Quarantine - has a Silver Lining

It wasn't my fault I actually arrived at Midwick University in the Midlands the day the entire town went into lockdown because of coronavirus.

It was our first day on campus, a Friday. I was bright and earl, it wasn't even ten o'clock yet and there were a lot of people running around like blue-assed flies. Those of us who had been there early, as I had, had all carried our suitcases, backpacks, boxes of books and all our personal effects into the main hall. We had been assured at the reception desk that they were running a little late but that we would be allocated our rooms very quickly and then given help to carry our stuff. I did notice that there were piles of bedding, household furniture and kitchen paraphernalia dotted around the huge hall. I even saw piles of food and sleeping bags. They really were running late, I thought.

I had said a fond farewell to my parents at the entrance, I was pleased to see them go and was looking forward to meeting the guys with whom I would be sharing a dormitory this year. If we all got along well these would be my buddies for years maybe.

My parents were in a hurry to leave as well which is why I was so early. My father had a business meeting and invited mum along for a couple of days of R & R after his meeting. I think he expected her to be a little teary. As I am an only child this was going to be the first time I had left home and she was going to be as much on her own as I was. The only difference was that I was looking forward to it.

I joined a small queue of students after a lady put up a sign bearing the words 'Room allocations.'

She disappeared and then we waited, and waited, and waited.

An hour or so later, with the large room now getting busier, and the queues getting longer there was a booming noise from the Hall loudspeakers.

'Ladies and Gentlemen, new students, I must inform you that this University and indeed the whole town of Midwick, has been placed in quarantine due to the Coronavirus pandemic second wave. To ward off any signs of panic I can tell you that we will very quickly allocate you temporary accommodation, but that you will be expected to remain in there, with your allocated new roommates, for at least the next two weeks. We will supply food to the rooms, which may, I am afraid, not be up to the normal Campus catering standard, but will be free, and in due course we will start to deliver your education by a variety of digital devices. You are all bright, intelligent people and will realise that it is in your best interests to make the best of these difficult circumstances. I can assure you that it will have no bearing on the quality of your degree, and the staff and I, who are similarly quarantined, are confident that, with your co-operation, we can ride out this difficult time with little divergence from regular campus life. In the pack we are preparing for each of you at this very moment is a name and phone number of your personal, campus-experienced mentor. He or she may be a member of staff or a third, or fourth year student. I should point out at this stage that the campus gates have been locked, so no one else will be allowed in. Any students who were not here early will I am afraid have to go home and start their education digitally from there. Similarly, you who are already here will not be allowed to leave and we hope that at least for the first few days that you will be careful to keep your social distancing as much as possible. You will eventually no longer need this as you will 'bubble', firstly with your immediate roommates and eventually within your educational groups. Temperatures will be taken every two or three days, and any increase will mean you being moved to a new secure wing where we have a team of nurses and a doctor available.

I know that this is difficult for your first few days at Uni, especially after the last few months where your examination results were all delayed and changed and your school leaving ceremonies were all curtailed, but I am confident that these experiences will only make you more determined to succeed in furthering your education and getting a good job.

You will see that while I have been speaking there are four help desks that have been put up. Please join a queue at one of these desks and you will be allocated accommodation. I am afraid that you will not at this stage be receiving the halls or rooms that you were originally allocated but that you will now be allotted a bed in large, old I am afraid, dormitories which were last used in the in the boom years of the late 1960s.'

I joined a queue and was eventually given an envelope marked Chatsworth, which sounded quite grand. Chatsworth itself was a grand country Mansion, not that far from here. I was hopeful that the accommodation would resemble it. It transpired that all the dormitories were called after palatial estates. They would have been better off to name them 'Nissan Hut', or even 'Bus Shelter'. While we knew they were last used forty years ago, they were probably second hand prisoner accommodation originally from the second world war. They were undoubtedly quite smart then, and fit for purpose.

I got there to find a long dirty grey building with small windows and peeling paint. Opening the door I found three other students, who like me were staring around in unbelieving stupor.

There were about a dozen beds, mainly singles, some doubles. Each bed had a bedside cabinet, and most had a pillow and a couple of blankets lying on the bare mattress. The windows were bare, absolutely not a curtain in sight. Down one end there was a long table and a couple of stacks of chairs.

I looked up at the door I had come though. 'Chatsworth', it said. I looked at the other three.

'Wow.' I said. 'They must be joking.'

'Yes,' said one of the two girls. 'I am not sleeping in here.'

I suddenly realised who I had been listening to. One of two girls. Mixed accommodation. Surely not.

I looked again. They were both pretty though. Maybe things weren't so bad after all.

The other girl spoke next. 'I was here first, you think this is bad, go up to the door at the end and look at the toilet and shower block. I assumed that led to another dormitory, perhaps nicer ones for girls. Noooo. And then, when I saw him coming in,' she pointed to the other guy, who had long hair in a pony tail and was sporting a guitar, 'I realised it was mixed accommodation.'

While we were all still looking a little askance at each other another group of four arrived, three girls and a boy.

If this wasn't going to be joke I realised that perhaps I had better get myself a bed. I am quite tall, just under six foot, so automatically moved my suitcase towards one of the double beds.

I had second thoughts. Surely, they wouldn't expect us to share. I had third thoughts, after all I am a boy, and sex is never far from my thoughts. I looked at the girls, all five of them. 'Mmm.' I thought I would happily share with any of them. The truth is I had never been particularly confident with girls and I had probably never yet met one I wouldn't share with. After all I was still a virgin, a small problem I hoped to get rid of as soon as possible.

I wasn't that confident that any of the girls would want to share a double with me so kept on moving, walking past the double to put my suitcase onto one of the singles that had both a pillow and blankets. There was rush as other people saw what I had done and rushed to emulate me. Like me they ignored the doubles. I wondered whether, like Love Island, the doubles would be kept spare and used for dalliances?

'Philip,' I said putting my hand out to the girl who had chosen the bed next to mine.

'Don't get any ideas buster. I am not going to be here long enough for you to know my name, so you can get your mind right out of the fucking gutter now, fuck off and find yourself a bed further away. This is the girls end of the room.'

Not a good start I thought, but seeing one single bed still free a couple of beds further way, I upped and moved my suitcase. I was certainly intimidated, but if moving beds was going to make things easier, so be it. All eight single beds were now taken leaving just three doubles. Nobody was unpacking. A couple of people were on their phones, which I thought was a good idea. I would ring my mentor. I had his name, number and a small sort of CV describing him. A final, fourth year, student of Economics, which I was about to study as well. He answered after a couple of rings and I introduced myself.

'Nice to meet you,' he said. 'What can I do for you?'

I described broadly the problem, where we were, the mix of the sexes, the problem with the beds.

He laughed 'Chatsworth eh, I had a look around that block last year when a friend of mine, a science student, was hoping to turn that into an experimental hydroponics lab. He said that was all it was good for apart from pulling down. It was good for a hydroponic block because there was plenty of water available. Even in the walls when it rains. Have you seen the showers yet? You think the sleeping area is bad. Hoo hoo. Anyway, I would like to help but I am on my way home I am afraid. I arrived about eleven fifteen to find the gates locked and the announcement about quarantine, tacked to the them. You are on your own pal.'

Great, I thought. So much for my allocated mentor.

I got up and strolled through the door at the end to find toilets in an open room on my left and showers in a similar room on the right. It was unbelievable. That's when I wondered whether they were used for prisoners of war in the 1940s. There were no urinals nor screening round each of the toilets and the showers were just standpipes around the walls. No signs of curtains or any form of screening. I walked back laughing, and said to the room at large, 'You think this is bad, have you all seen the ablutions.'

As I was speaking the outside door opened and six more students came in. 'Six', I thought, 'three boys and three girls, and only three beds. There is trouble here.' No seven, I corrected myself before realising that the seventh was older, a teacher perhaps or at least an administrator. Well, she would sort this out I was sure.

My little friend, the only one to whom I had tried to introduce myself was the first to speak.

'I don't know who the fuck you are but you have to sort this fucking mess out. I am not sleeping one fucking night in this fucking doss-house and you are going to sort it.'

The lady accessed her notes, after firstly looking at the girl down her nose, over the frames of her glasses.

'Miss Evangeline Stanton, I am guessing? I was told to expect to hear from you.'

'Ms. Stanton if you don't mind Miss Cunt, coz that's who you are I am guessing.'

'Woah.' I thought. This was going to be interesting. I was glad I was not in the next bed.

'Young lady, and I use the words advisedly. You scraped in here by the skin of your teeth, with poor academic results and the proviso that if you did not stay and take this seriously then your probation officer will bang you up so quickly you will get your foul tongue caught in the revolving door. I have the Authority of the Board of Governors to do whatever is necessary to keep you and your foul moth under control. I can have you stripped and tied to your bed or maybe under one of the showers if that is what it takes. I can turn a blind eye to any foul language or even cries of anguish and screams that emanate from those pearly but acidic lips. If you do not fit in or you try to convert any of these other nice girls to your blatantly aggressive form of BDSM lesbianism I have the authority to move you to a dormitory consisting so far of fourteen rugby players. I will happily tie you naked to a bare bed in there. I have told them to leave me a spare bed in case. Trust me, they are looking forward to it. Now Evangeline, shall we start again. I will give you the opportunity to tell me how you would like to be addressed. You may call me Mrs Crook, and nothing less disrespectful please. While you are responding to me, I will be assessing the level of punishment that you have already earned for that foul-mouthed display.'

She looked such a meek and mild lady. We were as shocked by her as we had been by Ms... , by Evangeline. We all looked as shocked as we no doubt felt.

'Errr Ms Van, errr Miss Stanton, err I mean Van if you don't mind please Mrs Crook.'

'Better. You have just earned a reprieve from most of the punishment I was about to order. Not all but some. Firstly, I will tell the Rugby Squad that, at least temporarily, that they can use that spare bed for picking up immoral sluts to satisfy them as usual. I will not supply one for them just yet. Secondly, the clothes that you are wearing and your suitcase will be returned to you Monday. You may undress now and stay undressed until I return your clothes to you Monday lunchtime. Only if I get good reports from your fellow students about your friendliness and ability to fit in, will I return them to you. That means that you had better get very friendly, very quickly, with your new friends. A bad report by them, will be a very bad report for you.'

All our mouths were hanging open, not least Van's.

'You have until I have finished speaking to the rest of the Dorm to get naked, and I mean naked. Put all the clothes that you are wearing back into your suitcase. Store your blankets and any sheets that you have under the bed and leave them there until Monday.'

'Now, the rest of you. I hope that this difficult start with Van here has not intimidated you all. I am normally a happy-go-lucky sort of person, who can happily turn a blind eye to minor escapades, but as you can see, I have the ability to discipline any and all of you. I am so sorry about the facilities here. I am very hopeful that you will only be here for a couple of weeks. When the quarantine period finishes we should be able to put you into your correct accommodation. Unfortunately, most of it is just off campus and you are not allowed out there until the end of quarantine.'

We were all listening but the boys were all actually watching Van. She was down to bra and panties, a fairly solid black bra, supporting a magnificent pair of titties. Who was I kidding? I had seen so few, they were all magnificent?

'Are there any questions?' said Mrs Crook. Van hurriedly removed her bra and panties and stuffed them into her suitcase with the rest of her clothes.

'Thank you dear. I am sure we are all going to get on just fine in here. Look, there is not much I can say. These beds in this dorm are not suitable for pigs, but it is all we have. We, at the university, will try to make it up to you, first of all financially. As you have heard all food will be provided to the room here. You are restricted to this hut plus the green area immediately in front of it. Each of the Dorm huts has a green space so there will be no need to fraternise with other dorms. It will only be for a couple of weeks. There is worse yet, I don't know whether you girls have seen the toilet and washing facilities yet. I say girls, because usually girls are a little more sensitive about cleanliness and particularly privacy. There is none, neither showering or sitting on the toilet. I am sorry. Modesty will be impossible. We will at the end of quarantine make sure that you get the very best of the real accommodation. You will also have all your meals free for the full year. All teaching materials, photocopying etc will be provided for free. There will be no reason that any of you will need to get a job to supplement your income this year. My suggestion is that you throw modesty to the winds and become nudists for the next few weeks. It will be impossible to put a time limit to when the boys and girls can separately use toilets and showers. If you can follow Van's example here, you will eventually be able to laugh and put all this behind you. It is easy for me to say because I am a practising nudist on holiday with my family. I know it works. Van would you like to show us by example and go off to the toilet please.'

She did. Embarrassedly she walked the length of the dorm and turned left into the toilet block.

'If you all decide to follow these principles I will also undress when I visit you. I should tell you that I will be advising all of the other dorms to do likewise, possible with the exception of the Rugby dorm. I may still need to keep that as a potential punishment block. When they find out what the rest of you are doing, I would be surprised if they keep their clothes on for long.'

Van came back to sit on her bed.

'Right I will leave you now, you will need to talk about my suggestions amongst yourselves. I would ask you to support Van who has had a very difficult start, both in here and quite obviously in life generally. She will need all the support you can give her. You will need to co-operate with each other to make the best of this situation. It looks like there are 8 girls and 6 boys in here. The logic is that the three double beds are shared by girls as you are all more used to sleepovers and sharing than boys are. It will mean one or two of you volunteering to share. I will leave you to it all now and come back this evening with the evening meal to see how you are coping. Someone else will come round in a short time with some lunch and drinks. Please save any more questions that you have and I will try to answer them later. We really are sorry this is happening. The faculty is as shocked as you are with what we are having to ask of you. I will not be apologising again, but my thoughts will always be with you. I will see you later.'

She disappeared out of the front door leaving us all looking at each other, still in shock. The later six people were still standing in the middle of the room looking at the double beds. I saw one of the girls pull the sleeve of one of the others and say 'It's Jill isn't it. Do you want to share a bed?'

Jill nodded and they made their way to the bed. The three boys and the remaining girl looked a bit shocked and gazed wide eyed at the 2 spare double beds.

'The girl in the next bed to me said to the remaining standing girl, 'I will share with you if you're okay with that. I'm Emily.'

'Thank you', said the Asian girl standing there, 'I am Chynna and very happy that you will share. This is really not what I was expecting. I think this is not normal. Am I correct?'

Her English was good but not colloquial.

'You are very correct,' said Emily, 'this is very unusual. None of us would ever have dreamed of anything like this. We are all as shocked as you are.'

Van spoke up for the first time since Mrs Crook left. 'Look I am happy to share with someone but I can understand after Mrs Crooks description of me as a masochistic lesbian that none of you will want to share with me.'

That did cause us to laugh and all of the other girls who had single beds were quick to offer as well. The beds were quickly sorted out and the six of us boys, Van and a girl called Susan had the single beds. The rest of the girls shared the three doubles. Bhavna, one of the three Asian girls asked Van if she would like to borrow a t-shirt, and Geetika sharing a bed with her offered underwear as well.

'Thank you so much girls, but I had better not. If I was wearing something when she walked in the door who knows what punishments she would give me. And yes, I do prefer girls so I really would not want to be dragged off to the Rugby dorm. I am not suggesting any of you would report me, but I really do need to keep my nose clean. I need this Uni place. It really is a last chance for me, and I know I have already upset one of you.'

She looked at me and I was quick to say that I certainly wouldn't report her, and that she was welcome to borrow any of my stuff, including wash-kit, if it helped. 'Shall we start again Van. I am Philip, Phil, preferably.'