Walt and I shared the same college dorm, and he was one of the first guys at school I came out to. We were both athletic, although he tended towards wrestling and soccer, while I went out for swimming and track. As far as guys go, he wasn't really my usual type, being shorter and stockier than I usually like, but from the glimpses I'd had of him in the shower, I knew what a beautiful, well-muscled body he had, and when he smiled, his face lit up in a way you just had to love. I was taller and thinner (typical swimmer's build) and we both had the same dark brown eyes and hair.
But the most peculiar thing about Walt was that he was engaged to be married. Over a period of months, as we became better friends, he'd confided how he'd been quite the Lothario in high school, but in his last year, he'd met the girl of his dreams, and he wanted to commit himself to her and her alone. Unfortunately, she was staying in Montana while he studied in California, so they both had some fears of the relationship failing to survive. To insure against this, he had proposed to her in the last week before school started, and she'd accepted - setting a date for 4 years in the future, when they'd both have graduated.
Everyone thought it was very sweet. Everyone thought it was hopeless. Everyone loved Walt - he had one of those winning personalities - and everyone felt sorry for him.
Walt seemed to spend a certain amount of time every month agonizing over some new problem between him and Judy. Although hardly his only friend, I seemed to get more than my fair share of confidences from him on the subject, possibly because he felt I had an objective perspective being gay and all. I learned, for example, that his sexual experiences were mostly in cars, but not lying in the back seat; he favored sitting in the front seat Indian-style, with the girl facing him and sitting on top. I knew he liked oral sex, and he even asked me for tips he could give Judy.
He was probably the first guy I ever came out to that I wasn't hoping to have sex with. I genuinely liked the guy, and given he'd confided in me about his own history, I really wanted to be honest with him. He had taken it real well, asked me a few intelligent questions, and we compared notes on the differences and similarities between being with guys and being with girls. He seemed pleased that everything seemed so "symmetrical." (He was studying chemistry so that may have influenced his esthetics a bit.) And he listened patiently to my stories about sneaking around with guys in the high school chem. Lab, my affair with my first roommate, and my current loneliness.
One thing he said surprised me: he told me that he occasionally had some homosexual fantasies, but that they'd all involved much older men. Since we were both about 19, that probably meant 30s or 40s, but I never did get details on that. Anyway, he was totally committed to Judy - no matter what she put him through - and Walt wasn't on my short list of guys to get into the sack anyway. (That 10-inch cock didn't attract more than my scientific curiosity - honest!)
Walt also played the piano, and better than anyone I'd ever met before. He even composed his own work and could actually sit at the piano playing new music that he was creating off the top of his head - or so he said, anyway. I loved watching him play, and I knew that it was something he'd do to let off stress. Lucky for him, the dorm had a piano in the common room. It wasn't in the best of shape, but it was serviceable - up until Spring, when something broke beyond easy repair.
During that period, Walt took to playing on the much better pianos in the Music Center, even though it meant a walk to the far side of campus. I'd never accompanied him on those walks - however much I liked his company and his playing - but on one particular Saturday evening when the skies opened and the rain poured down in sheets, I happened upon Walt looking dolefully out at the water, and he asked me if I knew the underground route into the Music Center.
Our campus was undermined by a complex multi-layered network of steam tunnels. The Institute used the steam both for heating and to drive certain types of experiments, so the supply of various grades of steam was actually important enough to justify the construction of this subterranean maze. Naturally, we undergrads just loved them. Getting into them and getting around in them was a challenge, of course, but that just made it all the better.
As it happened, I was something of a local expert on the tunnels, as Walt knew, if only because I'd confided to him that I'd fooled around with someone down there once. So I grinned and assured him that I could get us from the dorm to the Music Center and never even get our hair wet. He thanked me, but he seemed very subdued - normally he'd be much more effusive in his thanks -- and looked a little concerned when I went for a flashlight first.
The reason most people didn't know you could reach the Music Center from the dorms was that the path led through what we liked to call the "Dark Tunnels" - places where the lighting had failed and never been replaced. Since someone had decided to store old lab furniture there, walking through them involved a certain amount of climbing over that junk. (I never said we wouldn't get dirty.) Most of the tunnels were at least as large as a hallway, and some were large enough to run vehicles through. Most tunnels were well-lit, and some even had natural light. The dark tunnels were very different.
Anyway, when we reached the place where the lights stop, Walt stopped too.
"Are these the Dark Tunnels?"
"Yep. There's no other way to the far side of campus. It's not a crawlspace - just unlit."
He peered at the table that seemed to block the way. "How do we get past that?"
"We climb over." I hopped up onto the table, turned on my flashlight, and smiled back at him.
"Um, did I ever tell you I have claustrophobia?" He looked really uncomfortable.
"It's not far." I extended my hand to him. He took it and climbed up with me.
Now I guess scrabbling across four or five lab benches in the dark with only about three feet of space between the table tops and the roof isn't the best thing for a claustrophobic guy, but we went pretty quickly, and soon enough we were at the drop-off - the edge of the last table - and we could both stand again. Again, I took his hand to help him down, and even when he stood up, he kept a tight grip on it.
So holding him by the hand, lighting our way with the flashlight, I led us down the narrow corridor. I kept up a steady, one-sided conversation, relating some story about my early explorations in these tunnels, until we reached the "Dark Staircase," which led us up into the broader, well-lit so-called "Northern Tunnels." I almost heard him sob with relief when he saw the light again, and as we stepped out of the stairs, he let go of my hand.
"Are you okay man? I didn't realize you had a problem."
"No, I'm not okay, but it's not your fault."
"Gee, I'm really sorry." He did look pretty bad. "We're almost there now though."
"No, I mean I had a bad call from Judy. I don't want to talk about it yet."
"Ah, I understand." I patted him on the back a bit awkwardly. In silence, we came around the corner through a door, and into the basement of the Music Center. When we got upstairs, we found that the place was deserted - unsurprisingly, since it was actually locked on the outside.
"How do you usually get in here when it's NOT raining?"
"Um, I guess I haven't tried to get in here so late on a Saturday." He smiled weakly for just a moment, and I felt a really strong urge to do something to comfort him, but the most I could do was smile back.
The Music center had about a dozen pianos, each in its own soundproofed room. Walt picked one, turned on the light in the room, sat down and began to play. I sat on the bench beside him and listened. Even though I considered myself a fan of classical music, I typically didn't recognize or at least couldn't name the often obscure classical pieces that Walt liked to play - when they weren't his own extemporaneous compositions in the first place - but this time, I recognized the piece immediately: Elton John's "Funeral for a Friend." God! I hoped he wasn't suicidal. I looked at his face and saw a tear running down one cheek, and I felt really bad.
Then he stopped playing and started weeping. And he turned and reached out to me.
So I twisted around to straddle the piano bench and opened my arms to him. He put his head on my shoulder and I wrapped my arms around him while he sobbed uncontrollably. I just held him tight, not saying anything. Not knowing what to say.
After what seemed a long time, he started to run down. At one point, he half pulled away and choked out what sounded like the beginning of an apology, but I pulled him back to me, told him it was okay, and to just take his time. He got quiet for a moment, hugged me real tight, held his breath a second, and then started crying again, but more softly. "It's all right. I'm here for you as long as you need me. I won't tell anyone." Then I whispered, "Us gay guys know how to keep a secret."
That earned a short, startled laugh through his tears, followed by some sniffles, and then just the heavy sound of his breathing. He just lay there in my arms for a while.
Then, not moving from where he was resting his head, "She broke it off."
I gave him a squeeze. "I guessed that. Either that, or else she died."
"She might as well have." Another sniffle. "She says she met another guy."
Strangled, "she says she never really loved me." Another bout of loud, uncontrolled sobbing, not as long as the first one.
And I'm really not sure what inspired me to do it, but I leaned over and kissed him on the cheek. "I love you Walt. We all do. If she doesn't, there's just something wrong with her."
"I love you too." And he snuggled closer to me. This was unfortunate, because as a direct side effect of this intimacy and this exchange of what were meant to be purely friendly affections, I was becoming aroused. I reached up with one hand and stroked his hair. He gave a long, tired, ragged sigh - the kind that signifies the end of a crying jag - but he didn't make any effort to move.
Then it struck me that we were tangled together in almost exactly the same position he'd described being in with his girls, except that we weren't in a car.
"Are you getting a hard-on?" I heard just a touch of amusement in his voice.
"Well, you probably couldn't do this with a girl and not get hard. I'm in control of myself. Don't worry about it."
"I don't mean to make you uncomfortable."
"I'm more worried about me making you uncomfortable. I'm trying to comfort you, remember?"
"Oh I'm real comfortable. This feels real nice. You don't mind?"
"No, I like holding you. It makes me feel special. I feel really close to you right now - in a warm, nonsexual way - except that I guess it can't be completely nonsexual." I trailed off, a little confused.
"I understand. And I do feel loved right now, and that IS really special." He snuggled up against me some more and sighed more contentedly.
By now I was fully, painfully erect, and any pretense of "pure, nonsexual love" was fast going out the window. I leaned down and kissed him on the cheek again.
"You're trembling."
"I'm so sorry. Maybe I should go find a bathroom and jerk off and then come back."
"Don't do that." Softly, "I'll take care of you."
"What?"
"Go on. Stand up." We disentangled ourselves, and I stood while he sat on the bench. He started to undo my belt.
"Are you sure you want to do this?"
"Well, I really feel like doing something for you," he undid my zipper and carefully pulled my jeans and shorts down to my knees, "and I've had this done to me enough times that I'm curious about doing it once." And with that, he wrapped his hand around my erection and popped it into his mouth.
Now I've had guys who sucked me because they thought it was their duty, or because they were sexually excited, or just because I told them to, but this was the first time anyone ever did it as a pure expression of love. I felt a warm feeling flood in waves all over my body. He looked up at me questioningly, and I smiled and stroked his hair and told him it was perfect. He closed his eyes and kept sucking. If I hadn't already jerked off a few hours earlier, I'd have shot in seconds. As it was, he sucked me patiently for at least a few minutes before I unloaded in his mouth. He made a small noise, but kept sucking until I signaled him to stop, at which point he pulled off and swallowed. A large drop of residual cum started to collect at the tip of my dick, and he leaned over and licked that up too.
"Wow! That was fantastic." Pulling my pants up and catching my breath. "Do you want me to do anything for you?"
"Yeah, get back here and hold me some more." He actually smiled brightly at me.
So I got back on the bench, and he settled back in my arms again.
"I won't tell anyone about any of this, Walt."
"I know. I trust you."
"I can't believe you did that when you weren't aroused."
"Oh I was a little bit."
"You were?"
"Yeah, but the main thing was that I was doing it for you. I could feel how much you liked it, and I just wanted to make you happy. Actually made me happy doing it."
"So you liked it?"
"Mmmm, I wouldn't go that far. I think this was a very special occasion."
I kissed him on top of the head - chastely this time - "I'll say! So are you feeling better now?"
"Yeah. Would you like me to play something for you?"
"You mean you play something besides the flute?" We both burst out laughing - and it was really good to hear him laugh. "Okay, how about Bach's 'Jesu Joy of Man's Desiring?' I can sing the vocal part." It was the brightest, happiest piece I could think of on short notice (even if the title was a bit unfortunate, given the circumstances) and we untangled ourselves and he played while I sang. I put an arm around him and he didn't object.
After that, he closed up the piano, and we turned out the lights and left. It had stopped raining outside, so we slipped out an emergency exit and walked back to the dorm.
If he had regrets about having given me a blow job, he never hinted at them, and although we never repeated the experience, we remained close friends throughout college - even after I came out to everyone. I learned that I could love Walt without being in love with him - a distinction I had never understood before - and when he married one of our classmates a few years later, I was genuinely happy for both of them.
In fact, looking back a quarter of a century later, I find I actually have only one regret to speak of: I never did find out if he really had ten inches or not.
--The End--