Bust a guy in the balls in the Confederacy and you’ll lose yours’. That’s the law. Ballbusting, however, isn’t the only crime in the Confederacy that is punishable by castration.

“Neil is going to come out this summer! Isn’t that exciting!” Mom was always enthused about visiting relatives.

“Yeah, I guess,” I replied. I didn’t have a lot of love for my cousin. I didn’t actually dislike the kid; I actually envied the lucky little asshole. I hadn’t seen him in three years but we kept in touch over the Internet, and he was always bragging about what a good time he was having in Jefferson.

Different states in the Confederacy have slightly different laws. Ballbusting, of course, in prohibited nationwide, as Axel the foreign exchange student that had been living with us painfully discovered, and population control is rigidly enforced everywhere. Prostitution is legal throughout the Confederacy but is regulated by each state. Here in Texas the legal age is nineteen, the same as Montana, but they have sheep there. In South Florida, the island once known as Cuba, there is no control and boys as young as eleven and twelve go at it anytime they please. Out in Jefferson the age limit is fifteen and every citizen is entitled to two free pops a week. Neil had turned fifteen last fall and every week since he e-mailed me all the details about what a good time he was having and about what all I was missing out on and now he’s going to come down here and flick me shit about still being a virgin. The asshole. Oh well, I’d be heading off to boot camp for my mandatory year of Guards training in two weeks, so I wouldn’t have to put up with him for long.

“Dude! How’s it hanging?” Neil said with a sly grin. We were back home in The Swamp, my bedroom suite, and he was changing from his traveling clothes into shorts and a tee shirt and had stripped nude and turned face me to make sure I got an eyeful of his stuff. I had sort of visualized him still being the same way he’d been three years ago at his last visit; a twelve-year-old prepubescent child in awe of the masculine hairiness of his twin fourteen year old cousins’ adolescent bodies and functions, but now he was taller and more mature looking than me, but no larger between the legs, and my twin brother had passed away.

“Great!” I answered, figuring he was wondering how big my cock was, “I graduated last week and I’ll be heading off to the Guards right after my birthday.” After all, I was a Man and he would still be an insignificant Boy for another three years, and although he walked with a swagger and carried a degree of confidence that I wouldn’t earn until the night of my nineteen birthday, I was still superior to him as far as our mandatory Guard service was concerned and I played this slight edge to the max.

“Boot camp, advanced training, then probably a posting to South Florida,” which was considered to be the best duty a horny kid could draw.

“Yeah, I’ve heard about those babes down there. Do you need some pointers?” He leered, referring to my virginity. Promiscuity isn’t tolerated in the Confederacy and youngsters are encouraged to remain virgins until they either get married or are old enough to patronize the bordellos, which are state supported and inspected. This is supposed to preserve one of the most cherished values of the Old South: The Purity of young women. That is why violators of sex crimes are dealt with so harshly and that is also why the anti-pornography laws are so strict and all encompassing.

“Don’t worry,” I said somewhat sarcastically. “If you were able to figure it out I’m sure that I won’t have any trouble.” He backed off and I chilled out, and we headed downtown so I could show him some of the local sights. I took him by the high school that had seemed like such an important part of my life until a week ago, and then down to the local mall, where we ran into a girl I knew.

Crystal had also just graduated and she would be starting her Civil Defense training about the same time I would be going into the Guards. She had always been shy and reserved and a very conservative dresser, but a couple of months ago she had come out of her shell and was now a lot of fun. She would technically still be a virgin on her wedding night, but she gave great hand jobs and had hinted that she might go down on the right guy. Her cousin Diane was fifteen and visiting for the summer. She seemed to like Neil, so I stood back to watch Mr. Smooth work his magic.

Crystal and Diane wanted to go to a street fair in a nearby town so we piled in my car. It was dark when we left there and I drove out to a park I knew about where Crystal and I took a walk and left Neil and Diane to fend for themselves. “Thanks for driving us to Dover,” Crystal said as we sat on a bench in the moonlight, “and, thanks for introducing your cousin to Diane. I think she likes him.” Then Crystal opened my fly and kneeled in front of me and really thanked me.

Neil was leaning on the car when we got back, looking pissed off about something, and Diane was inside with the doors locked. “Please take me home,” she said icily after opening the door, and then added “I’ll sit up front with you guys, if you don’t mind.” She squeezed in beside Crystal and left Neil alone in the back seat.

“So, Ace, how did you do?” I asked Neil after we had dropped the girls off.

“God damned bitch!” He answered. “Must be some kind of prude or something. Hell, I offered her all I had for a little lip service, and she got all upset and kicked me out of the car. Can you believe it?”

“You dumb fuck!” I laughed. Mr. Smooth had learned everything he knew about girls from whoring around. Even though I wasn’t old enough for Texas bordellos I still knew how the system worked, partly because he had told me all about it. All guys in Jefferson applied for their Permit Cards sometime before they turned fifteen, but the cards weren’t activated until the day of their birthdays. After that, they could take the card to any bordello and get two free lays a week. They had to pay for additional ones and they were responsible for tipping the girls. Also, the Card only paid for the basic service; anything more exotic, like the blowjob I’d just gotten, had to be negotiated and paid extra for. A guy’s fifteen birthday was special though, and the gals all made sure that the little fucker got all he could handle and went home completely spermed out. The Permit Card was a guy’s most valuable possession and could be suspended for a time for unseemly behavior or completely revoked if the transgression was serious. Neil knew he couldn’t screw her, so he’d offered to pay her to blow him. He’d treated her like a common prostitute and she’d shut him down, and now she’d probably tell the whole town about Donny White’s asshole cousin.

I explained Neil’s error to him but he still seemed mystified, as if he hadn’t a clue that girls were actually people too and had feelings that had to be respected. I also reminded him that his cherished Permit Card wasn’t any good in Texas and unless he was planning on satisfying himself by jacking off, he’d better buy Diane some flowers or candy and apologize to her. That might be enough to get him a hand job, anyway.

I went to bed contented. It had been my first blowjob in a long time and the second ever by a girl, and I knew for sure that I had the right stuff. I may not have been the stud that my cousin claimed to be but at least I had gotten laid. Sort of, anyway.

“Do you still do, you know, that thing that you and Danny used to do?” Neil asked, just before I had drifted off to sleep. Adolescent homosexuality is encouraged in Confederate Texas. Getting comfortable with your own body by way of learning about other boys’ bodies is considered to be a normal part of growing up, and all young adolescents become familiar with the taste and texture and girth of their buddies cocks, and naturally those of their twin brothers. Danny and I had given our hairless prepubescent cousin a demonstration the last time Neil had visited, and although he hadn’t been capable of participating he evidently remembered it well.

“No,” I answered, “guys get a little older and they usually don’t do that stuff anymore.”

“Oh.” He almost sounded disappointed. I slept great that night, and the next morning there was a big wad of toilet paper on the floor beside Neil’s bed.

I convinced Crystal to persuade her cousin to give Neil another chance, and a week later we were all together in The Swamp. Diane had conned Crystal into showing her how to make boys happy, and today’s lesson was The Hand Job. Neil and I were sprawled out beside each other on the edge of my bed; pants around out ankles, and the girls were doing their thing. “Go slow, like this,” Crystal instructed her cousin. “Don’t rush, they can do that themselves. The thing is to keep them aroused for as long as you can, almost to where they can’t stand it anymore, then bring them off. Also, don’t forget their balls. They’re really sensitive too. Rub them just like this.” Expert advice, it was.

Neil may have preferred a good fuck but he certainly wasn’t bitching about what Diane was doing, either. His eyes were closed and his head back, trying his best not to pop. I couldn’t help but notice that his cock wasn’t any longer than mine and was much thinner. Neil finally couldn’t take it any more and popped off like a hose, and that pushed me over the edge too.

“Yuck!” Diane said, tasting the finger that she’d run through the white ropes that adorned Neil’s hairless belly. “It tastes awful! How could you, you know?” She asked Crystal before running to the bathroom to wash out her mouth.

I left for Guards two days after that evening, and I never saw Neil or Diane again and Crystal never spoke to me after seeing me off. She left for her Civil Defense training about the same time, and Neil decided to try and further Diane’s education. He convinced her that girls in Jefferson were always naked when they gave hand jobs, as were the guys. She fell for it and when things got hot and heavy he jumped her bones.

All males convicted of forcible rape are castrated, but the sentence is delayed until minors turn eighteen, at which time a special castration jury meets to review the evidence and confirm, or in rare instances, set aside the sentence. In the meantime Neil was to be incarcerated at a prison work school, which is about the same as slavery in Texas. He made it almost a year there but about the time I was ending my Guards active duty he escaped and fled North to the Union. Six months later a bounty hunter collected a five thousand dollar reward by returning Neil’s severed scrotum to the same judge who had sentenced him, along with pictures that showed the sixteen year old boy’s ruined crotch and the pain and anguish on his young face. These pictures were posted throughout the confederacy as a reminder of the consequences of breaking the law, and they are the most lasting impression I have of my cousin.