Simon and the Crime Wave

I tried to open my eyes but managed only one, and that hurt so much that I closed it again. All I could see, anyway, was a pale grey light. My head pounded. Forget trying to see.

A while later I tried again. I could make out a dimly-lit room, net curtains over frosted-glass windows, a strange bed, painted white, a side table with things on it. Where the hell was this? Of course – the school sanatorium; I’d been here before. God, how my face hurt. Half of it was covered by bandages and a big gauze pad. This totally hid my left eye and the pain all seemed to come from there.

Footsteps on the polished floor.
A cheerful female voice called, “Hello Simon! How are we then?”

She has to be kidding, I thought.

The School Nurse was about 35, dark, a bit on the plump side and quite pretty. On paper she reported to Matron in the main school building, but over here in the san. (I think some call it the Infirmary) she went her own way. But there was one thing she’d learned from Matron for sure.

“You’ll get constipation, lying in bed all day, and taking Vicoden,” she said brightly. “And then your tummy will get all upset. So I’ve prepared a lovely enema for you”. (Even after getting my face kicked to hell, they were more concerned about my bowels!)

What IS it with Nurses and enemas, anyway?

Nurse tucked a mackintosh sheet underneath me and tweaked my pyjama pants down. The rest I’d felt so many times: her rubber-gloved fingers parting my bum-cheeks, some lubrication, the nozzle being poked in, the spurts of warm soapy water into my bottom as Nurse squeezed the bulb of the syringe. Then she'd reload it and repeat. At last it was over. Nurse made me lie there for a bit, then helped me to the bathroom to relieve myself.

It was a good thing, too, because I was used to binocular vision and I only had one working eye at the time.

After that, I admit that I did feel a little better. Enough to ask, nervously, “I can’t see anything out of my left eye, Nurse. Why is it all covered up? Have I lost that eye?”

Nurse laughed. “No, Simon, of course not, you silly boy! But it was badly cut, all round, and you’ve had twelve stitches!”

Then she said it.

“But of course, you’re used to stitches, aren’t you, Simon? You’ve had them before”. With what was meant to be a roguish smile she went on. “Two little stitches, one on each side, down there! So that you’ll grow up a big strong boy,” (she dropped her voice to a whisper) “but not able to DO it!!”

This was nothing to do with Nurse and I lost my temper. For a moment or two I just stormed at her, not knowing or even caring what I said. “Honestly, you of all people!" I went on, “I’d have thought you’d know better. I didn’t have any stitches down there. It was done chemically with a hypodermic”.

Nurse nodded. “Yes, I’ve read about it,” she agreed. “They prick a boy’s privates and they dry up. How dull!”

“Can we not talk about it, please?” I asked in a whiney voice. Nurse nodded again and went away, probably thinking she'd hurt my feelings. I didn't care.

Annoyingly I was now wide awake, with nothing to do but wait till teatime and started to think about all sorts of things. At fourteen I was – as Nurse had said, “a big strong boy who was unable to “DO it”". Unable because I had the penis of a 4-year-old and no balls or scrotum, no means of producing sperm or even attaining an erection.

Unable because at eleven-and-a-half I’d been neutered - my balls injected with a drug which made them dry up and vanish, and made my penis retract from a healthy two inches (not much for my age I know, but I liked it!) to just enough still to be able to pee through, standing up. Some of my neutered friends couldn’t even do that, unless they did it in the shower.

Unable because I was supposed to have “severe behaviour problems”. These had amounted to getting schoolboy erections all the time, becoming a serial bum-boy (not MY fault), and one fatal day of being caught in the act of rubbing my cock between a girl’s bum cheeks. It was at her invitation and she had kept her knickers on. It seemed so unfair that all the blame should fall on me. Lying there, thinking about it, I began to cry silently.

I do this now and then. It’s nothing to get ashamed of. It comes from having no testosterone. For the same reason I’m no use at boxing, although I’m tall and have a long reach. One glove in my face and the tears begin. It’s a problem, and one I’ll have to live with always, unless I try HRT, and that won’t put my balls back.

Nothing can put a neutered boy's ball back.

I’ve said all I want to, right now, about getting neutered, but there’s something you need to know, because it’s important for this story:
When the drug company, Neutersol Inc., first introduced their boy-neutering drug, it was quite slow to act: three to four weeks before the boy’s balls visibly began to shrink, and even longer before he ceased to get erections. By the time I was “done” they had brought out Neutersol “Plus” which halved these times. This, like the earlier drug, was only for use on young prepubescent boys, not adolescents.

After being neutered I was curious enough about my new state, to want to read about new developments and in time I learned there was yet another product; “Neutersol Rapid”. This speeded up the neutering process to a matter of days, not weeks, and was also suitable for boys who had started adolescence. It had a strange side effect. Initially the boy showed ‘flu-like' symptoms, then for a full twenty-four hours after the injections he would experience very strong erections, and he might even “come” spontaneously without needing to jerk-off in the usual way.

I'd also read about the lists of side-effects and warnings if the drug were to be used on a boy who was already well into adolescence. They say that drug users have bad withdrawal symptoms, but it sounded to me like "testosterone withdrawal" was a pretty bad one. But you can look up those for yourself. I was just glad that I'd never had the hormone to begin with, because it certainly didn't sound like a joy-ride to me.

That’s quite enough of that, though.
Here I was in the school san., half my face bandaged up. Why was I here? Because I’d been kicked in the face by another boy, deliberately. Unusual behaviour in an independent school – so who was he, that had done this to me?

His name was Jesse Morris, although he insisted he was called 'Jazza'. Sounds kinda funny for a boys’ independent boarding school in Sussex – so why was he there?

Okay, no way of dodging it. Background coming up. My school had been 100% boarding, but six months earlier we’d had a change of Governors and some of these felt that the school’s very large cash resources should be used for the advantage of local boys. Alright as a theory. But it meant changes. The creation of a day-boy “wing” and the alteration of timetables to suit the ten percent or so, who arrived by bus at 9 a.m. and departed at 5 p.m. The creation of another “house” for matches and so on. Till now we’d had five, all named after distinguished Admirals, not all of them British (we had to be cosmopolitan after all!) so whilst we had Nelson, Drake and Jellicoe, we also had Nimitz and Farragut. But for the day-boys the new house was called “London” – God only knows why.

The dayboys were all fee-paying except a few who were on bursaries. The Headmaster, Dr. Holroyd, was a sociologist and awarded the bursaries at his own discretion to “deserving boys”, “interesting boys”, “disadvantaged boys”, and so on. Dr. Holroyd was a good judge of potential and there were no misfits – till through some rush of blood to the head, he selected Jesse o.k.a. “Jazza” Morris.

Before I go on I need to say we had never, ever had the slightest suspicion of a colour problem. We didn’t need to. Black guys, Asians, Chinese – we had them all. I guess we all had something to learn from each others’ cultures. No one ever played the race card till Jazza turned up, and he had a whole deck of them.

Jazza wasn’t particularly Afro in appearance. He wasn’t particularly anything. His complexion was a sort of yellow and his wavy hair reddish. Apart from a wide mouth with thick lips he had rather pinched features. He reminded me of an artist’s impression of Neanderthals in their cave I’d once seen. But he clearly saw himself as blacker than black, more Afro than the whole of the African continent. I couldn't see it, though.

Jazza’s philosophy of life was rooted wholly in sex. “We blacks were once your slaves,” he once said. “You ruled us with the whip. Now, we rule you with the prick”. His point was that all black guys had huge cocks and once a white girl had one of those up her, she would never look at a white boy again.

“I never go out twice with the same chick,” he boasted. “I don’t need to. None of them can resist Big Jazza,” (he wasn’t particularly tall, either.) “And when I do, the first thing I do is pull her drawers down and shag her. And afterwards I say ‘What’s it to be, doll? Suck mine or else walk home, the choice is yours.'"

“Girls are only good for one thing, fucking!” was another of his gems. “I like them in black underwear with nice big boobs and nice tight cunts. Any time from fourteen onwards they are ready to be filled with spunk and kids. They all love hot spunk so I never wear a Durex”.

That particular bit of too much information actually frightened me, in wondering as to how many little bastard-Jazza's there were out there by now.

We were treated to this in the first week after Jazza’s arrival, and at intervals after that, with variations and extra little bits. We also got practical demonstrations in the changing rooms. Jazza was quite well endowed and was, of course, intact, with a big bush of pubic hair. He had four inches of uncircumcised penis (when down) and with shouts of, “Hey, dig this, fellas!” he liked to roll his foreskin back and show off his large purplish knob. He also liked to laugh at the boys with smaller cocks (there were a lot of them, for one reason or another.)

A fortnight after term began, I got a leave-of-absence and went to see Melanie. We met at Roddy’s house. Roddy wasn’t there, as he was busy. I'll explain later. In the attic bedroom I’d always used, I began telling Melanie all about Jazza.

Melanie screwed her face up. “He sounds gross!” was her comment. “I can’t imagine any girl dating him. And I shouldn’t worry about what he says. It sounds to me like a wind-up. Does he know that you’re... what you ARE? (Except when teasing me in the nicest way, calling me her gelding, Melanie never mentioned my neutered state. That was nice of her).

“I don’t think so,” I said. “Someone may have told him but it’s unlikely. He never talks to anybody – not properly. One can't have a civilized conversation with him. He only talks at you. It’s like he’d learned some strange language. He doesn’t talk like other young people. It’s all “Cool, man!” and “Hot-diggetty-dog” even to the staff. Anyway, he’s never seen me with my clothes off”.

“That’s alright then”. She gave me her very special smile. “And now let’s have some fun. I’m feeling horny today. How about “Ride the Gelding”"?

Of course, it was her favourite game.

We both stripped off and Melanie fastened the dildo round her waist in its harness. The game was very simple: I got down on all fours, Melanie sat astride me, far enough back for the dildo to go up my behind, and then she would ride me round the room encouraging me with horsey noises. It didn’t do a lot for me, but it gave Melanie a sense of power – she was riding this big strong male – horse or boy, it didn’t matter which – but all his strength was at her command because he’d been castrated, unable to penetrate her.

So I carried her round the room, my minuscule penis wagging between my legs as the dildo massaged my bum. The problem was, Melanie climaxed very easily and today was no exception. The horsey noises gave way to little moans and cries, and all of a sudden, Melanie collapsed, making me do the same, face down on the floor..

I hardly like to think of the next few moments. Melanie’s inert body sprawled on top of me. Her weight drove the dildo right up my rectum, as far as possible and more forward. It seemed to touch something, far up inside of me, and with that touch something seemed to be happening. I’d never felt anything like it. Was it wonderful or was it horrible? I couldn’t tell, but it frightened me. I didn’t want it to go on. As soon as I was able, I eased myself out from under Melanie’s sprawling body and the dildo came out.

I was very relieved.

“What’s the matter?” she said as we separated. “You’re trembling all over”.

“Nothing,” I lied, “Nothing at all”. We stood under the shower together, washing each other’s “bits”. But there was something. All the times I’d had a senior boy’s or man's penis up my bottom, all of the pints of hot sperm that had shot up into my guts – could it be that I was starting actually to like it? I was still thinking about this as I travelled back to school. It was very confusing. I didn't want to like it. Or did I? I really didn't like being a bumboy; it wasn't what I wanted. But what had happened, then? Why was I feeling like I did? It was a long ride back.

Next morning, from nine to ten, was a “quiet study” period, and as form-monitor I was the senior person in the room. There was some noisy chatter in the back. “Quiet, please,” I said.

“Quaieeeht, please,” came a drawling voice I recognised – the voice of Jazza Morris. Somebody sniggered. It had been quite a good imitation.

Jazza stood up. “I don’t have to take orders from you, man,” he shouted, and slammed out. But I couldn’t have told how the day would end.

That afternoon saw the start of the house matches. My house, Nelson, had drawn London, and we expected an easy win. Very few of the new dayboys had played Rugby Union before. (The routine was, after the first round, that the two highest-scoring winners played each other for champion house and runner-up; the lowest-scoring winner played the highest-scoring loser for third and fourth, and the two lowest-scoring losers slogged it out for fifth and sixth place.)

Very early in the game I collected a long, low-slung pass near London’s 22-metre line. If I’ve not said it before I’d grown quite long in the leg, good at hurdling and sprinting, a direct result of getting neutered (it happens with horses too). I set off at full pelt, intent on banging that ball down on the turf between London’s goal posts.

I hadn’t reckoned with London’s full-back. Jazza Morris. I tried to hand him off but by sheer bad luck he got his hand down the collar of my jersey and then round my neck. Over we went. It was a foul tackle and worth a penalty by itself, but it didn’t stop there. “You great long streak of cat’s piss,” he snarled, and booted me at the base of my spine.

Waves of pain and nausea flooded through me. I thought I would throw up.

“You wally,” came his hated voice again. “You big soft berk”. He stamped his foot on my face and screwed the studded heel around.

I blacked-out.

I think this is where we came in?

The ref., Mr Trefusis, had seen it all. He showed Jazza the red card and sent him off, then called, “Come on, Scott!”. But he found me motionless, blood pouring down my face. The match was abandoned, and soon an ambulance came and removed me from the scene...or so I was told. I was unconscious at the time.

And that’s how I came to be in the school san., after the local hospital had stitched my badly-cut eye and washed away quantities of mud and grit. Lying in a narrow bed, feeling hot, uncomfortable and sorry for myself.

Later that day, after tea, I had a visitor – Roddy. He brought a mixture of news. “I’m to have an audition,” he said excitedly. “Me and Mark, together. The record company have sent a number of two-part songs for us to practise and there’s a good chance we’ll cut a new album, the two of us”. His eyes were shining.

“You’ll sound just great together” I said. Roddy’s voice was still a crystal-clear boy soprano. But Mark’s was now something rarer still, the fuller, more rounded tones of an adult castrato. (Left intact, his voice would have broken long before).

But Roddy had something else to tell me. “I got a strange letter this morning. It was from the stamp shop in Brighton and it said that they had examined my collection but were unable to make me an offer. I could call and collect it at my convenience. So I went this afternoon and got it. But I’d never showed them my collection and I don’t know how it got there, and I had a terrible job convincing them that I was who I said I was”.

That wasn’t all. “Stuff’s been going missing,” Roddy went on. “Peter Keeble has lost a new camera, and Adam Watson a mobile phone – a new one, both from bedside lockers”.

This was serious. The dormitories were off-limits during the day. It sounded like domestic staff - someone who would have seen Roddy busy with his stamp collection and who knew where he kept it. There was no obvious solution.

Later, I had another visitor – Mr Trefusis. He was a man of few words but I liked him. “They tell me you’ll survive, Scott,” he said “and your handsome features won’t be too badly scarred. But you had better hide behind those dressings for a bit. By the time the medics took you away your eye was like a baboon’s backside”.

Next day, Mr Trefusis called again, bringing some test papers and a lap-top, so that I wouldn’t fall too far behind in school work.

After that, things settled down. A lot of people came to see me, but Roddy called round every day, with progress reports. More stuff had been stolen, some valuables from dormitories and also games kit. One night the drugs cabinet in Matron’s office was forced open and all the contents removed. But clearly the thieves decided there was nothing with any street value, because it was all found dumped by the main entrance.

And daily, before visiting hours, Nurse appeared with her enema syringe to keep me “regular”. In the end, I got quite laid-back about it, lying there half asleep, lazily enjoying the feel of the warm soapy water spurting up into my guts as Nurse pumped me up. While doing this she would often feel round my cock, and the place where my balls once were. Well, I thought, why the hell not? At least I won’t do anything embarrassing like getting a hard-on. Besides, if she liked it, who was I to fault her?

Next time Roddy called round, he brought Mark with him. The record company had signed them up! Roddy was over the moon. Mark confided that in time, Roddy would be an even better singer than he was himself – which, he said, left Aled Jones nowhere.

They also had some very odd news. Jazza was, seemingly, trying to go into business. Two mornings running, in the break, he’d produced a big old canvas grip, containing bran-new trainers and other sportswear, all with designer labels – Nike, Adidas, the lot. Asked where it all came from Jazza referred vaguely to a mate of his whose Dad kept a sports shop – he didn’t say where – and these items were discontinued lines, going cheap. There were a few takers, but not many.

That week, the house matches were resumed. Me being out of action, Mr Trefusis took a gamble and played Roddy in the mid-field; on paper he was a year too young for the Under 15 XV but very quick on his feet. Nelson easily destroyed London in the re-play but then encountered a much tougher proposition in Nimitz. It looked like nil-nil till the very end, when Roddy scored the one-and-only try of the match, which Jack Elliott converted, making it 7 – 0 to Nelson- and the championship.

London played Jellicoe, a weak side, and earned the wooden spoon after Jazza bit the Jellicoe scrum-half and again got a red card. Meanwhile Roddy was awarded his Under XV colours and came to see me wearing the gaudy green-and-white scarf which he was entitled to. I thought of the tearful, frightened boy of a year ago, and how he’d changed – and all through losing two little blobs of gristle between his legs.

Indeed, Roddy was not the same boy.

By now I was being allowed to get up during the day, although the base of my spine was terribly bruised and I still had a patch, though a smaller one, over my cut eye. With nobody to talk to, it was boring and I decided on a short walk. Although by the rules I wasn’t supposed to leave the san.

The san. was on the far side of the school field. A gate in the wall gave on to a path leading in both directions. To the right, it was a short cut into the town. The left-hand path forked, one half leading to the kitchens and storerooms in the main school building, where boys had no business to be – so it was off limits.

The other side of the fork was also off limits because it was thought to be dangerous. It dived steeply down into a cutting, where there was a spur line from the train station. It was used to store old freight wagons and unused passenger cars before they were taken away to be cut up for scrap. I like old trains so I thought I’d take a look.

It was a nasty place, there, under the trees, damp and dark, with the rusting lines and old abandoned cars. There were other things too. Boys from the town were rumoured to bring their girlfriends here to shag them, and there were a lot of used condoms. Most were dry and withered but others looked to be only hours old, white, limp and horrible-looking. From the length of these, unrolled, the boys must have huge cocks. I tried not to think about Melanie and the look in her eyes whenever she saw my 1¼ inches. As I stared at the condoms, realizing that I'd never use one, I felt odd again. But I shrugged it off.

The last of the old passenger coaches was a little apart from the rest and it looked interesting so I pushed through some brambles to take a closer look. It was a rotting old hulk, nearly all the paint gone. But somebody had stuck a Nike label on one of the windows – no they hadn’t: it was on something inside the glass. Funny! I tried the door, which wasn’t locked.

Inside was like Aladdin’s cave.

Piles of sportswear of every designer label you can thnk of. Golf clubs and golfing kit. In another place, electric drills, power saws and paint strippers. I’d seen enough. Making very certain I wasn’t being watched I left the old coach and climbed out of the cutting. As I reached the top I heard the clicking sound of a bike being wheeled along the path. A moment later I was face to face with Mr Trefusis, returning from the town where he’d been shopping.

“Scott!” he exclaimed. “What the blazes are you doing here? And for that matter, down there by the sidings – you know it’s off limits! Come on, explain yourself”.

“Sir,” I replied, trying to sound more confident than I felt, and very conscious of my high voice “There’s something down there I’d like you to see”. And so I led him on down.

“Well, well!” Mr Trefusis said in a thoughtful way, when he’d seen inside the old coach. He took out his mobile phone and rang Dr. Holroyd. Not long afterwards, the Headmaster joined us in the cutting, and a policeman with him.

I was sent straight back to the san. with instructions to tell Nurse that I’d been sent for by the Headmaster on a private matter – so that shut her up. I only learned what happened over the next few days at second- or even third- and fourth-hand.

The story about the games kit in the railway coach soon got around and it didn’t take rocket-science for people to make a connection with Jazza’s sales pitch, although there was no proof of anything. The first round went to the Roebuck twins. Freckled and ginger-headed, they had been orphaned in one of the Gulf States when only five years old. Local law required that all boys in State orphanages who were unclaimed after seven years should be neutered and pass into the economy of the country, which had a eunuch culture.

So Jon and Jamie had their balls pricked on their twelfth birthday. Some present! They would no doubt have ended up as eunuch slaves attending some oil sheikh’s spoiled brat of a daughter (or serving as bumboy to his son, in secret), if relatives had not traced them, too late to save their balls - and flown them to Britain. Among other accomplishments hidden by their quiet and gentle appearance, they were Judo black belts.

The Roebucks knew that the best time for anyone to visit the dorms, unseen, was during tea, when everyone was in the dining hall. So they absented themselves from tea and set up an ambush in the corridor.

As expected, Jazza walked straight into the trap. He had with him three more cameras and five more mobiles, all from bedside lockers. Jamie got him in a painful arm-lock while Jon went for help. This soon arrived in the shape of old Mr. Meredith and burly Mr. Munns, the woodwork master, and Gunner, the caretaker. Jazza was detained in the staff common-room until Dr. Holroyd could be found.

Under questioning it turned out that Jazza lived close by, and didn’t take the 5 o’clock bus. From the back of his house – part of a terrace – a path ran, connecting with those I’d found that afternoon a week before. All he had to do was wait till 5.30 when everyone went into tea, then creep into school by the back entrance. Nothing simpler.

While Dr. Holroyd was debating whether to contact the police, the police contacted him. The goods in the railway coach had been identified with some ram-raids in shops in Southampton not long before. It had taken some time for the Hampshire police to touch base with their opposite numbers in Sussex but now they did so. CCTV footage of the raid on a sports shop, and another on a DIY store, showed Jazza in an unmistakable way. He hadn’t bothered to wear anything over his face. But knowing him as we did, he no doubt felt “The filth will never get big Jazza!”

A police search of Jazza’s home found more games kit and more importantly a lot of personal belongings he hadn’t had time to get rid of – like Peter Keeble’s new Fuji camera. Jazza’s mother, a single parent, had five other children to look after and had no idea, much of the time, what her eldest son was doing. The police took Jazza with them: a trial before a police court was a certainty.

The trial would be in Winchester and so I’d no idea of what went on. I was still, very unwillingly, in the san. when late in the afternoon, a few days later, footsteps sounded on the stairs and the door at the end of the ward opened. (There was, by the way, room for six beds, each one of which could be curtained off). Two people came in. One was Nurse. The other, surprisingly, was Jazza. He looked very unsteady and poorly. Nurse steered him towards the furthest bed and pulled the curtains round it. A few minutes later she came over to me.

“We’re keeping Jesse under observation,” she whispered. “He’s running a high temperature and we think he’s been taking something – something nasty!” (she meant drugs of course.) “Call me if there are any problems”.

For a while there was silence from the other bed. I’d work to do, and rattled away at my laptop. I couldn't have cared less how Jazza felt. Then a faint cry of “Help! Help”. I went over and parted the curtains.

“Gimme a drink of water,” mumbled Jazza, without looking up. Even in his current sorry state, he was still ordering and not asking.

I fetched the water. Jazza had half-got out of bed and was sitting on the edge. He was only wearing a shirt and vest. This time he looked up. “Oh, it’s you,” he said in disgust and looked away again.

“Gotta hard-on,” was his next eloquent offering. This was all too obvious. He had an enormous erection, all of six inches or more and the knob of his penis, an ugly reddish-brown, looked ready to burst. “Gotta hard-on,” he said again, and reached down to touch it.

“Aw shit, I’m coming!” he moaned. His penis jerked, once, twice, three times. Blobs of sperm shot out and on to the polished floor. Something clicked in my mind!
Flu symptoms. Spontaneous erections and climaxing. It added up to – Neutersol Rapid! I knew, all of a sudden, what had been done to Jazza in the police clinic, because it had been done to me!

And I didn’t feel the least bit sorry for him.

“That’s the very last hard-on you’ll ever have!” I said, in a matter of fact voice that took him by surprise.

“Wha’?” muttered Jazza.

“I said, that’s the very LAST hard-on you'll ever have”.

Jazza collapsed sideways with a groan. He obviously didn't believe me. “My head’s bursting,” he whimpered. His face was greenish-grey. I thought he might be sick, and presently he was. I called out for Nurse, who made Jazza clean it up himself.

“Now, Scott,” said Nurse after she’d stowed Jazza away. “We mustn’t forget our routine. Time for your enema before tea”.

Again with the enema! I was just glad that Jazza was too out of it to care. Then, with a wicked inspiration, I suggested that a very high-volume enema with a lot of soap might be good for a boy with what looked like the beginnings of the flu. Nurse was only too happy to agree and demanded that I NOT tell anyone about her obvious oversight in Jazza's treatment.

I could hear him protesting the whole time, but he was too weak to fight Nurse. I relieved myself of my own enema, went back to bed, and was hardly off of the throne when Jazza (with Nurse's help) came stumbling in.

I dont' know about Jazza, but it made ME feel a LOT better.

Some of the blanks as to what has transpired were soon filled in by an unexpected letter from Uncle Carl. The trial had been almost a family affair, since the Hon. Selena Scott Hamilton (Melanie’s Mum) was presiding magistrate, assisted on the one side by Uncle Carl himself and on the other by Commandant Mrs. Briggs OBE, head of the local Red Cross and a sort of aunt of Melanie’s on her father’s side.

The police had brought an additional witness, a Swedish sailor called Lars Sugger. Sugger had been in the town centre between 11 p.m. and midnight, hoping to pick up a prostitute, when a white van had come roaring into the square and crashed into one of the shop fronts. Clearly some sort of violent crime was going on. Sugger made himself scarce but had noticed the van’s number plate because it looked rather like his own name; L498 SUG. He’d reported this, but it hadn’t got the police very far, because the number was false.

But the police found the false number plates at Jazza’s home. His connection with the ram-raids was proved beyond reasonable doubt.

Of course, I think Melanie must have mentioned me, too, and what Jazza had done to me. I always did like her Auntie. Lovely woman.

The Court’s verdict was “Subject to Home Office confirmation, treatment under L.R. Misc. Prov. Sec 828a”. Only one reader in a thousand would understand that. I was the one in a thousand, because Uncle Carl had explained it to me. Into a piece of tidying-up legislation, all to do with fixed penalties, there had been introduced a mandatory sentence of chemical neutering for serial juvenile offenders. It took them out of the gene pool, you see.

I still had to wonder about all of those suspected little Bastard-Jazza's, though.

Uncle Carl had one other item. Melanie’s Mum had found “Neutersol Inc.” on her credit card statement and had asked him about it.

“Nothing to worry about” said Uncle Carl. But he’d already had letters from Roddy. Dear Roddy, he’d written quite artlessly but happily about getting his balls pricked and the difference it had made to his life. Uncle Carl put two and two together.

“Simon,” he wrote “Do take care of that young woman (i.e. Melanie), or there won’t be an intact male in the County”. (As yet he didn’t know that Melanie had added Tommy Chow to her list.)

That was my last day in the san. The dressings had come off and though, according to old Mr. Meredith who had a fund of strange out-of-date sayings, I looked “fit to frighten the French.” I could see out of both eyes again. Back to school: free of the boring room with nothing to see and too little to do. Before I left, though, Nurse appeared. I feared it might be a last-minute enema, but it was quite different.

Nurse produced a small, a very small, gift-wrapped packet. “A tiny pressie, for my favourite patient," she said. The roguish smile had reappeared and I feared the worst.

The package contained a small white thong – a girl’s thong. “Try it on for me,” Nurse coaxed. I’d no choice but to drop my shorts and pants and step into the thong. It was going to be a very close fit. I pressed on my penis and it did a sort of concertina act, disappearing into my body. I pulled the thong up tight and looked at myself in the mirror. All you could see now was a curve – like a girl’s sex. I rather liked the effect, and decided to keep it on. It was soft, after all, and felt good.

Perhaps I’d start a Knickers Club – open to boys who found that wearing girls’ knickers was more sensible than wearing underpants. After all, cotton boys' briefs were pointless for a lot of us.

To finish the story, Jazza disappeared from human ken. The Headmaster decided he’d made a mistake, and did a deal with the local comprehensive school. In exchange for Jazza we got one James Brotherton, an extremely quiet boy who was so overawed by his new surroundings that he could do nothing but stammer when spoken to. I rather liked him and his self-effacing ways.

I still thought about Jazza every now and then, though. It always gave me great pleasure to think about how terrible he'd feel when the testosterone had gone from his body and he found that he couldn't even get an erection any more. No more fucking, not even wanking. Poor Jazza. Oh well.

Then on the last day of term there was a special assembly. Dr. Holroyd was coming to the end of a long speech about outstanding distinctions and achievements. Roddy, who by the way had reverted to his pre-adoption surname, which was Fisher, had had a mention already, for earning his Rugby colours a year early. There was a lot of cheering, for Roddy was popular. The Head was winding up now.

“If I had to nominate one boy for Pupil of the Year, it would be one who has added to his prowess in games, the talent and tenacity to enter the tough world of commercial music.” (There was polite clapping, most people thought he meant Mark). But he went on.

“Our accomplished young musician Mark Maitland has this year been joined by another boy whose talents – forgive me, Mark – may prove in time to be greater still. In the past this School has produced boy-sopranos who had the good fortune to have their genius preserved on record”.

He paused. Get on with it, I thought.

“But never before have two boys performed together. I would like you to hear a sample”. He signed to Mr. Trefusis to start the hi-fi system.

Crafty old Dr. Holroyd had got hold of an advance copy of Mark’s and Roddy’s new album. We were treated to “The Flower Song” – usually rendered by a female soprano and a mezzo. It was a well worn piece but rearranged for two boys it was something magical.

I daresay it was akin to what Angels must sound like.

“You have heard it for yourselves,” concluded Dr. Holroyd. “And I give you – Roddy Fisher”.

Tumultuous applause followed, cheers and a lot of stamping. Then everyone stood up.

Not long afterwards, at Roddy’s home, we’d been talking over the past year and what it had brought. To Roddy, success in many things, and popularity. But he had also been made sterile and impotent. He was a boy-eunuch. “Was it worth it, Roddy?” I asked him one day, very cautiously.

“Was what worth it?” he replied, his face blank. Then recognition dawned. “Oh, THAT. Losing my nuts." Then he smiled.

“You know, Simon,” he said, looking me in the face. “I’d go through it all over again”.

Roddy had always said he was different. He was.

THE END