siktici ©2017
*
I avoided writing this story for years, at first, out of sheer embarrassment. Some of it is true, some of it is embellished with slivers of truth. I couldn't deny the story any longer, as it insisted.
I closed a 21-year military career on March 1997; I came out to myself (To do so while in the military was still a pension killer); and I went back to my childhood city of Houston. The city had shed its cowtown isolation by wooing transplants with job opportunities and lower taxes. It lured me with the promise to be wooed by Friends of Dorothy; so, I found my voice, smiled as honestly as I could, and advertised my interests to every man who set off my gaydar. I failed to attract flies.
I didn't know the rules and I didn't swagger with narcissistic indifference, because I approached my community with honesty—a rookie mistake. So, I courted resentment, turned my smile upside-down, and exited shallow conversations before the slightest rejection.
Summer came stifling and claustrophobic, and I was jerking off to Richard Locke, Fred Halsted, and Casey Donovan. This trio represented the continuum of my sexual hunger. Although these men had long succumbed to AIDS, I enjoyed their bodies and their performances, while feeling a tinge of guilt at their demise.
Until a muggy summer's night in August 1997, I was convinced that watching Richard, Fred, and Casey was going to be as close as I would come to realizing my lust. I had made the circuit from JR's to Pacific Street to The Mining Company. Loneliness suggested I stay at The Mining Company, go to an outside bar, and occasionally look over the bar's high walls to lovers moseying along in the steamy night. I cursed them and pickled myself in vodka.
"Where is he?" a man asked with a very deep voice that vibrated from my ass to my nipples. I turned to see a very tall and tanned Texas Daddy, holding a Cosmo and something in a snifter. I remained perched on a high bench next to a high wall—just staring. "If you come down, I can give you this," he said and extended the Cosmo. "Come on. Yeah, that's better. Here ya go."
I sat beside him at the bar and said nothing; I was stunned by his handsomeness, of course, but I was terrified by his overture. I didn't know the rules. Here was my lust personified and I didn't know how to handle the situation.
"You won't scare me away, but if I were shallow, your acting like a scared deer would make me head for the door." His expression softened and he added, "Relax and give me you."
How did he know? I DID slowly relax, but I remained cautious.
"Okay, let's start with stats; that's pretty neutral," he began with a wink.
"I'm in my fifties, weigh a buck eighty-five, in a six-two slimming frame; and not bad to look at if I say so myself. I'm a retired real estate developer and avid boater. I'm out to the important people in my life, fuck everybody else. I'm a member of the leather community, but I'm pretty guarded about that part of my life. My clients really wouldn't take me seriously if they saw me in ass-less chaps," he said and poked me in the side. He had friends at all levels of gay life, enjoyed gourmet food, top shelf brandy, and the occasional joint. Undoubtedly, he liked having a fit body and he seemed highly educated.
After a little while, I found my voice. "I'm thirty (I lied), five-seven, one-fifty, soak and wet."
He said I wore it well, and my asshole squirmed at his intense look. I shyly smiled. "I'm just out of the military, where I used my dick and my imagination to keep me going until retirement," I said and finished with, "Don't worry, I won't wake you with the click of M16."
"I'm not worried," he said, "Some of my best friends are—"
I laughed.
"I'm amazed at your self-control, though. Working out must've helped you through that, huh?" he asked.
I nodded.
Again, he complemented my highly toned body, as I explained that I was only out to my mother and my best friend who weren't surprised.
"We are always the last to know," he said, and we laughed.
And finally, I explained that my refinements amounted to the occasional top-shelf vodka, an imported beer, camping, and marathons.
"I'll teach you about refinement, because you deserved the finer things," he said and took my hand to kiss us into turbulence.
Breathlessly, I said, "I'll do it," as my eyes fluttered and I shook away lust.
"You're adorable," he said.
I feigned offense.
"Hold on," he said grabbing my arm. "I'm not kidding." Taking my hand in his, he short-circuited me with his touch. "It's because you don't know how to be slick that turns me on," he said and turned me back to my drink.
"Adorable?" I asked, failing to hide my heated shyness.
"Yeah, adorable. I see you as a fawn trying out its legs for the first time," he said, and seeing that he was making the situation worse, he added: "I'm over slick moves and double-talk about how good a guy would be or how he's the answer to my prayers. So, when a guy like you blows into town, I count myself lucky that I get to have an honest moment with a very handsome guy."
Okay, he got me. Besides that, I felt lucky to find a handsome older man who found me attractive, and perhaps, mature. And more than that, I fell in lust the instant I turned from The Mining Company's high wall.
We had a nightcap at his place, an aging condo that sat slightly west of Pacific Street. It was smartly furnished with gay subtleties. The walls and minimal furniture exuded masculinity. Autumnal hues in masculine paintings, genitally protracted sculptures, and touches that called to mind world travel to none-beaten paths completed the motif. Books on architecture, photography, and war stood out from the usual books found in a bachelor's library and proved his sophistication.
"You have a nice place," I said as he handed me a small glass of a liquor unknown to me.
"I'll show it to you later," he said and pulled me to a deftly stuffed couch. I barely had time to place the drink on the table before he pulled me into a breathless kiss. "I'm sorry," he said on our surfacing. "You make me base. I hope I didn't overwhelm you," he said and weakly smiled.
I only managed, "Don't stop," before he took me back to the depths.
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