December, 2023
"Good evening, Mr. Reynolds. I hope you enjoyed the show. We haven't seen you for some time."
"I was doing the European tour for most of the last year, Fritz," I said. Fritz had worked the backstage at Lincoln Center's Koch Theater for as long as I could remember—since before my first ballet here, a couple of months shy of turning nineteen. He had worked his way up to backstage manager just as I had worked my way from the dance line to principal roles. "I've been touring the ballets there, checking out how other companies do it." I didn't say that I only was back in New York now because the pandemic had lessened enough that they could do Frank's memorial service.
"I hope you haven't given up dancing," Fritz said. "You were the best Cavalier in the annual productions we did here of
The Nutcracker
back in the day."
"That was twenty years ago, Fritz," I said. "No, I haven't danced in a ballet for some time. Not since . . ." I couldn't bring myself to say it.
"Not since Mr. Carlton died?"
"No, not since Frank left us. I always danced for him." I could talk to Fritz about this. He had always been understanding. And he'd idolized Franklin Carlton, who had been a mainstay here. His money had helped provide these productions.
"When they said we could do
The Nutcracker
again this year, I'd hoped you'd be back—maybe in the role of Herr Drosselmeyer. The production just doesn't seem the same without you in some role."
"It doesn't seem the same to me to be watching from the audience and not in it in some role, I admit," I said. "Maybe next year."
"I do hope so," Fritz said. "When did you first start in it here? You must have been a child."
"I was eighteen, in the background dance line. I think I had four costume changes. In the early eighties."
"Well, it's good to see you again backstage. Are those flowers for anyone in particular?"
* * * *
December, 1983
I was nearly nineteen. I wanted to be a professional ballet dancer in the worst way. It was my first professional production,
The Nutcracker
, with the New York Ballet, at Lincoln Center, my first visit to New York. It was a beginning, but it threatened to be an end too. I couldn't afford to go on—not unless I found a way to earn more. I was willing to do about anything to be able to continue trying in the New York ballet, and I had some assets in addition to the dancing ability. I was young, good-looking, very fit albeit sight and lithe, and I'd gone with men before. I wasn't coerced to go with men. That had been a choice completely independent of the ballet. So, it was natural to use that as I could. I was headed to the Long Island shore opposite Fire Island to use that.
"They're just renting it for the week. It doesn't belong to any of the men who will be at the party, Adam."
I had remarked on how lush the mansion was that Gregor was bringing Kyle, Win, and me to as candy for a private Christmas multiday party in an area called Babylon, on Long Island. The driveway was long, flanked by now-leafless trees that a hunk of a black man was stringing white fairy lights on as we drove up to the house. I looked up at him where he balanced on a ladder and he stared back down at me with a knowing smile. My body quivered.
Did he know what sort of party I and the other guys were coming to? Did he know that we were the entertainment? We obviously were too young to be guests at a party in a venue like this.
I didn't feel guilty nor was I embarrassed about coming to this party and letting men cover me. I was only eighteen—so were Kyle and Win—but we were all mentally old and tough for our ages. We knew what we had to do to get ahead in professional ballet. We were all in New York City for December, gathered from across the country. I was training at the Philadelphia Dance Academy, at least through the end of the month when my family no longer could afford tuition there and I'd maybe have to give up my goal of being a premier ballet dancer. What I'd earn from this party plus what little I'd be paid for dancing the line in Tchaikovsky's
The Nutcracker
at Lincoln Center would just get me to the end of the year—another two weeks. Of course, if there was a generous tip, I could go on longer. Gregor had told me the tips would be good.
Gregor Gerinko, the dance master for this NYC Ballet performance of
The Nutcracker
, had made the arrangements for us to be at the party and had driven us out to Babylon in a rental car. Kyle, a blond from Cleveland; Win, half-Chinese from San Francisco; and dark, Jewish me from Philadelphia, were all in the weekend cast of the Christmas ballet, performing background dance line duties in several different costumes each in roles going from mice to mechanical dolls, to toy soldiers, so we were free in the middle of this week before Christmas to take on this extra gig. We all had male ballet dancer bodies: less-than-normal height, willowy stature just beginning to muscle up, and limber, flexible bodies. Each in our own ways we were beautiful young men—more beautiful than handsome.
"There are six men at the party," Gregor said as we approached the house. "You are to give them whatever they want. There's a cook and a coordinator, but you guys will be the waiters and servers to attend to the men's needs and desires. The waiter duties are secondary to what they want sexually. Don't ask them any questions that would lead to their identities. This is a very private party. They are paying you well for what you'll provide. Just always look happy to be there and with them—and treat them all like they are hung gods, no matter what their looks or their age. Open your legs to them on demand and treat them like they are the best stud you've ever had."
"You'll be there too, of course," Kyle said.
"No. I have to go back to the production," Gerinko said. "I'll be back to pick you up Thursday evening. The party here ends that afternoon. Don't go wild at the party in ways that breaks anything in the house. It's being rented. You're there for these men. You are to be their sex slaves for the three days of the party."
We certainly couldn't say we didn't know what was expected of us. I'd let men do me before. I hadn't been in an orgy, though, and I was a little excited about the prospect of what could come. He said there would be six of them at the party.
As we were climbing out of the rental car and being motioned into the ornate double front doors of the mansion by a scowling, thuggish looking man in his forties who was identified as Steve, the party coordinator, I sensed we were being watched. It was chilly, but not cold for a December in New York, but the thought of what I would be doing for the next couple of days made me tremble and shimmer a bit and I pulled my coat tightly around me. I looked back at the long driveway we'd just come down and my eyes met those of the black hunk on the ladder, stringing lights. His gaze was piercing. I wondered if he was some sort of gardener or handyman here and whether he knew how the house would be used for the next couple of days. And I wondered if he knew how three eighteen-year-old male ballet dancer would be used as well.
Was he into this as well or did he view us with disdain?
I'd never been with a black man before. I had been used in Philadelphia by men I needed to help me in becoming a ballet dancer, so there was nothing new in what would be happening here, but they'd always been regular men—nothing dangerous or forbidden about them. And none of them had been black—or as muscular as the man on the ladder.
But it seemed in the way that black man on the ladder looked at me that he knew—and that it turned him on as much as it must be turning on the six men coming together to have this mid-week party with three eighteen-year-old male dancers the week before Christmas.