Hoff and Hols, a Romance Ch. 13

As we celebrated, I asked AK whether it was not a little 'premature'?

"Fuck it, Squirt. Look what happened with Cris. I don't want to wait. Keith wants me - and Issy - and I want him. No doubt a sensible woman would wait, but then how many are widows with a kid at the age of twenty-one?"

She had a point. More than that, her instinct was right. Across the next few weeks before Keith went back to the navy, we got to know him. He was a true empath. He was sensitive to AK's needs, but able to cheer her up when she got down in the dumps. He was also great with Issy, and once he saw how we all were with AK, he became fast friends with us all. Lady F, who was a tough judge of character, said he was the perfect gentleman. That he played the piano well was a bonus. On the Friday nights, he added a musical touch to our soirées.

It was wonderful to see AK so full alive again, and we made sure she and Keith got lots of "couple" time, as Emma and myself looked after the growing Issy.

Emma did not come round every night, but by this stage in our relationship it was more often than not that we spent the night together. She loved the way I had taken to playing with her breasts the way she wanted. So, one Friday night after one of Lady F's soirées, I decided to be a bit more adventurous.

I had been talking with AK, who was a fountain of information about all things sexual, and it was she who had raised the issue of what she called "penetration."

"Squirt, do you ever fuck Emma?"

As we had just been talking about the way in which she enjoyed Keith fucking her - it was a natural extension - so to say.

"Why do you ask?"

"It's just that, well, I know you are not that into it, having anything in your pussy, but are you assuming Emma is the same?"

I admitted that I had rather been making just that assumption.

"It's just that, well, you know she has had men in the past, so she may miss cock as much as I have been until Keith, and I got together."

"What do you suggest? Shall I ask you to ask Keith?"

"Cheeky girl, hands off, he's mine!"

We both giggled and the moment passed. But about a week later, a parcel arrived addressed to me.

"Open it!" AK urged.

"Oh I ought to wait until Emma is here, it looks like something she may have ordered for me."

"Just do as I say Squirt. Open it!"

I was glad I did. It was a dildo and harness set!

"What?"

AK giggled.

"Well, there you are, Squirt. My gift to you and Emma!"

I didn't know whether to kiss and hug her or to be somehow offended - so I decided to kiss and hug her.

That Friday night, I decided to make use of it.

As Emma went to the bathroom to wash, I took the opportunity to work the harness on. AK had kindly shown me how to put it on, protesting loudly:

"I am not perving on your little tits, and cute arse, it's just you don't need your knickers on when you are using this!"

It felt naughty to be with AK like that, but given our past, it also felt good. And after all, I reasoned, Emma would be the beneficiary.

I put my robe on, so that by the time Emma got back to the bedroom, there was no sight of what I was wearing.

"Why the robe, Pix?"

"Well," I smiled, "I've been thinking I want to make love to you before bed."

She grinned at me.

"Don't let me stop you."

"Now, darling, will you sit on the end of the bed, I have this urge for your pussy, but want to play with those wonderful tits."

"Oh, I see, is my Pixie in a bossy mood tonight?"

"What if she is?" I smiled.

She giggled.

"I may just have to be a good girlfriend and oblige."

Smiling and kissing her lips, I said:

"My good Emma!"

I saw a little shiver of excitement pass through her.

I knelt between her legs, keeping my robe on, but cupping her breasts.

Looking up at her I said:

"I love your tits darling."

As I caressed them and kissed and licked her nipples, her hands gripped my shoulders.

"Oh Pix, Pix! My girls love the way you treat them!"

As I massaged them, I sucked her nipples, and then, cupping her breasts, kissed each nipple, making them wet so that my thumbs and finger slipped as they teased and pulled on them.

Kissing down her body, my hands playing with her breasts, I reached her mound, and, taking one hand to find my way through her hair, the tip of my tongue played with her clit. I licked it as my thumbs and fingers drew out her nipples. I loved the way she moaned and pressed into me.

As her pussy began to get really wet, I decided, from the whimpering, that she was ready and asked her to get back on the bed.

Assuming I needed the space to lie there to lick her as I usually did, she obliged, giving me a wonderful view of her wet pinkness.

I shrugged off my robe, kneeling on the bed, still playing with her breasts with my right hand. What she could not see was that my left hand was on my girl-cock.

"Here goes!" I thought, as I rubbed the bulbous head against her wetness, making her groan loudly.

"Oh Pix! What?"

"Shush my love, I want you."

She put her knees up to help me, and then, slowly, I pressed against her inner lips, and gradually, inch by inch, my girl-cock slipped into her. Emma moaned.

"Pix! What!?"

"I want you, Emma, I want you!"

As I slipped into her, I could hear her squelch, and once I was sure I was in, both hands gripped her arse as I leant in to kiss her. As our nipples pressed into each other, we both moaned. Having, courtesy of AK, watched videos, I knew the theory, but goodness me, getting the angle right and being able to thrust at the same time, gave me a fresh respect for men!

I drove into her hard, and she loved it. The harder I pressed in and out, the more she groaned. The equipment had an additional part which meant that if I pressed in hard enough, I would rub her clit, and as I got into the rhythm, she gripped my arse, pulling me to her.

"Fuck me! Fuck me Pix!"

Being an obliging girlfriend, I did.

It was hard work getting it right, but so worth it.

Sucking at her nipples as I pressed in and out, Emma was wilder than I had ever seen her before. Excited by her excitement, I pressed in harder, rubbing her clit each time I pounded her hard enough.

"Pixieeeee!"

Emma came, hard and shuddering, gripping me. As she began to calm down after a few more minutes of moaning, her half open eyes looked at me.

"Was I a good girl for you?"

"The best!" I smiled.

"Where did that come from?" She asked smiling.

"Oh a friend!"

She giggled.

"AK strikes again?"

"She does."

"Can I have more?"

"Yes, Miss Twist," I giggled. And more she had.

It added a wonderful new dimension to our love-making. AK grinned smugly when I thanked her.

"What else are friends for?" She winked at me.

Trinity term was a hard one for me. Footy and I got on perfectly, and my work for her was of a high enough standard to satisfy her, but my tutor for the "Epistles" module and I did not get on at all. He was a conservative evangelical and objected to the feminist perspective I brought to St Paul. I was careful to keep it in check, but the slightest deviation from his orthodoxy was treated like heresy. When he sent back an essay on "Romans" which identified "Junia" as a female Apostle with a fail grade and sarcastic comments, I appealed. The second marker agreed with me, and as a result, he refused to teach me. I was invited to talk to the Head of the Theology Faculty.

Professor Carson was a small, rather severe looking man.

"So, Miss Hoff," he said, inviting me to take a seat and have a coffee, "you and Mr Bartlett are parting company?"

"To be accurate, Professor, he refuses to teach me unless I toe the line on his view of St Paul. You have seen my work, and the comments of the second marker. Was I disrespectful? Did I miss something? Was I not balanced?"

"You were, Miss Hoff. But you are aware that your views are taken by a minority of scholars?"

"Professor, until the late nineteenth century most scholars took the view Junia was a woman, so if I am deviating, it is from a recent orthodoxy, and I quote my sources. I thought Oxford encouraged thinking?"

He smiled.

"You are quite as formidable as Footy said. Look Miss Hoff, this is a very unusual situation, but we can resolve it if you are happy to work alone and to have the same second marker deal with your work. It will mean not tutorials, but I take it that would not displease you?"

"Can I come up with a counter suggestion?"

He looked intrigued.

"There is a Canon Theologian of St Paul's who is working on this, I have written to her, and if you would allow it, she is happy to supervise me."

"That is most irregular, Miss Hoff, but so is this whole situation. Let me see what can be done."

He was as good as his implied word, and I got the supervision I needed. But there was an unexpected, and unpleasant consequence.

It was toward the end of Trinity term, my work in, and exams to come, when Emma arrived home looking worried.

"Pixie, there has been a complaint about me to the Bishop!"

Trembling, she showed me a formal letter from the Bishop. Allegations had, it said, been made that she, Emma, was living as part of a lesbian commune, a member of whom was one of her own students. She was, it said required to see the Bishop on Friday morning.

"What am I going to do Pixie? Who can have done this?"

"Let me guess - Bartlett?"

"Surely not even he would be that horrible?"

"Why not?"

We discussed it with Lady F and then with Footy. The latter was clear.

"Look, Emma, this is a simple matter!"

"It is?" Emma asked, rather irritated I thought.

"Tell him to go fuck himself."

"Oh great, and what then?"

"Look," I said, "before you two start World War three, can I make a suggestion?"

"Do!" They said simultaneously.

"Answer the allegation, darling. This is not a lesbian commune. It is Lady F's house; she is the widow of a former Archbishop of York. AK is not a lesbian, she is a widow with a small child whom you, as a good Christian, are helping. You are not a lesbian either. There is only one lesbian here, me, and as for our relationship, just tell them that the Dean of the College has approved it. Do you really think you will be asked if you fuck me?"

"Bugger! You know Emma, Pixie is getting wise! That, Pix, is bloody brilliant. Right, let's go over the script."

That was what we did.

AK was furious and wanted to go round to Keble (Bartlett's college and "kick him in the goolies", but we restrained her.

This, Emma said when we were alone, was what worried her. She loved her job as vicar and College chaplain, but was aware, as most gay women in the ministry were, that they, we, were vulnerable. The Church recognised gay marriage and relationships as "valid" but would not celebrate them in church, and would not allow its priests to marry someone of the same sex, or live openly with them. This forced many, as it did Emma and I, to in effect hide under the radar. But we were always vulnerable to someone doing that had now been done to Emma.

We hugged. That week, as we waited for Friday,

She was back by noon. Footy was there.

"So?"

"I kept to the script!"

"And?"

"It bloody well worked! Pix was right, they did not ask the nature of our relationship, so I offered nothing. The matter is, they said, resolved!"

Footy needed few excuses to open a bottle of wine, but we all agreed the occasion merited it. our friends rallied. Footy was openly up for going to Bartlett's college and "telling him he's a bigot - as well as an idiot and a poor scholar!" But we persuaded her that would be like pouring petrol on the flames.

I coached Emma on what to do and say. Both AK and Footy thought it was "mealy-mouthed," but I insisted. It was all very well digging 'last ditches', but they got putrid when people died in them. It might not have been heroic, what I advised Emma, but it was better than that, it was clever. As I remonstrated with Footy:

"We are supposed to be clever here, darling, so can we please use our brains?"

"Well, you better be right, Pixie, because if they go for Emma, the stink I am going to raise will be smelled in London!"

That Friday morning, Emma and I were up early. We did morning prayer together, and the small congregation, which exceptionally included Footy and AK, all wished her well.

I sat with AK and Issy while we waited. Issy was so good at distracting me from other preoccupations. She was such an active little thing that one simply responded to her needs; I saw AK smiling.

"You know, Auntie Pixie, I have been thinking. Assuming Emma comes up clean from this, how about we Christen Issy and you, Emma and Chloe being godparents?"

That helped take us through to coffee time with Lady F.

"I will intervene if the Bishop is not sensible," she told us. "I know the Archbishop and am quite happy to put my two penn'oth in."

I was hoping for a text, but did not get one.

Then, just as I was thinking of preparing lunch, I heard the door open - I ran to her. To my utter relief, she was smiling.

"Yes!"

That was all she said before we embraced.

AK came running into the hallway with Issy.

"And?"

"Yes, it worked!"

That was the signal for a group hug.

As I went to get Lady F, I texted Footy, who arrived ten minutes later with a bottle of champagne!

Over lunch Emma told us all about it. As I had suspected, not one went down the prurient "and do you and Miss Hoff fuck?" route. The Bishop accepted that we were not a "lesbian commune" and that whatever the relationship with me, it had been declared to the Dean and that Emma and I did not live together.

"Clever little bugger, Pixie!" Footy smiled at me. "You are doing my Special Subject next year aren't you?"

"Yes, Footy, of course!"

Like there was any way I could have avoided spending half the year with her!

As the others talked on, Footy came closer.

"Now do you see why you have to go down the academic route first, Pixie? Literally, God knows what will happen about women like you and Emma, but you need an escape route."

I knew when I was beaten and agreed.

"Good, because, dear girl, by the time you start, there will be a fully-funded DPhil scholarship for the best Theology student doing a doctorate. You are going to win it."

I told her I was up for that!

My exam results exceeded even my expectations, and together will my coursework and dissertation, I was, Footy confirmed, in line to win the award.

But if (as we did) we expected the meeting between the Bishop and Emma to be the end of it, we were sadly mistaken.

Lisa, my Christian Union friend sent me an urgent text a few days after our exams had finished; it contained a link to a website.

There was a picture of the College Chapel, St Michael's, or as it was universally known among the students, "St Mike's," except it was entitled: "St Dykes". The text was so repulsive I won't repeat it, except to say it was about "Mummy and her baby dykes". The implications were clear: Emma was a predatory lesbian and probably a paedophile. I felt sick. I had to show Emma, who also felt sick.

Footy, who had also seen it, fired off urgent emails to the ISP to take the site down, but it was also all over Twitter. Then came a call from a friend of Emma's at The Church Times, warning us that there was going to be a letter in the paper criticising the Bishop and the College, signed by three dozen clergy. Would we, she asked, like a right of reply?

Footy called a Council of War, cancelling the usual Friday soirée. By then we had seen the letter. There was also, we were told, a letter to the Dean and to the College President. It was like being at the centre of a storm. It raged round us, but we had no way of controlling it - which was where Footy came in.

AK was horrified. Lady F, as ever, a tower of strength; it was Emma who began to worry me. I had to stop her from going to the website, and every time she logged into Twitter or Facebook, there were posts about her. Friends were wonderfully sympathetic, but the vitriol poured on her by her opponents was, frankly, too vile to be repeated. I found her awake at odd hours in the night, and her appetite faded. I made her favourite food, but she hardly ate a thing.

Footy was clear:

"We know where this has come from. You two," she said, looking at Emma and myself, are going to have to get ahead of this. I have drafted a letter to The Church Times, and I am going to write a piece for The Sunday Times, as I gather there is going to be a nasty little piece on you tomorrow. Here, look!"

Emma couldn't bring herself to; so I did. It was Footy at her intellectual best, but the problem was clear to me; this was not an intellectual argument. Yes, the vitriolic stuff was awful, but there was a reasonable argument from tradition behind the objections. The problem was that Footy, like me, was trying to deal with the latter, while the Press was loving, and therefore concentrating on, the former.

We did as she said.

I hardly dared look at Saturdays Times, but as Emma could not bring herself to do so, I read it.

It was a well-known Evangelical giving the classic arguments from Scripture and Tradition against gay relationships, with some nasty digs about predatory lesbian lecturers being treated differently from their male counterparts. AK threw the thing on the floor:

"It's only fit to wrap Issy's nappies in!"

She was right.

"It's a storm in a teacup," Lady F said. But it wasn't.

By this stage of Trinity term, attendance at St Mike's was down to a few dozen. As Emma and walked across the Quad, it looked as though there were going to be far more. As they saw us, suddenly banners went up and a chant began:

"Dykes out! Dykes out!"

The banners said the same thing.

Emma went white.

"I can't do it, Pixie, I can't go past them!"

She turned and ran back to her room. I stood there. They were cheering.

I walked on.

As I got closer, I heard someone say:

"That's her, the baby dyke!"

The chanting got louder. I kept walking.

"Let me through to the Chapel!" I said, as reasonably as I could.

"You blaspheme the name of the Lord!" Said a burly chap, who could have made three of me.

"If you want to engage me in theological arguments, I'll see you after - but at the moment you are barring my way to where I worship every week."

A tall man joined the burly one.

"There is no place in God's church for lesbians."

"Oh!" I said, "so when Jesus came to save sinners, he only had in mind bigots like you and your friends?"

I walked at them. They blocked my way.

As I walked away, there were cheers.

Shaking, I went to the Porters' Lodge and got help.

The Porters, lovely men, came with me, and as we approached the mob, the chants got louder.

"Sorry, Miss Hoff, this needs the police."

At that point, I saw a journalist taking photos. I had no idea how long her had been there. But damn it, I thought, I was going to Church.

I walked straight at the crowd.

"We are not letting you in, dyke!"

At my size, pushing does not get you far, but brains do. I had noticed they were standing legs apart to give them greater stability in case the Porters charged at them. So, I ducked and went through their legs, and ran up the stairs to the Chapel before they had worked out what I had done!

For a moment, I felt alone, as though there was no one else there. But as I approached the altar where we kept the reserved sacrament, I knew I was not alone. God was there. I wept - and prayed. I prayed for Emma, I prayed for all those like us who were persecuted; and I prayed for the mob outside.

The noise was still there when I went to the door.

I could see some police approaching. The journalist was taking photos like they were going out of fashion.

I stood at the top of the steps.