“Yes, Sir. And when we saw you in London, I recognized you immediately—even with the beard you had then. I was so glad to finally get to touch you. Master said I could suck one dick that wasn’t his that night. And I’d wanted yours for so long.”

  “Synchronicity,” I murmured half-aloud, in wonder that our mutual longings should have lasted all these years.

  “Beshert!” Jake said with sudden finality. “It was meant to be!”

  Our courtship progressed slowly, if steadily. We both knew where we were going, knew that we were heading for the same destination, and we took our time getting there. We traveled back and forth, Barry more than me, and spent every available holiday and vacation together.

  Sam’s death had left Barry financially fixed, if rudderless. His mourning had turned into depression that devolved into a self-destructive spiral. Occasional drug use became a constant, and unprotected sex with strangers the norm. By some miracle, he avoided infection or worse. Sometimes he credits me for bringing him out of the miasma of his pain, but that’s a gross exaggeration. All I did was appear at the moment when he was ready to bring his life back into focus.

  “Synchronicity,” I tell him.

  “Beshert!” he responds.

  Now that he didn’t need to work, he could do what he really wanted, which was to go to graduate school, to study and teach. He applied to schools all over New England, thinking he’d attend the school closest to me and Boston. Then, on one of his weeklong visits (a week he spent collared, often naked, periodically flogged or whipped, and occasionally chained), I told him that I’d been offered a job at a teaching hospital in New Hampshire. He looked at me strangely.

  “Where in New Hampshire, Sir?”

  I told him.

  “They just accepted me into grad school, Sir.”

  “Is it where you want to go, boy?”

  “Yes, Sir. It was my first choice,” he said. “Synchronicity.”

  “No,” I corrected him. “Beshert!”

  I woke up this morning to find him next to me, awake, sitting on the edge of the bed and looking out the window at the slowly moving river this former factory town was once dependent on for power and transportation. I reached over, touched him, and he turned to me with his usual smile.

  “Sir,” is all he said, all he ever needs to say.

  I pulled him to me, kissed him hard, held him tight, spread his legs, and fucked him through the convenient hole in the back of the union suit he wears to bed during our New England winters, fucked him without so much as spit between us. He opened to accept me, opened then squeezed tight. Now that he’s mine, now that he wears my collar, he is where I plant my seed. That’s how I mark him as mine. I do what no one else is allowed to do. The collar is only the symbol.

  I think of how my wife had demanded my help on occasions like this. She was, quite naturally, insisting on equality in our marriage, something Barry neither wants nor needs. His self-confidence and my belief in him are all that matters—that, and the chain around his neck and my seed in his body. We are two orbs circling each other, reflecting our love back and forth, two planets dancing in perfect sync.

  Just before our guests arrive he showers and puts on a fresh shirt. Then, because there is time, and because I need it, he sucks my cock, successfully drawing the cum from my balls just moments before the doorbell rings. As always, his timing is impeccable.

  At dinner, the local historian again remarks that one of the town’s founding families shared Barry’s surname. Barry’s response to this information is polite interest. He knows already that he is their descendent but refuses to take credit or blame for this accident of birth.

  “You’re such a great cook,” the minister’s husband remarks. “It’s almost enough to make me want to be gay. Honey, why don’t you cook like this?”

  His wife shakes her head and rolls her eyes, this being a tender point between them.

  The women with the antique store laugh, delighted to watch the foibles of their heterosexual neighbors. The biker couple shares a smirk with each other, and us.

  “That’s not fair,” Barry says with his usual modesty. “Cooking is just a hobby for me. And I don’t have a congregation to respond to at all hours. Besides, we eat very simply most of the time. Often it’s just soup and bread.”

  “True,” I agree, not saying that the soup is one he makes himself, the bread fresh because he’s learning the art of baking it, that canned and frozen food are a rarity in our kitchen unless prepared by him. No one knows the trouble he goes to when he cooks, or how well we live. Like all New Englanders, he likes it that way, the exact details of his personal life kept a mystery.

  I smile at him, prouder than ever, my cock hardening again.

  I watch Barry the next afternoon working at his desk, absentmindedly petting the cat that sits next to the keyboard, purring. I fucked and flogged him the night before as a reward for our successful dinner party. Then fucked him again this morning, making sure he shot his own load before I gave him mine. He hums as he strokes his cat, content with the warmth of the healing welts on his back, with the feeling of my seed deep in his guts, with the touch of his cat’s winter coat. Then he notices me watching him and starts to stand up.

  “Sir?”

  “It’s OK, babe. Just admiring my boy.”

  “Your boy who’s turning gray, Sir.”

  “As if that could make me love you less.”

  He laughs, crossing the room to my chair where I’ve been working on my grant proposal, and sits at my feet. I stroke his short hair and beard, happier than ever to have captured my mysterious Other in the crook of my heart. He leans his head against my leg to better appreciate my touch and sighs deeply, tendering a kiss to my free hand. Together we watch Barry’s cat stretch, jump off the desk, stretch again, and step noiselessly across the carpet to our dog lying in a patch of winter sunlight, absorbing what warmth he can from it. The dog lifts his head to the cat’s soft salutation, to the gentle touch of the cat’s paw on his muzzle. They touch noses in greeting before a brief but well-mannered exchange of affectionate grooming, and the cat curls himself up with the dog, purring loudly.

  The dog wags his tail, content.

  My Reagan Years

  Kevin Bentley

  December 16, 1979 Major leap through time: I’m exactly where I had hoped to be over the last few months, first morning in my new Polk Street apartment, all my stuff moved in and put away, laundry going in the laundry room off the lobby downstairs so that I’ll have clean jeans to go meet Ben in tomorrow.

  Ben: Last Monday, December 10, I went to Sutter’s Mill on break and sat down at a table with my legs stretched out, drinking a beer. Two weeks before, I’d been cruised by this cute young guy; we’d exchanged names and I’d gotten smashed that night on Castro because he’d said he might be there—but we missed each other. He’d said he comes to the city every Monday; I activated some slight self-control and didn’t race back to Sutter’s the following Monday, so as not to be haunting the place for him. (He says he was there looking for me.) So last Monday, just as I was about to give up hope and leave, there he was. I felt a sort of pure joy when I saw him again and he approached me, smiling broadly. He said he was aiming to do something really different this evening, maybe go to the baths (Or get laid, maybe? I thought). I asked if he’d like to meet me at Bonanza in fifteen minutes and go to dinner at Hong Kong Café, then check out punk night at the Stud.

  A little later I was closing out my drawer and saw him browsing the gay section, smiling a conspirator’s smile, and I felt all true-romance-comics, “couldn’t take my eyes off him,” etc. He drove us to my old place on 16th Street in a tidy little Toyota and I changed my shirt and led him up to the roof to look at the sunset and smoke a joint. Then we were making out in earnest, kissing hard and rocking against each other, rubbing our hard-ons together through our jeans. When we broke and clambered back downstairs, both flushed and cocks protruding, we brushed past Eddie in the hall. I turned on the radio and we fell to tearing off each other’s clothes. He has a delicious body: hunky, pale, and very hairy, thick doorstop cock. I was very turned-on to his ass—dead-white plump cheeks and a tuft of dark hair at the crack—and fucked him greedily, twice, with intense flashes of tenderness and lust. My cock felt so good inside him: Holding his hairy legs back over his shoulders, I could push in slowly and pull almost all the way out again and feel his tight hole grabbing at my cockhead. I could just bend down and get the head of his fat, dripping dick in my mouth, staring back into his open eyes while he moaned and yelped. I fucked him slow and long, stopping whenever I was about to come and just panting and staring. I’m hard now thinking of it, and would beat off except I’d like to save it for when I’ll see him tomorrow.

  He didn’t say until much later, after we’d gone to dinner, danced at the Stud, and come back to my bed to fuck again till the early hours, that it was his birthday: he’s twenty-two.

  July 12, 1980 Just back from a three-day visit with Steve, my old pal and sometime-fuck-buddy from the bookstore, and Randy, with whom he’s been living since last fall, in Monterey.

  On Wednesday, Steve drove us to the Dunes, a notorious cruising zone near Fort Ord. We climbed over a sandy hill covered with electric-orange ice plant and walked along an empty white beach; the sea was that incredible glittering aquamarine-indigo. Back over the hill, we walked through a shady forested area, soon passing several lone male strollers. A slender man in white gym shorts and sunglasses with a blue backpack said hi and held my gaze a moment. I looked back and he had stopped and was staring after me. “If I go with him for a while, will you wait for me?” I asked Steve. “Oh sure, I’ll be at the car,” he said, laughing. I walked toward the guy and followed him around a bend, wondering if it could really be this easy. He cut into the trees and then beckoned from a sort of natural shower-stall just off the trail, a roofless wigwam of branches and leaves. (Steve told me later that a deaf guy who regularly sucks people off there had constructed lots of these shelters.) My woodlander was handsome and tanned, with serious blue eyes. It was stifling hot even out of the sun beneath the trees; there was a soothing background roar of insects and the surf just over the hill. We didn’t say a word, just stood face to face, smiling, running our hands over each other’s chests and crotches. His hard-on was apparent and accessible in the loose terry shorts; I’d had a boner since turning back to see him staring at me. I knelt and sucked his cock a bit, opening my pants and stroking mine. Then we changed positions and he blew me while I looked out at the trees and the other occasional man passing by. He stood, entirely naked now (he’d only been wearing the trunks and the backpack to begin with), pulled something from his pack and greased his ass and my dick, then turned and presented his buttocks, obscenely pale beneath his tan line, bending slightly against a tree trunk. My legs were shaking as I shoved my dick into him and started pumping. I was quickly drenched with sweat, only my shirt unbuttoned and pants half-down; men walking by could see me from the chest up; some stopped to peer over the foliage and watch. A very sexy, shirtless, muscular young guy in green army pants leaned in, grabbed the back of my neck, and kissed me passionately, and I came thrusting into the first guy’s slick butt. He stood and began kissing our visitor without batting an eye, while I knelt and blew his swollen red cock till he shot down my throat, moaning in concert with the beefy army guy, who’d pulled out his dick and jacked off.

  I staggered back to the car sweaty and trembling. “Jesus, you look like you need a drink!” Steve said as we sped away.

  March 8, 1981

  Steve and Randy came up from Monterey and spent a night and day last week. Monday night we took acid and walked to the Balcony in the rain; I’m vague on the rest of the night. I do recall laughing at two clones with little teddy bears in rat-traps sticking out of their back pockets. Next day, mine off, we ran around in the afternoon with Michael’s new lover, Gary—we took more acid and went to watch dirty movies in booths in the Tenderloin. Steve and Randy paired off, and Gary and I piled into a booth, fed quarters into a slot, and watched a flickering picture of some hunk pumping his cock into a skinny youth’s ass. What with the smut and the proximity, it wasn’t long before Gary freed his hard dick (had I seen it before now? Not erect, I don’t think) and was taking my hand and wrapping my fingers around his boner, grinning nervously. “I think I’m going to have to shoot my wad, Mr. Kevin,” he said, and soon I had mine out and we were jerking each other off in earnest, sweat pouring off us in the dank booth. Had I realized before how attracted I am to him? He’s Michael’s boyfriend, but they’re both vocal about their stormy and totally nonmonogamous relationship. The film faded out and we went on jacking each other’s cocks, our faces inches apart, almost kissing, but not. “That’s it, you’re gonna make me shoot,” he said, never breaking eye contact, and we both shot our wads onto the walls and floor. We fell out of the booth laughing and in disarray; Steve was smoking a cigarette out on the sidewalk and looking at me quizzically.

  We continued partying on Castro Street, where Michael met up with us when he got off work at the copy shop. We laughed and drank beer and played pool, and hours later Steve and Randy dropped me off at home, where, when I’d gone up the stairs and shut my door, I threw myself on the green vinyl couch and cried till my nose ran and my head hurt. It had come to me as a total coup de coeur in that airless booth: I’m in love with Gary.

  April 19, 1981

  Report from out of the gap; the way I brag, oh yes, I’ve always kept journals here: big lie.

  Today my under-lip’s raw from excessive kissing with Joey, a handsome waiter friend of Steve’s whom I met last June in Monterey. Steve called up on Thursday night and said, “Joey’s here, and he’s coming to the city Saturday morning. How’d you like to go out with him?” I’ve always asked after him: “Seen Joey lately?” And Steve always taunts me, shaking his head sadly, “It’s a shame, he’s so shy, he never tricks, and he’s always complaining of how horny and lonely he is….” This, about a six-foot-tall, former construction worker Italian stud with impressive biceps and olive skin. So I was like, whoa, it’s Christmastime in the city.

  I was just getting out of the shower Saturday morning when he arrived, cold and wearing a big dorky ski jacket—it was cold and foggy out. Broad chest, nice ass, big thighs: When I opened the door I was almost struck dumb. He was shy; he just kept looking at me and smiling. Steve had said, “He’s bringing coke and mushrooms—” as if they were Green Stamps, and I felt fairly sure the expectation was that we’d be spending the night together, but it seemed too good to be true. We were both shy enough to spend five hours together before kissing.

  Very shortly after he came in he’d put lines of coke on a plate, and soon my teeth and the roof of my mouth were numb and we were chatting away like old friends. We took a long walk, smoked some Thai-stick I had, and then drove in his car to Land’s End. Despite the cold misty drizzle and wind we walked way out on the path above the nude beach. You couldn’t even see the bridge. The moments when we stepped behind trees and lit bowls of Thai-stick were silent, very high, and sexually charged; he was leaning close into my face to light the pipe.

  Back at the apartment we sat on the couch talking and sipping beers; he bent to kiss me and when our lips touched, pow! We were all over each other and clothes were flying. When we lay on the bed pressed together naked I was happy in the extreme. I couldn’t speak; I kept thinking the word joy. And I remember thinking, If my life ended at this very moment, I’d die filled with joy. Well, I was so high, and my heart pounding so violently, I felt as if that were a real possibility. My dick was hard and he was handling it and admiring it and then sucking it slowly and reverently. I pulled his muscular, hairy thighs around my neck and found my way to his big, hard ass. The crack was heavily furred; I pulled his cheeks apart and kissed the clean, pink, pursed hole as tenderly as I’d been kissing his lips. He rolled onto his stomach and I started thrusting my cock between his cheeks: This gentle stud who could bend me into a pretzel was going to let me fuck him! I couldn’t get it in with spit; I had to get up and find lube. His body was tensed and hard; I stared at the broad, sweat-slicked shoulders, stroked his big hot buttocks, and pushed straight up and in. He was so tight it almost hurt, as if I were trying to poke my dick through a knothole. He turned to kiss me and I pulled out and squeaked back in slowly till I squirted. We lay stuck together and I stayed inside him. After a dazed, dreamlike time passed, his ass started moving under me, flexing on my cock like a gripping fist. We started kissing and to my own amazement I was hard and fucking him again till I came, tingling and covered in goose bumps, my hair soaked.

  We napped, got up and showered, snorted a line of coke each and ate some mushrooms, and headed over to Uncle Vito’s for pizza and wine. Afterward, we walked down Bush to Polk and over to the Giraffe, but we were much too high to keep it together long in a noisy Saturday-night bar. The noise of the disco and shouting patrons around us as we timidly sipped our beers was painful; when I began hallucinating little red light explosions like flashbulbs going off around me, I thought it wise to go.

  At home again there were some weird moments; we were so much higher than when we left, and I was acutely aware of being with a stranger, however congenial. I spent a few minutes trying to adjust the rabbit ears on the TV set before realizing I couldn’t tell whether the picture was in or out of focus and my effort was pointless. We started kissing again, and it was different—slower, awkward, as if we were both sticking our tongues in another’s mouth for the first time. Stripped again, I was intensely conscious of his otherness, of not really knowing anything about him; the full weight of the “dirtyness” of our acts came over me in the most exciting way; all my Gay Is Good conditioning fell away and I felt the clumsy, nasty, forbidden nature of taking a hard, dripping cock in my mouth and making of myself a slave, a sucking machine with one goal: to make him shoot his load down my throat. His cock hadn’t always been hard earlier; now it was stiff and red and I couldn’t get enough of it. He came, thrashing and groaning; then I lay on my back with my hands behind my head while he blew me and took my load.

 

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24