The Paper (Man) Delivers

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I made it through the week, not an inconsequential accomplishment. Arriving at the end of it meant spending the weekend with my now-ex. God, it was horrid. Between her and the job, I was about beside myself.

Since I started the long slow march to my divorce, I had stayed away from computer contact with the gay world. I had hoped marriage would resolve some of the brief and inconclusive encounters with men that started back in college. It worked for a while, and I could pretend to be a regular guy. What do they call it? CIS-Gender? I could never figure out all the new words and terms for something that I thought was just 'sex,' a little different but perfectly normal.

Some memories of the long-ago pleasures and uncertainties were still around. Down at the office, there was a coffee ship around the corner that had a rack of the local alternative press, and I enjoyed looking at the "personals" ads in the back to see that there were still people looking for some of the things I once had. But communicating from home, even from the anonymity of the computer was a risk. I knew enough to know that if anything was on the computer's hard drive, it was recoverable by anyone with even a modicum of techno-savvy. Lists of web sites, temporarily saved images and stuff like that were invisible and present forever.

Approaching 15 years in the relationship I realized there was something going on with the ex. I had done some sleuthing on the computer, nothing too advanced, and once called up an image file at random from a long list of anonymous numbered jpeg files and was astonished to see blonde handsome young man with six-pack abs and an improbably large erection. His face was screwed up in passion, the first jets of his

orgasm shooting upward under a clear blue sky.

It looked like Los Angeles, I thought. I wondered who had summoned this picture to the hard-drive. There was no one else in the shot, so I could not tell if this was hetero or homosexual in orientation. The arc of jism was caught in two major courses, and I found myself wondering if he was ejaculating on command, or simply for the joy of it.

I found the whole thing unsettling. Was that what the wife wanted? Or had I summoned it, not remembering?

It was a magic time in my life. By that I do not mean glittering good. More a sense of giddy freedom, with the knowledge that the abyss was beckoning to me. But somehow I knew the abyss would take me anyway at some point, and it would define its own terms.

I was not unfamiliar with the ad game. When I felt the most trapped in my marriage I would sometimes scan the pages of the gay paper at that coffee shop, careful never to keep a copy, reading in coffee houses during breaks I found in my job in the city. It was pleasant to daydream about casual sex. But as my marriage became increasingly composed of two hostile camps under one roof I began to think about actually acting out on my daydreams, or at least figuring out how to do so.

There were problems, of course. One was about responding to the ads. The game was that there was a substantial charge to respond by phone, and it would leave a record. I mailed a few responses, but realized there was no way I could leave my work number, much less take a call at home.

It appeared that the smart way to do this act of unfaithfulness was to place my own ad and see what happened. I composed one mentally, finally screwing up my courage to go to the advertising department of the paper and pay to have it published in cash. Untraceable. That also meant traveling to the paper to pick up the responses.

Th process of balance and security made it quite an adventure, and I will never forget the lovely lady who worked as a receptionist at the paper. She told me I had beautiful eyes. I thanked her, wondering that while soliciting sex from anonymous men in the greater metropolitan area I was still attracted to this lady. It was in a strange manner, though. Often I just wished I could be her, with the privilege of being pursued.

The nature of sex is an eternal mystery to me.

Over the months I gained increasing confidence and placed several different ads, screening the dozens of responses which ranged from the bizarre to the appealing. For the most part, it remained a process of mental arousal. But there was an increasing desire to consummate one of the exchanges to see what would happen.

I arranged meetings in public places, sometimes actually seeing the man I arranged to encounter. But I was never able to bring myself to actually walk up to them and consummate the rendezvous. Anonymous sex was

too dangerous, as we all learned from the AIDS panic. I enjoyed the thrill of the encounters, which was mostly the sick feeling in my belly that I was capable of this perverse desire. I normally had a list of likely men I might call back. It was something to toy with, dreamily imagining scenes of intense passion.

The nature of that passion was a little undetermined. Exchanging body fluids obviously had risk, and the whole top-and-bottom part of it was something I did not fully understand. That lack of clarity was part of the excitement.

One of the letters contained a phone number, and I went to Herndon to meet a recently divorced bureaucrat for an early coffee. It was an uneasy meeting, neither of us quite sure what would develop. We talked about needs but were unable to come to anything that seemed to appeal to us both. There were no sparks, and after an awkward conversation, I thanked him for his time and left for an appointment in Maryland.

The closer I got to this tantalizing riddle the more complex it seemed to get. The urge also grew more insistent, which increased the risk of doing something stupid that would blow up my little lifestyle. The thrill was in the anticipation, I concluded, not in the act.

But the urge was insistent and had no release at home. A few weeks later I arranged to meet a young man at a strip mall off Route 5 not far from the route downtown.

He was standing where we had agreed, and after an awkward introduction: "Hi! Are you the guy who answered the ad in the gay paper?" I agreed to follow him to his house. As I drove behind him, I thought how insane this behavior was, and yet how exciting. I noted a butterfly net in the back of his little white Ford Fiesta. As we got out of our cars at a modest little place, I asked him if he was an entomologist. He said he was.

At some point he asked me if I was married. I said I was. He had kissed me ferociously, almost clicking his teeth against mine. We were in his bedroom then, having come up from the small living room. We were lying against each other, not fooling around, but exploring the implications of the contact. he was slim and boyish and wanted me badly. I was so aroused that I erupted the first second he touched me. There was no intimacy or closure. My release was too soon, no buildup, just a jet of wetness without completion.

I was embarrassed and tried to jerk him off. I didn't know how to lubricate his thin erection properly. It irritated him, and we parted badly. I tried to call him later, to see if there was a way we could meet to try to fix things, but he was adamant that there was not. I hung up and walked away from the payphone, scratching his name from the list. Feeling frustrated and a little lost. The orgasm with him had done nothing to relieve the need.

The next week the fever was on me again. I was lobbying at offices downtown. The commute from the suburbs only worked very early, so there was advantage in getting down to the city before anything was going on. Accordingly, there was normally time to kill before my first appointment of the day. I could work out at the health club, or have breakfast and read the paper. Or I could play with my little list of names from the ads.

The one I placed this time had said I was looking for an "Early Bird." This particular Monday, I made a call on a payphone- remember those?- to another promising name on the list. The man who answered had a curt, almost brusque demeanor that was a little unsettling. He told me he would get up early to have coffee and see if there was anything there. He gave me directions to his place and rang off.

The next morning I awoke long before the alarm. There the familiar heaviness in my belly and a feeling of anticipation. I drove downtown earlier even than the specified early hour. I bought both morning papers and drove slowly from the big road over to the one that runs along the ridge above the River. I saw a light on at the correct address and parked around the corner. The heels on my dress pumps clicked on the concrete and my heart was sunk down in my belly with nervousness. It was the familiar feeling of dread and anticipation. I knocked on the door with my knuckle. I heard footsteps approach and the door opened.

"Paperboy" I said, offering the two papers, one thick with advertising and the other thin with news.

"Thanks" said the man.

He looked to be in his middle fifties. He was of modest height but had a powerful torso. His hair was thinning and he had cropped it short. Close shaven. Full sensual lips. "Why don't you come in?"

"Thanks" I said, a little breathless. Thoughts of flight ran through my mind as he led me through a formal dining room and into the wood-paneled

kitchen. The house was one of those built in the 1930's, and the floor plan had not changed much. A close-in house, two stories, designed for another

era. He turned and pulled two coffee cups from a cabinet over the sink. A small color TV murmured in the corner under soft warm yellow light.

"My name is Rick. Would you like cream and sugar?" he asked.

"No, thanks. Black is fine." He poured from the Mr. Coffee and then led me through a door and back up the hallway to the living room. He sat on the couch and I joined him, sitting properly two feet away. The conversation began awkwardly.

"So, what are you looking for?" he asked, matter-of-factly, as though strange men came to his door every day looking for something personal. His voice was smooth and his vowels were oval. He wore shorts and no belt. I said I was looking for a friend. That began a monologue for him, and I listened to his soft voice.

He told me about his life there in Suffield. He was an entrepreneur. He had invested wisely. He had no day job, save to manage his portfolio. He was a bit of an Auntie, I thought, though his arms and shoulders were powerful, like a collegiate wrestler. He smoked, and that was a relief. I noted my fingers quivering as I lit one of my own. The coffee was strong and good, and we eventually had another cup. I began to turn my thoughts to escape.

Once again I was acting out the pattern. I was

getting further along, but still not ready for a decisive moment.

I was moderately surprised to find Rick was a Republican, I don't know why. We talked about

Politics, which is always risky. I glanced at my watch and told him I was grateful for the coffee and really had to be going. He smiled as we rose and he walked me to the foyer.

I tried to apologize, saying: "I don't think this will work. It's not your fault, you are a very nice man. I just don't know what I want. Maybe I will figure it out someday. But I want to thank you. I enjoyed the conversation."

"I did, too" he said. "But I got up early to make the coffee. So, I think you owe me a favor."

"Of course," I said. I felt bad that I had led him on, but relieved that this encounter was nearly complete and I could go back to real life.

"Just show me what I am going to miss." He took me by the hand and led me to the stairs. He turned and walked up. I looked up at him, frozen. I had finished it, said goodbye. Then my feet moved forward and I found myself climbing the stairs behind him, my heart suddenly thumping.

What was this? Could he be a killer, enticing sexual seekers and then garroting them in the stillness? What was I doing? My feet were moving on their own, uncontrolled.

It was dark in the hallway. There was a bedroom to the left as we reached the top of the stairs. He didn't stop there. He rounded the corner and went down the hall. There was a bathroom directly ahead. I could see the light reflected on old white tile. Bedrooms were to the left and right. He paused at the door of the one on the right and I stopped behind him.

He gestured inside the open door at the striped coverlet on a neatly-made double-bed. I wondered if he had slept here last night, or if he reserved it for other activities. A clock on the nightstand next to the bed radiated the time in blue light. It was wrong by several hours. The room was bathed in soft orange light from the rising sun. The furniture was in keeping with the house, old and dark and solidly built.

"Why don't you take off your shirt and let me see what you look like" he said. "That's really all I need." His eyes twinkled in amusement and the corners of his mouth turned up in a knowing smile. I considered his request as my fingers went of their own volition to my collar and loosened my tie. I removed it, looking at him.

I turned and placed it on the bureau. I unbuttoned my collar and slipped the suspenders from my shoulders and let them hang at my side. I finished unbuttoning my shirt and pulled the tails from my trousers. Then I took it off slowly. I laid it atop my tie. I turned back to him, avoiding his eyes, looking down.

"Thank-you." He said. His voice was soft and reassuring. I crossed my arms across my chest, self-conscious and feeling vulnerable. The room was warm

and still, the smell of the old house mixed with something else, something vaguely familiar. Like Old Spice. The pause was awkward. I took a step toward him and he matched it. His arms came around me.

I tensed and then slowly relaxed in his arms and laid my head on his shoulder. I drank in the smell of him. There was soap there from his shower and the Old Spice.

There was something else, too, a musk that was deep and rich and multi-textured.

We stood that way for a long time. I don't know how long. I drank in the smell of him. My heartbeat began to return to normal, and in a very natural way my right hand reached out and gently felt out his manhood. He

responded. This too went on for a long time. I marveled at the weight and mass of him. I could feel him swell against my fingers and I could feel myself respond in kind. His smell was intoxicating.

This was not anything I had expected, and no fevered rush. It was a blossoming. I felt something more than the hardness coming to my groin. My head came up from his neck, eyes closed, and my lips sought his. I brushed the short stubble on his cheek from his morning shave. They were full lips and they opened to meet me.

Our tongues met, gently probing. I tasted coffee and the cigarette and warmth of his saliva. Contained in the kiss was an offer and an acceptance. At the right

moment our embrace loosened. He took off his t-shirt. I unfastened my trousers and let them fall to the floor.

He unbuttoned his shorts and skinned them off. He wore white briefs and the bulge of his penis distended them in a nice tent in the front. I dropped my boxers on the trousers and we stood and looked at one another, wordless in the silent room. But there was a rhythm in the quiet, one that was rich and deep and powerful. So powerful that my misgivings fell away and only a raw and fragrant need remained. I liked what he was doing to me. Taking the lead.

He hooked the top of his briefs and drew the elastic down with his thumbs. The tip of his penis was the first exposed, then the dark mass of his pubic hair and finally his balls. His cock stood out proudly, arcing up to the right from his trim belly. I stepped to him

and cupped his balls with my hand. They had a velvety feel beneath the coarse texture of his hair. They moved smoothly and independently under my touch. I caressed his shaft.

His cock had a pronounced and impressive shape. From the base to the tip he seemed enormous, and the glans was fat and assertive. It appeared thicker at the distant end, thicker than the base even before the pouting shape of the helmet. It was a wonderful and hypnotic sight.

"May I kiss it?" I asked. It sounded ridiculous to me, with the words floating there in the air between us. I hadn't come here for this, had I? I had come to be with a gay man and get things sorted out. Not to have intimacy with someone I had just met. This was too fast.

"Of course," he answered. I sank to my knees, my arms softly caressing him on the way down. Having had this opportunity presented, I was suddenly eager to examine this marvel. At eye-level he was even more massive. I ran my tongue along the length of him, delighting in the texture of the veins and ridges. I was careful not to take him entirely in my mouth.

I was concerned about ingesting his semen. I wanted this to be safe. I had not come to do what I was willingly doing, licking a man's hardness in a small quiet room.

So, in violation of my planned purpose here, I went ahead and licked him as a child would lick an ice cream cone. I gave him three or four languorous slurps, my tongue protruding from my open lips. Then I abandoned his proud hardness and dipped down to kiss his balls in their hairy sac.

I was a bit tentative at first, but with growing confidence as his hips squirmed in delight. "You like this, don't you?" he said. I nodded against the mass of him, inarticulate with both his testicles rolling over my tongue. His hard spear rolled sideways over my nose and caressed my forehead. The weight of him against me made me giddy, my nose filled with his now ripe rich smell. He welcomed the feel of my lips and the worship of his privates began to fill my senses fully. This was something entirely new.

At some point, and I am not sure how, he moved. Not away from me, but in a manner that kept me on my knees, subservient to his motion. He sat down on the bed, my face buried in him as I rested on my knees. It felt natural that way, and I licked him in satisfaction. The power he had so casually asserted over me was an intoxicant as powerful I had ever felt. I could feel it weighing on me, my concerns limp beneath its liberating immensity.

That sudden freedom was reflected in the softness of his skin and the insistence of his power over me. The power that had compelled me to seek him was transformed into an appreciation of his power over me. Given freely, if unexpectedly. And releasing his balls from my mouth I returned to an avid slurping of his erect penis, licking from the base on each side to his massive tip. I rose slightly to reach the tip, drawing my tongue along his slit, now lubricated with his slippery pre-cum. I licked it until there was nothing remaining. Then I moved my head up and back so my lips could surround his massive glans and work the base with my tongue while letting the top slide back and forth across the roof of my mouth.

Looking up at his face from there, eyes on one another, I felt my submission to his need like a rich gift. And then he relaxed his arms, reclining in a way he had perfect visibility of my submission and obedient suckling on his penis. I remained in my delightful position on my knees, but now elevated sufficiently to bob my head enough to bring his glans right to the back of my mouth, suckling the hard soft flesh of his weapon of love.

His shaft was now moist and slippery with my spit, taste of him exciting. I licked the tip and started to stroke him until the spit dried and became a bit sticky. He stopped my hand. Afraid I had done something to displease him, I looked up apprehensively and saw him smile. "You have to keep it wet, silly." He scooped a gob of saliva from his mouth with his fingers and ladled it onto his penis. "Now" he said. "Nice and slippery. Get back to work."