There it is, now—an instant between us videotaped for posterity, a testimony of my absolute surrender to your manlove. What the world will never see are the private nights when you possessed me. Once the sun rose and you walked out my door, you probably never gave me a second thought. But for the hours when the rest of the world was dead to us, when the only two people alive were you and me, you would look at me with your gorgeous smile—part mischievous imp, part tender lover—and I never doubted the sincerity of your pleasure in feeling yourself one with my muscle, with my body, even with my soul. It was always my pleasure to let you inside of me, as deep as you wanted to go. Whether you were gentle or whether you plowed away, it was my honor to move with the rhythm of your body. Yes, my goddamn honor, because it was you I was letting into the most private, sacred crevices of my inner being. You, Jordan, you.
I wasn’t losing you. Not entirely. We met from time to time after that shoot. A year later, you took me for an evening ride on your motorcycle. The helmet you made me wear had all sorts of piggish trash scribbled on it: CUM DUMPSTER… RAW ALPHA-SLUT… JOK FUCKER… BUTTHOLE BUDDY…
It was autumn. If it was cold, I don’t remember. We weren’t wearing jackets, just flimsy T-shirts. I asked, “What do I hold on to? You?” You said, “That’s pretty much it.”
As I wrapped my arms around you, you raised them higher so that my hands were on your chest, and you squeezed your fingers around mine, goading me to pinch your nipples throughout the ride. Streetlights were shining like gold under violet water. Friday night revelers crowded outside of bars, distant as onlookers gaping into a fish tank. That was how it felt in tandem with you, whizzing past strangers as the wind carried your voice toward me. It felt as if I were soaring on the crest of a wave.
We continue to meet. But it’s always touch and go between us, and often our meetings start with a text message from you, out of the blue, a text message following weeks, months, of silence.
You: Hey big guy, what are you up to?
Me: Good to hear from you. At work right now. This weekend?
(That weekend…)
Me: Hey, Jordan. Love to get tribal with you.
You: (silence)
Me: Love being your porn whore.
You: :)
ONCE UPON A TIME, IN 1969
Dirk Vanden
Brad and I rented a place of our own, the top half of a duplex, on a street called Castro. Ours was in the middle of a group of brightly-painted two-story Victorian houses—most of them rented to gay men, many of whom stood in the street, or on front steps, or watched from their windows, as the Cosmos’s Twin Bartenders, as we came to be known, moved in.
We were in love, completely enthralled with each other. It was magic and wonderful, and we played it to the hilt. We walked hand in hand down Castro; stared at each other, moony eyed, holding hands over a sidewalk table at the Sagittarius, a gay coffee house near our apartment; chased each other naked in the surf out at “bare-ass” beach near Land’s End. And we entertained hundreds nightly as we groped and goosed each other behind the bar.
To love somebody and to be loved in return—that’s what it’s all about. That’s what makes the whole rotten world worth putting up with. When you’re in love, life is heavenly. When you’re out of love, life can be hell. At the moment, Brad and I seemed to be sharing paradise.
For the first time in my life, I had a partner I could share it with. Even though we quickly learned that we were two very different people, there were many things we both enjoyed—the same movies and TV shows, the same kinds of food and, most importantly, the same kind of people. And he would actually listen when I talked. He was interested in what I had done and where I had lived.
I was fascinated by this man who looked so much like me, but was so very different. He had grown up in California, moving up and down the state, settling wherever his carpenter father could find work in the postwar housing industry. He had lived in most of the large cities of the state. And he had been gay since high school—when he’d been seduced by the boys’ phys-ed coach.
I’d spent most of my young life as a sheltered Mormon farm boy, in a very Mormon community in Idaho. After two years at Brigham Young University, I decided against going on a Mission, and went to work on a cattle ranch in Colorado instead—where I’d met Brad.
Since Brad had been my first, the one to “bring me out,” as he called it, we decided we were meant to be.
At first, it was fantastic, having sex with someone whose body looked and felt so much like my own, whose cock liked the same things my cock liked. Brad was a fantastic cocksucker—he’d taught me, originally—so we usually ended up having a sixty-nine. It was the fulfillment of a boyhood fantasy—of sucking myself off. Fucking myself in the face. Brad had remarked that it seemed the same way for him.
But after a while, things started going wrong. Brad wouldn’t be able to get a hard-on for me, no matter how long or deep I sucked, or I’d have to strain to come when I was fucking him because he seemed bored or distracted. We took turns being “too tired,” or having headaches.
That’s when the silences began. Sometimes days would pass before we would talk to each other about anything not absolutely necessary. It was hard to figure out what had started the silences; I’d wake up in the morning, already annoyed because he was banging around in the kitchen, or vacuuming the front room, or doing something noisy. Whenever he got really pissed off at me, he would clean house—and for some reason, that made me furious. I hated cleaning house—so when I watched him intently and silently scrubbing and polishing everything, I hated him.
And I hated myself for hating him.
And we both started getting jealous. Inevitably, in a gay bar like Cosmos, customers have their favorite bartenders—usually because they want to have sex with them—and I found myself getting irritated whenever some customer seemed to prefer Brad to me. What, I wondered, did Brad have that made him preferable to me?
He seemed to be having the same problems with my favorite customers. From time to time I would catch him glowering at two of us, laughing or joking. I caught myself deliberately embellishing some conversation with a hot customer, simply because I knew it was pissing Brad off.
And it wasn’t just affecting the two of us—one night I heard someone remark, “You know, I’m getting just a little bit sick of those two assholes. I mean, just because they can’t get along is no reason for me to get snapped at. Let’s go someplace else.”
Then one Monday night—Brad’s night off—Ash and Dave, Cosmos’s owners, came in and said they wanted to talk to me. I already knew what they wanted to talk about: Brad and I were ruining their business. We were letting our problems affect the customers.
“What’s wrong, Warren?” Ash asked. “What’s happening with you guys?”
“Frankly,” I said, “I don’t think that’s any of your fucking business.”
They looked at each other, obviously startled by my attitude.
“In fact,” I said, feeling furiously reckless, “I am sick of your fucking business. I am sick of the whole fucking gay thing. Brad was right. It isn’t a fucking bit gay.”
I took the large set of keys from my belt-loop and tossed them onto the bar, then grabbed my jacket and hat. “You know my address. Just send the check there.” I stomped out and slammed the door after me.
The instant I stepped into the alley and heard the door close behind me, I knew I had just pulled the stupidest trick in my life. I knew Ash had just tried to be friendly and helpful—and surely had no intention of firing me. But I hadn’t been able to stop myself. For weeks now, the pressure had been building and building, and I’d finally exploded without thinking. I knew I ought to go back in and apologize—sit down and tell them honestly what was wrong. They had been together five years; maybe they could give me a clue as to what was happening.