At the Big Red Rooster Page 12

  Richard took his first unsteady sort of slightly groggy sort of step towards doom, but only because Barry was pushing him from behind. ‘It’s for your own good,’ Barry hissed in his ear. ‘Besides, you’re pissed now and it shouldn’t hurt too much.’

  Wilma waited.

  But miracles do happen. Bible Class sometimes gets things right!

  Richard got two-thirds across the floor and Barry pushed him a mite too hard right into Annie and god-like Mike.

  ‘Watch it, kid,’ growled Mike in a friendly fashion – the sort of endearment that would normally have turned Richard full on.

  Softly, as if from nowhere, came a wisp of silky white. The blonde Merle may have seemed gentle, almost delicate, but in reality this was one fit girl. A couple of years piloting a commercial sewing machine gives a sure and certain strength. With one strong arm she pulled Richard Brown to her lithe frame. With her other strong arm she pushed the goggle-eyed Barry directly into the outstretched arms of Wilma Dorff. Almost in time to the music, Merle swept Richard, circling, circling, circling… out of the front door of the hall. She dragged him through the tinkling, clinking shrubbery and its crop of bottled beer, probably secreted by someone for a little after-supper boozing. On and on they went, down the school hill to a little dell, out of sight and well away from the hall.

  ‘Arg,’ said Merle. Taking Richard’s head in her hands, she kissed him full and deep on, and in, the mouth.

  Richard’s head spun and spun and spun. ‘Arg,’ he replied. The miracle of deliverance, the speed of their downhill plunge, the too many cigarettes, the hip-flask of Barry’s cocktail – and just who needed it now, ha ha? – he couldn’t take it all in. Then sweet-scented Merle left his mouth to start nibbling on his neck, deftly untied his tie, unbuttoned his shirt and played with her lips, her tongue, down the length of his torso. He stood there, dumbly luxuriating in Merle’s soft touch as she expertly unbuttoned his trouser fly. Gravity, in one form or another, disposed of his underpants…

  It was all too much, too soon, too unexpected, too – too wonderful! As Merle’s amazing head of hair swept across his erect dick and as she came in closer with those soft lips, that soft mouth, that soft moist tongue, Richard said ‘Arg arg’ again, and came, powerfully, messily and very abundantly – right down the front of her dress.

  ‘Arg,’ said Merle, whipping out a handkerchief from somewhere.

  Richard sank to his knees, gasping. ‘Th – th – thank you,’ he murmured.

  * * *

  ‘Whatever became of Mike, anyway?’ asked Richard, trying to sound as disinterested as he could.

  Annie checked around the house for signs of her agent. ‘Oh, he’s doing fine. I had a drink with him and his partner. Lovely young guy.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘He’s gay. Mike was gay. You knew that, Rich. You must’ve known. Why d’you think I chucked him, looking as drop-dead gorgeous as he did?’ She stared at her brother. ‘God, Richie, you were always, always, so thick. Didn’t you realise the only reason he ever went out with me was to get close to you?’

  Annie laughed at Richard’s stunned expression and shook her head. ‘Like, he even told me that. I thought you knew.’

  She looked up. ‘Well, here she is, the agent. Another blast from the past, love. Wilma! We’re over here, dear.’

  About the Author

  WILLIAM TAYLOR is the author of some thirty novels, including multiple award-winning Agnes the Sheep, the Knitwits series, Possum Perkins and The Blue Lawn.

  He has won the Esther Glen Medal, the Aim Children’s Book Award and the prestigious Italian Premio Andersen Award for best children’s book of the year. He is also the recipient of the NZCBF Margaret Mahy Medal and has been a Writer in Residence at the Palmerston North College of Education, University of Iowa and the Dunedin College of Education.

  Formerly a school teacher, William Taylor has made his living as a writer of humorous and more serious fiction for fifteen years. He is the father of two sons, and has a grandson. He lives in a spectacular setting near Mt Ruapehu in the central North Island of New Zealand.

  Copyright

  Published with the assistance of

  This book is copyright. Apart from any fair dealing for the purpose of private study, research, criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright Act, no part may be reproduced by any process without prior permission of Longacre Press and the author.

  William Taylor asserts his moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

  © William Taylor

  ISBN 9781775531555

  First published by Longacre Press 1998

  9 Dowling Street, Dunedin, New Zealand

  Book and cover design by Jenny Cooper

  Cover photograph by Reg Graham