Frankie Fey - 1. Frankie

Unlike his peers at St Puritan’s High School, fifteen year-old Frankie was addicted to observing things to discover how they are made and function, so he could understand why they aren’t more efficient, more rational, more… sensible. Having endured a somewhat late onset of puberty, he had lately been making up for lost time by conducting experiments and observations in the field of sex and sexuality. Recent investigation into the aesthetics and mechanics of same-sex coupling with a classmate had yielded valuable data, so now he was ready to expand his research by evaluating the practicalities and satisfaction levels of copulation with the opposite-sex.

The Internet is an excellent provider of vicarious information, but true knowledge can only be obtained through first hand experience. Unfortunately, not being sportive, tall, conventionally handsome or socially competent, he had been unable to find a willing experimental female; the general consensus being that the new boy was skinny, strange, too ready with his stupid opinions, and knew too much about useless things and nothing about what counted.

Fortunately, there was Flora; a pleasant, pale, sturdily built lass with straight brown hair, soulful eyes, large breasts, shapeless legs, romantic disposition and a tendency to imagine no one was cleverer than she. When Frankie joined the class she lent him her notebooks so he could catch up, helped him with assignments, and, mistaking politeness for interest, bored him witless with inane gossip about the other students. Frankie’s stoic restraint bore fruit when, desperate to unburden herself of an intolerable secret, Flora confessed her misery at still being a virgin while all about her were apparently losing theirs. When Frankie confessed that he too was an unwilling virgin, which in a heterosexual sense he was, her tears welled in sympathy and he settled back patiently to wait.

Two days later she shyly drew him into a quiet corner and offered to sacrifice her maidenhead on the altar of friendship. Frankie feigned astonishment, applauded her generosity of spirit, and equally shyly smiled his acceptance. Flora was instantly assailed by doubts.

‘I’m not a slut,’ she whispered.

‘Neither am I.’

‘You won’t hurt me?’

‘Never! You can tell me to stop at any time.’ He smiled sweetly to underline his good faith.

Flora visibly relaxed. ‘Tomorrow at lunchtime?’

‘Sure…What’ll I bring?’

‘Just yourself—I've got everything. Meet me on the far side of the tennis courts as soon as the bell rings for lunch.’

The following day, while the other seven hundred and thirty four students were opening their lunch boxes in the quadrangle or under trees on the side lawn, Frankie and Flora were ducking under a wire fence into a scrubby wasteland. A barely visible track led to a concrete wall about three metres high and ten long.

‘Hurry. We mustn't be seen; this place is out of bounds.’

Frankie looked back. ‘We can be seen from the tennis courts.’

‘Not if we’re on the other side of the wall.’ She skipped excitedly around the back to a grassy spot, used her sensibly shod foot to shove aside cans, plastic bags, cigarette butts and other detritus to make a space, took a rug from her schoolbag, spread it, handed Frankie a foil-wrapped condom, and plonked herself down, unsure what to do next.

Frankie sat beside her and looked around. ‘What is this place? And how did you know about it?’

‘Charlene told me. It’s where lots of the girls come with their boyfriends. It’s an old rifle range for when boys used to have military training about sixty years ago or something.’ After a nervous look around she whispered, ‘We’ve only half an hour left.’

‘Yeah, right.’ Frankie stripped, played with himself until he was stiff enough to roll on the condom, then stared in horror at Flora who had placed her neatly folded cotton panties on the rug beside her and, still wearing her regulation school uniform, sensible brogues, beige socks, and cream blouse buttoned to the throat, was sprawled on her back, eyeing his manhood in alarm. The front of her pleated tartan skirt had been drawn up just enough to expose a soft white hand covering her pudenda. The effect was lewdly prurient.

‘What’s the matter?’ he demanded, failing to conceal his irritation. ‘Never seen a penis before?’

‘No. I mean yes. I mean are they always so big?’

‘Usually bigger. I’m on the small side, so you’ve no cause for concern.’ He paused and took a deep breath before saying something he would soon regret. ‘I’m sorry, Flora,’ he blurted, ‘but there’s no way I can have sex with you if you're wearing clothes!’

‘But…’

‘The full sensual delight of sexual pleasure can only be experienced when both participants are naked, stimulating all the senses and culminating in the physical entry of one into the other, at which time they become a temporary physical and spiritual unity.’

Frankie’s soft, reverent tones insinuated themselves into the part of Flora’s psyche desperate for attention, mystery, ceremony, and actions that would validate her existence as a female. As if mesmerised she ripped off blouse and skirt, tore off the brassiere, and lay back with legs impossibly wide apart, arms wide to the sky and vulva swelling with desire.

Frankie frowned and regretted telling her to strip. Exposed to the light of day the smooth, pale, over-abundant flesh was not an inviting mattress, nor did he relish the possibility that, face to face, she might want to kiss him.

‘What's the matter?’ Flora asked, nervousness galloping back.

‘Nothing. You look wonderful—the primordial virgin.’ Frankie’s voice became even more intimate, suggestive and, to Flora at least, arousing. ‘I want to make this special for you, and the most natural and satisfying way for men and women to copulate is the way all primates do it—the female on all fours and the male mounting from behind. The penetration is easier for both, the clitoris is better stimulated, and the male can use his hands to caress the female’s breasts.’

Kneeling beside the speechless young woman, he gently rolled her over, placed a strong arm under her soft belly, heaved her onto hands and knees, then positioned himself behind, intrigued at how little difference there was in appearance between a female in this position and a male. The anus was the same and Flora’s slightly swollen and darkish vulva looked very similar to a scrotum, except for the vertical slit showing pink at the edges.

He stroked it, triggering a whimper—whether from pleasure or fear wasn’t clear. Then placing himself directly behind her, he positioned his knob at what he had read were the gates of heaven, and was about to thrust when…

‘Stop right there, Frankie Goldmein!’ The voice was loud, nasal, sharp and unpleasant and belonged to Mr. Hayter, the schools Christian Chaplain and defacto guidance counsellor.

Frankie turned his head and frowned at the man standing beside the wall. ‘Why?’ he snapped. ‘What's it got to do with you?’

‘Why? You cheeky upstart, I’ll give you why!’ The lean and pinched purveyor of morality bounded forward, grasped Frankie by the ear and dragged him backwards.

Enraged by the pain, Frankie slammed his fist into his attacker’s celiac plexus at the top of his stomach. The Chaplain sagged back, gasping for breath, then vomited over the rug, just missing Flora’s legs. She leaped to her feet wailing soundlessly as she scrabbled for her clothes, too nervous and agitated to dress herself. Frankie calmed her with his hands, then dressed her, telling her not to worry. He would sort everything out. He was just tying her shoelaces when the Chaplain, who had been leaning against the wall taking deep ragged breaths, shouted, ‘Perverts!’

‘Go back to school, but don’t speak to anyone! I’ll make sure you aren't in trouble.’

Flora remained frozen, transfixed by fear.

‘Go!’ Frankie snapped, giving her a sharp shove.

Flora stared wildly at Frankie, took courage, and ran.

‘Cover your shame!’ the Chaplain rasped.

Frankie gazed down at his lean frame and quiescent penis, from which he casually peeled the condom. ‘I’ll dress, but not from shame.’

‘Wait for me outside the Principal’s office in ten minutes!’ the religious man snarled before staggering back towards the school.

Making himself as presentable as possible, Frankie raced to the Principal’s office, arriving before the Chaplain. He burst in without knocking. Closing the door he stood in front of Mrs Payshince’s desk with his hands behind his back.

Apparently unsurprised, the Principal, a middle aged, comfortable woman with grey hair and no obvious makeup or perfume, calmly placed her sandwich on a plate, wiped her mouth with a sensible handkerchief and raised her eyebrows to invite an explanation.

‘The Chaplain followed Flora and me to the Rifle Range and saw us naked.’

‘Flora?’ The incredulity in her voice was unmistakeable. ‘Flora Shiotte?’

‘Yes. But I forced her.’

‘How? She’s twice as big as you.’

‘I told her I’d spread nasty rumours about her on social media if she didn’t.’

‘And did you have sex?’

‘No, Mr. Hayter must have been watching us for a while, because he stopped me at exactly the last second.’

‘How?’

‘By shouting. Then he grabbed my ear and it hurt so I punched him in the stomach, then he vomited over the rug, so I told Flora to dress and leave.’

The Principal’s head was shaking in disbelief.

‘It’s true! So promise me you won’t punish Flora; she’s a good girl and I think you should keep all this a secret so she doesn't get ridiculed by the other girls who are really nasty to her sometimes, and…’

A knock on the door interrupted what was in danger of becoming a litany of complaints about the school he detested.

‘Come in.’

An angry, self-righteous and fully recovered Chaplain recoiled in fury at the sight of his enemy. ‘I hope you haven't been taken in by the lies of that moral cretin, I found him…’

‘Yes, I’m aware of what you found. Frankie has explained it all.’

‘What are you going to do about it?’

The Principal turned to Frankie. ‘I will have to suspend you, Frankie, for punching the Chaplain.’

‘What about what he was doing with Flora?’

‘Thanks to you, Mr. Hayter, he did nothing.’

‘But…he was naked and…’

‘So were Adam and Eve in their innocence.’

‘What about the girl?’ The Chaplain demanded.

‘What about her?’

‘She must be punished.’

‘Don’t you think vomiting over her was punishment enough?’

‘I missed. And if you don’t order her punishment I will make sure she…’

‘From what I can gather,’ the Principal interrupted sharply, ‘you perved, I think the expression is, on the two young people for some time before intervening. I don’t think that will look good on your reference when you're looking for another job.’

‘You mean you’d…?’

‘Yes. So take heed of your guru’s advice and forgive sins and nurture the sinners, Chaplain.’

He was shaking in anger, apparently unable to formulate a response.

‘Don’t let me keep you I’m sure you have important things to do.’

The Chaplain stormed out and she turned to Frankie. ‘What is it about the school you dislike?’

‘The teachers have tunnel vision and aren't interested in anything except exams.’

‘Several teachers have told me you don’t concentrate, have a wandering mind, and are constantly interrupting with irrelevant bits of information, asking impertinent questions, insulting them, and not bothering to study for tests.’

‘Insulting them? How?’

‘Telling them they're ignorant. Berating them for their narrow approach…’ She let her voice trail off into a question.

‘That’s because as soon as they tell us something, dozens of related ideas pour into my head and I think about them as well as what the teacher’s saying and then I ask them about it but they don’t understand me and…’

‘Won’t your parents be angry when they find out?’

‘No. They're used to me. They said that if I don’t make a go of this school I’ll have to either get a job or do correspondence. They leave it to me to do what's best for myself.’

The Principal was shaking her head in perplexity. ‘You seem so…’ she shook her head and changed tack. ‘Why did you choose Flora?’

Frankie’s grin transformed his face, triggering a sudden surge in Mrs. Payshinse’s heart rate. His eyes literally twinkled, and health and life seemed to erupt from every pore. In that instant she fell in love—in love with the first young person who embodied everything she had always hoped to find, but never had in the teenagers in her care. A delight in learning, in living, in laughing and daring, in moderation and excess in… She stopped herself. ‘I’m ridiculous,’ she told herself. ‘He’s just another kid,’ but she couldn’t take her eyes off the animated face and body, and joined in his laughing as he described his relationship with the bovine Flora, who was the only person to befriend him when he arrived, and when they discovered they were both virgins they decided to rectify the deficit.

‘So why are you taking all the blame?’

‘Because she needs an education and likes it here, whereas I want to get kicked out. So, if you please, Mrs. Payshinse,’ Frankie continued, tugging humbly at an imaginary forelock, causing her to laugh explosively, ‘could you please, please expel me? I really don’t like it here. It’s not you,’ he added hastily, ‘I really like you, you're the best principal I've ever met, it’s me… I just don’t fit in… so… please?’

‘Oh Frankie… you look so ordinary; but you're definitely not.’

‘And so do you; and neither are you.’

The Principal heaved a sigh. ‘I wish I’d got to know you earlier. Go and get your things and then collect your official expulsion notice at the front office. It should be ready in fifteen minutes.’ She held out her hand.

Frankie grasped it, kissed it, shook it, then pulled her close and planted a soft kiss on her cheek. ‘Thanks, Mrs. Payshinse. If all the teachers were like you I’d never want to leave.’

And then he was out the door and the room seemed dimmer, drained of energy and life, and the Principal sagged into the chair behind her desk and stared vacantly into space, wondering what she was doing and why, and how long she could keep going.

Frankie had just collected his letter from the secretary when Flora exited the Principal’s office. She ran to him, wrapped him in a bear-hug, kissed him on the lips, held him at arm’s length and whispered, ‘Thank you, thank you, thank you. You are the nicest person in the world.’

And then she was gone and Frankie whistled happily all the way home.

Two hours earlier than usual he let himself quietly into the house, wondering why the gas delivery truck was parked in the drive. Not wanting to encounter his mother before he’d worked out a way of presenting his fate in a favourable light, he was tiptoeing quietly to his room when a scream followed by grunts and moans diverted him to his mother’s bedroom. He should have guessed. Instead of writhing in the throes of death, she was writhing in the throes of ecstasy, in the identical position to that of Flora a couple of hours earlier, while the impressively hairy body of the man who delivered gas cylinders was doing what Frankie had been prevented from completing.

Leaning silently against the doorjamb he studied the scene in an attempt to understand what had so offended the Chaplain. Unable to see anything depraved in the activity, his shrug of incomprehension caught his mother’s eye.

‘Frankie! Are you all right?’ she asked with unwonted concern, causing the gasman to stop mid thrust. ‘Don’t stop,’ she snapped over her shoulder.

He recommenced rhythmical pumping, staring curiously at the intruder.

‘I’m fine, Virtue. I just got caught doing what you’re doing, so they kicked me out.’

‘Oh, poor darling… ouff!’ she panted after a particularly hard thrust. ‘Go and uhhh make uhh… us a nice ahhhh… cup of ohhhh yes!!…tea and we’ll talk it oooover. Give me ten minutes?’ Her voice slid up an octave along with her lover’s orgasm.

Having secretly watched his mother during other such apparently ecstatic couplings, Frankie shook his head at her insatiable lust and lack of discrimination when it came to partners. In the kitchen he pondered the meaning of life while preparing afternoon tea. Unsure if his mother would want sweet or savoury biscuits, he plonked both on a plate, poured boiling water into the teapot and sat, wondering how to make the best of his new freedom.

Five minutes later he heard the gasman drive away and the shower running, so poured two cups and took a plate of sandwiches out of the fridge.

Virtue arrived wet from the shower, still drying herself. ‘Let’s drink it out on the verandah.’

‘The neighbours will see you and complain again.’

‘Not if I hang the towel in their line of sight.’

They went out, she pegged up the towel then collapsed onto a chair. ‘Ouf! I feel as if I've been running a marathon.’

‘It sounded as though you were.’

‘Was I very noisy?’

‘No more than usual.’

‘Cheeky monkey.’ She took a sip of tea and a sweet biscuit. ‘So, Frankie, you’ve been expelled again! Really. Why weren't you more careful? Who were you doing it with?

‘A girl at school.’

‘What happened to her?’

‘Nothing. I said I’d forced her.’

‘Why?’

‘So I’d get expelled.’

‘Typical… How did they find out?’

‘The Chaplain followed us, perved for a bit, then stopped me just as I was about to take the plunge.’

‘Next time choose somewhere private.’

‘There won’t be a next time. Having seen her saggy body and then you and the gasman, it no longer appeals.’

‘That was unnecessarily cruel.’

‘But true.’

‘Are you going to tell your father why you’ve been expelled?’

‘No way! He reckons masturbation’s a sin, so he’d slaughter me if he knew I’d been caught fornicating. What about you?’

The mother concealed her amusement and smiled conspiratorially, ‘I won’t tell on you if you don’t tell on me.’

‘Fair enough.’

They shook hands. Not as friends, they'd never been that, but to confirm the loose alliance they’d formed when Virtue decided she was too young to be the mother of a clever five-year-old extrovert, so they pretended to be brother and sister whose mother had disappeared mysteriously, leaving them in the care of a grumpy old man whom Frankie called Dad, despite being certain he was no relation. It wasn’t long before Frankie was very pleased that no one thought the outrageously flirtatious female who accompanied him occasionally, was his mother!

During lunch, Frankie gave a slightly more detailed account of the incident that set them both laughing.

‘So… you're still a virgin at fifteen.’ she stated thoughtfully. ‘Does it worry you?’

‘Not at all. I was just curious.’

‘I’m pleased you were interrupted,’ she said quietly. ‘Girls like your Flora only need to think about sex to get pregnant. And I know what I'm talking about,’ she said with unaccustomed thoughtfulness. ‘And I'm not surprised they got rid of you,’ she added with a sigh of resignation. ‘All your teachers have disliked you. I can’t recall a positive comment on any report card since you started school.’ She raised her eyes to the ceiling and recited, ‘Frankie is an intelligent child burdened by overweening self-importance. Frankie is an opinionated child. Frankie is irritatingly dogmatic. Frankie is convinced he’s always right. Frankie’s pontifical manner irritates pupils and teachers alike. Frankie should have sensitivity training before someone does him serious harm.’ She gazed in confusion at her chirpy son who was nodding in delight as if she’d been reciting a list of compliments. ‘Don’t you care that your teachers all think you're a smart arsed, up yourself, self-important, know-it-all prick—an assessment with which I heartily agree?’

‘Thanks Virtue.’

‘You're welcome.’

‘I don’t care what they think about me,’ Frankie added with a shake of his head. ‘Teachers write nonsense like that because they’re ignorant, unintelligent, dull witted, obtuse, pea-brained, brain-dead idiots too stupid to realise I'm smarter than them… and much more charming and interesting,’ he added with a nod of finality.

Long before her son had reached school age Frankie’s mother had learned not to wast energy arguing with him—he always won. ‘I’ll concede the last one,’ she sighed. ‘Meanwhile, how about using your superior intelligence to decide what we’ll tell your father.’

‘No need to tell him anything. He’s always at work when I'm at school, so there's no reason for him to find out.’

‘But what about school?’

‘The Internet’s full of study courses. I’ll do it by correspondence.’

The mother shrugged. When it came to decisions she was no match for her son. Despite being considered beautiful by all who knew her, Virtue Goldmein’s lack of education, formal or otherwise, had resulted in a deep-seated sense of intellectual inferiority, causing her to withdraw into irritable silence when forced to think about things not directly concerned with day-to-day living or sex. Her parents had not named their only daughter Virtue on a whim. Believing in the mystical power of names, they hoped to ensure she would remain pure and unsullied until marriage. To assist the name to work its mystical power, as soon as menstruation commenced she had been forbidden to leave the house unless accompanied by one or both parents, or her brother Ingenio.

Ingenio’s name had been intended to make him inventive, creative, resourceful, shrewd and sophisticated. To their delight he embodied all of those qualities and, although three years younger than his sister, took responsibility for her as if he was older and wiser.

The same parents had insisted their grandson be called Frank, to ensure he was at all times candid, direct, forthright, plain-spoken, straightforward, open, honest, truthful, sincere; outspoken, and not afraid to call a spade a spade. Their daughter’s name turned out to be egregiously inappropriate, but they had been spot on with her son.