Chapter 1
The au pair.
Although I was still growing fast, my mind for the time being had outstripped my body, as was all too obvious from the intimidating equipment on display in the school changing rooms. Although my classmates frequently called me an arrogant wee shite, I could live with a bit of name calling from these thickos, as these big fellows still didn't hesitate to creep up and beg for my help with their maths and physics homework. However, this covert homage to my elite performance in class wasn't enough to restore my self-esteem, I was still a geeky underdeveloped, 5ft 7in just turned eighteen year sixth former with squeaky voice. I was looking for more tangible endorsements of my nascent manhood.
Although, the concept of girls and sex, with girls, was appealing, the actuality was another matter. I hadn't much acquaintanceship with this other species, except for my young sisters and cousins, who didn't count and, a few nodding acquaintances at Sunday School.
This all changed when the new au pair arrived. She'd been hired to look after my sisters when they returned home after school, whilst mother got on with preparing dinner and her other business.
Simone was about eighteen, shy and moderately attractive, small face and small figure, petite with dark hair, pale dark complexion, about the same height as me. Her English was quite good, although slightly accented in a French-Swiss way, though she understood everything perfectly. She had come to improve her English before becoming apprenticed in the catering trade back home. She was generally cheerful, had an impish grin, smiled a lot, laughed a little when I made jokes and was generally even-tempered and seemed happy to be mixing in with our family life.
For the first few weeks we didn't have much to say to each other, she was preoccupied with learning the routine, taking and collecting my sisters to and from school, keeping them clean and tidy. I was busy either in school or doing homework, which took forever, even at weekends! My weekly sessions at Boy Scouts and the dreaded Sunday school were my only breaks from this punishing routine. In the evenings she met up with other au pairs from the language school that she attended in town.
Come July, after celebrating my eighteenth birthday, we all set off on our annual month's family holiday, staying in a seaside cottage just outside St Andrews, whose main attractions were the empty sandy beaches, lots of flat roads, good for long bike rides, and many golf courses, where Dad spent nearly all his time, sometimes with me trailing around, but as I wasn't much good at golf and although I saw merit in a well hit ball, watching it soar into the distance, this was such a rare and unpredictable event that the whole enterprise was a turnoff. Dad preferred to play with his friends. That summer I was into Sherlock Holmes, I had the omnibus edition, a few thousand pages, so that was entertaining enough for me and allowed me to spend time daydreaming by myself.
About twice a week, Simone baby-sat when my parents went out to dinner with friends, or by themselves. My parents hadn't got used to the fact that I was now eighteen and fully capable of calling for the fire brigade, police, or ambulance, should the need arise. They thought that my sisters were in safer hands with Simone! Without a TV, which we had at home in Glasgow, a newly acquired monster, that frequently went on the blink degenerating into a screenful and earful of white noise, she seemed rather bored with only books and a few old magazines, my young sisters and me to occupy her time.
After my sisters went to bed, we talked about what her home, Hauterive, a village near Neuchatel, was like. Her childhood had differed considerably from mine - which was a typical wartime British experience: first the blitz and rationing, then Dad, - in the RAF, posted oversees to India, and Mum, sad and lonely, and not much fun and then starting proper school, regarded by some, as a posh boy's private school that was even less fun! It was strongly disciplinarian and uptight with a big emphasis on sport and patriotic endeavour. This was quite normal, but most of the values they tried to inculcate, about how great the British Empire was, left me feeling sceptical. It was obvious that the enterprise was a hollow pretence. This was linked with being a Christian soldier and forever, 'going onwards into battle'. Where and why, no one asked. The school cadet corps had a central place for boys aged thirteen to eighteen in the senior school. Endless drills, discipline and bullying, cleaning and polishing boots, pressing uniforms, so that the seams were razor sharp, all this reinforced by schoolmasters, who enjoyed dressing up in their old uniforms and lording it over us schoolboys: pretending to officer ranks that probably, they had never actually attained in the forces. So, for a budding nerdy scientist like me, all was quite grim, although to be fair, many of the others enjoyed playing rugby and ordering and shoving smaller lads around.
Simone's background was different, far more peaceful, no wartime experience for her, her parents both worked in the hotel trade, not prosperous, but not poor either. School was a Catholic girl's school with a strong emphasis on languages, history and domestic economy- cooking, bookkeeping and of course religious devotion. Simone claimed that she wasn't too keen on the devotional aspects- the nuns frightened her, I didn't think to ask why. She said, she had a younger brother, with whom she liked playing games and hiking in the forests.
I suggested she should have a go at reading one of my Sherlock Holmes mysteries, but she was hesitant, didn't think detective fiction would suit her. I asked her what kinds of books she preferred? "Oh, romance, girl meets rich boy, they are instantly attracted and fall in love."
That kind of stuff had no appeal to me whatsoever but set me thinking.
"What was it about the girl that the boy found so attractive? and what did the girl like about the boy, apart from his money? Some boys in my class, for example, came from extremely wealthy families, who owned some of the biggest shops or businesses in Glasgow, but some were, to my mind at least, fairly unattractive individuals. Neither clever, nor good looking, nor agile, just plain dull!"
"Well, they would have to be kind and clever, definitely. But, also, strong and good looking." She said, looking straight at me....
"Oh well," I said, "not much hope for me then!"
She laughed loudly, "as if I'd fall for teenager! Go and read your book!"
The next day Mum, Simone, sisters and I went swimming in the sea... the weather was warm and sunny, but the sea was freezing cold! I could swim quite well, although my sisters couldn't. They paddled around by the water's edge... with Mum watching over them.... I was trusted to swim further on my own. When Simone swam up behind me, I was surprised, as I didn't realize she'd been following.
About fifty yards from the shore, the water became only quite shallow, we were able to stand on a sandbar. Suddenly, a large wave swept over us, covering our heads and then quickly ebbed away. The force of the drag current tugged at Simone's bikini top seeming to pulling it down under her breasts... she didn't notice at first, but I certainly did! Her cold goose-pimpled chest was fully exposed! Small breasts were sitting like a pair of mini blancmanges with purple berries in the middle. After a short time, I pointed at her chest, "look what the wave has exposed!"
What a commotion!.... She blushed bright red from head to neck, miraculously the blancmanges turned bright pink and the blueberries to raspberries!
"Never mind... I'm only a mere teenager!" I said, as she covered up, then she pulled me under by my swimming trunks and swam off...without waiting for me to pull them back up from around my ankles.
On returning, to the beach-hut where we had our stored our clothes and towels, I was towelling myself when Simone opened the door, she smiled, when she saw my birthday suit, "Sorry I didn't know you were here, then looking at me directly and pointing, said, "goodness, you are much smaller than my brother and nearly bald down there!
un phénomène étrange, n'est pas
?" before closing the door. She probably thought that was a tat for tit; I thought it was a little sneaky. Although was inured to that kind of changing room banter, I'd never encountered it at home. I decided to set it aside for the moment.
That weekend Mum and Dad announced they'd be home late, "could Simone make supper and put the girls to bed? And don't wait up for us."
I was reading whilst sitting on the living room sofa, when she reappeared, after settling the girls, she sat on an armchair and we began talking. As my curiosity had been aroused, I asked her about her brother. Was she close to him?
"Oh yes, that was one of the reasons she had decided to spend time away, as an au pair!"
"Oh? How come?"
"Well, my mother thought that we were becoming too close."
"What do you mean, too close?"
