David the Graduate Student Ch. 02

Barbara and Alistair left the restaurant. We poured another cup of coffee. Paolo asked us if we would like a glass of grappa with the coffee, but we declined. Having finished, I paid the bill and we left to walk back to the hotel.

"Do you think that Barbara and Alistair will settle down together?" I asked.

"It's possible," said Jon, "Alistair is not as cloth-headed as rugby-playing types often are. We never asked him what he did for a living, I bet he works in a bank." We reached the hotel about 10 pm, and decided not to have anything further to drink but to adjourn to our suite and have some more coffee. The suite had attached to it a minute kitchen with facilities for making coffee and toast. This seemed somewhat at odds with the luxury standards of the hotel, but seemed to be designed to avoid the customers having to use room service to order cups of coffee!

We undressed and went naked into the kitchen, where we were obliged by the narrow space to press up close against one another. "We'll be pissing all night after what we've had to drink!" said Jon, as he poured out two cups of black coffee, which we carried into our sitting room.

"Well, at least it will be using our dicks for something other than sucking or fucking!" I replied.

"Don't you want to fuck then?" asked Jon in husky tone of voice. I looked at him and his sweet brown eyes with their long lashes looked hungrier than I had seen them for some time.

"Well, you obviously do!" I said and wrapped my arms tightly round him and began to kiss and nibble his neck under the left ear. Then I nibbled first the chain holding the locket with my picture in it, then his ear-lobe and he grunted with pleasure. I moved down his chest with my lips and started to nibble his nipple. He moaned with pleasure before sitting up and pushing me back on the sofa and pressing his face up against my belly and smothering my midriff with kisses. "The 'Storing pour homme' enhances your scent, fag-boy!" he said as he nuzzled around in my pubic bush. Then he rolled me over, made me get up on my knees and began to rim me. The sensation of his tongue in my arse-crack was delicious, and I nearly went crazy as he pushed it into my sphincter.

I can never make up my mind which gives me the greatest pleasure: to make love to Jon or to be made love to by him. Making love gives me that sacramental sensation that in fucking my lover I am experiencing what God Himself undergoes when he pours out His love on His creation, but when Jon makes love to me, I experience a sense of total surrender to love that makes me think that I am feeling the love of God for me and for my partner as well. But the glorious thing about being gay is to be able to experience BOTH these wonderful sensations: that lovemaking can give me two different kinds of delight, whereas mere heteros are denied this double experience. I am glad that God made me gay!

By now, Jon had thoroughly coated my crack with his saliva, and soon he was spreading lube on the condom that I had just helped him roll on to his tool. He turned me over on to my back, and I spread my legs to open myself up. I clamped them round his waist as he entered me with his man-stick. "Jon, Jon my wonderful man, you give me all I need and dream of. I am yours, totally yours, to do whatever you want with me. Take me, take me, ravish me, eat me up!" I said to him quietly, and pushed my belly upwards against his as he worked his tool in my rectum. Every minute or so, Jon would pause, bend forward, and kiss my lips. I would reach up and stroke whatever part of his lithe, smooth body I could reach...

Next morning, we took the 9 am train to Camford, left our bags at home and by noon I was in the lab. The technicians grinned at one another as they saw my happy and contented smile as I put my lab coat on and started to take test-tubes out of the drawer. Angela, Charlie's middle-aged technician, smiled at me. "Did you have a good weekend in London, dear?" she asked.

"What do you think?" I grinned. "Lots of culture, lots of alcohol, nice food and lots of other things!"

Chapter 33 David

An Unexpected Legacy

One night early in July, just after the end of the Pentecost Term, I got a phone call from my Uncle Kees in Amersfoort. My grandfather had died, not unexpectedly. He had been suffering from pancreatic cancer for nearly a year. I had visited him the previous August, an unpleasant experience that I preferred to forget. Reluctantly, out of a sense of duty I flew to the Netherlands to attend his funeral. No way was I going to let my mother attend after the way she had been treated, and my sister and Jeroen had never met him.

The service at the crematorium was rather miserable. My uncle and aunt and myself were the only family present, and he had few surviving friends, and many people who had known him were not prepared to attend the funeral of someone who had been 'fout in de oorlog' (wrong in the war); for the Dutch have long memories about collaborators and Nazi-sympathizers. My uncle was not prepared to give a spoken tribute, so I stood at the podium and said a few words about how God's love and mercy could embrace even the worst sinner, without mentioning that the old guy had never shown any sign of repentance or regret for his Nazi views. The condolence session in the coffee room of the crematorium after the committal ceremony was over in 10 minutes. The deceased's lawyer and the three of us decided to adjourn to an adjacent café to discuss the will.

It transpired that although my grandfather had declared that he was going to change his will after meeting me, the changes had never been implemented. One half of the estate went to my uncle, the other half was to go in equal shares to myself, Dorothea and Jeroen. Not a cent was to go to my mother. I was outraged. I did not want the old man's money, which came from dubious wartime transactions, but my mother could make good use of it. Rather than refuse the legacy, I resolve to take the money and give it to my mother. As Dorothea and Jeroen had never had any contact with the old man, it seemed right to me that they should have their money and make good use of it. The total amount the old man had left came after tax to three million guilders.

When I got back to Camford, I asked Jon to come home with me to Loxton for the following weekend to talk to my family about this sudden event. Jon agreed with me that I should give my share of the legacy to my mother. He pointed out that I could expect a good income in the future either as a scientist or a singer, and in any case, he would look after me financially if the need ever arose. To save time, we went by train, catching a train on the Friday evening which in those days still had a restaurant car, so we were able to have dinner on the way. We got to Loxton about 10 pm and took a cab to my home.

Late though it was, we sat up with my parents until midnight discussing the situation. My father agreed with me that I should give my share to my mother, but she required a lot of persuasion to accept the offer. She said that she was sure that the money had not been honestly earned. I said that that was irrelevant, that she should regard it as compensation for the way that my grandfather had treated her and my father, or if she preferred it, to regard it as a gesture of love and appreciation from me for the love she had lavished on us and for the kind and loving response she had shown to my relationship with Jon. The only stipulation I made was that she should not give more than a small amount of it to my sister and brother. Jeroen's share of the legacy would in any case have to go into trust until he was 18. I suggested to my father that he got Tim Ingledown to invest it securely for the next four years.

I asked my mother to break the news to my siblings that they were about to become moderately wealthy. I said that she should not at present say much about the old man's past, but explain the fact that they had never met him by saying that he had behaved badly when she wanted to marry my father, and that they had then lost contact. Both Jon and my father were adamant that she should not say that I had given her my share of the legacy. I said that if they asked me how I was going to spend my share, I would just say that I was not going to spend it. To that end, I asked my parents to continue to pay me my small allowance until I got fixed up with a job. My father was quite happy to do that, because he did not want me to receive any money from Jon, as it would look like payment for sexual favours! I blushed when he used that phrase, but it was true. I did not want ever to become financially dependent on Jon.

Jeroen was delighted to see us both, and as usual made a great fuss of Jon, though I noticed that he shook hands with him rather than kissing him. He did let me give him a quick brotherly kiss however. He was very excited to hear that he would come into money when he was eighteen, though my mother refused to tell him the sum involved. She also telephoned Dorothea when Jeroen was not around, and told her that she was about to acquire a significant sum of money and to be careful what she did with it. The Dutch are very careful with money.

Chapter 34 David

The Language Course

My progress in my second-year work in the lab had been such that Charlie had no objection to my three-week absence in Italy for the language course. Jon too did not feel guilty about taking time off. The time of year was not ideal: the end of July and beginning of August when the Italian summer was act its hottest. However we reckoned that the course was so intensive that there would be very little outdoor leisure time. The study programme timetable was 9 am to 1 pm, followed by a siesta break, and then resumed from 4 to 7 pm, when we had a two-hour break for dinner, followed by an evening session from 9 to 10 pm. The study hours at the weekends were shorter: Saturday afternoons and Sunday mornings were free. Some nights the evening session was social, and some nights it was cancelled, so sessions for coffee, beer or wine were possible, but short. The instruction was entirely in Italian, and the students were graded into groups according to their previous knowledge: I was in the beginners group, Jon in the next higher group, so we only saw one another at night, where we shared a two-bedded room.

The course was taught by the University of Trabizona, a relatively modern university in Emilia-Romagna. It was the era when language laboratories were being introduced, and we had a lot of audiotape exercises, to learn details of the grammar. Other instruction involved pronunciation classes, conversation groups, quizzes, conventional lectures, readings from literature, project work and visits to historic cities including Florence, Venice and Bologna. There was a limited amount of written work, but the major aim of the programme was to promote oral skills. There were students from every nation in Europe and a few from Australia and North America and use of languages other than Italian socially among the students was heavily discouraged. While most students were in the 18 to 25 age-group, there were some of all ages up to 65, and the mixing of ages and nationalities made it a really memorable experience. There were approximately equal numbers of males and females among the students, and a small number of homosexuals of both sexes. I recogized a couple of the men as middle-aged queens, who looked lecherously at me, as did some of the girls.

It was a tremendous experience for both of us, and the fact that Jon and I spent less time than usual in each other's company was also good for us, it made our nights in bed all the more enjoyable. One Saturday afternoon we paid a quick visit to my sister in Verona, and met her Italian boyfriend, who seemed quite hot. Even in casual student garb, even I could see that he had an air of style that Anglo-Saxon men very rarely achieve, and Jon was obviously quite impressed, to judge from his bulging crotch. It was interesting to try out our Italian on a stranger. Jon managed very well, and even I seemed able to put together whole sentences that were understood. I said to Jon, "I bet Marcello will refuse to speak to me in English when we get back."

"In that case you must make sure that you know enough curses and obscenities, as well as lots of musical terms! We're both also going to need to learn lists of words. But we can test one another using flash cards. It will be a change from watching porn videos!"

Chapter 35 David

A Summer of intensive practice

Our second paper on the biosynthetic pathway was submitted and accepted for publication. Charlie was delighted with the progress. In my singing however, things were less spectacular. Marcello did indeed insist on speaking to me in Italian, and both Jon and myself spent half an hour daily learning words with flash cards, and Marcello kept lending me short documents in Italian to improve my reading skills and enhance our vocabularies. The vocal exercises that Marcello made me do got progressively stiffer, and it was only just before we were due to leave for Italy that the items that I was to sing in the competition had been decided.

Unlike some singing competitions, the Dunchester Mozart Competition did not have entry classes in topics like opera, lieder, oratorio etc.; instead it asked for entries for particular voices: tenor, soprano, baritone etc., leaving competitors free to choose items from different topics and styles. Marcello thought that this was very important for singers like myself, who had not decided to specialize. Each class of entry had a first round, with a maximum of ten entries, followed by a final with maximally five entries, and then a Champions' final in which the winners of the six or seven entry classes competed against one another for Champion singer. There were two Champions: one male, one female. In practice, the class finals were the most important, as they gave impresarios and agents the chance to survey and maybe to recruit from all the different voices. Prizes were given to the first three entrants in each of the class finals. The prizes were mostly monetary, except that the first prize in each class also included three master classes with a world-renowned singer. Each round required two different items, one by Mozart, one by another composer, so I had to learn a total of four numbers. Entrants were allowed to use their audition numbers in the first round if they wished, as the juries were different from the adjudicators in the auditions. It seemed sensible to stick with my two audition items and for the possible final (if I got that far) to learn one new Mozart item and we decided on 'Il mio Tesoro' from 'Don Giovanni,' as it was quite demanding, leaving only the non-Mozart item for the final to be decided. On Marcello's advice, we fixed on 'La donna è mobile' from 'Rigoletto' as a suitably demanding and impressive number and a contrast to the Mozart, and I got to work on all four pieces.

Pressure intensified when we got back from Italy, and Marcello now started to nag at me in Italian! One night we were practising at Marcello's house, when Caterina came into the room. "Marcello, it's time that you gave David a break. I've been listening to him, and it's clear to me that he knows all four pieces perfectly. Basta! Give him ten more minutes on scales and exercises, and then come and have a drink and unwind. There are still two weeks till the competition, and David has other things in his life besides singing. But, David, speaking as a retired professional, I think that you sing pretty well."

Caterina was sweet. She had sensed that I was getting stressed from repeated singing and was offering us both an opportunity to unwind. She poured each of us a large glass of Marsala, and we sat down and she began to chat to me in Italian, to which I struggled to reply in whole grammatical sentences, but it was difficult, and eventually we ended up speaking English. She told Marcello that he was overdoing the pressure on me, and asked why he had to drive me so hard when he was much more easygoing with some of his other pupils. "None of them are entered for competitions," he replied, "Most of them are University students with exams in which I am not involved. I want David to win or at least to get a prize at Dunchester."

"Let's talk about something different," I said. "How do you find my Italian now?"

"Like your singing, it needs more work!" said Marcello. He was never a person to throw away compliments.

"David, bring Jon with you next Thursday and the two of you stay for dinner. There won't be anyone else there and we can have a nice tension-free evening and you can both practice your Italian!" said Caterina.

"And in the meantime, refine your pronunciation in 'Il mio Tesoro'" added Marcello.

Chapter 36 Jon

The Dunchester International Singing Competition

Dunchester is a small historic town just off the Roman Fosse Way in the English midlands. There were more than fifty entrants for the Competition, and even though many competitors stayed with friends or local families, most of the hotels and bed-and-breakfast establishments in the small town were full for the five days of the festival, which attracted several hundred visitors. Anticipating this, I had booked some months before a twin room at the four-star Accrington Arms in Dinkerton, a town some 30 km from Dunchester. We decided to stay for the whole duration, because David could probably pick up some useful ideas. We had both had no problems in getting a week off for the event. Marcello was rather vague about when, if at all, he would be there. He did assure us though that he was not involved in the organization at all, though he did know several of the jury members.

The competition was held in Dunchester Town Hall, an eighteenth-century building with a large hall with a balcony and seating for about 500 people. A series of small rooms at the top of the building had been set aside for last minute practising. These were bookable, but David had decided not to do any last minute practice for the first round. It turned out that of the two boys that David had met at the auditions, only Nat, the quiet baritone, had qualified, but his friend Mike the tenor had come along to support him. The first day of the competition was devoted to women's voices. We listened to some of the sopranos and were quite impressed, but then the four of us left after the coffee break and went to one of the pubs that are abundant in the town and are short of customers for most of the year. There we had a drink, followed by an early lunch. The boys from Stamford told us that the agents and impresarios would not turn up until the second rounds, which were on the last two days. We went back in the afternoon to hear the mezzos and contraltos and to hear the names of the second round qualifiers announced. It was an easy first day, and enabled us to understand the routine and know what to expect.

Next day the tenor class was in the morning and the baritones and basses in the afternoon. There were actually only nine tenors in round one, so David had a greater that 50% chance of qualifying for the final. This time he had to perform the Verdi first and then the Mozart. It was interesting to hear the other entrants. None of them had chosen numbers from Mozart's sacred music, and for first item most of them had chosen nineteenth- or twentieth-century composers. Baroque music did not seem to be popular among the entrants. There were some very good entries, and David, who had had to listen from backstage told me afterwards that he was quite worried about the high quality of the competition. However, he performed flawlessly as far as I could tell, as usual he moved me to tears with his performance of 'Panis vivus,' and I noticed that several others in the audience were similarly affected. At the end of the day, when the qualifiers were announced by the jury leader, we heard that he had qualified for the final. Nat the baritone had also qualified. We had been interested to hear Nat sing, because David had not heard him in the auditions. He was very good, in particular his rendering of 'Vedrò mentr'io sospiro' from 'Le Nozze di Figaro'. The paths of these two boys would cross again several times in the future.