Date: Mon, 22 May 2023 02:03:39 +0000
From: FM352 <FM352@proton.me>
Subject: The Naked Man (complete story)

If you decide to give this story a go -- it's leisurely, consciously
literary, and only spasmodically pornographic -- and decide that it's
worthy, please let me know.  If you have questions, I'll happily entertain
them.  Courtesy demands that I respond quickly and thoughtfully.

I worked hard on this one. I just hate the thought that I'm pissing into
the Void.

FM352@proton.me

The Naked Man

1995

The man scooped up the blanket and stuffed it into his backpack. He turned
away from me to dress. I watched him pull on a pair of cargo shorts and
slip into some Birkenstocks. I didn't move, couldn't move. I was
momentarily paralyzed, oblivious to the patchy grass on my bare and burning
ass, a patina of sweat, saliva, and still-drying cum on my summer-brown
chest. I tried to say something, to remind him that while he'd hurt me
pretty bad, I was okay, just fine, really, that I'd asked for it, that I'd
wanted it all along. But that fully-formed thought stuck in my
windpipe. The clotted sound that came out instead was more wounded animal
than American adolescent.

Now fully dressed, the man turned back to face me.  He smiled, shook his
head, then put his index finger to his lips -- the universal signal for
silence. Perhaps because he was so much older than I was he understood
there was nothing left to say, that what we had just done could not be
undone, and that I would have to find those words some other time. He then
put his hand on my shoulder, a last gesture of reassurance that life would
go on for both of us. He brushed away a loitering teardrop with that same
omniscient finger. I wanted more than anything at this moment for the man
to wrap his thick arms around my still-naked body and hold me close one
last time. I imagined a last kiss, the back-lit final scene from some
cheesy movie. Parting is such sweet sorrow and all that.

It was not to be.  The man smiled at me again -- it was his habit when he
was out of words -- then trundled off into the afternoon, disappearing into
the trees, gone forever in an instant, a vapor trail on the horizon. I
sighed and fought back fresh tears, managing somehow to acknowledge to
myself that I was a hot mess and needed to get moving.  I wiped myself
clean with my black Calvin undies. My married sister, Elena, had given them
to me for my birthday -- not as a gag, but as evidence that I wasn't a
little boy anymore. She'd chuckled when I unwrapped the package, telling me
with what I understood to be pride that if I seriously wanted to model for
Wilhelmina, I'd better get some fashion sense. Fat chance, I'd told her
then, but I understood she had no reason to lie to me. Big sisters don't
flatter as a means to an end. I tossed the stained briefs with a flourish
into some nearby bushes, and got dressed. I'd have to freeball my way back
to town. An hour before, this might have seemed like a delicious
transgression, letting the breeze whistle up the legs of my shorts and
tickle my bits, but now it was simple necessity. My life had changed
forever, I knew that much. I surveyed one final time the clearing in the
woods where I'd just discarded the last toys of my childhood, and headed
back to Ponferrada.

I'd never asked the man his name, though if I had I suspect he might have
lied-- as I also had a few times on that July afternoon almost 30 years
ago, as most of us do when staring down the barrel of an uncomfortable
truth. It's what I've done my whole life when common sense takes flight and
I make a fool of myself. His name didn't really matter anyway. In an hour
he had become indelible, a birthmark, a part of me forever. He was destined
to live on in my memory as The Naked Man, and even though I've replayed
that afternoon a thousand times, until now I have not told anyone the story
about what he did with me -- or rather what we did with each other.

___________________________



I'd turned 16 in May.  If somebody had guessed 13, I could have understood
their reasoning. I'd never heard the word, of course, but I was
unquestionably androgynous.  Lay on a little blush and some lip gloss, some
mascara to frame my hazel eyes, and you might have said, "pretty girl, that
one." Delicate, gamine even, though if one of my smart-ass friends had ever
said any of this to my face, I'd probably have punched him. Punch first,
apologize later was my M.O. at the time. Yes, this late-bloomer could have
lived in peace without the burden of epicene beauty.

Like most kids I struggled to figure out exactly what I wanted from my
life, but I already knew one thing for certain: I was all boy, all the
time. 46,XY. No question about that. So, too, my fever dreams: all boys,
all the time. Every once in a while, as an experiment in heterosexuality, I
tried sneaking a hologram of Natalie Portman into the mix, imagined Julia
Stiles by my side whispering lines from Othello into my ear. Didn't really
do the trick. I tried hard to convince myself that this gay thing was just
a phase, that I'd hook up soon enough with the drop-dead girl in Geometry
class. Alas, when my dick was stiff in my grip at 3:00 AM, not one single
girl ever appeared in the video streaming in the ether above me. Dicks,
I've come to learn, speak true.

Happily, my balls had dropped a while back and my voice had dropped down
with them. And while I was still ectomorphic, I was strong and healthy. My
shoulders had broadened noticeably and my pecs were starting to thicken. I
had biceps-in-training and soccer-player calves. Anyone with a degree in
physiology could see that soon enough, after the testosterone finished its
elongated mission, I'd be one tough-ass motherfucker.  One tough-ass gay
motherfucker, to be honest, though in 1995 I hadn't yet mastered the
concept of honesty.

Anyway, this was the boy who accompanied his mother to her homeland in
early July. Her father, my abuelo Quino, was calling it quits on a long,
good life, and she had joined her siblings at his bedside. They had
gathered to grieve the inevitable, bury him, and settle accounts. I could
have stayed home in Sacramento with my dad, spending the heart of the
summer lounging at the pool or playing Virtua Fighter 2, but she seemed to
need me. Even then something about Spain whispered to me, so I tagged
along.

There wasn't much for a kid like me to do in Ponferrada.  Recognizing this,
the grown-ups tried to keep me occupied, though their hearts were otherwise
engaged. My mother took me on an overnight to visit cousins in the capital
city of Leon, where I got buzzed on cañas at the corner bar and rode
criminally unsafe rides at the feria. My Tio Lázaro took me fishing
at the pantano, sensing I needed a little guy-time. Otherwise, I sat in my
room and read books. I wasn't unhappy, just unmoored. I'd spoken Spanish
all my life, so this was not an issue, but even back home in California on
the mean streets of Lakeside, where everybody but the nanny spoke English
and had a Beemer, I didn't walk up to strangers and ask, "do you want to be
my friend?" If potential friends were out there, they appeared to be hiding
from me. So, most days I spent alone.

I discovered walking.  Ponferrada is great for walking.  I rarely had a
destination of any consequence (the chino for chips and litros of soda, the
open-air market near the Plaza Mayor to buy fruit and cheap CD's from the
gitanos), but I found that the more I walked the better I felt -- and the
better I was able to process the mess going on in my pointy little
head. Sometimes I'd walk two miles to the edge of town and across the
highway to the foothills before turning back and heading home to Tia
Carmen's place. I almost never got lost in the twist of streets in the Old
City, and I started what has become a lifetime obsession with finding
secret places, caves, copses and bowers, blind alleys, culverts, places
where, I imagined, I could hide out for a few minutes and dive into my
expanding portfolio of daydreams.

The local kids stared at me, or at least I felt their eyes boring into my
back when I passed by. The guys whistled at the pretty-boy
streetwalker. The girls behind them whistled, too. They called me guiri,
pijo, puto maricon and worse, not knowing I understood every syllable. They
knew I was American and they discerned I was rich. My baggy shorts were
Patagonia and my Jordan's were legit. That was enough to excite them. They
didn't intend harm, they didn't really hate me, they were just marking
territory. Still, I picked up my pace whenever I passed a pack on the
street. I saw these kids -- my age or possibly younger -- as more nuisance
than nemesis, but caught between the urge to flick then off and turning
around, I always opted to walk right past them with what I hoped was a
credible smile. I often wondered if I had gone up to the Alpha, the big,
thick sneering boy with the soul-patch, and introduced myself, if he
wouldn't have invited me to join them. Bueno, majete, bienvenidos a
Ponferrada! Te presento a mis compañeros. Como te llamas, guiri?
What ees jor name? Quieres que te chupe la polla?

Do you want me to suck your dick? Yes, I would have answered. I'd love for
you to suck my dick, I really would.  In fact, that's exactly what I've
wanted for some time now. Pues,de todos modos me llamo Alejo. Alejo
Montero. Y sí, soy guiri. Welcome to Ponferrada, indeed.

As I've said, though I was 16, I was only about nine months into
puberty. Whisker-free.  Corn silk on my arms and legs, but nary a wisp
sprouting in my pits. I'd grown a patch of thick brown curlies down there
(thank God), but had he decided to go down on me, the boy with the
soul-patch might first have asked, "sure you're old enough, faggot?"

And then when he saw it, his eyes would have bulged out of their
sockets. He might have marveled at the thing he was set to consume.  It was
big. Well, not big exactly, as in thick and bulky like a gourd, but
extremely long, tapered at the end like a Rocket Pop, a dangler to be
reckoned with in any case.  My friend Danny had dubbed it The Schlong, as
if it were a creature from another planet. "Tripod! Tripod!" they'd all
whisper when the girls were in earshot, supposing (incorrectly) this public
revelation might embarrass me. "Watch out, here comes Capitán
Kielbasa!" I shrugged it off, pretty sure even then that this was envy
talking. I had no valid point of comparison, anyway -- except to theirs,
and that was a statistically insignificant sampling. The internet was still
in its infancy then. The Monteros had cutting edge dial-up at the time, so
I hadn't yet had occasion to confirm on gay porn sites that my dick was,
well, ninth decile. I thrilled to what a big dick might portend once I grew
up and practiced with it. I was equally terrified I might be a freak.

And then there was the foreskin thing. Or nineskin as Danny cleverly put
it, appropriate in his mind as a disguise for The Schlong. Most of my
buddies were circumcised.  I thought their dicks looked vaguely damaged
with that hem stitched around the head, but I suppose I would have played
happily with any of them if they'd been offered to me.  A couple of curious
types had actually asked me what it was like to sport a hoodie. I wanted to
tell them, but then I would have had to show them, let them touch it and
slide it gently back and forth over my Bing-cherry glans, and that would
have been super gay, and then I would have been exposed before I was ready,
compromised for the rest of high school, at least. Capitán Kielbasa
was an aardvark. El Capitán wore a turtleneck. The moment I
persuaded myself my dick was no big deal, it seemed to rise up and
contradict me.  I needed to find out just how big, and that would
necessitate busting a move sometime soon. My penis was starting to take
over my life, and it was time to wrest back control by any means necessary.

And so on that midsummer afternoon, right after la comida, I headed
straight out of town, crossed the highway near the Puerta Principal,
scrambled up the embankment, crossed a little footbridge over a culvert,
then sprinted a quarter-mile into the woods, with one project in mind: to
go as high up the mountainside as I could in 20 minutes. There I hoped to
find a big boulder, a promontory from which I could gaze down on the town
below me in all its medieval splendor and meditate on the state of things
in my britches. For a moment I was ten years old again, dodging invisible
wildlife and enemy warriors, an intrepid young explorer, the first American
ever to scale these daunting heights. Unlike Orpheus, who could not, young
Alejo Montero kept looking back, measuring his progress, amazed at how
quickly Ponferrada was disappearing behind him.

Seemingly out of nowhere a worn path emerged.  Clearly, somebody had been
here before me.  A lot of somebodies, it seemed. So much for boldly going
where none had gone before. The adventure having fizzled, I changed course
and followed the path. There must be something to it, I thought, a trail
out here in the middle of nowhere. It must lead somewhere. It soon crossed
a stream lined with purple wildflowers. I wondered if the water was safe to
drink, figured no livestock could reach this height to crap in it, said
what the hell, and drank deep. It was delicious. I splashed my face, then
took off my Pearl Jam Vs. t-shirt and wrapped it around my waist. Nobody
anywhere to critique my lack of physique. The sun was pretty fierce on my
back, but the breeze cooled me down considerably. I was happier than I'd
been in weeks.

About 100 yards from the path I saw an outcropping of boulders that
appeared to have an unobstructed view of the valley. I clambered my way
cautiously to the highest point. I sat down on the sunbaked granite and
dangled my legs over the edge, dizzy with exhilaration. I thought to
myself, if I fall, nobody will find my body for weeks. I shuddered and
pulled back a bit from the brink. I had to pee, so I stood up, pulled out
my limp and blameless penis and launched a golden stream that splashed
loudly onto the rocks below. I'm not sure why, but this excited me. My dick
started to chub without stimulation and I thought, maybe it's telling me
it's time to bust a nut. Right then and there.  I'd been celibate for two
weeks, after all, since a polite boy like me didn't feel comfortable
masturbating in his girl cousin's childhood bedroom. I held back, told
myself there'd be time, and returned to the path.

Ten minutes later, I wandered back into the woods, and soon found myself
descending about 50 feet into a clearing about the size of a football
field, surrounded and shielded by old-growth robles. A meadow colored with
bright flowers, a living Monet in the mountains. It was there that I first
saw the Naked Man, sleeping on a blanket in the shade of the oaks, his bare
ass a beacon calling me towards him.

I could have turned around right then and there, slipped away like fawn,
and left the man to his siesta. I probably should have, this far from
civilization. But I'd been feeling strange all day, and the little
schoolteacher voice that cautioned me to mind my own business was quickly
drowned out by a much louder one telling me to go for it. That man is
naked. You like naked men. He's n-a-k-e-d, you little fuck. This had to be
a sign, a scene scripted by my restless libido. The answer to my
novenas. My destiny. What was the likelihood that the only other human
being within a three-mile radius besides a seriously horny gay boy was a
naked man taking a nap?

I tiptoed towards him, holding my breath. I didn't want to startle him, but
more than that I was stricken with wonder.  When I was no more than five
feet away, I stopped. I took inventory of his powerful backside, stunned by
the taut musculature, so different from mine, intoxicated by the sheer
adult maleness of his body, knowing instantly what I had sensed all along,
that I was chasing my grail, that God had sent me on this journey, that
this was why He'd had made me the way He did.

Sensing my presence (or a presence) the Naked Man woke up with a jolt,
shook his head, and saw me there staring at him like a child at the zoo.
He didn't scream -- after all, I'm not very threatening despite everything
I've said, and he could have crushed me like a Coke can with one mighty
hand -- but he definitely had the biggest what-the-fuck? look I'd ever seen
on his face. He was pretty cool about it, though. Didn't roll over, having
the presence of mind not to expose himself to a kid.  He grabbed his shirt,
wrapped it modestly and adroitly around his waist, and sat up.

"Sorry.  You've caught me unawares. I probably should ask you what you are
doing here, but then you might ask me the same thing." There was something
playful about him, and I recognized right away that he wasn't from around
here. His Spanish was stiff and schoolbook. He had gray-blue eyes and a
cleft chin.

"You have an accent," I said.

"I have an accent in five languages. But, yes, I'm not originally Spanish."

"Neither am I," I said.  "Well, my parents were born in Spain, and I come
here a lot, but I'm from California. That's how come I speak Spanish. I'm
staying in Ponferrada this summer."

"American.  That's crazy. We meet here in the middle of nowhere in another
country." He shifted to English. "I'm from Germany. Deutschland. Alemania."
He sounded a little British, and nothing at all like Arnold the Terminator.

"Cool. So why are you here?"

"Here on the mountain or here in Spain?"

"Here.  This field.  Sleeping.  Nak...Without your clothes. I mean, I had
to walk really far to get here. I didn't even know this valley or whatever
was here. To be honest, I don't really know where I am right now. I've been
walking for hours." I was babbling.

The Naked Man measured his words.  If he was annoyed by my sudden intrusion
into his reverie, it didn't show. If he intended to kill me, I couldn't
read it in his grin. "Well, I've come to this very spot several times. It's
quite pretty, don't you think? I'm a hiker.  Wherever I travel, I -- how do
you say it? -- wherever I travel I like to hike off the path. I found this
place a week ago. It keeps calling me back, I guess."

"Do you always sleep naked?" I asked. I was staring again. The man's body
was hard and lean, all contours and hollows.

"Well, I seem to have forgotten my pajamas, and I wasn't expecting
company." Nothing sinister in his laugh.

"Sorry.  Do you want me to leave now?" My voice sort of cracked when I said
it. "I know I'm being annoying. Everybody tells me I'm annoying. It's part
of my charm."

"Not at all, boy.  Not at all. You can stay as long as you like.  These are
your woods, too. We can share this space. There's room for both us."

"I guess so," I whispered. His German Shepherd eyes seemed to pierce all my
defenses. I suddenly shuddered, though it was 85 degrees in the shade. I
blurted, "do you like being naked?"

"Very much.  It's natural." That inscrutable smile again. I was
flustered. He most certainly was not. Voice, flatline soft.

"Then can I see you? Now? I know this sounds stupid, but I want you to be
the way you were when I first saw you from the hill. Naked."

The man stood up for the first time. He removed the shirt he'd tied on for
modesty, and revealed himself in all his considerable glory. "Here I am,
boy. Have a look," he seemed to say. My eyes traveled quickly from head to
toe, pausing a few extra seconds to take in the spectacle of his penis and
testicles.  I found them beautiful.  His dick was substantial, not quite as
long as mine, but thicker. It was slightly darker than the rest of his
skin, unlike my own, which is as white as I am.  A blue vein ran down the
side. The head just peeked out of the shortish foreskin. His balls hung
down like plums in a marble bag.  It all fit together perfectly. He could
have been 30 or 50, I've never been any good at guessing ages, but all that
hiking had kept him in great physical condition. I thought for a crazy
second that I was looking at a statue in a museum coming suddenly to life.

"May I sit down now? Now that you've finished your, uh, inspection." Still
smiling. He knew, or at least I feared he knew, there was more than simple
curiosity in my request.

"Yes, sure.  Sorry for staring.  I'm not thinking straight today. I'm not
usually so rude."

"You're thinking just fine, lad. It's not every day one meets a naked man
in the woods. Feast your eyes. And look, if you'd feel more comfortable,
you can take off your shorts, too, and then we'll both be naked. The
same. Two guys taking the sun. As we were when we came into the world."

"Uh, I don't know.  I don't think I can." I sounded whiny.

"That's okay. Whatever you wish. That's cool, ja.  I'm a grown man and
you're a kid. Don't want any strangeness here. You are, what, 13? 14? Still
changing down there, I suppose."

These words finally shook me into action. The tough-ass gay motherfucker
who rents a room near my heart bristled. "No sir. I'm sixteen, if you want
to know the truth. And I can't take off my shorts just now because I have a
boner.  An erection. And it won't go down. That's why." I exhaled a year's
worth of poison with those words. "But goddamn, I want to. I really want
to." The first tears of the day welled up in my eyes. Please don't cry, I
pleaded with myself.

"Hey, boy.  It's okay.  No hay de que. I'm just having fun with you. You're
so amazingly pret- handsome."

The awkwardness silenced both of us for a moment.  I looked down at my
knees as if they were long lost friends. He clasped his hands together,
brought them to his mouth, and blew into them.

Then suddenly I stood up, looked him straight in the eye with all the
ferocity I could muster, deciding after all these months of shame and
confusion and aching desire to dislodge the offending pebble from my
shoes. I uncinched my belt, pulled down the zipper, kicked my oversized
Patagonias off my feet.  Then I ditched my briefs.And my Jordans. And stood
there before him as he had stood before me. The Naked Man surveyed in
wonder as I morphed into the Naked Boy. Freed from captivity The Schlong
arced proudly into open space like a gatling gun on a swivel, a rainbow
trout on a five-lb. test. I knew it had never been longer, and for the
first time in my life I understood I had been blessed.

"Ach du heilige Scheibe! I didn't expect such a thing. You'll make the
girls crazy." He laughed and shook his head. "You're bigger than me, and
mein schwanz isn't, uh, small." He whistled. "You're bigger than me and I'm
45."

"There are no girls here that I can see. I'm not really into girls, I
guess," I mumbled. I almost choked on the next sentence. "I'm hard because
of you. I look at you and what I see makes me hard." Now I couldn't stop.
It was like I was throwing up Truth. "That's why I woke you up.  I wanted
to see all of you because I knew how it would make me feel. Now I want to
touch you, to see how that makes me feel. I've never touched anyone else.
Not a girl or a boy. Just myself."

"Oh my. Okay. You're homosexual, bub? Gay? Shit. That's cool. But you can't
really know that yet, junge. But I understand. I do understand. I guess you
want to know who you are. And that's good."

The Naked Man hugged me, pulled me into him.  Then he placed his giant
hands on my chin.  I thought he might kiss me, but instead he spoke to me
like the guidance counselor at a nudist camp for wayward gay teens. "Then
we'll do this thing together, ja. I don't want to lie to you. How should I
say, to misrepresent myself. I am not gay. I have an ex-wife in Munich and
two daughters in university. But I want to help you know how it feels,
these things you've been telling me about. I want you to feel good, mein
schoner junge. I want you to know yourself better. You're an odd duck, boy,
but I guess for you I can be gay for a day, if this would make you happy."

I understood despite my confessional delirium that he, too, was in an
unfamiliar place. He backed away, pulled his arms to his sides. "You can
touch me now. I'm ready. Take it."

His thick dick swelled in my hand.  I massaged it into full hardness. The
man stroked my tousled sandy hair and told me I could suck it if I
wished. I learned on the job, you might say, opening wide for the
unsheathed head, licking the mustiness from under the skin.  I went down as
far as I could before I gagged, my nose tickled by his pubic bush. I was
careful with my teeth, but I'm pretty sure I grazed the skin of the shaft a
few times, bobbing up and down.  When I got tired, I looked up at the Naked
Man. His eyes told me he was knowing pleasure.  I jacked him with some
vigor, then slowed down, pulling the foreskin over the crown, then
pinching, trying to replicate on someone else what I did so expertly with
myself. The man inhaled, then gently pushed me away.

"Come here," he commanded. He motioned me to the blanket he'd spread out on
the grass. "Let's lie down together." Our bodies, his hard and sinewy, mine
soft and embryonic, merged.  My dick collided with his pubic bone.  His
found a space between my thighs. We squirmed and contorted. And finally, as
I opened my mouth to tell him everything I was feeling, he kissed me. His
tongue probed my mouth expertly. Then my inexperienced tongue launched its
own gentle expedition.  He nibbled on my ear, so I nibbled on his.  His
tongue flicked and flitted its way down my chest, a hummingbird buzzing the
honeysuckle.  He tweaked my little nipples between his thumb and index
finger for a few seconds, then tugged at them as gently as he could manage
with his teeth. This was simultaneously painful and delightful, which, I
would soon learn, is the essence of intimacy, the stop-stop-don't stop
commandment of sex. Then he descended to my groin.

The man was in charge now, and I knew it.  He picked up my pulsating dick
with his right hand and cupped my balls with his left, measuring things
with untrained eyes for what was to come.  The chemistry was easy but the
physics were tricky.  He did to me what I had been doing to him, seeking
just the right balance between friction and tenderness. He intuited that
because my foreskin was long and a little tight, he ought not pull down too
hard. I had winced audibly a few times, and he was aware of my
discomfort. He'd observed that my glans, once exposed, was the color of
maraschino liqueur and likely to be sensitive, so he guarded it from the
harshest of his manipulations. Then the man began in earnest to deliver
what I imagine was his first blow-job. I didn't care that he was a
novice. He did great. He could only take in about half of my dick's length,
but it was the vital half. He did magic tricks with that nimble tongue,
swirling it around the circumference of my dickhead, then plunging the
tautened tip into my pee-hole. He sucked up my foreskin with his lips, then
closed them around it, pulling it out an extra inch. He went fast, then
slow, a fascinating rhythm I hoped would never end. At one point I felt his
middle finger, moistened with suntan lotion, poking at my asshole. I was
delirious enough to relax and let it in, so sated with sensation that I
didn't care what was going on down there.  Then another finger, stretching
things a bit, massaging my prostate. That did it.

"I'm going to shoot, mister!" I pleaded, not sure if he wanted to swallow
my cum.  He took my dick in both hands and pointed it at his open
mouth. I'd been leaking for minutes, and it was awash in fluids of
indeterminate origin. Now was the time for Krakatoa to blow. "I'm serious!
Please! Aaaaarrh!" I shuddered. A sound I'd never heard before issued from
my mouth, part mourner's wail, part monkey screech, all ecstasy.

I fired five or six white blobs in the general vicinity of the man's face,
most landing on the ground next to us, a couple landing harmlessly on his
throat.  Then three or four aftershocks. Some watery droplets pooled near
my belly-button. Again, I thought I was going to cry.

"My God, son.  What did you eat for breakfast?" The Naked Man licked my
semen from his fingers.

The man was still hard.  I suspected it was time for me to apply the Golden
Rule, but when I grabbed for his dick, he brushed me off.

"I have a question for you, mein junge.  You need to answer honestly."

I caught my breath. "Of course.  I want to make you feel as good as I feel
right now.  You told me you're not gay, but I can see that you're ready. I
owe you."

"You owe me nothing. Nothing."

"So what's the question?" I watched him tug at his penis, the first one I'd
ever sucked, and wondered for a second if I would end up liking the taste
of his sperm.

"Well, I'd really like to fuck you. You know? Are you willing? It will
hurt, I think, when I stick it in." He looked ashamed, almost
apologetic. "I will be gentle, but . . . you know..." His voice trailed
off.

I didn't know. I'd stuck stuff up my butt, I think even straight boys do
that sometimes, and he'd managed to insert a couple fingers all the way in,
but his dick was much bigger than any of that. I was pretty scared.

"Well?  Tell me no, and it's okay.  I go without complaint.  I've already
done things I never thought I'd do, stuff I've always thought was wrong."
He was rubbing his dick all the while.

The little schoolteacher voice again advised me to cut my losses. Save it
for a rainy day.  The ol' gal didn't stand a chance. Not against the power
of the sunshine and the flowers and a naked man with a boner.

"Yes. I want to feel it inside me. You can fuck me.  I won't cry." Brave
words from a virgin.

We lay down again. He kissed me with amazing intensity, as if he wanted to
drown me in his open mouth.  This time I matched everything he did with
equal enthusiasm.  The Schlong snapped back to attention.  I was good for
anything -- not that I had any idea where I was headed.

The man grabbed a jar of tanning butter and slathered it on his dick.  The
scent of coconut permeated the air.  Then he turned me over on my stomach,
grabbed my butt cheeks, and wedged his hand between them.

"Relax, lad. Relax," he purred.  And I relaxed.  He gently massaged the
crack with a lubricated hand, pausing at the doorstep before poking through
with his fingers.  I tightened up again -- it's a natural response, I
suppose.  He told me to breathe slowly, in and out, to pretend that I had
to poop, and that seemed to help. He commanded me to get up on my haunches,
to give him an angle, and when I did, he pried open my butt cheeks, and
said, "I will go in now," like I was an elevator or something.

It took a while to get it right. At first the pain was excruciating, but
once I figured out that if I pushed back while he pushed in, we could
create a kind of suction. Once the man understood that he wasn't killing
me, that I was starting to enjoy myself, he pushed deeper and I sucked in
harder, and eventually we found something like communion, something as
primal as the tides.

He pulled out, then pleaded, "please sit on it, yes, that will be
wonderful." He then defected to German, having no words in English for what
we were doing. I squatted over him and aligned my butt as best I
could. With one hand I guided his pulsating dick ever so carefully into my
slickened hole. Again, the process was hit or miss, but once we
synchronized, I could tell that this was what he liked best, me straddling
him, looking at him from above. His eyes were bright with rapture. I
thought to myself should the Naked Man ever decide that he really was gay,
this was how he would choose to do it.  My dick windmilled above him,
propelled by his thrusts. My thighs burned with lactic acid, my back ached,
my breathing was labored from all the exertion, and I could feel another
explosion was imminent. I grabbed my penis at this point, retracted the
foreskin, groaned ecstatically, and shot out several more dollops of watery
semen. Seeing this, the man grunted, muttered something in German, pulled
away from me, took his dick in his right hand, pumped furiously a few
times, pointed the head at my face, and spit out half of his
life-force. Spent.  Nothing left to give. And still I wanted more.

Tears came again, not so much from the pain of damaged tissue or the
recognition that what we had done was unrepeatable, as from the terrible
finality of it all. There would never be another first time for either of
us. I'd never felt more alive, yet it seemed as if the wildflowers were
dying before my eyes.



CODA: 2023

I'm 44 now.  Most of my questions have been answered, and those that
haven't can wait.

Anyway, my butt healed quickly.  Acknowledgement took much longer. As it
was in the beginning so shall it be in the end.

 The Naked Man went his way that long-ago July day, and I went mine. It was
dark when I reached Tia Carmen's. Dónde has estado, hijo? Worry was
etched into her lovely face. She asked me if I'd been in a fight. No, I
told her, no fight, just playing soccer. I chuckled grimly. I lost track of
time, Tia. I'm sorry. At least that much was true. I said I wasn't hungry
and that I needed a shower. Instead, I ran a hot bath, soaking my bruised,
exhausted little body for 20 minutes, trying with soap bubbles to clean the
knowledge from my pores. I was determined to take my secret with me to my
grave.

My grandfather died a week later.  My mother mourned for an appropriate
time, then packed us up for our return, each of us with memories we were
unable or unwilling to share. I wouldn't return to Spain until after I
graduated college. With my boyfriend, Caleb the set designer, and then
again a couple of years later with my first (and only) girl-crush, Jada,
who dreamed of eating snails in Barcelona and washing them down with
sangria. I always had fun on these trips, tour guide and lover, but the
ghost of the Naked Man hung around the periphery and invaded my dreams.

Coming out was actually easy. Towards the end of my junior year, some nine
months after I returned from Ponferrada, I was watching TV in the basement
with Danny. Conversation was lagging, the customary banter totally
uninspired.  I figured it was time to shake some trees and see what fell
out.

Out of the blue, I asked him if he wanted to blow this burrito truck and
see Priscilla, Queen of the Desert at the Tower Theater. "It sounds pretty
out-there. Right up your alley, Danny-Boy."

Then a curious silence, pregnant with portent.

"OMG. Revelation Day at last!," he said. "Is this where you finally tell me
you're gay?" he asked.  "Jesus, Alejo, you're so fucking convoluted. But
sure.  Let's go check out the drag queens."

"You know?" Talk about anti-climax.

"Alejo Montero, I've known, like, forever. It's a vibe. You wear it like
bad cologne."

"I do not. Wear cologne."

"Kidding, dude. Trying to take the edge off your moment. Look, I'll spare
you this time. I've had my speech prepared since 9th grade. So listen to me
carefully." He placed his hand on my shoulder, an oddly paternal
gesture. "I love you, Alejo. I always have, since you first invited me over
to play Super Mario that day in second grade."

"Thanks, Danny.  Really.  I've been scripting this for weeks. I had it all
planned out. I guess I wasn't ready for the spoiler alert."

"Well, this script is mine, so shut up. You're a moron, you know. You're
the best-looking guy in school, which is apparently lost on you. I know
better than anybody you've never ever done anything with a girl, and trust
me, they'd like to do everything with you. Well, fuck that. What am I,
carne asada? They come up to me in the hallway, Danny, you know Alejo
Montero -- and they get this dreamy fangirl look -- do you think maybe he'd
want to hook up? And I always say, sure, go for it! And they never do,
because in the back of their minds they know you're not interested. In the
meantime, Alejo, you have me. Igor, your loyal heterosexual servant. It's
very frustrating.

"Look, if I was gay -- and as you know, I'm not -- I'd be your butt pirate
in a San Francisco minute.  I'd let you squeeze The Schlong into my pooper
and scream with delight. You're amazing, Alejo. You just need to figure
that out. So if being gay makes you happy, then it makes me happy. It's
time to tell the world, buddy. I already knew. A long time ago. Now, can we
give it a rest?"



Now that I've finally told the story, I feel unburdened, light on my feet
(to coin a phrase). I suppose you don't really understand something until
you've explained it to somebody else. Until you've put it out there. Now,
there's only one thing left to do.

I've come back to Ponferrada, a gay American with a beard and a mission: to
give the Naked Man a proper burial. Something I've been meaning to do for
almost 30 years.

I've been scrambling for a couple of hours around the foothills, looking
for the path.  I'm not as nimble as I used to be. The backpack weighs me
down, and I have to stop every five minutes to take a breath.

Then I see the stream I crossed all those years ago. I cup my hands and
drink the cold spring water. I splash my face and remove my shirt.  And
suddenly, just as surely as there's sunshine in Castilla-Leon, I know
exactly where I am.

I follow the path up and over a couple of ridges. I see a hill beyond the
tree line.  I step through the oaks and walk down into the clearing.  I
feel the tears coming, and this time I let them flow.

When I find the spot, the spot where I saw the Naked Man sleeping, I set
down my pack, pull out a blanket, a bottle of Solares, and some tanning
lotion -- SPF 30. Then I take off my shorts and my Bombas and stand there,
naked again, saluting the heavens.  I know my body now, it's lines and
contours. It no longer is a skittish animal, a work in progress. I am a
man, after all. And, of course, I know my dick, my trusty companion, my
pride and joy. It seems happy to be back to where it all began, and I give
it a few nostalgic tugs.

Then I take out the gift, my offering. A leatherbound early edition of
Rilke's love poems -- translated, of course, since I don't speak
German. For the Naked Man. I read aloud, the sunlight and the flowers the
only audience:

Put out my eyes, and I can see you still,

Slam my ears to, and I can hear you yet;

And without any feet can go to you;

And tongueless, I can conjure you at will.

Break off my arms, I shall take hold of you

And grasp you with my heart as with a hand;

Arrest my heart, my brain will beat as true;

And if you set this brain of mine afire,

Then on my blood-stream I yet will carry you.

Then I take a folded printout of this story I have written in his honor,
tuck it into the book's pages, and set it among the wildflowers. In pace
requiescat!

The Naked Man is dead. Long live the Naked Man.



FM352@proton.me