Before I rang the doorbell, I inhaled from the bottle of Xtreme I was carrying. I needed something just to get me inside. A number of men were lounging around a stylish sitting room. Some of them were wearing just their underpants. Mostly they looked pretty relaxed and were chatting away as if they were at a normal party. Of course, their relaxed states may have been partly caused by alcohol and drugs.
Champagne, wine and vodka appeared to be the drinks of choice and I could see bits of drug paraphernalia around the place: mostly Crystal Meths, the party drug version of meth, GHB or G, and, of course, bottles of poppers.
I sat down as far away from the others as possible. Nobody took any notice of me. I watched a couple slide into one of several, adjoining rooms, presumably bedrooms, as a group of three made their way out.
On the one hand, I found it distasteful and on the other hand, erotic — pretty much the story of my sex life. However, poppers work almost instantly. Their effect combined with the heady, sexual atmosphere meant that I badly needed release. There was only one person in the room I could imagine making a move on. A young man standing in the far corner, fully clothed and looking even more uncomfortable than I felt. I liked that and I liked the fact that he was so pretty. It was Tim, of course.
I moved across the room to him.
After a few minutes of largely forgettable small talk, during which we discussed Soho gay bars and he mentioned The Freedom Bar and his plan to check it out, we headed into one of the bedrooms.
It didn’t take long. Not for me anyway. I inhaled deeply again from my bottle of Xtreme and offered it to Tim, so we were both high. Then I just let rip. But, predictably enough, once it was over the sordid nature of the ghastly event in this incongruously stylish apartment hit me, like an out-of-control juggernaut. Within seconds I was fully dressed again and out the door.
I heard Tim calling after me, but I didn’t stop.
Now I had another chance, it seemed, to be with this beautiful boy whose face had haunted me ever since.
There we were, among the confident, cool, gay set of The Freedom Bar, two awkward, reluctantly gay men sitting at a table making small talk again over a Cosmopolitan, in my case, and a glass of New Zealand Sauvignon in his.
I wanted to tell him how ashamed I was now, of having been so desperate that I’d sought out that awful, sex party. I couldn’t say that though, could I? Not to him. After all, he’d been there too. I certainly couldn’t really explain my revulsion and the reasons for it. I wasn’t repulsed by Tim, that was for sure. Indeed, looking at him again, even whilst feeling so awkward and stupid, I found my desire for him rising in me. And that was without the Poppers.
‘Do you want to go somewhere?’ I asked suddenly.
I saw him stiffen. I feared rejection.
Instead he said, ‘I can’t take you back to mine. I told you before, I’m a student, I still live with my parents.’
It made me smile that. It seemed so absurd, here amongst the cool ones.
But Tim wasn’t awkward and secretive about his sexuality in the way that I was. He was only eighteen. It wasn’t a habit of years, a way of life for a man who probably rather liked it this way, if the truth be told. A man who almost enjoyed the inherent sleaziness of his own behaviour, the hiding in corners and the lurking in shadows. Tim just didn’t know how to do things differently. Not yet. If he was at all hole in the corner, it was simply because he had not yet found the courage to fully confront his own sexuality, to tell his parents and those around him. He had no gay friends, because he himself was still coming to terms with what he was. The sex party was just a part of his exploration. The truth was that he would have loathed Larry’s Bar and everything it represented. I’d been kidding myself ever to think differently.
‘I remember that you live with your parents,’ I said.
And I certainly wasn’t able to take him back to mine.
‘There’s a Premier Inn at Leicester Square,’ I continued. ‘We could get a room.’
‘I don’t have much money,’ he said.
‘Don’t worry, I’ll pay,’ I told him.
So we ended up spending the night together. I paid cash in advance. The hotel was suitably anonymous. The room was basic, but clean and comfortable. And we were alone. It was certainly a vast improvement on that dreadful party.
I’d spent the night with men before, but not often. Over the years I’d mostly contented myself with sweaty fumbles in dark corners, cubicles in public conveniences late at night or the doorways of backstreet shops long after opening hours. My conviction that it was all I was good for remained ever with me, and Poppers made the surroundings irrelevant. Nothing mattered except the sex. Until it was over.
This was so different.
It felt good to lie on clean sheets. It felt good to hold Tim in my arms afterwards and watch him fall asleep, with his head resting on my chest.
For those few hours, I felt quite fulfilled. I felt complete, but I didn’t sleep much. I knew, all too soon, it would have to end. I would have to walk away, back to my usual, daily state of self-denial.
Somewhere around six, I wriggled my way free of my young lover. It was still dark. I didn’t switch on a light. I made my way quietly into the bathroom, where I washed the gel out of my hair and dressed. I was hoping to leave and disappear into the early morning, without having to face Tim. Particularly as I had put on my straight clothes.
But he woke as I re-entered the bedroom.
‘Hey, you,’ he said softly. ‘Why are you moving around in the dark?’
He reached to switch on the bedside light. I could see that he was smiling at me.
‘I have to go,’ I said, trying not to look at him. ‘I’m sorry. I have to be somewhere. I shouldn’t have spent the night with you.’
His face fell.
‘No,’ I said quickly. ‘I didn’t mean it like that.’
Although I half did, of course.
He studied me, curious, frowning.
‘You look different,’ he said. ‘Your hair, your clothes. Everything.’
‘My work look,’ I said, trying to sound casual. ‘I have to go to work.’
‘On a Saturday?’ he asked, still frowning.
‘Look, I just have to be somewhere,’ I said, more sharply than I’d intended.
I tried to soften my response. ‘Uh, it’s personal stuff. You know. I really do have to be somewhere else.’
‘Somewhere you can’t go looking how you did last night?’
I nodded.
‘Do you want to talk about it?’ he asked.
Rather to my surprise, he seemed quite accepting. But then, he’d already told me he wasn’t ‘out’. Not yet. He always added ‘not yet.’
I didn’t want to talk about it, of course. Bless him, I thought, if only he knew. But he would never know. There was so much in my life that I would never be able to talk about.
‘Not now,’ I said. ‘I’m sorry, I really don’t have the time.’
He threw off the bed covers revealing his beautiful, naked, young body. He had an erection again.
‘Stay just a bit longer,’ he said.
I glanced away. I would not let myself look at him. I must not. I could not.
‘I can’t,’ I said. ‘I’m really sorry, I do have to go.’
He looked crestfallen. He climbed out of bed and wrapped his arms around me.