The moon was in the center of the sky. My heart was light. My head was clear. I had a sense that the world was mine. The hedges surrounding the gardens bordering the expensive single family homes were bursting with green, vital, newly emerging leaves.
A shiver of danger shot through the nocturnal euphoria.
He was leaning against the lamppost, cigarette hanging from his lips, two admiring lieutenants flanking him, copies of him in dress and stance but far from his equals in arrogant and graceful power. That was only his. They knew they lacked it, and they willingly subordinated themselves to him just to be near it.
Hey, he said, you going somewhere.
I felt the threat and ignored it.
I'm talking to you. He didn't let it go. He didn't let me pass.
His lieutenants were on either side of me, each seizing an arm before I knew it.
2
Usually, there's a little hassle, minor roughing up and major humiliation. You leave one of these encounters feeling like shit, the crystal delight of the world shattered..
But this was different. One of them put a handkerchief over my mouth and nose and I passed out.
3
I was dazed, awake now, but out of it. I knew what was going on like I was seeing it, myself included. But I was indifferent. Feeling no pain.
I was naked. My hands were cuffed together around a high bar suspended over me and my feet just touched the floor.
He was examining me.
Scared?
The question was threatening and ironic at the same time.
I was unable to answer.
It was only when I felt him making a fist around my cock that I realized it was hard. My whole body stiffened with anxiety.
4
I was sitting in the Cafe Figaro drinking espresso and reading Rilke. It was a rainy Tuesday afternoon, three days later. I'd gone to my morning classes, but had trouble focusing and decided the afternoon would be better spent not trying to.
Rilke kept fading away and my mind seemed to evaporate. I was overcome by the memory of his hand around my cock. I was getting hard under the table.
It was dark by the time I left, and for no good reason I walked over to Sheridan Square and then over to Hudson Street.
It was a building I would have said I'd never been in, but I walked up to it and rang one of the bells. A buzzer sounded in response and I pushed the door open and walked over to the elevator like I knew where it was. I pressed seven and got off inside a loft that had been made into an apartment.
5
I was very relaxed. It was warm. I had to get out of my shirt. I'd feel so much more comfortable without it. My chest was filling with breath. Slowly I took my shirt off.
I think I felt him take hold of my nipples. Then I felt a woosh and I was filled with something that curled itself around me inside me. And then...but it's like a dream I can't remember.
6
It wasn't my habit to go to a barber to get my hair cut.
I let it grow and from time to time twisted this way and that in front of a mirror and took a handful of hair at the back or on the sides and cut it off. I was shaggy.
Similarly I was careless about how I dressed and what I ate. I was a little fat, and I was altogether flabby. It didn't matter to me much. I spent a lot of time doing research in the library and even more in front of my computer. My work was in demand. Money was not a problem. I had enough in several bank accounts that I could have stopped working and going to the New School and lived ok for a long time. But I liked work. It filled up my time. And I was looking to meet somebody at school.
But I was pretty much a loner. Meeting someone would be nice. But I was also worried that it might be too much trouble if I did. I was afraid of the demands someone I got involved with would saddle me with.
Besides, I could take care of myself when I felt the need.
So I was surprised to find myself sitting in a barber chair, a sheet tied round my neck, getting my hair cut.
Sal scolded me.
Who cut your hair?
I do it myself.
Yeah. It shows. No more. You come to me. Today is just a start. I give you a chance to grow something good-looking. What you got now, it looks...
He didn't finish the sentence, but the look on his face of disdain mingled with disgust said more than I wanted to hear.
I hardly recognized myself when he got finished. A lot of hair was on the floor.
That's better, Sal said.
It was hard for me to agree with him. At the same time, it did feel really good to have had my head shaved. I felt like I was getting a hard on, paid up and gave a tip and got out of there before I could be even more embarrassed, but not before Sal made me promise to come back in a month for a real hair cut.
We gonna make you worth it.
I couldn't figure out what he meant.
I wandered around the Village the rest of the day. I was restless.
I was on the corner where Sheridan Square rays into Christopher on one side and West 10th on the other. Above me, through a wide second floor window I saw guys working out. It was a gym. I wasn't into body-building. But I felt like seeing what was going on inside, anyhow.
Cool guy at the desk said I could go the first time free, see if I liked it and then join up if I wanted.
He asked me if I needed some gym clothes since it didn't look like I had my own.
I didn't know I could get so much pleasure working out. An hour became two and two nearly three. I was actually surprised at my own stamina and strength.
I registered with Mike at the desk and wrote a check.
Welcome, Mike said.
Then I realized he was looking at my shaved skull.
I like it, he said.
Thanks, I smiled.
The evening was dreary and felt darker than usual. The Seventh Avenue tar was slick from the rain, and the red and yellow echoes of neon signs and stoplights slithered shimmeringly across its vinyl. I'd had a headache all day. A workout was essential.
Hey, Mike said when I entered the gym. Tough day.
You're sharp.
Come here.
I walked over to the desk.
Get out of your clothes and go into the massage room. I'll give you a rub down before you work out. He said it with his large warm hand grasping my shoulder.
Thanks, I said.
In three months of working out daily, my body had undergone a terrific change. So had I.
I'd greatly reduced the hours I spent working in front of the computer, but what I did with the time was hard to figure out. It was like a daydream I kept going in and out of.
I wasn't stripped and spread on the table long when Mike walked in.
He put his palm on my lower back and cupped the back of my neck with his other hand.
Relax, he chanted several times. Then I heard the words serve and obey. They rang in my head like an ineradicable melody.
I was rising from the depth and dancing to that tune, grinding my ass to it, feeling his breath on my neck, his cock in my ass, one hand around my throat, my back arched, the other cupping my chest.
But he was not my master.
This man was my Master, the one whom I found myself frequently attending without even knowing it. I did not even know his name. I called him Master each time I went to his loft on Hudson Street. It always felt like the first time, I was never sure how I had gotten there, and I always felt like it was the only place I was supposed to be and the rest of my life was a fake.
I was sensitive to his commands and could anticipate his needs. I was nourished by his praises. I served him with fawning tenderness and heartfelt gladness. I needed to be in his presence. He dressed me in leather; harnesses and chains were my costumes.
My tongue swept over his instep again and again. I was worshipping his ankles; my whole body was as hard as my cock. And then I was worshipping his cock. The stiffer it became in my mouth, the stiffer I became, too.
I saw out of the corner of my eye another guy was kneeling before him, kissing his feet. I was filled with pride.
I could not understand what my classmates were...what? alarmed? concerned? confused? about. They told me I looked different, I acted differently, dressed and spoke in an unfamiliar way, that I was not myself. I did not know what they were talking about. This freaked them out even more, that I could look blankly at them with not the least sign of recognition for what they were saying I had been like. They said it made them feel like they were crazy or like I was one of the pod people.
Then I'd smile and throw my arm around the guy if he was the least bit good looking and say, enough of this crap; what are you doing later this afternoon? A surprising number said "nothing" and were pleased to spend the afternoon with me. I could tell I excited them, and I never had trouble getting their clothes off and our cocks out.
It was strange how many began telling me that they were in love with me and hated the time they couldn't spend with me. It left me cold and I turned off before their eyes, but the farther away I got the crazier about me they became.
There was a particularly sweet dark-haired boy who affected me differently. With him I did not become cold and distant. I had a great big school girl crush on him, and we spent hours walking in the park, sitting on the benches and frisking with each other.
I began to feel a desire for him that frightened me. Gently I kissed him on the lips, tenderly swept the tips of my fingers over the tips of his nipples. They stiffened and ripples of laughter spilled over his face.
He looked at me with pleading eyes. I was his last hope. I lost myself with him in some early nineteenth century fantasy, and romance was our Master.
And by that I was blaspheming, for I had begun to value this adorable boy more than my master. Even in his presence, even when he swung the blue crystal with the glowing gleam of a ruby in its center before my eyes and instructed me to follow its movement back and forth, my mind wandered, my eyes wished to rest not on oblivion but on my beloved.
You would not believe I was such a fool as not to imagine that my master would notice this. But I was so transported, I had no mind to give it.
He locked my cock against my scrotum with a ring anchored at its base. I could not extend myself sexually, but I could befoul myself with a urinary leak when pressed, and rinse myself off with embarrassment.
And the boy, suddenly, was not the person I thought he'd been. I was in this crippled state neither of use nor interest to him. I could not feel anger at him, although I was stung by his new coldness, but held myself accountable and felt my own unworthiness, my clumsiness. There was something in me which craved domination and that was gonna mess things up. It was inevitable. I could not blame him.
I know it's a cliche, but his beauty blazed as he walked to the door.
From his throne in my heart, my master was laughing.
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