As I walked into the home room for morning registration I saw my best friend Noah already sitting at our table, lazily scrolling through his phone, his expression vacant through tiredness. Normally I would be much the same, but today was different. Smiling coyly to myself I pulled out my seat, placed my chin on my fisted hand and my elbow on the table, giving him the smuggest look I could manage.
"Pay up." I remarked, causing him to look up from his phone.
"Whuzzat?"
"I finished the bet last night."
"Bullshit." He looked worried now, though not yet convinced. I slid my own phone onto the table with the screen unlocked, a chat open.
Me: last night was intense. round 2 soon?
Lindsay: That could definitely be arranged ;)
"Fake. There's no way that's her." Noah protested.
"Oh yeah?" I asked incredulously, snapping my phone back up and rapidly working my thumbs. "Watch this."
Noah turned just as I hit send and watched Lindsay Turner pull her own phone from the pocket of her khaki cargo pants, blushing as she read the message, her own thumbs soon moving quickly. My phone buzzed and I read the message with pride, replied, then once it had buzzed again slid the open phone back onto the desk.
Me: at lunch? I'll drive us to the beach and show you a private spot
Lindsay: Don't tempt me! I don't have a change of clothes. :(
Me: good, skinny dipping's more fun
Lindsay: Oh god! I'm already getting wet!
"Jeez... okay, that's impressive. I was genuinely convinced she liked girls."
"Clearly not." I confidently remarked.
And what reason did I have not to be confident? Our year was small, just seventeen of us left, and though we had all passed the most awkward stages of puberty, not all had waltzed through quite as spectacularly as I had. Whilst Noah stood at 5'10" and was built somewhere between lean and skinny, I was closer to 6'2", and at my last weigh in I was 194 lbs of muscle. I had been a member of both the under 18's basketball and rugby teams before I aged out of their bracket six months ago, and now only play recreationally until I leave for college. But that's still a couple of months away, so for now my physique serves no purpose other than appearing pleasing to the eye. Honestly, the down time has been nice, and let me focus on other things. Like the bet.
Of the seventeen of us left there are eight girls and nine boys. Up until the end of last year I had been dating Georgina Pearson, but she got drunk at the Halloween party and got fingered by some college guy. We had a very loud, very public argument where I punched said college guy, but more than his nose was broken that night. Ever since then,
Georgie
has been somewhat of a social pariah, whilst I have been afforded great sympathy. That is where the idea of the bet started.
Noah had never been lucky with the girls, even with me as his wingman, whereas I've always been treated more favourably. The first day back after October break - one week after the party, and one week since anyone other than Noah had seen me - Brittany, Becca, and Lucy all made a move to let me know they would be happy to supply a shoulder to cry on. Lucy was persistent about it, in fact.
"Jesus Christ, Caelan," Noah had uttered. "I can't get one of them to look at me, and yet every girl in class wants to fuck you."
"I mean, you're not wrong. Can you blame them?" I smarmily replied. The attention was nice, and I wasn't in the best of head spaces, so I enjoyed the confidence boost.
"Asshole. I bet you really think you could, huh?"
"Could what?"
"Fuck every girl in class."
"I mean, discounting Georgina for obvious reasons, I bet I
could
..."
"Oh you
bet
you could? Bet what?"
"I'm not making a bet about this." I faltered, not liking where this was going.
"Oh, so you don't think you could do it? Ain't the hot shit you claim?" He goaded.
I narrowed my eyes and a thin smile formed on the side of my lips. "Okay, you're on. I bet by the end of the school year I'll have banged every girl in class."
"A hundred?"
"Deal." We shook on it, right as registration began being called.
That was five months ago, and now I had done it, with eight weeks of class to spare. I started with Rifa Mitri, knowing that due to her culture she would never go for it if I was seen as a player. We went on three dates before we had a fairly eventful week of daily sex, though that culminated in both of us deciding we were too different to take things seriously.
Lucy Morgan came next, and was by far the easiest to win over. A ride home from school was all it took for her to offer me a friendly blowjob, and who was I to refuse? We hooked up at least ten times since then, and each time was memorable. She is
wild
.
Brittany Macleod, Laura Devlin, Becca Wilkinson, Aimee Corrance, and Candace Parsons came over the next few months. From December to March I spent so much time in their company that I nearly forgot what my mother looked like. But that left just one. Seducing Lindsay had been different. She was shy, bookish, and a tomboy - not my usual type. Most assumed she was gay, but as it turns out she's just odd. She had only been part of the class since the beginning of the year, and as such hadn't really made any friends. In order to win her over, I bought a copy of the book she was reading and sped through it. An in-depth conversation about the strength of Hazel Grace Lancaster was all it took for a friendship to bloom, and a further two weeks of spending time together sealed the deal. As it turned out, not only was she not a lesbian, but she wasn't a virgin either, having experiences with two people before me. And that leads us to now, and my winning of the bet.
Or so I thought.
"Doesn't count." Noah protested, obviously not looking to fork out £100 that he likely didn't ever expect to lose.
"Explain?"
"Last time I checked there's another girl in the class." He retorted, glancing to the front of the room and nodding in the direction of Ms Caster, our class head.
"Fuck right off, we agreed girls in the class, not teachers." I argued, annoyed at the very notion he'd consider this a part of the bet. Whilst I had definitely enjoyed my recreational activities this year, I wouldn't have done them if not to prove the point.
"Ms Caster, can I ask a question?" Noah raised his hand, a look in his eyes that I didn't like.
"Yes, Noah?" The ever cheery Ms Caster asked.
"For the purposes of counts and such, are you considered part of the class?"
"Well, technically yes," Ms Caster offered. "My name is on the attendance sheet, and in the event of, say a fire alarm or an evacuation, my name would also appear as the head of the class."
"Thank you
very much
." Noah drew out every word, a smug smile of his own now across his face, though mine was nowhere to be seen.
"There's no way you expect me to," I stopped in the corridor, looking around to see that no one was close enough to hear. "Seduce Ms Caster."
"She's divorced, ain't that old. Hell, she's actually kinda cute. In her own way." Noah laughed, his observations not inaccurate but entirely irrelevant.
"Bro, I can't believe you'd stoop this low for a hundred quid." I tutted my disapproval.
"Buy me lunch for a week and we can call it quits." He offered, slapping my shoulder.
"Nope. A bet's a bet. And after this, I need to teach you a lesson. I'm taking your money." I defiantly replied. Noah stopped moving, then laughed harder than I had ever seen as I continued walking on to class.
#
For the last two years I've worked part time at the local golf club and leisure centre. It's a very exclusive affair, with annual memberships costing upwards of a thousand pounds. Tony, the manager, was my dad's best friend, and I've long believed he only gave me a job out of pity when my dad passed. But it's worked out well, I work as the lifeguard as well as the odd job guy, and the pay is far better than anything else I'm qualified to do. Plus it means I get plenty of opportunities to look at rich women in their bathing suits. I unironically love my job.
Each year we host a company raffle to raise money for a member chosen charity, with prize winners being picked out of a tombola. Last year I was chosen to pull the tickets, with the only stipulation being that none of my family entered. Tony hasn't asked me yet, but I'm going to make sure I can host it again this year.
As I entered the Golden Orchard Golf Club - thirty minutes early, no less - I approached Tony with my usual can-do attitude. As always he greeted me with a warm smile, the evidence that he still holds me in high regards even years after my dad's passing.
"Hey kiddo. You're early. Too much free time?"
"Hah, something like that. I was actually gonna ask if I could host the charity gala again this year?"