Undercover

As every story worthy of a read should feature at least one dilemma, let's take a look and see just how our hero got himself hoisted on the horns of his particular problem. There he is; just turned eighteen at the start of the brave new decade that will gradually unravel over the course of the 1970s. His name's Simon and he seems at first glance to have it all; intelligence, as much wealth as most and more wealth than some, plus the face of an angelic choir boy that you'd swear could charm even dead birds out of the trees. Unfortunately though, his youthful charms aren't working on girls of around his own age. This is due to his insurmountable shyness. Even a casual "Hi" said to him in passing by a young cutie is enough to bring him out in a cold sweat and have him mumbling something incoherent to his shoes in response. Consequently, his sex-life has never evolved beyond masturbating over magazine pictures of scantily clad young lovelies in his bedroom.

This is okay as far as it goes, in that it at least keeps him from gnawing his own legs off in sexual frustration: but those semen splashed girly images lying on his bed lack a certain quality that would really bring them to life for Simon. Namely, movement.

So, to remedy this and with no small trepidation, Simon's now heading for the Cameo cinema. This is a flea-pit of a place that manages to survive by showing a continuous stream of soft porn continental movies. It's regarded locally as a haven for gentlemen of questionable moral taste, or as they're more generally called, "the dirty raincoat brigade." This generic term covers peeping toms, indecent exposers, and exponants of just about every other sexual perversion you might care to name. Hence Simon's trepidation in going to such a place. What if someone who knows him sees him going in there, his reputation will be . . . maybe a little more interesting than it currently is?