There were seven besides him. Eight seats. A table. Prosecco. Bottles of Prosecco. Oh, the prosecco, of which Tabitha was waxing lyrical yet again. Where did the bloody stuff emerge from? And why couldn't it go back there? He wasn't sure what was worse, the drink or people who insisted on loudly, always so loudly, telling everyone just how amazing Prosecco was, normally allied to four pointless and thoroughly unamusing tales of oooh, that time when they had just too much... Eugh. Surely there was no other drink that created this much tedium. Scotch had its single malt sniffers. Cider a group of wide eyed eighteen-year olds. But... Nope. It really was the ideal drink for this sort of thing.
They were talking about work.
He nodded, smiled, said something of no import to demonstrate just how delighted he was to be there.
Work.
Really? Why did these things always involve such extensive exhumations of the working day? Surely there was something more in their lives? Rat shit behind the flowerpots or some unpleasant discharge.
Work swirled around him in guffaws and oh-my-Gods.
There were people. Arses, legs. He could talk long about a well crafted leg. Books. If Phil had been here, he could have siphoned him away to discuss books, authors, poems, words, things. There were hills and walks, lakes, places to dream of going. Vietnam. Laos. Hettie would talk of her jaunts through Peru that summer...
Sex. We could talk about sex. Not work.
He knew the next topic would either be new kitchens, children or cars. Anyone of which was sort of substituting shit for shit.
Crafts. Pottery, painting, fellatio. That was a craft. Tapestry. He quite liked sewing. Certainly more than work, and infinitely more than talking about sodding work.
Someone pushed his glass towards him, he smiled, lifted it and drank deeply. Colours. He wanted to talk about colours. There were amazing colours. Even moths had amazing colours, all that blending of fluffy browns and greys. Amazing.
Work.
Fucking wanking work.
He reached for a biscuit and spread a dollop of sour cream dip across it, half ten, headed towards the shrieking tipsy hour. Oh joy. He leant back in his chair, extending his legs beneath the table, nudging feet with someone unknown beneath the fold of white table cloth. Said something banal about excel to Martin, who used it to riff hilariously about management failings last week.
Spades. He'd made himself a fantastic spade on a blacksmithing course last weekend. That had been wonderful, the heat, the sweat of hammering that blade flat, the thrilling noise of it. Perhaps if the party was one of smiths, this wouldn't be so bad. But would blacksmiths drink Prosecco and have twee dinner parties? He suspected not. Perhaps he needed to become a horny handed man of toil.
Alison squealed something about her youngest's Picasso like artwork and leapt from the table in a scattering of napkins and apologies to collect the gem. Martin guffawed. Tabby was... oh God...
Absolutely lovey, no I couldn't. Yes. Another glass would be lovely, I'll just finish... Thanks.
He interjected, enough to be thoroughly invisible. This was a dinner party art form he'd perfected. Why he didn't know. Phil just refused to come. How had he ended up perfecting a method of enduring...
Someone was caressing his crotch. Very pleasant. Distracting. A little side-eye. Lets not scare them off... Who? Left or right? No looking. Unless Alison had shot under the table instead of getting her daughter's painting. That he doubted.
A squeeze.
So not a stray foot then, feet didn't squeeze. He twitched deliberately, encouraging his accomplice in distraction. They responded, running fingers firmly along the outlined length of him, and he had swiftly lengthened. His excitement was never shy, and there was an amazing thrill to this.
He delighted in the Alison family Picasso.
The hand stroked repeatedly along his length, nudging firmly so he lay straight, obviously they were as bored as he. Now the twitches were involuntary, as the fingers ran along the denim shielded head, the butt of the hand pressed against his solid shaft.
Surely they weren't going to make him come whilst Alison...
He wasn't sure if being wanked through jeans would work now. It had years ago of course, but like dry-humping, that was long since passed.
It was certainly nice though, and he shuffled down slightly as he drank, just making that access a little easier for whoever's hand it was.
Hard squeezes. A finger firmly between his thighs, pressing against his balls and up again. Gone.
