Chapter 3: Exile and Betrayal

Cassie, although she was settling down in her new life in Scotland, was beginning to miss Sid's presence in her life. She didn't lack company though. She was sharing a flat with a couple of gay men. In fact, they were so gay, they made Maxxie look straight. Sid, of course, missed Cassie's bright company, but had his own worries about his best friend Tony, who was still in a deep coma in hospital, following his violent encounter with a bus. Michelle was at a loose end. She was spending more time with Sid as she recognised that he would benefit from some friendly feminine company. Cassie's emails, while they did serve to keep Sid in touch with her, did provide a source of worry as he saw the two young Scotsmen, Lachlan and Ruiri, as rivals for her affection.

Tony was totally unaware of the many hours Sid had spent at his bedside as he was still in a deep coma. By the time he regained consciousness, Maxxie, and Tony's parents had taken over from Sid. In fact, when Tony was discharged from hospital, it was Maxxie who spent most time with him. The hours Sid had spent with Tony and the lack of any sign of recovery had driven him into a deep depression. He was advised to stop seeing the unconscious Tony 'for his own good'. This gave Tony the impression that Sid had forgotten about him.

Gradually, Tony recovered, but it would be a long time before he was fully back to normal. The friend who did most to assist Tony was Maxxie, who was otherwise uncommitted. He spent nearly every day with Tony, helping him relearn how to read and write, as these facilities, and several others had been damaged by his brain injury. By his actions in helping Tony, Maxxie had left a very deep impression. He seemed to be almost infinitely patient with Tony's frustrations, and never got rattled when Tony lost his temper.

Understandably, Sid wanted to improve his communications with Cassie, so he persuaded her to join an Internet chat site, which had a video facility. The result of this was to prove disastrous for their relationship. Sid attempted to contact Cassie on this chatline at a particularly unfortunate moment. Cassie had obtained some particularly skimpy underwear from a shop in Aberdeen and wanted to get some opinions about it. She decided to consult her gay flatmate, Lachlan about which sexy bra would excite Sid more. When Sid tried to establish the link, the video only went one way. Sid could see Cassie, but she could neither see nor hear him. When she opened her side of the link, all she was wearing was her skimpy intimate underwear and an unbuttoned cardigan. Since she could neither see nor hear Sid, she went back to that she was doing. She went back to Lachlan, who was in bed, removed her cardigan, and allowed him to unclip her bra. Cassie's webcam was still open and Sid saw all this happening. He quickly cut the link as he didn't want to see what he assumed was about to happen.

That evening, he contacted Cassie again. This time, the video worked both ways. Sid had drawn his own conclusions from what he saw in the morning and had assumed that Cassie had betrayed him with Lachlan. He was not prepared to let her explain what was actually happening, and told her he no longer trusted her. She replied by saying she could not talk to him anymore. The beautiful relationship between them appeared to be over. In a fit of jealous rage, Sid destroyed his laptop computer, and thus broke nearly all possibility of communication with Cassie. As a result of this spat, Cassie in a fit of pique, blocked Sid's phone number. As there was no possibility of a relationship with Lachlan or Ruiri, because they were both completely gay, she was now utterly on her own.

Sid, meanwhile had his own problems. The morning after the apparent ending of his relationship with Cassie, as he saw it, he tried to call her on his mobile phone, to see if he could make it up to her after the previous evening's harsh words. When he did find a place in the house where there was a useable signal, he received a message that Cassie had blocked his number. In his mind, this was confirmation that she had indeed ended their association, and that there was no going back. He was heartbroken. It never rains, but it pours. When he went downstairs, he found his father dead in the armchair. He had lost both his girlfriend and his father on the same evening. He went through the next day at College like a zombie. Eventually he was helped by Tony, who urged him to call his mother, Liz who, after walking out on Mark, was staying with her sister. Helping his mother organise the funeral did, at least, keep his mind away from dwelling on the loss of the one person he saw as his key to happiness in the future.

It was now the middle of the Winter, Cassie's parents realised that she was really deeply depressed over Sid, especially after the apparent ending of the relationship. They decided to take her on a completely different type of holiday. They told her it was going to be different this time and that Cassie should forget all her preconceptions and try to enjoy it. However, they did not tell her about the true nature of the holiday until they had checked in to the resort hotel on Gran Canaria. What they hadn't told her was that this particular resort hotel was operated by 'Freikorperkultur', the German naturist organisation. She was terrified on the first morning when she realised that she would have to shed all her clothes when she went on to the beach, or even if she visited the hotel poolside bar. She refused to leave the hotel room, thought about her lost relationship with Sid, and started crying. About half way through the morning, her mother, Margherita came back to the room, and took Cassie to the poolside bar. Oddly, and much to her surprise, she felt embarrassed being fully clothed, while everyone else was completely naked. She was wearing blue jeans, a black roll neck sweater and a denim jacket. She looked completely out of place. Once she had drunk some lemonade, Margherita took her back to the room, persuaded her out of her clothes, and spent the next quarter of an hour convincing her that she looked good naked. After a couple of days, she acclimatised herself to being naked outdoors in company, and much to her surprise, she found, after a couple of hours, she thoroughly enjoyed the experience. She was able to put all thoughts of Sid and her lost romance behind her. She found it especially pleasing when other hotel guests complemented her on her beautiful body. For the first time in her life, she began to feel comfortable in her own skin.

Michelle was about to celebrate her eighteenth birthday. The six remaining members of the 'gang' plus Scarlet, Michelle's step sister suggested that a camping weekend in South Wales might be a suitable way of marking the occasion. Sid was feeling particularly depressed, having lost both his father and his girlfriend. He tried to back out, citing revision for the forthcoming exams as a reason. He was persuaded, against his better judgement, and also against a little voice somewhere deep inside him telling him it would be better for him if he stayed in Bristol.

The camping weekend was a disaster on several levels. Their transport to Oxwich Bay was Scarlet's big Volvo estate car. They had put the tents etc. on the roof, but lost them somewhere en-route, as Chris, whose job it was to secure them hadn't lashed them down. Fortunately, Scarlet had a largish pop-up tent, and this was set up on the beach. The next thing to happen was that the car, which was further down the beach got drowned when the tide came in. Oxwich Bay, in common with Weston-Super-Mare, has a very wide beach and a tide that comes in very rapidly. The gang, therefore, now had no alternative but to sleep under the stars. In the evening dusk, Sid felt a wave of deep depression overtaking him and tried to slip away. Fortunately for him as it turned out, he was intercepted by Scarlet, who engaged him in conversation for a few minutes. He did manage to escape from her, but not before Michelle, who did still care about him, noted that he was absent from the sleeping area. When she found him, he was sitting between two sand dunes, seriously contemplating drowning himself. He had come to the conclusion that his life was worthless and that no-one would miss him if he just disappeared.

"I'm so lonely." he said, sadly, as tears streamed down his face.

Michelle embraced him, consoled him and then made love to him. They spent the night out on the dunes. In the morning, they made their excuses and made their way back to Sid's home using their thumbs. Sid had now come to believe that Cassie was regrettably a lost cause and was now fired up for another exciting sexual liaison with Michelle. This time in his own bed. As they entered Sid's bedroom, each engaged in the task of removing their partner's clothes, a voice from the corner said: "Hello Sid, hello Michelle.". Cassie had been waiting for Sid to return, hoping to put things right between them. When Cassie assessed the situation, she gave Sid and Michelle a look which seemed to say: "Oh! I see." and rapidly melted out of the room. Neither Sid nor Michelle were sure that they had actually seen Cassie, or whether she had been a figment of their joint imaginations. They finished the delightful task of stripping each other naked, making the most of each new area of exposed skin. They enjoyed the new experience of exploring each other's naked bodies. This was the first time that Sid had seen every bit of Michelle's body. They once again made love, producing twin simultaneous orgasms even stronger than those they had experienced on the beach. Sid's long held dreams about making love to Michelle appeared to have come true. He had just enjoyed a wonderful sexual encounter with the girl he had lusted after for nearly a decade. It was nearly ideal with both Sid and Michelle totally naked and in a bed. In the next couple of days, they made naked love on a few more occasions. On one night, they slept together, enjoying the naked presence of each other under the duvet.

In the middle of the following week, the 'gang' were spending an evening at a club. During the course of the evening, Chris dared Jal to get hold of the singer's hat. She was able to approach the stage, snog the singer to the floor and put on his hat, before a bouncer caught up with her and picked her up. She could now see over the crowd. She caught sight of Cassie coming into the club, and shouted "It's Cassie." through the still open microphone. Sure enough, at Katie's suggestion, Cassie had come to the club. She approached Sid and Michelle, announced to one and all that 'lovely Sid' and 'lovely Michelle' were fucking. This was news to everyone particularly Tony. She then kissed Sid's cheek really tenderly, then slapped his face as hard as she could and walked out of the club. From that moment on, Sid felt really guilty having sex with Michelle. He realised that far from Cassie betraying him, he had betrayed Cassie's love for him with Michelle. It would be some time before he came to realise that his apparent break-up with Cassie had been a terrible misunderstanding.

Sid was now on the horns of a dilemma. He now realised that after all, Cassie did actually still love him. He was torn between his new infatuation with Michelle, and his genuine and heartfelt love for Cassie. Cassie remained angry with him for some time. She even sent him a postcard on which she had written: 'Fuck off and die.'. This, he reluctantly took as proof that Cassie did not want anything more to do with him. His heart still ached for Cassie, but for the time being, although he still felt guilty about the situation, he would continue to regard Michelle as his girlfriend.

After an extraordinary university interview day, during which Tony had a sexual encounter with a girl called Beth, he realised that his primal urges had, at last, returned to normal. He reclaimed Michelle, leaving Sid in the lurch, with no girlfriend.

For the next few weeks, Sid's life was a lonely nightmare. Cassie was now back living in Bristol, but refusing to speak to him. Tony was back with his Michelle, but it would be some time before they totally trusted each other again. Chris and Jal were a stable, happy couple. Chris was being very protective regarding Cassie. Sid was now completely on his own, without anybody he could call a friend. He was now missing Cassie's love and companionship more than ever. He was desperate. Of all people, it was Effy who came to Sid's rescue.