A drab room lost in a bureaucratic nightmare of drab corridors. A screen and a file-cabinet full of cases, each of them lost delinquents, just as I am. Hopeless repeat offenders.
He looks up at me with a bored expression. 'You realize that, no matter what mitigating circumstances we can fabricate, you qualify for a custodial sentence this time?'
I shrug as best as I can, attempting to seem nonchalant.
He shuffles papers on his desk, in and out of a buff-coloured manilla folder, as though contemplating. 'There is... just one possible way out for you, although I hesitate to suggest it.'
He's perked my interest. 'Tell me, Mr Collingwood, tell me.'
He gets up, turns around so he's looking out the window, hands clasped loosely behind his back. 'You know about Community Service? Course you do. You've done all that picking up litter and scrubbing graffiti off walls thing. I know you have. Because of the severity of your situation, what I'm empowered to offer you is a different kind of Community Service, a way of working off your debt to society. But there's no compulsion. None of this is being done under any kind of duress. You are absolutely entitled to reject this offer, and take whatever legal consequences that follow. You understand?'
I nod warily. 'What's so special about this Community Service?'
'It's a branch of Help The Aged, care in the community for isolated elderly gentlemen. You will be required to act in the capacity of a kind of surrogate, to relieve their sexual tensions and frustrations. To improve their quality of life.'
I startle to my feet in shock. 'You mean sex with old guys?'
'As I say, your refusal will be honoured, and is understandable. This is an entirely voluntary service. But it will qualify as Community Service, and get you off the hook regarding any other legal proceedings.'
Wait, I'm thinking it over. I've not always been socially well-adjusted. I've got what welfare calls a 'troubled' life-history. I've got myself into precarious scrapes. I've done things I've not always been proud of. And sure, I've had dubious sexual encounters, some of them involving the exchange of payment. Can this proposition really be so bad?
'How do you know I can do this?'
'You'll be learning on the job. I'll be monitoring. Any time you feel unsure, any time you want to back out of the agreement, that's fine.'
'So when do I start?'
'Right now, if you feel you're ready.'
His Japanese hatchback is parked in the lot out back. Being outside feeling the low breeze on my skin seems strangely unreal. As though this isn't really happening. How weird, how surreal is this? Mr Collingwood pulls out into traffic, me in the passenger seat beside him. He has a briefcase with a clipboard and tablet. 'You're young' he begins. 'If you get custodial it would not go well with you, if you get my meaning. Chances are you'd end up being used sexually anyway, with or without your consent. I'm concerned about you. I'm offering you to chance, you understand, Bryan?'
I nod. 'Thank you, Mr Collingwood.'
We pull into a fast-food franchise. He gets me a burger and coke, and watches as I consume it greedily. Then he looks down at his folder. 'Your first client will be Mr Edgerston. He's a seventy-five-year-old widower who lives alone. This will be your test-case. But beware, he can be a devious cunning old sod. You will give him fellatio. You understand the term?'
I smile nervously around a mouthful of burger. I know all the terms I need to know.
Soon afterwards we draw up outside a bungalow in a leafy cul-de-sac. He parks the hatchback precisely aligned to the curb. 'Number seventy-two' he indicates, 'that one. I'll wait here. Are you alright with this Bryan?'
'Sure I'm alright.' I step out onto the grass verge, crunching on drifts of dead leaves. Still not believing that this can be for real. I turn my collar up, not exactly because of the cool breeze, more because it seems furtive. The garden gate creaks. I slouch up the path and push the bell. I get a sudden irrational urge to make a break for it, to get the hell out. Collingwood's attention is lost deep in his files. If I take to my heels I can be over the low wall and off down the street before anyone realizes. But what's the good? You can't fight the system. They'd only track me down and haul me in.
The door opens abruptly. A tall stooping man with steel-grey hair. 'Yes? What do you want?'
'Mr Edgerston? Mr Collingwood sent me.'
He appraises me up and down critically. 'In that case, I suppose you'd best come in.' I squeeze past him into the entrance hall, and from there into the front room. 'So, you're the new boy?' he demands. 'I hope you're better than the last one they sent me. He was useless, did nothing but sob and whimper.' I look around nervously, there's a clutter of old-fashioned furniture, ornaments and family photographs that seem to come from some other lost age. He slumps down into a faded corner armchair opposite the TV. 'C'mon boy, what are you waiting for? Get your clothes off so I can see what they've sent me this time.'
So this is how it begins? He watches as I kick off my shoes, a cool searching gaze as I drape my jacket carefully over the chair, then pull my T-shirt up and off self-consciously. I hesitate. This is creepy. There's no sound but the ticking of the clock on the mantelpiece. With sudden determination I take a deep breath, unfasten the belt, and shove my pants and underwear down in a single move, straightening to step out of them. Embarrassingly, I've got a lazy half-erection that sways free. Unexpectedly he reaches out and grabs hold of my cock. His old wrinkled fingers curling in tight around me as he laughs out loud at my discomfort. My first impulse is to push him away, but I resist and control my reaction. Allowing his fingers to do what they may. He nudges me around and runs his hand across the soft curve of my bare bottom, chuckling possessively like some miser counting his wealth.
At the same time, he's fumbling in his own groin, unfastening his way down his fly-buttons. 'Oh Fuck, this is where it gets REALLY nasty.' And he's pulling out a surprisingly impressive erect penis. 'Down on your knees, boy, get this in your dirty gob.'
I glance out through the net curtains. The Japanese hatchback is still there. This is what I'm here to do. I crouch down, shuffle in between his splayed legs. There's a stale aroma as my face moves in. He's holding his cock at its base, in a nest of wispy white pubic hair, arrowing it up at me, it looks angry and impatient. He's grinning a big lewd grin, enjoying my humiliation. I close my eyes and gulp. My lips purse up against the cock-head, apply slight pressure so that it just slips inside, a sour taste floods my mouth. His hand tightens against the back of my head, and he shoves, so I have no choice, but to swallow more of it and suck automatically. He grunts with obscene satisfaction. The foulness has been swallowed away, and I can no longer see his face, so it's more anonymous, impersonal. The more I suck the quicker the whole escapade will be over and I can go, so I suck more fiercely, lashing my tongue up and down the impressive shaft, nuzzling my head deeper into his groin.