This took place quite a few years ago. Yet, the memory is still very vivid.
I was out of my Prep and to start my freshman-year in October. I got myself a decent summer job at one of the seaside resorts. Neither cash nor plenty of sex were in short supply those days. People have been always using their vacation to do the things they would normally stay away from. You are far away from home. No one really knows. No one really cares and they are also doing the same thing anyway.
I was swinging both ways at that time. A hot body was a hot body and whoever was willing to get it right now as opposed to 'a bit later' was welcome in my books. Girls knew, I was not into fidelity but I kept my gay side well under cover. Guys, on the other hand, knew I was scoring well above the average and that did not hurt either. Nothing succeeds like success or so they say...
Things started changing a bit towards mid-September. I met Mary-Ann who was going to attend the same college I got admitted to that fall. She was a soph girl at the time and we quickly clicked together. The summer was coming to its end anyway, and the days of limitless debauchery were numbered thin. Going 'steady' sounded kinda alright, though I had my own doubts and had no intention of 'settling down' and playing the role of a happy, monogamous boyfriend. Guess, monogamy has never really been my thing. Mary-Ann was neither deaf nor blind, though. What attracted her to me was that legendary story that I got laid with every qualified chick within the 2-hour drive from our resort base. (Admittedly, she did not know the other part, or pretended she did not. Whatever.) She was going to live with it all, for as long as she remained 'the girlfriend' and got recognized as such. She certainly had all the right attributes and was a fun guy to be with. (If I did not want sex, she knew I was hungry and made me a sandwich. That bit always worked. A simple, old but true clichΓ©!)
Mary-Ann's Birthday party practically coincided with the final week of our job assignments and all of us decided to make it our end-of-the-summer party, too. Basically, our last call to try and sort the things out before all of us took our separate ways.
Marcus was my co-worker, a seemingly very straight dude who was pretty much after Mary-Ann. I found him hot, good-looking, defined and all. Mary-Ann kept on giving him a cold shoulder, though. Just when I thought that everyone knew everything about everyone else at our resort, (save for the stuff, I did not want them to know) it suddenly looked like, something was wrong there. Good, ole' Mary-Ann would normally flirt heavily and turn the dude down, when he was dead sure, he was going to score with her. Guess, I forgot to mention, she was a real bitch. She did not bother to go through those notions with Marcus. My curiosity was aroused and I thought the party would be a great chance to turn that stone, too. Not that it was any of my direct business.
For all of his bad luck with Mary-Ann, Marcus was a popular dude and was dating Isabelle pretty heavily. I knew Isabelle and have had a few chances to get to know her well. She was a bit too much into romance for my taste but sure did not miss a single opportunity to get her itch stilled, if she felt, the dude was qualified where it mattered. Been there done that and even did not bother to get a T-shirt.
Isabelle took a bee-line over to Mary-Ann, obviously to start on one of those absorbing subjects of the latest nail polishers or something to that effect. Being a co-host, I took Marcus on my side, offered him a drink and started the usual breeze-shooting session.
Yeah, he had no complaints. Life was treating him well. His college money was secured and he did earn a bit on the side. (For those of you, not familiar with the industry, it really was a code word for hustling or escorting on the side.) Now, this was news. Never a word about this on our bush telegraph. He was looking forward to signing up for the next summer, too. He liked the people, the cash and even the work. He was one happy trooper.
I went back to my host duties, mixed with the people and watched Marcus closely. He was befriending that bottle of vodka a bit too fast for his own good. The party was now getting in its full swing. Lots of guys came to say 'bye, c ya,'. We all felt that somehow, the good times were over, for a while, at least. I thought I may as well score one more time before packing up to go. Men fuck, wussies socialize or so it says in my book.
I knew I was going to try my luck with Marcus. Risky as it was, he was the only guy on the grounds I still wanted (and thought I could jump) and I was not going to pass on this one, if I had any say in it. We were all checking out in some two days. Time was running short and so was the vodka in his bottle. Yeah, we all drunk in those days, but Marcus must have been doing a richly paid overtime. I did not like that overtime bit.
Besides, I needed to extract the two of us from the slowly dying party. For all I cared, he could drink somewhere else, too. And I certainly wanted to fuck him somewhere else, too. Since he claimed he was familiar with that hustling thing which has been going on all the way through, I thought, I'd play safe. I went over to him, showed him my pager (not that he was going to read anything on it) and said,
"Dude, they want me at the airport. Looks like one of our guys did not show up for work. Wanna come along?"
Obviously, he was either going to read the script and take it up or exit. No one would be embarrassed. At least not at this stage.
Fortunately, Marcus was holding his drinks well.
"Yah, dude! We'd better be going. Whatever they might need us for."
He was fully compliant. He wanted himself outta there too. Hey, we drank; we ate and now was the time to bust the nut, one way or the other.
Holding my pager in my hand and gently pushing Marcus ahead of me, we went over to Mary-Ann, Isabelle and few other guys who were just hanging arpund and blurted out the news, pretending we were actually stoned but had to go anyway. Isabelle sounded like: 'better you guys, then anyone of us'. Well, she did not quite know the script. That much was obvious.
I started leisurely towards my car and Marcus followed closely. The moment we both got in, he lit up for the first time that evening.
"Dude, thanks for getting my, or should I say, our asses away from that place. Sounded like a happy funeral with all those creeps there." said Marcus with a note of 'we-r-in-this-together' in his voice.
Hope, no one gets me wrong here. I thought fucking Marcus was a good thing to do on that particular evening. I never thought starting a private conspiracy was in the cards, though.
"Sure, Dude. I thought I liked that story of yours of 'making a bit on the side'. We could go through a six-pack together at my bungalow and you could fill me in on that one."
"Wow, I was hoping you wouldn't ask. I like to keep the rumors down, if you know what I mean? Do not want people talking." Marcus was lying here and he was a poor liar at that. Sure, he did not want people talking. He wanted people envying him. Talk has been the least price ever paid for that deal.
"Like I said (I did not, but this sounded good and reassuring), your secret is safe with me." I really did not care one way or the other. But Marcus wanted a firm word on this, so he got it. Another least price ever paid for a pending penetration.
I motioned Marcus out of the parked car and quickly hailed a cab. I was opening the door of my summer bungalow in less then ten minutes hoping to land that hustler stud on his back with his feet on my shoulders and the pained expression on his face in anything below the next 15 minutes. Yeah, we all kept scoreboards in those days. I soon started measuring the time needed to get where I wanted to be and was steadily increasing my speed. Practice makes perfect or something to that effect. Something was telling me that this time around, I was either going to have my average score ruined or not enter the score altogether.
I grabbed that cold six-pack and tossed a can over to Marcus. I wanted to know, I was not going to tell and we were two men, so there was nothing to be ashamed of.
There ensued a silence. Anticlimactic, bare silence.
I decided to give him another chance, lit two cigarettes and gave him one. You do not get closer to any male in a non-sexual context than this. He is putting his lips on where yours have been until a second ago. A powerful invitation to share in other pleasures. A firm, loud, 'I-am-your-closest- friend-here'. I was good. And he started opening up.
"I suppose, I may as well just say that. I mean, I needed cash. So did everybody here, right?"
"Yeah, man, that's why we all came here to work." I confirmed, though I was still far away from catching his drift. Like most other people around the resort I seriously doubted the deeper truth here.
"I needed it more than all of you, guys. I am in bad shape." Marcus went on.
"So, who has been burning your cash or should I rather ask the 'what'?"
This was turning into a sadly predictable story of a young, still very much college-jock-to-be dude's who was into some harsh, heftily priced stuff. Was I going to call this a consolation or an encouragement fuck in my books? But fuck, it was going to be.
"It is Isabelle, dude." Marcus gulped down the last drops of his first beer in a record time and practically ate his cigarette with my spit on it.
"Isabelle?" This was more confusing than anything. "What's wrong with her?"
"I have been paying her, ya know." Marcus sounded broken here, yet willing to carry on with it.
"Dude, you have been paying her? For what, if I may ask?"
"To stay with me, pretend we were dating and all."