Caroline felt very alone as she watched her parents’ car disappear into the distance the day she was dropped off at St. Ursula’s, but being an only child and an introverted one at that, she was used to feeling alone. The sprawling Victorian boarding school was an entirely female institution, the only exceptions being the priests who officiated at Mass, confession, etc. and an elderly groundskeeper who mostly kept to himse...

Seated on the train, Erich stared out the window at the passing countryside and caught himself thinking back on the changes the past year had brought. He felt older. He was moving further and further away from the past and he knew it. Though he was not yet a man, he could no longer identify with the boy he had once been. Pulling himself back to the present moment, his focus shifted to the person seated across from him. Th...

The following Friday I received a note from Patrice saying he was in town and asking whether I was free to take lunch with him. I was travelling home in two days’ time, so I arranged to meet him at the Grande on Saturday afternoon. When I arrived at the hotel restaurant at half past one he was already waiting. Having met him only once before—and that in a darkened house where everyone was naked—it took me a moment to reco...

She and I had kept in touch, of course, if only through customary means. A thoughtful card at Christmas and on our respective birthdays, that sort of thing. When a letter arrived from her in the autumn, I was pleased to read that she would be in town the following month and invited me to catch up over coffee. The hotel bar was very grand in its tastefully understated way and I spotted her immediately, smiling warmly at me...

Vienna, 6th August 1900 My Dearest Kathi, Kindest thanks for your moving lines from 20th July. They were highly stimulating and have been a great comfort to me on more than one lonely night. Please forgive the lateness of my reply but it is only today that I have sufficiently recuperated from the events which I will now endeavour to put down on paper for your enjoyment. It will scarcely come as a surprise to you to learn...

Jane’s eyes flitted to the house across the street as she waited for her mother to unlock the front door. There was a black Jag parked in the drive, which meant that Mr Southgate was home. Or John, as she called him these days. She was, after all, sixteen now and no longer a child. John spent about half of the year abroad, and when he was away his car was locked up in his garage. A little grin crept across Jane’s lips at...

The timid panting of the young man beneath me was stifled by the pillow his glistening fingers clung to as I rhythmically impaled him with a passionate dedication. Despite his best attempts to be quiet he would let out a little moan now and again that caused a delectable twitching deep in my lower abdomen and I would counter the sensation by taking a deep breath and turning my face up toward the dark ceiling before focusi...

Stefan was a first-year violin student referred to me by my professor. A rather average posh kid of limited talent, he was only admitted into the conservatory because his father had called in a favour from a brother in-law who happened to be on friendly terms with the head of one of the departments. That aside, he was actually an altogether agreeable young man and, as different as we were, I sympathised with him. He could...

“What we did last night…” the boy ventured, compulsively thinking of sex as he watched his older temptress ease the cork out of a bottle of Merlot, “it…it wasn’t the first time for me.”Elisabeth turned and looked at him, eyebrow raised. “Is that so?”The boy nodded quickly, averting her gaze. She poured a glass for herself and one for him. “Anyone I know?” she inquired with a hint of playful suspicion as she handed his dri...

Vienna, 1899“Gustav!” a warm and familiar voice called and I turned to find a fellow student smiling at me, hands buried deep in his coat pockets to stave off the chilly April breeze.“Ah, Christian!” I called back, returning the smile as he approached me and shook my hand. After the customary comments on the weather he asked where I was going, and when I replied that I was on my way to look at a flat, he stopped me.“Movin...

That night he retired to his room a little earlier than usual. There was much on his mind that needed to be processed. He lay in bed for a while, just thinking about her. Reliving the sweet and splendid hours they had spent together. In his mind he went over what he was going to say to her the next day. He knew they were too young to be making plans but in a few years’ time he would be going off to university. He would st...

The year was 1901; the final year of my music studies at the conservatory. Franz was about ten years older than me and occasionally visited our class to lecture or give instruction as he was too young to acquire the position of a professor at the time, though he was on good terms with all of the teachers and many of the students. A respected young conductor, he was a mentor of sorts to me, having already achieved the stat...

Vienna, 1899We turned the corner and arrived in the notorious Spittelberg Alley. I knew the place by reputation, but the thought of visiting it had never crossed my mind before that evening. My friend, on the other hand, seemed perfectly at ease. And he was not the only one, I noticed as I spotted a number of well-dressed men either going into or coming out of the houses lining the street. This was one of the few places i...