Derelict on HotGuySecret
DERELICT
1
The carpet is green. In some spots, damp dark like summer grass. In other spots, more lightly like the color of newly unbudded leaves. These are spots, each one is in the shape of a cloud – that is, indistinct, melting away. Along the edges. These spots, all jumbled together, each one having an expanse of no more than three or four inches, all jostling up against each other, bump bump bump. Spread long and wide and rectangular over the surface of the floor. This is my carpet. It stops at the wall. The wall chops it off. Steeply.
The carpet is flat. It is very, very old. Like people who, when they grow old, turn thin and bony, their skin dry as dead leaves so carpets grow old. My carpet is thin and bony. It is hard and bumpy. It’s all squashed down, matted, unkempt and there are stains, stains, some large some small, some shaped like an amoeba, or a broken circle, or a streak or a splash. And there are burn holes too, hard black little pits where the live ash from a cigarette fell glowingly to the carpet, melting it with a hiss. But mostly my carpet is flat. Was there ever any padding beneath my carpet? It’s all gone to dust, dust, long black dunes of it, long ago (I know, I peeked). My carpet is inert. It lies with its cheek pressed against the hard wooden floor everywhere it looks in all directions. The floor squeals it bleats out old creaks, it grinds out moans as I shift my feet. Memories. The floor is full of memories. My carpet is green.
When I look at porn and masturbate I look always at a single image, a picture of a man – any particular man. Around that image accrue fantasies, some of them very long and involved, whole stories unto themselves, with multiple episodes. They are fantasies that can be rehearsed, perfected. They can be edited, they can be controlled. Every word uttered, every action taken can be studied, thought through, manipulated, to better elicit an excitable response. It exists in the brain, this perfect world. It services psychology, this perfect world. It is a garden, this perfect world. It still has mystery and so, intrigue and delight. It knows my carpet, this perfect world. So I watch it that carpet, I watch it close. I monitor it. I know it knows my feet, this carpet. I know it knows my eyes. Little flakes of me my feet my arms my scalp my eyes are scattered throughout its fibers. They grow old, these flakes disintegrate as the carpet disintegrates. We are disintegrating together. Slowly laying down dunes of dust.
2
There’s a cum rag on the floor. A cum rag is lying on the floor. It’s a torn off squarish piece of old shirt, bright red. Its corners bend and twist on the carpet. It’s a splash of color on the carpet. I think it inside my eye. A little fist of red, I absorb the punch. It bursts inside me somewhere in the vicinity of a universe, black and specked with stars. Inside my chest. Not in my heart. I take it in the chest.
Two cats hover at the edge of my sight, one sleeping at the end of the bed, one flopped lazybelly-up in the middle of the hallway. Others hover at the edge of my mind. Flittering, fluttering, a mere something a motion a flash of light and me always just a second too late. One I almost feel in my arms, a momentary pressure of warmth and weight, litheness at rest. Another trots at my side whenever I travel from room to room, another twines back and forth between my legs, darting ahead casting glances at me over its shoulder. One dashes at my feet, then rolls out of sight. Pinprickling claws I feel as another one stretches up to catch at my thigh. This is how angels. This is how angels this is how ghosts seaem their way into my life.
I have had more cats even than lovers. I have loved more felines than I have men. This is where they go when they die, to memory’s mind. Angels they live there, hovering just behind my head, flexing between my feet, flashing in and out of sight. And what of the lovers? Banished, locked away, ghosts fucking ghosts fucking ghosts every one of them. I condemn them, I condemn them, jailed for life now they wait only one lamp burning for the arrival of death. That hungry kiss. That suffocating embrace. Come to me lovers. Come/cum
3
I feel excitement. I feel gloomy. I feel jealousy. I feel rage. I feel . . . excitement. My body trembles slightly. My eyes look eager, but for something they do not see. The brain knows it is coming. My brain is familiar with this particular thing – there is no apprehension, just a belief that the time will soon be when some pleasure will be . . . having. Heartbreakingly tenuous philosophically speaking, this belief made of a measuring of probabilities and finding faith enough in the outcome. Fragile, perilous: You are no more than a child here. And I feel gloomy. I sink into the marshlands under a grey sky split with lightning, but dry – there is no rain. The marshlands are mud, cracked. I sink into a crevice of darkness, its pressure is all around me. This is how it feels. My back is bowed. My head hangs low. It’s not that I see nothing, it’s that I don’t see. that I don’t see. My eyes float up on yellow strings, they’re above my head floating, bouncing from up to down, from side to side, as I do not move an inch curled inside me yet take in the entirety of an inner terrain. Rocky it is, a land full of boulders and heaps of slag, barren of life. A cloud, if there was one, might be the nearest thing to it. The sky is far, far away. The sun a mere haze of light brushed against the bluish-grey. This is what it looks like. I feel jealousy. Why not me? Why not me? Every thought, every action, comes down to this. Not just, Why am I not chosen? but, Why can’t I possess? Someone else did: You weren’t that hard a get. Now you have possessed me. You make me shake as if I were sick, you make me pant, you make me pace. You make me fume and burn and choke with smoke. Everything burns. But you, you are stupid, you are cheap. You are caught in a web of your own making, you are yourself a part of the web. Sticky web, dare try you to catch me. I would consume you like fire should already have consumed you, instead I tried to break free, to loose myself from you and I couldn’t, I can’t. I feel a hand on my leg: It is mine. I imagine your hands stroking my calves, my thighs, feel them pressing my legs open wide. Now your lips are murmuring their way across my skin – you are willing; now I require. We are together, we are one, we are neither. I am alone, and I despise you for it. You make me want to puke (I feel rage). It flares, I glare, trembling with this sudden violence, this blossoming shock. It’s fight or flight time, but my fear is for you, and for what I might do. For you are small and putrid. You defile logic, have made a study of hypocrisy: you lie. And you never really die.
A shadow lumbers towards me through the thin smoke hovering over the rocky terrain. The shadow is squat and flat and though curved along its shoulders its head is squat and flat as well. It is as solid as a tombstone, and as thick and cold. It has massive arms and giant, puffy hands rocking at its sides as it lumbers, bumbling its way towards me, and it must have eyes too, for I know that it sees. What it will see. What will it see . . .
The spring moon. The spring moon’s a golden boy, a child, growing now into a man. His sideways grin as it stretches wider stretches open becomes first knowing, then cheerfully leering. Slowly, night by night, I watch that mouth gaping, gaping, lips parting as if with raucous laughter, pulling me sucking me into that dark hole at the center of light. But not yet, not yet. Shadows still remain, flitting across that winking face: hints of mountains, valleys, perhaps a canyon cutting a ragged scar, crested by plateaus of barren, crusty rock. There are places I can go to there. I can dream there. I can remember. I can walk, alone and happy, in the moondust.
4
Access to an escape route. Ok, but don’t be cornered by the mind. My but this tabletop is hard.
The thickness of a forearm. Skin covered with coarse black hairs, a crinkly surprise to the fingertips, or fine brown hairs, a delight to pet. Mine or his or his. Underneath, the muscle, grown large with heavy use. Blood punched through veins in slow, methodic pulses, cells buoyed in fluid moving like leaves through a windstream, zooming by like flying saucers, cavorting like fish. Tendons, tensile, stretchy, white and hard, but not like bone – no, booone, baby, that’s at the core of it all, and inside the bone more cells, the birthplace of life. Into the life. Shoulders loose, wrists rigid, and the palm a soft pad, the palm calloused and stained, the palm a paw – but fingers made for interlacing.
Maybe later. Curled fists around bars of steel now lift, lift, liiift. Holy shit – it feels good to feel the blood pumping, pushing, nosing its way through tunnels, swelling with need. Lift, lift, liiift. Work with it. Work against it. Work the weight. Muscles remember. They know their place exactly, they function without guile. When tamed. When taught. When commanded. When told.
Tell it then.
“Tell me what you know,” I say to one of my cats, a fat old tabby, staring intently into his eyes. He shifts uneasily. He takes the intensity of my gaze as a threat.
He is not there. I make things up.
Indirection is the great gift of language. And style counts for everything.
5
Jagged spasms and spikes of energy. A needle through the back of a butterfly/beetle. Who are these people? I don’t know them. They seem to know how to speak. They seem to move about alright, their limbs orienting them successfully in space. I like to observe them. I enjoy being their voyeur. The assigned part I was born to play. The outlines of their bodies, the clothes they’ve chosen to wear, each individual one so . . . distinct. So idiosyncratic. Singular. Whole. Other. The masks they put on reflexively. The masks they see as mine. I watch them going up and down the street, wandering about in stores. I imagine things about them. How I long sometimes to touch like them. to touch them.
Saw my brother last night. At the abandoned house out on Geiger Road. He said he couldn’t help it, the pressure in his head was just . . . too much.
My feet are lying flat on the floor. Long, wiggling flappers. The carpet is green. The carpet is coarse. I feel like crying. Images are so sweet. My feet are touching the carpet. The carpet is coarse. I feel like dying.
6
It’s like everything goes round and round. It’s like you can feel the world spinning, the sky lurching after continents, clouds torn loose, every tree bending, ocean tides drowning. Everything’s a blur, a flash. About my brother this time, mainly: that look of craven need. Everything else springs from that: hope, love, fear, need, sorrow.
At times though, terrifically. Other people, how do they sing that song? They sound just like birds. When I listen.
Words spell out time. They march across the page in somewhat disheveled but basically orderly fashion. Time is flight for this little bird.
The alleyways are lumpy, pitted in spots, swelling, heaving, sinking. Tripping me as I walk, rolling away behind me like laughter’s tongue. Wide eyed I owl the streets: it’s well past midnight. The streets are empty, all the houses blind and square as tombs. There’s something breathless in the air. The park I go to isn’t far from the center of town. It’s Saturday night. People are coming and going from the bars. I sit on a bench at the edge of the park. I’m alone. I sit near a streetlamp so I can be seen sitting alone. I lean back on the bench and look up at the sky. Patches of clouds – rents of stars. The air is cool and smells so fresh it must be almost clean. A slow breeze rustles the trees . . .
After a few minutes, I sit up straight. I’m still alone. I stretch, I stretch a good long time. Anyone could see me stretch if they looked. Arms crooked up, chest expanded, belly so tight it almost touches my spine, anyone could see me . . . I’m alone. I arch my lower back, squeeze my buttocks together and open up my legs to show off my bulge. I’m wearing my favorite pants for doing this. They’re light blue, the cloth very thin, very soft, and very clingy. My penis pulses. Cars go by. They’re not so far away, but I’m still alone. I get up, wander my way slowly back out onto the streets. Go up a block, make a right, cut across a vacant lot, skirting pools of streetlight, owling every passing vehicle, truck, car, any make, whatever. Until one of them slows. Just like I knew one would. It pauses at the corner, engine rumbling, then turns left. A minute later, so do I. Casting my eye down the street I see it, still a ways ahead of me but moving slow. I saunter towards it, walking not too fast, but in an interested way. It makes another left at the next corner. I do the same, and . . . yes! There it is, halfways down the block, pulled up beside the curb, motor thrumming. I’m approaching it very slow now, trying to size up the driver as I go. When I get beside him I glance. Quickly I see he’s going bald. Quickly I think I detect a slight paunch. The closer I get he gives me nervous, hungry shooting intense looks through the windshield. I stop under a streetlight and wait. He looks. He likes what he sees. From the corner of my eye I can see him liking what he sees. His hand motions me towards him. I cast a quick glance to either side, then step forward. The night is breathless. Shadows shift with the moving light. The car, a thing of rubber metal and glass, looms humming shimmying before me. I look, I see. Some man. I’m not smiling – but he is. How can I resist? I skirt round, pull on the door handle and slide in.
7
The painting on the wall, a watercolor, is of a village, very rustic looking, with cobblestone streets. On one side of the street three squat stone buildings with steep thatched roofs jostle each other for space, on the other side a single clapboard house huddles alone. Puddles gleam here and there amongst the cobblestones, and the shallow dirt runnels on either side are muddy with wet. There are trees too, long and thin, scattered along the road, and both they and the buildings they surround have something wavery about them, as if they were waterlogged, half-drowned with rain. The trees are flecked with orange and grey and brown, for the season is autumn. Clouds overhead, unseen in the visible part of a faintly blue sky, cast the foreground of the painting in shadow. But far off down the street there is a splash of pale sunlight, and in the midst of that light a solitary figure stands. He is quite far away and so very small. His shoulders appear to be slightly hunched, and one booted foot is extended. Squint: Forward or back? It’s difficult to tell. Is he walking towards or walking away? Perhaps he’s merely standing there, bundled up tight in his thick overcoat, waiting. Yet: Looking back, or looking ahead? He does not beckon, he does not gaze – he simply looks. As he comes he goes. He is doing both, he has done neither. He is walking stilly. He is caught in time.
My hands smell slightly sour, slightly doughy. My skin is always slightly damp to the touch. When I breathe I can feel the air rushing into my nose. Because I want to move on, I suppose. Because I am restless. Because I’m bored. I can stroke my own lips with my fingertips, sure. But it’s not hard to remain frozen, once you’ve trained yourself to it, once you’ve made it your habit. Better than clichés. The back of my head itches. There are little itches here and there all over my scalp – all over my body. Tiny ticklings, like little ants crawling through forests, crawling through grasslands, of hair.
I listen. I always listen. With each stroke of the pen I listen. I hear crickets chirping. Even here, in the middle of town, I can hear them outside my window. I don’t. I did when I was a boy, and we lived practicly right next door to the country.
The man who lives on the second floor of this house is called Frank. Franks stands just under sex feet tall and has a broad, meaty sort of body, big in the shoulders, thick in the legs, round and hard through the belly. He has curly black hair, and coarse black hairs sprouting from his forearms as well as across the hard walls of his chest – what I’ve been able to see of it anyways. Frank used to be a cop. What he does now I don’t know for sure. He fucks alot, I know that much. A whole series of women through the years I’d guess, though lately or at least since I’ve started noticing it’s been the same one – a tall, bony, lank-haired young fillatina with wide hips and large breasts. She looks like she’s had kids, like, she’s still young but already gone to seed. I can hear her and Frank going at it through the floorboards. Nights, afternoons, mornings – don’t neither of them ever have to go to work? Or maybe she’s already on the job and Frank has more money than I know. Or maybe . . . maybe he’s got something on her from his days as a cop, something that makes her an especially easy lay. Or maybe she just likes sex. Maybe they both do. They sound like they do. Frank is quite muscular, he has alot of bulk. I imagine him, hairy, hairy everywhere a man should be hairy and then some, his broad back a wide armful, his thick thighs and calves quite a legful. And the ass? Good, I’m betting, nice and big and round. Though you can never tell about asses for sure. Until you see them live.
Steve. Where are you now? I haven’t heard from you since that night. Did it help, our meeting? You were all anger, violence, and greed. I hadn’t seen you that way in a long long time. What set you off, what started it all? You were calmer when you left, but grim, your face set like stone, your eyes two black embers still glowing. Did you tuck it straight home to the wife and kiddies? When’s the last time I gave her a good fuck – is that what you were thinking? Or did you go to a bar, top off the evening by picking a fight with some drunk whose cheek you could crunch? I went home. Maybe I should have tried the streets, I didn’t cum, you almost never make me cum, not on purpose at least. Steve. Steve. Waiting in time. Steve. The carpet is green. It’s grass and clouds and the tops of trees. Steve. My feet lie flat on the carpet. Steve. Two long, wiggling flappers. Steve. Steve. My feet are touching the carpet. Steve. Unfreeze me.
8
I first started going to visit him when I was eleven. By that time I hadn’t seen him in almost seven years. So it was like I didn’t even know him. I was told I would like him. But I didn’t know about that either. It was like that with us. I mean, being blood and all, we was bound to mix it up somehow or other, but . . .
No. No no no no. What I don’t remember is when, or how soon, our hugs became ‘special.’ Almost right away I think. And I was the one who started it too. I wasn’t trying, I just couldn’t help it – even at eleven there was something in me that more than just liked it, the way he felt, the bigness of him under my hands, the inward curve of his waist, the general all-over warmth of him. I didn’t know what it was about back then. It made me feel happy that’s all, and that’s all that seemed to matter. It’s all that mattered to me. I liked it. I suppose the fact that I was just about to enter puberty didn’t hurt. Hugging him was like priming the pump, a way to explore new feelings, new sensations. I wasn’t worried about it.
I think at first I just kept holding on a little longer than maybe I was supposed to. And I think he was a little surprised by that – at first, then little by little not so much. Later I think he was maybe a little bit troubled or confused. I remember once when I started rubbing my hands around on his back he tried to just goof it off, but next time we hugged, which we did once at the beginning and once at the end of each of my visits, I held him close for as long as I could – and he let me. I think maybe for a little while I he just told himself I had a special need for physical contact because I’d missed out on so much of it growing up. So he decided to be cool with that. And that was nice. But I kept it up, the hugging him close I mean. Month after month, twice every visit, I’d wrap myself around him, press my head against his chest and just sort of . . . hang on. And after awhile – especially after puberty really hit, I could tell that he . . . well, had stopped being surprised. Had stopped resisting. Now, when the hugging ended, we’d step back, look at each other and grin. It was special, that grin. We shared it. It was our special friendly grin.
Of course, this all happened slowly, over a period of years. One weekend a month is all I got to see him, sometimes not even that if he was away on business. My dad was a financial banker. Or maybe a financial adviser. Something like that. Anyhow sometimes he had to go meet with a client or whatever somewhere and we might miss a month, or even two, three one time. Which meant things didn’t get really serious between us for awhile. From the time I was eleven until I was almost fourteen nothing much happened between us except those hugs, and even they didn’t get serious for a long time. Then maybe around when I was fourteen or just turned fifteen we started giving each other these special ‘goodnight’ hugs. In addition to the ones we shared when I got there and when I left. I don’t know how they first began, but pretty soon they got to be a time I really looked forward to because, see, we was both feeling really relaxed then, at the end of a long day we’d spent together. So after awhile those hugs got to be pretty comfortable. He was the one who always broke away first. He was keeping me in my place, I guess, teaching me how to behave. I remember what a charge it gave him though when my voice started to change. He’d been waiting for it of course. Me too. During one of our hugs he’d explained to me about what would be happening to my body soon, what changes I should expect. But even though it was all completely natural – I mean, biological – when it happened it was like he was proud of me. Like when my voice started croaking he acted like it was funny but also cool, and it was like he . . . I dunno, started seeing me as an equal maybe. Or as somebody who might be an equal someday. Started seeing me as a man. Or at least as a man-in-training. After that there was a certain something in the way he looked at me. Like, he might be standing with his forearms resting on top of my shoulders, hands clasped loosely behind my neck, a small smile playing over his lips but listening close as I yammered on about something, whatever happened to be floating through my brain at that moment, and the look in his eyes would be one of interest and enjoyment and admiration and . . . affection. An affection that was deepening into love. It was all becoming very clear to me. I’d go to bed grinning from ear to ear. It grew clearer the more it happened. And did I curl up under the sheets to jack off, thinking about that look in his eyes? You bet I did. I couldn’t contain myself – I was too full of knowing. And what I knew is that he was waiting. Waiting. Waiting for me.
There was some other things that started happening around then too. Little things maybe, but I could add. He gave me two pictures of himself. One was a wallet-sized thing – he’d gave me a wallet that year for my birthday and it had a picture of him tucked inside. It was a professional shot, my dad all dressed up in a suit and tie, his beard and moustache neatly trimmed, every hair on his head combed into place. Even his smile was professional (I knew that, see, cuz I’d seen him smile for real). Anyhow, he looked perfect – you could almost smell the cologne. The other photo was a digital snapshot I’d took myself. In it, he’s standing in the kitchen, dressed casual in a short-sleeved shirt, his bare forearms folded across his chest. His beard’s a little scruffy, the hair on his head sticks up a little. I told him to give me a stern, fatherly look. I asked him like, just kidding dad – but do that. He did, he gave me a dark glare, his head tipped down a little, his forehead bared – and I clicked my camster. About a split second later a grin opened up on his face, but I’d got the snap I’d wanted. I looked at that one alot. I looked at both of them alot.
Still, it wasn’t until I got past fifteen that anything really big started going on between us. I was growing fast then, inches a month it seemed, and soon when we hugged we was standing almost eye to eye. It was impossible not to nestle our heads together when we pulled in close. That would make us both feel a little shy, on the other hand it was that very shyness that let us open up to each other, bit by bit, as the months went by. All my small fears, my dreams, my most secret plans, I shared with him then. And as I talked he’d be looking at me with those eyes, those steady brown eyes, and I’d see in them a gradually deepening pleasure, something that reached beyond mere gladness. Sometimes I’d see him recognize that himself, and he’d laugh and glance away, shuffle his feet – wouldn’t know what to do with his hands. I’d try my best to remain calm then, to prove to him that I could bear it, I could bear my bashful boy, because I was a man. I kept my arms around him, I held him close. I tried to let him know that it was easy to understand. We was falling in love, that’s all. We was just . . . falling in love.
9
Slippery down. Side-wising clown. And slishy-sloshy as a water slide. That’s how middle-age feels. Too habitual for fear, plenty of dread though. The plunge is near. There’s a roaring in my ears. Lions and waterfalls. I remember he smelled of cigarettes and beer. I think of him greasy haired and greasy eyed. I remember his throat unshaven, and how his mouth turned down at the corners.
Steve remembered him better than I did. He knew him better of course. Much. Even after my parents split up, he and Steve continued to spend time together. Steve would go over to his apt across town sometimes and stay the weekend.
I remember when Steve was young how lean and how taut he was – arms: thighs: torso. He was one long muscle, with hardly an ounce of fat. You could see his ribs, you could see every sand-dune ridge his belly could hold. I remember when as the hair on his chest came in, how it gathered and joined and grew down in a tapering line over the muscles in his belly like a trickle of water tumbling over a bed of rocks. I remember later when he’d got a bit soft round the middle, I remember his belly then too, that beckoning billow, that hairy gentle pillow under my forehead, under my kiss, under my cheek.
Spider steps, spider steps, spider steps up here, up here, tap tap tap in my head. Daddy longlegs stalking through my brain, each leg as thin as a needle’s prick prick pricking round and round just under my skull, traversing fissures of dusky musty grey, and against the empty black sky above, a gaping mouth pointed downwards . . .
Sometimes there is horror/horror/horror – at what we have done, at what we have meant to each other. We are triumvirate, we three. We are also the snake that eats its own tail. Meanwhile, the summer moon is flying high, first my handsome and shy boy, then boisterously suggestive, his mouth opening wide, wider, wide with laughter, and growing less boyish all the time. Sucked into that hole of light I
But back to reality. I had a little run-in, a funny sort of a run-in, with Frank today. He was coming out of his apt just as I was getting home, and he asked me, or basicly told me really, to slide a spare key to my apt under his door sometime tomorrow before I left for work. He said there ‘appeared to be a leak’ coming from somewhere in my apt, and he wanted to check it out. He said he’d been appointed ‘building manager,’ lately so it was his job to fix any problems that might come up and make sure everything generally was kept running in tip-top shape. Well. I wondered how he got that job. I wondered if he got a deal on the rent in exchange. Of course he can’t make enough to live on, doing just that. He asked me if I knew anything about plumbing. I said not much.
All this happened just like, not five minutes ago. He was leaning out his apt door as I was coming up the stairs, almost as if he’d been waiting for me or at least listening for me to get in. As if he knew already as if he’d taken the time beforehand to notice what time I usually got home. He was wearing jeans, but his feet was bare. And why not he had nice feet, long and wide, but with a graceful arch on the bottom, bony and veined and a little hairy on top, the toes long and delicately curled with firm, fleshy pads at the ends. The sleeves had been ripped out of his blue workshirt, revealing a pair of well-muscled arms which at the moment were folded blithely across his expansive chest. His eyes took me in. I didn’t look at them I let them I looked instead at the gold chain he was wearing. I remember how it shifted how it glittered against the black hairs growing on his pecs as it rode on top of them, as it nestled inbetween. He kept talking but my eyes went to that gold chain every chance they got. If he noticed he didn’t show it not once. Not even once. How could he have not noticed? I kept looking at it hard enough . . .
I know – the big tease!
10
Molecules of scent float in the air. They surround me like a cloud of minuscule droplets, they are sucked into the interior of my nose, make contact there, alert electrical currents, register in my brain, nose their way deep into my lungs go swimming through my blood. The apt is still. The carpet is green. My cats sit statue like, staring, one out the window, one at me. But there’s an odor in the air. I sniff at it, begin to analyze it. Of course. Smoke. Someone’s been smoking here in my apt, and not that long ago. The key was taped to the door when I got home. I imagine him standing here perhaps just minutes ago, thick across the shoulders and through the chest, big in the rump and thighs. Tall and burly – in this place with its low ceilings he’d have to watch the top of his head as he came through the door – hairy feet bare, pausing to look around a minute, then taking out a cigarette, lighting it, walking about from room to room, bending down sometimes, pushing aside this, lifting that, peering, fingers probing. Thinking Yeah maybe I like women, but I know what it means when a guy eyes me up like that. That’s what happens. But I don’t know how it makes him feel. Yet.
But he’s also an ex-cop. Whatever he sees he sees that way too. Like, x-ray vision. And a suspicious mind. He was sposed to be checking the plumbing. I walk over to the bookshelf. I look down at the ashtray. I see turds of ash, the crumpled crushed out brown butt of a cigarette. And beside that I see . . . nothing. I look and I look at the ashtray. But nothing is all I see.
Gravity falls to the floor.
I find the roll, or the part I hadn’t finished smoking yet anyways, later. When I go into the bathroom. Lifting up the toilet lid it’s like – surprise! There it is. Floating in the toilet bowl. In a sea of yellow piss, still bubbly. His.
11
The small forked-blue vein pulsing at his temple. Heavy browed tonight. His dark hair very short, prickly, but fine and soft where it grows at the nape of his neck. A long nose slightly squashed. Eyes that bore in deep. Something inside that connects. So in control. So needful. What else brought us together? Control can never tame the chaos, it only allows him to ride it awhile. But it feels fine while it lasts, he says.
Trust is my defense – my only one.
His chin square, sharp, with a jaw like a hatchet blade. Sometimes a moustache above the long lips, sometimes a beard grown like pubic hair all around the mouth. Cheeks sometimes smooth but always rough, for his beard was coarse.
Was I frightened? Usually. But it got better over time. That first night in my bedroom when mom was out . . . That first night when he came into my bedroom . . . It was very dark, and very very quiet. I woke up suddenly. Then I heard him standing there. Almost before I got my eyes open I could hear him breathing. He said nothing. He slid off his underwear. He stood before me, erect. He told me to touch him and . . . do other things to him. He pushed me down on the bed and jumped on top of me, shoving at me, twisting my legs, forcing me to roll over onto my belly . . . My struggling seemed to excite him, to interest him, how could I stop it from happening? And then . . . Well basicly he raped me. At least, it seems like that was the first night. Our first night.
He said he had to.
I said . . . I understood.
12
Tarry tingle, the cat’s in heat. Actions abounding with motion. Same there here. Squares invoke circles involuting squares and off they go, arm in arm into infinity. That helpless purring. That length of time . . . But this is gooey.
Gruesome gooey 2. Catapult the moon, it sticks to the sky. And below that sky, so much desire: Zombies and butterflies. The spider’s legs are hairy. That smites me fine. New moon. Doesn’t even know yet what it necessitates in being. Unbirthed boy caverned inside his father’s dead shell. His mother in the next room, waiting. Us together under a black starry night watching for the appearance of that first freckled sky-lancing smile.
Under quivering leaves them touching our backs cool gentle nighttime breezes. How I felt that anger boiling up in my brother’s arms, his biceps turning into two hard stones. It was like wrestling rage. Forced. Necessary. “Cocksucker.” Him stomping away, glancing back over me at his shoulder. I was the heap on the floor. Coiled into my own belly, eyes wide open and remorseless, the whirls, the waves spinning into the fibers of the carpet, interrupted fitfully by the graceless presence of one of my hands.
But oh my goodness, the excitement! Wading through pools of light, then a car door slams. A hand slides slowly up my leg. And my brother doesn’t know – he doesn’t even know! The moon is everything to me then. Fat, old, homely, ugly, young, healthy, handsome, sad, hungry, cheerful, guilty – all that matters in the end is strong. Need: that’s what I’m learning to seek. My brother taught me. And he doesn’t even know!
Until invincible me. Until I explode, until I cum. And he gave even that to me, my brother did. At least I imagine it. That first accidental cum. Enter the sea. We drift alone there, he and I, even when we’re not alone.
A face bends low. Ah, fireworks! Lol.
Thanks, bud. Drop me off at the edge of town, would ya? That’s a good boy, I never said that though. “Cocksucker.” No, not then bro. Later, sure, but not then. I swear, you was the first. You was the first one to fill any of my holes.
13
Frank came up the other night to check for leaks again. He wanted to know if I’d just had a bath or a shower. Since I’d greeted him wearing nothing but a towel wrapped round my middle and my hair was still wet he looked very much like a cop, not the way he was dressed but his demeanor, of course I said yes. He was wearing the shirt with the ripped-out sleeves again, and this time more’n the top button was open. He had on a chain again too round his thick neck, a heavy gold one with a large silver medallion hanging at the end. It fractured light against my eye. I wondered, my gaze held fast by the sight of that medallion rolling sparkling between those hilly hairy tits of his, if his shirt had busted open another notch just from the swelling of their size. They were looking pretty big – or was it just that his shirt was looking pretty small? Huh. “Was there a leak?” I asked. “Skip the leak,” he said. He came in planting himself bam! bam! stamping his feet down he planted himself squarely in the middle of the room he looked me straight in the eye. I was startled. “There’s other shit I wanna talk to you about,” he said. “I know you been smokin up here, and I know what you been smokin up here Cannico. Am I right?” His hand went to his chin to the back of his neck, he nodded his head he was watching me. He was watching everything about me this whole time. He said, “I spose you know you could get in alot of trouble for that. I spose you know I could get you in alot of trouble for that.” He moved farther into the living room, like I had a choice? I kept backing up. He sat down on the couch – sprawled back into it like it belonged to him. Spread his legs, he was wearing shorts, his thighs was beefy. Tree trunk size. “Get that thing,” he said, pointing to a stool. “Sit down. Here, in front of me. I got something to say.” I did. I moved the stool over and positioned myself between his legs. He settled himself back more comfortably he propped his bare feet up on my knees. I looked down the planes of his inner thighs towards his crotch. “Now, I could get you in alot of trouble,” he repeated, “or I could do . . . something else . . .” He smiled. “That is, if you can think of some way to persuaaade me . . .”
No (dammit). Frank came up. I was dressed regular, he was wearing a t-shirt and jeans. He was barefoot, but he almost always is. Also he did give me a nice view of his ass once, when he was down on all fours digging around under the kitchen sink. And I’m sure that when he stood up he saw my eyes shifting back up to his face from where they’d been. I looked him straight in the eye – well, quickly – trying to pry open the secret between us. He snorted softly and turned his face away, explaining to me all the while about the sink and what he was gonna have to do to fix the leak he knew was there, back behind the wall. When he was through he lit up a cigarillo looked around and asked me where the ashtray was. When I brought it I saw him noticing how it was so clean. “Thought you smoked,” he said. “Uhhh only once in awhile,” I mumbled, he turning and knelt back down under the sink. He pointed to show me where he was gonna have to cut open the wall. I got down on my knees and looked under the sink with him. Our faces was very close. There was a smell of wet metal in the air. He rapped on the wall with his fist to show me the spot. I looked at where his knuckles hit. Then I turned my face and looked straight at him a long time, for whole seconds. He did not look back. He was studying the wall.
Next he left. He stood up and I looked at his crotch. Tossing the butt of his cigarillo into the sink he told me he’d let me know when he planned to get started on fixing the leak, and then he left. Halfway down the stairs he paused and said, “I hardly ever hear you up here. You don’t make much noise, do you?” “No, I . . . don’t have much reason to I spose. I mean, I don’t – never have much company, so . . .” It wasn’t much of an offer, but it had a suggestion of suggestive but he only gave another one of his little snorts and continued down the stairs. “Riiight,” I heard him mutter. And then he was gone. I looked over the railing at where he’d just left. I could still smell him really.
14
But free. Beholden to know one. In this little space. In this breath of air. I stretch out my arms, embracing . . . room. No you can’t come in. No you can’t come in. “Touretters fffuck it.” I’m liberated here. The revolution is complete. Quiet! It’s not a secret. How rare is this: little room. Complete chaos. In rhythm. The sea in a bottle. I tip it about, gayly.
Cars enter out. Sometimes rubbing my crotch. As every man knows. The source is piquant. Gayly. I be alone. Barely many years now. Crash bang goes the world. My boat is small, the sea goes on forever. Amazing desolation, not like outer space. Too much pressure. Down there. Follow the bubbles up: water surrounding air. Now I hold the sea in my mouth: I can’t breathe. So I swallow.
They swarm bees. All their bees. Needling me. Needing me. I learn to approach cautiously, I learn to meet their needs I let it play out. As if submissively. I ran into him again today, Frank. His shirt was open, completely open just hanging wide like Who cares? I saw his chest and belly all of it, taking it in in deep thick glances. His chest is biiig fffuck! And so’s his belly lol. He asked me when my next day off was. I looked at him blankly. My mouth was hanging open. He said he would be up to cut a hole in the wall he was starting to sound a little impatient he snapped his fingers in my face and said hey! he wanted me to be there, was I listenin? He wanted me to keep the cats out of the way and help clean things up after.
15
I kill time. I kill time I kill myself. As – but that was yesterday. Today is today – so catch up! To leave time and then backflow time in. I hadn’t thought of my brother in days. I hadn’t thought of my brother in hours. I hadn’t thought of my brother in minutes. I’m thinking of my brother now.
What did he feel like? How did he taste? Was the hair on his belly coarse or fine? I hardly ever saw him. I was not required. Did my mother give him Steve willingly, knowingly? She was defensive, even self-righteous. And she always kept her distance. Across the living room, across the kitchen. She worked alot anyways. Although she was a good cook. But she was also a nag. Later in life she grew bitter and self-pitying. She died, suddenly, of something bursting in her head. Like a sort of brain fart or something.
He called me away from the picnic table, away from the shady spot where Shara sat eating and the kids scrambled about playing noisily. We walked through some sparsely planted trees, twigs crackling, pebbles rolling underfoot. The sun was drooping, the day beginning to feel its age, the coming night starting to glimmer in its mother’s eye. He scowled at the sun scowled at the ending day he turned his back on it. His brow was drawn in tight. “I’m worried,” he muttered, “I’m worried. I’m . . .” He couldn’t say it at first. “scared, Simon.” Stopping there he pushed his hands into his pockets, hunched his shoulders looked at me with a quick grimace he tried to pass off as a smile. “I feel sick inside,” he muttered. The coarse hairs of his beard stood out sharply on his cheeks. His face looked gaunt his grimaced smile flinched at the corners. “I backhanded Shara the other day,” he said. “Slapped her right across the face. Twice. Bloodied her nose, cracked her lip . . .” He shook his head looking down at the ground. “Trouble is, I think I liked it. Or needed it. Or something like it . . .” Turning towards me, “I think maybe I need you, Simon.” He stared at me like his eyes like nails into my head. “I just wanna talk to you,” he said, moving closer. “I gotta tell you some shit, that’s all.” Speaking fast speaking low. “I need to explain to you some more you know like how I used to? some shit that happened between me and dad, that’s all.” He looked at me like his eyes as flat as a sky washed blue after rain. “I promise,” he said. “I just need you to help me out.” His eyes fell back to the ground. “Please?” he said. “I think you’re the only one. The only one I can tell.”
“Ok,” I said, “ummm. Ok. So . . . lets talk.”
“Not here.” He almost sneered, like suddenly he was speaking to an idiot. “Not now.” Turning his back on the direction where Shara and the kids lay. Hands still in pockets, shoulders still hunched. He glared at me. I opened my mouth to ask where and when and suddenly
But when we got together, that first time after so long at that old abandoned house out on Geiger Road, we didn’t really end up talking much. He looked at me examining me up close and asked if I remembered what he’d done to me those times when we was teenagers and he came into my bedroom at night, or he cornered me in the bathroom or the basement or a closet even. I said of course I remembered. And that was about all.
He took me. He started out by saying, “This is what he done. He did like this. And like this. Touching me. Over and all over. He done this too, he said. And this. . . And this . . . Yeah. Just like that. He done me just like that. And you like it, don’t ya, huh? You like being touched like that. Makes ya hard, don’t it?” He rode his knee up between my legs. Hit my balls, and I felt a dizzying rush of excitement and pain. Adrenalin gush. When he found out he’d made me stiff he lost all control. Twisted me round, jerked down my pants, flattened me against the wall. “Then daddy did this to me,” he said. “Yeah, lemme tell you all about it. Lemme tell you all about what daddy did to me.” He stuck it in me fast and hard. It really hurt. Because that’s how it’d been done to him. Besides, he had to really force it that time, and many times after, to make me understand, to make me know what he really wanted . . . Which was another skin.
When he was done, after he’d did what he had to do and crawled back into his pants again, yanked on his boots stuffed his head up through his shirt he looked at me and said sarcasticly, “Daddy’s good boooy.” I was trying my best to get my own twisted pants back up my legs but I had to keep stopping to wipe my nose, which had started to run, finally I used part of my shirt to do it. He shook his head at me like he was all disgusted. “Sorry, Simon,” he said, “but what can I tell ya? I guess I ain’t a good boy. I guess I ain’t a good boy at all.” He stomped off, heavy boots clomping on the dusty old stairs. I heard the front door echoing slam shut. I heard the door to his car open and shut. I heard the sound of the motor fading into the night. I felt silence everywhere it got creepy I finished putting myself together in a hurry.
He’d left me there, in that cranky old deserted house. Fuck him. I had to walk all the way home. Like I was doing penance. Me. The road was long and cool and dark. I saw stars.
16
Longing: An ephemeral word. Longing: It collects dust. Longing: It sniffs at the ground like a dog after scent. Longing: It stares out the window at the teenaged moon. Longing: It scours the world for signs. And then it falls back and remembers.
His hair was coarse and curly. Or was that one bald? Bald, yes – and very hairy. He had more hair on his back than most men have on their fronts. He was my doctor. Well my mother had picked him out for me really. From the phonebook but I needed a physical, a general exam, as required now by law to graduate and I didn’t have no doctor, so. And everything was fine at first. I mean I was a bit nervous, when you’re seventeen and gawky sitting in a exam room with your shirt off in front of a middle-aged and very matter-of-fact nurse it can feel pretty awkward. It felt that way to me anyhow. But the nurse took a blood pressure reading and had me step on the scales, checked my forms, asked me a few questions and she was bored, I could tell she was bored the whole time. Just another patient, just another day. Finally she told me I could finish undressing, lay myself down on the table and cover myself with the sheet, the doctor would be by in a few minutes. Thankfully then she left. I stripped my clothes off, throwing them in a heap on a nearby chair, hopped up onto the metal table with its smooth, thick plastic cushions and pulled the thin cloth sheet up to my chest. Having completed that task, I tried to relax. First I flexed my toes. I studied motes of dust and tiny hairs and whatnot floating in the air. I tried to waste time waiting. I listened to the faint electric hum made by . . . I couldn’t tell what, the air conditioning or the lights on the ceiling maybe. Wires in the wall. I looked down at the two peaks formed by my feet under the sheet, and at the lumpy bump that showed where my penis was. Even covered by the sheet I felt very exposed. I blinked somewhere up towards the ceiling. My eyes blurred. I breathed.
Finally the door opened, the doctor came in and introduced himself: “Hello, I’m Doctor Brent,” he said. He was wearing grey dress pants, a white shirt, a blandly striped tie, and over all this a long white smock left hanging open in front. I guessed he was somewhere between his mid-forties and early fifties, it was hard to tell for sure because of his head being shaved completely bald. His goatee, however, was salt-and-pepper. He had a nice face I thought, with heavy, masculine features. A generous face, gravely lined, with steady, serious eyes. I sat up, or rather propped myself up on one elbow, so that we could shake hands. Briefly he reviewed my forms, standing quite near to the table, legs relaxed, hip cocked to one side. He asked me a few more questions about my general health, then tossed the clipboard onto a nearby counter.
“Alright.” he said. “If you’re ready, Simon, let’s start the exam.”
“Okay,” I said.
First he asked me to sit up and slide myself down on the table so that my legs dangled over the end. I did, leaving the sheet pulled across my middle. He put a stethoscope to my chest and had me breathe in so he could check my lungs. Then he thumped my back, leaning in close to listen to the sound it made with one large, fleshy ear. He shone a light into my eyes and up my nose. Hit me just under the kneecap with a little rubber hammer so my leg jerked. Told me to straighten my spine, then probed softly at my chest, all around my nipples and up into my armpits. Ran a finger lightly down the length of my spine, which made me shiver. Stepping back a little he looked at me, an amusedly polite smile playing on his lips. “Ticklish?” he asked.
“No,” I said.
“Oh.” He asked me to lie down again, which I did, and he began folding the sheet down to my hipbones. Examining my belly next, he pressed his fingers in at various spots, here, there, peering down at me to study how it looked. His hands, I noticed, were large, experienced, confident, hairy. “Good, good,” he murmured. “Everything seems to be fine so far.” A largely reassuring hand patted me on the arm. “Alright, now Simon, if I could just have you roll over onto your side . . . No, the other way – that’s it. Now draw the knee of your top leg up . . . Atta boy.” He used his hand to guide me, folding my leg and raising the knee towards my chest. I felt him tugging at the sheet around my hips, adjusting it, lifting it, pushing it back – then suddenly realized that my bottom had been laid bare. I could feel cool air back there. He walked a few steps to my left and I heard a drawer open, then the sound of him putting on rubber gloves and snapping them into place. Okay, Simon, he said, I’m going to do a prostate exam now . . .
“Oh!” I said. Like . . . Oh!
He paused. “You do understand what that means, don’t you?” His voice was low and even and entirely prepared to be explanatory.
“Oh yes,” I said. “Of course”
“Good,” he said, though I wasn’t quite sure he believed me. “Now then . . .” He laid his hands on my hips and twisted them slightly, shifting my weight so that even more of my backside was available to him. I felt my cheeks redden slightly – my facecheeks I mean. “First,” he said, “I’m going to apply a little lubricant to the anus.” He stepped over to a nearby counter and I heard the sound of something being squirted from a bottle. A moment later I felt strange fingertips rubbing something wet and goopy all over my . . . anal area, which retracted slightly at the unexpected sensation. “Now, I want you to take slow, deep breaths,” he told me, “in and out, through your mouth.” I did. It was like a slow panting. His fingers were circling round and round the core of my anus, massaging its pursed lips gently until the muscle began to relax. “Deep breaths,” he said, “in and out.” Suddenly his finger slipped in up to the first knuckle. My anus contracted tightly, then, as he waited, slowly relaxed. With the next deep breath his finger slid in to the second knuckle – with the third it went in all the way. I could feel it moving around inside me, the tip of it probing, searching muscular walls, looking for and then finding some organ there that felt firm yet yielding under the pressure of his touch. He kept passing his finger over it, exploring the entirety of it, sometimes using a back-and-forth motion, sometimes a circular one. He asked if what he was doing was causing me any pain or discomfort. I told him it wasn’t. He asked if I’d been having any trouble urinating lately, or was urinating more often. I told him no. He asked me if I experienced any pain while urinating. I told him no. He said, “Hmm. Okay, one more deep breath,” and deftly slid his finger out again. It felt curiously ticklish when he did that, as if my anus were tingling with an afterthought.
Removing his gloves, he gave me another little pat – on the hip this time – and told me I could roll over onto my back again. He was walking away, crossing the room to throw the gloves into a metal garbage can –
“Can I umm, have a minute alone?” I asked. “Before we go on with the exam?”
He stopped and looked at me, clearly a little surprised. “Problem?” he asked.
“No,” I told him, “I just need a minute to . . .” I didn’t finish the sentence. Frankly I didn’t know how to. I was looking at him over my shoulder, my body twisted awkwardly, one leg still raised. I blinked at him, maybe even batted my eyelids at him a few times in some weird attempt to look casual, I don’t know. I couldn’t think of what to say.
“Okay,” he agreed, after a long, considering pause. I heard him cross the room, put his hand on the doorknob and stop. I could feel him looking back at me. I was lying down on my back again now but I kept one knee raised under the sheet so he couldn’t see . . .
After another long pause I heard the door open and then, a moment later, click softly shut. With a sigh of relief, I stretched my legs out completely and shut my eyes. The sheet felt cool against my penis, and I hoped it might draw out some of the heat. I could still hear that buzzing, electric sound vibrating all around me. I could hear it humming even inside my own head. The room was suffused with a clear, white light. I stared at the ceiling, arms at my side, palms flat on the table. The bulbs overhead were set behind thick square chunks of wavery glass. More lights glowed behind thin partitions that squared the ceiling. The rest of the ceiling was made of some bubbly white material, vaguely plastic. I stared and stared at it.
I tried to think my hard-on away. I tried to force myself to relax. I tried to think of . . . something else. But my hard-on wasn’t mental. I closed my eyes awhile, then opened them. Yeah, maybe I was feeling more relaxed now – maybe, a little. I kept trying.
After a few minutes the doctor came back in. I heard the door slipping open and clicking shut. I drew my knees up slightly, starting to sit up, then leaned back on an elbow and turned my head, watching him walk towards me. He was watching me too, I noticed.
“How’s it going?” he asked.
“Fine”, I told him.
“Good,” he said, and gave me a pleasant, polite smile. “Ready to go on with the exam then?”
“Umm . . . sure,” I said.
“Great. Now, if you’d just lie down fully and . . .” Gently he pushed my shoulders back into a prone position on the table, gently he began urging my knees back down with his hands. When they were lying completely flat I took a deep breath. “I – have an erection,” I said, my voice coming out very loud and sudden. But I had to say it because I knew he was seeing it, it wasn’t covered by anything but a thin sheet and his eyes had gone right to it, and I felt like saying something about it somehow helped to explain it. “I . . . I can’t seem to make it go away,” I told him. I glanced up and saw his eyebrows had lifted slightly as he stared at the lump under the sheet. He gave a little cough and said, “We-ell, that’s nothing to be worried about. Certainly nothing to be embarrassed by.” He tried for a laugh but didn’t quite succeed. It didn’t take him long to recover from his surprise though – after a moment he wheeled a chair over and sat down on it, leaning towards me, elbows on knees and chin in hand, looking thoughtfully at me, as if pondering something, mulling it over.
“I think,” he said finally, “I think, Simon, that it might be worth emphasizing at this point that the doctor-patient relationship is a privileged one – by which I mean, it’s a private one – you understand?” I nodded uncertainly. “Look, everything that happens in this room, everything that’s discussed or shared, remains confidential. Any information that’s given stays strictly between the two of us. I want you to know that. At the same time, however, it’s important that you try to be as open and honest with me as you can – otherwise I can’t do my job. Okay?”
I took a breath. “Okay,” I said.
“Which means,” he continued, “that I’d like you to be open and honest about what’s going on with your body as well. At the moment it’s functioning, believe it or not, in a perfectly normal way. So there’s no need for shame or embarrassment here, okay?” When I didn’t reply right away he tapped me lightly on the arm. I looked at him. He nodded encouragingly. “Okay?” he asked again. His eyes were serious and kind.
I breathed a little easier. “Yes,” I said. “Okay.” I felt my penis begin to settle a little, gently subsiding from a stiff rod into a lazy log, warm against my belly.
“Good,” he said. “Now, I’d like to ask you just a few more questions before we go on, if that’s alright.”
“Sure,” I said, settling myself in more comfortably. “Go ahead.”
He got out of his chair and positioned himself at my side. Placing a hand briefly on my arm he said, “I noticed, Simon, when I was examining your prostate a few minutes ago that it felt slightly enlarged. It concerned me a bit, enough for me to give you a longer exam than I might otherwise have done. You said you felt no pain associated with that portion of the examination, correct?”
“Yes,” I said. “I mean, no, it didn’t hurt or anything.”
“Hmm.” He thought a moment. “Was it during the prostate exam that you became erect?”
“Umm, well . . . yes,” I said.
He thought another moment, then said, “I think I’m starting to get an idea about all this. Ye-es . . .” He nodded. “If you don’t mind, I’d like to give you another quick exam now. Just to verify that what I suspect . . .”
“Is there something wrong?” I asked nervously. “Should I be worried?”
“No,” he said, and patted my arm. “Having an erection is entirely natural. I suspect that the cause of the erection is too. But that’s what I’d like to verify, before we continue.”
“Well if you really think . . .” I said.
“I do. Now if you could just turn again, position yourself as you were before . . . That’s it.” I raised my leg up again, knee to chest, and felt the sheet being pulled back, exposing my anus. I think he must’ve used his thumb this time, because what he stuck in felt shorter and fatter than a finger, its probing broader and more definite. Also, I suddenly noticed, he hadn’t used a glove, at least I didn’t think so. He told me to breathe and then pushed in deeper, and I heard a small unh escape from me as he found the organ he was looking for. “Mm-hmm,” he said. “Any pain at all – here? Or here? Any discomfort?”
“N-no,” I said. “Just . . . unh . . . a sort of . . . pressure.”
“Mm-hmm,” he said again. He wriggled his thumb in a little deeper, I could feel two of his fingers splayed out on either side of my scrotum, and my butt muscles began to squeeze spasmodically. I heard him inhale sharply through his nose, and I was going to apologize but – “Breathe,” he said. I took a long breath. He took one with me. We breathed together once more, then slowly he pulled his thumb or whatever it was out.
“Okay. You can relax now – just lie back as you were before.” I lay back on the cushions gingerly, my legs only gradually subsiding into a flat position. He gazed down at me, rubbing the hair on his chin thoughtfully. I looked down too. Once again there was a pretty sizeable lump showing between my legs – it was pushing up against the sheet with little jerking motions. I’m still hard, I said. And I still felt pretty embarrassed.
“Yes, I see,” he murmured. “You know, I’m wondering if the reason your prostate is enlarged is due to nothing more than a buildup of seminal fluid. Tell me, Simon, when was your last ejaculation?”
“My last . . .”
“Ejaculation,” he said. “When was the last time you . . . ‘came’?”
I hadn’t expected the question. It took me a minute to think how to answer. I kept thinking about my dick instead. “I . . . guess it’s been awhile,” I admitted at last.
“I see. Any chance you could be more specific?” he asked.
“Umm . . . I guess it’s been . . . I squinted up at the ceiling, about three days? Maybe three and a half?”
“I see. And is that a normal length of time for you to go between ejaculations?”
“We-ell . . . no,” I said.
Small lines had gathered between his eyebrows. The skin puckered there, the look in his eyes was concerned . . . “And what’s changed?” he asked.
I gave a little shrug and glanced away. “I dunno. It’s hard to explain,” I mumbled.
“Well, does it have to do with any sort of painful or otherwise unpleasant physical reaction you associate with masturbating, or with having an orgasm? Could you be experiencing a burning or a stinging sensation for example, when you climax – that is, when you cum?”
“No,” I said, shaking my head, “nothing like that.”
He returned to his chair. “Tell me, Simon, have you been feeling depressed lately? Anxious? Worried about some particular problem?”
“I dunno,” I said. “I guess maybe – in a way . . .”
He waited patiently. I looked over at him. He watched me steadily. I tried to think of something to say, but nothing came. Finally he said, “Simon, I want you to remember what I told you before, that anything we discuss in this room remains completely confidential – especially anything of a personal or intimate nature. But I need you to be honest about what’s going on with you. The only way I can properly diagnose whatever issues you may be having is if you’re willing to talk to me about those issues. Just remember, anything you say is okay here. You do believe that, don’t you?”
I nodded. “Yes,” I said, and took a deep breath. “Well, to begin with I . . . See, I don’t have –” I waved my hand vaguely in the air – “anyone that I have regular sex with. I mean,” I corrected myself, “I don’t have anyone that I have sex with regularly.”
“Ah,” he said, smiling. “Regularly, I see. I assume then that you . . . masturbate?”
“Uhh, uhh, I . . .” My heart thudded. “Sometimes, yeah. I guess,” I admitted.
He rolled his chair close up beside me and bent forward with hands clasped, looking first at my face, then, more searchingly, at my eyes. “Listen, Simon, masturbation’s actually quite a common activity among young men your age. In fact, it’s not necessarily an uncommon activity for men of any age. Some men may masturbate to . . . oh, I don’t know, relieve stress. Others might do it simply because they enjoy the sensation. Or it may be that a man is separated from his regular partner – or any partner – for a length of time and finds himself with no other option. Young men of your age group frequently masturbate because they want to explore their sexuality and have yet to find someone to help them with that. So they use fantasy. Regardless of the reason, it’s important for you to understand that it’s a completely natural and normal activity.” He sat back in his chair and raised an assuring hand. “It might even be called a healthy one.”
“Yes, but . . .”
“Yes, but . . . what, Simon?” he prompted.
I took a breath. “I just thought maybe I was masturbating . . . too much.”
For just a moment he dropped his gaze. “I see,” he said. Then he looked at me and waited, as if to see if I had anything more to say. “Tell me, do you adhere to a religious or moral view that holds masturbation to be somehow wrong, perverse, or dangerous?”
“No,” I said. “No, I just thought I was . . . doing it too often.”
“Huh,” he said. “Has someone told you not to masturbate? Were you ever caught, perhaps, while masturbating and told or otherwise made to feel that you were doing something shameful or bad?”
“Nooo . . .” I said.
“Well, that’s good.” He leaned towards me again. “So,” he continued, “I wonder if you can explain to me what you mean when you say that you thought you were masturbating ‘too much.’ Can you tell me what your frequency of masturbation previously was, say, over the course of a week?”
“You mean like, did I do it every day?”
“Yes,” he smiled. “Did you do it every day?”
“Yeah,” I told him. I gave him a glance. “Do you think that’s too much?”
“Not really,” he said with a little shrug. “My guess would be that that was pretty normal for a healthy young man of your age. So, you generally masturbate every day. And that would be what, once a day . . . ?”
I didn’t say anything.
His eyebrows lifted. “Twice a day?” he suggested. I felt the heat rising in my cheeks and opened my mouth to say . . . nothing. Nothing came out. Suddenly I felt his hand gripping my forearm, even giving it a little shake. “Hey,” he said, “Simon. Look at me.” He actually pointed to his eyes this time. They were as steady and calm as before. “There’s no reason for shyness here. I told you that.”
“Yeah,” I sighed, “well, I guess I probly umm . . . I guess I probly usually umm mastur – mastur–”
“Masturbate.”
“Yeah, masturbate about three or – three or four times a day.” I looked at him. “Sometimes more,” I said in a rush. “Sometimes it’s five times – sometimes I do it six times a day. Twice I’ve done it seven times a day. And I just thought . . . maybe I should stop for awhile. I mean, don’t you think seven times a day is too much?”
“Hmm, well, hmm, hmm, nooo, I don’t necessarily . . . I mean, I don’t think it’s helpful to make any automatic assumptions . . .” He coughed a little, then went on. “I do think it’s likely that your sudden cessation of the practice is what’s causing the buildup of fluid in your prostate though.” He stopped to think a moment, looking as if he were trying to make up his mind about something. “Listen,” he said, “I’m sensing that there are a number of different issues and topics here we might need to discuss further. So I tell you what. What I’m going to do is this, I’m going to leave you for a few minutes to relax while I go take care of some other matters. Once I’ve got that done, I’ll come back in here and we’ll have time to talk things over in greater depth. How’s that sound?”
“Okay,” I said. “That sounds good.”
He nodded and got up from his chair. “Good,” he said. I lay back and blinked up at the ceiling. I heard him stop at the door, glanced over to see him fiddling with a knob on the wall. The lights dimmed. “Just take it easy,” he said, his voice very quiet, very calm. “Relax. I won’t be gone long.”
“Okay,” I said, settling myself down comfortably and closing my eyes. He paused, his palm resting on the doorknob. I heard him standing there a moment, looking at me. Then I heard the doorknob turn. My erect penis was bobbing up and down under the sheet. The pressure of the sheet seemed to make it throb even harder. I tried to remember to breathe.
In the hallway Dr Brent nearly collided with the assistant nurse, who was just coming from the front to inform him that all his other patients had been processed and cleared. He told her that was fine. He said she was free to go.
He told his receptionist the same thing, that she was free to go whenever she had finished with her duties. “Thanks,” she said. “But what about . . .” She jerked her head towards the hall. “Oh, yes,” said the doctor. “Well, we’ve got all his paperwork done and I can see to his billing. I’ve finished with his physical and everything’s fine there – what I really think he needs right now is just the chance to talk a few things over with someone.” “Problem?” she queried, her interest mildly piqued. “No,” said Dr Brent, and then he tried for a little joke, albeit a private one – “Just what you might call . . . a case of growing pains.” The receptionist smiled politely. “Really, I think he just needs to have a little man-to-man. You know . . . mmm, absent father, that sort of thing.” She nodded understandingly. “Well, then . . .” she murmured, reaching for her purse.
After she’d gone the doctor walked to his office at the end of the hall. He did not shut the door but he did take off his smock and remove his necktie. He pulled it from his neck slowly, thoughtfully. He unbuttoned the top two buttons of his shirt, then rolled the sleeves up to his elbows. When he was done he put the smock back on. His heart, he suddenly realized, was beating rather fast. That made him pause. He took a few slow, deep breaths and collected himself before heading back down the hall to the examining room again. Once there he stood still before the door, face to one side, listening. He heard nothing. Then, perhaps, the slight rustling of a sheet. Standing tall, dressing his face in a smile, he pulled the door open and went in.
By the time the doctor came back I was feeling a little more relaxed. My dick was still hard but it wasn’t throbbing so much now. It was more like, resting quietly against my belly again. “How’re we doing?” the doctor asked, with a warm yet concerned smile.
“Okay,” I said.
He sat in his chair again and rolled himself up beside me. “Good,” he said. “Alright. Well. I’d like to uhh continue with the discussion we were having earlier. That is, if you’re willing?”
“Sure,” I said.
“Aaand you remember what it was we were discussing?”
“Ye-es . . .”
“Well, we were talking about masturbation,” he said. I nodded. “Soo do you mind if we discuss that a little further?”
“No,” I said. But my fingers twitched nervously. Talking about it made me start thinking about it, and thinking about it was making my downstairs area start to feel bigger again.
“Alright,” he said. “I hope that by now I’ve emphasized enough to you that masturbation is a perfectly natural and normal act, as well as a more or less commonly practiced one. I nodded. Good, he said. Now, as to spontaneous erections. You should know that spontaneous erections, that is erections which occur without any specific contact or direct stimulation involved, are also a normal phenomenon, commonly experienced by most if not all healthy men of your age. Understand?” My eyes danced along the ceiling. I was listening to his voice, all I could hear was his voice. It was a soothing voice, rich and comfortable, with just enough of a burr in it to keep my ears pricked. “Yeah,” I said.
Suddenly I noticed that the lights were still dimmed.
“Now, as I recall,” he said, “you were also telling me that you’ve currently gone without masturbating for three, was it three . . . ?”
“Three and a half days,” I told him.
“Yes,” he said, “three and a half days. And, prior to this, your usual habit was to masturbate . . . I believe you said it was something in the neighborhood of four to five times a day, correct?”
“Yeah,” I said – “but sometimes more.”
“Right, it was when your rate of masturbation began increasing to six and even seven times a day that you became concerned that you were masturbating ‘too much’. Have I got all that right, Simon?” he asked.
“Yes,” I said. “Well, eight times once.”
“Eight times? You mean you masturbated eight times in one day?”
“Yeah. Just that once though. To see if I could.”
He paused. “Well. What I think we can say for certain is that one consequence of your having decided to stop masturbating is that an excess of seminal fluid has built up in your prostate gland. I’d like to discuss what that means with you, as well as the entire process of how the male reproductive system works, in greater detail later.”
“Okay,” I said.
“But first”, he said, “I’d like you to tell me how you’re doing, umm . . . psychologically.”
“Psychologically?” I said.
“Mm-hmm. You wanted to stop masturbating and you accomplished that. You have in fact stopped. So, mentally and emotionally speaking, has your ability to prove that you can stop masturbating at will brought you the satisfaction you sought?”
I blinked and thought about that a minute. “No,” I said, surprising myself.
“Interesting,” he said. “Why not?”
I shrugged. “We-ell, I dunno. First of all I guess it’s because now all I seem to think about is mastur – masturbation. More than I used to even. I think about it all the time. Sometimes it’s like I can’t think about anything else, even when I try.” I glanced over at him to see if he was okay with hearing all this. His brow was slightly furrowed, his mouth held straight, his brown eyes watched me closely.
“Believe it or not,” he said, “that’s entirely normal too. What you’re experiencing is simply a manifestation of one of the body’s primal needs impressing itself on the brain.”
I blinked again. “Oh,” I said.
He smiled. “Think of it this way. You know how, when you start to get hungry, you begin to imagine pictures of food? You may even think about how it tastes, how it smells. It’s the same when the body needs sexual release. Having sexual thoughts is a quite natural response for you to be having at this point in time. The increase in the frequency of those thoughts does, however, indicate that your body’s need for release is growing very high. Follow me?”
“Yes . . .” I said.
“Good. Now, Simon, emotionally speaking, have you noticed any increase in feelings of anxiety, worry, or depression recently?”
“No,” I said. “Not at all, it’s just that I don’t get . . . why I mas – masturbate –”
“You can say ‘jack off,'” he said, “or use whatever phrase you like. If that’s easier”.
The words rumbled out of him, that rough burr scratching just underneath. The sound of that gruff burr made me jump a little. I mean it made my dick jump. “I know what you said,” I continued, “about it’s being normal and all, so I guess I don’t need to feel weird about doing it. And I guess I understand about what you said about my body needing . . . I mean, what my body needs to have happen in order to get me to stop thinking about it . . . But what about doing it so much? I mean, why do I wanna do that?”
He shrugged, waving a hand dismissively. “I’d put it down to nothing more than your having a high libido – that is, a strong sex drive – perhaps a very strong drive in your case, but . . . In and of itself that’s not a bad thing, it’s something that can bring you a lot of pleasure, once you learn to . . . well, harness it, let’s say. Perhaps your desire to stop masturbating altogether was no more than an overstated desire to instill greater discipline with regard to your sexual practices. I don’t know any of this for certain of course, it’s for you to say. I would like to mention, however, that there are certain mental and physical exercises I could explain to you later that would help you with this – with, that is, gaining greater control over your sexual practices. If that idea should interest you.”
“Uhh . . . yeah,” I said, “that sounds good, I think.”
He leaned forward and gave my forearm a brief squeeze. “Excellent”, he said. “Now, for the last part of your exam I’ll be taking a look at your genitals and the surrounding areas. As I do so, I’d also like to give you a quick run-through as to how the male reproductive system works, and explain the various ways in which your prolonged period of abstinence is affecting your body. How’s that sound – alright?”
“Umm . . . okay,” I said.
“Good. Now Simon, how ’bout I get you to slide just a little bit farther down on the table here. That’s right, you keep moving down until your legs are hanging over the end, and I’ll just . . .” He stood up and pulled something out from the bottom of the table, a sort of shelf for my feet. “Now,” he said, “I’m just going to move this sheet up a little ways . . .” He tugged at it until it lay with its slight weight, its light pressure, draped over the shaft of my penis. “Ah,” he said, peering closer. “There’s a slight problem here. No, no, nothing serious, it’s just that your testicles are somewhat retracted. That is to say, they’ve pulled up close to your body. You may have noticed this happening before when you’ve been in an aroused state. Normally of course the testicles hang several inches below the body, because they need to be a little cooler than the rest of the body in order to manufacture sperm, which is their primary purpose.” He glanced up at me. “Did you cover any of this in school, in health class, or biology?”
“Yeah,” I said, “a couple of years ago. I didn’t really understand it though. They used weird diagrams.”
“Well,” he smiled, “I think we can do a little better than that. But before we do anything more I need to find a way to relax your testicles a bit so that I can examine them properly. If you’ll excuse me a minute, I think I have an idea to help with that.” He stepped away, and a moment later I heard the faucet being turned on in a nearby sink. Turning my head to look I saw him take off his white smock and hang it from a hook on the wall. Then he opened a drawer and pulled out a small cloth, which, after testing the temperature of the water with a finger, he wet in the sink. “I’m going to apply a little moist heat to your testicles,” he said, walking back over to me. “This should help loosen them up a bit. Now, if you’ll open your legs just a little wider . . . Good. And now I’m going to wrap this cloth around your scrotum . . .” I felt something warm and wet and heavy and soft being draped over my . . . what had he called them? My testicles. My lips parted. I grunted. He wrapped the cloth carefully around my . . . around my . . . ‘scrotum’ – yes, that was it. Scrotum. Tucking the warm cloth in, patting the air bubbles out of it with the palm of his hand so it fit nice and snug . . .
“Alright?” he asked.
“Mmf. Mmm-hmm,” I said.
“So, to continue on with the biology lesson,” he said, seating himself in his chair again and rolling it to the end of the table, “at the moment of orgasm, the sperm, which are manufactured and stored in the testicles, are expelled out through several small tubes towards the penis. What’s needed now is additional fluid to carry the sperm up the shaft of the penis and out into . . . well, into whatever receptacle awaits it. Follow me? Even if it’s just a hand.” He flashed me a friendly grin. “Unh,” I said, lifting my head to look down between my legs at him and nodding. “Anyhow, he went on, “between the testicles and the penis, if you remember, lies the prostate gland. The prostate’s job is to secrete and store a fluid which is added to the sperm as it travels from the testicles to the penis. Together they make ejaculate, also known as semen – uhh more commonly called cum,” he said, and looked up at me. “Is all of this making sense to you?”
“Sure,” I said, lying back down. “Yeah unh, huh.”
“Good. Now, there a couple of problems that can occur when ejaculate, or cum, is withheld for an unusually long period of time. First, the testicles can become tender to the touch, may even ache at times. ‘Blueballs’ it’s sometimes called. Have you noticed this occurring at all?”
“Yuh, I said, kinda. I guess they do, they kinda do. No – yuh – when I’ve been hard for a long time they’ll start to ache like that.”
“Mm-hmm,” he nodded. “I’m not surprised. You see, during all this time you’ve gone without cumming, your testicles, or balls, have continued producing sperm. They’ve become somewhat swollen at this point with the excess that’s collected, and this fullness, or overfullness really, is what causes the aching sensation. Fortunately it’s not a serious matter – relief should follow fairly quickly after your next ejaculation. Any questions?”
I shook my head.
“Good. A second problem that can occur is one I’ve already mentioned, that your prostate has become slightly enlarged from a buildup of fluid. What I haven’t mentioned – and I want to be clear that this is not something you should worry about unduly – is that the fluid, if it’s contained long enough, can become stagnant, and that makes it a more likely breeding ground for bacteria.” He patted my leg reassuringly. “I’m sure you’re fine. It’s just another reason why regular ejaculations are a good idea. Keeps the plumbing cleaned out. Follow?”
“Yuh, huh” I said, and tried for a joke. “I guess you could almost call it, unh, a medical necessity.”
He gave a little laugh and coughed and patted my leg again. “Yes,” he said, “you certainly could call it that.” We were silent a few moments. He checked his watch. I noticed that his wrist was hairy. In fact with his sleeve rolled up I could see his whole forearm was hairy. Very hairy. And there were dark sprigs and curls of hair showing where his shirt was unbuttoned. “Okay,” he said, “I think that should be long enough.” He rolled his chair forward a bit and loosened the cloth between my legs, lifting it up so he could take a peek under. “Much better,” he said. “I think with the help of a little gentle massage the exam might proceed without any further difficulty. Let me just get some lubricant . . .” He went to a nearby counter and squeezed something squelchy and thick-sounding into his hand. Sitting himself down in his chair again he said, “I’m going to begin to massage you at the base of your scrotum first – you should find that soothing – then move onto the scrotum itself. I’ll be examining the testicles as I go. Now, what I need you to do for me is take a nice long breath and . . . relaaax.”
I did my best. He began by pressing between my legs on either side of my scrotum, his fingertips moving up and down and making small circular motions as they went. I took a breath and held it. “Just checking for any unusual swellings,” he explained. Next he placed the flat of his palm against the center of my scrotum and pressed in, slowly separating my balls. After a few moments he started to curl his fingers round one side, then the other . . . “Unh,” I grunted, “unh.” My whole body gave a kind of jerk. He removed his hand immediately and placed his other, dry one on my chest.
“Easy,” he said. His hand moved up to cup my shoulder. “Breathe deep and easy. I know you’re feeling pretty sensitive right now, so I’m going to take this slow. Okay? You ready, Simon? Breathe . . .”
“Unh,” I said. “Unh.”
I felt him probe his way, slowly, around my scrotal sac, lifting each testicle in turn and letting it rest a moment on the pads of his fingers before rolling it around between his fingertips. “Mm-hmm,” he murmured. “As I thought. Your testicles are somewhat hard to the touch. Of course, I don’t know what size they might be during periods of regular ejaculation, so I have no point of comparison, but my guess would be that what I’m feeling here is an enlargement caused by the testicles being overly engorged with sperm.” He paused a moment to continue his examination, now lifting both testicles in his palm, almost as if to weigh them. “Actually,” he said, “this is an exam that it would be good for you to learn to do yourself. Have you ever been taught how to perform a self-exam of the testicles?”
“Nuh,” I said.
He smiled. “Well, that’s easy to fix. What I want you to do is, once a month or so, in the morning when you’re lying in bed or when you’re showering, just reach down and grasp each testicle in turn as I did, rolling it about between your fingers to examine its shape and texture. Okay? . . . Sure, you can go ahead and do that now. No, wait a minute . . .” He leaned forward and took hold of each side of the sheet, stretching it out to better flatten it against my belly not to mention my dick, which, feeling the renewed pressure, stiffened jerkily in response. “Hmm,” he said. “Okay, okay. Now, just reach down and find one of your . . . Yes, that’s it.” My scrotum felt slippery from the lotion he’d been using, and I was having some trouble getting ahold of . . . “Never mind. Just let it slide about under your fingers,” he said. “That’s right. I heard him settling back in his chair and lifted my head to look. Over steepled fingers he was staring between my legs with studious intensity. “What you’re doing now,” he said slowly, “is becoming familiar with the shape and feel of your testicles. And what you’ll be looking for when you do this exam on your own are any unusual changes, the appearance of any unexpected lumps or hard spots . . . that sort of thing . . .”
“Uunh okay,” I said. “So, are these just veins?”
“Veins?” he said, leaning forward alertly. “What do you mean? Where?”
“Here.” I tried to show him by rubbing the spot with my fingertips. He leaned in closer, peering, and I lay back, then felt his fingers brushing against me as he took hold of me, finding and gently pulling on my testicle. “Hmm,” he said. “Here? Yes, those would in fact be, uhh . . . blood vessels. Rather engorged perhaps . . .” He probed about a little while longer, then released me, giving my leg another quick squeeze and settling back in his chair again. “Now,” he said, “I want you to examine your other testicle. Just as you did the first. That’s it . . . Good, good. Next, using just your fingertips, I want you to rub both testicles at once. Up and down. That’s right. Becoming aware of their texture . . . aware of their weight . . . up and down, that’s it . . .” My chest felt thick, my breath heavy. I heard him shift about in his chair. Leaning forward maybe, or leaning back . . . “Very good, Simon,” he said after awhile. “Very good. Alright, you can relax again. This self-exam should be done, as I say, once a month or so, when in the shower or even, if you find the sensation pleasurable, during masturbation. Understand?”
“Yes,” I said.
“Good. Now, if you’ll just put your hands back at your sides, and if I could ask you to raise your hips up just a little . . . No, just your hips . . . There, that’s it. Perfect. I just need to do one more quick check here . . .”
I tried to breathe normally. But my mouth was hanging open and I could hear myself breathing loud instead as I lifted my hips and his fingers began probing between my testicles again, gently but firmly pressing in, dropping down each time they did so another half-inch or so, and then another . . . until at last he’d reached the very root of my penis and found where it grew deep into my body. “Here,” he said, “is where vessels leading from the prostate gland feed into the shaft of the penis. So, to review, when you have an orgasm – that is, when you cum – sperm leaves the testicles –” he ran his fingertips over them lightly – “then mixes with fluids produced by several glands, including the prostate, which as you’ll recall is located here –” he rubbed a fingertip on a spot just below my scrotum – “and is propelled by a series of muscular spasms up the shaft of the penis, which begins –” again he pressed in deep between my legs just at the base of my scrotum, ran his fingertips over and around something long and rubbery inside – “here.”
“Unh,” I grunted. “Unh. Unh.” I couldn’t help making those sounds, and I couldn’t seem to stop making them. He made no comment, but instead continued to rub at the root of my penis, gently, rhythmically, until eventually, surprisingly, I grew calmer.
“Simon?” I heard the soft rumble of his voice and looked up. He caught my eyes and held them, steadying me. “Okay now?” he asked.
“Sure,” I said. “Okay.”
“Good. Excellent. Now, for the moment I’d like you to just rest comfortably.” He removed his hand and slowly, I lowered my hips onto the table again. “That’s right,” he said. But I couldn’t stop my legs from jiggling, and my feet was all bouncy. He leaned towards me, resting one palm on each of my knees. “Easy now. Nice and easy,” he said, and waited like that, his hands resting on my knees, all the time looking into my eyes, until my breathing had evened out and my jitteriness had subsided.
“You’re doing fine,” he said. “There’s just one last area I need to examine . . .” He rose and began to fold the sheet up as he was saying this, he kept folding it and folding it until it lay across my ribs just under my chest leaving my entire dick exposed. A wash of cool air spread over me and the feel of his eyes on me, looking at me – at . . . it – made it start giving little spasmodic jerks. I swallowed down a “Unh,” and the doctor, after waiting a few moments to let the jerking subside, said, “You know, I think this would be easier if I could just get rid of this altogether . . .” He pulled at the sheet, and it slipped off me with a cool slithery feeling. Now I lay completely naked before him. I was trembling all over – so I closed my eyes and concentrated on breathing. Deep and slow, like he’d said. The doctor moved round to the end of the table. I heard him sit and lean back in his chair again. After a long pause I lifted my head and looked down at myself. My dick was sticking out stiffly, bobbing an inch or two above my belly. There was a long thick strand of clear fluid drooling down from the head of it – even as I looked another heavy drop started oozing out. Below that was the face of Dr Brent, fingers steepled again, eyes flicking from my face to between my legs to my face again . . .
When he saw me looking back at him he steadied his gaze. “I think we’re ready,” he said, “to move on to the final part of the exam.” Was his voice slower now, thicker? Or was that just how I was hearing it? I couldn’t tell, my ears were full of electric hum. I lay back again, eyes to the ceiling. He leaned forward, I heard him rolling his chair closer. Then I felt his fingers begin to press and probe their way up my inner thighs, starting just above my knees and not ending till they’d reached the crevice between my balls and my leg. After examining me carefully there – “Just checking the lymph nodes . . .” he murmured – his fingers felt their way up towards my penis, pushing finally into the scratchy tangle of my pubic hair. He examined this area and the whole of my lower belly thoroughly, pressing and probing with his fingers, rubbing with his palms, sometimes just placing a hand on one specific spot and letting it rest there a moment or two so the warmth could sink in. I tried to keep still during all this but I couldn’t help what my body did. My back flexed – my fingers twitched – my butt muscles kept squeezing and releasing. At one point I felt my penis brush against the back of his hand. I could feel the fine, dark hairs growing there and I couldn’t help groaning. “Now,” he said, “let me just . . .” He grasped my penis lightly just below the head with his fingertips and began to lift it up, up . . . “Let me just see . .”
I had to speak. I had to say something – and it had to be now. “I . . . I’m going to . . . I’m going to cum if you keep doing that,” I said, my voice something between a whisper and a croak. My head felt heavy, my face was sweaty and hot. He released my penis immediately, then rolled himself over to the side of the table.
“All I want, Simon,” he explained calmly, patiently, steadying me with his eyes, “is to perform a brief exam of your penis. It won’t take long, I promise.” Having explained this to me he reached forward again and, having grasped it lightly once more between his fingertips, began to lift . . .
With a sudden jerk I reached down and clutched at his forearm. It was thick with muscle, thick and hairy. “I need –” I stammered, “I need –”
“What?” asked Dr Brent, and though his voice was still patient and kind, there was an edge, an urgency to it now too. The burr had grown heavy. I felt suddenly dizzy. My vision went kind of haywire, it was like I couldn’t really see. My hand was still on his forearm, I was squeezing it spasmodically, moving my hand up higher and higher with each squeeze, feeling how the muscle underneath it swelled . . . Groaning I lurched forward and grabbed at the the front of his shirt, pulling him towards me. He rolled forward in his chair, his lips parting slightly with surprise. Everything felt crazy. It was like I’d gone suddenly crazy in my head. With another helpless groan I tried to wrench his shirt open, pulling free first one button, then two, three, until at last I could get at his chest . . .
To my surprise, he let me. His chest even seemed to be expanding under my touch. It was big and warm and fuzzy, with large hard nubs where the nipples poked through the undergrowth of hair.
“I need –” I said again, my voice almost exhausted with overripe desire, “I need –”
“What?” he asked, the word coming out deep, gruff, and ever more insistent. “What? You have to say it, Simon. I can’t help you unless you say it.”
Suddenly, blindly, I was pushing at his shoulders, twisting him, forcing him to turn and look down at me, to look down at my bobbing dick. Pushing at his shoulders, pushing at his head, I forced him down until his face was just inches away from it. He turned his head and met my eyes. “You have to say it,” he said. “I need you to say it. You have to tell me. It’s the only way I can help you.”
“Unh,” I said. “Unh. Unh. I need you to make me cum, doctor. I need you to help me . . . Unh, please, please . . . I need to cum, I need you to help me so I can cum. Pleeease.” I heard him grunt, as if satisfied. Then he was wrapping his fingers lightly around the base of my dick and lifting the whole heavy, throbbing weight of it. It arced greedily up to meet him as he bent slowly forward, ever nearer . . . I fell back on the table – lifted my head up so I could watch, so I could see . . . Now his mouth was opening. Oh god now his mouth was opening, his lips, his white teeth were opening and he was bending in close, so close, and now his tongue, his thick red tongue was emerging, was curling . . .
My head flooded with light. I started to cum. Before he was even on me I started to cum. Long white streams of it squirted into his mouth, rained back down on me, drizzled down onto my belly. Then I was deep inside him, deep inside his mouth, and I came again, and again and again . . .
Later, as we were leaving his office, I suddenly remembered what the doctor had told me earlier about certain exercises he’d said he could explain to me, or show me, certain . . .
“Techniques,” he said, and sounded rather pleased that I’d brought it up again. “Yes, there are some exercises and techniques that I’m aware of and could teach you, and which I believe might help you deal with some of the issues you’re confronting. If that’s something you think you’d like to pursue, we could schedule a follow-up visit and go into the matter more thoroughly then. How does . . .” He paused a moment to think. “How does next Saturday at saaay three o’clock sound to you?”
“Yeah,” I said. “I think I could make that.”
“Good. I don’t normally see patients on Saturdays – the office isn’t officially open then – but I think in this case the additional privacy and and extra time we could spend together might prove beneficial. Also, I’d like to give you another physical, to assess the changes that occur as you resume your normal rate of orgasm. Which, I assume, you intend to do?”
I nodded. “If you think that’s the right thing.”
“I do,” he said. “There is, however, one stipulation I’d like to make – well, two, now that I think about it. First, I want you to limit your rate of masturbation between now and next Saturday to three times a day. Do you think you can manage that?”
“Sure,” I said. “I mean, I stopped it altogether before, so . “. .
“That’s right,” he said with a smile. “You did. Second, I want you to refrain from having any orgasms at all for a period of twenty-four hours before your next scheduled visit. Let’s say you can allow yourself . . .” he paused to think again, “one orgasm Friday morning, but . . . No, let’s just say there should be no masturbating at all on Friday – understood?”
“Yes,” I said. “Nothing on Friday. Got it.”
We pushed through a pair of heavy glass doors and stepped out into the sunny parking lot. “Well, Simon,” he said, turning towards me and holding out his hand, “I guess I’ll be seeing you on Saturday then.”
“Yes,” I said, “at three.”
“That’s right,” he agreed. “At three.” We shook on it. My hand felt small in his, but I looked him steadily in the eyes the whole time. That seemed to please him. Made him smile anyway. All the way home I wondered about what all it was he might have to teach me. I didn’t know, could hardly guess – but I had the feeling I had a lot to learn.