Maxim Elphberg, considering the very strange life he led, was no more reflective an adolescent than any other boy of fourteen. Puberty was for him, like most of his peers, a roller coaster ride he was stuck on, and he dealt with the consequences, however intrusive, as and when he had to, from the physical changes that sneaked up on him to the sudden agony of an erection trapped in his underpants and trying to bend beyond what was humanly possible. In some ways adolescence was easier for Maxxie than for other boys. He was, for instance, well aware that it was something he had survived before. He had little direct connection with his former life as the boy, Mark Tolmie, but at times he caught a faintly amused echo of the personality of another heterosexual adolescent boy in his mind, which somehow had the ability to reassure him and even inform his choices. He was as a result not in the least disturbed by his occasional compulsion to masturbate and he found no guilt in the act at all, which Mark seemed to have been equally addicted to.
The other legacy Mark had left Maxxie, so his Uncle Henry had theorised, was his musical talent, and particularly his facility with the guitar, classical or electric, though he was pretty cool on drums and keyboard too. Maxxie’s mind was filled with music but he had not yet found other kids at Medwardine to create the four-piece band of his dreams. But he had plans to change this.
Medwardine town was home to another very different school than Edward VI Grammar. It was a highly ranked 11-18 comprehensive, which recently had been sending almost as large a proportion of its sixth form to Oxbridge as the public school. The intake of the Comp was socially very different however. It had no school uniform or house system or prefects, which fascinated the Medwardine boys, who regarded the place enviously as almost a centre of alternative culture. Its upper sixth was even allowed to smoke and vape on the premises, and there was sometimes a more pungent reek of smoke around its school gates on Castle Street. Maxxie had friends in Year 10 who knew kids in the Comp’s Year 10 who were happy to be their dealers. And that was how he had met Sylvie.
Maxxie did not overuse his abilities at school. He tried to confine their use to matters in which he was helping others. But Sylvie was becoming an exception, in part because he rationalised their relationship as his ‘helping’ the girl.
Sylvie Masson was a year older than Maxxie. She was a lithe, dark and self-aware young woman, mocking and funny when the mood took her. Her father was French and indeed her younger years had been spent in France. But she lived now with her mother and her mother’s current lover in Medwardine. She fascinated Maxxie. She was not a girl of any particular beauty, but she was slim and uninhibited and very daring. She was steadily enticing Maxxie into her own world, where there were no boundaries. She had taken his virginity with no hesitation, and now when he somehow appeared at her bedroom window in the evenings she invariably welcomed him inside nude.
‘Suck my tits, rich boy.’ She commanded that evening, burning with need for him, and Maxxie submitted readily, stripping as he sucked, his mouth moving gradually down between her legs and inciting her to a noisy orgasm with his tongue. She never restrained herself when she climaxed. ‘Now rich boy,’ she gasped, ‘time to see how much better you’ve got at using that big bite of yours. Better control I hope. I’ll never let you forget you busting your nut before the fun began the first time you tried it.’ She looked his body over. ‘Shit, you are a good-looking fucker though. And you smell so good. Even your ass.’
Maxxie was getting used to her banter, which came with no filter. She’d set up her camera stand for filming their copulation without asking him directly. He checked the angle. As requested, it would show only his bare ass as he fucked her, and the back of his head at most. He knew that she would cheat eventually and film with her second camera his body and face unveiled as they had sex. She could not disguise her lack of scruple from him, but partly to his own surprise he could live with it, such was his sexual need for what she freely offered.
Maxxie was not necessarily happy with these liaisons with a girl who was part whore, part sextortionist, part drug dealer. He was cursed with the clear sight, so Sylvie’s moral bankruptcy and deceit was laid bare to his empathic mind. It was obvious to him that she would sooner or later attempt to further monetise their relationship. But yet he could see something in her that appealed. She was a victim, and she had suffered abuse. He could offer her something more than a good fuck from a superb young male body. So he tolerated her videoing of their sex, because he knew she needed a record to prove that she was able to attract such male beauty and that she was not as worthless as some had told her. What perhaps he did not appreciate was that Sylvie was already sharing with her girlfriends the pictures of their sex and that his exposed ass and cock were already being admired by many people unknown to him.
Maxxie squirmed on top of her warm and soft body, probing at her entry with his erection and letting it catch, but then withdrawing as she got more and more aroused. ‘Fuck me you bastard,’ she hissed in his ear.
‘Beg me for it,’ he laughed.
‘I’ll kill you,’ she snarled. ‘Put it in.’
‘You like it, my cock?’
She gasped. ‘You know I do. It’s big and thick for a kid and fits inside me so well.’
‘I made you cum, didn’t I.’
Sylvie growled. ‘Just cos I wet the bed last time don’t make you a super stud.’
Maxxie chuckled. ‘I think it does. No one else ever did that to you. True?’
‘Fuck me, you posh bastard!’
‘Say please, Sylvie.’
The girl glared up at him, baffled and angry, which excited Maxxie. ‘Say it, Sylvie.’
‘Please … put your penis in my fanny, you arsehole cunt.’
‘How could I turn down such a request, so politely phrased. Here it comes. Squeal for Maxxie.’
The girl heaved as he entered her slowly, and she clasped him with her legs. She was soon gripping his cock and thrusting her groin into his. She growled in his ear. ‘You’ll fucking suffer for that, you bastard. God I love your cock. You’re a natural born fucker, no word of a lie.’
In the afterglow, Sylvie condescended to be nice to him, and even interested. ‘So you’re American, Maxxie?’
‘Mom is. But our family lives in Central Europe.’ Sylvie’s utter lack of intellectual curiosity was fortunate. Maxxie had more than enough of an international social profile for her to find all she needed to know about him easily from the reawakening internet, but she just couldn’t be that bothered. It was the reality of his handsome dick that really interested her. She picked up the subtle signs of wealth however, even in the cloistered schoolboy he currently was.
She lit up a joint and passed it to him. Maxxie grinned. He passed back a large denomination British banknote. ‘That’ll pay for the next stash.’
‘Are you fucking dealing behind my back in your posh school, Maxim?’ she said, mock-sternly. ‘I’m not a middle man … person. How much are you making on the mark-up?’
Maxxie shrugged and gave a faint look of distaste. ‘I don’t sell it, girl. I consume it or give it to friends who aren’t so lucky in their contacts. It’s a work of grace and generosity.’
She reared up and looked down on the naked golden boy on his back in her bed, as if he was a strange form of life she’d found infesting it. ‘What the fuck? Grace and generosity? Are you for real?’
He looked back up at her, troubled. ‘Grace and generosity are real, Sylvie Masson. One day I’ll make you realise that. You already know something about it. You give yourself to me with such joy and humour.’
She shook her head slowly and said meditatively. ‘Fuck off, weird posh boy … just do me again first … with grace and generosity.’
***
Martin Westenra and Louis von Carolath depended on Maxxie for their supply of weed, and he held a “smoking room” for their benefit and for other needy friends in Long Wood in the school grounds. Long Wood was at the southernmost boundary of Medwardine Grammar’s precinct. Beyond it were the farms and fields of southern Worcestershire spreading away to Ludlow and the Malvern Hills. The belt of thick beech plantation was the home to several of the school’s less healthy and sanctioned occupations.
One clearing next to a stream was notorious for gay cottaging amongst the boys that way inclined, and occasionally haunted by local adults seeking young flesh. It was called, with a certain grim realism, the Grooming Parlour. Another clearing was a gambling dive and had been since Queen Victoria’s reign. Maxxie, Martin and Louis however were using the clearing Maxxie had designated as the Smoking Room, a relatively more recent pastime in school mythology. It had already collected an archeological drift of roaches amongst its fallen leaves. But the vegetable smell of pot did not last long there, and that was why the boys patronised it. Their sins were blown away by the breeze from the Welsh mountains.
‘You should let us pay for this, Maxxie. Are you acquiring it by your … special abilities?’ said Louis.
Maxxie sniggered. ‘You might say that.’
Martin looked puzzled. ‘Special abilities?’
Louis shot his scrum-half a cautioning look. ‘Maxim can do things most humans cannot, Westenra. You’ll find out more if he decides to trust you. Just be grateful he plays rugby without using them, though cricket … I’m not so sure.’ Louis grinned. ‘So you have a local supplier. Has to be a comp kid. They’re all at it. I got offered ketamine in the fucking High Street from one of their sixth formers. Do you do a memory wipe on him after the deal?’
‘Who says it’s a him?’
Louis gave an impressed stare, ‘You’re fucking your supplier, Maxxie! You jammy bastard. That explains a lot.’
Martin stared wide-eyed and impressed. ‘You’re fucking a townie tart, Elphberg? Shit. Does she spread it around?’
Maxxie scowled. ‘You know Westenra, I do not like the implied power dynamic there. And I am not your fucking pimp, you dumb arse. Louis, clip this cunt around the ear for me. It’ll land more heavy from you.’
Louis, embarrassed by his consigliere’s stupidity, gave Westenra a token blow and said forcefully, ‘Apologise, Martin you arse.’
‘Sure, didn’t mean anything by it. Just … I mean … shit! You’ll get in the tabloids, mate!’
***
Afran, King of Rum, arrived in his realm quietly, though not without a certain new ritual. The first item was an equerry and household military attaché, Major Sayin of the Royal Guard Regiment, personally selected by General Martinovica, who was standing stern and critical as a detachment in their red and gold uniforms and shakos greeted Afran at the Osmaneli station, with a royal salute.
‘We’ve got toy soldiers,’ hissed Will, following up with a grin. He was wearing a sober suit, though Afran was in a colonel’s uniform. ‘Gotta outrank my equerry,’ he commented.
A small crowd greeted them, mostly local kids attracted by the uniforms. The general also ensured that a government cameraman was there to create images of King Afran’s delighted condescension to his people. She later told Will that the cameramen had instructions to edge Will into public consciousness. ‘Son, they’re going to have to get used to the idea of you as a fixture by their king’s side sooner or later.’
A motorcade of black Range Rovers and minibuses was awaiting Afran, and it ferried him and his security round Lake Iznik to their house at Göl Kenarındaki.
‘Damn, I needed this,’ Will said as they walked naked down the track to the lakeside in the afternoon heat with swimming, or maybe something more, in mind. They paused on their dock, as Afran assessed the feasability of a dive into the dark fresh water.
‘I don’t like those weed beds, Willemczu,’ Afran confessed. They might conceal rocks or might trap your ankles.’
‘Or hide giant, predatory freshwater sharks?’
‘You can be very silly, lover,’ Afran laughed indulgently. He slid into the water from the dock, gasping at the cold water.
‘That day we had with James and Jason here was so good,’ Will observed, as they trod water together. ‘How’re the guys? I know you keep up with King Jimmy.’
Afran twitched the wet hair out of his face. ‘Jason’s pissed at him, because now he’s a duke and official royal consort of Canada he’s not allowed to return to ice hockey. James is hiding from him by taking command of the new Oecumenical Pacific fleet. You’re a bit out of touch. He occupied Vladivostok last week after the collapse of the Russian Federation. He’s heading a big commission with the king of Korea and the emperors of Japan and Mongolia as to what to do with the former Russian Far East provinces. Fortunately for the Oecumene the People’s Republic of China has just collapsed into civil war, so the Chinese are too busy to take bites out of the region.’
‘Sounds like they have bigger problems than we have here in Anatolia.’
‘True enough, Will.’
‘So tell me, Franzi, what’s brought you back here in Reading Week. You didn’t say much on the train.’
The king sighed, and then turned to float on his back. ‘Our problems here may be small scale compared to Jimmy’s, but they’re stubborn. The elections gave us a liberal majority government, which is good, but also a fractious opposition of nationalist and former Muslim Brotherhood MPs. Our new government benefitted from its loud support of Oecumenical policy in the Black Sea, and the part Rumish troops played in the seizure of Crimea. So the government has to be very monarchist, which benefits my negotiations with them, through our fearsome mothers.’
Will sniggered. ‘So, Good King Afran, what have our mums pushed through?’
‘I don’t think they were initially pushing for anything more than what the Oecumene expects of its member nations: 1.5% of GDP in defence spending, including the levy to support the Oecumenical air and naval forces, and they got that. But then things went astray.’
‘How so, Franzi?’
‘They got ... er ... imaginative. Your mum had the idea for an “Anatolian Alliance”: Kurdistan and Rum but open to other affiliates, like Armenia and the Pontine Principality. My mum was very enthusiastic. She sees it as a useful preliminary to taming Mesopotamia, down to the Gulf, and seeing off the Persians for good. But the Rumish opposition is accusing her of being a Kurdish imperialist, seeing this as a possible way to turn the Rumish people against the Oecumene and the alien tyrant, King Afran. That’s me, if you don’t recognise the description, Will.’
‘Fuck. Life cannot be simple, can it?’
‘No dear. Young and inexperienced we may be, but I think we’ve worked that out. Still, it is up to us to sort it out all the same.’
Will gave a deep sigh. ‘Right wing religious fucking nationalists. ‘ he commented acidly. ‘To the human race they’re what guinea worms are to the natural world.’
***
Sylvie checked her phone. She was overdue her visit from her cousin in Birmingham. Her stock of weed was running low — worryingly low — with demand from the public school spiking thanks to her “pusher”, the American boy, Maxxie. She hadn’t seen the Yank boy in days. It unsettled her more than she liked to admit. Not just because the cash was flowing and the kids were hungry for more — but because her body was, too.
She’d always prided herself on not needing people. It was the great trick that kept her sane. But lately, all she could think about was him — that maddening grin, the lean, ridiculous perfection of him, the cock that could shut her up in an instant — and worse, that smell. That impossible, astonishing perfume that clung to him when he was close.
Carlo was supposed to be here by now. Her cousin, if you cared about the details — through her mother’s sister. He’d taken her virginity before he was even old enough to drive legally, and somehow, in his pathetic, macho little head, that made her his. She’d spent years dodging his grubby hands and entitled stare. It was easier before. But now… now she had Maxxie in her bed — when she could pin him down — and Carlo in her supply chain. Neither situation was exactly stable.
And her present arrangement? Far too profitable to risk. She needed Carlo’s weed. But she needed Maxxie’s body. And most of all, she needed to get her head straight — because when things got tangled, Sylvie lost control. And Sylvie hated losing control.
The knock at the door when it came wasn’t quite right. Not Carlo’s usual sly little tap-tap-pause. It was hard, flat and male. Sylvie’s gut twisted, but she cracked the door open all the same. Carlo stood there, cocky as ever, that greasy grin plastered on his face — and behind him, two lads she didn’t know. One wiry, jittery type with skin like stretched paper. The other broader, older, a meathead with tattoos crawling up his throat and dead eyes that clocked her without blinking.
‘You took your time,’ Sylvie said coolly.
‘Brought me mates, luv,’ Carlo announced, already pushing past her. His eyes swept the flat, possessive and casual all at once. ‘Got business to talk.’
The strangers followed. The big one lingered by the door, eyes heavy on her, making her skin creep. Sylvie kept her tone flat. ‘Since when do you need muscle to drop a bag of weed?’
Carlo chuckled, sprawled onto her sofa like he owned the place. ‘Ain’t about the weed, sweetheart. It’s about your little school project, and your pansy pusher. He glanced at his mates, smirking. ‘Your Yank. The pretty one.’
Sylvie’s stomach lurched. She folded her arms. “What about him?”
The skinny one sniggered. The big one just kept staring, silent and steady as a brick wall.
‘Word is,’ Carlo drawled, 'he’s shifting product for you like a good little boy. Thought it might be time we got to know him. Up close.’ His eyes glittered with implication. ‘Real up close. Y’know, make sure he’s… cooperative … and feels rewarded.’
The meaning slid into place with sickening clarity. Sylvie’s throat tightened. ‘You leave him out of this,’ she snapped.
Carlo’s grin widened, lazy and leering. ‘Protective, are we? Cute. But don’t worry, luv… we’ll be gentle. Especially with a little faggot Yankee boy that pretty.’
The other two sniggered again, quiet, filthy laughter filling the room like toxic smoke.
Sylvie clenched her fists, trying to steady herself. They were idiots. Dangerous, sure — but clueless idiots. They didn’t know Maxxie. Not the way she did. She’d said he was a pretty boy, a smitten cocky little pusher with nice eyes and legs worth spreading. They’d translated that into their kind of lust. But maybe that was not what she really saw in Maxxie either, and now they were about to walk blind into a disaster.
***
Carlo and his hoods — Rats and Asswipe, not their real names, Sylvie was fairly sure — made themselves at home in her bedroom and made it quite clear they weren’t leaving till Maxxie showed up. Rats was sprawled on her bed, hungrily watching gay porn on his phone, making no effort to hide the fact his hand was busy down the front of his stained sweatpants. Every now and then, he’d lean over to Asswipe, muttering some filthy comment, the two of them grinning like they’d already won.
Carlo, who wasn’t gay by preference — as Sylvie well knew — was still visibly getting off on the whole sick little plan. He pulled her roughly onto his lap, breathing against her ear.
‘Wanna know why we call him Asswipe?’
‘I really don’t, pervert,’ she snapped, wriggling in his close grip.
Carlo just giggled. ‘Your Yankee prince will demonstrate it for you in a minute. Then you’ll know what perversion really is.’
The sick twist in her gut told her everything: her partnership with Carlo was over. Never mind that she relied on him for solvency. Never mind the fleeting little buzz of power it gave her. Maybe it was time to find another source for weed… and those pills the public school kids popped like sweets.
But then… suddenly… A wave of relief washed over her — quick and irrational. Maxxie’s face was grinning at her through the window, out of the dark. He never knocked and never used the front door. Show-off that he was, he usually climbed the Victorian drainpipe like some romantic, reckless burglar. But now… now, as she stared… it struck her: He wasn’t clinging to the pipe. He wasn’t climbing anything. The Yank was just standing there — high up, at the window — grinning like a god of mischief, as if gravity didn’t apply to him at all.
***
Carlo and his thugs were nothing if not slow on the uptake. They gaped and Rats stopped masturbating, but beyond a subdued ‘Fuck!’ from Carlo, there was nothing.
Finally Rats shook his head and hissed ‘It’s like that scene in Salem’s Lot. That Yank kid’s a fucking vampire!’
‘Oooh!’ sniggered Asswipe. ‘I wanna be a vampire.’
Carlo snarled, angry and fearful. ‘No-one’s gonna get much of a interview out of you, tosser.’ He tossed Sylvie off his lap and with a certain amount of unexpected bravado, strode to the window and pushed it open. But the dark outside was empty. Yet when he turned back, the American was now sitting on the bed, with Sylvie in the position she had recently been in on his lap, his hands clasped protectively over her belly.
Maxxie whispered into her ear. ‘You’ve really pushed the boundaries this time, girl. Now I have to do some things.’
Maxxie swept the thugs with a grin they quickly realised was dangerous, and not in the least friendly. ‘So you were planning to fuck my faggot Yankee butt?’ he asked, with a laugh. ‘Now what do you expect me to do about that?’
‘What the fuck? How could you know ...?’ sobbed Carlo, his breakdown well under way now. And then he screamed, because the worst thing possible then happened. Apart from their piled and empty clothes, Rats and Asswipe were gone from the room.
Laughing crazily, Carlo was reciting, ‘Vampire, vampire, vampire.’
Sylvie twisted in his arms. ‘You did that, Maxxie! But what did you do! How ...?’
‘Okay, girl. I may give you answers, but I don’t really need to. Just tell me this, and I will know if you lie, did you plan this nasty piece of street theatre with these thugs?’
‘No, no of course not. Why would I?’
Maxxie smiled his broad smile, but it was dangerous now; the full stop at the end of a death sentence. ‘Why indeed, Sylvie ma chère? Our little arrangement was working so well for you: it was safe, profitable and I flatter myself that you really liked the sex. I certainly did. But your mouth ran away with you, and your cousin here — sorry, he’s somewhat demented now — couldn’t let it be. That’s the trouble with dealing with the likes of you people. Greed. Ahah! Now I have a solution. Darling, we’re off on a holiday. Don’t pack. In fact get out of your clothes. It’s more appropriate for the place.’
‘Place? What place?’ shrilled Sylvie. But then all three were sitting on grass of an unlikely shade of green, and all three were naked. A clear shining stream was running past them, and the sky above was of a blue more appropriate to a jewel than the firmament. Just to add to the weirdness, Maxxie was sitting on a bale of hay. He pulled out a straw, put it in his mouth and chewed.
‘Just so as we’re clear,’ he said, ‘this is nowhere on Earth. It’s a place my old mate Lance used to go to chew over problems and deal with them. I begin to see why. It’s called Eden.’
Copyright © 2025 Michael Arram
Posted 4 October 2025