Part Three: Dies Irae [Day of Wrath]

The valley widened as route 220 approached Altoona, known to Penn State students as "the Armpit of the United States," but it was the closest medium-size city to claustrophobic, rural State College. It was the place to go for serious shopping, weekend entertainment, and, for a small minority of the student population, anonymous sex. 

It was along the path of our return-trip to Pittsburgh. We had skirted it on our trip to State College much earlier this morning, when all thoughts were on my destination and the funeral. But now all of that was the past...I had left my past there, buried in a standard grave...and all ties were severed now. But there were still some bodies to exhume and some demons to exorcise. 

Things had changed rapidly after the break-up with John; I felt alone and rudderless... looking for something, but I didn't know what...numb from rejection, regretful for anything I had done to hurt him, guilty for having pulled-away. I can remember lying in my dorm room, in the dark, clutching my own torso and vowing never to love again...the chances of getting hurt were too great, the chances of a lasting success were too slim. "Love hurts" I kept saying to myself. "The peaks are just the tops of roller coaster humps...get ready for the plummet." A coldness set-in...like the numbness. I knew that the only person I could depend upon was myself. No matter how perfect I made myself...in appearance, intellect, or capabilities, ...I could only satisfy my own needs. Not Jack's. Not John's. Certainly not Lindsay's. 

"Are we stopping?" Justin felt the car slowing as we approached the intersection, and it had jarred him from partial sleep. "I've gotta pee." 

"No" I said. "I'm going to show you one of my college "haunts"...where I actually learned a few things I've taught YOU already." He looked confused. "You can pee there," I added. 

There were no gay bars in State College in 1992...at least none that I could find from scanning the phone book or reading the newspaper want-ads. To someone who had hidden his sexuality in high school, the prospects of making the first-move toward someone of unknown preference was daunting. I had been beaten-up for the mere appearance of being gay (but you know that story), so it was almost impossible for me to let someone know about my sexuality without knowing theirs first. There were only two solutions: to make myself available and wait for someone else to approach me; or, to find a gay bar where the sexual preference of the patrons was almost a certainty. The closest gay bar was in Altoona. I found an ad in a sleazy tabloid newspaper. And I vowed to go there. 

"Rumors" was a complex of gay-related entertainment. Calling it a "complex" is perhaps too generous; it was a somewhat-sleazy gay bar, with a back room, a small arcade of video booths mostly for anonymous sex, and a small 30-seat "theater" which showed videos on a large screen TV. The clientele was diverse...from college guys like myself to older guys looking for a cock to suck or an ass or mouth to fuck; some just wanted to jack-off while they watched. 

My first visit was like a rite-of-passage. I had driven there in my beat-up car as fast as it would go, but when I got to the parking lot, I sat there for almost half an hour watching guys come and go, getting-up my courage. Sitting in a car like that is an invitation in itself, I learned later, which explained why the same guy kept walking by, pausing at the window, and then moving on. Finally I saw someone my age go inside and I followed him. The place was dim and smelled of beer and sweat. A TV over the bar played a small-scale version of what was showing in the theater...and a young guy was being fucked at both ends, I remember...quite an introduction to hardcore gay porn. Most of John videos had been beautiful scenes of young boys together, but this scene was raw, vivid, and graphic...domination and punishment...and I didn't know where to look. When I looked at the patrons, I realized that many of them were looking at me, which made me uneasy...I was an outsider, a newcomer. I finally studied the liquor bottles behind the bar...and I kept glancing up at the video...he was being held-down now and fucked by another man with a larger cock. 

I felt the hand on my shoulder and it made me jump. "Want a drink?" It was the bartender returning from some errand; I hadn't noticed the bar was unattended. "You're new?" he asked. I exhaled as I relaxed from the startle, "Yea, my first time...here," I said. He smiled as if he knew my secret. "Well, look around," he said. "There's an arcade and a theater...and the back room for other "entertainment." He raised his eyebrow on the last word, and I caught the gist of it. "Everything's free, except the booths and the booze. What'll you have?" I bought a beer...and posed like a beer commercial on the barstool. But once I started sipping it, my nervousness made me drink the whole thing in a few gulps. The scene had changed on the video now...young guys in a locker room, familiar territory for me, so I decided to follow the sign for the Theater. It was smaller than I expected...and not totally dark. There were only three guys there, so I took a seat in the second (of five) rows...and I studied the screen as if I was watching a first-run cinema. I had been seated for only a few seconds when a guy stepped over my feet and sank into the seat next to me; it was the young guy I had seen entering the bar earlier. I almost felt relieved, as if we had a bond in common. He looked at me, then down into my lap, then into his own lap, and finally at the screen. I glanced down to see if my fly was open, but when I looked back, he seemed intent on the action...three guys in the shower, soaping their bodies...and eventually stroking their cocks. His hand, which had been draped across his crossed knee, suddenly dropped into my lap...and nearly scared the shit out of me. His fingers didn't move. They just rested there on my inner thigh...but they burned through the denim of my Levis like hot coals. I didn't want his hand to leave, but I wasn't sure what I was supposed to do. So I just sat there like a statue, frozen in indecision. His other hand crossed his body and it gripped my wrist, placing my hand over his cock; I could feel its hardness through the fabric and I moved my fingers slightly to feel its size. And then he looked at me again...but this time with a question on his face that I couldn't interpret. I knew he wanted something sexual, but I wasn't sure what he expected me to do. Frustrated, I got up quickly and walked through a door beside the screen that led into a hallway. He followed me. I heard his footsteps behind me on the tile floor. He grabbed my shoulder from behind and pulled me to a stop, spun me around, pressed me against the wall with his forearm, and then his torso. And he kissed me...not the kind of soft kisses that John had used, but a hard, demanding kiss that made me weak. My knees almost buckled. Sensing my motion and putting both hands on my shoulders, he pushed me down to my knees. He quickly unbuckled his belt and opened his pants, letting them fall to his knees. He was wearing no underwear, so his hard cock hit my cheek in the narrow hallway. "Suck me," he said under his heavy breath...and as I opened my mouth to reply, he shoved it between my lips before I could say anything. I had sucked John before, so I knew what to do; John had actually taught me the fine-points of fellatio and how to suppress my gag-reflex, . But this guy wasn't interested in my skills...he just wanted a place to ram his cock. Suddenly another man turned the corner from the direction of the theater, and then another. I tried to break the contact and get up, but the guy's hands flew to the back on my neck, holding me down and forcing me to take more of his shaft. With my face buried in his groin, I couldn't see much...but the other men were urging him to fuck my face...slam his dick into me...their words echoed in the short hallway. And then it was over. He slammed in one last time and I felt his cum surging into my throat; I was gripping his hips for support...and then he was gone. I slumped against the wall, reeling from the intensity of this abbreviated sex-act...and I knew that I had been initiated into a new sub-culture...random, anonymous sexual encounters for lust, not for love...for release, not for expression. I squatted there for a moment, tasting the remains of his cock and his cum in my mouth...then stood and found my way back to the bar. 

"Enjoy yourself?" said the bartender, noticing my dazed look. He probably thought I had jacked-off in the theater. I started to say "Some guy just..." "It happens," he interrupted. I drank another beer, and then left....but I knew I would come back. "Friday night's the best night," he said as I got up to leave. I nodded and almost smiled...then headed for the parking lot. 

The taste of that encounter lasted for a week. At unexpected moments...in-class, in my room, in the gym...his flavor would return, perhaps just a memory or a few molecules of his pheromones...but it was a sustained, repeated reminder of that first visit. 

The second visit was easier...and the third...and the fourth. I began spending Friday and Saturday nights there, returning to my room in the wee hours. By watching other patrons, I learned the moves. By patrolling the back room, I learned the techniques, the positions, and the slang. An open door on one of the video booths was an invitation...a few quarters-worth of privacy...and the sounds of live-sex intermingled with the soundtrack of the porn videos. I studied the videos as seriously as I attended my college lectures. And I was slowly recognized as someone who could give a good blow-job or shoot a substantial load into another guys throat...and they learned my name...and eventually gave me the nickname "Breaker." (I got in a fight once at Rumors, and broke a guy's wrist.) The sex was raw and impersonal, but I found it satisfying, in a way...no promises, no expectations, no regrets...no responsibilities other than hygiene and safety...no ties...no need to feel anything but pleasure. Sex divorced from love. Physicality cleft from emotion. It sometimes seemed like a rut; I got tired of blow-jobs from the same guys. But, in the dark, all mouths felt the same. 

"What is this place?" Justin asked as we entered the parking lot. "It's the gay-boy University," I said as I slammed the shift lever into Park. "You've seen me at my best, now meet me at my worst. Here's where I got my MBA, 'Master-of-Blowjob Administration'." 

The bar was full...more so than I remembered it ...the music was louder...and the bartender was younger. It smelled the same. The memories came flooding back as we sat in one of the booths where the "spectators" sit...and I stepped to the bar to buy us drinks. No one would question his age here. As I turned to return to the table, I saw another guy moving in on Justin and cut him off with a "Back off! He's taken" and slammed the beer bottles onto the table. I had forgotten how "fresh meat" draws the predators. 

I began to tell him the story of this place...how important it had been...and his face wrinkled in what I interpreted as concern. "What's the matter?" I asked defensively. "I really gotta pee," he repeated..."but I didn't want to interrupt you." I knew I didn't want him going into that bathroom alone, so I led him to the room with a metal trough in the center...and the memory-image from years ago of that blond-boy lying naked in the trough being pissed upon by four guys flooded my memory. I had joined them that night...to be one-of-the-gang. "Get it over with," I said as I unzipped my pants. Justin followed obediently. "You even piss differently when you're here," he observed." 

When we returned to the table, I told him more about this place and its memories. "Do you want to see the theater where it all began?" I asked. "Sure," he said...and that began the tour of the entire place. Not much had changed...better technology in the arcade, a projection-screen in the theater...but the seats and cum-stained carpet were the same. Back at the table I told him the details, matter-of-factly, as if I was describing someone else. He looked surprised at times...concerned at others...but he laughed appropriately at the stories of my "education." He asked questions, innocently sometimes and teasingly at others. "Did you go home with guys?" "Did you ever do THAT?" (pointing at the video of a hunky guy in a sling.) "Did you take it up the ass?" he questioned...and I replied with a simple "Sometimes." We drank our beers, leaning forward to hear each other over the loud music and locking our gazes eye-to-eye as if to cut-out the other patrons. That was my intent, at least. 

I carried the remains of my third beer as we exited to the parking lot. This place represented my low point, I suppose...things I'm not proud of. As if to finally close this chapter of my life, I suddenly pulled-back and "pitched" the bottle against the black, windowless brick wall of "Rumors". The contents splattered in a perfect star-burst, then dripped down in rivulets. I surprised myself at the intensity of my feelings for this place; "Fucking Hell-hole," I murmured to Justin who was wide-eyed at my violent outburst. 

Back in the car, he said quietly, "Are you sure you want to drive all the way back to Pittsburgh? I mean, it's over an hour and it's been a long day,...and you've had two beers." He did sound like a public service announcement sometimes, but I knew he was right. "I don't need to be at work tomorrow morning, so it means we can stop. That's a good idea," I said, knowing full-well that, for him, it meant another night together. 

Together in the king-sized Ramada bed, he propped his head on his hand and lay beside me in the dim light listening to me talk. He has that way of cocking his head that says "Tell me more"...and I obliged. 

"So, did you always go there for sex?" he began. 

"For awhile, until I found a few other places like it...but then I learned that I could find what I wanted right on-campus, or nearby...without the drive." 

I told him about finding my own apartment for my senior year...actually, just a few rooms over Lou Massa's garage...but I had my own entrance, a place to do simple cooking, and the privacy I wanted...just a mattress on the floor and a place to study were all I needed. Mr. Massa was retired, and spent most of the winter and spring with his daughter in Florida, so I just kept-up the main house, cut the grass, and paid minimal rent. 

I told him how I could get guys to make the first move simply by making myself available. I would go jogging in Orchard Park wearing my Aussie Rowers and stop in the public toilet there...or cruise the Nittany Mall. On occasions, I'd go to the Seven Mountains Rest Stop and just sit in the car, and soon someone would approach me. The campus offered the best opportunities with guys my age, however...the area around the Bell Tower at night or the locker room at Rec Hall were great places to get noticed. And even if no one approached me, I enjoyed the looks of admiration from guys, as hesitant as I was to make the first move. 

The biggest change occurred, I suppose, when I started using the exercise room at the Natatorium to keep in-shape. It was such a cruisy spot, I learned to "read" the looks...to make the glances...to say "go for it" with my eyes...and eventually to make the approach. The memories of most of the guys have faded into oblivion...some as soon as the next day...but the first guy I brought home is still a vivid memory. 

I had practiced the approach in-my-mind for a week after I had seen him the first time in the circuit-training room in the White Building. He was a little shorter than I, but with more muscle and definition, and he wore soft cotton exercise shorts with the nicest pouch in the front and a cut-off t-shirt that showed just a promise of his abs. His thighs had the lovely slant of a developed Sartorius. His blond hair was long on-top, and it stuck-out at odd angles when it was damp from his sweat. We watched each other exercise, often following each other around the circuit...or even skipped stations to exercise side-by-side. No words, just a nod. But I knew he was interested. He often licked his lips absent-mindedly as he waited for me to finish the pec-machine...and more than once, he came back to wipe-down a machine after he had used it, while I was getting it adjusted to my size and strength. I could feel his heat as he stood next to me. He wiped the machine, but his eyes were on my body; he was caressing the machine as if it were a muscular torso. A nod, a knowing smile...for over a week, that's all we exchanged on an almost daily basis. 

I decided that, if I wanted him, I could make the first move. His interest was too obvious to be mistaken. The room was crowded that night...everyone waiting for stations to become vacant...jostling for space. We had both done a first circuit of the equipment and were partway through a sweaty second round. His damp hair was plastered to his forehead and his thin shirt clung to his torso in places like a coat of paint. As I finished the deltoid apparatus, he was leaning against the wall, watching me in the mirror; I felt his eyes caressing my body. It was time to move. I stripped off my damp shirt, draped it around my neck, walked over to him, and slumped against the wall behind him, close enough to lean forward and say (in my most sexy voice), "My place...my way." He turned quickly, as if surprised, and looked at me with an expression I have seen hundreds of times since then...that look of relief at being picked, the flared nostrils of arousal, the raking of teeth over lips in anticipation, the sharp inhalation of mild fear. He nodded wordlessly and headed for the locker room. We changed clothes in separate areas, but he finished first and came looking for me with his gym bag over his shoulder. I liked his eagerness. Outside he spoke for the first time. "I don't have a car. Where do you live?" "Just a ten minute walk," I replied as I touched him for the first time...a firm hand on the shoulder of his jacket which guided him in the right direction. I barely remember the conversation...and I don't remember his name. Suddenly after a week of silent nods, he was a font of conversation...classes, his major, his dorm, where he was from...I only wanted one thing from him now, and it wasn't talk. As we walked, I began to feel the power of what I had just done. He was coming with me because he wanted me. And he was doing it on my terms...no questions and no negotiations. I could do this. 

At the top of the stairs, I unlocked the door quickly and preceded him into my apartment. Once inside, I spun around, gripped him by the front of his jacket, pulled him inside, and closed the door. I pressed his back against the wall using my chest against his. "You want this, don't you?" I challenged. He felt my hand slide between us as I gripped my cock through my levis. "Yea, man," he said in a way that let me know he meant it. I unzipped his jacket and shoved it off his shoulders. "Get those clothes off," I said...and he started undressing in the dim light from the street lamp. 

He stripped to his underwear, then straightened up. "Don't stop," I said as I stood in the shadow and began to remove my shirt. He could hear my levis hit the floor as he slid his briefs down his thighs and let them fall to the floor. I stepped into the light wearing only the tank-top I had worn at the gym. "Oh, man!" he whispered as he stepped forward. I put my hand on his chest...feeling his heart beating and his heavy breathing...and I held him a foot away. Reaching down, I felt the cock that had been hidden in those short, and I wasn't disappointed. He was already reaching tumescence; it swelled in my palm. I stepped a little closer and brought my shaft alongside his, holding them side-by-side in my open palm...then gripping and stroking them together. I could feel his body sag a bit from the stimulation and he inhaled sharply. "I can't believe this is happening. I mean, I've wanted you from a distance...watched you workout...and here we are..." he said as he closed his eyes and tilted his head back exposing a throbbing pulse-point in his neck. His pecs hardened. His jaw tensed...his mouth opened slowly as I stroked our cocks together. 

"Okay, on your knees," I said quietly, dropping the tough-guy approach and deciding to see how far this guy would go. I released our cocks and he fell to his knees on the hard floor letting his hands trail-down from my shoulders to my waist as he guided his face to my swaying shaft. One touch of his lips for positioning, and then he swallowed almost all of it in one lunge...hungry to experience my unwashed taste. I stood with feet apart, swaying gently front-to-back with my fingers in his wavy hair. His hands slid to the backs of my thighs as he tried to take more. Oh, such a good mouth...and so different from the furtive, desperate blow-jobs in the public toilets. He was preparing it for more; he was working hard to please me. When John had sucked me, it had been an expression of love; this blow-job was a promise, an invitation, a desperate attempt to earn more. I felt the back of his throat...hot and tight...contracting on my mushroom-tip. 

"Now onto the mattress," I said, pressing his head off my rigid cock. He lunged forward again, almost unwilling to let it leave his lips completely. I pulled him up by the hair and guided him to the mattress with a jumble of blankets that I swept away with one foot. He settled onto the bed on his back, looking up at me from the floor as I stripped the tank-top over my head rapidly and threw it into the corner. Looking down at him, at my feet, I felt that a boundary had been crossed. I was no longer John's little secret...or the schoolboy learning "the ropes" of gay sex. I was in-charge now....able to get what I wanted...able to take what I wanted...and I wanted HIM. 

I sank down between his legs which I spread with my hands, kneeling to taste his cock for the first time. I gripped it, first in one hand, and then with both hands, as I licked the tip with my long tongue like an ice cream cone...encircling the head, tracing the soft tight skin below the overhang, then licking up over the top to pause long enough to explore his piss-slit. His pre-cum was already percolating down his nicely-formed cock as I wrapped my lips around the tip and slid downward, letting my accumulated saliva lube the way. He moaned, almost as if he was in pain...but it trailed-off into a shuddering whimper. I felt him tremble in my mouth, ready to shoot; too bad for him....it could have lasted longer. His firm abs tightened more as he arched his back...and then he lifted his arms, reaching out to grab me as the convulsions began. He gasped with each explosion. I pulled off a bit so I could taste his cum before I swallowed it; I had learned to savor the different flavors over several months at Rumors. It gave me a feeling of power to make him lose control...to reduce him to his animal instincts and autonomic responses. As I lifted my eyes to him, his cock still planted in my mouth, I could see the facial expression of utter ecstasy...eyes rolled back, jaw sagging like a pre-Raphaelite painting. His abs trembled uncontrollably as he finished; I sucked the last few drops with harder suction and cleaned up any drips that had escaped my lips. 

I crawled upward over his torso until my balls rested on his pubes. "Now your ass is mine," I hissed in his ear. "Think you can cum again?" His eyes opened, almost in-fear, and he shook his head "yes". I smiled, lifted my torso to an upright position, and slid my arms under his knees. I hefted them to my shoulders, like lifting a barbell, as I slid his ass along the bare mattress. Off to the side of the mattress was a large jar of Vaseline. I leaned to one side, reaching for it and twisted his torso in the process. He thought I wanted him to roll-over, and began to lift himself with his arms. I straightened up and shoved him back down flat on his back with a hand on his chest. "You just lie there,...I'll put you where I want you," I ordered. He looked stunned and overwhelmed. "It's yours, Man," he murmured softly. 

I unscrewed the lid and dipped my thumb full-length into the contents, then dropped the jar behind me. With his knees over my broad shoulders, his ass was lifted, spread, and exposed. Briefly, I ran my other hand over his crack, feeling for the hot-spot, then directed my thumb to his tight sphincter. "Take it easy, Man...I don't do this often." He was no virgin, that was obvious. His ass positioned itself to take my thumb. Pressing against his hole, I slid inside to the first knuckle, then rotated my wrist so my fingers pointed upwards to grip his dangling ball-sac for leverage. I could feel him simultaneously fighting my thumb and trying to open-up to take it. 

"Aaaaahhhhhhhhh!" he exclaimed as I pressed in as far as it would go. His body arched in reflex; his fingers clenched on the mattress cover. I rotated my wrist 180-degrees to spread the lube in his colon, then withdrew slowly, letting him expel me. I wiped my thumb on his semi-rigid cock; we'd use what was left as dick-lube. 

Now I was ready to fuck him. The urge to dominate, to use him, to satisfy my basic instinct, to shoot my load deep into his jock-ass...all of these took over as I gripped my shaft like a weapon, positioning the head in the small well outside his sphincter. He tensed as he felt my size. A thumb is one thing; a fully-engorged cock is quite another. He reached out again to grab me...to prevent me perhaps...but I lifted him higher, avoiding his grasp, as I swayed forward forcing the head into his hole. 

"NO, Man, NO!" he cried, but I was already partially buried in his ass. The tightness and heat burned my cock-head. Pulling out now would just delay the inevitable. I gripped the fronts of his thighs, bending him sharper at the waist and driving in another inch. He was thrashing now from side to side, definitely in-pain...so I gave one final thrust and drove it home...filling him with my pulsating cock-meat...skewering him on my fuck-pole. After one heaving convulsion, he settled down, adapting to the fullness. I could feel his muscles contracting on my shaft...trying to expel...trying to adjust. The fingers of one hand toyed with his nipple, as if to distract himself from the pain with some self-administered pleasure. I remembered briefly my own first-fuck with John...then purged it from my memory. 

I didn’t tell Justin the entire story as I related it here,…just enough to reach his arousal-point so that we could fuck before sleeping.