Author's comments:
I am repeating here a few selected, topic-appropriate chapters of the much longer "Growing Up Denying I was Gay" that posted here some months ago in the High School stories section.
This story deals with a forbidden yet sensual relationship that continued the pattern of my practiced teenaged lust, even though I was now in my late twenties...and married to boot. I won't give too much away other than it highlights the consequences of outrageous behavior that are rarely mentioned in writing of this type. I'll give ample warning as to exactly where to stop reading for those who want to dwell on the glorious parts without reading the rest, I promise. There is also a newly added post-script at the bottom for people who may have read this story before.
Looking back on my life, the tale I am about to recount is admittedly still my most provocative, exciting sexual memory of all. I don't know why exactly, probably because of the illicit nature of it, and the major unlikelihood of it having ever happened in the first place. The fact that it (arguably) ended in disaster should alone be enough reason to keep it completely off my top ten list, but the fact is I still think about him, dream of him, and I wonder where he is and what he is doing now.
You may contact me, Bradhealey@rocketmail.com.
Married for a few years already, I had proudly (sort of)
convinced myself I had turned straight.
I had sex with my wife, and even think I enjoyed it sometimes. Sure,
there was that small stash of gay porn magazines and books I had hidden for
occasional bathroom masturbation sessions once in a while when I needed to blow
of some steam. And yet I had remained
faithful. Well almost, if you excuse the time that Keith had called and needed
help with his taxes and I invited him over while my spouse was Christmas
shopping, and we ended up doing more than taxes... or the time that Teddy, then
in college, "happened" to stop by while my wife was out of town and we had some
pizza and then ended up having some good-old fun for old-time's sake.
Though my teenage life had been filled with a near free-for-all of sexual encounters with other boys, I had deftly managed to keep that part of my personality hidden from the public side of my world. To all who knew me by the light of day, my co-workers, friends and wife, I appeared as normal as could be and certainly straight as an arrow. I concluded I had managed to submerge my defective sexual urges the same way a bully would drown an invalid in a tub, pushing down on his shoulders with all his might, wild thrashing below the surface of the water but the victim not coming up for air, struggling evermore weakly till, the bully victorious, the cripple unhanded and presumed drowned for good.
Married to a pretty girl, engaged in a climbing career, I was known as a young
pillar of the community where I lived. I had surely beaten my curse at last. We
were blessed with a handsome young son and had another on the way. So what if I
occasionally visited the adult book shop at lunch while at work in the city,
straying immediately into the section reserved for guys who liked guys,
surveying the racks of cellophane-sealed magazines with lurid titles and even
more graphic photographs on their covers? They excited me, I supposed in the
same way that some guys were thrilled by the thought of going bear hunting or
by the prospects of a night of binge drinking and chasing pussy. Hell, I knew
some guys who picked up hookers, and I didn't do that! I knew for certain my
twist was harmless and I was certain that every man had his own dark little
secrets just like I had mine.
After all, once I had even gone to talk to a therapist, concerned that my lust
for seeing males undressed and aroused was a fatal flaw. Then, badly shaken, I
had betrayed myself by making a pass at a younger fellow I barely knew and had
been angrily rebuffed. He had called me a faggot and pushed my hand away. A
week later when I saw him again I apologized, and he told me to forget about
it. But for a long time after, still I couldn't sleep with worry. I had never
been caught like that, never called out so blatantly as a pervert before. This
therapist listened to me rant for an hour spilling my anguish, he blinking at
me owl-like through thick glasses while sitting nearly motionless, notebook in
hand but pages left clean. Three sessions later he delivered his prognosis:
"boys will be boys" he concluded; I should not worry, he had said.
Everything was alright for me, and I must realize that many people had
something twisted that turned them on. I shouldn't expect to be perfect. He
advised me to simply make sure that whenever I had an orgasm I was always
thinking about women, and eventually a cure to my depravity would take hold.
So, it was just as I already knew it. I only had to work yet a little harder
and I could be fixed. It was all within my power, and truthfully, even if I
couldn't really fix it, no one else ever had to know. I had kept this secret
for twenty years so far and surmised I had only sixty years or so left to live,
and that I could finish the marathon and die without anyone important to me
ever discovering my weakness. No one would ever need to know.
I was in great shape and I felt no different inside from the way I had felt as a
teenager. I could still run as fast, jump as high as any 18 year old and I felt
disgusted and annoyed with my same-age peers who were slowing down, getting fat
and who had seemed to have turned some unmarked corner towards middle age. When
the high school boys on my street had a game of street hockey, I was out there.
When the contest was who could throw the football the farthest, I needed to
compete and reveled when I won. Some of the guys would challenge me to race,
and I could beat nearly all of them every time. I loved my life; I was grown
man but as happy as a boy, living in a neighborhood full of new vibrant
friends. Everyone liked me, all the parents trusted me. I'd carry my small
three year old son Brandon around on my shoulders on warm afternoons and we
would talk and walk, stopping to meet children, pet neighborhood dogs and talk
with moms and dads. I could get along with them all, though truthfully I felt
more at ease and in tune with the teenaged guys than I did with their parents
who were all older than me.
When we had first married and moved in to the neighborhood, Nick's family lived
just a few doors away. Nick was just a kid then, and he went to Catholic school
evidenced by the uniform he wore when he walked by early each morning, slacks
and a red sweater-vest in winter, shorts and a white polo in the spring. His
folks were older, nearly as old as my own parents I
had guessed. Nick was the last in line, an afterthought for sure, his older
siblings all long grown and gone. Nick's dad yelled a lot: at the dog, at his
wife, but mostly it seemed he yelled at Nick. Sure, Nick was mischievous, but
he wasn't bad at all. Dishwater blond hair curly, tangled and matted, chipped
front tooth, dirt and grass stains on the knees of his school uniform, shoes
untied he'd come running home from school with book bag flying behind him,
shouting and yelping with the other boys, oblivious to anyone else around. He'd
reappear somewhat later, having changed into play clothes, still running and
shouting with the other guys his age. "Nick" was a perfect name for
him; a word in synonym used to describe a small gash in a tabletop or other
damage that left a formerly perfect article less than pristine, but one that
gave it recognizable character. Nick exuded character.
He was too small to play football with the older boys and me. Sometimes he'd
watch for a while but he was likely too shy to try to join in, and it was just
as well. Elbows flying and sneakers scrambling and slapping on the hard
asphalt, cries of "go long" before two or three thundering,
stampeding boys jumped at once, coming down in a heap of tangled arms and legs
on a lawn or sometimes even in the street. Rarely did a game end without some
blood being drawn, an ankle twisted or a shirt torn. I loved every minute of
it, even looking forward to the after dinner games played in the fall dusk.
Hearing their fists bang on my door in the middle of dinner was like a symphony
to me, an aphrodisiac to know I was wanted and accepted by them as one of the
team.
My wife would hold baby Brandon sometimes and watch us for just a little while,
but would leave shaking her head. "You're going to get hurt" she
warned. But I was too happy to listen. "You're too old to be playing out
there", she would say other times, but I knew better. I never felt more
alive than when I was running my fastest, tracking a thrown ball that sailed
through the air in my direction, knowing I could time it just right get there
to catch it before it landed, outrunning boys eight or ten years my junior,
knowing that I even had even more speed in reserve if I really had needed it.
Only seldom did I feel out of place, and those were the times I inadvertently
hurt someone with a poked eye or a misplaced elbow of my own. The game would
stop and suddenly I'd feel sad and sorry that I had hurt one of these boys
unintentionally, for a fleeting moment I was a parent who had hurt someone
else's son, anxious as to what I could say, lending him my handkerchief to
quell his bloody nose, then leading him home to personally apologize to his
mother, fearful that the mother would say to me the same thing as my wife had
said... "You're too old to be playing out there." But no one ever got
banged up badly enough for repercussions to have happened.
Sometimes when our games ended, Nick and his friends would take over the
street, playing a junior varsity version of our sport, their high voices
calling out the same plays we used. "Go long!" Nick would holler in
his church choir soprano, and a herd of smaller sneaker-feet would thunder down
the street in chase, as he hurled the ball half as far as I could.
I imagined I was so happy. In equal parts I loved the sport, the companionship
and the smells and sounds of adolescence that surrounded and immersed me.
Shirtless and musky, hot and wet; sweaty and salty, giving and getting pats on
the butt, playful cuffs on the head, bear hugs after big plays, wrestling on
the lawn when we were through. Tasting their heat, soaking up their energy,
absorbing their sexual power so that the nights with my wife were even more
vital and powerful... vivid images of the touch of feel of their skin and the
smell of their sweat filled my brain so fully, as soon as I closed my eyes it
was as if they were there in bed with us, urging my passion, fueling my lust.
It was springtime the next year when Nick first spoke to me, one afternoon
while I was washing my car. "Hi" he said meekly. "Hey little
dude" I greeted him, and I was amused that he sat on the grass to watch.
"Grab a sponge and help," I offered, and he did. He was cute as a
button, sort of small for his age, but 100% male. Scraped knees and elbows, his
tangled curls fell over one of his blue eyes. He had a small scar on the
underside of his chin, I noticed, a proud battle scar of boyhood it was, and I
wondered what circumstances it was earned under. I easily imagined he did it
roughly playing somewhere he wasn't supposed to have been,
and that when he was brought to the emergency to have it stitched up he was
brave and didn't cry even a single tear.
You got tall! I said to him, and he smiled revealing that chipped white front
tooth. "Thanks" he said. "I know I did." We engaged in
small talk, about school and sports and stuff, till I heard his dad call him
for dinner.
"See you later Brad!" He said dropping his sponge and running off on
his strong but slender legs in the direction of the call. I was amused; I
didn't even realize he knew my name.
That Fall the street football games resumed, and I was surprised when this year
Nick joined right in. I knew now that he was quite older than he looked, possessing an appearance of youthfulness he and I
had shared in common. I had often been mistaken for a younger child when I was
a teenager, and it infuriated me. I didn't like being smaller than the other guys my age, and I cursed the gods who were responsible for
it. I felt an immediate kinship with him because of this alone, I know.
At first I was especially protective of him, fearing he'd be harmed. But he was
incredibly agile and fast, and I soon stopped worrying about his safety. His
father gardened endlessly and was always outside to keep a watchful eye—that
is, if he had cared to see. But in fact, I noticed that Nick's father never so
much as turned an eye our way. Weary of life in general, perhaps, or at least
from having raised at least three sons long before Nick arrived, he seemed
disinterested in anything but his azaleas and rhododendron.
The next year, Nick played ice hockey, and the bruises and bumps he sported
showed he was unafraid to mix it up with the other guys. He was a tough kid,
the kind I wish I had been; the kind I hoped my son Brandon would grow up to
be. He rough-housed with his friends and didn't mind getting his clothes
rumpled and torn or his face dirty. When he wore short pants the purple and
greenish-gray badges on his shins and knees showed that he could take a hit,
and I imagined he never, ever cried. His hair looked as though he didn't own a
comb, but his apple cheeks blushed easily when he was paid a compliment, eyes
cast to sweep the ground and smiling like he didn't deserve to be praised.
When he was with his friends he was loud and brash. Laughing, cursing and
spitting with the other lads, he was a rough boy who could both take it and
dish it out.
But when those friends were gone and he was alone he'd appear out of nowhere
and sit with me and talk. Displaying a completely different persona, when he
was with me he was suddenly thoughtful and sensitive. He talked quietly and in
a different tone, using rich words and complex sentences to describe how much
he liked art and music. He wanted to paint his room and mused at length what
shade would be best and why. He didn't seem to mind long periods passing by
with nothing being said, me sitting on the lawn, him lying on his back on the
grass, arm behind his head, one knee raised, staring
at the sky with his eyes that matched its hue almost exactly. His voice was
getting deeper and his shoulders broader. He was becoming a man but he still
had the same boyish mischief in his blue eyes.
There was something happening here. Something between us; and we both knew it.
I knew it because of the way I felt inside when he lay on the grass silently
near me, the pangs I felt when I heard his father yelling at him for seemingly
no reason, Oddly perhaps, I understood and fully accepted the way he completely
ignored me when he passed with his pals; I didn't mind at all; without ever
discussing why, we both completely understood respected the need for mutual
anonymity when he was with his same-age friends.
But especially worrying to me was the feeling I had when I realized I didn't
want my wife to know that he had grown to like me and that I was growing fond
of him. Sometimes he brought his tape player so I could hear music he wanted to
share. As we listened and talked quietly our hands would touch together, and my
hand might rest briefly on his calf or on his foot, I could claim it was
accidental but it wasn't.
One summer evening late at dinnertime I saw him sitting alone on his front
steps, eyes cast at the ground. "Nick?" I asked "Did you have
dinner yet?"
He shook his head "no". His parents had gone on a trip and he was
home alone for three days. They had left him food and money for pizza, but he
didn't feel like eating any of it. "Come eat with us." I offered. My
wife had made pot roast, and Nick gladly joined us at our table that night.
Brandon, now in kindergarten, was delighted to have Nick in our house.
"Sit next to me?" he chirped, face aglow.
Nick ate like he was a starved man. I was surprised at the amount he put away-
and he drank at least three glasses of milk. "This is so good" he
told my wife. "May I have a little more?" While I was glad to see him
eat, my heart hurt for him because even though he had friends, I sensed a deep
loneliness in him. He looked into my eyes and smiled. "Thanks Brad"
he said.
After Brandon had gone to bed and my wife did the dishes, Nick stayed for a
while to watch TV. He sat near me on the sofa and his shoeless foot strayed to
rest near my leg. I patted it, and he moved even closer to me. I reached out to
hold his foot in my hand and he didn't move it away. I gently fondled his foot
through his sock, outlining every toe and rubbing his sole. I caressed his
instep and his ankle. I stroked his bare shin and noticed that though this was
the first place a boy grows hair as he was becoming a man, that he still had
very little there, just a few wisps.
Then I heard my wife approaching and quickly, instinctively, moved my hand
away, but I needn't have worried. He moved his foot away just as quickly so
that she wouldn't see. Like me, he too knew that she wouldn't understand and
must not see, though we had never shared a word about it. My blood rose with
the realization that he too felt something strange, that something less than
innocent-feeling must be stirring inside him too.
My wife had long been nagging me to paint the cellar walls, a job I dodged
every time she brought it up. The ceiling was low, and worst of all there was a
narrow crawlspace that needed to be painted that I could barely fit into.
Finally, she came up with a suggestion that made my heart leap at the thought.
"Why don't you pay Nick to do it?" she suggested. "He's small
and agile enough to fit in the tight spots and he'd probably like to earn some
money."
I couldn't wait to ask Nick to do the job. I went up to his house and knocked
on the door, and it was answered by his dull father who invited me inside. I
explained to him what I wanted, and without allowing me to even finish, he
turned to bellow into the house for Nick to come downstairs. I had never been
in his house before. I glanced around and saw photos of people I assumed were
his older siblings on the walls and tables. A photo of a smiling Nick wearing
his red First Holy Communion robe sat on the shelf, and I was astounded as I
realized how much he had grown up in just a few years time since then.
Nick bounded down the steps and the glow on his face indicated he was delighted
to see me. His dad turned and immediately exited the room, clearly
disinterested in being involved in my proposal, leaving me alone with his son
to discuss what I wanted done. Nick eagerly agreed and we set the date for that
coming Saturday. He arrived right on time wearing torn jeans and a faded t-shirt,
a crooked baseball cap on his head covering most of his curly hair. Together we
went to the cellar to begin work.
I worked on painting the edges and kept the paint bucket full. Nick climbed
into the crawl space and began to work there. We didn't talk much but being
alone and so close with him made my mind fill with thoughts of things about him
I wanted to know. We met periodically at the paint bucket to refill our pans. I
asked him about hockey and school and he provided short answers to my questions.
I asked him about his family, calling out that I noticed how his dad seemed not
to care much for him, and he looked away and shrugged. It was clear he didn't
want to talk about this. "I dunno what's with
him. He is always tired and he doesn't have much patience with me", Nick
admitted. I asked him if he had a girlfriend and he shook his head
"no". He returned to his work and I waited, took a deep breath and
then I asked him what I really wanted to know.
"Do you like girls, Nick?"
Looking away from me stopped painting for a moment, his arm frozen in position.
I could tell his mind was working and that the right answer wasn't coming
easily to him. Then after a brief period of heavy silence he shook his head
almost imperceptibly. As I had suspected, the answer was no.
I knew it would be.
I sensed in him the same emptiness and pain that was there
in me at his age, the pain I still felt presently in the rare occasions when I
really was honest with myself. I could tell from so many clues he offered that
another non-kindred spirit would have missed, ones his father surely never saw
at all. It was the way he talked harsh and tough around his friends, using a
surly tone and bad grammar, yet spoke in a completely different, quieter voice
to me. The way he let me rub his arm or grip his hand sometimes just for a
moment when we were near each other, small lingering glances into each others'
eyes that lasted fractionally longer than "normal" guys will do. But
I especially remembered that time a few months before when we had wrestled for
the football on the lawn, laughing, scrambling, me trapping him underneath with
my size, then allowing him to get on top to wrestle some more, finally
collapsing in laughter – then lying cheek to cheek, with him in my arms, our wrestling
hold having turned into an embrace as we held each other close for just a few
moments, a few moments longer than guys are supposed to, him trembling as I
breathed in his beautiful smell, pressing my lips to his hair, his arm clasped
around my back then burying his face in my neck and chest... just for a few
moments.
There in the dark basement, paint splattered on our hands and cheeks, he had
just let me in on his deepest secret, one I am positive he had never breathed
to another soul. Staring at a spot ahead on the wall, his brush still
motionless, I replied to him.
"I know. Me too."
We resumed painting and finished the work, and my wife was pleased with the
job. I took him to lunch at Taco Bell as a reward, and he ordered a family pack
of six tacos and, chattering happily as he ate all of them but one, I watched
and just glowed with warm happiness.
I had found someone else just like me.
******
I didn't ask him any more questions about it because I didn't need to; I
already knew all I needed to know. He still acted exactly the same towards me
as before, and I smiled inwardly as I more clearly observed his two faces—that
tough one he showed his friends and the tender one he exposed to me. I imagined
him as a younger version of me, and we both obviously knew the rules without
speaking them aloud... keep your terrible secret safe and you can live a normal
life. No one else had to know what we knew about each other, because Real Men
didn't need to talk things out. After all, I was living proof, married and
happy, wasn't I? That's the way things were supposed to work out. There was no
need to ever be foolish, lisping, limp-wristed fairies, no reason to be open to
anyone else about the bitter poison in your soul. And when the feelings of
desire and lust rose to unbearable heat as they sometimes did, the fire could
be quelled with pornography and masturbation or a quick liaison with another
person you met. There was never any need to talk it out. I could help him learn
that, I imagined; help him like no one else could.
Sitting one day on the lawn I asked him if he liked to read hot stories.
"What kinds?" he asked.
"You know, like in Penthouse, the Letters section," I said.
He nodded. "Yeah, I like that", he admitted with a shy smile, playing
with a shoelace.
I smiled too. I had been introduced to this when as a teenager. I had
volunteered to work at the Marching Band's paper recycling trailer at the high
school. Stacking the papers people left, I had come across a treasure trove of
pornography, dozens of Penthouse magazines. While the pictures of the girls
were mildly interesting to me, I found the Letters sections to be especially
exciting, as there people often told stories that were twisted and kinky,
sometimes with a same-sex theme. I brought home as many as I could safely carry
without discovery, and through my later teens I read and reread my favorites
again and again, experiencing the thrill in the realization that other people
had kinky fantasies too, taking silent comfort that I was not alone in my
depravity. As an adult, I again had amassed a small stash of books that
contained these types of stories and I kept them carefully hidden, using them
to masturbate with when I needed an urgent release.
After we threw the ball around for a while, his mother called him for dinner.
He turned to leave, but then turned back and said, "remember,
you said you had some books for me?" I was secretly pleased... he was
obviously interested in sex and was unashamed that I knew. "I'll get them,
wait here". I ran into the house and picked a few and hid them in a brown
grocery bag for him to carry. I made sure that the one was in there that I
liked the most, the one that detailed a story of twin teenaged brothers who
became lovers, explaining their sexual contact in graphically explicit detail.
"Thanks!" he called as he sprinted away with his prize. I couldn't
help but imagine him later that that night, surely locked in his room and
masturbating furiously to the same stories that turned me on; perhaps climaxing
to exactly the same parts I liked.
When I saw him a week or so later I asked him if he liked the books.
"Yah," he smiled. I asked him if he liked the story about the
brothers, and he blushed bright red and said, "I
especially liked that one." I messed up his curly hair. "You are a
horny little dude", I said. He just smiled back at me and blushed some
more.
All I wanted at his age was to be understood. Understood, and then accepted.
But I knew how unlikely this was, because I knew well by then that my sexual
urges were perverted and gross. That fact had been confirmed to me in Boy Scout
camp when I was only 13, when I had been caught staring longingly at an older
boy getting dressed. Apparently one of the boys had noticed me watching him
dress the first night, and the next night they had planned a ruse. Everyone was
told to watch me, and the handsome boy was instructed to begin to undress then
to move just outside my line of vision. Stealthily, I thought, I climbed down
from my bunk to get a better view, my gaze never once wavering from my idol. He
was a tall, fair, finely muscled boy who to me was nearly a man. I had never
seen muscles on another boy's chest and abdomen like his, and seeing him even
briefly nude was a reward I craved more than anything else I could have
imagined. I gasped a little as I saw his penis suddenly exposed, it was
beautiful and long, bobbing slightly and so much more perfect than I dared
imagine. I drank him in aggressively and with all my might since I knew in a
few moments it would all be over. But still deep in concentration I was stunned
to hear the room erupt around me in laughter and catcalls. Snapping rudely out
of my self-inflicted trance, I realized with a knife of horror that they were
laughing at me; a dozen sets of eyes trained on mine, tracing my gaze directly
to the other boy's naked loins; a dozen boys who had at once all discovered my
fatal defect. If I could have died and disappeared I would have, right there. I
never went back to Scouts after that.
I never wanted that sort of humiliation to happen to Nick. I wanted him to know
he was not alone in the world and that I understood him. I could teach him how
to hide using all the tricks I had mastered. No one had to learn he was flawed,
especially the terrible way I had been discovered. Since that awful day I had
worked hard and learned to play it straight – and things had gone well for me.
I could guide him on the same path.
One night when we were set to go out to dinner with another couple, the baby
sitter called at the last minute to cancel. My wife was in a panic. "Call
Nick and see if he can come instead" she suggested, and I eagerly dialed
the phone. Nick was indeed available, and he showed up at the door moments
later. I let him in and sat with him by the TV while my wife dressed.
Completely alone, I knew I could get very close to him, something we clearly
avoided when anyone else was present. He sat on the edge of the sofa and I sat
on the edge of the chair next to him, our knees touching "Cool!" he
said, spying a new car magazine on the coffee table and he picked it up and
started thumbing through it on his lap.
"Let me show you something in there", I offered, sliding nearer to
him and turning the book on his lap diagonally so we could both see it. Reaching
over, I turned the pages looking for an article I wanted him to see, but I
froze the minute I brushed against his trousers. At once, I felt it there,
stiff and erect, probing straight up. My breath caught suddenly in my throat
and I stopped talking midsentence, my words and thoughts wiped cleanly away.
He left the open book over his lap, and both of us swallowing hard, I very
carefully, very slowly, very deliberately began to tenderly feel him there, my
hand disconnected from my brain and unable to pull away. Showing no alarm, he
slowly flipped pages of the magazine, pretending to look at the pictures but I
am sure that he saw nothing, as his eyes had lost their focus just as mine had.
He was wearing Levis 501s over boxers I soon found out, because when I probed
his fly, my little finger slipped easily between two of the buttons.
And instantly I found it. It was right there, right below the brass buttons, poking warmly up through the opening in his boxers. We both drew breath simultaneously at the contact, and moving my extended finger around, I felt the velvet circumcised head, the tiny slit at the tip, his thick straight shaft and probing just a little deeper, the fuzzy patch of silk at its base. He shifted his weight a little, allowing me better access and reaching deeper still my fingers found the top of his soft balls, pushed up and nestled just below. My heart hammered, and as he flipped slowly through the pages I caressed and fondled his penis with a single finger, feeling every inch while trying to imagine how it looked and how it would feel on my face, in my mouth.
With caution and trepidation I watched as his flipping caused him to reach the end of the magazine. I knew that this would surely be the end of this short dream, and at very least that he'd use this as the chance to get up, move away and put an end to this illicit contact which he surely would want to stop. I only hoped that his reaction would be civil, it hadn't even occurred to me how much trouble I would be in if he was angry and made his feelings known.
Instead, I was intoxicated to see that he immediately
flipped back again to the beginning of the book starting over with page one and
giving me more time—and more importantly the tacit permission to explore him
further.
"Nick, is this OK?" I whispered with my voice quivering more than I
wanted it to.
"Yah, it's OK", He answered quietly.
I wanted to unbutton him, even if just one button, allowing him to poke free
and so I might see the prize exposed, if only for a moment, after all this
situation would likely never be repeated: and I'd never again have the chance
but I didn't dare, and it was a good thing I didn't since my wife appeared at
the doorway a moment later, fastening her earrings and telling me that we would
be late if we didn't leave now.
"Nick, there's soda in the refrigerator and the number of where we will be
is next to the phone if you need us", she said as she walked back towards
the front door. I stood up, patting Nick on the shoulder as I left.
"You are cool, Nick" I said to him so only he
could hear.
"You too" he replied softly to me.
I don't remember what I did the rest of that night, not where we ate, who we
were with, what we did after, what was said. I could only think of him. My
thoughts spun inside my head making me disoriented, dizzy and even feeling
drunk, I imagined how our relationship might grow, Nick and me, and how lucky I
was to have him and him to have me. Without even discussing it he clearly knew
that we'd have to keep this a secret and I knew he would. I knew I could keep
it together too. After all, look how far I had come with my secrets intact. I
thought of other jobs at the house he could help me with, legitimate reasons we
could be together that wouldn't arouse suspicion.
When we returned home I paid him and walked him home, mostly because I wanted
one final word with him alone. "Are you OK, Nick?"
I asked as we stood in front of his house.
He seemed nonplussed. "Sure I'm OK", he replied "We're
good."
Will you come back again? I asked
Of course he would, he answered. Then he was gone inside his front door.
***********************
One unusually warm day that winter, while walking the dog, I saw him in his
driveway washing his father's car and I stopped to talk. Slyly and suggestively
I told him that my wife would be out for the afternoon, and I casually
suggested that he come by. At first he didn't reply, as he kept rubbing the
soapy sponge on the car hood, and in my insecurity I wondered if he was having
second thoughts about being friends with me.
"I need to take a shower first," he said.
Not wanting him to delay his visit I assured him that this
wasn't necessary, but he replied that it was very important to him. "I
like to feel clean", he said. I was slightly aroused as I wondered to
myself why this was; what he thought would happen that he needed to be clean
for, I mused that he wanted to look and smell his best for me, but also
strongly considered that he was using this as an excuse to delay his visit or
not come at all.
But when her car pulled out of the drive, not ten minutes later he was at my
door, fresh from the bath. "I have a tape of a new song I want you to
hear" he cheerfully suggested. We put the music on the stereo and sat on
the sofa to listen.
I don't remember the exact moves that followed, One minute we were sitting on
the sofa, then suddenly reaching out to him we were holding each other tightly,
my fingers in his damp hair, his face buried in my chest. I wanted to, but I
didn't dare kiss him on his mouth- I was terrified of how he might react. I
recalled vividly my own feeling of the taboo, knowing well that I hadn't kissed
another guy till I was 19, and before that how horrified I had been at that age
by the thought of crossing the line showing mushy affection I perceived as weak
and feminine.
But I wanted to see his cock, and I needed to see it right away. Wasting no
time I hooked my fingers in the stretchy waistband of his silky sweatpants and
pulled. He clearly had no objection. Without any hesitation, he lifted his butt
off the sofa to assist my conquest, his pants came sliding off to show that he
was wearing navy blue gym shorts underneath, and I could see and feel his long
lean and smooth, practically hairless legs.
I felt between his thighs and with no surprise I found that he was already
aroused and quite erect. Reaching for his waistband of his shorts he met me
halfway, pushing his cotton shorts and the boxers beneath them down to his
thighs, and I saw it exposed for the first time.
In telling my stories, I have seldom stopped for a deep description of the
moment of seduction, talking more instead about how I felt than what I saw. I
will make an exception here.
His body was absolutely beautiful, in fact the most beautiful male form I have ever seen. The fair skin of his torso looked like it was sculpted from marble, smooth and unblemished, peaches and cream, and with his abdominal muscles defined and rippling just slightly underneath as he moved. He did not have the overdone look of a bodybuilder, rather he had the body of youth whose muscle tone came from honest activity: organized sports, climbing trees, foot races, biking and ice skating, as perfect as a teenaged model on an Abercrombie and Fitch catalog cover, except he was not airbrushed to perfection; he just was. His navel was shallow, symmetrical and perfect. His thighs were slim yet powerful, and at the locus where these elements all joined together was the most beautiful and perfectly proportioned erect penis I imagined I had ever seen, just less than six inches standing erect and carved from white ivory, adorned with a small tightly woven patch of brown silk at its base, and graced beneath by a set of beautiful round balls that nestled below, beside each other in their soft sack.
But looking up into his face was where the most erotic sight awaited. His expression might have shown some lust, but was primarily one of peace. There was not a single sign of stress in his entire being. His eyes, half closed, were focused on mine as I looked up at him. His lips were slightly parted and formed a relaxed smile, his cheeks slightly flushed, and his nostrils flared just the tiniest bit with each quickened breath. I watched his smoothly muscled chest rise and fall, and I allowed my gaze to slowly travel from the top of his curly blond head all the way down to his bare thighs and then back up again, scarcely daring to believe that this was happening, that all these parts were of one body, and that he was giving his body to me, trusting me to have it however I wanted. I never dared dream that this opportunity would present itself, but here it was.
He leaned back, and I positioned myself in front of the sofa kneeling facing him, my chest between his knees. My face inches from his nakedness, I felt every inch of what I had only dreamed of ever seeing or touching in the flesh. He felt like velvet, there and all over, his skin was supple and hadn't acquired any of the leathered toughness that accompanied later manhood. Looking up at his face I saw his flushed cheeks, and reaching up to feel them I was greeted by their downy softness. Looking at his cock an inch from my face I could watch it and see his heartbeat inside, as it twitched almost imperceptibly with each pulse. I caressed his cock and he twisted his body with pleasure from my touch, encouraging me to rub him with gentle friction that he craved. My face so close, I could sense the musky heat radiating from between his legs and feel his breath coming, I could even hear the sound of my palm wrapped around his shaft, rubbing his smoothness close enough that I could have tasted it if I wanted to, and I did.
I sucked it deep into my mouth once, top to bottom, then
twice, finding that it fit nicely and tasted sweet and clean, flicking my
tongue at the tiny opening at its tip.
He flattened his palms on the sofa and raised his hips to meet my lips,
thrusting his cock as deeply as it would go into my mouth. I pulled off because
I wanted to enjoy watching him. I
decided I wanted to make this last, and taking my hot mouth away, I gripped his
muscled firmness in my fist, and rubbed slowly up and down, but just a few
times, looking forward to edging him and eventually bringing him to a powerful
climax.
But he didn't cooperate. in just a few moments' time,
certainly less than even a minute, squirming and twisting, suddenly and
unexpectedly he was cumming, squirting several ribbons of his thick white
liquid all over my hands and his belly. "ooooohhhh- " he moaned quietly in a mix of surprise and pleasure
I was amazed but a little sorry that he had climaxed so
fast; I hardly had any time to enjoy drinking him in as I masturbated him.
"Ohhh jeez!" he said in a whisper; I
doubted he had expected to climax this fast. But for all my disappointment, I
was secretly thrilled and suddenly highly aroused that my touch alone had
caused him to lose control so quickly. "Sorry!" he said.
I surveyed the damage. He had made three good squirts, two of them on his tummy
one across my fingers that drizzled into his fuzzy patch. I drew the conclusion
from the modest size of his emission that he probably masturbated regularly.
This was no pent up flood, and that image excited me as well. Without a
second's hesitation I reached out my tongue to taste him, and didn't stop till
he was completely clean.
It is in this moment between two guys, especially in a
seductive situation like this that the mood is the most fragile, that good
feelings can turn suddenly bad. Guys don't mean to be that way, but after
coming, something in one's mood changes, and feelings of shame and guilt, even
anger can intrude in an overpowering flood without warning. But Nick just
opened one eye and smiled at me, then closed it again. He made no move to cover
up, no move to want to get away. "Sorry dude." He repeated. "I
can go again, don't worry."
Turned on beyond belief at what I had just witnessed, I fumbled with my belt,
and unzipping I roughly unsheathed my own cock and kneeling an inch from his
teenaged cock, still tasting him on my lips I began to rub myself, grabbing a
handful of tissues just in time from the table before I exploded all over
myself. As aroused as I was at what had
just happened, the concern of what was legal and what was not entered my mind.
I was dully aware that although my young partner was
physically mature, I wasn't about to take the further chance for trouble by
urging him to have sexual contact with me in case he had severe second thoughts
about what we had done later.
There was a football game on the TV and we pretended to watch, leaning against
each other, still half undressed, me holding him close, my hands on his chest
and on his naked cock. I was amazed at his peace. I was sure that if I had been
in this spot, at his age, with an older man, I would have panicked by about
now, at very least wanting to get dressed and covered up, and probably wanting
to get away to process alone, at home, and in my own head what had just
happened. But Nick acted completely
unconcerned as he sat nakedly exposed in my arms.
Suddenly snapping alert, I recalled the true situation--
that my son was napping, my wife had gone shopping and could come home at any
moment unexpectedly, and what we were doing was in full view of the windows,
open to the back yard had anyone looked our way! I turned to Nick and urged him
to pull his pants back up, and he did, though he left them loosely untied, and
as we watched more of the game, I still held him and now and again I would slip
my hand inside to feel his penis, mostly just to watch myself do it and prove
to myself that he really would let me have him again if I wanted; that this
hadn't just been a dream.
We sat close together for a few minutes, synchronizing our breathing, bodies
close and touching, just feeling each other's warmth. I was in a place more
peaceful than heaven. Nick was mine, and everything was alright with the world.
As we sat I asked him quiet personal questions that now seemed perfectly
appropriate and normal—how often he masturbated, if he had ever been caught and
how he had learned. He answered me without shame, asking me a few questions of
his own in return, again surprising me at how calm and at ease he was with our
presence together. I was left wondering if he had done this before, with
another man or older boy, perhaps with a cousin or an older brother?
Just a few moments later, I found myself aroused again and again lost any hold
on my sense of reality. Reaching down between his legs, I made him hard again
inside his shorts, and after stroking him softly, again with his willing help,
I had kneeled on the floor between his spread knees, turned him to face me and
stripped his pants down again with his help, this time pushing them below his
knees. Laying him back on the couch I kidded him "Think you can hold out
longer this time?" He laughed. I loved him.
He let me have my way with him, he tasted of sex and clean soap and water, and
this time I wanted him to come in my mouth. I caressed him in the most sensual
ways, not only using my hands, but my lips and tongue, moistly, hot and wet,
sucking deeply for almost ten minutes, backing off and easing up every time he
seemed to be getting close, till I finally pushed him over the edge and, with
his fingers wound in my hair and his cock buried deep in my throat, he at last
exploded with a groan of relief. I knew what I was doing, and I knew that I had
pleased him. His sperm had filled my throat first, and then my mouth and it
tasted sweet, salty and a little tangy against my tongue.
When we were done, a smile on his
lips, he lay once again shamelessly naked for me to survey, and I admit that I
did, examining him up close, watching his cock sleepily deflate, finally sated,
but only temporarily drained of its energy. I smiled knowing that we'd only
need an hour before we'd both be fully ready again, but I knew that I was
already pressing my luck.
"Cummon tiger" I urged with a gentle nudge
in his ribs. "Zip up. Someone might be looking for you." And truly
just a few minutes after Nick left, little Brandon awoke from his nap and soon
thereafter my wife pulled into the drive when Nick was safely gone.
*****************
Sex with my wife was never better than after I had been with Nick. My batteries
were recharged, my pilot was brightly lit and the furnace was stoked white-hot.
I tried not to think about the fact that my sexual urges were fired by him,
instead I congratulated myself on being a better husband in bed as a result. I
felt no guilt at all being with him either. Why, other men cheated on their
wives with whores and with dangerous romantic liaisons. I simply had a young
jack off buddy who satisfied my needs. I assumed it satisfied his too, though I
never really asked him how he felt; I just assumed as long as he was still
speaking to me that we must be cool.
Our meetings weren't frequent, and I congratulated myself on this too. See, I
reasoned, I could control myself very well! I didn't "need" him every
day or even every week. But on those times when I did need him I imagine felt like
a heroin addict going through cold turkey. I couldn't think of anything else
but him; my temper grew short and my attention was consumed with schemes of how
to get together with him without arousing my wife's suspicions. By now she had
noticed something odd in the way we acted towards each other. She was a sharp
observer and a quick judge, and whatever it had been before; her attitude
towards him had changed. "I don't think you should be with him. He should
be around boys his own age, she had said. My blood pressure rose quickly with
indignant anger, and I almost said what I really felt, that he was very mature
and that at heart I was indeed nearly a boy his own age, at least almost. But I
knew better and stopped myself short.
Nearly fifteen years separated us on the calendar; and they were fifteen
important years. In that period I was married with a family, while he was still
a High School boy and had yet to go out on his own. So I said nothing;
certainly not promising to heed her warning, only resolving to myself only to
be more careful in the future so she wouldn't see us together.
One Sunday afternoon I heard a knock on the door, and it was him, standing and
smiling. I was so glad to see him my heart leapt for joy. I had been in the
garage washing my car, and as I answered the door and he came in to tell me his
father wanted to borrow a tool I had, a device that could pinpoint the location
of wall studs through the plaster.
"Sure," I said, "come in and I'll find it.
He followed me down the cellar stairs, and stood behind me as I rooted through
one drawer after another looking for the tool he needed. I found it and turned
to him with it held in hand, and was surprised at how close he was standing to
me. I reached the tool towards him, but I embraced him instead of handing it
over. I hugged him close, hard, desperately, and he lowered his head to burrow
it into my shirt. "Oh my God, Nick." I whispered. "How I've
missed you."
He didn't say a word as I turned him to lean against the table saw's workbench.
Resting back on his elbows in a pile of sawdust he spread his feet slightly,
and pushing up his hooded sweatshirt and kissing down his chest I finished by
kneeling in front of his waist. I pulled at his sweatpants and he didn't resist
at all, allowing his pants and boxers together to be roughly pulled down in one
fell swoop, exposing his beautiful cock which bobbed free and hardened fully
and quickly in front of my eyes. No words were spoken as I rubbed his throbbing
dick, exposing and pulling mine at the same time. His eyes were shut, his teeth
gritted, and I knew he was trying to hold back his orgasm, but I wanted none of
that. Rubbing him roughly, jerking him rhythmically, staring at his cock
intently, I wanted to see his climax. I didn't have long to wait, as he, leaned
his head back, shifted his feet almost losing his balance and let out a gasp of
breath and a grunt as several thick ribbons of sperm gushed out across my hands
and wrist and onto the floor. I groaned myself with guttural lust as I felt my
own climax coming. I kept my eyes fixed on his wet and dripping cock as I
jerked harder and harder, till in my moment of climax I sucked his cock deep
into my mouth tasking his sperm and I felt my own explosion simultaneously
ignite and detonate below.
He looked like an angel to me, cheeks flushed red,
disheveled in his untucked heavy flannel shirt, pants
around his knees, sawdust in his curly hair. Still leaned precariously
backwards, I helped him with his balance, stood him up and helped him pull up
his pants and I held him in my arms. "Nick I missed you so much" I
said. He held me in return, and I kissed the top of his head. He was my secret rough boy, hiding his secret
face to everybody in the world except for me.
I guided him back up the stairs, making sure he had the tool he had come for,
and I asked him to stay for a while. "I can only stay a minute" he
said. "My dad is waiting for me." I knew he needed to go, but I
didn't want him to. Sitting on our usual
spots on the sofa in the family room I explored underneath his shirt with both
hands, feeling his velvet chest, small taut nipples, rippled abs and playfully
pulling at the small damp tufts of hair that grew under his arms.
"I should go," he said just a few minutes later, and I agreed, walking
with him through the garage out to the driveway.
"Bye Nick," I said softly. "Come back again, OK?"
"Sure," he answered.
******************************
If you've been reading for the thrill and excitement of it, I'll advise you to
stop right now, and not read even one paragraph further. For it is here and now
that the consequences of my actions caught up with me. My life has never been
the same since.
***********************
Just as he turned to go, at that moment my wife's car pulled into the driveway.
I busied myself polishing a bumper, but I could feel her gaze on the back of my
neck. Calling me aside from the door inside just a few minutes later, she
demanded to know why he had been there. I told her that he had simply stopped
to say hello and to borrow a tool and hadn't even been there a minute. She
disappeared again, but after he had left and I went back in the house, like
Colombo at his best she confronted my explanation with one damning question
after another.
"Was he in the house with you?" she demanded to know.
"No", I lied. My heart suddenly hammered.
"Oh, Is that so?" She accused. "I noticed a lot of sawdust on
the sofa cushions, the same as was all over the back of his sweatshirt",
she said. I was speechless... I had been caught in a bald-faced lie and I knew
it.
"So he was here on the sofa, but first you were in the basement together
with him, right?" She correctly concluded. I stammered like a mute idiot,
blood draining to my feet, unable to contrive a lie that would pass my lips.
"And I suppose you have no clue about that stuff splattered all over the
floor by the workbench? She hissed, eyes narrowed, teeth unfurled, the word
"STUFF" spit from her mouth like a lethal dose of venomous, bitter
poison.
"Huh?" I said weekly, slumping like a coward where I stood, my
stomach doing a flip and my neck burning with adrenalin that coursed suddenly
through my veins. My body knew the jig was up before my brain did.
Her eyes flashed with fire.
"I know exactly what you did, you pervert. She screamed. He's only a
boy!"
"No, he's not" I said feebly, as I practically admitted right there
and right out loud that what she had guessed was completely true, feeling like
I would throw up, my heart thumping like a hammer so hard I feared it would
leap through my shirt and once dismembered from my body stop dead. I felt the
overpowering urge to pee like a coward would. I had never ever contemplated
this might be my end.
*******
Allow me a short diversion.
The world of erotic literature, perhaps especially gay erotic literature, is
filled with tales of the wild and daring, dangerous and unwise and often
illegal things done by people we are supposed to like. Very few stories end
when writers who point out what really can happen when their illicit private
passion becomes an open, shared risky activity.
I never thought I would be able to share this story with anyone, and in fact it
took me three years of trying to
actually put it down in writing to get this far. I'd start then stop, then read
what I had written and destroy it in disgust for how I sounded, in some cases
pathetic, in other versions arrogant and defiant, yet in every version with me
coming across somehow like a victim, when in fact I had caused my own defeat.
Like a deranged blind dog who shits where he eats, I was suddenly overcome by
loathing and disgust in the discovery of my own filth, because I had truly
never seen it before that moment.
After my wife discovered my infidelity (and that's what it was, without
question) things changed for me in nearly every aspect of my life. It would
have been one thing for her to find her husband involved in a romantic
relationship with another woman, an attractive young co-worker perhaps. But to
find him in a tryst with another male– a neighborhood boy several years from
adulthood—that would be hard for any woman to absorb. Another woman she might
comprehend. But a guy? The incomprehensible scope of
her dismay and distrust of me based on this outrageous discovery had shaken her
to the core. I lost any status and standing as a partner and equal I had with
her.
Once unmasked, my daily life at home became a living hell. I was not trusted to
be alone, even to take care of my son, and I thrust myself into therapy mostly
out of confusion and fear of losing everything I thought was important to me.
Within a week I decided to move out, partly to remove
myself from the living hell I had caused, and partly to try to figure out for
myself what to do next. I rented a small apartment in a much less desirable
part of town, furnishing it with secondhand castoffs from the attic. I soon
learned that she had contacted a divorce lawyer and was considering all her
options of dividing up our property and taking our children with her. I was
heartbroken and angry. Angry at her, yes, but angry more at myself for my
cowardice in not being able to deal with my situation before it dealt with me.
I was angry at God for making me this way, and angry at the world for seeing
homosexuality as immoral and wrong, Pick a target and I was enraged at it. I
had truly never considered the consequences of my actions, or what I had to
lose. In some ways, I was like the drunk who had managed to drive himself home
in a stupor every Saturday night for years, waking up on Sunday wondering how
he got home, whose luck suddenly and predictably ran out, killing a family on
his way, one final night.
You might shrug and say "So what—so now that he finally realized he was
gay so he should just leave her and start over." But as odd as it sounds,
that wasn't what I wanted. As crazy as it might seem – at that turning point I
was STILL unwilling to accept my sexual orientation; I looked at this as yet
just another hurdle to overcome. I still wanted to be straight and
"normal", still believed this was possible. But most of all I wanted
to be a father to my sons every day of their lives growing up, not an absentee
parent who saw them a few hours on weekends. And as strange and unbelievable as
it sounds, I really did still love my wife.
You may be wondering what happened to Nick- and I can honestly say I do not
know, and this is one of my greatest regrets. With the perspective of
hindsight, I want to make some observations on him, and on my relationship with
him, mostly filled with sadness.
Was Nick gay? I hope he was. I don't know for sure, but as blind as my sense of
moral direction had been for much of my life, my sixth sense about others'
sexual orientation was rarely wrong. I felt familiar recurring electricity when
he was near, a feeling of deep connection, of kindred affection, a deep but
unspoken understanding of his feelings and thoughts that I still, today, I
could try but not properly put into words for you. Sure, I was sexually
attracted to him. Who wouldn't be? He was cute and adorable, athletic and hot
and quite sexually willing. But more than anything I regret that instead of
being able to talk with him about his feelings and his probable sexual
confusion, I very likely compounded it immeasurably by making him my lover. In
my brain-addled mental state in those years, I truly can say I didn't know any
better, but looking back now I can only imagine what the experience and its
aftermath was like for him. I wish I could just apologize to him. But
admittedly I still want him, at least as he was.
Though in years we were far apart, emotionally we were probably exactly the
same age; I had never allowed myself to grow and mature regarding my sexuality.
I was stuck; fixed close to age 15 in my mind. I connected with him so easily
because we shared the same teenage-rooted values and ideals. I might have been
a decade and a half older but I was certainly no wiser than he was about life.
All Nick likely knew for sure is that he simply never saw me again. My wife
became cold to his family and cut off all contact. I became a recluse, no
longer playing ball, not washing the car or walking in the neighborhood with my
children (we had two sons now). Nick must have certainly noticed my sudden
disappearance from the face of the earth immediately following our last
encounter, and I am sure he concluded that something bad had happened directly
because of it, and if I can wonder further, he was probably full of fear as a
result: afraid of being exposed to the world as a depraved homosexual himself
and accused of something evil. I seriously doubt he told on me to anyone, not
because he wanted to protect me but if only because he would never have wanted
anyone to know that he was visiting me for sex, and our once-fun secret
doubtlessly had become a dark worrisome, heavy and nagging burden to him; that
whatever happened somehow he was at fault, that my sudden lack of contact
spelled rejection that meant I didn't like him anymore, that I must totally
hate him to so suddenly avoid him.
Gay teenagers have enough doubt and shame of their own inside that they don't
need the assistance of an irresponsible adult like me to pile more shit like
this on top of it.
In these past two decades years since this story took place I have learned that
my twisted ideas and dangerous acting out was based in my inability to accept
and love myself as a gay man, and that my lack of honesty with myself had
compromised almost every aspect of myself. Not every such man follows this path, in fact many gay men deplore these situations that
give "them" a bad name.
But at the moment in time this chapter ended, I might have seen a glimmer of hope, but sadly I wasn't close to being ready to turn the corner. Disgusted, depressed and alone, I turned to the only comfort I knew, more sex. As you will see in the next two chapters, I couldn't give it up, at least not yet. Like a rollercoaster off the tracks, my exciting ride was likely headed for a disastrous fall. But I just didn't seem to care.
*******************
Post script: I have found Nick again, rather by accident. Let me share the odd circumstances. What do you think I should do?
Thinking about him very fondly (and admittedly lustfully), I absently put his name into Google to see what I would find. His name is an incredibly common one, so there were literally thousands of hits that came up. I went to one of the reunion/people search engines that advertises on TV, and I put his name and his year of high school graduation in to see what I'd get back. I was rewarded with at least a hundred hits that could have been him. I poked around for a few minutes, reading vague profile information that told me little. Finally, common sense prevailed and a silent voice screamed at me from inside my head, "Brad, what the hell are you doing?"
I shut the browser down and went back to my work. But then something very strange happened. A few hours later, an email appeared in my inbox—from Nick, my Nick! It said "Are you looking for me? Why?" The blood rushed to my head. I wrote back to him immediately. "How did you know I was looking for you?" I asked. "But I am so glad to hear from you."
He wrote back a message that from its formatting I could tell had been composed on a mobile device. He replied, "My wife called me at work. She wanted to know who Brad Healey was. I was really surprised and upset. Where are you now? What happened to you so many years ago? I would love to know if you would tell me?" I learned he was 32, married with three small children. This fact surprised me not a bit
I was freaked out. And then I pieced together what had likely happened. The web site I had used to search his name advertises that you can go there to see "who has been searching for you?" I realized that in my few minutes of searching. I must have accidentally touched on his profile without knowing it. This insidious website then sent a message, assumedly to his home email address, proclaiming "Nick, Brad Healey is looking for you! Click here to find out more." His wife opened that message, and called him immediately at work to find out what was going on.
Though I wrote back another message asking him more details about his life, he would only reply and say "I am too upset right now and I need to let this settle." I have not heard from him in almost two months.
I am not surprised that he is married. Why? Because all tough Catholic boys from my old blue-collar town get married, regardless of what they might "be" inside. "My kids mean the world to me," he had said. He didn't say "I love my wife and I am so happy." I want so much to contact him again, tell him I want to see him and that whatever his circumstances I will accept and understand him. And I must wonder, why on earth would his wife have called him at work to ask him why a random stranger had searched out his profile? My own wife, who is justifiably suspicious of me based on my past indiscretions would have viewed such a message as junk mail, and would not have even mentioned it to me, let alone called me at work to ask me about it.
What do you think about that? And what would you do?