Here is the fifth and final chapter of The Good Die Young. As the title suggests, there is no happy ending. In spite of that, I hope that the reader will enjoy these tales of school in an age now long gone. As I said, unlike my other published writing on Nifty, this story is true. If you do enjoy it, please don't forget to make a contribution to Nifty, so enable people to enjoy this wonderful website for many years to come.
The Good Die Young, by Scotnat
Chapter 5
School was very different for me without Peter. We kept in touch through occasional letters. Long-distance phone calls were too expensive to be an option and of course cell phones were unheard of. I had plenty of friends still and occasionally managed to fool around with one of them. I was the only one without a girl friend at that time. Dennis, who had been in 1B with me and had briefly been a friend in first year, also had a girl friend, but he had a bit of a reputation which got him the nickname "Camper." One day there was an event in a smaller hall, one which had a stage, and the whole fifth and sixth years were all there. It may have been some kind of debating thing. We were packed in like sardines.
I found myself sitting in the very back row, in a corner, close beside Dennis. He and I had barely exchanged greetings for years; he was following a completely different course from me. However, there we were, sitting very close together. I became aware of gentle movement at my left side. A hand was trying to get into my trouser pocket, and it wasn't my hand! Of course I was interested. Dennis must have counted on that, or else he was just incredibly, stupidly brave! There really wasn't room for him to get his hand well in, but I wriggled a bit to give him more access. I hoped like hell that the guy sitting on my other side wouldn't notice. Dennis managed to get his hand in far enough to stroke my thigh but couldn't get near my cock, which was rigid by this time. I tried to get my hand into his pocket but there really wasn't room at all. We just sat there, occasionally exchanging a grin.
On the way out of the hall, as soon as it was safe, I whispered in his ear "Want to go somewhere?"
"I'm supposed to be meeting Claire, but I'll put her off. Meet me at the gates in ten minutes." He went off to find his unfortunate lady friend.
"I don't have long before I need to catch the bus," I said as we met outside the school gates.
"There's a toilet near the bus station, let's try there," Dennis suggested.
Fortunately there was no-one in the public gents when we went in. I popped the necessary penny in the lock and opened a cubicle. We squeezed in together. We were both really horny by then and lost no time in undoing each other's trousers and dropping them and our pants to our ankles. I placed my hands on the smooth skin of his flanks, he did the same to me, and we rubbed our bellies and cocks together. It was no more than five minutes till we both came. He shot more jizz than I did, but we made quite a mess of each other. Old fashioned hard toilet roll was no use for wiping up sperm, so we had to use our pocket handkerchiefs. Everyone carried cloth hankies in those days, and I don't suppose we were the only boys who used them for that purpose! I've often wondered if my mother knew what caused the stains on the handkerchiefs she washed for me every week.
I had to run to catch my bus then, but that was the start of an episode which lasted a few weeks. Dennis and I met up as frequently as possible, usually at lunchtime, and we became familiar with all the public toilets around the town. One day we were returning to the playground just in time for afternoon classes when I noticed two teachers having an animated discussion. "Where?" said one. "There, that one," said the other and I realised he meant me. I glanced down and saw that my flies were wide open! If those two teachers guessed what Peter and I had been up to, they gave no sign. Perhaps they'd seen it all before!
I could now drive, and was allowed to borrow my dad's car on Sundays to go to church, where I was still in the choir. I was also now having organ lessons from Mr Thomson. I thought it was the greatest honour of my life when, forty years later, I was able to return to St Kevoca's as organist and choirmaster -- Mr Thomson's old job! But back to the sixties, There were a couple of boys in the village, a year or two younger than me, who were also in the choir. I got into the habit of picking them up in the car, so that their parents (who preferred the early service) didn't have to drive them. The three of us all wore the kilt every Sunday. I was now 18 and my libido was raging. I had however managed to control my propensity to get hard every few minutes, to the extent that I was also now regularly wearing the kilt without underpants. It felt wonderful -- and it still does!
One day after matins, a few of us were standing outside the church chatting. It was quite a breezy day. Kevin, the elder of the two brothers who travelled with me, was standing with his back to me talking to someone else, when a gust of wind blew the back of his kilt right up to his neck. I was disappointed, however, because all I could see was his long white shirt tail. In those days, men's shirts were cut much more generously than they are now, regularly reaching half way down the thighs at the back. When I thought it over later, I realised that that's what others would see if my kilt blew up in the same way -- and I did not like that idea! So from then on, I got into the habit of tucking my long shirt tail up and under to my waist, leaving my bum bare. What a kinky little sod I had become! I didn't want anyone to see my shirt tail, but had no problem with them possibly seeing my bare bum! (I'm glad to say that I've never grown out of that particular kinkiness, and my wife quite likes it!)
Final year at the Academy came to an end, and for the first time in my life I dated a girl for the leavers' summer dance (what would nowadays be called a "prom".) She was a nice girl; I had borrowed my father's car and drove her home at the end. We kissed in the car, but it never went any further.
That summer Peter came back up to visit. I can't remember who he stayed with, but it wasn't me. We met up for an afternoon in a café, with one or two other mutual friends, and spent a wonderful couple of hours reminiscing about our years together at the Academy, about Mr Thomson's choir (I was still a member) and of course about those wonderful summer camps. I learned that Peter was going to Bristol to study some new-fangled subject called "sociology". I was headed to Glasgow to read classics. At the end of the afternoon we shook hands, said goodbye and Peter went back home to Berkshire. The following year I heard that he had got married, at only 20, but we had lost touch by then and I never saw him again.
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It was four years later, I had completed years one and two of my course and had then taken a year out to study abroad, and was now coming near the end of the third year of my four year degree course, when one day in the street outside the university main building I bumped into a boy whose name I have sadly forgotten. He was younger than me by a couple of years. He and his father had both joined the choir of St Kevoca's church shortly before Peter's family moved away. I think his father had worked for the same firm as Peter's dad. He and I had a brief catch up conversation, then suddenly he said :
"You were friendly with Peter Silversmith, weren't you? I gather that he's really quite ill now."
I must have gaped, for he said, "Didn't you know? I think he has something called Hodgkin's disease."
I was gobsmacked. I knew that Peter's elder brother was still in the Glasgow area so I sought him out to ask for news of Peter. Yes, it was true. James Silversmith had qualified as a doctor by that time and was able to tell me the sad news that Peter had an incurable form of cancer and that the prognosis was bleak. Fortunately he and his wife had not got round to starting a family.
I spent the next few months in a fog. With finals approaching, between wondering about Peter and having problems with an unsuitable young lady that I had got in tow with, I came close to flunking my degree and eventually only got a third rather than the 2/1 I had been hoping for. However, I did graduate and decided to be sensible and ditched the young lady before spending a rather better summer than I really deserved.
That was, until one day at my parents' house, the local weekly paper was delivered. I glanced through it and that was how I learned that Peter had died. He was barely 24.
I couldn't explain to my parents how I felt, of course. They knew what had happened to make me upset, but they couldn't understand why I was mourning as much as I did.
I wrote a long letter of condolence to Peter's mum and dad, who had both entertained me at their home so often while Peter and I were at school together. Like my own parents, they can't have known just how much Peter's death affected me. I got a lovely reply from Mr Silversmith, in which he paid loving tribute to his son, but I got the impression that they had had time during Peter's illness to prepare themselves for the end and were now glad it was over. Meantime I was still reeling with shock and a deep sense of loss which, because of the nature of my feelings for Peter, I could share with no-one -- until now.
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Those events took place nearly sixty years ago now. Life has to move on, of course. I began my career as a teacher of classics, and eventually put my feelings for my own sex aside when I met a young lady with whom I clicked instantly -- and she with me, which never ceases to amaze me. We're still together, and our golden wedding celebration is fading into the past; but not a day goes by when I don't think about Peter. I've never ceased to mourn for him, even after all these years, for he was my first love, the good man who died too young.