For J.V., and Miss Flannery O'Connor -- the greatest Southern writer ========================================= **** If you're in a hurry, and just want to skip to the sex, jump down to the last part of the story ("ACT 7: REQUIEM FOR A DREAM"). **** ========================================= I've got two other works on Nifty, both in the /gay/highschool/ section: * "Kyle and Skylar" * "Gay in the South" ========================================= AUTHOR'S NOTE:

They say you can't be a gay redneck, or a black conservative, or a contented housewife. I don't know who "they" are, but they sure do spend a lot of their "open-minded" time trying to typecast the continuum of humanity into a very few politically-correct stereotypes.

So why are there gay men who father children, or straight men who have male-on-male sex?

We have a saying here in the South: "Even a blind pig finds an acorn sometimes." For those of us gay rednecks in rural Dixie, one of those rare acorns -- and perhaps the most beautiful of them -- is when a hot straight guy, who DOES fuck women, breaks out of his pigeonhole by willingly initiating a male-on-male sexual encounter.

It's happened to me before, and this story is a fantasy inspired by a close straight friend of mine who makes me wish it would happen again. :-)

Our story today, in seven acts: =========================================

~ ACT 1: A CHANCE MEETING ~

It was a warm, clear October afternoon in beautiful eastern North Carolina. I was behind the wheel of my beat-up old Chevy, beginning the half-hour drive home from my factory job, to my old farmhouse at the other end of the county. As had become my custom after a mind- numbing day doing my monotonous tasks in the shipping department, my brain was offline, and I was absentmindedly listening to an old CD on my truck's one working speaker.

Up the highway about a mile, and one exit before mine, I saw a broken down seventy-something GMC truck. Remembering my last job as a vintage Chevrolet mechanic, and my Southern duty to be a Good Samaritan, I decided to stop and help. As I slowed down, though, I noticed the driver was no longer with his truck -- so I sped back up and prepared to go back to minding my own business.

Fate had other plans, however. As soon as I cleared the next bend in the road, I saw a young man hurriedly walking along the shoulder, head down. Putting two and two together, I decided to pull over just ahead of him and offer a ride. Setting still on the shoulder, I looked over at my side-view mirror, pitted with age and caked with mud from a weekend of fun at some point previous, and noticed the young man -- who appeared to be shaped quite pleasantly -- speeding up to a jog, to reach me.

Still, you never know who you're gonna meet on the highway; so with a tinge of apprehension as I saw him approach, I tightened my right hand around the pistol I always keep concealed in my pocket, and rolled my window down a few inches.

The stranger reached my window, and I finally had a good view of him: he was tall, skinny, tan, handsome, and had all his teeth. Factor in the long, straight hair and I was in love!

He wore glasses, which combined with his appearance, made me figure him for a chronic video-gamer still living with his parents. I judged him to be harmless. My hand left my pistol, I smiled, and rolled my window down the rest of the way.

"That your truck back a-yonder, bo?"

#

~ ACT 2: NEW BONDS ~

"Hahaha!"

We sat, laughing and talking and listening to records, in the dim glow of the light bathing the austere living room.

I had followed the young stranger home after our roadside rendezvous, to ensure his truck made it. But we ended up hitting it off so well, our evening didn't end in the driveway.

I had learned his name was Zachary Marceaux -- not Zach, not Zacky. Zachary. He was 25, not too far from my own 22, and a loner. We shared a lot of common interests. We both liked old vehicles. We both preferred to listen to our music on vinyl. We both owned old homes, and had both ripped down the drywall to expose the character of the original wood walls. Firewood kept us both warm in winter, and we agreed that open windows beat air-conditioning any day.

Wrong about the gamer thing. Wrong about the living-with-parents thing.

We both smoked cigarettes; he rolled his own. By now, I was figuring him for a total liberal hippie.

Sitting beside him on his couch, which was a blue vinyl bench seat taken from the back of his truck, I checked him out discreetly. I always "play it straight" around guys I've just met; in rural North Carolina, one wrong move can cost you your life.

I couldn't see much, for his clothes. They were wrinkled, mismatched, and baggy on him, like the kind of clothes a poor person might get from a thrift store. All I could see were his neck and forearms, but the veins and sinew on both said "athletic".

You know, you can tell a lot about a guy by how his shirt hangs on him. If it sticks out further forward at the chest than at the stomach, he's a bodybuilder with some nice pecs. If it sticks out more at the stomach than the chest, he's overweight -- maybe not morbidly obese, but definitely no "beach body". That's me. If it's a flat line from top to bottom, he's just plain skinny, and that was Zachary, as best I could tell. Anyone in the first and third of those categories is fuckable. Yes, that means I wouldn't go to bed with myself -- call me a hypocrite, but my rule stands: no abs, no sex. Sorry.

"Oh yeah, the boy can play..." came the Dire Straits album on the turntable.

We basked in the warm feeling of the evening, helped by the alcohol we were both slowly consuming. The feeling of elation at making a new friend, with so many common interests, seemed mutual. We laughed and talked and swapped stories, bonding there on a makeshift couch upon a floor in a room so full of vintage character; it was something we'd both been needing for a long time.

He wasn't a native, and thus lacked a Southern accent of any incarnation. He articulated a level of intelligence unfortunately uncommon among locals. I wasn't sure how I was feeling; this was a complete change of pace from my hard-partying redneck friends out in my more rural end of the county...give us a dirt road, a bonfire, a bunch of pickup trucks, a few dozen gallons of beer, and we're ready to be the subject of a country music song.

Remember that liberal hippie thing? As it turned out, Zachary's a born- again libertarian. I decided it might be time to shelve my stereotypes for a while; they may prove correct in general, but this boy defied labeling.

I tried to feel him out on his sexuality, and on his position on having a gay friend, by playing "devil's advocate" -- dropping small anti-gay sentiments into the conversation a few times, to gauge his reaction. But one of the things I learned about Zachary that night is, he's pretty even-keeled. He doesn't wear his beliefs on his sleeve like I do. So I decided to just relax and go with the flow.

By the time we went to bed, it was five AM, and needless to say I didn't make it to work the next morning...a transgression for which I was summarily fired. But I didn't give a damn -- then, or now.

#

~ ACT 3: WHILE ENDLESS AGES ROLL ALONG ~

Time went by in its own inimitable way, like billows of wind issuing forth from the sunny blue sky over the Great Plains, rolling across the fields of wheat from one end to the other, like God's bowling alley. Father Time is indeed very much like the wind: quiet and invisible, yet unstoppable, and obvious in effect.

It seems to me that when I was a little kid, before puberty, my head was clearer than it is now. Sunlight seemed brighter, night was blacker, water was wetter, and the edges of images were sharper. I didn't miss a thing. Nothing ever happened "in the background" without my really stopping to notice it. My memory, both short- and long-term, was nearly photographic; I was acutely aware of the finest details of everything in my life, simultaneously and continuously, and the events of the past stayed defined and discrete -- never blurring into a hazy, dim timeline.

The opposite is true now-a-days. Maybe it was the puberty hormones, or maybe it was the death of my parents by age 11 and the ensuing restructuring of my home life. Who knows. I now live my life in a fog of sorts. My mind is fuzzy, and thus so are the images and feelings that pass through it. I can't clearly remember the events of six hours ago. I have very little clue what the outside of my house looks like; when I was a child, I could have told you every missing chip of paint on every clapboard. I've lost all empathy and enthusiasm, having had them replaced by jaded sarcasm and bitterness. I have no clue how I look or sound to other people, or what emotions my presence and personality evoke in them. How do I make them feel when we hang out? I don't know, and I don't care. Even with the people I consider my closest friends, I just don't care. I can't seem to help it.

Don't get me wrong -- I'm not misanthropic or evil. I like my friends, I try to make them have a good time, I'd give them the shirt off my back, and just generally help them any way I can in terms of money or food or working on their vehicles or houses or anything else I'm good at...I just have an emotional distance issue. In other words, I'll drive you to the hospital if you break your leg, but don't expect me to cry myself to sleep because your grandmother died -- that's your problem, not mine. Likewise, if I happen to read a newspaper article about a father of three who died in a skydiving accident, don't expect me to do anything other than laugh my ass off at his stupidity for having jumped out of a damn airplane in the first place.

This mindless, "checked-out", zombie-like effect used to bother me as a teenager. I've given up worrying about it, though -- what can I do about it? I just go with the flow, floating along from one event to another in life, like a water-bug floats from rock to rock in a river. Turns out adult life isn't the perfect, fair, unencumbered string of bliss I had imagined it to be as a child -- rather, it's actually true: "Life's a bitch, and then you die."

I have only hazy memories of the seven or eight months between when Zachary and I met, and now as I write this. I was actually surprised when I counted a moment ago and realized it's only been that long; it feels like two or three years. Isn't it amazing how time flies? It flies faster for us zombies.

I have a few fuzzy recollections of hanging out with Zachary in the past two-thirds of a year, like distant stars scattered across the sky. We'd hang out at his house or mine, drinking and talking and listening to music and occasionally working on home-improvement projects. We had a few sleepovers.

Some times were great -- in the warm and fuzzy combination of soft incandescent light, hard cider, and the heat from a cast iron woodstove, we'd sit together on the couch at his house, talking, or maybe just spacing out while a record played in the distance. The alcohol would cause me to transgress some of the gay-straight boundaries I'm normally known for carefully maintaining, and I'd snuggle into Zachary's side and feel safe...like I finally had something I'd really been needing for a long time: an athletic teddy- bear, who didn't hate me.

Other times, we'd argue. Everyone does, but my friendships contain more of it than most, because the deep-down "knowledge" that I have that my opinions are simply right, leads me to come across as self- righteous, stuck-up, arrogant, and domineering. Like a my-way-or-the- highway know-it-all. Can I help it if I'm right, and other people are insecure?

But through it all -- through the diverse mix of times we shared together -- Zachary and I got to know each other better, and we became closer. Despite our differences in personality and life-goals and political ideology, I started to fall in love with him. His warm and friendly personality, combined with his determination in pursuing a friendship with me even though we argued sometimes, led me to start having feelings for him. How can you not love someone who's nice to you, who seems to want very badly to be your friend, and who shares a score of common interests with you, which are rarely found in today's society?

Ah, but love...no. I can't allow that. I'm not ready. I'm scared. What if I get rejected in the end? What if something happens and the friendship dies? No, too much risk. I'm not willing to be left feeling empty, scared, and alone, like a little puppy abandoned in a dark alley.

So Zachary and I went from seeing each other every day, to seeing each other once a month or less. I tried to forget about him.

#

~ ACT 4: FUCKING THE DICTIONARY ~

Dear Diary,

Chase, as I'll call him in case anyone ever finds this, is a guy I've known for about two years, maybe a little more. I first met him when he would occasionally be a customer at the convenience store I worked at; as I recall, he was 16 and I was 21. Anyhow, he stood out to me not just because I found him physically attractive, but because he always smiled -- no, grinned -- at me; asked me my name the first time he met me, and always greeted me by it from then on, winking; always took an extra minute or two to make small-talk with me after I'd rung up his purchases; always hollered out "Hey! How you doing, bo?" when he saw me in the parking lot (grinning, of course). Do you know how few people in this world are that friendly, and how much better a place it'd be if the number who are, was inverted with the number who aren't?

After about a year, we started to hang out, and he introduced me to his friends, which happened to be just about every young person (14- to-21) in the community. I started going to parties on weekends, getting drunk with my new friends, just generally having the awesome time at 22 that I was cheated out of having in high school. My life was finally starting to turn around!

Over the course of that first year that I had known Chase, I had started to fall for him. How can you not love someone who's nice to you, who seems to want very badly to be your friend, and who takes a genuine interest in you personally...as though you're someone special, and not just another faceless number?

Just my luck -- or perhaps a lot of gay guys' luck -- Chase turned out to be straight. A very assertive, "No homo shit!" kind of straight. The following year like to killed me -- I fell head-over-heels in love with him, with an intensity and sharpness of emotion I hadn't felt since junior high school. And yet I had to simply watch from a distance, as he dated and fucked girl after girl. Lucky bitches... Every time he'd tell me about screwing one of them, it was like he was sticking a knife in my heart and twisting it.

We hung out together all the time, going to parties and getting drunk, riding around doing redneck shit, swimming with friends at the local swimming hole, and just generally being really close. We became inseparable -- the few times we were apart, people would ask me where he was, and vice versa.

It was hard, reconciling my feelings for him: I had both kinds -- platonic, and sexual...but he had only the platonic ones in return.

Sexual feelings are about more than just plain lust. It's not that shallow and dirty. At least for me, sexual feelings are actually primarily a desire to feel the deepest possible sort of emotional closeness and intimacy with a person. Nothing can bring two hearts closer than sex can, and nothing other than sex can achieve the degree of closeness that sex does. It's a very special act, one that puts two hearts in complete rhythm, and gives both parties a level of emotional security and reassuredness -- "yes, this person really does love me, and I have the privilege of a level of closeness with him which the great majority of people do not have access to...something which makes me feel special, and unique, and wanted, like I have a place of belonging. Someone needs me. Someone loves me. I have value. And I have something more precious than the run-of-the-mill level of closeness which everyone else has access to with this person." I don't care how it's packaged, platonic friendship is simply never as close as sexual friendship, and there are a few people I fall so deeply in love with that I just need that sexual component with them to feel complete. I want to be that close.

But regardless of what I want, "it takes two to tango". Chase simply didn't have any sexual feelings toward me or any other man. Period. So I had to reconcile my heart. In a cruel "catch 22", I loved Chase so much that I needed a sexual relationship with him in order to be able to feel right; without it, it was as incomplete a feeling as an aborted yawn...but at the same time, I loved Chase so much that I was willing to hide and repress those desires so that he wouldn't get uncomfortable and terminate the friendship; besides, it's poor class to try to force yourself, sexually or otherwise, where you're not wanted.

So I had to go to bed with him in order to feel happy and complete, but I had to stop having sexual feelings toward him in order to be able to be the friend to him that he needed me to be -- and which he deserved.

But who can control the desires of their heart?

I very nearly committed suicide, and was just generally miserable, often crying myself to sleep at nights.

We argued and fought, and went through periods of being close friends and then not even being on speaking terms. Eventually, though, after about six months of emotional turmoil, I finally managed to rearrange things inside my heart such that I could move on with my life while still being Chase's friend.

I accepted that he and I would never have a sexual component to our relationship -- we'd never be "friends with benefits", as it's called. We'd be very close, but in a totally platonic way -- like brothers. I embraced this, and we went forward. It wasn't fake, or a repression of my true feelings. I had simply matured enough to where I could handle the situation in a healthy, functional way. Chase and I moved forward with our friendship, and life was great for both of us.

Time went on, and we drifted a little -- I had a new job, and he knocked a girl up. So while we were still great friends, we didn't see each other on a daily basis any more. Besides, November rolled around, which marked the start of deer-hunting season here in North Carolina. I love the thrill of the kill as much as the next guy, but I haven't got the patience to sit still for hours doing nothing, on the prayer that a deer just MAY happen to wander by. I'd prefer shooting fish in a barrel.

Thanksgiving came, and on the evening of that day, my life changed forever.

I got a text from Chase, who wanted to come over to my house and hang out. I was thrilled -- none of my friends had invited me over for Thanksgiving supper, or even texted to say 'hi', so I had been feeling pretty rotten.

Late, perhaps 10:00 PM, Chase arrived. We hadn't hung out in about a month. I was sitting at my computer in the living room. He sat in the other chair facing me, and we made the typical small-talk for a while.

We got high on some speed pills Zachary had given me to fence for him, and spent the night laughing and talking and carrying on. Finally, the next morning, there came a lull in the conversation. Suddenly, Chase looked me dead in the eye and said "I'd fuck you."

I had moved so far past my sexual desires toward Chase, that I didn't even get mildly excited. I simply brushed it off, figuring he was joking or making some idiotic remark like overtired, high people might make -- you know, like drunk-talk.

Another hour or two of hanging out passed, and he once again told me -- in no uncertain terms -- that he'd fuck me.

At this point, I was a little miffed that he'd make light of something which had once troubled me so. I said, "Chase, you shouldn't joke around like that, you know how badly I used to have feelings for you. It's like a slap in the face."

"I'll give you something that'll slap you in the face," was his reply, and he leaned back in his chair and motioned toward his crotch.

I decided to call his bluff. I got up, crossed the room, knelt down in front of him, and stared up into his eyes.

"What, you need me to unzip it for you or something?" he asked.

I couldn't believe this was happening. Some of the old feelings started to come back -- not all of them, not some big flood of emotion...just a desire to be close to a person I really love, who had given me my social life in this community to which I was a transplant from the next county over.

Diary, let me pause the story here to point out an important fact: at this time, I was a virgin. I had never been naked in front of another human being (not counting physicals at the doctor's office). At 17, I had sucked a dick, while I was fully clothed, and I chickened out before the guy came. I'd never fucked anyone. Never been fucked. Never been sucked off or even gotten a hand-job. Total 22-year-old virgin. About to lose it to a 17-year-old.

Despite that fact, and despite my self-consciousness about not having a "beach body", I was rolling with things like a Mack truck rolls with a forty-thousand pound load of pipe. Full speed ahead! Sometimes, it's beneficial to let the drugs do the talking. :-)

The next thing I knew, we were both standing there stark naked. Chase is a small guy -- 5 foot 7 inches, 135 pounds, skinny as a pole bean, pale-skinned and dark-haired (Irish blood). On a guy who's 5 foot 7 and scrawny, a 6-inch dick looks HUGE! And it won't no pencil-thin thing, neither. He had small balls, like I had as a little kid before puberty, but he had a big fucking schlong, made to appear bigger by the fact that he shaved his pubes. I stared at that thing like a calf stares at a new gate. I couldn't fucking believe it! Here I was, naked as a jaybird with "straight" Chase Lancaster, and about to lose my virginity to him -- the man I had once been so head-over-heels smitten with. Who says God doesn't answer prayer, even if He's the proverbial three days late sometimes?

Luckily, I had some lube on-hand, as a "just-in-case" thing. Wishful virgin thinking...

Thanks to the drugs, and my generally shoddy memory, I can't remember what-all we did that morning -- I know I sucked his dick at least twice, and I know he fucked me at least once. I will never, ever forget the feeling of that first time I got into the doggie position on that twin mattress, and he entered me, taking my virginity. I was his. No matter who I may love in the future, and no matter what Chase' and my friendship may become, one fact will never change: he was my first. He received the one gift I can never give anyone else.

Diary, I've left out one other part of the story. Before we actually did the horizontal hula, Chase laid out some "ground rules":

(1) Never tell anyone,

(2) No strings attached -- this is just "friends with benefits", not a romantic thing or "a relationship",

(3) We won't let it change anything between us... we won't treat each other differently, and the friendship won't end if either of us decides we don't want to do it any more,

(4) I am not, under any circumstances, allowed to call him "gay",

• and -

(5) We will only suck and fuck...no kissing, no hugging, no cuddling, no even holding onto each other during sex -- just "wham, bam, thank you, ma'am".

Fast-forward. We had sex a bunch more times over the ensuing months. We even developed a code word for it, so we could use text-messaging to booty-call each other without risking discovery.

Finally, I got curious about something. To me, 'straight' means "has sex only with people of the opposite gender", 'gay' means "has sex only with people of the same gender", and 'bi' means "has sex with people of both genders". By that definition, Chase is bisexual.

So I asked him about it one day, being careful not to breach the "you can't call me gay" ground rule. How are you going to fuck a dude, repeatedly, and of your own initiation, and yet call yourself "straight"?

Evidently, though, there are a lot of guys who fuck both girls and guys -- and yet, instead of identifying as "bi", identify as "straight".

As best I can tell, these guys tend to be more attracted to women than men, perhaps to the point that they see one attractive man for every ten or fifty or hundred attractive women they see...in other words, they're maybe 60% straight, maybe 85% straight, maybe 99.999% straight...but still occasionally attracted to other men.

And for these "straight" bi guys, the definition of sexual orientations that I gave earlier is not accurate. Rather, either:

(1) "Sexual orientation is only a self-applied label. You are what you SAY you are. So if you fuck guys, but SAY you're straight, then you're straight."

• or -

(2) "You're only gay if you act gay. As long as you act like a stereotypical straight man -- rugged, masculine, macho, manly -- no 'gay accent', or effeminate mannerisms or habits or hobbies or comments, etc. -- then you're straight."

Talk about redefining words to suit your needs...

My conclusion: more men are bi, than admit it. Indeed, many will only admit it if they want to get into the sack with you. They won't advertise or openly admit it, because they want to maintain their public image as being "straight", for religious, social, employment, or family reasons.

As I write this, in June of 2012, seven months after losing my virginity to Chase, we're still getting together to fuck intermittently. He's asked me to fuck him a few times, but I don't want to -- I enjoy being his bitch: sucking his dick and getting fucked by him. :-)

Which reminds me...I wonder how many hot straight guys would otherwise be willing to fuck me, or let me suck them off, if they didn't think that I'll want "something in return" -- to fuck them, or have them suck my dick? Why don't they understand that many gay guys DO get off being their bitch? That is what we get out of it. As I once heard it put: "He gets a blow-job, and I get his cum, in a perfectly even trade."

I have been with one other guy, several times, since "losing it" to Chase. But despite the fact he was a model, I dumped him -- besides being emotionally bankrupt, he reminded me of one of my core values: sex is about more than just lust and raw physical attraction. He may have been sexy, but I didn't have the emotional connection with him -- the love for him -- that I needed to have, in order to be willing to be that intimate.

I did learn one important lesson, though... As a virgin, I used to believe that sex was something which beautiful people did with other beautiful people. In other words, hot people never willingly had sex with ugly people, unless it was "sympathy sex", or paid for with cash or drugs. I may not be a wart on the ass of the Hunchback of Notre Dame, but I'm no prize either -- face or body. I figured I'd be lucky to ever have sex, and that if I did, it would only be with other moderately-ugly people. But both the guys I've been to bed with have been very attractive -- leading me to realize the following: sex feels good, plain and simple. A tight hole feels so good, most people aren't picky -- they'll take it from whomever's offering...not turn away willing contenders just because they're fifty pounds overweight or a "butterface". So while still self-conscious about my appearance, I feel a little better -- at least I know I have a chance with some hot guys, which is more than I'd figured I'd get in life.

Sincerely,

-Me

#

~ ACT 5: A NEW LEAF ~

Dear Diary,

My friendship with Chase has been good for my other friendships. It's been good for me, period. It's forced me, in a nurturing way, to grow up and mature emotionally.

What hasn't killed me, has indeed made me stronger -- I'm not claiming I've become emotionally bulletproof, or Dr. Phil, or anything like that, but I'd like to think that I'm more mature and sedate than I used to be, more caring about the needs and desires and limitations of others, more willing to let things flow at their own pace and along their own course, and more able to adapt to friendship on someone else's terms: just because I want or even need something from them, doesn't mean they can or will give it to me. If there's any possible way to still make the friendship work, no matter how great the sacrifice on my part, I've become more willing and able to do it now than I was before my friendship with Chase came full-circle.

It's also made me more appreciative of some of the things my friends have put up with from me, in terms of my shortcomings. None of us are perfect, but in an honest assessment of myself, I'd have to say that I think I've generally put more emotional strain on people than their other friends have.

I'm not saying I'm some totally new person, or that I've been perfected, or that I no longer have any bad habits or weaknesses. I'm still less empathetic, and more sarcastic, than most people would probably like, but I do try to be a little softer in private with my really close friends. I may still be apt to give them hell, but I trust that they know I love them, and that any criticisms are for their own good. It grieves me to see the people I care about making the same mistakes I've made in the past.

It's with those sobering bits of wisdom under my belt, that I've decided to try to rekindle my friendship with Zachary. Deep down, I have to admit that I still care for him. And he deserves better than to be put back on the proverbial roadside of my life, just because I'm scared of letting anyone get "too close" emotionally.

I've decided that I'm going to give it another go, with a few learned lessons in mind:

(1) Ease back into it slowly -- see each other only once or twice a month, perhaps,

(2) Not make sexual contact a requirement for emotional intimacy. While I am incapable of being as emotionally close to someone platonically as I am in a "friends with benefits" situation, I have to be willing to accept the platonic level of intimacy as the final plateau in the relationship, because Zachary may never be willing to go further and have that sexual component with me,

• and -

(3) Let things flow at Zachary's pace, and on a course with which he's comfortable. It was only when I truly accepted a platonic relationship with Chase, and quit trying to nudge him in a sexual direction, that he did an about-face and took our friendship into that territory. Perhaps he was only willing to do so when he felt secure that it was his call, and on his terms, and that I did indeed care enough about him to be willing to not have it, if necessary to maintain the friendship. It was only when I ceded that level of control to him, and let him have equal say in the relationship, that he felt close enough to me and trusted me enough to want to be THAT close and THAT intimate with me. And I don't think that's unique to Chase -- I think that's probably human nature, meaning it's likely true of Zachary and everyone else too.

My friendship with Zachary is about more than sexual attraction. Sure, I feel that for him, and he knows it, but that's far from the only reason I want to be around him. In a real sense, he's my soul-mate -- he's the only person who understands a lot of aspects of me. I could get really emotional talking about how the move away from wood (in favor of plastic) is destroying society...and where everyone else would think I'm nuts, Zachary would agree with me, and understand where I'm coming from, and support me. Having a friend who sees eye-to- eye with me on a lot of things that I hold dear, is a privilege I find solely in Zachary, among my friends.

Besides, he and I have been through a lot together emotionally -- and that kind of thing should never just be tossed by the wayside.

Sincerely,

-Me

#

~ ACT 6: THE MONA LISA'S SMILE ~

I texted Zachary one Saturday, and we hung out for the first time in a long time. We went to a junk store in Durham, then chilled at his house with his newly-acquired roommate -- a bisexual, 27-year-old, unemployed, overweight bum, who we'll call Thorbridge O'Flaherty -- talking until the wee hours of the morning. It was wonderful to see Zachary again!

What made my heart swell the most about it, was the fact that he got all choked up hugging me when I left. I couldn't remember anyone ever being so happy to hang out with me, that they could experience that level of positive emotion toward me.

After a few weeks went by, I dropped by again, egged on by the pleading of Thorbridge, who felt I was "a good influence" and that Zachary "could use a dose" of me. I figured he knew I was gay, and just wanted to get laid.

It was noon on a fine Saturday in June, and Zachary and Thorbridge were supposed to be expecting me. I parked my truck, walked up to their bright red front door, and knocked softly on it.

A long minute went by, before I heard any signs of human activity. Then, the knob turned, and the door slowly opened to reveal a shirtless and just-awoken Zachary standing before me.

"Hey, man!" he said, smiling at me sleepily. I forced myself to look at his eyes, and returned the greeting. He welcomed me inside, and shut the door behind us, before walking to his bedroom.

Unable to keep from staring any longer, I drank in the impressive sight before me, one I had been curious about for a long time; Zachary always wore baggy clothes, which had given no clue as to his physique.

My jaw hung open. Zachary had a killer body!

His smooth, tan skin covered a sexy, athletic figure. Not an ounce of fat anywhere. He wasn't exactly a competitive bodybuilder, but he had cut, defined muscles -- much more so than Chase, who was one of those scrawny guys whose cuts are visible only by virtue of him being borderline anemic...what they refer to as "skinny muscle".

I had never really expected it. Zachary could be a model, or on the covers of fitness magazines! If he walked around shirtless, he'd have chicks lining up on their knees. Plenty of actors in Hollywood -- who women nationwide lust over -- don't have bodies this nice.

His muscular shoulders sloped down in a V-shape across broad lats and cut obliques, to a tight waist. I starting counting his abs, trying not to drool. One, two, three, four, five, six...gone. He pulled a shirt on, then turned around and smiled at me.

For the life of me, I have no clue what small-talk he started making. All I could think was, "Damn!"

It actually took me a minute to come back to planet earth. I was in a trance, remembering what I had just seen. It turned me on immensely! And I hadn't seen it coming in a million years. It was shaking me up inside, suddenly seeing my friend in this new light.

At some point, I reattached my jaw, and managed to rip my mind away from my lustful reverie. I asked where Thorbridge was, to which Zachary replied that he was still sound asleep, having not gone to bed until around 7:00 AM, for having been playing on the computer. Bum...

We hung out in the living room for a little while, so Zachary could sip his coffee and wake up. We decided to leave Thorbridge sleeping, and go check out the big flea market at the state fairgrounds in Raleigh.

Along the way, we stopped for some fast food -- my lunch, his breakfast. Afterwards, as we were pulling back out onto the highway, he lamented the fact that neither he, nor his roommate, could find girlfriends.

"Well," I replied, "It's not so much true for Thorbridge, but if you ran around with your shirt off, you'd have everyone staring, like I was this morning."

"What, you liked the tummy?" Zach asked, smiling, and lifted up his shirt to show his abs for a brief moment. Pinch me, Jesus...

"Well I was enjoying the view, but then you had to go and put a shirt on, and take away all my fun!" I complained jokingly, regretting it as soon as I'd said it -- I didn't want to make him feel uncomfortable. Straight guys don't like hearing that sort of "homo shit" from gay guys.

"Well, maybe I'll give you another peek later, after we go to the flea market," he replied.

Christ on a pony! Did I hear him right? Did my hot straight friend, who knows I want him, and who has turned down every advance I've ever made over the time we've known each other, just really choose -- out of the blue -- to cross a new line and offer me free eye-candy? It must be my damn birthday!

Despite the fact that my mind was now totally in boggle-mode, I figured he was just joking, or not yet fully awake and thinking clearly, and either way would forget about it by the afternoon. I made a resolution to myself, that if he did indeed forget, I would NOT remind him. If he wanted to enter new territory with me, however tame or wild, it would be on his terms and at his own pace -- with no incentive or prodding from me. That's how I could be sure it was consensual, and that I wasn't taking advantage in any way.

We went to the flea market, and walked around for an hour or two, having a great time. After seeing everything of interest, and being as I had to work later on, we got back into my truck, heading back to his house so I could drop him off.

No sooner did we pull onto the highway, than Zachary said "Oh, yeah," as if suddenly remembering something, and proceeded to take his shirt off.

Being as it was summer, we had the windows down. "It feels really good to get some air in my armpits," he said.

You know how the Mona Lisa is famous for her elusive smile? Its appearance changes based upon where you focus your gaze. It raises more questions than it answers, confounding her viewers -- is she happy? Smug? Innocent? Fearful? Inviting? Angry? So many mutually- exclusive possibilities...

Zachary's actions today were like that famous smile. What were his motives? Why would a straight guy, in the presence of a gay guy whose advances he had refused, choose to suddenly put his athletic physique on display? Was he trying to torture me, in revenge for some of the emotional stress I had inflicted on him in the past? Was he trying to take our friendship in a sexual direction? Was he just horny and desperate for someone who'd willingly suck him off? I had no clue, and on top of those million unanswerable questions racing around in my mind like some sort of caffeinated Energizer Bunny, my physical side was dumping more onto my already-overloaded brain. How was I not supposed to respond to the stimulus of having a hot, shirtless guy fifteen inches away from me?

I glanced over at him every chance I got -- mainly at stoplights. He actually had decent pecs; hairless, save for a small faint ring encircling each nipple. His abs, totally absent of fat, looked like solid marble as his skin slid over them whenever he moved. I wanted to whip out my cell phone camera and take a picture, but I forced myself to keep my mouth shut, again not wanting to take the lead in this, or to make him feel uncomfortable.

With his right hand, he reached up to brush the hair out of his eyes -- causing his bicep to casually flex. It seemed unintentional, but all the same, I nearly fainted right then and there.

Wait a minute... he had read the two gay erotic stories I'd written, both of which detailed my deepest sexual fantasy -- one nearly universal among gay men: getting up-close-and-personal with the muscular body of a young athletic stud, seeing and feeling his muscles, smelling and licking the sexy manly scent of his armpits, and getting fucked by him.

Why was Zachary doing this right in front of me? Surely, he can't be that dense...

Wouldn't most straight guys rather kill or be killed, than to be shirtless in front of a faggot, turning him on?

I couldn't get my mind off the fact that (a) he knows I'm gay, (b) he knows I'm into him, (c) he's read my stories before, so he knows I'm into muscle, and he also knows specifically what my "turn-ons" are, and yet -- (d) here he is, shirtless, making a comment about his armpits, and now basically flexing his biceps.

Shoot me now, I'd die a happy man!

I could hardly breathe. I damn sure wouldn't be able to walk straight for another half hour!

At that moment, I wanted SO BADLY to reach out and gently lay my fingers on those big, hard muscles of his. I wanted to feel the power in them. I wanted to feel that bicep bulge. I've never gotten to live out that fantasy -- muscle sex. I've wanted it as far back as I can remember, maybe as young as 5 or 6, when my little dick would get hard looking at the guys on the cover of Men's Health magazine. Here I am at 23, not getting any younger -- pretty soon, I'll be too old to have a chance at fulfilling my fantasy of sex with a muscle-stud at his peak (late teens or early twenties). Pretty soon, Zachary will start showing signs of age too -- he's already 25, older than the guys I usually fantasize about. Is it now or never? Is this my last good chance? I wanted to lick and kiss that big, strong bicep of his so badly...

But I didn't dare. If our friendship was going to get physical, he'd have to make the first move. No hints, no implying things -- a direct, overt move which clearly displayed his desire and intent. Kiss me, or grab my hand and put it on his body, or straight-up tell me to go ahead and cop a feel, or something.

Besides, maybe I was totally misinterpreting things. Maybe he's really the most oblivious straight guy on God's green earth, with no clue of the effect he was having on me (the zipper in my jeans is still seeking an arbitration clause in its new contract).

"Aww, dude, that's so not fair!" I play-whined, grinning from ear to ear. "You're gonna be all shirtless like this while I'm driving, when I've gotta be watching the road! You shouldn't torture me like this!"

"I'm just trying to be a good buddy," he replied.

My blood suddenly ran cold. Did he think he had to do this to earn or keep my friendship? Please, Lord, don't let that be his motivation here...

Not wanting to ruin the moment by possibly overanalyzing things and getting too deep, I decided to keep my mouth shut, trusting that he knew I loved him, and that he didn't need to pervert himself in order to have my love and attention.

I grabbed his shirt, which had been laying in his lap, and transferred it to mine. Zachary laughed. I intended to wait until he wasn't looking, then lift it to my nose and inhale his scent. Hey, might as well ride the wave here, right?

We had a great time on the way home. Sometimes we laughed and talked, other stretches were filled with a comfortable silence.

Back at his house, we got out and walked around the yard for a second, preparing to say our goodbyes. I toyed with the idea of kissing him on the cheek before leaving, but again deferred to the notion that I should let him make the first move, if I was even indeed reading his signals correctly. Besides, Thorbridge finally woke up and came outside to join us, and I didn't want to start a war in their household -- being as Thorbridge is bisexual, he no doubt wants Zachary too, and might be childish enough to take the position of "Well, if he gets to do it, then I should be allowed to too!" Bless his heart...

Sitting on the back porch steps, I looked up at Zachary, and said "Walk with me," motioning through the yard toward the driveway, on the other side of the house from where the three of us were talking. I wanted the opportunity to say goodbye privately...but much to my chagrin, Thorbridge tore through the house at a million miles an hour, like a sack of bowling balls thrown down a staircase, emerging through the door which opens onto the driveway. Jealous, much?

We hugged, said goodbye, and I left -- confused about Zachary's motives and intentions, but with a smile on my face nonetheless.

Who knows what the future might hold? He might just "pull a Chase", and fuck the shit outta me. I could only be so lucky...

I went home that night and jacked off in bed, thinking about what I had seen earlier that day. I felt a little guilty doing so, but I figured it to be a "victimless crime". In any case, I came harder than I had in a long time, and proceeded to use Zachary's body as my jack- off vision, both morning and night, for the next several days, and intermittently thereafter.

But as I lay there in bed that night, I realized something far more important: I realized that I had, over the course of time, fallen deeply in love with Zachary. The kind of love where I'd take a bullet for him, or give him a kidney, even if I never again saw him shirtless, much less saw more than that. I'm not denying I was attracted to him, but it was so much more than that -- my heart was attracted to him as much as my dick was. I loved his kind, gentle, forgiving nature. I loved the fact that he had stuck by me despite everything I had put him through. I loved his intelligence! I loved his passion for the people and things that he loved, and the voraciousness with which he'd pursue learning about something that interested him. I loved him for the fact that he made me feel special -- like he looked up to me, as though I had rare, valuable knowledge. I loved him for the gentle way he speaks to people. I loved him for the time he sat on his front porch and got angry and told me I needed to grow the fuck up. I just plain loved him!

Sure, he annoyed me sometimes, but welcome to life. No one's perfect. I had met a man, in Zachary, that I trusted more deeply than any other. A man I admired, and looked up to, and truly loved. A man who shared so many of my personal interests. A soul-mate. One who happened to be devastatingly sexy, to boot...

And I sat there that night and wept, for the horrible shame it was that I couldn't have been born a girl, or that he couldn't love me, because I was a man. A "crying shame", in the literal sense...

And I wondered why fate had once again dealt me such a shitty hand in life, something it had done repeatedly since I was a little child. Was being tortured the sole purpose of my existence?

#

~ ACT 7: REQUIEM FOR A DREAM ~

A few weeks later, Zachary and I got together again. For the first time in a long time, I slept over at his house.

The evening had been unremarkable -- we did the same sorts of things we used to do, drinking and watching old VHS tapes, and listening to records.

Sleep, in his guest bedroom that night, was fitful. Uncommon for me, I had a series of short dreams, punctuated by waking up, tossing and turning, then falling back to sleep.

In the first one, I remembered a snippet of a conversation Zachary and I had about one of the erotic stories I'd written, a copy of which I'd given him to read at his request.

"Yeah, a girl I used to fuck said the same thing you did in that story -- she wants me to fuck her when I'm all hot and sweaty."

<SNAP!>

Dream two. Zachary recounted the story of how he let Thorbridge suck his dick for a few minutes once, in return for drugs. Thorbridge evidently wanted it pretty badly, if the price for his drugs was to be allowed to give a blow-job -- and an incomplete one, at that. He put on a dress and makeup for the event, and Zachary distracted himself by watching a heterosexual porno.

<SNAP!>

Round three. Zachary's telling me how he likes to be an alpha-male in the bedroom. I tell him that I couldn't picture that -- he's so reserved and gentle.

"The quiet ones, are the ones you have to worry about," he replied. "They're often the biggest animals in the bedroom."

He starts telling me about his favorite porn actor, how the man "just utterly fucking demolishes a girl; then, when you think he can't possibly dominate her any more, he flips her around and goes at her even harder from a different angle."

<SNAP!>

Number four. I'm reliving an old conversation Zachary and I once had, wherein I asked him whether or not he uses condoms.

"No, I just pull it out right when I'm about to cum, then make the bitch suck me off the rest of the way."

<SNAP!>

Dream five. It's a furiously hot summer day. I'm walking down the middle of a dirt road, just outside an abandoned, old-fashioned Western-looking town. I'm coming down off the crest of a hill. The sun is cyan, and the sky is a deep navy blue. I have no facial features or clothes -- I'm just an animated stick figure, like off a bathroom sign. I'm dark green, almost black. Suddenly, the clock strikes high noon, and the sun's so strong I instantly freeze to death, and shatter into a pile of glass dust on the road. A lady stick-figure sets a pie to cool on the windowsill of one of the houses in town.

<SNAP!>

I awoke yet again. It was raining steadily outside, and the dim light of a cloudy morning bathed the room in an emotionless grey cast. The sound of rain tapping at the window lulled me back to sleep, and I slept for five hours straight this time, dreaming no more.

I awoke from a deep sleep, having heard the front door slam shut. I glanced over at the clock-radio -- it was 10:47 AM. The rain was gone, having been replaced by bright sunshine.

The old porcelain doorknob of my bedroom turned, and the door started to creak open. I could see the silhouette of Zachary filling the doorway.

I rubbed the sleep from my eyes, and reached over for my glasses. Putting them on, I looked up again. This time, I had a better view.

Zachary was standing there, wearing only a pair of jeans. No shirt. He looked like he'd been doing yard work -- there were some grass clippings on his boots, and he was all hot and sweaty. A smug smile was on his face, and there was a gleam in his eye I'd never seen before.

"Alright, bitch -- you've wanted this for so long. Now you're going to get it. I'm going to show you what a REAL man is."

He crossed the room nimbly, exuding the confidence of an alpha male. I sat up on the edge of the bed, and he stood directly in front of me. I was about to cum right there, being so close to all that hot, sweaty, hard muscle.

I reached out, gingerly taking hold of the button on his jeans. I looked up into his eyes for confirmation. With the same in-charge smile, he winked at me and said "No ground rules. But no promises, either. We're just going to do what feels right to both of us."

Hands trembling, I undid the button on his jeans, and unzipped his fly. His jeans fell to the floor, and he was standing before me in just his plaid boxers.

I stood up, facing Zachary. In addition to the bulging muscles and movie-star looks, he was also taller than I am -- 6 foot 1, I believe -- which heightened his aura of manliness.

Due to my intelligence and outspoken personality, I was used to feeling like the alpha in life...but now, suddenly, things seemed completely different. It was scary, but thrilling at the same time -- I was no longer the biggest, baddest thing in the room. In fact, I was nothing more than a little bitch. A baby. I was as desperate to worship the true man's body in front of me, and please him, and obey him, as a newborn kitten is to nurse at it's mother's breast. I was like some sort of little kid again. I was helpless, and totally in his power.

I couldn't take the suspense any more. My heart was beating a million miles an hour, and my breaths were rapid and shallow. At that moment, the entire world was blocked out, and my universe consisted solely of his body. He had opened the door, and was willingly giving me the opportunity of a lifetime to walk on through.

I stood up, and tentatively reached out and placed my right hand on his left pec, followed a second thereafter by my left hand on his right shoulder. My heart beat so hard it hurt, and my knees were shaking.

The feeling was indescribable -- it felt like warm marble. So hot. So hard. I could sense the incredible masculine power in these muscles, and it thrilled me imagining what they were capable of...what they could lift, and wreck, and break, and destroy. He was the real man. He was the alpha.

Suddenly, he wrapped his strong arms around me, and pulled me close -- my soft body against his hard one. Looking down into my eyes, he smiled, and then kissed me -- deeply, passionately, making me his. My whole heart and soul belonged to him now -- I was his property, his bitch. I loved it -- I loved that he was the one in control, dominating me. He had taken me from big, bad, and intimidating, and reduced me to a simpering pile of jelly.

He finally broke the kiss, and let me step back and resume where I had left off. Something inside me just snapped, and I became a wild man, desperately needing to experience everything his body had to offer, all at once. I had never gotten to feel real muscle before, despite having spent nearly two decades longing for it, and I was finally seizing my opportunity. I'd forever love him for having given it to me, even if today's events were never repeated.

My hands started at the base of his neck, running along his traps to his shoulders, then over those big swells of muscle to his chest, which I massaged gently, before making my way down to his washboard abs. I ran my fingers up and down, feeling the definition and separation between the muscles. My dick was as hard as a diamond, and I started to feel a little dizzy.

I gently ran a finger down inside the waistband of his boxers, toying with his pubes. His dick, which was already tenting his underwear quite impressively, twitched and grew harder.

But I wanted to save the sex for later -- right now, all I could think of was worshipping his muscles.

I put my hands on his sides, just above his boxers, and wrapped my fingers around his hard, tight waist. I admired how it was all muscle and no fat, and a pang of jealousy shot through me, wishing I could be like him. But I didn't have time to worry about that right now. I slowly ran my hands up his sides, feeling his obliques, and then his lats, which were like steel wings. I couldn't wrap my mind around the power in his body. He could probably break every bone in mine, without trying. He was a real man.

As my hands inched upwards, he lifted his arms, and flexed his biceps for me, causing the muscles to rise up into twin hills of pure jock power. They were like granite softballs. My ramrod-straight dick spasmed inside my flannel pajama bottoms. Taking my hands off his sides, I reached up and caressed his bulging guns. I felt all over every part of them, then held on while he relaxed and flexed them a couple more times, causing the peaks to tower higher with each contraction. Dark blue veins pulsated under the surface of his tan skin, bulging off the tops of the muscles.

I started to black out, at which point I realized I'd forgotten to breathe for several moments, and had to remind myself to start again.

I leaned in and starting licking and kissing my way all over his right bicep, from his elbow, along the split peak, to his shoulder. I could smell the manly scent emanating from his armpit, and licked my way down his still-flexed bicep toward it.

I started eating out his armpit, reveling in the alpha-male scent he oozed. The sweat of a young muscular jock smells different -- sexier, manlier -- than the sweat of someone who's overweight, or old. His dark armpit hairs glistened with droplets of sweat, announcing to the whole world that he was a hard-working stud in his youthful prime. He was a fucking MAN, and I was enjoying every moment of it.

My fantasy was finally coming true, and I could feel something changing inside me.

After a few minutes, I moved over to his left arm, kissing my way across his chest, sucking on his hard nipples and lapping up the sexy sweat he'd generated by working outside. After eating out his left armpit, my knees finally gave out, and I flopped back down to sitting on the edge of the bed. Zachary stood over me, grinning down at me smugly, knowing the effect he was having on me. He was totally dominating me, and he didn't have to lift a finger to do it.

He took another step toward me, so that the hard tent in his boxers poked me in the chest. I reached out, placing my hands on his abs again, feeling their mean hardness, as I worked my way downward. I hooked my thumbs into the hem of his drawers, then slowly pulled them down. His hard dick sprang up, finally free from its cotton prison, jutting out proudly from his dark forest of untrimmed pubes, ready to conquer anything it wanted.

It was bigger than I had imagined...so long, so wide, with a head the size of a plum, and veins wrapping around it like vines on a trellis. It stood there angry, red, and throbbing. It wanted to dominate. His beastly balls hung down like a pair of lemons, full of his hot cum, ready to shoot their potion into whatever hole his huge weapon had just vanquished.

There was only one thing to do, and I instinctively knew it -- I dropped to my knees, and prepared to pleasure my master. I wrapped one hand as far as I could around the base of his huge tool, kissed the head, and then proceeded to take it slowly into my waiting mouth. Its huge girth stretched my lips.

I sucked for all I was worth for several minutes, as Zachary guided me with his hand on the top of my head. At one point, I looked up, over his cut abs and jutting pecs, and saw he had his head thrown back in ecstasy.

After a few minutes, he pushed me off of his throbbing member, picked me up by my shoulder, then threw me back onto the bed, so I was lying down on my back, face-up, with my legs hanging off the edge.

Smiling, he said "Alright, bitch, now I'm gonna show you what a real man does."

With that, he reached over to the nightstand, grabbed a bottle of lube, and put some on his dick, rubbing it over the whole thing. I knew I was in for it now...

He leaned over me, placing his hands flat on the mattress on either side of my chest, then leaned forward, slowing driving his dick up my ass, staring me straight in the eyes the entire time.

When he got all the way in, he held it there for a moment, so I could get adjusted to his gigantic width. I had never felt so completely filled in all my life! Slowly, he pulled out so that only the head of his dick was still inside me, then he drove it in again. Repeating the process, he started building up a rhythm. He was fucking me, and I was loving every minute of it! I watched his abs alternately relax and contract as he ravished me for his pleasure.

I wrapped my legs around him, pulling him closer to me, and wrapped my arms around him, feeling the hard muscles in his back and shoulders flex in time with his powerful thrusts. I was literally impaled on his rock-hard cock.

He alternated positions and rhythms, sometimes pulling all the way out to the head and stopping, toying with me. I'd claw the bed and beg him to continue fucking me, desperate for more. I was his bitch, at the mercy of his powerful body.

Finally, I couldn't take it any more. The symphony of muscle was all too much for me, and I came right then and there, between us, as he stared me dead in the eyes.

"I...love...you....Zacky..." I moaned out, as I came harder than I ever had before in my life.

My orgasm caused my hole to tighten around his dick, which pushed him over the edge too. I could feel his hot cum splattering inside me, as he filled me to capacity with his seed. He came for a long time, shot after shot after shot, filling me completely, marking me as his own.

As his orgasm subsided, he looked down at me, sweat dripping off his body, and smiled warmly at me, his dick still in my ass.

"I love you, too, baby," he said, then leaned down and kissed me passionately, as I wrapped my arms around him and pulled him closer to me, wanting to become one with him, never to let go.

After our lovemaking, we lay there in bed together, spooned, him holding me from behind. I relaxed back into his embrace, feeling so secure, like nothing could ever harm me. I was safe, as long as I was in his strong arms. He was my man -- my protector. He wouldn't let anything bad happen to me.

I turned around, so that I was nuzzled in his chest, inhaling his scent. All the tragedies and disappointments of my past were finally made up for, and the one thing I had longed for all my life was finally here to stay -- true love, with a sexy guy who felt equally for me, what I felt for him.

I didn't mind not being in charge any more. I had finally found my true match. I honestly wanted to serve him for the rest of my life -- I wanted to be his slave. I wanted to live with him, and cook for him, and clean for him, and be the little bitch he used to satisfy his sexual needs; I wanted to bow down before him, and kiss his feet, and worship him. I wanted to please him. He was my sun, my moon, and my stars.

And I swear the corners of the room started to look a little sharper...

THE END.

========================================= Please send comments to ephraim.johnson@gmail.com