"Yeah, right!"

I watched Simon as he spooned up the cornflakes that filled his bowl and place them into his mouth, a little of the milk fell from the side of his mouth and his tongue appeared to quickly lap it up.

I turned my attention to my own breakfast, which, in all fairness, was a much better meal than the one we had been given the previous evening. As well as a choice of cereals, we had toast, onto which we could spread a selection of marmalades and jams, there were croissants, which I'd never seen before and, because we were English, I suppose, they served us with bacon, eggs, tomatoes, mushrooms and other delights of a full English breakfast. Delicious.

I ate too much, but after last night's dismal offering, I was starving and, had one been presented, I daresay I could have devoured a scabby horse. Fortunately, one was not forthcoming. I already had a fear of being given snails and frog's legs and I suspected, rightly, or wrongly, that a scabby horse might well have been another national delicacy and I dismissed the thought with a shudder.

Simon ate just as much as I did, so I didn't feel too bad. In fact, looking around the dining room, I could see that everyone was eagerly tucking in to the delights on offer and I spied Kevin Bradshaw filling his plate for a second time and grinned.

"What you grinning at?" asked Simon.

"Bradshaw - he's already on a second plateful."

Simon turned his head to where Kevin Bradshaw sat forking sausages into his mouth as though they were about to go out of fashion.

"He'll make himself sick."

I nodded in agreement and, as I did, the egg I was just about to place into my mouth fell from my fork and onto my shirt and I made some sort of expletive.

"Now what?" Simon's voice.

"Bloody egg all over my shirt," I said, dropping my knife and fork back onto the plate, as I picked up a napkin and started rubbing at the offending foodstuff.

"Don't do that you plank, you'll make it worse."

"Well, what the hell am I supposed to do? I put this shirt on clean this morning and now I've got egg yolk all over it."

"Here, let me see."

I removed my hand and looked down at my shirt. Rubbing it with the napkin had smeared the egg yolk and made a real mess.

"Damn!"

"It's not too bad."

"Not too bad? What do you mean, not too bad, look at it, it's ruined."

"No it isn't, stop being so bloody dramatic."

"It's okay for you, it's not your shirt."

"It'll wash out, just don't rub at it anymore with that napkin. It just needs a bit of water on it, that's all."

"A bit of water, it needs more than a bit of water."

"Oh, for Christ's sake, look."

Before I could stop him, Simon had picked up his own napkin, folded it in half and submerged part of it in to the glass of water that sat in front of him. He leant forward, napkin in one hand and then, with the other, he grabbed the hem of my shirt and manoeuvred it inside, brushing against my stomach and up to my chest, as he did so, before creating a fist to push out the fabric and using the water-soaked napkin he started to dab at the offending stain.

I shivered.

"Stay still," he said.

Stay still. It was easy for him to say. I was shivering with excitement at the touch of his hand on my skin, like an electric shock had just run through me, I tingled and I felt my heart begin to pound. His hand was so close that he must have felt my heart beating against it. Simon's face was screwed up in determination to rid my shirt of the egg yolk and I hardly dared breath, as I could feel the heat from his arm as it rested on my stomach.

"We'll sort out that sausage, later," I head him say.

"Sausage?"

"The one you dropped down your trousers."

I followed Simon's gaze and saw, to my horror, that I had a large bulge in my trousers. My dick had a mind of its own where Simon was concerned and had taken this opportunity to stiffen.

Simon grinned: "I think you'll have to go change into another shirt, I'm sure this place has a laundry service, it can be washed later."

"And the sausage?"

"Sausage? What sausage?"

"The one..." I paused. "No matter."

"Paul, are you okay?"

"Yeah."

I looked at Simon, who picked up his own - very dry - napkin to rub across his mouth before putting it down to continue devouring his own breakfast and I stood up from the table to return to the dormitory to change my shirt.