Bad Penny (7 page)

I shook myself, forcing my attention back to the
Journal of Genetics
to stop myself having to run to the loos to masturbate.

I had to attend the meeting, I was far too curious not to. Bourne Hall was no great distance from my own hall of residence and fifty-seven proved to be a corner room with a view over the river. I wasn't too concerned with the view, because all my attention was taken up by the company. There were seven women in the room, and they were unified by a certain look. None of them could have been called pretty, but it wasn't that there was anything physically wrong with them. It was rather that they affected a rather dowdy, perhaps even austere, appearance. I was in my usual jeans and T-shirt, with my hair in a bright red scrunchie, but suddenly felt as if I'd walked into a vicar's drawing room in my bra and panties.

‘Hi, Raquel,' I announced myself rather uncertainly.

‘It's Rachel, Penny,' she replied, ‘but welcome anyway. Do sit down.'

I nodded to the others as Rachel introduced me. I didn't recognise any of them but they all looked to be stern, rather serious young women. As I took my seat, a rather good description of their manner occurred to me – strict but fair – rather in the style of old-fashioned English girls' school teachers. It was a description that appealed directly to my sexual fantasies, although the prospect of actually becoming involved with such a group was more than a little daunting. I had never yet touched another woman sexually, and the idea made me feel a little ashamed of myself, yet it was undoubtedly appealing.

‘I think everybody's here,' Rachel said, ‘so now perhaps I should explain our aims to the newcomers and give them a particular welcome – Faith, Clara and Penny.'

She nodded to me and two of the other girls, both of whom looked more at home in the company than I did.

‘As you know,' she continued, ‘we are a branch of the League of Purity . . .'

My fairy-tale castle of imaginary pleasures collapsed on the instant. They were no clandestine society of old-fashioned lesbians, but the local representatives of the League of Purity. I'd heard of them, vaguely, but only knew that they took vows to remain chaste until married, or some such pointless rubbish.

As Rachel wittered on, all I could do was sit there and wish I had the guts to get up and tell them that not only had I been buggered and sucked men's cocks, but that I had enjoyed every second of it. Of course, I didn't, and could only sit there politely while she talked about God and our moral duty and treating our bodies as temples and so on and so on. Like so many organisations based on religion, their creed had been constructed by extracting the bits they wanted from Christian ethics and dumping the rest. Having been a confirmed atheist since the age of twelve, I was less than impressed. I also felt really hurt. Rachel had singled me out as a potential new member, and had not even troubled to sound me out on my principles first.

Looking around the room, I realised how other people saw me, or at least how Rachel obviously did. I had always seen myself as cheerful, impish, perhaps a little coquettish, maybe even impudently sexy: certainly dainty and undoubtedly feminine. The last time I could remember feeling as bad was when I'd been judged last in a sandcastle competition at the age of about five, and I was close to tears by the time Rachel asked if anybody had any questions.

It went on a little longer and finished with some dreadful hymn. I was keen to leave as soon as politely possible, but was cornered by Rachel before I could escape.

‘Penny,' she began, taking me confidentially by the elbow, ‘might I offer a little advice, from an elder sister as it were?'

‘OK,' I answered, although it wasn't what I was thinking.

‘I know that you are with us in your heart,' she began, ‘as I heard what you said to that dreadful man, Aran Ray. Yet I do feel that you might dress a little more demurely . . .'

She trailed off and gave me a nod that was both knowing and somehow commanding, as if she had set me back on the right path with a kindly word. I thanked her and left, walking back towards Kennet Hall, where my room was. I was in a black mood, but what Rachel had said at the end had actually cheered me up a bit. Her remark about Aran gave me an inkling of why she had singled me out, and her comments on my dress made me think that there was hope for me yet.

When I got back to the hall I stood in front of my mirror, trying to see myself as another person might see me. Try as I might, I couldn't see myself as one of them, and it wasn't just my clothes. Facially, I did look impish: cheeky with a smile, sulky with a frown. The red scrunchie holding my long dark hair in a pony-tail looked sweet, too, or at least I thought it did. As far as my clothes were concerned, they struck me as entirely practical. It was true that the outlines of my nipples showed through my T-shirt; but with small, high breasts, a bra is seldom necessary.

That cheered me up a little, but I still went to bed in a bad mood which was made worse by the sounds of my neighbour, Tiffany Bell, being humped by her latest conquest.

I have never been a great one for standing up to people, barring the occasional loss of temper, and so felt under pressure from the League of Purity when most women would have found no difficulty in telling them to get lost. Their aim was to have a hundred members by the end of term, at which time some self-satisfied prig would be coming from the parent society in the US and everyone would take the oath of chastity. As they only had a dozen members between the male and female branches, this meant that they were pretty keen to hang on to the ones they'd got. I generally managed to avoid them but still got dragged along to another meeting, after which I had the bad luck to bump into Tiffany Bell. We didn't get on anyway, and she took great delight in the discovery that I was supposedly involved with the League. The information was round the hall in no time, with much the same effect as if someone had welded me into a chastity belt.

I pretty much despaired, concentrating on my work and assuming the social situation would work out in due course. Nothing changed much for two weeks and then Rachel visited me again to bully me into going to a lecture on pornography, or rather, against pornography. She explained that the speaker was terribly important in the anti-pornography campaign and that it was vital to get him a good audience. I couldn't see why, but still let her dragoon me into it, even promising to wear a dress. After all, there was always the chance that he would bring some samples.

Of course, he didn't, but just talked about how awful it was for anyone to see sexual images, particularly of women. I suppose in his way he was a good speaker – at least, he certainly had conviction. On the other hand, his arguments were thin and circular. What he called facts were dubious theories, based on bad statistics. The statistics were built around the theories, and so it went, round and round. I quickly switched off, finding more interest in the cracks in the lecture theatre ceiling.

It was when he started talking about peoples' need to free themselves from what he called the trap of immorality that he got my interest back. The idea seemed to be for those who had used pornography to admit to it so that others could keep an eye on them. For their own good, of course, not at all to enable the watchers to feel superior. He then asked the audience if any of its members would like to unburden themselves of their past sins. I was immediately both horrified and fascinated. The audience had greeted his talk with murmurs of self-righteous approval while he had demonstrated how pornography was supposed to cause everything from divorce to murder. Now he was asking people to stand up and admit to reading it, or ‘using it', as he put it. The thought scared me, even though it was nothing to do with me. I prefer my own imagination and had never bought a pornographic magazine in my life. Still, I could imagine the equivalent if he had asked women who masturbated to stand up and admit it.

I would have stayed firmly in my seat, and that was exactly what the audience did, all except one. I had turned to look around the hall, as had everybody else, each secretly hoping that some fool would admit to the unspeakable sin of enjoying looking at naked girls. He was near the back, a tall sandy-haired young man in rather old-fashioned clothes. He was white in the face, but he had his hand up. Everybody was staring at him as if he had just admitted to genocide with a side order of cannibalism.

Personally I was disgusted: not with him, but with the whole self-satisfied, pompous travesty. I could see why the speaker was popular, though. Both he and the audience were clearly getting enormous enjoyment from the poor man's discomfort. I couldn't decide whether the man was brave or stupid, but I felt immensely sorry for him in either case. The lecturer then told him to stand up and explain himself. That was too much for me. I simply wasn't prepared to be part of the hypocrisy of what they were doing. I got up and walked out, hearing the poor man admit to having had some magazines at school as I left.

I was really shaking as I came out. The theatre was one of a number opening off a central foyer, in which there was a hot drinks machine. I made for it, desperately in need of something to calm my nerves. For some reason, I felt a deep empathy with the sandy-haired man. The rest of the audience seemed really bloodthirsty to me. My fingers were trembling as I dialled for a large cocoa, which I had just picked up when the lecture theatre door banged. I jumped, spilling my cocoa and looking round nervously. I know it's ridiculous, but at that instant I expected to find a baying mob coming towards me, intent on lynching anybody who wasn't one of them. Instead it was the sandy-haired man, and he was in a worse state than I was.

He was in tears and his jaw was shaking, his face set in an expression of absolute misery. He was walking fast and heading for the main doors, casting me only a brief and embarrassed glance.

‘Are you all right?' I asked, which was a silly question as he obviously wasn't, but he must have heard the sympathy in my voice because he stopped.

He didn't say anything, but shook his head. I could see the tears on his cheeks and felt even more desperately sorry for him than I had before.

‘Come and have a cocoa,' I suggested.

He nodded and gave me a weak smile, coming over to the machine. He was shaking so badly that he couldn't get the money into the slot and I had to help him. I wanted to hold him and stroke his hair but contented myself with putting a hand on his shoulder.

‘They'll be out soon,' I pointed out as he made for a row of seats. ‘Let's go upstairs.'

Upstairs was a gallery that looked down on the foyer and which was ringed with big soft seats. I took his arm as we walked up.

‘Why did you walk out?' he asked at the top of the steps.

‘I couldn't stand it any more,' I replied. ‘They're so smug, so self-righteous, and I felt really sorry for you.'

He didn't answer, but sipped his cocoa and, after a bit, let his breath out as if in relief at having escaped. We stood in silence for a while, looking down at the foyer, until I finally plucked up the courage to ask what I wanted to know.

‘Why did you do it?' I queried.

‘I . . . I don't know,' he answered. ‘He made me feel really guilty, as if I'd done something really dreadful.'

‘What, read a couple of girlie magazines?' I answered, unable to keep a slight giggle out of my voice.

He didn't answer, but sat down on one of the seats, leaning forward with his cocoa in both hands. I sat down next to him, feeling somewhat conspiratorial and not a little naughty. The very act of walking out had been in defiance of Rachel, and now I was sitting with a man who she undoubtedly considered wicked in the extreme. The gallery was dim, lit only by the lights in the foyer, which added to the atmosphere of doing something I shouldn't. He was attractive, and I felt a bond between us in our mutual lack of supposed virtue. I was intrigued too, and wondering if I hadn't found a man to my taste.

‘So what did you tell them?' I asked after a moment.

‘That I used to keep two porn mags at the bottom of my tuck-box at school,' he admitted, obviously sensing my sympathy.

‘And then?' I questioned.

‘He asked me if I . . . if I used to use them. That's what he said; it was obvious what he meant, and everyone was looking at me, and I just couldn't handle it. I ran out.'

‘So, did you?' I asked.

He looked at me suspiciously, presumably wondering why I, who had after all been at the meeting, was asking the question not in a demanding or accusing tone, but in a mischievous one. He obviously felt pretty guilty about reading pornography, but to me it was no big deal. At my school, obviously unlike his, it was considered perfectly normal for boys to drool over pictures of naked girls, and presumably toss off over them in private. Kate used to reckon that boys who read porn mags were likely to be better in bed, simply because they'd have picked up a few useful tips.

‘You can tell me,' I continued when he didn't answer.

I was beginning to feel smutty, really for the first time since I'd finished with Aran Ray. It was how mixing with Kate and her friends had always made me feel: sexual, aware of myself as an animal, a female animal with female needs. I put my hand on his leg, feeling solid muscle. He was tall and looked fit, making his shyness and insecurity seem out of place. For the first time, I felt that I had met someone who would be physically able to dominate me with ease, yet who might really empathise with me. Not only that, but if he spent his time wanking off over dirty pictures, then he might just be as dirty-minded as me; maybe he even liked to spank girls.

‘Please,' I insisted, stroking his leg.

‘Yes,' he admitted quietly.