Unwanted

Less than a week into the three still to go until my birthday, and right in the middle of science class, a problem came up.

I was able to keep it furtively hidden at first, because we were all sitting at our desks, but I knew it’d be impossible to hide if I had to get up.  I cast an extremely anxious glance around the classroom.  If I could just stay in my seat until the end of the lesson, surely it would have gone down by then!  But oh, if I couldn't, and everyone saw this had happened to me, it was highly likely I'd become the first boy ever to die from embarrassment!  

Not that it was still my secret shame anyway, as I soon learned.  The boy next to me with whom I lab-partnered was smirking.  

“I take it there’s still something you and Jenny haven’t got round to, then?" said he.  

"St-stop looking!" I gasped back, so panicky that I almost forgot to whisper.

"I'm not looking!" laughed my lab-partner.  "Anyone can tell from the way you're fidgeting, and checking every two minutes to make sure no-one's noticed!"  

"Well, don't tease, then," I retorted, red-faced.  Maddeningly my lab-partner giggled again.  

"If Jenny finds out then seriously, she's the one who’ll be teasing you - until you leave the sixth form!" he declared, sounding altogether a bit too happy about it.  

"I suppose it never happens to you!" I cried back indignantly, helpless.  

"Nope, I can mostly keep mine down," he replied, then smugly stood up and went to the teacher to get his work marked.  I let out my breath, feeling very weak and more than a little stung by his behaviour.  I'd never been able to stand him, in fact I didn’t even know how we’d ended up lab-partners! 

Ooh, it was bothersome though. I was as annoyed, by him and by the problem itself, as I was frightened anyone would see.  Why did Morgan have to be such a pain, insisting we do it like this?  And why did this nuisance have to happen just because I was a boy?  I'd been dreading it ever since I heard I’d have to wait until my birthday, but not even I'd imagined I'd have such trouble in the first week of three!

My lab-partner came back.  He'd got top marks and our teacher was pleased with him, all of which he was eager to show off to me about.

"Wow, is there anything you can't do?" I retorted pettishly in a silly put-on voice, because I'd just about had enough of him by now.

"At least I'm not popping my pants over Jenny!" he declared, in altogether too loud a voice for my liking.

"Sh-sssh, please!" I begged him, frightened.  A few heads around us seemed to turn, and my cheeks felt the first sure tinglings of a massive blush. And had I just caught a glimpse of Jenny herself, smiling? Oh, I didn't dare look!

"So, me or Jenny?" was the first thing Morgan asked, when I met her after school and told her what had happened. She sounded most amused. "Which one of us was it who got you like that?"

"Jenny," I lied at once. "No contest!"

After all I wasn’t about to give her the satisfaction of knowing she’d had anything to do with it, not when it was all her fault in the first place! She giggled though, and I had a feeling she’d seen right through me.

"I don't think a little prissy-knicks like Jenny actually can make it happen," Morgan declared, as if she knew all about it.

"Look, can we just drop the subject, alright?" I pleaded.

“Fine. Sorry to have raised the subject,” she replied with a smirk.

Practicing one-on-one with Jenny that Saturday, it happened again. Jenny being Jenny, she didn't mention anything about it until after she'd won and we were alone in her room, but then she said very primly: "If you can't even play me one-on-one without running into those sorts of troubles, I'm not sure if you're ready for the kind of commitment I'm asking of you."

I fumed inwardly at this, but as I still hadn't been able to get it to go down, I couldn't exactly protest.

"You know I've entered you in the junior tournament next weekend," Jenny went on. "Will you even be able to play if you get like that again?

"It's happened before, believe me," I told her with a huge sigh. "I'll just have to try my best. You can't make it go back down by wanting to, nothing does that."

Jenny sighed with impatience. “All I'm asking is that you beat a girl in her teens, at one match,” she declared.

"I'll try to," I promised her again. “And, um,” I took a deep breath, still blushing, “I’ll also try and see if there’s anything I can do about, um, this.”

Jenny didn't reply, but slowly she started sliding her hairpins out, letting her hair down. I watched, so captivated and entranced I could barely breathe. Seriously, if she didn't want me in this state, then why was she doing something that was certain to keep me that way?

“If you want this, you’ll do it,” Jenny told me matter-of-factly.

I gazed at her, helpless.

She began to brush her hair. "Sort that problem out and I'll let you stay a little longer," said she.

Right away I asked her permission to get up, and having done so shoved my hands into my shorts pockets and applied myself at once to the “thinking about something else” part. It was hard work, and I had to pace back and forth a bit, but I think Jenny’s withering presence probably helped speed things up. Anyway it was so embarrassing I really wanted to get it over with! When I’d finally gone down I waited for her permission to rejoin her, knowing I mustn’t ask this time, and on receiving it did so.

All this, for the privilege of sitting next to Jenny a bit more!

I usually looked forward to birthdays. This year however, I positively couldn't wait!