Multi-Orgasmic Vol 3

Passing Out Passion As we filed into the mess, I glanced to my left and caught my mother’s eye. We shared a smile. From my other side, my dad grabbed my hand and gave it a quick squeeze before letting go. It had been a tough twelve weeks, but now my younger brother Shane had successfully completed his basic training for the British Army, we were overwhelmed with pride. We’d just watched him and his colleagues at their passing out parade, complete with the pomp and ceremony Brits are famous for, and were heading indoors for some food, drink and celebrations. I could hardly wait to see Shane and tell him how proud of him I was, but I knew that the recruits had some stuff they had to do before they could head into the mess and be with us. Hopefully they wouldn’t take too long. Throughout the parade, I’d barely taken my eyes off the spectacle before me. The band and the recruits had mesmerised me with their well rehearsed routines, and when I’d finally spotted Shane, I’d welled up. My little brother. Though, of course, he’s not all that little. He’s four years younger than me, yet when we stand side by side I barely come up to his shoulder. Now, though, I looked around at the other families and friends who’d also come to celebrate their loved one’s achievement. There were lots of hugging women, and men shaking hands and slapping backs. There were people closer to my age, too, the brothers and sisters of the recruits, and also girlfriends and boyfriends. “Christina.” My mother’s voice tugged me out of my thoughts, and I turned to face her with a smile. “Come on, sweetheart, your father’s gone over there to get us a table.” I fell into step behind her as she walked towards the table she’d indicated. But the room was filling rapidly, and I quickly lost her in the squeeze of bodies. I wasn’t concerned. I continued to slip between people with a polite smile and the occasional “excuse me” if they hadn’t seen me. Soon, though, I got to a group of people so tightly packed together and laughing so raucously that I was going to have to resort to shoulder tapping, I just knew it. After my increasingly loud pleas went unheard, I reached up to tap one of the group on the shoulder. The guy spun round faster than I’d expected, almost knocking me over in the process. He reached out and grabbed my elbow to steady me, then our eyes met and a gasp escaped my mouth before I could stop it. He was obviously just as surprised as I, as his blue eyes widened and his grip on my arm tightened. My resultant frown obviously made him realise what he was doing, as he let go of me and finally opened his mouth. “Hey!” His previous shock forgotten, his face transformed from surprised to delighted. “What are you doing here?” My mouth suddenly dry, I gulped a couple of times and forced myself to speak before he thought I was a complete moron. “We’re here for my little brother, Shane. He just passed out.” “That’s why I recognised the name! My little brother just completed training, too.” He carried on talking, and although I was gazing at his face, I had no idea what he was saying. I was desperately trying to process the fact that he was here at all. Phil Ashdown, at my brother’s passing out parade. Granted, it was his brother’s parade, too, but my brain refused to compute that part. Instead, it went into total meltdown. “Anyway, Phil, it was lovely talking to you, but I have to go see my parents, and Shane. Take care.” He looked surprised at my cutting him off mid-sentence, then recovered quickly and replied, “Sure. Maybe catch up with you later?” I slipped past him without replying, and dashed towards the table where my mum and dad were sitting, waiting for me. At the same time, I spotted Shane crossing the room and detoured to give him a hug. “Shane!” I pounced on him excitedly, and he picked me up and swung me around as though I weighed nothing, then set me back down. A smile spread across his handsome, good-natured face. “Hey, sis! I missed you too.” We laughed, then I tucked my arm through his and led him to our table. As our parents stood and greeted Shane, I sat down, my back to the wall. I’ve always hated the idea of someone creeping up behind me, and I adore people-watching, so it was a careful choice. In this case, though, it was one person in particular I wanted to watch. Phil Ashdown. I could still scarcely believe he was here. Or, come to think about it, that I’d been rude to him and all but run off. It was totally out of character for me to be rude to anyone, even someone I didn’t like. And I certainly didn’t dislike Phil Ashdown. Before I could take advantage of my strategic position and see if I could spot Phil in the crowd, I was drawn into conversation with my family. I pushed Phil out of my mind and listened intently as Shane chatted animatedly about the crazy things he’d been put through in his training period. The more I listened, the prouder I was of my brother for completing his training, and I told him so. My parents agreed wholeheartedly, particularly my mother, who gave him another hug and left a generous smudge of cerise lipstick on his cheek. He waved his hand dismissively, as though it had been nothing but a stroll in the park, but the pink twinge that flushed his cheeks gave him away. I grinned at him, ready to dish out some of the sisterly teasing I hadn’t been able to administer for weeks, when out of the corner of my eye I saw two people approaching our table. I assumed one of them was a colleague of Shane’s, given he wore the same dress uniform. With him was Phil. I shuffled down in my seat, pointlessly hoping he wouldn’t notice me sitting there. What did he want? As they drew up to the table, the guy in the uniform tapped Shane on the shoulder. Shane turned, then jumped out of his seat with a grin and gave his colleague a hug. My stomach lurched. I knew where this was going, and it wasn’t anywhere good. “Hey, man! We did it!” The boys clapped each other on the back, then turned to face me and my parents. Shane did the introductions. “Everyone, this is my good buddy, Paul Ashdown. Paul, this is my mum, my dad, and my sister, Christina.” Paul gave a wave and a grin, then swept his arm back to indicate Phil standing just behind him. “Hello, everyone. Nice to meet you. This is my brother, Phil. He’s in the army, too. But he’s much older than me, so he’s practically a veteran.” Paul nudged his brother jovially, getting a fierce scowl in response. I bit my lip to hold back a smirk, just as Phil shot me a look. My face immediately straightened, then filled with heat. He continued to stare, but luckily my mother had, by now, invited the Ashdown boys to sit with us and so nobody was taking any notice of me. Except for Phil. He took his seat wordlessly, continuing to gaze at me until I was begging any deity or supernatural being that would listen to make the ground open up and swallow me whole. Sadly, I remained exactly where I was. I pointedly ignored Phil and listened to the boys chatting with my parents. However, my peripheral vision told me that I was still being stared at, and it was seriously starting to piss me off. If my parents and brother hadn’t been sitting right there, I’d have given Phil Ashdown a piece of my mind. Phil obviously had a few things he wanted to say to me, too, as he stood up and said, “Would anybody like a drink? Christina, would you mind helping me?” I watched a strange look pass between my brother and Paul. My mother’s face, already perfectly happy, brightened even further. Wonderful. They’re matchmaking us now. That’s all I need. I didn’t see any way I could get out of it without appearing either rude or bonkers, so I stood up with a tight smile and made my way around the table as Phil took everyone’s orders, ignoring the silly eyebrow-wiggling and inane grinning my mother was partaking in. We headed for the makeshift bar. As soon as we were out of earshot of the table, Phil spoke. “What the hell is wrong with you, Christina? First you don’t want to talk to me, and now you’re acting like we never met before! I didn’t realise you hated me that much.” I glanced across at him and shook my head. Moron. How could he possibly think I hated him? I took in his cropped blonde hair, sparkling blue eyes, chiselled jaw and smokin’ hot body, and decided the only people who could possibly hate Phil Ashdown were other guys. After all, with him in the room, girls wouldn’t want to look at anyone else. I certainly didn’t. “I don’t hate you, Phil.” The words in fact, I’m still in love with you, were left unsaid, but they floated around my head, threatening to creep out when I least expected it. His handsome face creased into a frown. “So what’s up? Why are you being like this?” His voice had risen in his irritation, and a few nearby people glanced in our direction as they heard what probably sounded like an argument. I rolled my eyes, grabbed Phil’s arm and steered him outside where we could talk in private. “Firstly, don’t speak to me like that. Secondly, if you must know, I’m being like this because I don’t know how else to be.” “I don’t understand.” I wasn’t surprised. Phil might have been hot, but he wasn’t always the quickest on the uptake, particularly when it came to matters of the heart. “Really? You don’t understand? Well, let me spell it out for you. We met at university, we dated, I fell for you and thought we had a future. Then you announced that after you graduated you were going to join the army and didn’t think it would be fair on me to continue our relationship, effectively ripping my heart out of my chest and stomping on it. Then we end up here together, years later, and you expect me to act normal. Get it now?” Phil looked so stunned and confused that I almost felt sorry for him. “But I thought you wanted to break up.” Now it was my turn to be confused. “What? How could you even think that?” “You didn’t disagree. When I said I thought it would be too difficult to maintain a long-distance relationship, you just accepted it. I figured it was what you wanted.” For once, I kind of understood his logic. I remembered the conversation well, and he was right. I’d followed his comment with a shrug and an “okay” and left. What he didn’t know was that I’d headed straight back to my dorm room, locked the door and cried into my pillow until I’d fallen asleep, exhausted. In my mind, it hadn’t been up for discussion. He was dumping me, and that was that. I’d avoided him for the rest of the term, then we’d graduated and got on with our separate lives. I repeated this thought process to Phil, and by the time I’d finished his eyebrows were almost in his hair. “You’re kidding.” It wasn’t a question. “So you’re telling me you didn’t want to split up, either?” “What do you mean, either? It was your stupid idea!” Phil slapped his forehead. “Sounds like we’ve both been stupid. Listen, Christina, I never wanted to break up with you. I knew that when I joined the army, it would be tough to maintain a relationship, so I gave you the option to get out. When you took it without hesitation, then ignored me for the rest of the year, I figured I’d been dumped.” We looked at each other in silence, though I was sure he must have been able to hear my heart pounding in my chest. I couldn’t get my head around the conversation we were having. All those years ago, neither of us had wanted to break up, and yet we’d done it anyway. Stupid wasn’t the word. I couldn’t think of a single thing to say to make things right and, given Phil’s continued silence, neither could he. All I knew for sure was that we’d both f****d up, royally, and that I was still madly in love with him. I dropped my gaze before he saw the tears welling up in my eyes.