The New Story Is Begun!

This will be a sequel to School for Sissies, so don't be shy to say what you think. here's the prologue:

Prologue

The leaves were still green on the trees despite the bite in the air when Martin Presley arrived at Waverly College. His father was behind the wheel of the car, silent on their arrival as he had been on the trip to the small university town. His mother made more of an effort, a few attempts at small talk that came to nothing. Tension was the invisible passenger.

Ever since Martin was brought home in the back of a police cruiser three months before, his father had been distant and cool to him. It wasn’t the first time Martin felt the weight of his father’s disapproval, only the most recent. And it wasn’t as if he was some burnout on drugs. He liked his freedom, that was all. And maybe a little bit of graffiti. And some beers under the trestle bridge with some of his high school pals. His grades were good and he had a keen mind. When his parents met with his teachers on conference nights, the old chestnut ‘he would do well if he only applied himself,’ was heard as oft-repeated critique of his scholastic efforts.

Before the police lights were done spinning, throwing alternating red and blue curtains over the faces of his parents, his father had issued his tight-lipped declaration.

“We’re going to find a place that can give you some discipline, son. I’ve tried everything I know to do. It doesn’t seem to help much. I think we’re going to have to give someone else a try.”

His father was former military, and Martin was sure that his vague threats meant Martin was headed for a military school, or maybe enlistment right out of high school. He’d run away if that happened, he decided. He wasn’t going to become one of those empty-headed thugs that the military churned out to send to some war, so he could come home with his brain broken more. He was shy enough. Martin didn’t need PTSD on top.

That’s why the brochures from Waverly were a surprise. It looked like a nice campus, the kind of place that had big oaks on the quad and old buildings with steeples and cute girls smiling over books in the pictures. It was a liberal arts school, too, which fit Martin’s interest in writing, at least. After being handed the brochures by his father, an unsurprisingly wordless exchange, he asked his mother about the decision.

“It was your father’s pick,” she said. She was nervous, moving around some of the canisters on the kitchen counter while they talked. More, she wouldn’t look Martin in the eye. “I just want you to be happy, you know? They said they could promise that much, at least. And after the first semester, we can bring you home, maybe. Just do what they tell you to do and keep your nose clean.”

And then she’d taken Marin in her arms suddenly and with a ferocity of emotion. She hugged him so tight he heard one of his vertebrae crack. He returned the hug, more alarmed by this sudden show of affection than any silence from his father.

Looking around online, he could find no mention of the college, aside from the official site of the college. There were some vague references to ‘Waverly girls’ on some subreddits, mostly in reference to their relative attractiveness and willingness to have a good time, but these were the kinds of posts you’d see about any college. It was odd, for sure, this kind of web anonymity. It was a small school, he rationalized, and they didn’t appear to have any organized sports or extracurriculars that made the campus noteworthy.

When they arrived at the parking lot near the big library on the edge of campus, there were a few cars unloading new students scattered around them. Martin met a few eyes, and understood by the sullen looks on the faces of the boys he saw unpacking trunks and pulling backpacks over their shoulders that no one came to Waverly because it was their first choice. He offered a nod of hello when he locked eyes with one of his fellow collegiate outcasts, and got the same in return.

“I can take it from here,” he said. His big suitcase was on the ground beside the family SUV, his backpack with laptop inside was over one shoulder. He aimed the next at his father, who stood as silent as the sphinx beside the car. “I know you don’t want to have to deal with me anymore.” His father remained quiet, hands shoved in the pockets of his khakis.

His mother hugged him again, cheeks wet with tears as she kissed his cheek. “I love you, Marty,” she said. “Be good. Keep out of trouble and we can see what we’ll do next year when you’re home for Christmas.”

“Sure,” he said. “Bye, Dad.”

“Hrmph,” his father replied. The old man was already on his way to the driver’s seat before Martin lifted the handle of his luggage.

‘And fuck you, Dad,’ he thought.

The Ross Dormitory was the male dorm on campus. It stood three stories high with a big lobby on the bottom floor, an information desk manned by a pretty girl in a billowy white dress with yellow flower prints on it. She had straw-colored hair with one long braid on the right side, freckles, and a big smile she used to set the boys at ease when they came to her for dorm assignments. The nametag said her name was Kaley. Martin noticed she had braces, which made her look even younger than college-age.

“You’re on floor two, sweetie,” she said, her voice marred by a mild lisp that likely accompanied her braces. Still, he couldn’t help but eye the rise of her breasts under the white dress, her nipples prominent beneath.

The suitcase was heavy and the dorm had no elevators. Dragging the suitcase up to the second floor was tough on his small frame. By the time he reached the second floor riser, he was sucking in great lungfuls of air. He pulled the suitcase behind him until he found his room – 206. He could hear music playing from inside before he turned the handle to open the door, steeling himself for a blast of unfortunate electronic dance music.

“Hey, man! I’m Kevin!”

A hand was coming at him and Martin instinctively took it, getting two strong pumps before the grip released. Kevin, his roommate Martin presumed, was almost a foot taller, lean and angular. He looked like a basketball player, all knees and elbows and soft brown hair trimmed tight to his scalp. He had a big toothy smile that was aimed directly at Martin. Rather than feel disturbed by the aggressive friendliness, martin found he liked Kevin Tyler quite a lot from the first moment they met. He was big and sunny and had a shirt-off-his-back quality that made it difficult to dislike him. It also helped that his first act after shaking Martin’s hand was turning down the music, and then helping to drag the big suitcase into their room.

“I’m Martin. Thanks for the hand.”

“What are roommates for?” His face went from sunny to curious. “No, really, you’re my first one.” Back to sunny again, laughing. “Good to meet you. I guess we’re both doing time at Waverly, huh? I talked to a couple of the other guys downstairs. Sounds like we’re all the fuck-ups of our old schools. What are you in for?”

“Spray painting a building. But also, like, three years of goofing off and telling my dad he’s an idiot.”

“Yeah, that’ll do it. The one good thing is that the girls here seem pretty hot. I mean, if you’re into girls.”

“Oh yeah. For sure.”

“Cool if you’re not.”

“I appreciate it, but I’m straight.”

Kevin’s shoulders relaxed and he laughed, clapping Martin on the back. “Great. Like I said, I don’t have anything against it, but good to know if I walk around in nothing but a towel you’re not trying to get a look at my business or something.”

Martin laughed politely and opened his suitcase. There was painfully little in the way of personal effects. He could have been handed a suitcase that read “Standard Issue Teenager” and found the same tee shirts and shorts and a couple of pairs of shoes. He never felt more hopeless or anonymous than he did in that moment.

“You are just in time,” Kevin announced from his side of the room.

“For what?” Martin regarded a green concert tee and tossed it on the twin bed that mirrored Kevin’s, only his was already made up with sheets and a blanket on top.

“Orientation. Probably some old man telling us how we have to straighten up and fly right or something. Want to walk over?”

Martin thought about delaying to put away the rest of his belongings, but found the idea only depressed him. “Yeah, sure thing.”

On the walk to the student center, Martin learned a lot about Kevin. He had played some basketball in high school before he decided it wasn’t for him. He talked about the girl he left back home, and how he hoped she’d wait for him without any belief that it might be so. Martin learned how strict his parents were, and how disappointed they both seemed by his relaxed attitude when it came to his future. More than anything, they wanted him to behave, and that was something Kevin found it difficult to do. By their standards, he’d be home ever night before the sun went down, studying in between college test prep.

Martin listened, as he normally did. He was like a sponge, one friend told him. A sponge of secrets and stories, absorbed but never to re-emerge. Martin didn’t offer a lot fo information about himself because he rarely felt worthy of divulging anything. Who would be interested in his boring life? He was just like everyone else, in every way from his dreams to his shameful desires. He read enough to know that most of human experience was universal, and absorbed enough confessions from his friends to understand that he was no different from the rest of them. So he kept his own counsel.

“You’re easy to talk to you, you know?” Kevin said as they climbed the brief set of stone steps leading up to the wide entrance of the student center. “Sorry if I talked your ear off.”

“I don’t mind,” Martin said with a shrug. “I like to listen.”

“Nobody likes it that much. Come on, I think the auditorium is this way.”

They passed the big dining hall and bulletin boards with job offers and dangling phone numbers snipped into rectangles advertising tutoring and, strangely, fashion and makeup tips where Martin would have expected offers for tutoring or rideshares.

The place was crowded with more than a hundred of their classmates, all filing into the lecture hall. At the front of the room was a lectern, a wiry microphone angled up at the woman behind it. She was brown-haired, styled very professionally. Her suit and matching skirt were dark and just snug enough on her body to suggest some enviable curves. Martin was transfixed by her almost at once, where Kevin was scouting the others in the room.

“How come there are no girls here?”

Only then did Martin scan the crowd. He saw every shape and size of male freshman, but nary a woman in the room, besides the one at the front of the room.

“That is weird,” he agreed.

“Good evening,” said the woman from the stage. “My name is Nina Harliss, but most of youw ill come to know me as Doctor Harliss. I’m the dean of students here at Waverly College, and let me be the first to welcome you to this new chapter of your lives.” She paused through a smattering of applause. “ I know many of you came to this school as a result of some bad decisions you’ve made and you feel this place is a form of punishment. I want you to know that we believe in second chances here at Waverly. And as far as I am concerned, what came before in your lives is in the past. What I want for you all is to be the happiest, most successful versions of yourselves that you can be.”

More applause. Even Marin joined in on this one. Harliss had charisma as well as beauty. She would have made a good politician.

“And to help guide you on this journey, each of you will be partnered with a class liaison, someone to help you get through these first formative weeks of your college life.”

While she spoke, a line of young women marched onto stage behind her. To a one, they were beautiful. Some dressed more daring than the others, but all were lovely enough that no boy in the room would complain for having been paired with them.

“After we leave here, you will wait in the student hall until your mentor finds you. Just be sure to wear the nametags you’re provided in the backs of the seats in front of you. And please don’t take all the Sharpies. You may fill out your names while we go over some things in the student handbook. If you didn’t find one in your dorm, you will find additional copies in the pocket of the seat in front of you with the name tags…”

Martin and Kevin removed the name tags and the handbooks while Harliss covered the rules of conduct for all students. It was hard for Martin to concentrate when there was such a collection of beauty on the stage. He tried to find his favorites and hope they would be his mentors.

“Is it bad taste to say I like Asian girls?”

Martin followed Kevin’s eyes to the row of pretty college girls standing with their backs to the cafeteria as if they were prepping for the sexiest game of red rover ever played. Kevin was probably referencing the short girl with the long dark hair tied into pigtails. With her tartan skirt, she looked like the stereotypical naughty schoolgirl. Martin had to admit it was a good look for her.

“I would have guessed leggy blondes were more your speed. Being the athletic type and all that.”

“You might be right.” He tilted his head, pensive. “You know Marty, I think I might like all girls. Is that a problem?”

Martin laughed. “Not here. I guess we know where they were hiding all the girls now.”

They watched as the loose line of boys shuffled to a table outside the auditorium where a girl named Heather, according to her nametag, was matching the student IDs from the boys with the assignments pulled from her laptop. One by one, the boys met their female counterparts and went off on their journeys together. When it was Kevin’s turn, Heather grinned up at him as she handed back his ID.

“You’re going to be with one of our sophomores. Justine. Come on down, Justy!”

Justine was lean and auburn-haired, with dimpled cheeks. She had a loose dress, but the breeziness of it couldn’t hide her bouncing chest. Martin resented Kevin for getting paired with such a wholesome, all-American beauty like her.

“See you later, Marty,” he said, offering his arm to Justine. Justine took it with a grin.

“You are a tall one, aren’t you?”

“I like to think of it as worth the climb.”

“Hey.” Martin gave a half-hearted wave when he handed his ID over to Heather. She looked older, not like the childlike freshman faces, but like a whole woman, ready to be released unto the world. There was a sophistication in her movements and in her confidence that some of the other girls lacked. They were giggly and excited, where Heather was calm and matter-of-fact without being unfriendly.

“Martin Presley,” she said, holding his card while she ran a polished nail across the screen before her. “Oh, lucky you. Elaine Park,” she said, raising her voice so that his mentor would hear.

It was the Asian girl Kevin ogled before, now skipping to the table to collect Martin.

“Hey, Martin! We are going to have such a good time!”

“Yeah, hi,” he said, tugged away from the table as soon as Heather handed over his student ID. She was ebullient, walking on air while she pulled Martin out of the student center, made hot by the throng of bodies compacted within, to the relative cool of the evening.

Other pairs were walking the quad and chatting. Elaine guided Martin along a sidewalk, away from the dorms and the student center.

“Welcome to Waverly, first of all.”

“Thanks,” he said, and then went silent. He felt uncomfortable in the presence of a pretty girl, and Elaine Park wasn’t just pretty, she was drop-dead gorgeous. Not only did her outfit accentuate her toned body and well-proportioned hips and ass, being close like he was, Martin could smell the floral scent of her perfume. She moved with surety and an easy sensuality that made Martin feel inadequate.

“Second of all, we are going to be spending some time together, so you might as well start talking. Oh my God, look!”

Elaine pointed at Justine and Kevin thirty yards away on a bench lining the sidewalk. Kevin’s hand was buried under her top while Justine leaned back her head to give him access to her neck, which Kevin kissed with hungry passion.

“He doesn’t waste time, huh?”

Elaine laughed. “Some of the girls at Waverly are more friendly than others. I thought we might start with a tour and let these two work out their hormones.”

“Uh, I should head back.”

“What?”

“Yeah, I want to unpack, get myself ready for tomorrow.”

Elaine looked stunned. “I could come back and hang out, keep you company.”

“No, that’s okay. I’ll catch up with you in the next day or two.”

He was already walking away, throwing the last sentence over his shoulder as he departed. There were about a million guys who would think he was the stupidest man on Earth for leaving this beauty standing alone under a lamp on the quad, but Martin wasn’t one of those guys. He shoved his hands in the pockets of his jeans and marched quietly back to his dorm, never looking back.

He did plan to unpack, but as soon as he began, he grew very tired. Half his clothes hung, he collapsed back onto the unmade bed and lost himself in a dreamless sleep.

Day One

Martin’s eyes cracked open when the dorm room’s door opened, the metal handle slamming into the wooden wardrobe on Kevin’s side of the room.

“Sorry,” he whispered when he saw Martin looking at him, consciousness creeping slowly back in. It felt like a curtain had fallen over his thoughts and he was struggling to draw it back to awareness. “Hell of a night, huh? What happened with that cute Asian girl?”

“Elaine.”

“What?”

“Her name is Elaine. And nothing happened. I came back early and fell asleep. Slept like a log, too. What the hell is this?”

Martin rubbed his fingers together and felt tiny particles between the pads of his fingers, like invisible grains of sand. When he brought his fingers to his nose, he inhaled a medicinal smell that made his nose wrinkle.

“Looks like we need some dusting. I wonder if Justine does windows. ‘Cause I know she does polishing.”

“You two-?”

“For sure. I mean, I think so. I kinda passed out toward the end, but we were going at it pretty hot and heavy. Man, she has great tits. I think she might have had some work done, ya know? Nobody has tits like that without a doctor. Anyways, we made out for a while and she took me back to her room. Next thing I know, my pants are off and she is going down on me and I’m just laying back and loving it. Then I passed out. She didn’t seem to mind, though. She was plenty friendly this morning, too.”

“Congrats, I guess.”

Kevin chuckled and stood, snapping the waist of his briefs. “Time to clean the pipes, Marty. Then let’s get some breakfast. I am starving.”

Martin hurried through a shower in the communal bathroom, unable to completely shake the fog between his ears. Once they were on the quad and moving, he felt more himself, and even appreciated the simple beauty of the Waverly campus. The leaves were falling in earnest and provided a colorful rain.

The student center was mostly full with a mix of Freshmen boys and their mentors, along with other groups of young women huddled in small circles. They whispered to one another and watched the boys, and some giggled. Kevin led the way, his outgoing nature on display as he waved to others and winked at some of the girls, inspiring new rounds of red-cheeked laughter.

“Justine’s not here,” he mused. “I don’t even have her phone number. Where’s your girl?”

“I don’t know. We didn’t talk very long last night.”

“Kid, you need some self-confidence. I have a feeling that these Waverly girls are good to go. If you don’t take advantage, someone else is. And by someone, I mean me, probably.”

He clapped Martin on the back and the pair settled into the cafeteria line, which moved molasses-slow. They finally reached the rows of prepared foods and Kevin was given eggs and bacon and a bowl of fruit. Martin was given grain cereal and a similar bowl of fruit, without the eggs and bacon.

“Hey, I wanted some French toast, too,” he grumbled.

The girl on the other side of the Plexiglass was fresh-faced and slim-chested, but quite pretty. She turned her head down, her blonde pigtails draped over her shoulders, and avoided the question. An older woman with gray threaded through her dark hair stepped between them.

“We have carefully selected a meal plan for each of you. I promise you’ll be getting all the calories you need and all the right nutrients, too. If you want some snacks, there’s more fruit by the register.”

“Yeah, sure,” Kevin sighed.

The pair carried their trays to a table that was largely empty. Kevin shoveled some of the eggs into his mouth and wiped with the back of his hand.

“Don’t worry, Marty. Your old pal Kev is going to get us a stash of goodies. They might control the cafeteria, but they can’t control what we get at the Quick Sack. And I have a hot dog on a roller with my name on it.”

“That stuff is disgusting.”

“Quiet and eat your barley or whatever,” he grinned.

Martin scanned the students gathered around the tables. “You think it’s weird that there are so many girls compared to the boys?”

“You complaining, Marty?”

“No. Just weird.”

He finished his fruit and cereal, unable to shake the feeling that the girls were staring at them.

Miss Helena looked like a Playboy bunny. Her hair was an obvious dye-job, pile don top of her head with curls that may or may not have been extensions. Her lips were full and a glossy pink, eyes dark and defined by long lashes. While her skirt fell past her knees, it was the pencil variety that hugged her round ass and firm thighs on its way down. The button-up top was white, and the black bra she wore beneath was easily visible, as was a sizable amount of cleavage. She had to be at least a D-cup, Martin figured. She also possessed the distracting habit of chewing on the end of her pen between sentences, or when she listened to a student speak in the literature class. When she answered questions hurled at her, she did so in a breathy voice that seemed built for whispering in a man’s ear.

She paced the front of the class in tall black heels. “So, what I want for my students is to instill a love of reading. Who cares if it’s stuffy old British books, or the latest thriller? What matters is that you’re all reading as part of your day.”

It was hard to concentrate on her words when she was leaning against a student’s desk in the front row, bending forward to show off the tan skin of her ample tits.

“I’ll be handing out some books. Feel free to pass them around with each other. And don’t be surprised if the book you get isn’t the kind of thing you normally read. I want you to push your boundaries.”

She turned and showed off the pendulums wing of her ass while she opened a cardboard box and removed paperbook novels.

“Take one and pass them back,” she said, delivering the first stack to a student in the front row.

Martin already noted that the class was entirely male in its composition, and that made it all the stranger when he was handed a romance novel, a shirtless Adonis on the cover with a busty wench in his arms. He leaned forward to see the book given to the student in front of him and saw little difference in the covers save for the title. He cracked the stiff spine on his paperback and saw the typeface was big, unlike the tight spacing of the usual literature collections.

“You’ll have two weeks to finish them. When we’re all done, we’ll discuss what we’ve read.”

Two weeks? It would take him no more than two hours to finish something like this. He supposed Waverly was more interested in keeping its students in line than in challenging their intellects. At least Miss Helena was hot. He might not learn anything, but he’d have a marvelous view.

Martin trudged back across campus toward the dorms. His phone buzzed with messages from Elaine, who was determined to meet him again. There was something about the girl’s aggressive pursuit that made Martin nervous, despite her undeniable beauty. With his head down and backpack bouncing on his shoulder, he was lost in his own thoughts when he heard his roommate call out.

“Martin! Come over!”

Kevin had his back to one of the big red oaks that dappled the open quad and sent their red and orange leaves spinning to the ground. Justine was nestled into the crook of his arm, her hand on his stomach. When she looked at Martin, he though he could see something calculating in that look. Despite the chill running up the back of his neck, he started toward them, unable to tear his eyes off Justine.

He never saw Elaine coming. One second he was locked on Justine’s gaze, the next he was tumbling, staggering to keep his balance while Elaine hit the ground hard in front of him.

“Oh my God, I’m so sorry!”

“It’s my fault for being so short,” Elaine laughed, and took Martin’s hand to bring her back to her feet.

He wondered how she wasn’t freezing in the fall weather, with her short purple skirt and high knee socks, an outfit that suggested the go-go dancers of the 1960s. When she was fully on her feet again, she leaned into Martin, placing a hand on his chest like they were romantic partners and not relative strangers. Martin was acutely aware of her nearness and the familiarity of her touch.

“Glad I literally ran into you, though. We still have some orientation stuff to go over. And I thought we could do some studying together, maybe. I’m smarter than I look,” she tittered.

Martin took a step away. For an instant, a look of supreme frustration flitted across Elaine’s face, then became the sunny expression she always wore in his presence again.

“I’m good. I want to call it an early night. You want to head back to the dorms?” he asked Kevin.

Kevin was lost in Justine’s presence. He had the look of someone in the early stages of love, when the whole world shrinks to the size of that person.

“No, thanks. I’m going to hang out with Justine. You sure you don’t want to stay?”

“I’ll see you later,” Martin said, and put his back to them. That itchy, uncomfortable feeling found him again, like there was something decidedly off about Waverly and its students, but he couldn’t quite give it a name. Yet.

Back in the dorm, the door locked and checked to be sure, Martin went about preparing his assignments from his day’s classes. Aside from the cheap romance novel assigned in his literature class, there was a math assignment and civics work to do. What Martin hadn’t anticipated was that even these felt aimed at the most rudimentary levels of understanding.

His math homework was series of word problems, the kind of basic arithmetic that he remembered from his grade school years. Stranger still was the wording used. One problem read: You’re shopping for your husband and he’s only given you fifty dollars for groceries. How many of each item can you afford?

The civics homework was equally sexist in its tone, suggesting that when in trouble, all citizens should find a man capable of dealing with stressful or dangerous situations.

With its largely female student body, Martin would have imagined a more progressive curriculum. All the lessons he’d encountered thus far were tailored for a housewife from the 1950s or ‘60s than a modern woman. And none of them were inclusive to a male student.

His cell rang and he saw Mom appear on the display. Swiping open to receive the call, Martin closed his civics book and leaned back in his chair, rubbing his eyes in preparation for his mother’s emotional inquisition.

“Martin?” she began. Her tone was tentative. “Are you alright?”

“Yeah, Mom, I’m fine. How are you and Dad?”

“we’re good, honey. I wanted toc heck on you, see if you needed anything.”

“Not right now,” he said. “This place is weird, though. I’d really like to come home. Maybe you can talk to Dad and-“

“We discussed this. I mean your father and me. If you make it through this semester, you can go anywhere you want, honey. I promise.”

Martin sighed. “Sure. How’s everything else?”

The rest of the conversation was normal, almost good. But at the end she paused before they disconnected. “I love you, Marty. More than anything. I just want you to know that.”

“Yeah, Mom. I know,” he assured her. “I’ll see you at Thanksgiving, okay? Maybe we can both talk to Dad. Make some plans for me to get out of here. I don’t think I’m actually learning anything here.”

“I love you,” she repeated, and then she was gone.

He sat the phone down, resolved to finish his ridiculous assignments when the phone rang again. An unknown caller. Once the ringtone faded, he saw a message left for him. It was Elaine, wanting to know if there’s a better time in his schedule for them to meet. He would never have imagined avoiding a girl as pretty as Elaine before now, but that insistent notion that something was not quite right made her presence more sinister than sexual.

He was wrapping the elementary homework up and settling in to read a few chapters of his romance novel when the door opened and Kevin came tumbling in.

“Hey there, Marty,” he said with a sloppy grin. He took two steps and fell face-first onto his mattress.

“You look like you had some fun.”

“I did. That Justine is something else. I think she drained me of all my vitality,” he laughed. “I think Elaine might have the hots for you. Do with that information what you will. I am going to sleep.”

“Sweet dreams,” Martin said, rising to turn off the overhead light Kevin turned on when he entered. By the time he turned around his roommate was already softly snoring.

The same weariness stole over Martin quickly, too. It was only ten, and he was struggling to keep his eyes open. He managed to turn off the lamp beside his bed, but just barely. He didn’t remember much of what he’d read, only that there was a girl on a farm, and she’d met a man she knew would change her life.