Date: Tue, 16 Nov 2021 10:32:40 -0700 From: Boris Chen Subject: Crossing Panama Chapter 5 (Revised) Chapter 5: Crossing the State. Note to readers: the parts of this book describing abuses by the Miami Police are 100% fictional. The next few weeks were super busy, I spent five days stuck inside a hotel in Miami interviewing potential clients trying to determine which people we should offer representation. The case involved potentially hundreds of people that were jailed for weeks to months without charges, and during their confinement they were subjected to threats, forced labor, violations of their civil rights, and beatings from jail guards. We collected hundreds of hours of surveillance video that captured most of the complaints. It amazed and angered me that guards beat innocent people, people charged with nothing, and did it in front of cameras! It wouldn't surprise me if I received death threats if I ever came into contact with police in Miami. The reason we were interviewing people was to identify those people confined but never charged with any crimes. People were held for weeks then suddenly released without any charges being filed. During their confinement they were forced to work in the prison laundry and factory at gun point. They were not allowed to call anyone, deprived of legal representation, medical care, and proper nutrition. The hard part was telling some very emotional and upset people that their case did not qualify to be in the class. A few of them even got violent, those were usually the meth users. That's why we always had at least one armed guard with us every time we interviewed people. In Miami I always carried pepper spray in my pocket. ---- We rented two meeting rooms and recorded video statements and contact information from people wanting to sue the police, most of them were Hispanic, usually Cuban. That was why they picked me to do the interviews, I was the only fluent Spanish speaking partner, even though I'm Navajo and not Hispanic! But many people said I looked Hispanic. Let's be honest, not everyone born in Mexico looked Mexican or even Hispanic. If you watched TV shows about Mexico most of them said Mexicans were usually descended from Spaniards or Native Indians. And if you went back far enough all Indians (in the Americas) were descended from the Clovis people, even if they had different origin stories. The Clovis people were supposedly from what were now Japan, China, and Korea. One thing I'd add was that I believed people sailed across the Pacific and settled on the west coast of the Americas long before the Clovis people arrived from Asia. I think the same was true with Africans sailing the Atlantic and settling the Caribbean Islands and the Americas long before Europeans arrived, that's why you saw Pyramids, language, and cultural similarities between Africa, Central America, the Caribbean, and Southeast Asia. The Caribbean Islands and the southeastern USA were heavily populated by black skinned people long before the first slaves were brought from Africa. So the genetic mix of native Mexicans was as varied as people in the United States. ---- The office manager at work reminded me I was on a spending account (with rules) in Miami, for my own safety I was not to drive a car and should avoid contact with anyone except the other staff involved in the interviews. He said the odds of being stalked and framed by the police were elevated, so I needed to remain nearly invisible down there. They even gave me a special encrypted cell phone to use for calling our main office in Saint Pete. He warned us they had already identified three plain clothes police officers posing as police brutality victims. It was clear the police understood they were being investigated, and had a great interest in stopping our work. Our hotel rooms and cell calls were likely being recorded 24/7 and we all needed to conduct ourselves accordingly. They said there were probably tiny cameras recording everything in our hotel rooms, so don't do anything but sleep or watch TV, and always dress in the bathroom with the door shut. I'm surprised he didn't suggest I only masturbate in the shower with the door shut. ---- While I was working in Miami a carpenter I hired was supposed to re-do the wood trim on the outside of my boat, which consisted of the cabin door and frame, and on the roof on the cabin were two long wood railings. I left the key with the harbor master so he could unlock it for the carpenter. He said it would take three four-hour days to complete the job, due to multiple sealant coats. After the woodwork was complete he was going to install a better locking mechanism on the cabin door. My two-piece cabin door was solid oak. It had a hardwood frame and one top section that lifted and latched to the windshield frame, then the door swung inward and latched in a fully open position. It was an awkward entrance and not handicap friendly, I was too tall for it regardless. Immediately inside the door were the stairs, seven wood steps covered by the only carpet in the boat, there was a railing beside the stairs. Near the bottom step was the primary bilge access floor hatch. When you got to the bottom step the door to the front cabin was straight ahead about 14 feet. To the left was the captain's desk and bunk, ahead and to the left were the dinette and the base of the aluminum sail mast, and ahead and to the right was the sofa. The main cabin had a lot of open space, it was large enough for a party of ten people if the bathroom wasn't used much. I have seen boat parties here where they had a portapotty delivered to the pier beside their boat for guests to use. ---- While I was in Miami I got a texted image from Carlo, he finally modified the photo he took of my chest. On his computer he hand drew a toothy smile, two eyes, eyebrows, ears, bangs, and a nose outline to the close-up shot he took of my left tit. I saved it to my phone and forwarded it to my email. It took me a while to recognize the background. It was a big round reddish brown circle with a cartoon face on top and a blemish on the tip of the nose. He said it's flashed on his screen every time I texted or called. I really liked it and made it my background image too. When I first saw it the photo made me laugh once I realized what it was. He did a decent job drawing face parts on my tit, made me wonder how long it took. I should do the same thing with him. I've seen pictures of tattoos where guys with wide and deep belly buttons had the back end of an animal as a tattoo so their belly button looked like an obscenely wide-open anus. Those images were almost upsetting to me. I was happy Carlo had no tattoos, like me. ---- When I finally made it back to Saint Pete I was exhausted, and felt stiff and sore, I felt it the most in my thighs. The more time I spent in my little studio apartment on the 20th floor the more I missed my sailboat, the fresh air, and the relaxing sounds of the marina at night. I wanted to take her out for our first trip on the Gulf, even if it was just a straight line west then back to Tampa Bay and back to the marina. I wanted to see and hear how the sails performed and how the cranks, sails, and ropes felt under a full wind load. I purchased a telescope with a digital camera to watch or record the marina from my bedside, but even with that I could barely see my boat because it was the same color as all the others. One weekend I clipped a tiny red bicycle flasher to my mast and that night I easily saw it from my balcony, which was neat. Then I knew exactly where my boat sat but really couldn't see much detail with the telescope. It looked like a sea of aluminum masts and gray hulls from the balcony at night. ---- The next day it started to rain and didn't stop for two days, all day and night, so I ran on a treadmill down in our small gym. The condo gym wasn't very clean and I brought my own sanitizer before I spent two miles running and holding onto the handles on the treadmill. I liked to run with my earphones in and my eyes closed so I needed to hold on or I'd run right off the belt. I texted Carlo but didn't hear back right away. I told him I had work to do down in Miami again and I'd be gone for a while. I probably should have confessed my profession to him. Friday July 27th, 2018. Yesterday after work I had things packed to spend another weekend with my friend Susan. I still needed to come up with a new name but it felt like I'd be destroying a sacred monument if I renamed it. There was still a small framed photo of Susan screwed to the wall near the captain's desk. I found an old newspaper story online that said her oxygen system failed during a south Florida wreck dive, she never made it out alive. Luckily, they recovered her body later that day before the crabs could turn her into a buffet. I liked the family idea of honoring her name on the boat instead of giving it a stupid name. I've seen a lot of dumb names proudly displayed on the back end of boats, search online for: stupid boat names. Another classic autistic trait I had was my sense of humor, I am too literal to find humor in much of what I saw or heard. That's why my original book (Crossing Panama) was written very literal, without any innuendo and almost no humor. ---- After work Friday I raced home because I was super excited. My first stop was my boat (Pier K, Slip 4) and my second task was a run over to I-275 via 13th Avenue and back home after a five minute rinse to cool down in the men's showers. If I dressed right I could go from a run to a cooling walk then take off my shoes and socks and step in the shower, then after a couple minutes I shut it off to drip dry. I picked up my shoes and walked to the boat in bare feet. All I had to do was wash my feet when I got home. I felt they should install a rack of rental lockers near the men's bathroom for active guys like me. And I also considered using the shower by the pool for my post-run cool down instead of the men's room shower. I could drip water around the pool and nobody was bothered but on the bathroom floor it upset some guys. I decided tonight to go back to the bar, Tim was there on the same stool as last time, and he seemed in a festive mood. "How you doing brother?" He asked as he reached out to pat my shoulder but stopped short. "I'm great, how's life in Bristol?" I said that as sort of an inside joke between us. "Fantastic, signed two new clients this week, taking tomorrow off, you?" "I spent time in Miami doing interviews but that's over for now, otherwise everything is great. I found a few problems all three marine inspectors missed before I bought the boat." "Well, were they safety related?" "Ummmm, probably not but its stuff I expected they would check, like batteries and if the water pumps for the sinks worked." "No sir. Marine inspectors check the hull, rigging, sails, and if boat is water tight below the cabin roof, they check the mast, doors, windows, hatches, decks, steering, anchors, and Coast Guard required safety gear like life jackets, but not if your microwave oven worked. You're thinking of residential inspections." "Ahhhh, I thought they'd be pretty much the same, but I guess not." "What did you find?" "Well, the waste tank was supposed to be empty but it was full, all six batteries were nearly dead and dry, the vent stack for the batteries was clogged with a bee's nest, and the wood door frame and railings needed to be re-sealed on the outside, and the water pump for the kitchen sink doesn't work right." "Ha! That's nothing. After I bought mine I discovered she sank during Hurricane Hugo in 1989, but it was only on the bottom for five days, but because of all the wrecks they forgot to mention it because every boat in the harbor sunk that day, they assumed I knew." "How did you find out?" "Fish bones around the batteries. Then I called the harbormaster and learned the truth, but I don't think the water really did much damage except the furniture, everything else was made to take it. You could probably sink a Bristol in a fresh water lake for six months and easily restore it." He paused for a second, but I interrupted him. "You want to share a pizza with me?" "Sure, but let me pay this time!" I gestured for a menu and placed the order for a pan crust, not the secret New York style. Then Tim added, "The most important part would be to remember to remove all the dead fish and seaweed before you tell the buyer the boat never sank." "Did you sue?" "You bet I did, it dropped the value of the boat by 60% and the dealer I bought it from knew it sank during Hurricane Hugo." "And..." "I got my money and damages too, it paid for my marina, club fees, and insurance for ten years." "Wow, that's cool." "Yeah, but it's hard to feel totally trusting of a boat that already sank once." "I wonder if mine was ever caught in a storm like yours." "I don't think so, I knew Doc. He was one of those guys that always took his out, wrapped, and stored on land when big hurricanes were coming. That can get expensive but it keeps your insurance down." "Does it damage a boat to sit on the bottom?" "Not much most of the time, if it's a sandy bottom harbor. This part of Florida is like a giant sand bar, so most of the harbors are sandy, if they had coral most of them would rent an excavator and remove the coral. Or at least they used to. Bayboro Harbor is old, it actually dates back to the 1890s. They scooped it bare back when steam shovels were first invented, the old Bucyrus (bue-SI-riss) steam shovels were what they used here back in the era of Henry Flagler, rich bastard!" "HA!" I chuckled as his comments brought back memories of Florida history. We worked on our beers and chatted more, then the pizza arrived on a hot ceramic pan sliced into eight narrow pieces. I was very hungry, running always gave me an appetite. Tim continued his story, "One thing I learned in my research on sunken boats was most of the rotting action happened to wood that's exposed to water and air, like a wooden piling stickin' out of the water, or a wooden hull boat just above the waterline. My Bristol sunk in a harbor near Palm Bay, Florida but it was only half under water, it settled seven inches to the bottom and leaned over so it hardly moved at all. They said the cabin door blew-in and rain flooded the hull. He told me they put lifting straps under her, lifted it a few feet and pumped it out. Then they towed it to the marina and hoisted it out for repairs. The engine and electric motors needed major work, and the carpet and cushions inside all needed to be replaced too." "They shrink wrapped it and ran a dehumidifier inside it for ten months and sucked out every drop of moisture, then repaired all the upholstery and ultrasound inspected the hull and found no structural damage. The damage was the same as you'd get in a house with a busted water line, all that stuff was replaced with new." He concluded. While we were eating the cheese and pepperoni pizza Tim told me he saw old photos of Bayboro Harbor in 1899 when they closed it off to dig it out for large freighters, that's when the very long concrete piers were built. He said they closed it off with sand bags and tons of rock. After it was pumped dry they dug it out and built the concrete piers for passenger ferries and cargo ships, it had to be deep enough for the newer iron hull boats. He said the harbor used to be the actual Port of St. Pete, but now it's an airport. It has five very long commercial piers, two of them were part of the Florida University School of Maritime Sciences. It's hard to picture what this place looked like 110 years ago with steam bulldozers and steam shovels making a huge hole in the sand. He told me our end of the harbor used to be a swamp, they purchased the land from the city and increased the size of the harbor to what it is today. In 1905 this was a protected basin for large iron hull ships to hide from unexpected severe storms. While he described our harbor over 100 years ago I got mental images in my brain, I probably wouldn't have been sucking dick here in 1890. They'd probably throw a rope in a tree for any man caught blowing another man during the Victorian Era. It made me wonder what life was like for gays back then or even earlier. Or more recently, what was it like being gay in the 1930s in America? How'd they find dates, by word of mouth or at private clubs? I heard that Hollywood was just as perverse then as it was today. Tim told me almost everything he learned about wood rotting in water, he said the entire island city of Venice sat on wood pilings that were hammered into the ground over nine hundred years ago, they'll never rot as long as they're never exposed to air. After our pizza we went our separate ways. To further cement his point that many things underwater have been restored to new condition even after extended time on the bottom. He said there have been over 50 World War 2 training airplanes recovered from Lake Michigan that crashed and sunk in the 1940s and were recovered from the bottom 70 years later and were now new looking museum pieces. ---- I checked Grindr for messages from Carlo, there were three. I've sort of forgot to check that app lately. Too bad he's not here instead of Tim. I still felt the need for a cover story if we were going to sit at this bar again for dinner and drinks. I don't think he could fake being a lawyer so I'd have to come up with something. I invited him over Saturday night if he was free. He couldn't invite me over because he lived with his parents and helped take care of them and their house and car. Carlo said that his father was getting difficult to take care of but his mother was fine. Carlo said his father started training to be a boxer as a child, they made him stop boxing and coaching after they bought the tire shop with his prize money. Then I got images in mind of Carlo going to school with a black eye at age 10. And in my head I did some mental math, Carlo must have been a late pregnancy, like his mom was in her forties when he was born. He never mentioned having any brothers or sisters. ---- Just after 9pm and my third beer I walked around to the men's room then back to the boat. I stood there for a few moments looking at all the lights around the area, the blue and white rotating beacon atop the airport control tower, and several large ships at anchor out in the bay. The two Coast Guard ships were all lit up, they never closed. It was really beautiful and quiet here, but I needed to go to bed soon. Sometimes the Coast Guard ships had training or actual missions and they got all fired up and sailed out onto the Gulf, they surely made a lot of noise as they made steam for propulsion. And with a large crew all the cars that drove in and parked by the ship also made lots of noise. It looked like quiet an operation. I looked at the boxes from Amazon on the sofa and knew one of those items probably should be opened tonight, it was the big box with the camping toilet and chemicals, there was a good chance I'd use it tonight. With a steak knife I sliced it open and flattened the box and tossed it on the back deck to go to the car with me in the morning. I poured in the concentrate and filled the top tank the rest of the way with tap water from the hose on the walkway. That's about the time I noticed how stuffy it was in the cabin so I opened the three hatches and the cabin door and turned on the fans. I got the chem toilet set-up after taking a few minutes to understand how it worked. I put it on the floor by the captain's bunk because I planned on sleeping in the front bunk from now on since it was nearly twice as big and several inches longer, and had the nice hatch right above it with the best fresh air in the cabin. There was no rain in the forecast so I'd be good overnight. ---- Friday morning I jogged to the bathroom at 7am and did my stuff before it got busy, the entire bathroom was empty so I used the free showers instead, and did my daily 'drop the kids off in the pool' in a public stall. Luckily there was plenty of paper this time. ---- Friday I spent the entire day in my office, even skipped lunch. I had lots of reading and research to do about our Miami clients, and learned we now had 39 more to interview, some of this group would be homeless folks too. My next trip to Miami was a few weeks away. I sighed and wished I didn't have to go down there. Miami was beautiful and magical in some areas and in others it's totally third world and unsafe, just like the area I jogged across when I ran out to the interstate highway west of our marina down 13th Avenue all the way west to 30th Street, just a block from I-275. I hated the idea of living in a locked and guarded compound when my fellow man was barely scratching a living outside our barbed wire topped fences. Just after my head hit the pillow I heard my cell buzz over on the kitchen table, it was a series of short buzzes which meant it was a Grindr message, so I hopped up and grabbed it and sat at the dinette. Carlo just got home from the hospital, his dad had pneumonia and was very sick but his mom was sleeping at his bedside and the doctor thought he could come home in two or three days. I asked him to text me his father's picture sometime. I briefly mentioned having no plans for Saturday night but he didn't bite the worm so I went back to bed. Saturday. My list of things to do that weekend was long. I had all my laundry from the apartment with me, I think I'm one of the few lawyers in our office that washed his own laundry (which gave me two hours of quiet reading time). By 8am and I was in shorts in the Laundromat with four washers running. I had my eyes focused on the Florida statues researching for the suit. One of the most important things to research was previous Florida suits against police for abuse and illegal confinement along with any appeals. I had to read each case that had ever been tried in the state or by the state or federal Supreme Court. While I was reading the list of circumstances when it was legal for a prison or jail guard to beat an unarmed prisoner my cell buzzed three short bursts, with a smile I reached over by the car keys and swiped the screen, it was Carlo. I should tell him but I really liked his first name, but I thought Carlo was Italian. He said he could come over for a few hours but couldn't stay overnight, he had to babysit his dad, they thought he might get discharged tomorrow afternoon. He sounded happy and sent several smiley face icons. We agreed on 7pm, I told him to arrive hungry but didn't specify for what. I asked him to text me from now on, so we stopped communicating through Grindr. One of the things I had to get done every Saturday morning was to hang all my work clothes (six two-piece business suits) on their hangers covered by a plastic bag, and down to the condo lobby for the laundry guy to pick-up. They also dropped off six fresh suits for next week on hangers. The service provided sport coats, shirts, slacks, ties, handkerchiefs, and cufflinks. Most of their customers were doctors. There was a butcher in Saint Pete with delivery and they also had an awesome deli and were one of the biggest pork suppliers on the Gulf coast. I ordered two inch-thick ribeye steaks (USDA Prime grade), two Idaho potatoes, and a bunch of asparagus. I got out my little iron hibachi and got it loaded and ready to light. I also pulled up the two front sails today and carefully inspected them, I also carefully checked every cable and rope on the mast and boom (as far as I could reach without a ladder). I was thinking about taking a trip, 2-4 days along the coast as my first trip, I might even invite Carlo. I probably shouldn't tell him it was my first actual trip since summer camp. Next was a search online for an electrical guy to troubleshoot the battery charging system on Susan, I ended up talking to a nearby marine repair shop and agreed to make an appointment to sail her up the river and park it there for them to troubleshoot it then teach me how it worked. He said it could get expensive since those systems often failed due to salt water exposure and high humidity. A bit after I got off the phone I heard a loud whistle across the harbor (the last several notes in Pop Goes the Weasel) and saw someone walking towards my part of the harbor. When he got closer I saw it was Carlo so I quickly lit the charcoal and went to the bathroom to check my look and brush my teeth. I even quickly ran the electric shaver around my lips and chin because razor stubble felt really bad against the head of a man's dick (if I got lucky tonight). When he came aboard I had to carefully maneuver around so he couldn't hug me in public here in Heteroland. I showed him the grille and he handed me a paper bag with two bottles of wine (a California Merlot and an Argentine Malbec). I looked at him with scrunched up eyebrows and he pulled out his cell and flashed the Uber app and told me he got a ride here, his Impala was at home. We both laughed and I gently pressed him inside the cabin. We took time to rinse and slice our veggies, I turned on the radio app on my cell to the reggae radio station (KQMQ 'Hi93') from Honolulu and linked it to the cabin stereo. I wrapped the veggies in aluminum foil and put them near the edge of the grille and let them cook, the steaks went on (19 minutes after I lit the charcoal) and would take a while as thick as they were. He wondered where I found steaks that thick and I showed him the web page for the butcher, he said he never heard of it. While we were at the sink I told him it would be better for me if we didn't touch outside in public here, he happily agreed and said he had the same rule at home and at their store. "Carlo, I got a question for you." "Uh oh, sounds serious." "Nah, s'all good, I was just wondering if you'd like to take a trip with me, soon." "Sounds fun, where too?" "The Keys." "How long?" "Oh, if winds and weather are good, four days. I'm thinking like leave early Thursday morning and get back here Sunday evening." "Yeah, the store's closed Sundays. I'll talk to Mom and let y'know." He sat there smiling and looked deep in my eyes, then he spoke again, "When?" "We should go before hurricane season or we'd have to postpone 'til after Thanksgiving." "Ahhhh yeah, I understand. Well like I said let me talk to Mom. We got coverage for me as long as the guy doesn't quit but I don't think he will." "Cool, let me know soon. As soon as you can decide I'll take time from work and rent us a slip in the Keys. Might not be on Key West but there are a lot of slips for rent around the islands." "Good, it sounds like fun, always wanted to go sailing. How far is it?" He asked. "About 220 miles one way." "How fast'll she go?" He asked. "Totally depends on the wind, but we should do around 8-18 miles an hour." He pulled out his cell to do the math, then he looked at me and said "Eighteen hours sailing time." I repeated, "It depends on the wind. It won't always be straight behind us." When I was a kid I sailed every summer on an eight foot Sunfish on Hamlin Lake near Ludington, but that was twenty years ago. I knew the basics of sailing, but this was a real sailboat and I wanted my first trip to be with someone I knew. When I asked if he'd been on a boat before he said he took a three night river cruise two years ago and never got seasick. We both went up on deck to flip the steaks and check the internal temp, we were shooting for 130 degrees in the middle which would make them about medium rare. He took the tongs and moved the wrapped veggies and one of the grills up to a higher level and we sat in back and watched them smoke and flare up, the scent of cooking steak was wonderful. I smelled the sizzling steak fat and dreamed of the scent and feel of his dick rubbed side to side across my lips. The head of his dick was really large and rubbery and felt wonderful all slick and warm sliding around my face and inside my mouth. Carlo fired the kid's squirt gun any time the charcoal flared up into a big flame. We took the potatoes off the grille and finished them in the microwave so they'd be done today. Anytime I used the charcoal grille I always surrounded it with foil so it didn't stain the deck. Carlo started telling me about his week and his schedule with trying to run the business and keep an eye on his parents and how his dad got sick and ended up in the hospital. I told him I was jealous that he had such a nice family. My comment made him give me a strange look that I couldn't understand. I asked if he was a vet and he said he served four years in the Navy but never went overseas, he was stationed at Great Lakes Training Center for his entire enlistment in the base supply unit. He said that's where he learned to manage inventory and order supplies and deal with delivery guys and order takers on the phone. Then I asked if he ever had guy sex in the Navy and he smiled and said yes, but not much with other sailors. "Most stations were too gossipy and unsafe, it could end your career if you got caught fuckin' a guy or if pictures appeared." When the steaks flared up really big I ran to the cabin and got the tools to pull everything off the hibachi and carried all the food inside. We sat at the table sipped wine and talked about life, love, car tires, his dad, my boat, and our possible cruise to the Keys. He looked so totally relaxed and happy I could hardly keep my hands off him. We slowly ate our steaks and asparagus and emptied two bottles of wine, I offered him a place to sleep but he insisted he had to report to the hospital at 9pm or his mom would start calling every five minutes, 'Donde estas Carlito?' He didn't know I spoke fluent Spanish. I watched his hands while he lifted the knife and cut a few pieces and stalks of asparagus too. He had a weird thing he did with his lower jaw when he chewed. I noticed his chin sort of moved in circles as he chewed so his lips constantly formed different shapes. I also noticed he had dimples on both cheeks too. The best part was he looked truly relaxed and happy here. I wanted tonight to last but the fucking clock was working against us. Someone had to stay with his dad because he often got out of control (late in the day) with his dementia. I heard some men got violent later in the disease process. For some men it was like being trapped in a never ending nightmare where nothing made sense, they could tell something was wrong but couldn't make it stop, then suddenly everything was almost normal again by morning, but only for a while. I think they stayed with him because he could get violent with hospital staff but usually not his family. Carlo described the weirdness of his father during his confusion when he thought it was 1970 and he was in the military, yet his son was almost 30 years old and how the two couldn't happen at the same time. But it was still very confusing and he'd get angry at everything and everyone, but that would fade as the sun rose in the morning. While I cleared the table he asked about me going to college, I told him I went to college at the University of California in Los Angeles (instead of saying UCLA School of Law). Then I changed the subject and asked where he went to school. He said he went to Alexander High School in Laredo, graduated in 2007. He said they moved to Florida in 2008 when his father was hired as a boxing coach. We went back to the table with freshly filled wine glasses, I asked him to tell me about sex in the Navy. Carlo laughed and took in a deep breath and said there was a kid he met late one night. "I rented a bedroom in a big house on King Drive in North Chicago, it was close enough I could ride my bicycle to work. And on my evenings I rode around for exercise. One night I was riding on King Drive about 2am and saw someone on a skateboard across the street, so I turned around and chased him down. It was a guy on a skateboard, no shirt on, just saggy jeans and shoes, a T-shirt was stuffed in his back pocket." "I rode up behind him and whistled, he stopped and watched me carry it up on the sidewalk. It was late at night and dark but I could see it was a young guy, short and skinny, everything about him looked wrong but I had a knife in my pocket." "He asked why I was riding on King Drive at 2am, so I asked him the same thing and he said he couldn't sleep. I tried to look at his body but I blocked the street light so I moved aside to put some light on him. The kid was super skinny, he had long dyed blonde hair, a baby face, his ribs stuck out and he had a lump for a belly button and dark red dime sized tits. I figured he was late teens, maybe 19. He looked poorly, probably a local boy, but he seemed harmless." "I looked around and saw a bus stop bench nearby so I asked if he'd care to sit a spell, I walked my bike to the bench but he rolled over on his skateboard and sat down. I figured we'd get questioned by the cops but they just zoomed by and never paid attention to us. The kid asked me a bunch of questions, so I asked him where he went to school but he said he didn't go to school no more, expelled for bad grades. When I asked why he said he had brain damage from his mom drinking during pregnancy." "I've heard a lot of strange things but I never heard someone say that before, but in the face he looked normal. His teeth were fine and he didn't act stoned. I looked at his body again, he was pale white and he had kind of a Marfan chest shape to him, the way his ribs stuck out in the middle. His pants were really low, almost to his dick. He stood there showing off his entire front side to me." I interrupted Carlo and asked when this happened, he said when he was in the Navy, maybe 2011. He continued his story. "I told him he had a nice body but he never said anything. We sat down on that bench, the kid looked around like he was watching for someone he knew. I reached over and put my hand on his thigh near his knee and rubbed it around a little but he sat there with one foot on his skateboard sort of ignoring me." "Then I put my hand on his shoulder and across his chest and rubbed it around, then over his tits and gently pinched one between my thumb and finger several times but the kid did nothing, he didn't even look at me or my hand on his chest." "He told me to lift my shirt, so I did it, pulled it up to my shoulders." "Since I lived nearby I knew all these blocks had alleys, so I softly told him we should go 'round back. He got to his feet and stomped his skateboard to make it stand up. He grabbed it and we walked along the side of the building by the trash bin in the alley, there was a stack of car tires I got him to sit and then I started to rub his shoulders and his chest again. His skin was very warm and soft. I went lower to his stomach then down the front of his jeans. His pants were so low I could see the base of his dick but the kid just stared at my chest." "Then I moved around and got to my knees between his legs and ran my hand across his stomach. He had his pants so low that I could rub his lower belly, that made him take in a deep breath but he just watched and never said a thing." "After a few moments I unbuttoned his jeans, unzipped them, and spread them wide open. He leaned back and spread his legs wide. I reached inside and grabbed him and pulled it out. I stroked him a few times and took him in my mouth. His dick was small but he tasted nice, like someone that didn't sweat much." "This is hot Carlo, did this actually happen?" I asked. "Yep, not making it up, this actually happened, all of it." "Well keep goin'." I insisted. "So I blew him and he came in maybe two minutes but it was bitter, I think he let go a few drops of pee. The boy said I was a good cocksucker." "I asked his name and he said he was Kyle. I told him where I lived and invited visit if he wanted more, but he just chuckled. He said if he took up all the offers he got for blow jobs his dick would be in someone's mouth twenty four hours a day. He said skating around with no shirt on was good advertising and he never said no to anyone except junkies. Then he told me he knew I was in the Navy by the way I looked, that's why I got it for free. Most older guys paid top dollar for what you're gettin'." "I asked him how much he charged and he said sometimes he earned a thousand bucks a day letting old guys suck his dick." I asked Carlo, "You do him again?" "Yes, three more times until I found out he was a child, then I stopped." "How old was he?" I asked. "Fourteen." "Wow, riding around on a skateboard at 2am near a military base?" "Yep. I never saw him in the area after that summer, so he turned into something of a mystery. But he had a nice little dick, maybe as big as an Oscar Mayer Hotdog. I spit out his semen, but his pre-come tasted good. His body smelled very boyish, not sure why." "Did he come to your apartment?" I asked Carlo. "Yep, three times. He said he liked me because I was nice to him and he really liked my tits. When he came over I pulled off his clothes and sucked him to an orgasm, he jerked me off once, but he wasn't very good at it, his hand was weirdly shaped. He wouldn't kiss or fuck or suck mine or let me play with his butt, but I could lick his tits and his belly. I asked him once how many times a day he came and he said at least eight, sometimes sixteen. He said he was a dick delivery boy." "I asked if he ever went on the Navy base and he said yes, a few times a week. Sometimes he had a few sailors put their money together and paid him to walk around their party naked so anyone could take a turn with his wiener or his body. He said he'd been with a lot of naval officers too, and some admirals. Then like I said, one day he vanished." Carlo guessed he died, lots of young men with Marfan died in their teens of heart problems, but he probably died rich if the stories he told were true. I told him that if what the kid said was true, he had fetal alcohol syndrome and Marfan syndrome and the school expelled him for getting nothing but D and F grades then they risked an enormous civil rights suit and millions in fines. But it also made me horny, so he got up and came over. I turned sideways but still seated on the bench, he bent over and kissed me then undid my shorts and blew me. I warned him and came in his cupped hand instead of his mouth. Then we got on our knees in the middle of the cabin and kissed for several minutes, we both whimpered into each other's mouths. He ran his fingers through my hair while I massaged his big marshmallow tits with my thumbs. Then Carlo whispered that he had to go. As we slowly pulled apart I felt a strong sense of attraction in him and at first he didn't want to let go of me. I felt we were getting closer to using of the L-word. As he got his clothes in order he remembered something else about the boy from North Chicago, "I just remembered he liked my tits, he'd rub 'em and suck on 'em too. I think that might have been why he gave me free home delivery." ---- At 8:30pm he ordered an Uber and we walked in the dark to the street by the marina entrance and sat on the steps outside the front door. After nine minutes his car arrived and I watched as they left up 3rd Street towards downtown. He lived north of downtown, so he drove by my condo on the way here. After he left I researched rental slips in the Keys. Rental prices went up this time of year but I saw over twenty available across the western islands. I also emailed the business manager at my employer and told him I may need four days from work, he said he'd do whatever it took to get me the time off, I had only taken one day off since I started working there and even worked some weekends answering the phone for potential clients. We got those calls because of our internet ads but we clearly said we were not criminal lawyers. When I went to bed I visualized the kid in his story and jerked off. ---- Three days later an excited Carlo texted me, he could go and needed the dates as soon as possible. I emailed him back and set the dates for Thursday August 9 to Sunday August 12, 2018. I said we'd leave hours before dawn Thursday morning and get back Sunday evening around sunset. We'd be in hot humid rainy weather the entire time, dress accordingly. Don't bring any money, just bring your driver's license and your cell in a plastic bag. I immediately emailed the business manager at work. Since I became 'Mr. Multiple Alphabetized Shopping Lists' I started another (shopping and packing) list for the trip, I've never planned a trip on a sailboat before. I knew we'd be using the pump toilet and the bathroom. I had two weeks to get Susan ready. Just in case, I got Carlo's clothing measurements and ordered shirts, shorts, and sandals for Key West. The marina had a dress code (inside the club) and claimed it was gay friendly. I also got him a swim suit and bathroom stuff too. I was going to buy thirty pounds of dry ice and enough stuff for a week long excursion on the ocean. I ordered a second anchor and a really expensive high carbon steel 60' welded chain. We still had no dinghy but I now had an inflatable raft and one plastic oar just in case. We texted a lot during the two weeks before the trip, I suggested he conserve sperm before the trip but he never commented about that. I fully planned on extracting semen from him during our trip. I might even ask him to sail naked, or lie out in the sun and let me oil his body. I ordered a satellite phone just in case and I got an AA battery case for the Icom VHF hand held transceiver too. ---- The weekend before the trip I took Susan out onto Tampa Bay by myself and made two laps around the bay to practice with the sails and the ropes. Everything worked like a charm and it was a very nice run, nothing went wrong for three hours. Let me tell you, there's a huge difference between an eight foot Sunfish near Camp Douglas-Smith and a forty foot Bristol with over 700 square feet of sail. I left our harbor and sailed south along the coast to the Skyway Bridge, then south to the far shore and up the east shore to Beer Can Island then back around MacDill Air Force Base, back to my harbor, and around one more time. It's about 12 miles from my harbor to Beer Can Island (Pine Key) if you went straight across but I followed the shoreline which passed near the end of a runway at the Air Force base. ---- After my two laps around the bay I sailed Susan to the marine repair shop on the river about two miles from the harbor and tied her up and went inside, I arrived ninety minutes late for my appointment. I explained the charging problem, she had a wind generator and solar panels but it appeared none of them were working, and the batteries might be dead too. We went on board Susan and I showed him the battery box under the captain's bunk and removed the mattress and left it propped open. He looked at a couple of the batteries and shone his flashlight around, then we went on the back deck, he stood on the bench and hand turned the wind turbine blade and told me it could be expensive to repair. I authorized him to do the necessary repairs, and mentioned that I was planning on sailing to Los Angeles via the Panama Canal some day. He just sighed and told me repairs would take several days, we shook hands and I left and called for a taxi. Before I walked to the street I repeated that I was planning on sailing the Panama Canal and wondered if this boat could be upgraded to sail the entire canal on battery power, he said he'd look into it, but right now this sailboat would never make it across. His comment scared me, but it was also a much needed wake-up call and reinforced that the marine inspections (I paid cash for) were not done correctly, despite what Tim said. ---- By next weekend Susan was repaired and they even sailed her back to the harbor for me and left the keys with the harbor master. Total cost: $7,735.00 and now everything (electrical) worked perfectly, but still not my kitchen sink foot pump. He replaced all four solar panels and re-built the wind generator and installed all new deep cycle marine batteries and replaced some wiring and a switch. During my work week I asked my secretary to call a (marina handyman) repair guy and have him replace the foot powered pump at the base of the kitchen cabinet that cost me $375 and took him twenty minutes. In the kitchen and the bathroom the faucets were powered by foot pumps similar to foot powered bicycle air pumps. You stood at the sink with one foot on the pedal and slowly pumped which put air in the tank and made the water flow out any open faucet or the toilet. ---- On Friday morning before the trip I drove down to Bean Point Park to do some underwater research. Let me explain: If you sailed a powerboat, (without sails) you had a multitude of places to cross from Tampa Bay onto the Gulf of Mexico. I needed about 54 feet of vertical clearance for my mast and the antenna on top to fit under bridges and wires. That limited me to three passages to the Gulf. Two of them were wide but were reserved for large ocean going vessels, military, and thousand foot long cruise ships. For small boats like mine we're supposed to use the southernmost gap just north of Bean Point Park and had a small island (sand bar with weeds) in the middle of the waterway. There's usually lots of small boats in the area, lots of people in swimming suits with kids and dogs in the water. It's a huge/notorious Florida party spot. The main problem for me was Susan sat deep in the water and the nautical maps were not very detailed. I didn't want to strike an underwater boulder. My best bet was to swim across the waterway with my GPS, find the deepest passages and mark them with my GPS, then use those waypoints as targets and sail at them so I knew, high tide or low tide I always had enough water under the keel to pass through without scraping off some paint. We could use the commercial waterway but technically it's against the rules, I wanted to do it right but I wanted good information, so I decided to inspect it with my own eyeballs. If you got on the commercial waterway about the same time as a large ship it quickly became dangerous, since there was no way to hit the brakes and wait for them to clear I wanted to use the smaller opening where right of way conflicts should never happen. Plus, that area around the mouth of the bay was notorious for having sudden strong winds and tidal currents. I could sail through with the sails down and steer over any spot I wanted. Let me be honest about that place, imagine a huge liquor store across the street from a big park and beach. This waterway would be like that street, busy as hell and mostly populated from drunk assholes! ---- That morning with flippers, snorkel and facemask, and my GPS in a doubled Ziploc bag I drove down to the park and paid a guy with a small motor boat to take me halfway across the passage so I could jump-in and look at the depth of the water. He had a fish finder that also showed the bottom, we motored out 120 feet from the park. I used the GPS and with my facemask and snorkel I found the deepest/widest part of the passage and set three waypoints in my GPS and saved them (left, right, and center). What that did was it created a window about 60 feet wide and fifteen feet deep that I could sail through and not have to worry about slamming the keel into immovable coral at low tide, because I'd eventually sail through there at night at low tide. He also took me around watching his depth finder to show me that the opening extended towards the bridge and out into the Gulf. He said he saw other large sailboats use that gap too but he wasn't sure why it wasn't on any maps. The tiny island near the park was a long narrow strip of sand with some grass on it. It had a beautiful white sand beach all the way around and people would motor out there, drop anchor and spend the day swimming in the tropical warm water, picnicking, and downing gallons of alcohol. It looked like a great party spot, but with no water or bathrooms guess where those drunks peed? There were bathrooms in the building by the parking lot and a couple guys made money hauling people ashore and back for a couple bucks a ride but I'm sure most pee went right into the water. There's several beach-like sand bars around Tampa Bay, they attracted scantily dressed beautiful people from around Florida and was a great place for fit young men to show off their gym bodies. I saw some ridiculous looking elderly people on the sand bar, some made me laugh they looked so sad. One thing I never understood about women was why after having breast implants they never seemed to realize that in certain common body positions it was clearly visible they had fake breasts. Maybe the actual goal of implants was to publically say: I had enough money to afford surgery! The second funniest looking thing were lip injections, they always looked like she got punched in the mouth. Out on the beach you saw all that crap and a lot of it too. Sometimes I felt really sad for those people. The 70 year old ladies with D-cup implants looked the worst. That little strip of sand sticking out of the water was super crowded some days, and even attracted men and women that refused to wear clothes, but the police wouldn't enforce local laws, the island was a free-for-all at times. They even had brawls out there over nudity and drunkenness. Drunks on a Jetski were always a bad combo. ---- On Tuesday of the week of our trip I had everything ready and I was confident in my ability to get us there and back safely. I had one kitchen cabinet full of almost every type of canned food they had in our local grocery store. We had one sauce pan and one fry pan, neither of them had ever been used, but they were ready. I didn't plan on eating much on the trip down because I didn't want either of us to risk getting sea sick. I brought snack items too and thought I would encourage that instead of large meals on the way. I packed six bags of beef jerky, cans of Pringles, and a case of 24 ounce bottled waters. The utensil drawer was now loaded with common kitchen tools too. We had nice bowls and plates for microwaving food and lots of disposable cutlery and drinking cups too. I also brought along hummus and salsa, two bags of chips, and five different brands hot sauce. In the ice chest with the water were two cases of beer in bottles and another warm case in the cabinet. If we arrived in the Keys with big appetites then we'd have a great excuse to check out more restaurants which we both seemed to enjoy. From my experience, taking guys out to eat (and drink) increased the odds of having great sex later on. But I felt Carlo was easy to get into bed, I didn't think I'd need any help. Contact the author: borischenaz gmail