When did the feeling of daddy and sonny-boy come to an end?
Was it when Dad divorced Mom?
That didn't seem likely.
Because that should have brought us closer together, he and I.
As though it had not been a divorce, but a death in the family, the death of the one without whom the family itself would not have been possible.
Except that it did hot happen that way.
Maybe if it had, things would have been different.
We would still have been a family.
I could have visited Mom, or she could have come to see me.
I was even ass hole enough to think it would work that way.
But I guess, when you're seventeen, about to become eighteen, about to graduate and go out into the world on your own, the "child" is seen by the court as almost a man in his own fight.
And since my dad already called the lamp shop "Smith & Son", and I happen to be the son thereof, there wasn't much question of custody, visitation, or anything else about the offspring.
And as for Mom's wanting to see me, that was another laugh.
She had been distant from me, from both of us, for a very long time.
She had gone through the motions-keeping house, cooking the meals, doing the laundry-as though it was some kind of low-wage, hourly-rated, unskilled labor.
Which, by her estimation, I suppose it was.
Because she allowed. Dad to buy his half of the house, getting herself a small condo.
In another city.
She wanted nothing to do with me or him.
Which was perhaps my fault as much as Dad's.
The things we did-fishing, hunting, working out at the gym-were not so much designed to exclude her as they were inherently nothing in which she would have the least interest or inclination.
Even the business, successful as it was, was just Dad during the day, Dad and me after school, weekends, summer vacations.
Because it was so simple.
You got everything from the glass factory or overseas.
You put the glassware bases on one end of the belt, started it up, and walked them down the line, assembling as you went.
And it was a beautiful business.
Because the whole of the quantity was equal to ever so much more than the sum of its parts.
I mean, you took three to five dollars worth of parts and turned them into a ten to twenty dollar lamp.
At least, that's what Dad charged the five and dime stores.
And they were happy to get them at that price.
So that we were making a damned good living.
Low overhead, high profits, and the corporation bit, so that the taxes were low.
Maybe if I had decided to go to college, things would have been different.
But it made no sense.
I was sucking down big bucks, fresh out of high school.
Because, with me able to make lamps full time, Dad talked the buyers into giving larger orders.
True, he could have gotten a guy to help him, maybe even hired a couple of them so he could play executive.
But that didn't appeal to him.
Because it was like pissing away part of the profits.
Like Dad said,
"Listen, Jack, you know what your labor's worth?"
I shrugged.
I knew a rhetorical question when I heard one.
"Nothing!"
And I started to get pissed.
But he continued,
"Your labor, mine-nothing.
"Because we gotta stick around anyway, suckin' air, see?"
"So, while we're hangin' around, suckin' air, we may as well do somethin' with our hands.
"So you tell me-why do I hafta shell out good dough so some other bums can keep busy while they're suckin' air?"
You can't argue with logic like that.
And Dad was nothing if not logical.
Everything he did made sense in strictly practical terms.
And those were the only terms with which he ever dealt.
I don't recall my father ever expressing one philosophical idea, one so-called higher thought.
I even asked him about it once.
"You know what philosophy is?"
The old rhetorical-question again.
"Bullshit. That's what it is.
"People start spoutin' a buncha crap, they sound like your mother.
"She was good at that.
"Always on my back about 'higher values', or, 'meaning in life*.
"Shit like that, you know?
"Got to the point that we could never talk.
"Two different worlds.
"Tell ya the truth, I think she was from Mars ta begin with.
"Lucky you look like me, or there could be a problem."
I suspect that I looked like him on the inside, that is, the way I thought, as well as on the outside.
The sized, the muscle, they were his and therefore mine, right enough.
But it was more than that.
The physical world, that was where it was at.
Aesthetics?
Other peoples' tastes.
Not that we were cynical, bitter, overly critical, or anything.
Just the opposite.
We just plain didn't give a shit.
Slowly, as furniture or bedding or linens or anything got worn out, had to be replaced in the house, it was done with plain stuff.
No frills, no decorations.
One day, Dad and I packed up every last knick-knack, every piece of bric-a-brac, and shipped it to Mom, along with most of the books in the house.
Dad and I did not miss them, any more than we missed her.
We did everything together.
We ate together, worked together, and played together.
As for excitement, well, perhaps we weren't all that close.
I was dating a few girls.
And Dad also was going out, seeing-people.
I asked him why he never brought them home, but he said it was because he wasn't that serious about any of them.
I told him I wasn't that serious about any of the girls, but that I still brought them around once in a while.
He said that that was because I was a good kid.
But that he himself was no longer either good or a kid.
So his dates were on a more
"gut level", as he put it.
I don't know.
Maybe a person sees just what he wants to see.
I would often see Dad in the locker room at the gym, talking quietly, intently to some guy, breaking it up if I came too close.
Meaning close enough to hear what they were talking about.
But I never asked him what it was about.
And he never explained.
Or even introduced me to the guy.
"Who was that?"
"Oh, just some guy I know."
Enlightening, right?
And there were evenings when we would run into each other, coming back from a date.
"How was yours?"
"Terrific! Yours?"
"Oh, okay, I guess."
"Waddaya mean, okay?"
"Nice enough girl, Dad, but nothin' to get serious over."
"Waddaya mean, serious?"
"I mean like-committed."
"Well, son, I tell ya-There's serious and then there's ... serious, know what I mean?"
And he pumped fist and forearm suggestively.
"Yeah, well, Dad, these are young girls, you know, and I am a gentleman."
"Oh, are you now?
"An' would ye be after puttin' on airs, foin gentleman that ya are, boyo?"
"Come on, Dad, knock off the accent.
"You know what I mean.
"I can't do like you with the worldly people you see.
"I mean, what if I was to get one pregnant?"
"Well, there's no danger of that with my dates, I can tell ya!
"I'm perfectly safe on that score."
And I actually thought that he meant because of precautions they took.
"Ya mean ya don't fool around at all?" he asked.
"Oh, we do everything but."
"Well, there's something to be said for that, then, I suppose," he conceded.
"After all, a hole's a hole."
"Well put, Dad."
"Well, it's true enough, Jack.
"What difference does it make, as long as the feeling is there?
"The feeling and the feeling and the feeling, that's
" all there is.
"And the rest is bullshit and don't you be forgettin' ya heard it here first."
"Words to live by."
"Damn straight!"
Sarcasm was wasted on him.
So it went.
Until one night, when he pushed it further.
"So," he continued.
"Tell me about it."
"It?"
"Do they give ya a blowjob?"
"They do."
"Do they letcha take 'em in the ass?"
"Really, Dad, I-"
"Just answer the question, lad!
"Or are ya ashamed of what cha do, like maybe it won't stand up ta the light of day?"
"It's not that, Dad.
"It's just-you're my father."
"Well I should hope so.
"And by the look of ya, there's not much doubtin' the truth of that."
"That's not what I meant."
"Oh? And what didja mean then?"
"I meant, I meant-forget it."
"Forget it.
"Man asks his best friend and constant companion a simple question and he's told ta forget it."
I looked at him then.
We had had conversations before but this was the first time he had pressed me like this.
And I didn't know why and I didn't know where it was leading.
But I decided to find out.
"Okay, Dad.
"Yeah, there is one.
"There is one that I fuck in the ass.
"And I eat her and she eats me."
"Swallow yer come does she?"
This was too much.
"Dad, what do you want?
"You want me to write you a fuck book here and now?"
"Merely curious ta see how you're gettin' along out there in the world, Jack."
"Why, Dad? Why?"
"Because," he sighed, pacing the living room,
"we go around just the one time in this world, we do."
"Yeah, so?"
Could it be the old man was mellowing, becoming philosophical, and him not yet forty-five?
This oughtta be good.
"So, it wouldn't hardly do for ya ta be all hung up in yer sex life.
"'Cause that's the only life there is, really.
"Your mother never believed that, but I do.
"A man's alive only when he's in the saddle.
"A man's a man only when he's in the saddle.
"A man doesn't understand that, he's wastin' his time.
"And the problem with the ladies is, they just don't understand that.
"They're always draggin' their moods, their status in life, the way the world's treated them, tomorrow's grocery list, and the kitchen sink ta bed, right alongside 'em."
"You want some, they don't.
"They letcha have it as a favor.
"And favors, as anyone can tell ya, have ta be paid back.
"So it all turns into a kind of whorin', is what it does.
"I give you a little now, and in return, here's what you hafta do fer me.'
"Until the politics of it, the balance sheets of it, are marvels to behold.
"And you tell me, now, what's that to do with life?
"Not a helluva lot, I can tell ya.
"And meantime, a man's juices build up.
"And not just down here," and he grabbed his cock through his trousers,
"but up here as well," and he tapped his head.
"So a man ends up sayin' to himself, 'If touchin' the flesh', if usin' the flesh is all that important, and I can see by the feel of meself that it is, then what's to be done?'
"What's to be done?"
"What is, Dad?"
"Whatever it takes, son, whatever it takes.
"The path of least resistance, as they say."
"And why are you asking me all these things, telling me all these things?"
"Ta make damn sure you're not fucked up in the head.
"To see to it that you've got no hangups.
"Because they'll drive ya crazy, lad.
"Kill ya, they will, like a cancer in the brain, growin' an' growin' an' there's no help for it and no way out.
"You're young, Jack.
"You've gotcher whole life ahead of ya.
"Don't waste the years, Jack! Don't waste the opportunities. Don't limit yourself! Don't blow it, Jack!"
"What are you, what are you-advising?"
"Deny yourself nothing, Jack, in the way of what your mind desires.
"Don't fight it.
"Go with the flow, is what I'm sayin'.
"Now, I can see by what you've been doin' that you're not off to such a bad start.
"But it ain't all that great, either?"
"You mean because I haven't fucked a girl in the cunt yet?
"I've got some very real concerns there, Dad."
"I know ya do, son.
"That's the trouble with women.
"All their concerns are real, as real as the one ya just named.
"I haven't denied that, have I?
"Oh, they're real enough all right.
"As real as tomorrow's sunrise, they are.
"And yet, a man has to be free.
"That, or give up bein' a man."
"Then what's to be done, Dad?"
"I've said as much as I dare, Jack.
"You can lead the horse to water, as they say, but if you have to explain to him that what he's lookin' at is wet, then he's not yet ready to drink.
"Go with the flow, is all I can say."
Go with the flow.
Arcane advice, for alt its simplicity.
And for all the intensity with which it was delivered.
What Dad said made a lot of sense and no sense at all.
"It's late, Jack.
"We both need a good night's rest.
"A lot of work to be done in the morning, you know."
And he trudged off to bed.
And I?
I went to my room, determined to sort all this out next morning, and slept soundly.
* * *
Morning.
Breakfast.
As though the conversation of last night had not happened.
Everything normal.
Work.
Busy, as Dad said we would be.
Fast lunch.
Still, everything was not ready when the truck showed up.
"Better get us some more help, Dad?"
"Not a bit of it, me lad.
"I'll stay tonight."
"But I thought we were going to the gym."
He shrugged.
"A man's gotta do-"
"Okay, Dad.
"You stay.
"You be the hero.
"But I'm not.
"Because this is getting really ridiculous.
"The orders are getting heavier and heavier and there's still just the two of us humping this shit out."
"Yes, well, perhaps we'll hit a slack period and you'll see the sense of it.
"The light at the end of the tunnel, as it were."
"Don't count on it."
Clearly, Dad wanted to change the subject.
"There's roast beef in the fridge, but I'm not sure it's enough."
"That's okay, Dad, I'll eat out, on my way over there."
"Or after, son. After would be better."
"Yeah, right."
* * *
I decided to take Dad's advice.
I wanted to go up on the weights and tonight I was scheduled to work the upper body.
The increase and the area of concentration militated against a heavy meal beforehand.
And I'm a big guy, so heavy meals are the only kind I eat.
So here I was, changing into my gym stuff at my locker.
"Hey, where's your partner in crime?"
He was big.
Bigger than me.
And older, going bald.
And changing just as I was, getting ready.
And smiling.
"My what?"
"Partner in crime.
"I've seen how you guys cheat on some of your movements."
"Guys? Oh, you mean me and my fa-me and the guy I work out with."
Don't ask me why, but I didn't want to blow Dad's image at the gym.
There was just a bunch of guys.
Relationships, they didn't count; getting built did.
"You really think we cheat?"
The man shrugged.
"Your curls. If you bent any further back, they'd be leg lifts.
I laughed.
"My partner's not here tonight.
"But I am working uppers,
"Care to watch my form, since you seem to be such an expert?"
"Don't hafta be an expert ta see where you guys are goin' wrong.
"Name's Larry, by the way."
"Jack."
We shook.
"And your partner, the one who's not here?"
"That'd be my-that's Bill."
"Bill, he repeated.
And I looked at him a bit funny, trying to remember.
Because I was almost sure I had seen my father talking to him one time, in one of those strange, intense conversations.
"I thought you already knew Bill."
"Seen 'im around is all, just like you."
"Guess I was mistaken."
"Whatever.
"Shall we hit it?"
"I, uh, probably don't need that much help," I said, not wanting to impose on the guy's exercise time. "Just for the curls, I think."
"Mostly for the curls," he conceded. "I'll be around."
The curls come last for me on the upper body routine.
They're the killers.
Every routine I do ends with a killer, the one thing I go all out on, limping off to the showers an exhausted, semi-cripple after such intensity.
So I sort of kept an eye out for the guy, just to make sure he was sticking around.
He was.
And doing some quite impressive bench presses.
I couldn't see his build beneath the bulky sweats, but, judging by the iron he was pumping, that couldn't be liverwurst underneath there.
Finally, I was ready for the curls.
He was making the wall pulleys sing, their elevators loaded to the max, as he pulled them out, facing away from them, clicking the handles together in front of himself.
He looked up, sweat beading and dribbling on his face, and smiled.
And completed his set before grabbing his towel from a wall peg and mopping his face with it.
"All set?" he asked.
"You tell me," I said, leading him over to the bar, picking it up. He watched as I did the first set.
"When you're curling almost your own weight, gravity takes its toll on form," he said.
"So you're always gonna lean back a little at the peak of each rep.
"But if you put your feet about a foot wider apart, it won't be too bad."
I looked at him and picked up the bar, as soon as I got my breath back, careful this time to place my feet as he had suggested.
And I was glad I had not gone up on the weights on this exercise.
Because the better form made for a tougher lift.
But the strain was in all the right places, namely both heads of the biceps.
"Feel better?" he asked.
"Better and worse both," I replied.
And he laughed knowingly.
"Come on, sport," he said, "one more set and we hit the showers."
Chapter II
I watched him undress.
Like me, he had to literally peel the soaked sweatshirt and pants off.
And I saw him looking at me, as though keeping pace.
The guy was massive!
Not all that tall, his muscles seemed to be heavy and thick, the pattern of sparse hair on his chest emphasizing the bulk of his pectorals.
But his arms, his legs were also hugely muscled, requiring a bit more definition, perhaps, but wanting nothing in size.
He shook out his long, thick cock, with its rounded head a knob, eye pointing to the floor.
And, as he led the way to the shower, towel in hand, I could see the motion of the massive mounds of his rounded, protruding buttocks, as well as the broad slope of his back and the bulging twin heads of his calves.
"You musta started really young to get built the way you are, as young as you are," he commented, adjusting his shower head.
"How young do you think I am?" I asked.
He shrugged.
"Twenty, maybe twenty-one, I guess."
"That's about right," I replied, wondering how he had come so close.
Because, with my clothes off, my body is the main feature, and bodies don't show their exact age all that closely.
But perhaps, I reasoned, he's merely a good guesser.
And we soaped up and showered off in silence.
Except.
Was it my imagination, or was he lingering unduly on the attention he paid to his private parts?
Granted, beneath sweats and underpants and jockstraps, cock and balls took a sweatsoaked, oxygen-starved beating, still, it was hardly necessary to soap and fondle them until you had the start of a hard-on.
And the ass hole, if kept clean, did not require all that extensive and thorough, one might say meticulous scrubbing out, aimed in the direction of the guy across the way in the shower.
But that's the way it was going down.
And the guy was looking at me and smiling the whole time.
"Have you eaten yet?" Larry asked, as we finished up.
"No," I replied.
"No, I haven't. Why?"
"Because I haven't either.
"So what say we hit the chow line together? My treat."
"Sounds good to me," I replied.
He smiled and, it seemed to me, swaggered slightly as we went back to our lockers.
And made rather a production of putting his cock into his briefs.
But we were dressed and on our way, walking to a nearby tavern.
"They have excellent fish here," Larry said. "Broiled is best, of course, but even their fried is quite palatable."
I order halibut, he swordfish.
"Split a pitcher?" he asked.
I nodded assent.
We ate and drank in silence.
Which I thought rather odd.
Because he had just met me, he had invited me to a supper for which he was paying, and yet he did not ask me the most rudimentary of questions.
Perhaps he was expecting me to carry the ball.
You know, like he had done his share and now it was my turn.
So-
"You work around here?" I asked.
"Yes, I work in an office."
Which meant that he could be a mail boy, a corporate vice president, or something in between.
He named a large office building.
No help.
And a large firm, a mail order house headquarters.
No help.
"I have a nice bachelor pad, quite near where I work.
"Condo, actually. I own the place.
"So I can pretty well do as I please there.
"Privacy, you know?
"Person needs privacy, wouldn't you say?
"I mean, our home life, our private lives, are nobody's business but our own, right?"
"Sorry," I said.
"Didn't mean to pry."
"Oh, no, no, no, no, no, no!" he chuckled, putting a hand on my wrist.
"That's not what I meant at all!
"I'm so terribly sorry, if you misunderstood me, if you thought that I meant-never mind.
"No, what I meant was that I was perfectly free to entertain whomever I wished, to invite whomever I wanted to my home.
"And that we-I-could come and go as I pleased, without restrictions of any kind."
I looked at him oddly.
"Me too," I said, actually intending to convey, "So what?"
"Marvelous, isn't it?" he asked.
"It?"
"To be free, to he free as a bird, free to do anything one wants with and in one's life."
"I, uh ... wouldn't have it any other way," I responded, tone still puzzled.
And took another swig of the beer.
Cold beer is an oddity after a workout.
It's both crisp and calming, refreshing and relaxing.
"Here's to us," he said, holding his mug aloft. "Two consenting adults."
I clinked mugs with him.
"I'll go along with that," I said.
"But, uh, just what is it we are consenting to?"
"To that which gives us pleasure and does no harm to others!"
"Words to live by," I shrugged.
And chugged the mug.
He laughed and joined me.
We finished the supper.
"Anything else, gentlemen?"
Larry gestured at me, inquiring.
"Uh, no, no thanks.
"I've had quite enough.
"Maybe even-a little too much."
"Nonsense! You look just fine to me."
To the waiter, "Just bring me the check, please."
And I finished the pitcher as the check came and Larry paid.
"Well," he said.
"What say we go over to my place and I'll show you the wonders of the well appointed hacienda for one?"
I got up, and felt the beer.
I was not drunk, but my teeth were anesthetized.
I was not unsteady, but rather too steady, too deliberate in my gait as we left the tavern.
And something was bothering me, about the bachelor pad.
And it was that he had not asked anything about me, so bow could be know that I also was not the proud owner of a smashing living arrangement?
Or was not also-or however it went when things were less hazy.
He couldn't.
Or could he?
And did it matter?
And I kept gnashing my teeth together, anxious, without really knowing why, for the feeling to return.
As we walked the pleasant night streets of the pleasant neighborhood in each others' pleasant company.
Everything was suddenly so damned pleasant, so terribly, exquisitely comfortable.
"Ah, here we are!" he said.
A uniformed doorman, seated before a console of screens that monitored the hallways, started to rise, recognized Larry, saluted, and went back to his newspaper.
Seeing me looking at the array of blue-white pictures, Larry said, "Not to worry, my dear.'
"They are strictly for the public areas.
"I hope.
"Otherwise, I fear that dear Albert could blackmail the shit out of me!"
And he laughed uproariously.
And, for reasons not clear to me, I joined right in.
We took the elevator to his floor.
The seventh.
I know that now.
At the time, I was busy retaining my equilibrium against the gravitational phenomena of a stopping elevator, an event that had never bothered me before in the least.
"Et voila!" be exclaimed, letting us in.
White walls.
Large, unframed paintings, abstracts in mostly yellow, with black, white and red splashes superimposed.
White walls and ceilings and everything else pearl grey and chromium and glass.
"Makes quite a statement, doesn't it?" he asked.
"Uh, yes."
And for some reason, I was eager for him to tell me just what the statement was.
Read it for me, will you Lare? Because I am particularly dense tonight.
But I did not dare say this aloud, lest I be thought gauche.
And why am I talking swishy here?
Perhaps it's because Larry was.
Or so it seemed, through the beery haze.
Which was not a haze, but more of a barrier, invisible, cocoon-like, which put me one step (but only one step) removed from bare reality.
So that I was not so much drunk as I was an observer, as the scene unfolded, panel by panel, as in a comic strip, before me.
I am a camera.
This is what comes of watching too many TV documentaries.
Still, I was perceiving.
Whoever the fuck "I" was supposed to be, at the moment.
And Larry had definitely gone limp in the wrists.
So that he was prancing around the apartment in a burlesque of the imitation of somebody imitating Betty Davis.
Even to the point of sounding like it.
And all I could think of was, If he says,
"Philip, Philip, Philip!" I'm walking.
Instead, he asked, "Would you like an after-dinner drink?"
"Uh, no thanks, I've had too much to drink already, apparently."
"Ah, yes.
"Beer will do that to one, if one is dehydrated and one's stomach is empty."
"My fault," I said.
"I shoulda watched myself."
Or better yet, drunk water instead.
But it was too late for such considerations now.
The damage had been done.
Except that it had not-yet.
"Why don't you loosen your clothing? Perhaps you'll feel better."
"How do ya loosen a sweatshirt?"
"Good point.
"By taking it off, I rather imagine."
I shrugged.
And took it off swiftly, dexterously, as though to prove to myself that I was still capable of decisive movement.
And sat there, bare-chested, on an over-upholstered, oversized couch covered in pale gray canvas, my forearms trapped in my sleeves.
Larry laughed.
"Here, let me help you," he said.
And he tugged on the sweatshirt as I sat back.
And he staggered backward as it came loose and I fell back onto the couch, both of us laughing uproariously.
He tossed the sweatshirt onto the matching huge armchair.
And I remember it, a spot of bright red against the pearly, pearlescent grey.
And people who are not drunk would not remember such details.
And yet, for some reason, he had to help me to a seating position on the couch.
And remain beside me, close to me, perched on the edge of the couch, both hands bracing me, one on a shoulder, the other on a knee.
"You all right?" he asked. "I mean, you promise not to fall back over, if I leave go?"
I have never properly understood the mechanics of alcohol.
That, in part, is why I have a tendency to shun it, except on rare occasions.
Because, at a certain point, a person assumes a certain bent of the mind, in which, on the one hand, you are convinced that, while not entirely in command of your faculties, you are not, in any sense of the word, drunk.
And yet, very clearly, to a part of your mind at least, you are.
And you know you are.
Except that you will be all right, as long as you don't move.
Yes, as long as you sit or lean or lie like some kind of puppet or rag doll, you will be all right.
The mind is clear.
Only the body is slightly anesthetized, slightly out of control.
And perhaps anesthetized is the wrong word.
Because certainly there is feeling.
And in fact, it is a very good, a very comfortable, a very warm, very intimate feeling.
So that the hostile becomes neutral, while the neutral turns friendly.
So that the chrome and glass and ugly abstracts become mere background which does not offend.
Whereas this soft, large couch becomes a warm, responsive, cradling environment.
Where I have been joined by positively the most likeable person in the room, other than myself, of whom I am particularly fond at the moment.
Who is expressing concern for my welfare, or at least for my physical equilibrium.
And I will not put him down.
I will not deny him his value, his function, his concern.
If he is holding me up, then obviously it is for my own good and I need, I require, I could sustain serious injury, without such holding up.
So that I lean toward him, into him,
"Whoa there, friend," I hear him say, gently (and his voice is tinged with concern), "we had better get you into bed until you're feeling better."
And he helps me to my feet.
And, since I am not drunk, I am perfectly capable of walking.
Except that I do not choose to.
Because I guess I am a little under the weather after all.
Oh, I could if I wanted to, but this is so much more-fun.
So that I am not drunk, but a person playing at being drunk.
And yet, is it not my having drunk too much, whatever one cares to call it, that is causing me to behave this way?
And he is strong.
So that, big as I am, he has no problem, one of my arms over his (big, broad, muscular) shoulders, the other around his (hard, sturdy) body.
And we are going into his bedroom (or is it that the bedroom has materialized around us?).
Where he gently sits me onto the edge of the bed.
And I, drunk that I am (except that I am not; I don't have to act this way) flop backwards onto the bed.
Where he will not doubt undress me-
But he does not.
It is himself that he undresses, stripping quickly, efficiently, his face turned toward me, to see if I move.
Which I do not.
Although I probably could, if I wanted to.
Which I do not.
And only after he is completely naked does he bend over me.
And I can see the great shoulders as they bend toward me.
And I can see biceps and forearms working, as they undo my belt.
And strip my pants off, my underpants along with them.
And I laugh as they are stuck on my shoes, which he has forgotten to remove.
And he shares my mirth as he kneels, so that I can only see the top of his balding head, gleaming dully in the indirect light of the bedroom.
And finally, I am naked.
As naked as he is.
And he swings my legs up, centering me in the bed.
And I laugh.
Because again, he has gotten the cart before the horse.
So that now, his big cock dangles in my face, closer than any cock has ever dangled before.
So that I see the thick flange of its big head, the vein at the top of it, the configuration of his bush, as he pulls the covers down around me.
And I am warm and comfortable and relaxed and he is about to tuck me in where I will sleep off this whatever it is.
Sure he is.
Sure I will.
That's why he's in bed with me, and we're both naked, right?
And yet, at the time, it all made sense.
No it didn't.
That was a lie that part of me believed.
Maybe.
Maybe none of me believed it.
Maybe all of me knew that something was happening that had never happened before.
To me.
And yet, not to me.
It was happening to the me there on the bed as the all seeing eye of camera/me watched and did not participate.
As Larry arranged my head on a pillow.
And propped himself up, back against another pillow against the upholstered headboard.
So that the cock in his lap was facing me, the ruddy eye of the plum head staring right into my face.
As Larry gently ran a hand over my shoulders and kneaded my pectorals as though they were a woman's breasts.
Assuming, of course, that Larry in fact kneaded a woman's breasts.
Or anything else of a woman's.
Which on the surface of it appeared highly unlikely at the moment.
As he twisted his body toward me.
So that his heavy equipment flopped down, touching my shoulder.
And I, who could not move, was moving.
As I turned toward the dangling organ.
But I did nothing.
I looked at it at close range, finding it odd that a male sex organ should, for the first time in my life, occupy so much area of my vision.
And now, one hand on the back of my head-not pushing, just there-with the other, Larry picked up his dong.
And rubbed the huge, rounded head against my lips.
And I could have pulled back.
I could have sat up.
But I did not.
Because it was-easier.
The path of least resistance, someone had told me, or I had heard or read somewhere.
Go with the flow, I seemed to hear a voice saying to me.
Just let it happen.
Just let it.
Just let.
Just.
Juff-
And the head of his cock was inside my lips, scrubbing itself against my closed teeth.
And just doing it.
Not insisting, not pressing, not calling for re-enforcements from the hulk to which it was attached.
So that nobody opened my mouth.
I didn't either, of course.
It just came open.
Because I was too much under the weather, too relaxed to keep my lower jaw in place.
And so, it was in me.
Not him, it.
I had not been seduced by another man, had not given in, been persuaded of anything.
But it was in my mouth.
And there was a salivation there.
And I suppose that it could have been construed as a kind of hunger.
In any case, since it was not too much trouble, I sucked it like a lollipop.
And of course, the shaft behind it could not remain limber.
So that the prick (which happened to be attached to Larry, was in that sense another man's cock, I suppose) became hard.
Long and thick and vibrant it was.
Just as was mine, no doubt, when the girls sucked me off.
But of course, under those circumstances, it was me they were sucking off.
Whereas, at the moment, I was merely sucking a cock (expertly I might add, using those techniques which felt best on me) which was, of necessity, attached to a male body, to wit, Larry's.
And I felt my own spring to life, standing hard and erect.
Proving once more that, while I had been drinking, I was certainly not numb, not in any way incapacitated.
And now, Larry pulled it back.
And reversed himself in the bed.
So that, in order to reach his cock, or rather, the cock I was sucking and which happened, just happened, to be his, I had to actually move down in the bed.
But, drawn by the cock, inspired by it, seeing it there, hard and stiff and pulsing and shiny with my saliva, I seemed to float down, down, down.
And now, a delightful, a magical thing happened.
Because, as I covered the head and a good part of the shaft of the cock with my mouth, I felt my own similarly engulfed.
So that now, it was as though, by sucking the cock which was attached to Larry, I was causing the same action to be performed on my own.
And now, as the sensations of sexual arousal coursed through me, knowing exactly what it was I wanted done, how I wanted it to fee!, I was controlling the action entirely with my mouth.
I was sucking Larry's cock, taking more and more of it into my mouth and throat, my head bobbing faster and faster, my suction smoother, harder, more eager, more hungry.
As I felt myself getting hotter and hotter.
And now, I was not so much sucking as I was summoning.
And it was not Larry's jism but my own that I was extracting, eliciting, soliciting with every long, hard, tongue-winding suck.
Until, with an explosion of pleasure beyond pleasure, I was coming, coming as though in my own mouth.
Chapter III
"Feel better, Sport?" Larry asked, lying beside me, rubbing my head gently with one affectionate hand.
My back was to him.
I could not face him.
I was not ready for that.
Yet.
But it was coming.
Not daring to let myself care, to take an attitude, I knew that it was coming.
Feel better?
Yes I felt better.
I was no longer drunk.
Or in that state in which it seemed the thing to do to be drunk.
Or to seem to be.
Yes, there were degrees of drunk.
There had to be.
And one of them was when I was drunk enough to pretend to be drunker than I was.
And that was what had done it to me.
Or for me.
Because I tried to tell myself that it was the beer that bad fucked me up.
But that was a lie.
First of all, it wasn't the beer.
But beyond that, exactly what was it that I had fucked up?
Nothing!
Consenting adult, that's me.
And it was not as though Larry had dragged me to his place and talked me into letting him have me in the mouth or ass.
He had given as well as he had gotten.
Or was it me who did that?
Still a little fucked up in the head, I see.
But no matter.
Really.
Because it was all right.
What about it was not?
The logic was inescapable.
My father's kind of logic.
Linear.
Step by step.
With the full physical evidence at hand.
The world had not ended.
I have not been damaged.
Me and Larry were as we were before.
Better, in fact.
A barrier had been breached.
We had broken through to a plane of more real-reality.
I had, at least.
Larry had been here before.
I knew that.
Consenting adults, indeed!
How about one consenting and one non-dissenting.
I had not consented to a damned thing.
It happened, that was all, while I was in a state of diminished capacity due to overindulgence in alcohol.
Half a pitcher of beer.
Right.
And if you believe that-
I did not believe it.
Not really.
That was bullshit.
This had to have been there, lurking in the back of my mind the whole time, what I had done.
And I deserved it, dammit!
And I meant this in the form of reward, not of punishment.
Or humiliation.
I mean, there was absolutely nothing wrong with my going to bed with a healthy cock and a healthy body, a cock and a body as healthy as my own.
I deserved it and Larry deserved it.
This was not some stranger, some bum I had picked up.
I had not taken him into an alley and gone down before him drooling, for Pete's sake!
It had been a coming together of two bodybuilders, their common interest already established, for an act of-what?
Friendship?
Of a sort, I supposed.
But what was this denying bullshit there before?
Not Larry's cock, but a cock, which happened to be Larry's.
What crap!
It was Larry's cock, dammit!
The big knob, the thick, long, vibrant shaft, the balls, the jism in the mouth-it was all Larry's.
All, all, all, dammit!
Just as it was me who had fucked Larry in the mouth.
And not with just any cock (a ridiculous notion), but with mine, the only one it could possibly have been.
What was that reservation, that barrier?
Was it some deep, subconscious conceit?
No, I knew what it was.
Denial.
This is time out.
What happens here does not count.
It is tentative, putative, hypothetical, under the influence, and otherwise unreal.
This is a lacuna, a flight of fancy, a Chapter in a dirty book that happened to some fictional character who looked like me.
Bullshit!
It was as real as the world.
And it was done in the real world.
And these nasty little defense mechanisms, these excuses, these denials would not cut it.
Not for the blinking of an eye.
For better or for worse, it was a part of me.
It was a piece of personal history, ranking right up there with the birth certificate and the high school diploma.
Even more so, perhaps.
Those were mere official attestations as to facts no longer in evidence (maybe I can go to law school nights; I'd make a hell of a lawyer).
The point is, it not only happened, it is still in the process of happening.
That's fight.
Because I'm not about to haul ass out of here and not look back.
On the contrary; I'm into it.
In for a penny, in for a dollar, as they say.
I am going to wallow in it.
If necessary, I am going to rub my own nose in it.
All of it.
The whole ball of wax.
And I turned to face Larry.
Whose glance was alert, questioning, dubious.
As though anticipating that other reaction.
The one in which I would blame him for everything, springing up, cursing him, perhaps threatening physical violence.
Larry had heard of such attitudes before.
It had never happened to him, but there was always the chance, when he was dealing with a virgin.
Larry had read all about that kind of thing.
Between the lines.
Youths arrested for injuring homosexuals.
Questioned by police.
Who would not ask them the one pertinent question-when and where did you last suck dick?
All this, I could read in his face.
But I was not about to smile at him in reassurance.
Because this was not, is not a joke.
Fun yes; joke no.
Or it would be.
As I went from the denial phase to the proving phase.
Going from no, it did not happen to yes, part of it happened.
Because now I was compelled to go on with it.
"You look like you have a question preying on your mind," Larry said.
"Who gets it up the ass first?" I asked.
Larry smiled.
"You're the guest.
"You call it."
I admit it-I was tempted.
Macho man.
Top man.
Me up and you thereby and therefore down.
Bottom man.
Passive, receiver, female.
But that was bullshit too.
And I knew it.
But I had to prove it to myself.
Still, why make it easy?
"Get down on hands and knees," I said.
"Elbows and knees," Larry corrected. "That way, I can get my ass up where it's supposed to be."
And he demonstrated at once, assuming the position.
I got behind him.
And spread the cheeks of his ass, feeling his buttocks yield as he made a conscious effort to relax them.
So that now, spreading his crack wide with both hands, I could see the large, round, slightly protruding mauve star of his ass hole.
And I sealed my mouth to it.
And sucked it in.
And chewed gently on it with my teeth.
And ran my tongue round and round the segments.
And stiffened the tip.
And inserted it in the convergence of his star.
And stiffened my neck muscles.
And forced my tongue into the center of his asterisk.
In, in, in.
And heard him gasp with delight as my tongue found his heat and the yielding tissues inside his entrance.
As I felt beneath him, feeling his dangling balls, his stiff ramrod, inspired by my expert ministrations.
But I did not continue.
Instead, I pulled back.
And was on elbows and knees beside him, head turned to one side, looking into his surprised gaze.
"And that's how I expect you to start in on me," I said.
"You got it!"
And now he was behind me.
And I relaxed buttocks and sphincter as though I were a veteran of such happenings.
And felt him taking his time, rimming me thoroughly.
And enjoying himself.
I could tell.
Because the tongue was very far in.
And not just darting in and out of my hot young ass.
Rather, he was exploring, probing, making sure that the nerve endings of my rectum were ready to receive him.
Ready, willing, able, eager.
And still he was taking no chances.
I felt him pull his face back at last, his tongue sliding out of my ass hole.
I heard him opening the drawer of one of his nightstands.
There was a pause.
And then I felt it-a warm, oiled finger, probing my saliva-slick, slackened ass hole.
He was using mineral oil or baby oil.
And giving me a delightful finger wave.
And I could feel his knuckles stretching the entrance, even as the digit delved deeply.
And then there were two.
Yes, two fingers were now circulating in my ass hole.
And now they were going together, round and round.
And now he was twiddling them, sending fresh thrills of sexual electricity coursing through my body.
As his knuckles stretched the entrance to my ass hole still wider.
And now, he was ready for the main event.
And, certainly, so was I.
And he stood behind me on his knees, spreading the cheeks of my ass with the thumb and fingers of one hand.
As, with the other, he guided his turgid intruder toward my ass hole.
And now, the plum of his cock head was buttoned inside my ass hole.
And I could feel my vestibule settling down around it, caressing it.
And now, I braced myself for what I knew was coming.
And it did.
Because now he was pushing forward.
And the battering ram of his cock head was parting the walls of my bowels as it shafted slowly, steadily, in, in, in.
And the long, thick bar of meat behind it was keeping me spread.
Wide!
I felt like I had been opened up to the whole world.
Or like I was the whole world, a great tunnel being bored into me.
At last, he had driven it all the way home.
And I could feel his abdominal muscles pressing in on my buttocks.
And he paused there, as my insides settled around him.
And now, he began to pump slowly, gently, hips rocking back and forth, most of the motion his own, very little inside me.
So that I could feel his cock, on which I was impaled, tugging this way and that.
But slowly, little, by little, he increased the action.
So that now I could feel it.
A definite movement in and out inside me, not a part of me.
Yes, he was fucking me.
That was a fact, pure and simple.
So simple, and yet so complex.
Because the sensations were fantastic.
Never had I felt so thoroughly, so intimately aroused!
Because the arousal, the stimulation, was from a whole new, different direction.
There is stimulation from the outside, which is delightful, satisfactory, in its own way, even complete.
But this, this!
This was something new, something different.
It was a new dimension.
It was an experience quite unlike any I had ever had.
Because it was in me, within me, and yet, not of me.
It was more than feelings, fabulous though they were.
It was communication.
It was as though Larry and I were talking to each other.
But not with our mouths, our brains.
It was body to body.
And body was understanding body.
Body knew what body was saying.
And what body was saying was important, was in fact, essential.
Because Larry's ass fucking was more than arousing, more than stimulating.
It was confirming, affirming, giving meaning to life itself.
This sensation was it!
This was where it was at, what was happening!
You talk about luxury!
You talk about pleasure!
Well, let me tell you, friend, there was nothing like this to be had for love or money.
It just did not get any better than this!
And my ass hole talked to my body.
And my body talked to my cock.
So that the hard-on of hard-ons was hobbling stiffly beneath me.
Beneath us.
Because, even as I realized that I had gotten an erection (difficult to realize, since all of me was feeling like one huge erection, at the moment), Larry's hand was down there, grabbing me, as though to confirm its status.
Oh, no! I thought. He's not going to jerk me off!
Because it would not take very much at all to make me lose my load at that point.
And I did not want to cut short the flood of exquisite sensations that was surging through me with each stroke of Larry's monster back and forth inside me.
Surge, surge. Surge, surge.
That was the pattern, as Larry pumped my ass, a fresh thrill of sexual electricity coursing through me at each move.
Yes, it could not get any better than this.
Or so I thought.
Because suddenly, Larry did a change of pace.
And now, instead of the in and out piston action, he was rolling his hips round and round.
So that his mighty engine was reaming me in circular sweeps of my innermost depths.
And each circulation prompted an intense response of pleasurable sensation within me.
So that it was as though I were being propelled higher and higher through the realms of a lascivious paradise.
I had never used the spiraling action, so I could not imagine how it might feel on his cock.
Or mine.
And now, it seemed important to me that I get his rocks off, as soon as possible.
So that I could take up with his ass where I had left off.
So that he could receive my hot, throbbing erection in his ass.
And now, as though getting the message (And why not? After all, we were communicating.') I felt him begin to lose control.
More and more erratic his movements became.
Wilder and wilder and less and less consistent.
As though he were a puppet, being jerked around by an energetic but drunken puppeteer.
So that now there was a delightful piston action, now a wild, exquisite gyration, each carrying with it its own special thrill.
And now, he was coming!
He had gotten cherry ass.
My first load.
Delivered in long, hot, powerful surges, filling me.
And filling me to overflowing.
Because there was no room in my bowels for both the great salami and its discharge'.
So that the come was filming its way between prick and bowel.
And overflowing back at the entrance.
But it did not matter.
Nothing mattered except that he come and I not.
So that I would be at the ready.
And it happened, just that way.
So that now he was throwing his final hump.
As his mighty organ discharged the secretion of his final spasm.
And he pulled out.
And went down on knees and elbows at once, sensing what I most ardently desired.
And I was behind him, my mouth back on his ass, my tongue in his ass hole.
But I did not bother with the oil.
Instead, I used my saliva, all the way.
On two fingers.
With which I gave him a finger wave.
Not as long, not as thorough as the one he had given me, perhaps, but then, obviously, he had been here before.
That or he had a bung that was made for it.
Because there were no space problems as I drove in, in, in.
So that my abdominal muscles met his hulking buttocks without a sign of resistance.
And I was in him!
And fucking him, quickly building up a full head of steam.
So that now, he was getting it from me just as he had given it to me.
Full force, I went, pulling back until only the head of my cock remained inside his ass hole.
And then shafting completely into him, my stomach hitting his ass with an audible smack.
And we were once more in communication, body to body.
My cock was talking to his ass.
And delivering a thousand different messages of urgent delight to the millions of nerve endings deep, deep, deep inside him.
On and on I plunged.
And I did not know and did not care where I was.
Or what anything meant or did not mean.
Such things no longer mattered.
Nothing mattered at the moment except those feelings.
Wild, electric, incredibly intense they were, as they radiated from my cock through the rest of my body.
Male in male, with nothing, nothing, nothing in between!
There was a bonding here, a unity of sensation.
And sensation was everything.
And outside the sensation and our bodies and the moment there was nothing.
But we were complete.
We had everything we needed, right there, between us.
Thrill and thrill and thrill sang through my body and, I'm sure, through his.
Higher and higher we were ascending, passing plateau after plateau of pure pleasure.
It could not get any better than this.
But it did, moment by moment.
Who was I?
What did I know?
The pleasure was in me and I in it and I was the pleasure.
And the pleasure and the pleasure and the plea' sure.
Permeating me, radiating out beyond me, its pressure flowing through me.
And filling me, filling me to overflowing, faster than I can dissipate it through every pore in my body.
So that now it is exploding within me.
And my safety valve is blowing, popping down below.
And my hot jism is injecting itself deep, deep, deep inside Larry's bowels.
And he is taking it, taking it all, all that I can.
As it is my body now that jerks this way and that, the spasms of ecstasy wracking me helplessly with the exquisite twinges of the pleasure beyond pleasure.
And I am coming and coming, as though I might never stop.
But at last I do, the last secretions empty muscular convulsions.
And I sit back on my heels, my huge, stiff, wet prong hobbling in my lap.
And I have done it with Larry, gone through the whole ceremony with him, the ceremony of initiation and of pleasure.'
And he smiles and leads me by the hand to the shower.
And we shower together.
And no vestige of the beer remains in my head or my bloodstream, I am sure.
Whether or not there was all that much there to begin with.
But even that does not matter, not any more.
Because a doorway has been opened to me, a realm, a dimension revealed.
Chapter IV
"Hey, Dad, how's it
"Oh, not bad. You?"
"Uh ... fine, fine."
"You don't sound too sure.
"Things go okay at the gym?"
"Oh, sure. Makin' all kindsa progress."
"Good, good."
"How'd it go with the shipments?"
"We'll be ready tomorrow."
"Good, good.
"I still say you oughtta look at gettin' some help."
"We been all through that, I believe."
"And I see that nobody convinced anybody about anything."
"You got that right.
"So. Tell me about your evening."
"My, my ... evening?"
"Yeah, you know.
"Evening. As in hours after, say, five p.m.
"That evening.
"Don't tell me you been workin' out all this time."
I grinned.
I couldn't help it.
The double meaning was just too funny to resist.
The things I could say!
Instead-
"Ran into a guy at the gym.
"We had supper together.
"His treat."
"Then yours next time, son. No freeloaders in this outfit, ya know."
"I know Dad, I know.
"Anyway, we got to talking and he showed me his condo.
"Nice place, Dad.
"Really.
"He's got class.
"Style, you know?
"Not like-never mind."
"No, son, you go ahead. Say it. You got somethin' on yer mind, out with it."
"It's nothin', Dad. Nothin' worth mentioning.
"It's just, well, why does this place have to be so damned ... bare?"
"Bare."
"Well, not bare, exactly.
"Plain, I guess would be a better word."
"Plain."
"Plain. I mean, like, we don't have one picture hangin' up.
"Or one piece of furniture with any design on it, any style to it.
"Why is that, Dad?"
"Well, son, I tell ya.
"I never seen anythin' I liked, really.
"But ya gotta have chairs ta sit on, tables ta sit at.
"It's expected, you know?
"Otherwise, people'd get ta thinkin' we was weird or somethin'."
"Couldn't we, like, compromise, sort of, Dad?
"I mean make some kind of a ... statement?"
Dad grinned.
"Bin talkin' ta Larry, have ya ... Jack?"
"Yeah, Dad, I have.
"And Larry-hey! Wait a minute!"
And my father put the paper down, rubbing his eyes and chuckling.
"You mean ta tell me-that was a ... setup?"
"Bigger'n shit, son."
"You mean that you ... that you, and Larry ... that the two of you-"
"Made it?
"Right, Jackie-boy. We made it."
"You made it."
"As in, in the mouth, up the ass, takin' an' givin'.
'And you?"
I looked at him for a long moment, not knowing whether to shit or go blind.
Then, "Is there anything I could tell you that you don't already know?" I asked.
"Prob'ly not."
"Why?"
Dad tossed the paper aside and sat up in his chair, facing me, bent over, hands clasped.
"Why.
"Because, Jack, when two people have been together for as long as you an' me have, when they got as far ta go together as you an' me do, it's no good havin' fences between 'em.
"The fences don't do no good and eventually they'll do a lotta harm.
"So the best thing ta do with 'em is ta knock 'em down-get rid of 'em.
"I never wanted another woman after your mother.
"Truth ta tell, I never wanted her, shortly after you was born.
"Nor her me, an' that's the truth, too.
"How two people with as little in common as her an' me ever got married in the first place is another story, son, and one not worth the tellin' any more.
"Water under the bridge, over the dam, whatever.
"Be that as it may, we had you.
"An' you held us together for more years'n you'd prob'ly care ta take credit for.
"That, an' force of habit.
"Powerful force, habit.
"Easy ta come by, sorta sneaks up on ya.
"But hard as hell ta break.
"An' we didn't, not 'til you was about ready ta graduate high school.
"An' we parted.
"We didn't part friends, we didn't part enemies.
"We just corrected a mistake, a mutual error, of long standing.
"And I wasn't about ta make another mistake.
"You look at me, Jack, and you see what?
"From the neck up, a man old enough to be your father.
"The hell'm I ralkin' about? I am your father, dammit!
"From the neck down, though, that's another story, isn't it?
"Ain't that much difference between you an' me, is there?
"An' what difference there is is in my favor.
"Nothin' against you, just I've had a lot more years with the iron.
"Been pumpin' it before you was born.
"So," he sighed, "what was to be done?
"Women're out.
"I didn't love your mother, I won't pretend for a minute that I did.
"But I will say this fer her-as women go, no finer woman ever lived, by any standard.
"I believe that sincerely.
"Hell," he smiled, "in some circles they'd call that love, I suppose.
"But, be that as it may, when you've had the best, ain't all that much point in tryin' the rest.
"So, like I say, what's to be done?
"I mean, you followin' the logic at work here, ain'tcha, son?
"I mean, if I'm not gettin' through here, tell me now."
"No, Dad," I sighed, "your logic is, as always, impeccable."
And it was.
As I recall, it was one of the things that used to drive Mom up the wall.
"Now you an' me, we coulda had this conversation a long time ago.
"Problem with logic is that it's one thing for a person's head ta tell 'em that what they're hearin' is right and another for 'em to believe themselves.
"That's not a criticism, understand, it's just human nature.
"Because between pure logic an' reality, you got a whole body of customs, morals, pseudo-science- the whole bit.
"An' whether you know it or not, whether you even believe half the shit that's put about, intellectually, fact is, it's gonna affect the way you feel about people, about situations.
"You ask me why.
"My answer is that it was the only way to break down the fence between us, to turn it into vapor. This particular fence was the fact that you were datin' girls, which I knew about, and I was datin' guys, which you didn't know about.
"And this was the kinda thing that just bein' told about it wasn't gonna solve anything.
"Bein' told an' knowin' were two different things, in this case.
"So, I recognized the problem and solved it, the only way that made sense."
"Really?"
He shrugged.
"Mebbe so, mebbe not.
"But at least we got it behind us."
"Yeah, Dad," I sighed, "we sure did."
"So. Now you know. How's it feel ta have a queer for a father?"
"About like how it feels ta have one for a son."
"Anything you'd care to discuss?"
"Look, Dad.
"A lot has happened today.
"I'm tired, okay?
"I've got a lot to think about and right now al! I wanna do is get some sleep."
"I understand."
"Intellectually, or otherwise?"
"Touche," Dad sighed. "Catch you in the morning.
"'Night, Jack."
But I did not answer him.
* * *
Was Dad right?
Did it have to be this way?
Wouldn't I have understood if he simply sat me down and told me?
I didn't know.
And now I would never know.
Dad had not trusted me and I would never know if he had been right or wrong.
It was too late.
And what about me?
What had I found out about myself tonight?
Sure, the thing with Larry had been a setup.
All of it.
But it was not a forced situation.
At any point, I could have stopped.
Larry?
Not hard to see where he was coming from.
Dad was a helluva piece, by his standards.
And maybe I didn't have the bulk yet, but I was young and not hard on the eyes at all, for anybody, man or woman.
And knowing I was a virgin?
If anyone was mightily tempted by the situation, it had to be Larry more than me.
Actually, there had been several escape hatches for me, throughout the evening.
Seeing Larry's signals in the shower, all I had to do was say no thanks.
After dinner, all I had to do was say no thanks.
Hell, at the condo, all I had to do was say no thanks.
But I had not.
Why?
The beer.
Bullshit!
It takes more than some beer to make me a queer.
Poetry, bar, har.
No, here was the situation.
I'm a queer.
I have always been a queer, looking for a place to happen.
And it did.
No, my father's logic was not impeccable.
If I had been a dyed-in-the-wool pussy man, no way would he have been able to turn me.
In which case, Larry would have called to report the failure of the mission.
And Dad would have undoubtedly had to make a house call to assuage Larry's wounded vanity.
And the fence, the barrier would have remained.
And become stronger, insurmountable, had I discovered the truth on my own.
I would like to believe that this other me would have been understanding (really understanding, not merely intellectually informed and accepting), forgiving (as though there were something to be forgiven; my father's deception, perhaps?), and a dutiful, if detached, son.
But that was not how it had gone down.
That other me was dead.
Rather, he would never be.
And the tears formed at the comets of my eyes, in mourning for the self that might have been.
We homos are so fucking sensitive.
And yet, there had been a part of me, a small part, to be sure, too small to have a prayer of resisting what so much of me really wanted, had really wanted for so long, had I but dared to face it, that wanted to deny the reality of what was happening.
Maybe there was hope for me after all.
Maybe I could nurture that feeling, reach down inside myself and find it, protect it, encourage it, bring it along.
But I could not do that here. Never.
I would have to move out, move to another place, lead another life.
Yes, that's it!
I would join the Navy and see the world.
I would get a skill, something I could use whether I stayed or left.
I would-
I would do nothing until I had checked myself out, determined how I really felt.
How did I know how strong were these inclinations within myself, inclinations which had only been activated hours ago?
That other life?
That could wait.
There was no hurry.
This, this ... thing was what had to be explored on a priority basis.
The Navy was over two hundred years old.
They could wait another six months to a year for my body beautiful.
And his father?
His father who had manipulated him so skillfully?
Should he forgive him for that?
Was there anything there to forgive?
Or bad his father actually done him a favor?
Wasn't it always better to know the truth about yourself?
But what was the truth?
Had this been an ingrained thing, waiting to burst forth from within me?
Or was it but the weakness of a moment, enhanced by the beer?
And had the beer been at all necessary, as an excuse or whatever?
And what about Larry?
Would I want to see Larry again?
Even now, I did not know, I was not sure how I felt about Larry.
And it had nothing to do with his collaboration with my father.
It had to do with his physical self, his body.
That, and nothing else.
Because that's all there was.
To anybody.
Dad had taught me that, long ago.
What you see is what you get.
That, or less.
Never more.
But I had had Larry.
All of him.
So what more could I possibly want from him?
A repeat?
To accomplish what, to prove what?
No, Larry was one.
And he had been done.
By me, by my father.
Of course, Dad owed him for tonight.
And Larry would certainly collect.
But from Dad, not from me.
No, Larry and I were through.
And I smiled in the dark.
Larry and I, yes.
But.
And all those hurried, whispered meetings between Dad and those men in the locker room suddenly made sense.
Numbers.
That's what it was called.
Doing numbers.
Here was the bounty of the world and here's Dad.
Or, in this case, me.
I could do numbers.
I knew I could.
Everybody at the gym was very macho, but they had been there, the signs, the signals.
To be read by anyone who cared to look.
Yes, anyone could read.
But only a few could act.
To act, you had to have the muscle.
In some cases, the youth.
Or the looks.
And I had them all.
So that I could pick and choose.
So that there was no reason for me to do a repeat.
Not with Larry, not with anyone else.
I knew the shape, the size, the movements of Larry's body, Larry's cock, Larry's ass.
There was nothing more that his body had to say to mine.
It was conceivable that there were bodies out there that would require more than one session, so multi-faceted or so important were their messages.
And he could certainly handle that.
Yes, it was quite an adventure I had waiting for me out there, if that's what I wanted.
And to think, I owed it all to dear old Dad.
Who was not dear.
Not to me.
He had not one endearing quality.
Nor was he old.
Perhaps aging would have endeared him to me.
But that was not happening.
Would not happen until I myself was well into middle age.
Because that was the state of the art in bodybuilding.
So that that really wasn't my father.
I had seen what peoples' fathers looked like.
And Dad did not qualify.
He looked more like an older brother.
From the neck down, even that was debatable.
He had been my father once, when I was a baby, when I was little.
I had a mother back then, too.
And now I had neither.
Not really.
One was gone.
Perhaps dead and gone, for all I know, for all anyone would ever tell me.
And the other?
He was housemate, business partner, sporting companion, occasional advisor.
But father?
Only in the biological sense.
And that was twenty years ago.
No, Bill had ceased being a father a long, long time ago.
My father.
Dad.
Dead concepts.
So that I had hesitated to identify him to Larry as my father, even back there in the locker room, even before it had been confirmed that I was going to go with him, to do the deed with him.
He was just Bill.
I felt that that much, at least, was true.
Which was good, in a way.
Because there was nothing to hold me here.
Nothing at all.
The lamp business?
It was unskilled labor, the assembly, part of it.
Anyone could do it with a day's training, at most.
And Dad's personal income would increase.
He could hire people, several people even, for much less than what he gave me as a partner.
A full partner.
In all things, as it turned out, I added, grinning in the darkness.
No, my father's plans, his desires, would not hold me here.
Not for a day, if I decided to make the move.
He needed nobody and that's what he'd end up with- nobody.
Except for his locker room buddies.
He was virtually guaranteed another twenty years of those.
And after that?
That was where it was no good, I reminded myself.
If there was nothing but the body, and the body was perishable, then what?
At a certain point in time, in the process of perishing, as it were, the body becomes undesirable, unattractive.
How much nicer it would have been, I thought, had Mom and Dad grown old together.
Why were sad people, people like Dad, like me, called gay?
And suddenly, I realized the importance of numbers.
And of youth.
And of not wasting time.
Because there was no time to waste.
I was a perishable commodity.
In the process of perishing, even as I lay here thinking about it.
No, numbers were important.
Still, one had to pick and choose.
Otherwise, one became a number, instead of doing them.
And that was no good.
No good at all.
No, I would not compromise.
I might end up going home alone.
But if I could not get as good as I gave, that was the best way.
It was depressing enough, knowing what awaited me down the road, without turning the present, where I had everything going for me, into some kind of sad scene.
But then, maybe that was one of the things I would talk to Dad about.
After all, he seemed to have definite thoughts o on everything else.
And we had never been in a position to talk about what had suddenly become the burning subject.
Until now.
There had been no occasion for it.
Until now.
Now, everything had changed, over the space of a few hours.
Tomorrow could well be just another day.
But not for me.
Not for me and Dad.
But he would have answers.
I was sure of it.
For a man with no philosophy, a man who would tolerate no philosophy, he sure had a lot to say about everything.
And this should be heavy.
I could hardly wait.
I would ask, I would listen, I would understand.
And what I would understand above all would be that every fucking thing he said would have to taken with a grain of salt.
So maybe I would start him off with something simple.
Like who's who at the gym.
But would he level with me even there, or save the best stuff for himself?
Chapter V
"Feeling better this morning?"
I looked at Dad.
He was right to be concerned.
By several standards, he had played a dirty trick on me.
Even by his own logic, he did not fare too well.
And he seemed to know this.
Hence the question.
"Better than what?"
Dad shrugged.
"Sometimes," he began, "sometimes a man finds out something about himself, something he didn't know, maybe didn't even suspect, something that the world doesn't think too highly of, it's, well, a bit of a downer."
"On the other hand," I replied, "the truth can set you free."
"Right. And so can prune juice."
And we laughed at his shallow witticism.
"Seriously," he continued, "how you handling it?
"I mean, are you disappointed in yourself, disappointed in me?"
"None of the above," I said.
"Well, that's good, then."
And there was silence over the bacon and eggs and orange juice and vitamin pills.
As though neither of us knew what we were supposed to say next.
"I've, uh, decided you were right about getting help," he said.
"Oh?"
"Yeah. Obviously, I can't leave you at the gym by yourself.
"Look at the trouble you get into!"
We laughed again.
"Speaking of which," I said,
"You must know all the hot numbers there."
"A few," he admitted.
"And, of those you know, how many of them know that I'm your son?"
"None," he mumbled.
I made as though I had not heard.
Since we were sharing everything, how about some of the awkwardness?
"What?"
He cleared his throat.
"I said, uh ... none.
"Hey, if I got you for a kid, how old does that make me?"
"When is the truth not true, huh, Dad?"
"Hey, what's in a calendar, right?"
"Right."
I can be generous, when the occasion demands.
He had a point.
Those whose only virtue was youth had a tendency to look at the calendar as their only source of triumph, not recognizing in it their ultimate and inevitable defeat.
Nevertheless, even they could be numbers.
For a time.
So that it did not pay to alienate them.
I would not crab Dad's act.
"Does Larry know?" I asked.
"He probably suspects."
"Is that bad?"
Dad shrugged.
"Fuck Larry, all right?
"He doesn't exactly win any popularity contests at the gym anyway, all right?
"It's bad enough I-never mind."
"Bad enough you owe him one?" I completed.
"Something like that."
I grinned.
"Serves you right," I said.
"That it does, that it does," he sighed, agreeing with me.
"So. When are you going to pay off?"
"Tonight," he said.
"My, my. Time does indeed appear to be of the essence."
"Hey, at least I'll get him out of the way.
"Better that than having it hanging over me.
"Unless, of course-"
He let it trail off, looking at me.
"Oh, no!" I said.
"No way in hell, pal!
"You take care of your own mess.
"There's a whole new world out there waiting for me.
"I'm not sure it's what I want or what it's all about, but I do know that Larry is history."
"Wish I could say the same," he said.
"Hey, you made your bed, now lie in it."
"Better mine than his," he sighed.
"Unfortunately, that's not how it works," I pointed out.
"I'll live."
"When's the help coming?"
"Puttin' an ad in the paper this weekend.
"Guess we'd best be on our way."
"I'll take my own car, Dad."
"I figured."
"Hey, I could get lucky tonight, you know?"
"Glad one of us can."
* * *
The first thing, I reminded myself in the locker room, is the workout.
Nothing, nothing, nothing is to come between me and that.
Afterward, we'll see.
And maybe not every night, either.
Because bodybuilding is the love affair a man has with himself.
And, in the end, as Dad himself pointed out many times, ourselves is all we have.
More heavy shit from the non-philosopher.
So I worked out.
We worked out.
As though this were any other evening.
As though yesterday had never happened.
Except that Larry was here.
And working out in earnest, just like us.
He had a partner.
Older, he was.
But with a full head of hair, straight, dark, crew-cut.
And powerful.
A bodybuilder's exercises at a power lifter's poundage's.
"Wow!" Larry would exclaim, from time to time.
Or, "Look at that!"
Or even, "Unbelievable!"
Finally, Dad could stand it no longer.
"Uh, Larry, do you think we could make do with a simple 'ta-da!' at the end of every one of your friend's lifts?"
And the crewcut laughed, revealing a pleasant smile, dissipating the initial impression created by his brutal, heavy jaw.
"Oh! Sorry. How rude of me," Larry said.
"Guys, this is Clint.
"Clint, Bill and, uh, Jack."
We shook hands with the new boy on the block.
"Hey, you guys look a lot alike," Clint said.
"You must be-"
"Cousins," Dad said, quickly.
"Kissing cousins, Larry added, "as it turns out."
And he giggled, as Clint looked back and forth between us, puzzled but grinning good-naturedly.
"Yeah, well, we got a lot of iron ta push over the next two hours, so we can't be standin' around jaw-jackin'," Dad said. "Right, Jack?"
"Right, uh ... Bill."
And we did.
Except that I kept catching Clint's eye.
Or vice versa.
Assuming that all that bulk under the sweats wasn't flab, and, based on the weights that Clint was lifting, that hardly seemed likely, I had the feeling that my second experience since coming out of the cave of my mind was definitely about to take place tonight.
Except that Clint seemed to be with Larry.
Which wasn't too unlikely, since Clint was clearly from out of town, not having been in the gym before, to my knowledge, while equally clearly having put in hard time at a gym somewhere else.
So that he could very well be Larry's house guest.
Which could be rather awkward, if what Dad, pardon, Bill, had said about tonight was true.
Unless, of course, Larry were to let go of it, give ... Bill a pass.
On the other hand, if I were to take Clint out for the evening, that could solve everybody's problem.
And on that happy note, I had an excellent work-out.
The four of us hit the showers together.
And Clint did not disappoint.
Of the four of us, he had the best size, Dad the best overall combination of size and definition, and me the best potential.
Larry looked as good as he was probably ever going to.
Which was not all that bad, except that he would never win any contests.
Except, perhaps, the ones that he and people like him-like us-entered every day.
Larry was a long way off from an empty bed.
Given the right combination of horniness and the lack of any alternative, I might consider going with him again myself.
But Clint was a bull.
With his thick neck and thick but muscular body and limbs, he looked like a minotaur with a crewcut.
And his cock went with the rest of him.
It was long and thick, with a bulging knob dangling below.
And the whole thing swung heavily as it moved.
As did mine, apparently.
Because he was looking at mine with the same attention I was giving his.
Of us all, only Larry had the beginnings of a hard-on, in obvious anticipation of his getting together with Dad tonight.
Dad and Larry noticed the chemistry developing between Clint and me.
And Larry said, "I have an idea!
"What say the four of us go to my place?
"I've got plenty of steak and veggies, beer in the fridge, and a big, big bed.
"Anybody interested?" Clint shrugged.
"I live there, at least temporarily," he said.
"And I understand that you and Bill are on for tonight anyway.
"And I'm sure that Jack and I will think of some' thing."
We all laughed.
And, as though to emphasize the affinity of our happy quartet, a couple of regular guys stepped into the shower, looking around, hesitating, as though they would as soon come back later, when there was not quite so much abundant beef around to show them how outclassed they were.
We said nothing.
Not even to each other.
An act of kindness, to avoid emphasizing the fact that we were the inhabitants of another, better world, the world to which they aspired but would probably never attain?
And it brought home to me the fact that, in the hierarchy of desirable states of being, there were worse things I could be than a man who desired other men.
Because it was not just any man that I desired.
At least, I did not think so.
Rather, I was a man of taste, a man of qualifications.
True, they were all strictly physical, but, as Dad pointed out many times, what else was there in this world?
So we finished up, drying off and dressing very quickly.
And I grinned, as we left the gym and I saw that all four of us each had his own car, in anticipation, in declaration of being fully independent, fully mobile.
So that it was a mini-convoy that made its way over to Larry's condo.
And the doorman/security guard must have thought that a bodybuilder's convention or something was in town.
That, or the middle defense line of a pro football team.
We trooped to the elevator and rode up in silence.
Silence.
Except that the glances between Clint and me said it all.
I want you.
And it was beautiful.
Because it was wanting and knowing that we did and that there was only the physical commitment and nothing else.
Perhaps our brains, our minds would never get to know each other.
And that was all for the best.
What you see is what you get.
And that was good enough for me, should be good enough for anybody.
So that the so-called intellectual considerations we recognized for what - they were-bullshit, designed to compensate for physical lacks and shortcomings.
Except that we had none.
Oh, we were not perfect.
We had a ways to go, perhaps even a long ways to go before perfection would be achieved or declared, by ourselves or by others.
But we were well on our way.
And the interest and intent were there.
As well as the results.
No, we were neither beginners nor intermediates.
We were definitely advanced and, had life dealt us slightly different hands, could have been professionals.
And it was going to happen.
What you see is what you get.
That's all that counts, if what you see is what you want.
And it was.
Definitely.
As Dad and Larry hit the kitchen, getting the supper ready.
There was no room in the narrow space for four hulks.
So Clint and I sat down in front of the TV.
And we did not speak.
Because that was bullshit also.
"Where you from?"
Who cares.
I'm here and you're here.
"What do you do?"
Who cares.
We're at play, not at work and I'm sure that neither of us is writing a book.
So we said nothing, content to watch some action adventure crime series hero do his thing.
And casting side glances at each other.
But not touching.
Because that was bullshit too.
I was not in love with the guy, or he with me.
It was lust at first sight, not love.
Body to body, communicating through the eyes.
And knowing that the sack was what counted.
The rest was meaningless, unnecessary, and even false.
"Okay, guys, it's ready!" Dad announced.
"Sorry about the red meat," Larry said, "but the fish is frozen solid."
"No sweat," Clint said.
"Red meat once a week can't kill us."
We could have had pasta, but what the hell.
It had been a while since I had a decent steak.
And these were more than just decent.
And the salad, with vinegar, was crisp and delicious.
And the beer-of which I carefully limited myself to one bottle-tasted better than it should have.
I would have to watch that.
And do without on every possible occasion.
For Clint, I wanted to be cold sober, neither drunk nor in that middle state in which I told myself that I was.
After supper, Larry put everything in the dishwasher and started it.
"Well," Larry said,
"I'm sure we all know our way to the bedroom by now."
And we filed into the bedroom, where we stripped without hesitation.
And Dad paired off with Larry as Clint and I got into the bed on the opposite side together.
And Larry was certainly correct in his contention that the big bed would accommodate the four of us, and with room to spare.
We rolled back the covers like a maintenance crew un-tarping a ball field before the big game.
And now, I was in Clint's arms and he in mine, as we idly played with each others' cocks.
As Larry and Dad, next to us, did the same.
And I realized that, if I was not very careful, I would actually see my own father in action with another guy.
And I found that rather odd and vaguely disturbing, for no discernable reason.
But I quickly put the thought out of my head.
I had better things to think about.
Or, more accurately, react to.
Because now Clint was turning me over, onto my stomach.
And sliding down, down, down in the bed.
And now, he was wriggling his thick body between my legs.
And I felt his hot breath on the cheeks of my ass, an instant before he parted them, spreading them wide with both hands.
And his mouth was on my bung, his tongue rolling round and round on it as he chewed it gently.
And I rose onto knees and elbows, giving him a better target, reacting as though I had been doing this for years.
Encouraged by this, Clint quickly jammed his tongue into my ass hole.
Which took it quite easily as I relaxed my anal sphincter.
And he was rimming me thoroughly, doing things with his powerful tongue to stretch and explore, lubricate and prepare.
And now, I was ready.
And so, obviously, was he.
As he stood on his knees behind me and, using the one hand spreading technique with thumb and fingers, with the other guided the bulging head of his huge cock toward the target.
And now his knob was touching my bung.
And now it was buttoned inside it.
And my rectum welcomed its guest.
And now he was pushing forward.
And I could feel my cock go stiff, hard as rock, below me.
As though his cock had filled mine like a glove from the inside.
And he was stretching and filling me with his vibrant cock.
And now, it was moving in and out, generating those exquisite sensations of lascivious, intimate arousal peculiar to getting fucked in the ass.
And fucking me he was.
And there was no technique, no cleverness involved here.
There was animal strength, animal power, unrestrained.
Clint was operating, working in the full confidence of his might.
He did not worry about things like holding back, staying power, sophisticated things to be done with hands and mouth and hips.
These things were not for him.
They were not necessary.
He was who and what he was and that was enough and more than enough.
At least, for me it was.
Not that his technique was mine.
(Look who's talking, will you? My second time with a guy and already I have taste in techniques. Must be my natural talent making itself known.)
I would want to hold back, to prolong, to be artistic, versatile.
But Clint was built, was made for doing exactly what he was doing.
And so, ass high in the air, I opened myself up to him, totally relaxed, taking everything he had to offer.
And it was not until I turned my head to one side and opened my eyes that I realized that Dad was right beside me, in an identical position.
And looking at me, face red, eyes glazed with pleasure, as I'm sure was the case with me.
"Aaah!" I said, a fresh surge of delightful sensation forcing the exclamation of pleasure out of me.
"Oooh!" he said, a fresh surge of delightful sensation forcing the exclamation of pleasure out of him.
Fucking Larry!
He was doing this on purpose, probably matching Clint, stroke for stroke.
Forming a bond between Clint and himself.
Which was bullshit.
There was no bond.
Except that Larry was trying to create one.
But I did not think that Clint would buy it.
He did not need such body-mind games.
In his case, that would be gilding the lily.
He did not need anyone or anything, actually.
That was the message my body was getting from his.
I am complete, in and of myself.
I am using you, using you well, and hope you are doing the same with me.
But I really don't care, he seemed to be saying.
It doesn't matter.
What matters is me, me, me!
And the sensations that I generate within myself, using your body.
And I thought, this is as it should be.
Because sex was in the giving and in the getting.
And one was part of the other, one fed the other, in a closed loop.
So that sex was the one area in which, by being selfish, you gave.
And being totally selfish, you gave your all.
And so it was with Clint and himself, and with Clint and me.
And so it would be with me and myself, and with Clint and me, when I was on the so-called giving end of things.
And now, he was riding me all the way.
And it was as though a part of my consciousness was within intimate contact with his monster cock as it pistoned in and out of me.
So that my bowels could feel the sensations that shot through him like bolts of prolonged sexual lightning.
And I was feeling for the both of us.
And it was delightful, exquisite, somehow complete.
And now, I could feel the heat of his body, his breath, as he bent to his work, building toward his climax.
And I glanced at Dad, and could see by the look of ecstasy on his face that Larry, mocking, imitating Larry, was deliberately keeping pace with Clint.
And that conniving, affected Larry would probably time his climax to coincide with Clint's.
To store up the occasion, the memory.
So that he could say to him, some time in the future, "Remember the time when ..."
But-and I don't know why I even thought I could do this-I was going to fuck Larry up.
And so, I began to flex the sleeve of my rectum, milking Clint's cock, which was already right at the edge.
And I felt him coming inside me, the thick, hot spurts creating still more thrills within me.
And I knew, looking at Dad's face, that Larry had lost the pace.
Chapter VI
And Clint pulled out.
And I rolled over, so that I could see his huge prick, slippery and slimy with his fresh come, still hard, moments before it would detumesce.
And he showed it to me, sitting back on his heels, not moving, as though confirming that he had in fact gotten his rocks off.
And now, I watched Larry, redoubling his efforts, trying to catch up, as though he could regain the moment, if he came quickly enough.
So that the seismic shockwaves of his desperate thrusts were jarring my father, again and again, as, ass in the air, Larry fucked him to climax.
And I looked at Dad's huge musculature, crouched there, taking everything Larry had to give.
And loving every minute of it.
I did not think that Dad was aware of the game Larry had tried to play, the number he had tried to run on Clint, on all of us.
Not that he would have cared.
And I was not sure why I did, at least to the degree of resenting it.
I guess it was because of a distaste for being manipulated.
I hated that.
Why was it necessary for one person to run a number on another in order to enjoy a relationship ?
Why did it have to be con man and mark to make it work?
This was wrong.
This was something I would have to ask Dad about when I got the chance.
And take his answer with a grain of salt.
Because it seemed to me that my father was perhaps the most outstanding talent at that sort of game that I had ever known.
I was here because of his manipulation.
Which was far more elaborate than Larry's simple imitation of another's actions. My father's manipulation of me had been like one of those arrangements of dominoes I had seen on TV.
You know, the fantastic pattern of events that took place when the designer flicked that first domino with his finger?
Because it had taken planning, and a knowledge of my thought patters, my tendencies, my innermost thoughts.
So that he would have had to know me better than I knew myself.
And the chilling probability was that he did.
And I looked at him down there, getting fucked in the ass.
And not knowing and not caring about anything other than the sensations that flooded through him with each lunging thrust.
And now, Larry was coming.
Ostentatiously, naturally.
Because that's the kind of guy he was.
"Oooh! Aaah! Ahaha!"
Hips thrusting with almost vibrator speed, head thrown back, eyes closed, mouth open in an ecstatic leer.
Showing how much he was enjoying it.
And how good a job he had done.
And it was such bullshit I wanted to laugh.
As though any of us were supposed to believe that he was transported to that degree.
One of the disadvantages of manipulation is that you give up the spontaneity, the naturalness, and the purity of the pleasure that goes with it.
Because he pulled out, his last spasm throwing a small pearly jet onto one of Dad's brawny buttocks.
Clearly, he was racing to catch up.
As though suck catching up were possible.
As though it would have proved something to Clint.
Who, I was certain, could have cared less.
And now, there we were, the four of us, on our knees, on this football field of a bed.
And two of us had shiny, detumescing hard-ons.
And two of us had long, hard, thick, vibrant boners projecting stiffly up from our laps.
"Looks like you two are in bad need of some relief," Larry said.
Referring to me and Dad.
It was all happening so fast.
I had never seen Dad have sex before.
I had never seen him getting it up the ass.
I had never seen his face and body as he had it done to him, his body wracked with pleasure, murmuring and crying out in his sensual, sexual delight.
I had never seen him with a hard-on.
And the reverse was also true.
And now, here we were, the two of us, at the ready.
And with an audience.
Which did not seem to matter.
Not to Dad, anyway.
Because he looked at me, face flushed with excitement.
Sexual excitement.
The excitement which said that he did not care about anything except the throbbing monster in his lap.
And these other two were messy and recently satisfied.
As he was not.
As we were not.
And he was there and I was there.
And there was nothing, nothing, nothing in between us.
And now I understood.
This was the barrier he had set out to destroy.
And I realized, with an uneasiness overwhelmed by my desire, by the tumescent organ throbbing in my lap insisting on service, that he had succeeded.
The barrier was down.
Gone.
And he had it all.
Meaning the body.
And that was all that there was, really.
So he had always said.
And so I believed.
Or wanted to.
Because it had to be true.
Had to.
Here was the reality, the physical evidence of it, without dispute, without the possibility of misunderstanding, of misinterpretation.
Here was my body, there was his.
Here was my cock, there was his.
And there was nothing else there, only the two of us.
And our appetites.
And our desires.
And our throbbing potency.
And now, his hand was reaching for my cock.
And we were flattening out, turning onto our sides, reversing with respect to each other.
So that now we were in the sixty-nine position.
And his cock was in my face.
And mine in his.
And now, I was drooling.
I could feel the inside of my mouth, filling with fresh saliva.
I wanted him in my mouth.
So that, by sucking him, I would be sucking myself.
Except that I would be getting sucked by that which was other than myself.
By that which was my-no!
That had no meaning.
That did not count.
There was only the flesh and the flesh and the flesh.
And flesh wanted flesh, wanted to know it, to merge with it, to revel in that merging.
And there it was, all of it, mine for the taking, mine for the sucking.
The throbbing knob twitched, inviting me, the long, thick meat under the fishhead extending, thick and pulsing, to the eggs of the dangling balls.
And it was mine, mine, mine!
And nothing else mattered.
Nothing at all.
Nothing.
"Nuffick," I murmured, my voice a scant whisper, as my mouth closed over the bulging cock head.
There! I told myself. The deed is done!
There had been a barrier there once, but it was gone, evaporated.
So that perhaps it had been a mere illusion, something that had never really existed at all, a fairy tale, a lie, told long ago, preserved for some unknown reason.
But that no longer mattered, in any event.
What counted was what was.
Which, at the moment, was my cock and body, this other cock and body.
Which even now were merged into a closed circuit, as I felt gentle, moist lips close over the head of my cock.
And now, we were sucking each other off.
And it did not matter who or what we were, happened to be.
It just doesn't matter, I repeated to myself, my drooling mouth working at the luscious monster in earnest.
So that now my head was bobbing up and down, the great meat piston shafting smoothly in and out of my mouth, the head remaining inside at all times.
As I went lower and lower, wanting all of it inside me.
As I felt my own cock going deeper and deeper into the other body's head at each lunge of the sucking cycle.
And now, I opened the back of my throat.
Because I wanted this cock, all of it, inside my head.
Because only thus could I put my own all the way inside the head of the other.
And it was important to me that every inch, every centimeter of my cock experience that same exquisite sensation of wet, warm pressure.
And I realized to my great joy that it was.
It was happening!
I was doing it!
We were doing it!
My thick, throbbing monster (and I had never been so conscious, so aware of having a thick, throbbing monster) was going all the way into him, fucking his head to the hilt.
As his was into mine.
So that I could taste it, I could feel it, feel its bulk, its pressure, the life within it, its surface in intimate detail.
And we were sucking each other.
All of us.
There was no part of me, of my body, of my awareness, that was not involved, actively taking part.
And I could tell that it was the same for him.
The other.
Whoever, whatever he was.
Higher and higher we were taking each other.
Hotter and hotter our bodies were becoming.
And it was not happening rapidly or slowly.
This was taking place outside of time and space.
Such concepts were far too complex, too meaningless in the present situation.
Because there were only the two of us, and the single creature that we had become.
That, and the energy, the vibrancy, the life, the electricity, the force that was flowing through us in a continuous, closed circuit.
Nothing, nothing, nothing mattered except the feeling.
The feeling.
Which was a tingling, charged ecstasy.
Which had no precedent, no parallel, no substitute.
We were high.
We were higher than high.
We were at the zenith, the summit of the pleasure of which the human animal is capable.
And we stayed there, hovering at the peak.
As our heads bobbed smoothly, evenly, rapidly up and down on our turgid, throbbing meat poles.
We were moving like those pumps in oil fields.
And for the same reason.
We were reaching down, down, down into each others' depths.
And summoning.
Not the sperm, not the jism, the goo that would eventually come forth.
No, what we were summoning was the pleasure beyond pleasure, that miracle of sensation whereby we would attain that increment of sensation which in theory was impossible.
The pleasure beyond pleasure.
Which was in the flesh and of the flesh and of the creature, the fleshly creature, that we had become.
And now-
Here it came.
And I swallowed his load and he swallowed mine, an even, simultaneous exchanged, the huge, pulsating heads discharging onto our tongues, which could feel the spasms of the thick shafts.
And it was over.
And we did not glance at the other two who had watched the whole thing.
They had been there, and yet they had not.
They saw and yet they did not see.
They knew and did not know.
How could they?
There was no way they could have felt what we felt, thought what we thought.
There had been only the two of us.
They had played no part, had no faculties for viewing what had actually happened.
There was the doing and there was the watching and the two had no relationship.
Except that of the flesh.
So that they could know physically what had taken place.
And, knowing this, could anticipate the feelings, the wealth of sensations to which they could look forward to, if and when.
And there would be an if and when.
Because Dad and I would not always be here.
But the two of them would linger, after we had gone home.
Dad?
Home?
What had I done?
What had we done?
Stop it, I told myself, just stop it!
Those are not the thoughts you want to think, I told myself.
I was giving in to some unpleasant, and more than merely unpleasant feelings that threatened to well up within me, as I followed the broad back, the muscular buttocks to the bathroom sink.
And I did not look at him, even though both of us had our meat draped into the sink, washing ourselves off.
And I did not look at him, even though both of us were bent over, side by side, scrubbing our ass holes out with a washcloth.
But I fought the feelings back.
Except that I would not touch ... him again.
Not here, not now.
Not until I could get home, could have some time to think things out on my own.
Instead, I would take refuge behind Clint.
Behind him and with him, in his body, his cock.
I wanted both of them from him.
I would revel in his being, his physical being.
The flesh and the flesh and the flesh.
That was all there was, all there could be.
And it was enough, and more than enough.
For me.
For us.
For all of us.
And now, we were done in the bathroom.
And Larry and Clint took our place, washing off their own cocks, cleansing them of the stale come that had remained on them, cooling, as they watched (as much as they could) the action between me and ... the other.
And we did not get back onto the bed.
It was ridiculous, really, me standing there, fists on hips, looking at the gigantic, unframed abstract on the wall, peering at it intently, as though I could discern some deep meaning there.
And Da ... and the other sat on the edge of the bed opposite me.
I knew he was there, but I did not want to look at him, to see exactly what, if anything, he happened to be doing.
And I continued thus, until the other two came back into the room.
And Clint put his arm around my waist, sitting down on the edge of the bed with me, then swinging into the bed when I did.
As Larry did the same with ... the other.
And Clint lay on his stomach, as I had before.
And for the same reason.
So that now it was I who was insinuating myself between the fantastically muscled masses of his legs.
And it was I who was gazing at the bulging mounds of his buttocks, and the deep crack between them.
And I separated the cheeks of his ass with my hands, feeling his buttocks relax, as I exposed his large, puffy ass hole, surrounded by a ring of short, dark hairs, into plain sight.
And studied it, fascinated, for a long moment.
And now, I put my face closer and closer to it, opening my mouth as I went down.
And his ass, the cheeks still spread by my hands, rose into the air as I sealed my mouth to the ring of muscle.
And he was on knees and elbows.
And I was rimming him deeply, thoroughly.
And his anal sphincter relaxed.
And my tongue went in, in, in.
And I was fucking his ass hole with my tongue even as I chewed his anal sphincter.
And now, I kept his cheeks open with one hand as, with the other, I played with his huge, dangling balls.
And still I rimmed him, wallowing in the crack of his ass.
Until the promptings of my cock told me that my body wished to do something else, of which the rimming, delightful as it was, was the mere preliminary.
As it twitched and warmed into renewed life.
And lengthened and thickened.
Until it was huge and stiff below me as I knelt there, chewing away on Clint's ass hole.
And I pulled my face back.
And stood up on my knees.
And guided my cock toward his ass hole, buttoning the head inside it, feeling his rectum caress it eagerly.
And shafted into him, feeling the heat of his interior, feeling the parting of the tissues of the channel of his rectum yielding, warm and wet and smooth, only to close in on the head and shaft of my rampant intruder, hugging the entire length.
And I began the pumping motion of my hips, testing the wetness of his interior.
And finding it satisfactory.
So that I could speed up my engine.
So that now I was pistoning in and out of his generous, caressing, smooth, wet interior.
He was made for this!
Because he was taking it, taking everything I could throw at him, without resistance of any kind.
And now I was pounding into him, my abdominal muscles slamming into the solid twin masses of his buttocks, again and again.
And I could see the shaft of my cock as it moved in and out, long and thick and throbbing with power and life.
And I could look over and see the mirror image of myself and Clint.
Mirror image or parody.
Because it was happening over there, right next to me, a muscular stud socking it to one of greater bulk.
And going faster and faster.
So I turned away.
Go ahead, ass hole, I thought, go all out.
Run the race.
You win, okay?
Because I am going to take my time.
I am going to let my cock get to know the nuances of feeling, the peculiarities of pressure, the idiosyncrasies of reaction of this particular body, this particular ass.
I am going to explore the length, the depth, the height of action and reaction, my own and his.
I am going to hang right in there.
Until the cows come home, if that's what it takes.
Clint is going to know me.
Clint's body is going to know my body.
We are going to come to know each other as no two bodies ever have.
Because there comes a time.
There comes a time when a man has to say that he has arrived, that he need look no further, that whatever else is out there is either inferior or redundant.
How's that grab ya, Dad?
I am no longer on the market or in the market.
I am unavailable.
Clint here can do it all for me.
Call it what you like.
Call it love at first sight.
We are going to fuck and fuck and fuck.
And not need and not want anybody else.
Anybody.
Get the message, Dad?
Not that it matters, if you do or you don't.
This is not something for which I am required to give notice.
It just happens.
It's just happening.
For me and Clint.
It's-
It's bullshit.
Because, even as I came, even as my jism was exploding, hot and thin, inside Clint's deepest self, I knew that there was nothing special about my feeling for Clint.
I had thought to hide behind him, hide within him.
Clutching at straws.
Hiding from whom? From what?
But I knew the answer to that.
The question, the real question was, Did I want to hide?
And if so, why?
What was done cannot be undone.
Only a child believes otherwise.
And not a very smart child, either.
It happened.
It was written forever in the record of the world's time.
It had been a moment of heated passion against a background of lascivious sensuality unparalleled in all my experience.
It was-hold on.
Wait just uno fucking memento.
Why was I seeking excuses.
The first time, I was drunk.
Now, I was over stimulated.
Knock off the bullshit, kid.
And I sat back on my heels, cock hobbling, huge and wet, from my lap.
Looking at it, looking at the reality of it.
It was real.
As real as everything that had happened.
As real as what I had done with, uh ... Bill.
Say it, dammit!
Say it, you fucking coward!
Thus I screamed at myself in my mind, patting Clint's solid rump, letting him know it was okay to turn back over.
Chapter VII
Dad.
Is that the word you were looking for, Ace ?
And I knew damned well that it was.
There was no question.
I had engaged in a homosexual act with my own father.
Incest, it was called.
The most repulsive, most unacceptable of all man's vile actions.
From among a long list of traditional no-no's.
And yet, I had done it.
Without hesitation.
Hesitation?
Hah!
That was a real grin, that was!
I had gone after it eagerly.
It was not a question of hesitation but of how fast I could get on it.
It was my fault, all of it.
And yet, was it?
Dad was a manipulator.
An expert manipulator.
A manipulator of long standing.
And I was uneducated, a mere high school graduate, and of recent vintage, at that.
I had never been anywhere, never done anything.
What chance had I stood against Dad?
None.
And yet, and yet.
There could be a million "and yets".
And not one of them could change the fact of what had happened.
And it was all so gratuitous, so unnecessary.
We were a couple of knockout studs.
Both of us had all it took to get anyone we really wanted interested in us, man or woman.
Dad had an active sex life, and mine could be no less so.
So that it was not a question of turning to each other for lack of something better.
But Dad had gone out of his way, had in fact contrived a scheme of considerable complexity and elaboration to make exactly what had happened-happen.
It all works, doesn't it, Dad? I thought, bitterly.
You want something, you make it happen.
Never mind if you should want it, why you should want it, you want it.
And that's good enough for you.
Never a qualm, never a problem, never a hesitation.
To think about it is to do it and do it successfully.
How sweet it is!
And now, I'm so fucked up in the head that I'm feeling bad and I have no idea why.
Except that I can't stay here forever, washing off my cock.
There were at least three other people waiting to use the John.
I dried the heavy equipment.
"I, uh-I guess I'd better be running along, now," I said.
"Clint, it was a real pleasure.
"We'll be seeing each other at the gym, I hope."
"And after," Clint said, shaking my hand.
"Larry, thanks for the chow and the use of the hall."
"My pleasure. Any time."
And I ignored Dad as I dressed.
Stay or leave, Dad.
Or drop dead.
Aloud, I said nothing, giving a general wave as I departed.
* * *
I would leave.
I would have to.
I could stay here no longer.
I didn't know what was inside Dad's head.
But I did know that he had not gone to such elaborate lengths for a single incident.
I mean, I thought I knew where he was coming from.
It made sense.
I even went along with it, including his manipulation of me.
He was gay, he suspected that I either was or could be, and he took steps to clarify a situation that was of vital interest to him.
Okay.
That part, I understood.
That particular barrier had been eliminated and hoorah for our side.
So far, so good.
But now, it became apparent that that was a secondary objective.
That was not even the point.
I got the feeling that he would not have minded if I were not attracted to other men.
Because all that did was to make things simpler, easier for him.
To have-me.
That's what it had been about all along.
He wants me.
But on what basis?
Simple body to body?
Or was it something more?
Was he getting ready to abandon his promiscuity, to enter into a one on one relationship, with me the one in question?
He had another think coming, if that was the case!
He always had so fucking much to say, him and his logic, but he had nevertheless chosen this approach to, to-this?
Why?
Because he had been a winner, of sorts, up to this point.
The logic was indisputable.
At least not by me.
It was a simple exercise in identification.
Was I Jack Straight or Jack Gay?
And I had picked one from Column B.
So what?
Facts are facts.
And I was bent that way.
And we could all live happily ever after.
Except.
Still, I could see his point.
Perhaps I wanted to.
Or a part of me did, at least.
What if?
What if I had been ready, prepared to accept this, this ... thing he, we had done intellectually, but not with the old bod?
In that case, it would have been the same situation as accepting his sexuality, once removed.
I might have understood, but it would be only with my rational mind.
Emotionally, physically, nothing.
So that he and I would have dated like crazy.
There would not be an ass hole or a cock at the gym worth having that one or both of us would not have ended up sampling.
We would have been buddies, roomies.
In fact, for one night-last night, to be exact-I thought that was what was happening.
We would have been like the protagonists of some situation comedy.
Except, of course, that all our dates would be men.
But there was more to it than that.
At least, that was how it appeared to me now.
I was not, I could not be simply one more piece of ass, one more number to him.
Nor he to me.
It could not work that way, not with father and son.
At least, I did not think it could.
I shook my head.
It was all so damned confusing.
I gotta get an education, I told myself.
Hey, I was no dummy in high school.
And I even used the library.
I read.
Much to my father's deprecatory amusement.
"The hell you read that shit for, son? Ain't nuthin' in there gonna do you any good."
But now, I only wished that I had read more.
I wished that I knew where to begin with things like psychology, philosophy, sociology-stuff like that.
So that I could carry one end of the conversation with Dad.
So that I would stand a chance, a prayer of questioning him, of arguing with him.
Oh, I know you, Dad!
I know you very well, especially after the last two days!
And I can hardly wait.
I can hardly wait to hear the chain of logic that makes what we did all right.
And, no doubt, more than all right.
Acceptable.
No, make that desirable.
Something to be done, again and again.
That what you've got in mind, Dad?
I'll just bet it is!
I took a shower and went to bed.
Exhausted, I slept soundly.
And I had no idea when Dad got home.
* * *
But he did.
Because, next morning, I could hear him calling,
"Breakfast, Jack! Come and get it!"
And we ate.
I was actually very hungry.
We sat there in our robes, father and son, having the family breakfast.
Or were we still father and son?
And if not, then what were we?
What had we become?
Had there been a transformation yesterday?
I was waiting.
Waiting for the non-philosopher over there, the master logician, to begin his diatribe.
Or, more accurately, his monologue.
He did not.
Instead, he remained silent, as we loaded the dishes into the dishwasher.
"Ad'll be in tomorrow's paper," he reminded me.
"That's, uh ... good. I guess."
"There a problem of some kind, Jack?"
"Guess not."
"Well, then, if you're sure.
"Because, you know, Jack, all I tried to do was to break down the barrier-"
"I know, Dad."
"Then what?
"I mean, if there's some comment, some criticism you have of me, I'd like to hear it.
"It's true, I'm not perfect, but I'm not unreasonable, either."
"No, Dad, I'll give you that much, all right.
"When it comes to logic and reason, you're in there with the best of 'em, I'm sure."
"You see? That's just what I'm getting at.
"Your words say one thing, your tone of voice another."
"Real perceptive, Dad."
"Yeah, but I'm still not getting at the problem.
"So what is it?"
"Well, if you don't know-"
"Oh! I get it now! You mean about what went on last night!"
Brilliant, Sherlock.
I can hardly wait to hear what comes next.
"You think that there was something wrong in what we did, right?"
"I think," I began, clearing my throat, "I think that I've been manipulated to get me into a certain position."
"Uh huh.
"And so you have."
"Okay then, Dad.
"Suppose you just level with me.
"Instead of going on maneuvers, why don't you just tell me what you want from me?"
"I can't."
"You, you ... can't?"
"That's right.
"Because I don't know.
"I don't know, but I'd like to find out."
"Now you're losing me."
"I'm losing myself.
"But let me see if I can't try to explain.
"I owe you that much, I guess, since you asked."
"If I hadn't asked?"
He shrugged.
"I would have let our bodies do the talking.
"I'd have let them do the discovering.
"Because, in the end, I figure that's the way it's gotta happen anyway."
"The way what's gotta happen?"
"That's what I don't know.
"Let's put it this way.
"Larry. Do you want to see him again?"
"Not, not ... particularly."
"Clint?"
"Him, yes.
"Yeah, Dad, I do."
"Okay.
"So far, so good.
"Now, how many times more do you want to see Clint?"
I looked at him, surprised.
"How the hell should I know?
"Once, for sure.
"After that, I'd hafta see."
"Exactly.
"There's something about Clint that qualifies him to be of further interest to you.
"Whereas, with Larry, there isn't.
"Different guys, different degrees of attraction."
"Right. So?"
"So I've looked at you with, shall we say, sex-colored glasses for three years now."
"As what, Dad?
"With all the guys you could have, with all the guys you're seeing, why me?"
He shrugged.
"By absolute standards, why not you?
"You're handsome, built, hung."
"And so are you."
"All the more reason not to reject my advances.
"Or, for that matter, I yours.
"As we did not, yesterday."
"That was then, this is now."
"Just so.
"But I gather-make that I know-that yesterday is what's bothering you.
"It bothers you that it happened.
"We can't help that.
"And I did plan that it would happen, so that's on me.
"You can love me for it or hate me for it, it can't be undone."
"I know that."
"But what you want to know-"
"What I want to know, and I'm not sure I can trust you to give me the answer, is why it bothers me so much.
"We'll talk about your problem, which is where you are trying to lead us, after we get why I am so bugged by this thing straightened out."
"Very well.
"If, like me, you totally reject society's moral standards, the answer is that there's no reason at all for you to be, as you put it, bugged.
"If you do not, that is, if you make society's conventions and judgments your own, then the answer is to be found within that moral framework.
"That choice is yours.
"I can't make it for you."
"And I don't know enough to make it for myself."
"No, and I suppose that's my fault too.
"I seem to have imposed my standards on you, but not completely.
"On the other hand, you have never been exposed to opposing views. Your bad feelings are those that have 'rubbed off on you from society itself."
"Which may or may not be correct," I said, "but which probably are."
Dad smiled.
"Whatever works for you," he said.
"Meanwhile," I continued, "we're into what works for you, right?"
He shrugged.
"Hey, anything you don't like, you don't do.
"You're a big boy now, remember?"
I looked down.
He was right.
I had been doing nothing but copping out, since this whole thing started, casting about for where to place the' blame.
The beer.
The heat of the moment.
My father.
When it was me.
It had been me, right along.
Oh, Dad had been behind the program, all right.
But nobody had twisted my arm.
Not physically, anyway.
So, I guessed it was time to take the bull by the horns.
I had jumped on his back on my own, so I guessed the best thing for me to do was to ride all the way to the end.
Unless, of course, the bull threw me.
But that was a chance I was willing to take.
Because I would have it coming.
If I didn't have enough sense to know what I wanted, I would have only myself to blame.
"Okay, Dad," I said, looking straight at him, "we'll play it your way.
"What's next on the menu?"
He looked at me, not saying anything.
Finally, "You sure that's what you want?"
"Oh no, Dad! No you don't.
"I see what you're up to.
"I am going along, but I am not volunteering."
"Okay."
"It oughtta be. Either way, you win."
"So I do."
"And?"
"And I'll let you know."
* * *
The gym was not crowded.
It was early.
But Clint was there.
And I was glad to see him.
And the feeling was mutual.
"Hey! Gladja showed up."
"Likewise, I'm sure."
And he started to say something else, but changed his mind.
Instead, "Guess we'd better hit it, huh?"
"It's what makes us us."
"That's for sure."
And we did.
And only when it was over, when we were in the shower, did he say what was on his mind.
And apparently had been, ever since last night.
"Somethin' we didn't get to do the other night," he said.
"I know."
"Like to grab some lunch and we can make up for lost time?" he suggested.
"I'm all for that," I replied.
"And for that," I added, picking up the head of his heavy equipment.
He returned the compliment.
And we started to come up.
And broke it up, laughing.
As a thin man stepped into the shower, casting an envious eye at us as we exited.
* * *
"You sure Larry won't mind?" I asked.
"Of course he will, being left out like this.
"But what can he do? He's out of town.
"And what am I supposed to do? Keep it holstered until he gets back?"
"Good point," I said.
"He's getting to be impossible anyway," Clint said.
"Why is that?"
"He's so ... possessive.
"I'm seriously considering other living arrangements."
And he paused in the living room, Larry's living room, looking at me.
"Ya know," he said, "it's too bad you live with Bill.
"Because you and I would make one helluva team in the sack."
"Maybe something can be done about that."
"I was gonna say, I got a lotta nerve talking like that, when for all I know you could be in love with the guy.
"But I'm glad I did, now that I know I've got a shot."
"Well, it's all very tentative," I replied, uneasy at the thought of actually moving out.
"Hey, take your time.
"No big hurry.
"It's not unbearable around here, not yet, anyway.
"Just more and more ... inconvenient."
"I know the feeling."
It was true, I did.
A growing sense of uneasiness, of nameless discomfort.
As though the very air at home were somehow charged with a kind of negative electricity.
Which I suspected were Dad's labyrinthine thoughts, or perhaps his desires, which he had not yet communicated to me.
I loved it, this waiting for the other shoe to drop.
But there was no such tension here and now, as we stripped.
And we were in bed together, alone this time.
And it was ever so much better, so much more relaxed, so much more intimate.
So that we could take our time, fingers and hands exploring each others' muscles.
And slowly, unhurriedly, reversing our bodies in the bed.
And examining at close range each others' cocks and balls.
And putting the heads of each others' cocks in our mouths.
And slowly, gently, thoroughly sucking each other to full erection.
And lingering over the blowjobs, taking our time, bobbing up and down.
And wrapping our tongues around each others' thick batons.
As we sucked and devoured, sucked and devoured.
And gave each other deep throat.
Because we were in each other's heads all the way, fucking each other in the mouth at a leisurely pace, as though we could take forever.
And when we finally came, we were both careful to take our loads in our mouths.
And swallow them slowly.
Before joining each other on the pillows.
And napping, cradled in each others' arms.
And waking up with hard-ons, remembering to wash them thoroughly before going down on each other again.
Until, breaking away, not saying a word, Clint went down on knees and elbows.
And I found that I wanted his ass hole as badly as I had the first time.
So then, I thought, it's possible.
It's possible to want the same person the same way more than once.
And if more than once, then why not again and again?
It was possible with two people.
And a horrible thought struck me.
Was this what Dad had in mind for me, for us?
Because, if it was, he had another think coming.
Because I wanted this guy more than I wanted Dad, more than I had wanted him, even yesterday.
Yes, I wanted Clint.
But even now, I could not say how much.
Chapter VIII
"Been to the gym, huh?"
"Right, Dad."
"Gotta get over there myself in a while.
"Meet anybody ... interesting?"
"Clint."
"You and him, uh ..."
"Yes."
"I see."
"Problem with that?"
"No, guess not."
"Larry's outta town."
"Big deal."
"Clint's not happy."
"Also big deal."
"He's looking for a change."
"That was fast."
"Yeah, well, I guess Larry's company wears thin fast."
"I guess.
"But, uh ... how did it come up?"
"Just casual conversation."
"Why tell you?"
I shrugged.
"Got his feelers out, I guess.
"Determining his options.
"Bod like that, he's got plenty of those."
"You give him any ... encouragement?"
"Sort of.
"I left it open.
"Why?"
"Oh, nothing.
"Just, you're new to this game.
"Hate to see you close off your own options too soon."
"I'd kinda hate to see that myself, Dad."
And we looked at each other.
Finally, I spoke.
"You sort of left our conversation this morning hanging, Dad.
"I mean, it was like I gave you a green light and you sat there reviving, your engine."
"Yeah, well, that was hardly the time of day to .be discu-"
"Dad, we've gone hunting and you showed me how to lead the game.
"We've gone fishing and you taught me how to play the line.
"But I'm a man, Dad, not game or a fish.
"You don't have to lead me or play me on a fishing line.
"You don't have to wait for the right moment with me.
"I don't have a right moment.
"Or a wrong, one, for that matter.
"So what is it?"
"You want me to sleep with you, is that it?"
"It's a start."
"A start."
He sighed.
"I don't know where my feelings for you are leading me.
"I really don't.
"I know that I want you, but I don't know how much of you I want, how much of you I can have, how much you'd be willing to give of yourself to me.
"It's something I-we-have to work out.
"We have to give it a chance, you know?
"See where it takes us."
I smiled.
"Right, Dad."
Thinking, I've got your number now, Dad.
Because I knew him.
I knew his kind.
I should, after all-I was the same way.
Relationships were like packaged food.
You ate them, whatever it was-cupcakes, potato chips, candy-one at a time.
But whatever it was, it always ended the same way.
You threw away the empty bag.
Dad was telling me the truth, a part of it, anyway.
He didn't know where his relationship with me was leading.
But he did know how it would end.
A week?
A month?
Several months?
That was what he didn't know.
But one thing he did know, one thing he was not prepared to tell me about, was the fact that, sooner or later, end it would.
This was not a forever thing with him.
No relationship was, ever.
Not for Dad.
I knew pure ego when I saw it.
And when I was looking at him, that's what I saw.
I And I knew what he was looking for.
And I could have told him that he wasn't going to find it.
Not with me.
Naught loves another as itself.
I had read that in a poem in English class in high school once.
And that was why Dad, a stud among studs with a world of studs to pick from, had chosen me.
I looked like him, and for the best of all possible reasons.
A son is an extension of his father.
Dad was not old, either in years or in appearance.
But he was not getting any younger.
He had tried to find love with my mother.
Tried and failed.
As she had tried with him and failed.
You can't get blood from a stone.
And even the stone knew it.
So he had gone to men.
A logical step.
By his standards of logic, anyway.
He had gone looking for love and he had found sex.
Naturally.
Because they were not himself, they were other.
One could use them.
One could have sex with them, enjoy oneself with them, in the strictly physical sense.
But the deeper meaning had eluded him.
Therefore, it did not exist.
That was what might be termed his official line.
The deeper meaning was bullshit.
There was only the flesh and the flesh and the flesh.
Anything else was delusion, was myth, was lie.
And in Dad's case this happened to be true.
But there was irony at work here.
Because a part of him did not want to believe it.
A part of him was looking for something more.
But he would fail.
All of him, the whole person, would fail.
Because he was, by his own choosing, a moral and spiritual bankrupt.
And his search, his search in this direction, the only place he knew to look for a way to change this, would prove futile.
He would not love me.
True, naught loves another as itself, but he did not love himself.
Because, if he did, then he would be able to see himself in others.
And the others would not have to come from him, would not have to look and act like him, would not have to have his outlook, his taste, or his lack thereof.
So I was taking no risk with him.
He would not tie me up.
It would even be fun, the physical part of it.
I mean, let's face it; the man was built.
And the tragedy of what was facing him was a long ways off.
And I would be long gone before I had to witness it.
And yet, I could feel no sympathy for him.
I guess that was part of him, rubbing off on me.
But as far as the short range, yes.
Yes, I would sleep with him.
Yes, we would have sex.
In daylight and in darkest night.
In the early morning before anything else was up and moving.
In the mid-afternoon, when the rest of the world was hard at work.
And I would give and give and give.
To the master manipulator.
And watch him, ever so slowly, with great reluctance, come to realize that it was good and it was no good.
And that he had been right all along.
There was the flesh and the flesh and the flesh and nothing, nothing, nothing else.
Not for him.
Not with me.
Not with anyone.
Not now, not ever.
But yes, we would have fun.
He would have fun, trying.
And who knows?
Perhaps his logic would sustain him.
And in that sense, his theory proven to himself, he would have fun failing.
He would be wrong of course.
Or would he ?
Because there could be such a thing as personal truth as well as universal truth.
So that what was, what had to be wrong in the absolute sense would be right for him individually.
Giving him satisfaction, if not happiness.
Nobody ever said that satisfaction had to be happy.
"I'll, uh, I'll get on over to the gym," he said.
The concession had been requested and granted.
He did not want to stick around for any shifts in position, by either or both of us.
He had won.
Again.
As always.
But even that afforded him no satisfaction.
This was his world.
Where such things were taken for granted, and for good reason.
And I wondered if anyone had ever said no to him, had ever refused him anything.
Because I was the one with the best, the most frequent opportunities to do this.
And yet, I had not.
And was not about to.
He left for the gym.
I turned on the TV.
And stared, unseeing, at the boob tube.
Trying not to think.
Not about tonight, not about anything.
Which, if successful, is the easiest way I know to fall asleep.
When I woke up, it was supper time and Dad still had not returned.
I got some cold roast beef out of the fridge and made myself a couple of sandwiches.
I went upstairs and took a shower, coming back down in my robe.
And he returned.
"You eat yet?" he asked.
"Yes. You?"
"Yeah. Stopped at the burger place.
"Last time I ever work out this time of day.
"Hadda beat 'em off with a stick," he laughed.
"Am I supposed to be flattered?" I asked.
He looked at me.
"No, not at all.
He sat down next to me.
"But I do want you to understand how important this is to me."
"Don't worry. I do."
"I'm gonna go upstairs, take a shower, and go to bed.
"You close up down here when you're ready."
"Right."
* * *
I slipped into the bed next to him, naked.
And confirmed that he was.
And awake.
Because his hands reached around me at once, finding my buttocks.
And using a finger to find my nether star.
And rubbing it, round and round.
And now penetrating it.
And suddenly throwing off the covers.
And pulling my hips, until I was on knees and elbows.
And getting behind me.
And rimming me, sucking my ass hole, probing it with his tongue.
And quickly getting on his knees behind me.
And shafting into me.
And fucking me in the ass, there in the dark.
And doing it long and slow.
With variations, now pumping in and out, now going round and round, reaming me with his turgid invader.
In the dark.
Where I could have been anybody.
But he was having a good time.
And, for that matter, so was I.
He was good at it, I had to give him that much, displaying the energy and skill, the technique that I preferred for myself, as opposed to, say, Clint's straightforward, all out efforts.
And, when he came, it was a full load.
He cared enough to save up so that he could give his very best.
In the bathroom, we showered together, but did not speak.
Back in bed, we were again in the dark.
Where I did to him as he had done to me, rimming and then fucking him in the ass.
And he could have been anyone.
And in fact, it was Clint's image in my mind as -I drove him all the way home.
We showered together once more.
And he was lost in thought, reviewing what was happening in his mind.
It was happening full force.
So that, physically speaking, he was, had to be, satisfied.
But the other was not happening.
I could have told him that.
But that would not have done it for him.
He had to convince himself.
And we slept, wrapped in each others' arms.
And I wondered what Clint was doing with him-self tonight, just before I dropped off.
Sunday morning.
Light filtering through the curtains, discovering the two of us, naked and entangled.
With large, hard morning erections.
And he awakens.
And sees the twin hard-ons.
And reverses himself.
And we are sucking each other, as we had that first time.
And now, it was my balls he was looking at.
And my thighs which his fingers and hands caressed and explored.
And my abdominals against which his chest was pressed.
And it was good.
It was hot.
But hotter than if he had been in bed with somebody else?
I doubted it.
And so, I knew, must he.
I looked like him.
And I was adequate, even by his high standards, our high standards.
We washed off in the sink together.
And now, as though to review what he had done last night, to see it, to watch it happen, he made love to my ass.
Making love.
Not as romantic as it sounds.
Meaning merely that he took his time, that he lingered on each aspect of ass fucking.
The view of the buttocks at close range.
Spreading the cheeks to check out the anus.
Wallowing in the crack, mouth open.
Raising my hips, mouth still sealed to the target.
Fucking me in the ass with his tongue.
For an extra long time, pulling back to check his progress.
And fucking me, long and slow, his hands exploring my thighs, arms, and body.
And feeling my stiff cock, fucking the air beneath me.
And stroking my balls.
And coming inside me.
And pulling out of me.
And checking the view of my freshly fucked ass hole, his come oozing out of me.
And showering with me.
And knowing that it was good, that nothing really could be done or not done to make it better.
But not finding it.
It.
Meaning that special, unique relationship between himself and the closest thing to himself this world had to offer.
It wasn't working.
He had to see it, had to know.
And now, he was shaving in his bathroom and I returned to mine to do my morning stuff.
And I wondered what Clint was doing right now.
But I tried not to think about it.
Or about the fact that I would rather have been with him at the moment.
There is something singularly upsetting, depressing about being forced to go through an exercise in futility.
It was a beautiful day outside.
It was the kind of a day that, fifteen years earlier, we would have been walking through the zoo, the three of us.
And I would be eating an ice cream cone and carrying a helium-filled balloon on a long, long string.
While, unseen, invisible, the cloud of my father's emptiness hung over us.
Today, that emptiness was riper, more mature, more palpable.
It was a presence, in the course of being defined, realized.
Meaning made real.
It had made genuine progress, between last night and this morning.
Being and nothingness, and the nothingness of being.
My father was not a stupid man.
So that it would not take him long to catch on to what was or was not happening.
It did not surprise me, therefore, when he said, "If you wanna call Clint after breakfast and you guys wanna do something, that's okay."
I looked at him and drained my orange juice.
He knew.
And he knew that I knew.
It had not worked.
And he would not try again.
Oh, he and I would hit the sheets together, of that I was certain.
Because there was still the flesh and the flesh and the flesh.
But there would be no great expectations.
That had been tried.
And proven to be-physical.
What you see is what you get.
Nothing more, nothing less.
Not for him, anyway.
As though to emphasize this, he said, "Here. Here's Larry's number."
And he pulled a number from under a magnet on the fridge.
I shrugged and took it from him.
But I waited until after we had cleared the table and he went upstairs to get dressed before I called.
I would not perform closing ceremonies for him.
The phone rang twice.
I knew that there was an extension on one of the nightstands flanking the football field cum bed.
"Yeah?"
"Clint."
"Uh huh. Who's-"
"Jack."
"Jack!"
And I could tell by the difference in tone that he was suddenly wide awake.
"How are you, Jack?"
"Couldn't be better."
I was a little drained, but I would recover quickly.
"So. What's up?"
"Uh, I thought your situation over."
"And?"
"For a while, you understand, we could, like, try it, you know?"
"I don't know. Tell me."
"Listen, could we get together and, uh ... kick it around?"
"Yeah, sure.
"I've got company right now, but-fuck it.
"Come on over, why don't you?
"This here's sharin' stuff anyway."
"Be right over, soon's I get dressed."
"We'll be waiting."
I hung up.
And ran upstairs to get dressed.
And almost collided with Dad on the way out of my room.
"Got a mission, eh?" he asked.
"Uh, yeah, yeah, I thought I'd run over and keep Clint company for a while."
"You two got the hots for each other, huh?"
I shrugged.
"No, Dad," I sighed, "we just wanna get together and have a good time.
"That's about all two people can really do, you know."
"I know that only too well."
"And, uh ... Clint's thinkin' about finding a place of his own.
"We're gonna talk it over.
"I'm thinking about, uh, not ... living here any more."
"Whatever.
"To tell the truth, I'm thinkin' about gettin' a smaller place.
"Maybe, with you movin' out, this would be a good time."
"You do as you think best, Dad."
"I always have."
"Right."
* * *
Whatever Clint suggested, I would go for.
Whatever he came up with would be okay.
I could not face living with Dad any longer.
Not after last night and this morning.
I had been willing to stick it out, to help him find himself, searching the only way he knew how.
He had planned carefully, manipulated expertly.
He had set out to prove something to himself, using me as the guinea pig.
And I did not resent it.
Perhaps I should have, but I did not.
This had been important to him and therefore to me.
He was my father and, in a strange way, I owed him what he had asked of me.
I had done my duty and that obligation was now ended.
There was no more point in my being there with him.
Because our life together was over.
It ended, as it had begun, on his terms.
One door closes, another opens.
And now, I wondered what awaited me at Larry's.
And it occurred to me that perhaps Clint would want to move fast.
So that Larry would return home to emptiness.
Just as my father's house would be empty.
But for a while, Clint and I would have each other.
At least, our bodies would have each other.
To fill the emptiness.
NOTE
Nick "the Hunk" Johnson is the author of this book. He showed up at our offices in early June with his manuscript in his hand.
He was no more than a boy-and preciously cute. He filled us, the editors, with desire immediately.
"I would like you to publish this book," Nick exclaimed.
"How hard have you worked on this manuscript?" we asked.
"I have worked very, very hard," Nick said with a smile on his face.
"How hard are you willing to work to get it published?" we asked.
"I am afraid I don't know what you are talking about," he said.
We put our hand over our crotch and gave ourself a squeeze.
"You want sex?"
"That's right."
"If I give it to you, will you publish the book?" he asked.
"We'll see."
"What kind of sex would you like?" Nick questioned quickly.
"Blow job," we said.
"All right," he said.
"Kneel," we said.
He did. He reached up and unbuckled the buckle to our trousers.
"I can tell that you are well hung," Nick said, licking his lips.
Nick unzipped our fly and pulled the pants down, along with the underwear.
"Nice cock!"
"Thanks."
He licked the balls and then he sucked gently at the balls.
"That feels real good, boy!"
"More?"
"Yeah!"
He sucked the balls some more.
"Get the cock!"
"Right," he said.
He licked the cock-and then he sucked the cock. He didn't stop sucking until their was jism filling his mouth.
