Chapter 6
We made our steep trek up Calton Hill, both of us arriving at the very top somewhat out of breath and a little spent. Immediately, Alex spied the national monument, the unfinished, Greek-themed catacomb lying at the centre. She desperately wanted to get a closer look until I took a hold of her hand, intentionally leading her up another short but steep, breakaway path towards the walls of the old observatory on the top western edge.
Deliberately, I covered her eyes just in case she suddenly turned west to take a quick, sneaky peek and ruined the surprise of seeing the stunning views over Edinburgh's Old Town and its glorious castle. Alex smiled and giggled as I continued to shield her view.
“What the hell are you doing to me, Ryan?”
“It's a surprise!”
“Are you kidnapping me away to some place?”
“Yes.”
“And you have the nerve to accuse my travel hosts of such acts.”
As we approached the end of the steep pathway and the front of the observatory walls, I took my hand away from Alex's eyes to finally let her see my own little piece of heaven. She slowly scanned southwest, away from the grey, stone observatory walls and the beaming smile across her awed face told me everything that I needed to know.
“Now this is my Edinburgh.”
“Oh, my God. I am completely lost for words, Ryan. It really is so beautiful from up here. Truly.”
We both took a few silent moments to stare out at the magnificent view in front of us, not just of Edinburgh's Old Town and New, but of Arthur’s Seat, the Crags, and, to the far south, in the furthest of the distant horizon, the Pentland Hills. Alex turned, smiling radiantly.
“Thank you, Ryan. It truly is wonderful, and so much worth the hike up here a hundredfold.”
We began walking again, but deliberate and slow, around the outer-edge footpath of the observatory walls overlooking the east end of the city. Alex broke the silence first.
“My God, this brings back some wonderful memories. As a child I always loved walking up hills. I was always the most excited to reach the very top and see the wonderful sights. But I haven't done this for quite some time now, you know. I miss being a child so much, don't you?”
“I never really thought about it to, tell you the truth. But I can imagine you as a little kid, no problem. Playful, energetic, always smiling. I bet you were a right little troublemaker.”
Alex displayed a knowing grin.
“What makes you say that?”
“Just a feeling. Am I right? Were you like the little tomboy at school who'd always be chasing the other children around the playground? Don't tell me you were the cute, shy, little girl who hid herself away at the back of the class, wishing for the day when she was all grown up.”
“Well, I definitely was not shy, that's for sure. I was always the first to volunteer for everything, putting my name forward when the teachers needed someone for activities. Actually, I really enjoyed playing tennis and football with the boys at school, although, between you and me, I was always much better than most of them at sports.”
“Definitely a tomboy then!”
“How about you?”
“Ha! I was such an annoying little shit at school, especially towards the girls.”
“No, I can’t believe it.”
“Well, believe it. I remember always trying to kiss the girls, making fun of them, pulling their hair, lifting up their skirts. Three times in a month, my own mother had to be called to school because I'd made so many girls cry by hiking up their skirts in the playground in front of everyone else.”
“My goodness, you must have been like a mini Anti-Christ. Why were you such a terror?”
“I don't know. Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that I was always the new kid on the block and was always rallying for the other kids’ attention, trying harder to fit in than any of the other boys and girls and it usually backfired, spectacularly.”
“What do you mean by ‘always the new kid on the block?’”
“Well my dad was in the army, so we never really stayed in the same place for more than two or three years at a time. I ended up going to four different primary schools and three different secondary schools. It's absolutely crazy when you think about it.”
“Wow. That is a lot of schools.”
“I remember being so jealous of all the other kids who'd grown up in the same place their entire lives you know, with their closely knitted groups of friends and social circles, which were so hard for a newcomer like me to break into. Which I guess explains why I was such an annoying little shit, always asking for attention.”
A mischievous thought suddenly occurred to me, most likely inspired by thinking about all those childhood memories of teasing schoolgirls in the playground and getting into trouble. I playfully pulled the back off Alex's hair, before trying to tickle her sides and underneath her arms. Alex squirmed and squealed, desperately trying to get away from my reach.
“Hey boy, I'll put you on detention!”
I was having too much fun tickling and teasing her that didn't want to let her go. So I picked her up in my arms and started spinning her around in circles until she was both laughing and screaming.
“Okay, okay. Put me down! Put me down!”
With the adrenaline pumping through my veins and blood rushing to my head, I couldn't resist spinning Alex until we both finally fell onto the dry grass beneath our feet and were dizzy as hell. For a while, we just laid there basking in our giggles and playful giddiness.
“You see what you made me do, talking like that about our childhood days?”
“What I made you do?” Alex said, still giggling.
“You brought back that terrible, little troublemaker in me.”
I stood to my feet and pulled Alex up with an impish grin.
“Once a cheeky boy, always a cheeky boy, right?” said Alex.
“You got that right.”
Alex approached the edge of the path to study the sublime view once again. Slowly, I approached her. I wanted so badly to sneak up behind her now and tightly, but gently, wrap my arms around her waist, moulding the front of my body into the back of hers, pulling that delicious blonde hair away from the back of her neck to lightly kiss that pale soft skin underneath. I shook the daydream-fantasy from my mind and remained standing beside her. I wasn't looking out at the glorious views of the city with her anymore. Instead, I couldn't help but stare and intensely study the entire right side of her angelic face. She was perfect in that moment.
“I am so in love with this city right now, Ryan. It is just so damn beautiful.”
“Aye,” I softly replied. “Beautiful,” I added as I continued to gaze at her soft pale features, while she took in the scenery before us with a big, happy smile. I couldn't take my eyes away from her no matter what.
Suddenly, she turned to me and caught me staring. She blushed immediately.
“What is it? What was that look for?”
I smiled and blushed, too, before turning away.
“Nothing. I just—I was just caught up in the moment, that's all.”
I began walking away in the direction of the north side of the hill and the northern face of the Observatory walls.
“Come on. Let's check out the view from the other side.”
Alex quietly followed.
The views from the other side of the hill were also outstanding, with views of Leith, the old harbour and docks, Portobello, the River Forth where it met the North Sea, Inchcolm Island and the Kingdom of Fife in the distant horizon.
“What is that large island over there, the one which looks like there is a castle on top?”
“That's Inchcolm Island. And the building upon it is Inchcolm Abbey.”
“Can you go there?”
“You sure can. They do boat trips from South Queensferry a couple of times a day.”
“Have you ever been?”
“Never.”
I had always wanted to, of course, but like most locals, I could never happen to find the time and so forgot all about the medieval landmark in a foggy haze of too many working hours and the stress of more and more bills to pay.
“I remember some stories my Grandmother used to tell me though: like during the Second World War, they would light up Inchcolm Island, along with some of the other islands on the Forth, to distract the Nazi planes from bombing Edinburgh City.”
“And did it work?”
“I'm pretty sure Edinburgh was hardly touched during the war, so yeah, I guess it did. Apparently one Nazi aircraft was shot down over the Scottish borders. The pilots were taken alive and held as prisoners here, right over there in the castle, famously becoming the last prisoners ever to be held inside Edinburgh Castle.”
As we walked further along the north wall of the observatory, Alex noticed a single, small stone block, sitting all by itself upon a slight mound in the northeast corner.
“What is that stone block thing over there?”
I chuckled as the legend of Edinburgh's infamous Fairy Stone came back to me. I told her what I knew as I led closer towards the stone to take a closer look. “Some people believe it's the site to a magical entrance into the secret fairy world underneath Calton Hill.”
“A fairy world, huh? That's so cute. No wonder this hill is so inspiring to you with all its stories.”
Alex inspected the stone. She ran her hands all over the top flat surface, which was scattered with old rusty nails, some of which were loose while some had been embedded into the stone over time.
“Why are there nails lying here like this?”
“Because some superstitious people here believe that the iron nails ward off evil spirits, or keep the fairy world protected, or something like that. I guess it's more for the tourists. Although, some people believe that the true entrance to the fairy world is hidden underneath the old observatory building behind us, lying inside a hidden cave and can only be seen by those given second sight by the fairies.”
I tried to keep a straight face while telling all of this to Alex, but it was just so damn hard. Alex let out a slight burst of laughter and slapped me on the arm. “Are you just making all of this up?”
“No,” I replied, trying to contain my laughter. “I'm just repeating stories I heard and briefly read about over the years. Just Google Fairies in Scotland, cheeky girl, and you'll see.”
“Okay, I will, fairy boy.”
Next, I led Alex towards the National Monument in the very centre of The Hill, an uncompleted replica of the ancient Greek Parthenon Temple in Athens, that had been dedicated to Scottish soldiers who had lost their lives while fighting in the Napoleon War. Alex chuckled giddily as she approached.
“Oh, my goodness. Did we really just travel back in time all the way to Ancient Greece? What is this?”
“It's the National Monument.”
“But what is it meant to be? Why is it here?”
“I think it was supposed to be some kind of tribute tomb for the Scottish soldiers who lost their lives during the Napoleonic War in the eighteenth century. But due to lack of funding it was never fully completed.”
“That is a shame. It's a very charming and unique little monument. Would be nice to see the finished article in all its catacomb glory though, no?”
“I think I heard a story once that they did try and finish it for a second time, but it was right before the first world war broke out, so bad timing, I guess.”
Alex pulled out her camera. “Will you take my picture?”
“Sure.”
I took her camera and started clicking away before she was even ready which annoyed the hell out of her somewhat, yet, to me would probably make the best pictures. Alex then began making goofy poses and I took some more.
“Lovely.”
Alex noticed a friendly, middle-aged Asian couple and jogged towards them before I even had the time to put down the camera. She asked them to take a picture of the two of us. They did and I took this opportunity to wrap my arm around Alex's waist, ready to pose. After we thanked the couple and took a picture for the two of them, we decided to sit down on the dry and lush green grass right in front of the monument to relax. As I sat, I noticed that the sun was getting ready to set, perhaps within the hour. It must have been getting late.
“So at school, did you ever fancy any of your teachers?” I asked, reigniting our conversation from earlier. Alex, with her arms spread out behind her to support her upper body on the grass, glanced at me with a very confused look.
“Fancy?”
“You know, like have a crush on or find attractive.”
Alex continued to stare at me blankly.
“Did you want to kiss any of your teachers?” I said blatantly spelling it out for her.
Alex chuckled. “Are you kidding me? All my teachers were as old as the Earth.” She exaggeratedly shivered and swiftly shook her head in disgust before turning back to face me with a mischievous grin.
“But I'm guessing you did since you brought this subject up.”
“As a matter of fact I did, aye, when I was around nine, now that I come to think of it,” I said loud and proud.
“Nine!” Alex seemed to be in total shock.
“Yeah, I had the biggest crush ever on my primary school teacher.”
“You did not!”
“I did, I swear.”
“I remember that I'd always be the first one to volunteer to do anything for her in class whenever she asked; like cleaning off the chalk from the black board or collecting everyone's homework, and staying behind after class to help tidy up.”
Alex light-heartedly pinched my cheek as if I was a little kid. “Oh, that is so cute and sweet of you, Ryan.”
“Yeah well, it gets even better. Eventually, I found out that the bitch was married and it nearly broke my little nine-year-old heart.”
Alex started laughing hard, almost choking in the process.
“And from that point onwards I just became such a little shit to her in class.”
Alex continued to smile, shaking her head.
“Always playing up in her classes,” I continued. “I stole her stapler a few times and hid it, then sneakily wrote rude words on her blackboard before she arrived in class. I started throwing pens, paper, pencils—or whatever I could find whenever she wasn't looking—at the other kids in class. I was pretty sneaky like that.”
“Wow! What a little shit you were, Ryan. So what kind of rude words did you write on her blackboard?”
“Too rude to share with a cheeky Czech tomboy like you.”
“I'm the cheeky one now?” she smiled. “Hey, can I ask you the difference is between sneaky and cheeky?”
I chuckled too as a crazy thought swiftly entered my head.
“You don't know?”
“Well, I think I do, but I'm sure everyone has different interpretations.”
I quickly stood to my feet and held out my hand. Alex looked confused.
“What are you doing? More dancing?”
“Come, stand up.”
Alex took my hand and I pulled her up onto her feet. We were standing so close, only a few inches apart.
“Okay. Now close your eyes.”
She gave me a distrustful glare but grinned. “No, I do not trust you, you might do something very bad to me.”
“What, like steal your wallet?”
“Hmmm, that too.”
“Just close your eyes.”
“What are you going to do cheeky boy?”
“I'm going to show you the difference between cheeky and sneaky.”
“Why don't you just tell me?”
“Because it's more fun this way,” I said, still grinning.
She hesitated before letting out a deep sigh. Finally, she closed her eyes.
“Okay. Then show me.”
The adrenaline surged through my veins. I couldn't believe I was actually about to try this. I had no idea where this naughty, bold idea had come from, but it was too late to stop it now, I had acted in the moment, so I had to go through with it.
“Okay, so this is cheeky.”
I leaned in very close to Alex, almost like I were going to kiss her tenderly on her soft and delicious, red lips. Instead I lowered my hands down towards her perky buttocks and lightly squeezed them. Alex let out a playful yelp and slapped me on the shoulder.
“That was so bad,” she giggled, not backing away one bit.
“Okay,” I said, smiling right back at her. “And now for something sneaky.”
“Oh. That wasn't the sneaky-thing part?”
“Close your eyes.”
She did what I asked and closed her eyes.
“Okay, now this is sneaky...”
This time I leaned in right up close towards her, but agonisingly slow. My face and lips millimetres from her own. At the same time, I lifted my left hand and gently caressed her chin and neck and underneath her soft-flowing, blonde hair. I softly kissed her cherry-red lips. She never flinched in the slightest and, even better, her small, delicate mouth moved in unison with mine.
The whole mind-blowing act lasted for a good ten seconds and, just as I felt the tip of her tongue brushing against the top of my lip, she slowly pulled away. I opened my eyes to find her unleashing a radiant but devilish smile of her own.
“Well, that was unexpected.”
All I could do was grin. I was glowing.
“So that is the difference, huh?” she continued.
We sat back down upon the grass, but this time a little closer together. Alex was still beaming and blushing from cheek to cheek and so was I.
“So, before your little demonstration, you were telling me about your first crush on a teacher.”
“Oh yeah,” I'd almost forgotten.
“So you misbehaved in her class after you found out she was married?”
“Yeah, well, until she called my parents into school because she thought there was something wrong at home.”
“Your parents must have been livid?”
“Oh, they were, but to this day neither of them knew the real reason why I'd acted like such a wee shit at school.”
Alex shook her head. Another comfortable pause lingered in the air between us. She glanced away but I couldn't take my eyes off her. Alex broke the silence first.
“So how old were you when you had your first kiss?”
“My first kiss?” I replied, a little surprised by her question. “Twenty-nine and a few months, I guess. Right in the shadow of the National Monument, on a patch of grass on top of a perfectly stunning hill in the middle of Edinburgh,” I teased.
Alex laughed.
“Wow! Always the comedian, huh? But seriously, tell me.”
“Well...” I hesitated, still thinking really hard. “Jesus! Let me see. Well, my first kiss was with a girl named Kelly. She was about ten and I was about seven.”
“Seven!” Alex cried, looking even more surprised by this than my teacher-confession.
“What can I say, I was an early starter?”
“Tell me this was not with tongues.”
I gave her a sly wink.
“So you were quite the little Casanova in your childhood days, no? Falling in love with teachers. Kissing older girls. Lifting up their skirts and checking out their underwear.”
“In all fairness, I was trying to kick her ass before the kiss. She was trying to steal my roundabout, you see. So I had to deal with her somehow. When I tried to throw her off, she dragged me with her. We ended up rolling around in the grass fighting for a while. Somehow I managed to pin her hands down onto the grass and just held them there for ages. Then for some reason unbeknownst to me at the time, I gave her a quick but gentle, sloppy, wet kiss on the lips before letting her go and running like the clappers, getting the hell away from her as quickly as I could. Boy, she was pissed.”
Alex couldn't stop laughing.
“You are crazy Ryan.”
“So how about you? When did you first kiss a boy?”
“Me? Well that's an easy one. Until just now, never.”
I let out an overemphasised cough, trying to fake my shock.
“Bullshit.”
Alex smiled. “I swear it! I've never once kissed a boy.”
“Yeah. And I'm really twenty-one.”
“Wow! Really? Then you must have had a hard time growing up, Ryan, because you look terrible for twenty-one,” Alex said as she sympathetically patted my shoulder.
“Come on. Stop kidding me. You must've kissed somebody while you were growing up?”
“I have never kissed a boy,” she stated teasingly, before letting a mischievous grin appear on her lips. “But I did kiss some men. Oh, and some girls too!”
I was both stunned and dumbfounded. It sounded like every man's dream to hear but could be some other father's worst nightmare, I imagined.
“What the hell? What do you mean both men and girls?”
Alex deliberately took her time in giving me her answer.
“Well, I was thirteen when I had my first kiss with my best friend, Zuzana.”
“You're just teasing me now.”
“I am not; I swear it. We used to practice with each other all the time. Zuzana happened to be the first of us to have a serious boyfriend and, since she was so scared to lose him, because he was much older and more experienced than her, she would practise with me for a few weeks until, let's just say, we perfected our technique.”
I was rocked to my core and slightly aroused. I didn't know whether to laugh or just jump her, there and then, and ask her for another demonstration.
“And you say it like it was the most natural thing in the world.”
“Well, it was at the time and very much a thing of great beauty, too. Of course, I would never go all the way with a girl, that is for sure. But to share an ardent caress on the lips during the innocence of adolescence, it is a good thing, no?” Alex slyly smiled once more. “A good thing for the soul, no?”
Alex then completely lost herself in the moment, probably reminiscing her past, raunchy intimacy, no doubt.
“It was just... so really nice, that's all. And besides, most girls are far more superior kissers than boys, anyhow, so it makes sense that I should learn my first time from a girl.”
“So how old were you when you had your first boyfriend?”
“Honestly, I was quite the late bloomer in that department. I was fourteen and he was nineteen.”
“Fourteen? Late bloomer!” She had surprised me again. “And he was nineteen? Jesus Christ.”
“I told you. I have only ever kissed men not boys. But I did lie to him about my age for more than two years.”
“And I take it he's still enjoying his little prison sentence right about now?”
Alex let both her smile and her deliberate pause linger in the air for some time before speaking, 'And you? Let me guess; you were five, yes? For your first girlfriend?” she laughed.
“Close. You were only a few years away. Twelve. But I never lost my virginity until I turned seventeen, which I think is pretty late these days.”
Alex leaned closer to me and rested her head upon her hand. “So how did you lose it? Tell me.”
“Ha! Really? You sure you want to hear this?”
“Absolutely. I love a good horror story.”
I mildly tickled her ribs for her cheekiness until she begged me to stop. Finally, we composed ourselves and relaxed right next to each other.
“As it so happened, I was backpacking up the east coast of Australia with my girlfriend at the time.”
“Your first girlfriend?” Alex chuckled.
“No, second.” I gave Alex a mocking scowl for interrupting my story.
“I am sorry. Please, continue.”
“Well, we'd actually planned on venturing all the way up to Queensland in Northeast Australia to, you know, lose our virginities up there, together. For some weird and screwed up reason I never even questioned her at the time she had her heart set on somewhere near the tropic of Capricorn. Like Emerald or Rockhampton.”
“How romantic!” Alex said with just a hint of sarcasm.
“That's what she said.”
“So the Tropic-of-where, sorry?” Alex pestered further but I ignored her.
“And because she was offering to de-virginise me, my penis was obliged to follow at such a young and naive age. Anyway, we had a massive fight after she changed her bloody mind at the final hour and decided instead she wanted us to be married first before any exchange of bodily fluids would take place.”
I could see that Alex was desperately trying not to burst into a fit of laughter.
“I, of course, was not pleased, as I didn't fly halfway around the world with balls the size of water melons to get married at seventeen years of age in the middle of the Australian Outback with a bloody Kangaroo-priest, a couple of cute little Kuala bears as bridesmaids, and a native, aborigine tribesman as my best man. And all this for a girl I wasn't even in love with in the first place, just lusting after.”
“The power of the vagina is an amazing thing, no?” Alex teased.
“You're telling me. So when I finally bottled up the courage to break up with her, she stormed off to the nearest airport and jumped on the first flight back to the UK. I on the other hand, decided to stay for a few extra months and backpack all the way down the east coast again and just, well, you know, enjoy myself.”
“And why not. I would have done exactly the same thing in your position.”
“Thank you, Alex. That means a lot. Can I finish my story now?”
“Sure, but can you get to the virginity-losing part already? I'm going to need a bathroom break soon.”
“So, I finally arrived at a lovely little paradise haven called Byron Bay and it was there that I met this mildly attractive, intriguing yet over-sexually intimidating, twenty-seven-year-old German woman called Steffi.”
“Twenty-seven. And you were how old again?”
“Seventeen.”
“Wow. This is a surprise, Ryan. And you had the nerve to give me such a hard time over just a few years of age gap. You, grandmother-molester you.'
“Hey, she was the one who ended up molesting me. Plus, she was married but her husband worked back in Germany, and it had been a lifelong dream of hers to backpack through Oz. So he was happy to just let her go and get it out of her system, as long as she came back to him, of course, childless and STD-free.”
“Nice open-minded husband.”
“Although, I'm sure she didn’t disclose to him the part wherein she fornicated her way through most of the youth hostels in Australia and with any random backpacker or local she could possibly get her hands on.”
“Are you trying to say that she was a giant German slut, Ryan?”
“Something like that, aye. So we got talking one night at the hostel bar while also getting very, very drunk.”
“The main ingredients for most random sexual encounters.”
“And I ended up confessing to her about me and my ex-girlfriend's upsetting and disastrous virginity pledge. Now, I didn't know if this was a customary thing to do in Germany at the time, but she insisted, almost instantaneously, to loan me her vagina for the entire night. In fact, she pretty much grabbed me by the crotch and dragged me all the way back to her room, where she kept me hostage as her own, personal sex slave, mainly for her selfish, nymphomaniac needs and pleasures for the next three days.”
Alex chuckled and covered her mouth in shock.
“Oh, my goodness! That is almost like kidnap and rape of a minor.”
“That's exactly what I said but all the guys I told to at the hostel just pretty much laughed in my face and said how lucky I was to meet such a sexually-experienced virgin-deflowerer of teenage boys. So how about you, cheeky Czech girl? How did you lose the big V?”
Alex went quiet all of a sudden and slightly shook her head. I'd even go so far as to say that she looked a little uncomfortable.
“Oh, come on. I practically told you almost every little, sordid detail of my horrendous experience.”
“Well Ryan, there are just some things in this life that a young lady will not indulge in conversation with a complete stranger.”
Alex then stood to her feet while I remained seated upon the grass. I couldn't help but stare in a wondrous awe as the rays from the setting sun glistened all over the front of her lovely figure. She looked perfectly stunning in that light.
“So we're still strangers now, are we?” I continued. “I thought strangers were only people who hadn't already met or weren't on first-name terms with each other.”
“And what about last names?”
“Actually. Good point. Well, I'm Ryan Francis, and you are?”
“Just Alex. Plain Cheeky Czech girl Alex, remember?”
“You're not even gonna tell me your last name?”
“Ha! You can barely even pronounce my first.”
I chuckled at that and shook my head. I think I'd hit a nerve. I felt a little cheated that she didn't want to discuss her own 'loss of virginity' story with me, but I didn't want to push it. Not everyone's first time was as elegant and as comical as mine.
“So, do you want to eat something?” Alex said, completely changing the subject.
“Sure. We can do that.” I replied and, slowly but surely, I stood to my feet, too.