Hanging Out With The In-Crowd

I wouldn't describe myself as being 'square' exactly back then, but I was not the most world-wise 19 year old. I lived at home with my Dad and spent more time studying than getting up to regular sorts of teenage mischief. I was still a virgin. I'd had some limited experience of sexual practices but I'd never had a "lover" - it had tended to be more a series of fumbles here and there with girls who were as shy and inexperienced as me. When I started hanging out with Rebecca and Todd however, all that started to change. My name is Henry, by the way.

You know how it is at high school. There is always a group of 'cool' kids in the year who form a group. They tend to be the best looking, wear the trendiest clothes, have their own cars before everyone else and have a reputation for the wildest parties. Well, Rebecca Ashton was one of this group at my school, Beaumont High. She was absolutely gorgeous which helped make her a magnet to girls and boys alike, but she was also a rebel which gave her the reputation of being cool too. She would come in to class late, openly challenge the authority of teachers and was one of the first girls in the year to be reputed to have "gone all the way" with her boyfriend Todd Bateman.

Todd can perhaps best be described as the male equivalent of Rebecca -good looking, popular, physically more mature than most of his friends and with a reputation for being a party animal. To be friends with Todd (if you were a guy) meant you were elevated to elite status by your fellow students. If you were a girl and you were lucky enough to date him, you would be the envy of the class.

Given their status as the rebel king and queen of the year, it was perhaps inevitable that Todd and Rebecca would end up an item. Their relationship was a pretty volatile one - they would just as likely be seen having a blazing row in the hall as they would making out in the schoolyard, but this was characteristic of their obsessive personalities and the fact that they were crazy about each other.

I couldn't believe my luck when I first started to hang around with Todd and Rebecca and the rest of their group. I felt like I had been plucked from anonymous obscurity and finally given an identity. All of a sudden people knew my name and would greet me in the hallway; they would show me respect and laugh at my jokes. It was a bit shallow really, looking back, but when you're a kid being popular is sadly equated with feeling like you are somebody.

I only became friends with Todd and his group by accident and to be honest, I never really 'belonged'. I tended to be the quiet one whenever we sat around our regular table at the diner, or the one who hovered nervously in the background while Todd and the other guys carried out some wild act or another. They let me into their group only after I got my Dad to fix Todd's car one afternoon (my Dad was a mechanic). He didn't charge Todd anything for the repair and this was enough for me to start being invited to sit at their table in the canteen, and hang out with them on the weekends. I never felt truly comfortable with them as a group of friends - they always seemed to be bitching about someone or other, or carrying out some action that undermined another kid in the year - but if truth be told, I did feel a lot 'cooler' than I ever had done before. And I certainly had my eyes opened by them to a few things when it came to sex. There was one time in particular, which is what I want to tell you about here.

It was a Friday night and Todd and his gang would often spend Fridays at a bar called Mitzy's. Mitzy's was a dark, smoky place where they played live music on the weekends. Todd and his gang had a favourite table against the back wall with a couple of benches on either side. At a tight squeeze you could get about eight people around this table. On this night there were only five of us - Todd and Rebecca, Russell (Todd's best buddy), Clare (who was a new friend of Rebecca's) and myself. The bar was packed out but we found the band pretty lousy - it was some folksy trio of Irish acoustic musicians - and none of us were really listening. Instead we were laughing and chatting and drinking Coke by the bucketload, having consumed a few cans of beer in the parking lot before going inside.

After a while, the conversation inevitably got around to sex. This was Todd and Rebecca's doing - partly because they initiated every topic of conversation, and partly because the two of them were so horny for each other that when they weren't actually making out in front of us, they would be talking and showing off about it. As ringleader of the conversation, and following a whispered private conference with Todd, Rebecca announced we were going to play a game of Truth or Dare. I can't recall if anyone objected but they would have been unlikely to once Rebecca had decreed.

The first person picked on for the game on was myself. Like I said before, I was still the runt of the group and clearly the one who commanded the least respect from within, even if outsiders generally now considered me to be royalty. Rebecca asked me if I wanted truth or a dare. In an attempt to be as cool as I sincerely believed they were at that time, I casually answered "Dare". I would have given anything to prove myself and gain standing in the group.

My dare was (without asking) to drink the half-glass of beer belonging to some tough looking guy at a nearby table. It was easier to achieve than I thought as he was engrossed in watching the band. I casually passed by and surreptitiously swiped the beer, draining it in one gulp and just as casually and surreptitiously placing it back on the table beside him. Returning to my seat we all waited a good minute or two before the guy brought the glass back up to his mouth and seemed puzzled that it was emptier than when he last took a sip. This was met with hoots of laughter from the gang at my table and won me back-patting and accolades. I was pretty pleased with myself.

Next up was Clare, who was sitting on the bench next to me, our backs to the wall. It was not the first point in the evening that I sensed Clare was a bit of a kindred spirit. She seemed to be every bit as out of her depth and yet eager to please as I was. I could tell immediately she wasn't as comfortable with the game as the others around the table but that like me, she was also desperate to remain a part of the group, which had no doubt improved her popularity as much as it had mine. She opted for "truth" instead of dare and Rebecca seemed delighted by this.

Rebecca had a pretty sadistic streak in her. Everyone wanted to be her friend but I wondered if anyone ever really got close to her. She took great delight in thinking up a really tricky question for Clare to answer truthfully. I think she would have done so whoever's turn it was to answer, but seeing as she didn't know Clare all that well yet, she was probably deliberately harsh.

"Ok my question is this...", she said, grinning in advance at what she perceived to be her own cunning in thinking it up. "You went on the school camping trip last semester and shared a tent with Annabel Knight, right?" (Annabel Knight had a reputation for being a bit of a slag).
"Yes", said Clare, following carefully, clearly eager to answer whatever question might be coming.
"And Annabel told us that her and Philip Crowe fucked in their sleeping bag while you were in the tent, right?".
"Yes". Clare was happy to confirm the story. I thought she seemed a little relieved that this was all she was being required to answer. But Rebecca went on.
"So my question is this", she continued, "did you get turned on by listening to them fucking?"

This was clearly quite a clever question because Clare was definitely taken aback and went a little red. "No", she said, "I just fell asleep". She said it in a believable enough way but I suppose it did seem a little unlikely. Todd and Russell expressed disbelief. I stayed typically silent.

"Liar!", Rebecca snapped. She still had a smirk on her face, but I sensed she was a bit pissed off with Clare for not playing ball as far as Rebecca was concerned. Clare picked up on this immediately and looked anxious that she had disappointed.

Next up was Russell who took a dare to throw an ice-cube at a woman sitting on her own by the fire exit. This was met with squeals of delight from our table and resulted in the poor woman getting up to leave. Rebecca took "truth" for her turn and was asked by Todd what the biggest number of orgasms was that she had ever had in one session. She replied "seven", which struck me right away as a lie but of course nobody voiced any doubt and instead we all sycophantically cooed with awe.

Todd also took "truth" for his turn and was asked by Rebecca whether he had ever masturbated over her. He answered "yes, every day". This response delighted Rebecca and the game was paused for a moment while the two of them slobbered over each other's faces. It was a pretty sickly display - Todd and Rebecca's questions had clearly been designed to bolster one another's ego's and form part of this evening-long foreplay that would later result in them making out in the back of his car.

Next it was my turn again and this time I asked for "truth", eager to impress my friends with candid honesty as much as I had done previously with my courage and audacity.

"How many girls have you fucked?", Russell asked, before anyone else could formulate a question.
"None", I answered sheepishly with a smile on my face.
My honesty was met with approval from the men at the table. Todd raised his Coke and made a pledge to change that situation for me. I smiled embarrassedly but felt good that I hadn't tried to make something up. It would only have led to further questions and eventually I was likely to have been caught out.

All eyes turned to Clare again who, clearly aware she was considered the weak link in the game at that point, was desperate to make amends. She boldly requested a "dare". I hoped they were going to go easy on her and yet I could see that Rebecca was still of the view that Clare was a bit of a geek.

"OK...", Rebecca said with an evil glint in her eye. We all had to wait in suspense for a moment as one of the bartenders cleared away the empty glasses from our table. Clare looked nervous but still determined to rise to whatever challenge befell her. "...Your dare is to take your underwear off and put it on the table".

Clare tried to look unperturbed by this challenge and she glanced momentarily around the room and then down at her lap. From my place on the bench beside her I also looked down. She was wearing a short, loose-fitting black skirt that stopped half way down her thighs. Although I perceived she was uncomfortable, I didn't expect for one moment that she would refuse the dare. And sure enough she didn't.

Starting with the top half, Clare discreetly and with some dexterity, withdrew one of her arms inside the sleeve of her shirt. From here, and with all of us staring on in stunned but excited silence, she went about unfastening something from her back and pulling it down over her shoulders. She carried out the action swiftly and clinically, the whole time ensuring that what she was doing was fully concealed by her shirt. She looked inconspiciously around the room at the same time to ensure that nobody outside the group was watching. With impressive speed she eventually returned her arm through the sleeve of the shirt and dropped a peach-coloured bra, scrunched up into a ball, on to the table in front of us.

Todd and Russell went crazy about this, applauding and approving of her actions. In fact, their brief outburst caused two or three nearby tables to glance over at us. Rebecca seemed less impressed. I guessed this was partly because of Todd's approval but also because she had secretly expected (and even hoped) that Clare would refuse to carry out the dare.

By now the atmosphere around the table was tense and excitable and even though I sympathised with Clare's predicament, I couldn't help but be swept up in the erotic suggestiveness of it too. My eyes stayed fixed for a while on the lacy bra that lay on the table. It was an arousing thought that Clare's (quite impressive) chest had been set free beneath her shirt just a few inchesaway from where I was sitting.

Next we watched Clare reach beneath the table and once again being careful to remain as discreet as she could, wriggle free of her pants. The only people who might have got a glimpse of what was going on down there were Todd and myself as we were seated next to her - one on each side - on the bench. But unfortunately she was every bit as skilled at masking this action and her skirt fully covered what was going on underneath. Once she had removed the underwear from her waist, she naturally had to get it down over her feet so she appeared to draw her knees up under the table for a moment and lower her arms in order to free herself from it. Once again just a few short moments later, her hand appeared above the table and she triumphantly dropped a tiny little matching pair of G-string panties on top of the bra.

"Dare completed", she announced victoriously.

Once again the lads went crazy with approval at this but Rebecca still had the same reservation preventing her from appearing impressed. When Clare went to retrieve her underwear from the table, Rebecca got there first and snatched it up. "You're not allowed it back until the end of the game", she said bitterly. Clare seemed confused now. She had followed Rebecca's orders and won favour with the group but now seemed to be disapproved of even more by Rebecca herself. Rebecca was hell-bent on making her feel even more uncomfortable when she suddenly made the following announcement:

"Oh my God, her panties are all wet". Clare looked mortified but didn't say anything. "They're soaking", Rebecca went on, "have you been getting all horny down there?".

I don't know if Clare's pants really were wet but this new method of teasing her was rapidly winning Rebecca back into the boys' favour. They jeered and laughed at Clare and tried to cop a feel of the pants from Rebecca, although she kept them tightly concealed in her hand and would not allow them to. Rebecca carried on with her taunting: "they're all juicy and slimy", she went on, "she must be a right mess down there". I looked at Clare who was trying to keep a stiff upper lip but seemed really hurt. I felt I had to say something.

"Come on Rebecca", I protested, "that's not fair. Give them back to her".

Rebecca stopped her jeering and looked at me with astonishment. "Ooh sticking up for her now are we?", she said turning on me, "are you hoping that if she's turned on enough, she might take your virginity later?". Todd and Russell laughed even more at this and it spurred Rebecca on. "Maybe it was sitting next to you that made her all wet".

Heaven knows why any of us wanted to be friends with this unplesant girl but you know what teenagers are like. It takes time and maturity to realise there are more important qualities in life than popularity and hanging-out-with-the-right-people. At the time, I am embarrassed to say, my main concern was simply that I might be rejected from the group. Clare too seemed more troubled by this thought than whether or not she could retain her dignity.

"OK, your turn for a dare again", Rebecca said viciously, looking at me. "You like her so much, put your hand up her skirt". The boys loved this.
"What?"
"You heard! Shove your hand up her skirt. Touch her. Find out how wet she really is!" Rebecca was loving the power she was commanding.
"I, er..."
"Trying to get out of the dare are you?"
"No, I just..."
"Then DO it".

I won't pretend I didn't feel awkward and embarrassed but I saw the opportunity to redeem myself by carrying out this challenge and I could see that Clare felt the same way. Her eyes met mine and they seemed to be urging me to go for it rather than risk having us both fall out with Todd and Rebecca. So I reached my right arm under the table. Clare lifted her skirt up and replaced it over my hand. Todd let out a whoop of anticipation at this and you could tell from the look in his eyes that he was rather disappointed he couldn't see any of the details of what was about to happen.