Freshers' week fuck
Returning my son to university scores me more than a one-night stand
I was not looking forward to returning my son to Manchester for the last year of his course. His mother agreed after wasting the first two years drinking and partying, Jamie needed a kick up the arse if he was going to graduate from his computing degree. Since we divorced, he'd played me and Janice off against each other, but on this subject, we were united. He needed a shock, and I dropped the bombshell in the Services on the M6.
"Jamie, we could go on to Manchester, or I could go to the bank and get you five grand and you can fuck off and not bother me or your mum again. What do you say? You've got until I come back from taking a piss to decide your future."
His sullen teenager expression, which did not look good on a twenty-two-year-old, had disappeared by the time I returned.
"You wouldn't do that dad. Mum won't let you."
"Why do you think she made me take you back? Life moves on son. She's met someone she could get serious about and neither of us wants your sorry arse on our sofas all day as you sleep it off after night shifts in a delivery warehouse, because that's the only job you can get."
His face said he didn't like that version of the future. "We are going to Manchester, dad."
I broke the silence after twenty miles. "Sorry son, but you needed a shock. You are a lazy fucker like your dad. But I woke up at the start of the third year and ended up with a 2-1 by working smarter, not harder."
It was another ten miles before he broke and asked me how.
"I had lazy mates like me. But we divided the syllabus in four and made sure we were expert in our part. We taught each other the rest. Asked searching questions we would never have asked our lecturers, to prove we knew our stuff. We were in it together win or lose. You'd get a kicking if you didn't do your bit."
I could hear Jamie's mind working. "All my mates are lazy like me, but I don't trust them to pull their fingers out."
"Then you find new mates who you can study with. Don't you have any Chinese or Indians on your course?"
"Dad, that's a racist stereotype...even if it's true. But why should they help me?"
"Because you have skills they don't. Make them the offer. They teach you the course and you teach them how to pull girls and cheat at cards. Those strait-laced types are desperate to be party animals."
"Thanks for that assessment of my skills dad. Brutal, but honest." Jamie was quiet for the rest of the journey, working on how he was going to put his support team together. By the time we reached his hall of residence, he was smiling. "Did it really work for you, Dad?"
"I kid you not son. I'll send you a copy of my degree certificate and you can look forward to wiping your arse with it when you get a better result."
#
The hall of residence was a surprise. A new ten-storey building with a concierge and a foyer like a Premier Inn. Jamie was smiling. I was not.
"When I agreed with your mum, we needed to get you out of that shithole house and away from those piss heads you lived with, I didn't think she'd put you in the bloody Ritz."
The concierge explained the apartment complex was exclusively for final year students needing to focus. "Comfortable four-bedroom apartments with a communal kitchen/lounge. Our rules prohibit parties. We don't have a bar. We try to keep distractions to a minimum."
I could see my ex-wife's thinking. "So, the last chance hotel, doesn't have a last chance saloon?"
"Very good, sir. I'll suggest it as a slogan at our next marketing meeting. Here is your son's key. As he's the first to arrive, he has the choice of bedrooms."
We claimed squatter's rights to the quietest room in the modern tenth floor flat with a balcony overlooking the Manchester cityscape.
"You're living like a premier league footballer son. I can't afford a place this nice on what I've got left after your mother has rinsed me."
"It's a posh prison dad. I bet they come round and check lights out. No parties, no bar, it's like a prep school."
"No, it's not Jamie. No one is buggering you, unless you want them to." I laughed all the way back to the lift. Jamie didn't. By the time we'd unloaded his stuff onto the borrowed porter's trolley, Jamie's hard done by look was back on his coupon. We pushed it into the lift and I was searching for some motivational words as I pressed the button.
"Can you hold the lift for us, please?" The clack of high heels followed, and I defy any man not to be hypnotised by the pair of jiggling tits on the woman doing comedy running in stilettos. I looked at Jamie and we smiled. A father and son telepathy passed between us. Behind the attractive fifty something blonde in white jeans and a skinny black top was her stunning twenty something daughter in skin tight beige leggings and a crop top. We squeezed the pair of them and their cases into the already crowded lift. The mother wore expensive sunglasses on top of an expensive hair do. She was the sort of woman you'd see swanning around designer shops in Marbella, and from her tan it looked like she'd come directly from there to Manchester. The daughter was the natural shade of blond her mother had once been.
"This is cosy ladies." I smiled and pressed the button for the top floor. "We are going all the way."
The mother's cool blue eyes gave me a knowing look. "That's fortunate. So are we."
"Please mum, there are children in this lift."
Jamie laughed at the daughter's embarrassed comment and gave a `what can you do with them' shrug of sympathy.
By the time the door opened, we knew Amelia's daughter Chloe was in the flat two doors away.
"That's a relief Amelia. I've been lecturing Jamie that he needs to graft this year. He can't afford attractive distractions." Chloe blushed and an embarrassed Jamie said, "Dad you are supposed to be the responsible adult."
"I told her those leggings make her look naked. She should not be surprised if men look. Woman too, I suppose."
