Copyright Oggbashan January 2020
The author asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
This is a work of fiction. The events described here are imaginary; the settings and characters are fictitious and are not intended to represent specific places or living persons.
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"Sandy! Your Geoff didn't do anything, even when I was helpless!" Helen complained.
Sandy slid her arm around my waist and hugged me.
"What did you expect, Helen? Geoff is an English gentleman. His instinct is to help ladies in distress, not to take advantage."
"And even if we don't object to being taken advantage of?" Helen persisted.
"Is that what you wanted? I doubt he would, not with me here, or even if I wasn't. He treats ladies with respect at all times."
"I'd like a bit less respect and more hands on," Helen said.
"Me too!" chorused Angela and Rachel.
"Geoff? How do you respond?" Sandy asked.
"I'd find it very awkward," I said, "they are your friends and mine. I don't have the right to manhandle them."
Sandy kissed me on the cheek. She moved her head away so that Helen, Angela and Rachel could kiss my cheek too.
"And that is one reason why we love you," Helen said.
"Love? Isn't that a bit strong?" I asked.
"No!" all four women said, joining Sandy in a group hug. I was very aware of swimsuit covered bodies pressed against me.
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The latest beach wear for young women in Melbourne, Australia in 1960 was the Muu-Muu. It was supposed to be Hawaiian and was usually made in a bright Hawaiian style print. It was a basic shift dress that pulled over the head to cover a swimming costume. At the hem, neckline and arm openings it was trimmed with a white bobbled braid. It was usually worn with a white rope around the waist.
The other beach craze was the sack -- a large tube of material with elastic at the neck. It was pulled over the head and inside it a woman could change into or out of a swimming costume while preserving her modesty. The contortions of a woman inside the sack could be entertaining. If she lifted the neckline above her head so she was completely inside she could put her Muu-Muu on or off -- as long as she didn't fall over.
If she was with her boyfriend he might often take advantage of her helplessness inside the sack by grabbing and kissing her while her hands and arms were trapped in the sack.
That Saturday morning in mid-December I was on the beach with my next door neighbour's daughter Sandra, usually called Sandy, and her three girlfriends. I had driven them there in my car now I had an Australian driving licence. They all had new sacks for the first time. Until now, men had no difficulty changing on the beach. They could wrap a towel around their middles, drop their shorts and pull up a pair of budgies. When they had finished swimming, they reversed the procedure. But young women either relied on their parents to erect a square beach tent which needed to be brought by car, and took at least a quarter of an hour to erect using tent pegs, a mallet and paternal swearwords, or joined the long queue to use a cubicle in the Ladies toilets. The sack was much more portable. It could be shoved in a bag with the Muu-Muu and carried in a hand or slung when riding a bicycle.
But changing in a sack was an acquired skill that they hadn't yet learned. I expected them to try sequentially, with one trying first and the others learning from the first girl's mistakes. They didn't. All four started at once. I was rushing from one teetering bundle to another trying to keep all four upright as they struggled and giggled inside their sacks. Finally I was holding Sandy upright as the other three emerged in their swimming costumes. She leant against me as she pulled her swimming costume up inside the sack.
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Six months ago my family had arrived in Australia by ship. My father, Hugh Anderson, had been working for an Australian company in London and they offered him a job in Melbourne. The pay and conditions were much better and included a relocation lump sum, enough for a substantial deposit on a house in a Melbourne suburb, and a low cost mortgage. He had accepted partly because he had been working in London besides Andrew, Sandy's father, who had become a family friend, and also because the company offered well-paid jobs for me and my sister, Maureen. I had qualified as an accountant but the pay in Melbourne was more than twice my UK salary. Maureen was a qualified senior secretary and her job was secretary to a member of the company's Australian board.
My father had bought the house next to Andrew. Andrew and his wife Moira helped us to settle in to Australia and their daughter Sandy had decided that she wanted me to be her boyfriend. At first I think it was because I was unusual and exotic. She made fun of my English accent. But later she said it was because of my attitude to women. Unlike her previous Australian boyfriends, I always treated her with respect, listened to what she had to say, and assumed she had a brain and was capable of rational thought, and tried to please her.
Sandy had three close girlfriends, near neighbours who had been friends since they first started school. They were so close they were more like sisters, all of the same age, or almost quadruplets. They went everywhere together and that fact influenced my choice of car. My father, my sister and I were all entitled to company cars or if we wanted a substantial deposit and an interest-free loan to buy our own cars. My father had bought a new Holden estate. My sister had bought a new Morris 1000. I had gone to the local Ford dealer to see what they had. There was a reduced 1959 low-mileage demonstrator. I liked it because it was so over the top. It was a Ford Fairlane 500 Club Victoria two-door hardtop in red and white. It was large enough to take me and the four women. Sandy was stunned when she first saw it. It was so unlike any car that she expected me to choose. After a ride in it, she approved, as did her friends.
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"Geoff? Can you take us, and Maureen, to Chadstone for lunch and some shopping?" Sandy asked.
My heart sank. Chadstone shopping mall, opened a few months ago, was the largest shopping centre in Australia and the largest in the Southern Hemisphere. Taking five women there was likely to be boring for me as they indulged in a shopping frenzy for hours.
Sandy saw my expression and interpreted it correctly.
"We won't be long, honest, Geoff. We only want the fabric shop. We like Muu-Muus and the sacks but as new fashions they are expensive. We think we can make our own at a fraction of the cost of buying from a shop. After lunch we shouldn't need more than half an hour."
"Please, Geoff?" Helen added.
"Ok," I said.
I was swamped in another group hug before we all headed to the sea for a swim.
Sandy and I were first out of the water. I had to prop her up as she wriggled out of her swimsuit inside the sack and then dried herself. I passed her the Muu-Muu which she pulled down inside before her head vanished. My hands held her as best I could through the material but finally she emerged with her Muu-Muu covering her decorously.
Angela and Helen were next. They both slid inside their sacks. I was holding Helen as Angela leant against my back. When they had shed their swimsuits and dried themselves Sandy picked up their Muu-Muus to pass it to them.
But Angela's hands reached through the material of her sack to grab my arms. Her body pressed against my back and I was very aware of erect nipples against me. Helen pushed herself against my front and she had erect nipples too. I gasped as her hands grabbed through her sack to pull my skimpy swimming trunks down. No one could see my insistent erection because the folds of their sacks surrounded me but Helen rubbed herself against me.
"Help me, Sandy, please!" I hissed.
Sandy was no help. She was giggling too much as my swimming trunks slid down to my ankles and both Helen and Angela were pressing hard against me. Rachel arrived, grabbed my head and kissed me fiercely. That was too much for Sandy. She pushed Rachel aside to kiss me herself. She had dropped the Muu-Muus and had taken a towel. She slid her hands between Angela and Helen to dry my middle, including my erection. Rachel took the opportunity given by Sandy's drying to kiss me again. I had four women, two of them covered only by thin material, and one in only a swimsuit, exciting themselves on me. Finally Sandy pulled my shorts up and they let me go. Sandy kissed me.
"What was that for?" I asked when Sandy's lips left mine.
"Because we could," Helen replied, "And to show what a gentleman has been missing...."
"But we'll behave as ladies tonight at the dance," Angela said. "We want Geoff as a gentleman dance partner."
That evening our parents, the four women, my sister Maureen, and I would be at adjacent tables for the Chamber of Commerce's Dinner dance. It was an event for which the women could wear their ball gowns and do some proper dancing -- if they had an accomplished partner. Unlike such an event in England, which would be mainly attended by middle-aged couples, the sons and daughters of the Chamber's members would also attend and dance.
All young Australian men of my age had been taught how to dance formally as part of their compulsory military training, the Australian equivalent of the UK's National Service. But, after the formal sit-down dinner, all the men, of whatever age, would go to the bar for at least an hour before they had enough courage to ask a woman to dance.
Our mothers and their contemporaries were used to it and would sit for that hour engaging in gossip about the latest scandals. But Sandy and the four younger women wanted to dance. If I was with them I could partner one woman while the others danced as pairs. They expected me to dance with all five, including my sister Maureen, until the men emerged from the bar.
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I drove them to Chadstone. My car was large enough for me and five young women. We had lunch in a restaurant and the five women shared the bill, treating me since I was their driver and had paid for the petrol. They were as good as their word. They went straight to the fabric shop and bought the material and trimmings they wanted.
"Geoff? Can you whip a rope's end?" Sandy asked.
"Yes, Sandy. I was a Boy Scout. Why?"
"We intend to make two Muu-Muus each. That means ten rope belts. This silken rope would do but would fray at the ends. We don't mind if the belts end in a tuft but we don't want it unravelling too far. If I buy some silk thread could you whip the belt ends? We'll be working on the sewing tomorrow afternoon."
"I suppose so, Sandy. It will take me a long time to do twenty ends."
"I'll owe you, and you will get a supply of coffee and a reward from me when you are done, Geoff."
"Then, yes, I will." I replied.
I didn't know what kind of reward I would get but even time alone with Sandy was attractive.
I drove us back home. I would be collecting Sandy and the other four, including my sister Maureen, to walk to the Returned Servicemen's League club house for the dinner dance. I needed to press my evening suit and the five women would change into their ball gowns at Sandy's parent's house. Maureen hadn't yet bought a ball gown but would be borrowing one from Sandy. Until now neither she nor I had attended a formal dance in Australia. We had been to clubs and dances for younger people. At those venues the women tended to wear circle skirts with multiple petticoats or simple shift dresses that were knee length.
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I went next door to collect the women. Sandy's mother Moira opened the door. I was astonished. She was wearing a full skirt with multiple layers of net, floor length and spreading massively to fill the hall from side to side.
"Wow," I said. "You look spectacular."
