Best Gay Erotica 2006, page 2
We were hastily ushered out, and I promised myself that I would never enter that corral again. But nine years later, I find myself desperate. Public sexual spaces have been depopulated by the Internet. I go to Buena Vista Park at 1:45 a.m., and there’s no one there, I mean not a single person—this used to be prime time. I wait a half hour and then go home. Most of San Francisco’s backrooms have been shut down to make way for Tiffany wedding bands, and the Power Exchange, the sex club I usually go to, has always been tweaked out, but at least people used to have sex there—now they just walk in circles like they’re at some demented mall, or lock themselves in cubicles and dream of bedrooms. When people do have sex, they stare at each other with computer screens in their eyes—Kirk Read calls this “two-dimensional sex,” the crap you have when you hook up online, and everything is scripted to avoid any intimacy or even passion.
Of course, guys have been figuring out ways to avoid intimacy in public sexual spaces for generations, but there’s something more brutal and dehumanizing about the calculated hyperobjectification of the Internet. I’ve been a whore for more than a dozen years, so I’m aware of the ways in which reality desperately strives to imitate fantasy, but at least a trick who’s paying generally wants some intimacy, or the illusion of intimacy. But the Internet intensifies all the worst aspects of gay male sexual culture: A ruthless search for the perfect abs or ass or cheekbones or cock becomes an all-day obsession, scorn becomes “just a preference,” lack of respect is assumed, lying is a given. The Internet makes it safe for corporate lawyers to go on three-day crystal barebacking binges and rationalize the weekend by assuring themselves: At least no one knows.
But back to Blow Buddies, where I returned after a nine-year absence—I figured it had to be better than the Power Exchange. Military aficionado Steve Zeeland claims he’s celebrating masculinity in order to destroy it, and I’m skeptical but not entirely innocent either. I’ve learned to negotiate the hallways of sexual longing with just the right combination of studied innocence and discreet charm. Sure, I still smile way too much, but I can press silently against you for just the right amount of time to get your dick into my throat.
So at first, Blow Buddies was refreshing. Guys were sucking cock and jerking each other off in the open, but maybe I was accustomed to the Power Exchange, because I kept walking around and around until there was almost no one left. I eyed this one guy sucking a thick dick through a glory hole, looked up to see a hot guy with a shaved head, just the right amount of stubble, and the perfect scowl, I was practically drooling. The cocksucker kept choking, until he actually turned to me and asked if I wanted to take over—manners! Then I was the cocksucker, even though at first the guy’s dick tasted like a not-too-delicate mixture of liquor and digestive enzymes. I figured I’d just keep sucking and eventually it would taste better,
and I was right, pressing my lips up against this guy’s groin and wishing I could get closer to the rest of him.
I looked up and saw that the guy was watching me, so I reached up to grab his neck, and then he was pulling at my armpit and pumping my throat really hard and I was taking it like I live for, and he grabbed my head with the other hand and I was in homo heaven, sucking and slurping and aching for that load. And then he pulled away, shook off his dick, zipped up his pants, and walked off. And here I am now, still salivating over his masculinity, jerking off as I write this, aggravating my jock itch and teasing you with my flaming tendonitis.
But back to Blow Buddies, I stumbled upon some guy’s stretched-open shaven asshole pushed into a glory hole like a toothless mouth with big big cheeks. I thought: If sex is gonna imitate porn, then porn’s gonna have to become a whole lot more creative. Which brings us to the volume you have in your hand—the hand that’s not squeezing your cucumber, grabbing your peppermint stick, massaging your glo-snake. This book is dangerous and lovely, just like you.
IN BED WITH ALLEN
Marcus Ewert
In 1988, when I was seventeen, I flew out to the Naropa Institute in Boulder, Colorado, with the express purpose of sleeping with Allen Ginsberg, the world’s most famous living poet. To be more specific, I wanted to sleep with Allen so that I could join my life to his, thereby speeding up my own ascent into personal and artistic greatness. At the time, Allen was sixty-two years old, and I knew from reading his poetry how attracted he was to teenage guys. In the following true story, I have just introduced myself to Allen, and we’ve agreed to meet later that same afternoon, with the understanding that we are going to have sex.
After a desultory meal of fried tempeh in a bun—my stomach’s too jumpy for me to do much more than pick around the edges—I head back towards Allen’s. I mount the stairs and knock on his front door; he lets me in. Once again, Allen’s dressed in blowzy, white, pajama-like clothing. Stepping further into the apartment, I see that it too is suffused with whiteness: the sunshine of high noon slicing up the living room into a thicket of angles, as it streams in through the plate-glass windows.
Allen looks at me questioningly and cocks his head in the direction of the bedroom, upstairs. “Well, shall we?”
“Okay.”
And then it’s like a wind is pushing us up up up the staircase— a hastening of the narrative inevitable. Allen leads the way. He’s holding both my hands, clasped in a lovers’ knot.
The bedroom is primarily bed—a broad, king-sized mattress neatly made up with clean white sheets. A writing desk against one wall displays a ream of blank paper, one of those school composition journals with the mottled, black-and-white covers, a clutch of fountain pens, an ink bottle, and a box of Kleenex. Above the desk, the room’s one small window stands open. Through it, breezes bat like kittens’ paws, catching and belling the short curtains; warm puffs of air fragrant with the smells of summer: grass and pine and sun-baked soil. Allen unclasps his clunky wristwatch and drops it on the desk, causing a few pens to scatter. He faces me expectantly. I guess I’m supposed to take the lead now.
I guide Allen to the foot of the bed, and gently push him onto his back. He sighs and shivers with delight…so let’s be a bit more daring. I hop onto the bed behind him and cradle his head in my hands. I give his skull a little tug so that his neck will fully extend, which seems like the kind of thing a sexy…masseur-type guy would think of. Once Allen’s neck is unkinked, I carefully rest it, head back down, on the pillow. Then I worry: Did I go too far, just now? Is pulling on his head too weird?
But Allen’s looking up at me with the starry eyes and blank smile of a baby with gas. An expression which in this case, unfortunately, seems a bit cutesy and self-satisfied, as if Allen were thinking, Aren’t I amazing, to let myself FEEL pleasure so deeply?
On the other hand, I’m beaming right back at him, intoxicated myself that I seem to be playing the part of young swain so successfully. To an outside observer, we’d no doubt look like lovers gazing at each other raptly, but actually we read in each other’s expressions only signs of our own depth and goodness. Oh well.
However, as I peer down at Allen—intent as the mother in a Mary Cassatt painting—I do take the opportunity to really look at him for the first time…and am rewarded with a flush of physical attraction that I wasn’t expecting to feel! Wow, I think, he’s actually really handsome, kind of!
Supine in the sunlight, his head has a craggy dignity, like the face of a god on an ancient coin—Zeus or Dionysus. And he’s definitely got the lusty, bearded satyr-thing going for him….
The moment I establish a lineage for Allen, a historical precedent for the way he looks, any remaining doubts about having sex with him fly right out the window. Don’t I want to be a part of history, too?
“You’re very handsome, Allen,” I tell him. “You have a kind of…noble, heroic look to your face.”
“Yes-s-s-s,” says Allen slowly, astonished by my sagacity, “you’re right, I do look noble and heroic. How intelligent of you, to notice that! Most people your age wouldn’t have!”
Time to distract Mr. “Ego Unbound”! Glancing at Allen’s forehead, I suddenly remember how my Dad would tickle-torture me when I was a kid—pinning me down and blowing tightly focused little breaths on my head until I’d go crazy.—Ah ha!
Just as Allen is drawing breath to say something else, I cover his eyes with one hand. Gamely he goes limp, and shuts up—happy once more to concede control. I hover over him and purse my lips. Then, I graze his brow with zephyrs.
Allen groans! Twitches! Shudders! “Ohhhhh!” he moans. “Angel kisses!”—Nice.
I continue tickle-torturing him until I start to hyperventilate, then I flop down beside him to catch my breath. After a moment, Allen leans over and tells me eagerly, “Do you know that when you were doing that it’s like you were blowing directly onto my brain? ”
God, I’m such a good lover all of a sudden—it’s like I can do no wrong!
Let’s up it another notch: kissing.
I haul myself on top of Allen, push-up style. His lips are firm and puckered, emerging from the crinkly hairs of his beard like what I imagine a vagina to look like. I lower my face down to his, exquisitely slowly, so that we can really feel our energies mingling—bringing my lips down so that they just barely brush his, not even a kiss yet, just…contact. My eyes are closed. I keep us suspended there, right on the edge.
And then I part my lips, and fuck his mouth with mine.
Allen returns the fervor, doubled, which spurs me on further. His tongue is bumpy and slabby; visually, it looks like square pieces have been sliced from it at random. And on his tongue’s left side, my own tongue encounters a hard, raised nodule, like the pellet from a BB gun embedded in there— what is that? None of this is gross, though, it just adds texture. Allen’s mouth tastes like some sort of mouthwash too, kind of old-fashioned and medicinal, but not unpleasant.
After several minutes of hard-core frenching, Allen pulls himself free. “Oh!” he cries, unable to constrain the urge-to-describe a moment longer: “Candy!”
Wow, I think, he really is good with words! “Candy!” The perfect way to describe kisses from me: a mouthful of sweet, youthful innocence….
Emboldened, I begin to take off his shirt. Suspensefully, I undo each plastic button: striptease. I slide my hands under the shirt flaps and splay them open, baring Allen’s torso as if shucking an ear of corn. I skate my hands up his chest—the skin is cool. I place a hand over his heart and pause dramatically, as if calling upon the spirits to help me pump cosmic energy into Allen’s body. Cupped in my hand, his breast is soft and quivery, like a pudding with little hairs on it. Inside its cage of bone and flesh, I feel his heart softly juddering.
My turn for a little wordplay. Remembering a term I once came across in Tolkien, which always sounded cool, I say, “Allen, you are a greatheart.” I enunciate the unusual word carefully: “You are a greatheart, Allen.”
He looks at me like I’m the rooster who quoted Shelley. “Yes-s-s,” he says, with wonder, “yes-s-s, you’re right! I am, I am a great heart!” He makes it two words. Gazing off into distant realms of Destiny, he says, “And that’s what I try to be in the world—a great heart.” Then he brings his attention back to the here and now, and looks at me again, still marveling. “How wise of you, to see that!”
I pause respectfully for a beat, then change subjects by putting my hand on his crotch. That quiets him. Through the fabric of his pants I feel his erection, a short hard rod that I knead with the heel of my hand. I unzip his fly and withdraw his dick. It stands up proudly, perpendicular to his belly, just three or four inches tall. Not too threatening….
Still, looking down at the swollen head, I ask myself if I’m really going to go through with this. But the skin looks so tight and glossy, I do wonder what it would feel like against my lips…. Hmm, smooth. Well, while I’m down here, why not pop the whole thing in my mouth, see what that feels like? Hmm. Kinda filling, in a satisfying sort of way….
Gee, I guess I am going to blow him after all.
I suck Allen’s dick for several minutes and, really, it’s not that bad. On the other hand, I am getting light-headed. I find that breathing while giving head is difficult, plus, the intense self-consciousness of the last forty minutes—“In Bed with Allen Ginsberg”—has really worn me out. I just want to get off and go to sleep. God, I’m so selfish!
I stop blowing him, and lie back to rest. Allen doesn’t chastise me, but instead transitions himself from passive to active. He ministers to my body, doing a lot of the things to me that I did to him—like the blowing on the forehead, and the portentous hand-over-the-heart thing—but he’s not as good at them as I was, he’s kinda half-assed. On the other hand, the moment he gets my dick in his mouth, I know that I’m hopelessly outclassed. He blows me with one hand wrapped firmly around my cock, sluicing me up and down while his head bobs frenetically. After a few minutes of me bucking and thrashing in pleasure, Allen glances up.
“If you use your hand like this,” he explains, coming off my dick and showing me the wet sleeve he’s made with his fingers, “you keep your lover’s penis covered the entire time you blow him, so that it never gets cold. Also, this way, there’s never a moment in which his entire shaft isn’t receiving stimulation of some kind…which demonstrates mindfulness and compassion for your partner.
“Now you try,” he adds.
Ugh, I’m so tired! Plus, I absolutely hate the fact that now there’s technique involved, a right way and a wrong way to do things. I knew sex couldn’t be that easy. I knew I’d fuck everything up somehow….
Deeply depressed, I try to blow Allen like he blew me, but—sure enough—my timing and coordination are totally shot. Instead of the fluid, synchronized movements that Allen used, my mouth goes up when my hand goes down and vice versa, and I’m almost in tears. Plus, I’m gagging really badly. Allen cheerfully calls out blowjob suggestions, but they only confuse me more. Finally, I just give up.
Thankfully, Allen doesn’t seem too upset. Still chipper, he resumes blowing me as if there hadn’t been an interruption, until he brings me to a truly shattering orgasm. My eyelids seek to drag me down into sleep, but it’s only common courtesy to help Allen get off, I’ve screwed up too much already to shirk now. Allen pumps his dick with gusto and asks me to pinch his nipples, cup his balls, and look into his eyes while I kiss him, all at the same time. This seems physically impossible, but somehow I manage it, and Allen finally cums. I’m sure his orgasm was a lot less fun than mine, but he’s sighing happily, so I guess everything’s okay. We wipe ourselves off and then curl towards each other, ready to nap.
Just before we both drift off into pleasant, afternoon dozing, Allen bestirs himself. “This,” he says, indicating our quiescent, satiated forms, “is the only way to teach. Just like this—one on one, in bed. The ancient Greeks knew it. That was how all the great philosophers instructed their pupils— after sex, when the mind and the heart are more open.
“Whatever I do out there,” he continues, waving his hand in the direction of Naropa, and the world at large, “the things I say in class? That’s not teaching, those are just words—the neurotic chattering of the ego.
“Real education only happens between two people,” Allen tells me. “Through intimacy.”
STEPHEN
Kirk Read
Andy’s words are italicized because hookers speak Italics.
[Notes to aspiring hookers are in brackets in roman typeface.]
Hooker phone: Andy’s client Stephen
—Hey Andy, it’s Stephen. Are we still on for tonight?
—Sure.
—Can you bring some of your toys? I wanna try something different. You can just run the whole evening.
—Okay.
—Two hours, okay?
—Call when you check into the hotel and give me your room number.
—Will do.
—Also, if you could call down to the desk and ask them which exit it is from 101, that would be great.
Voice mail, received during a class discussion of Raymond Carver (which Andy thought got a little out of hand, what with all the flagrant worship) —Hey guy, it’s Stephen. It’s the Millbrae exit, then you cross the freeway and go right on Airport Road. Pass the Hyatt and it’s all the way at the end. You’ll see it—the Crowne Plaza. Okay. I’m looking forward to seeing you. I want you to take charge.
Hooker phone: Andy’s friend Doug
…I think children are used to further this notion of sex as terror. Adults assert their kids as an excuse to repress everyone else. It’s the ultimate double bind for people who care about liberty. How do you bring a child into this overpopulated planet—I mean, it’s already problematic on an ecological level—and not just put them in front of Disney videos? I mean, can it be subversive or are we deluding ourselves?
—I agree. What did you do today?
—Just got home from Harbin Hot Springs. I’m on my way to see a client.
—I thought you might be driving.
—I’m turning into the parking lot of the hotel.
[Early in your sex work career, this is an exotic thing to say to a friend on the phone.]
—How are you?
—Good. Went to see Tori Amos last night, U2 Thursday. Got three shows this week.
—I thought you were on a budget! I’m gonna do a seminar on how to be poor.
—Well, once I sell the book I figure it’ll change around. Something has to.
—Honey, I just can’t imagine myself being anything but poor. Then I don’t get disappointed.
