Date: Tue, 22 Aug 2006 22:28:18 -0700 (PDT)
From: Dannyboi <dgwhatever@yahoo.com>
Subject: Reality

This is my first shot at any writing.  So I would desperately like some
feedback (try to keep it constructive).  It is meant as a stand-alone short
story, so there won't be any more chapters on this one, but if I get
favorable replies I may post some other stories I have lying around on my
hard drive.  This story is somewhat auto-biographical, but all names have
been changed to protect the innocent, and, now that I reflect upon it, some
of it is a little bit overly dramatic when compared to the actual events.
All the usual disclaimers apply, i.e. if you are not of age wherever you
happen to live or if material depicting sexual activity between two
consenting adults offends you, don't read this.

Having said that here we go...

				  Reality

It's a tired cliche that it is 'better to have loved and lost then to have
never loved at all'.  I don't really know anything concerning the truth of
the statement, but it has always grated on me when people say it.
Admittedly, I know nothing about love.  I do know a little about loss,
though.  It sucks.  Shortly after I turned twelve, I became 'estranged'
from all the friends that I had growing up.  What made this loss both
harder and easier to deal with was the fact that I didn't have to cope with
anyone dying or any of them moving away... nothing as dramatic as that.  It
was harder, because their unwillingness to see me as a friend signaled to
me that their must be something very much wrong with me, but it was also
easier, because I could blame them for being popularity obsessed jerks who
were willing to tread on any head to get as high in the social order of
middle school as possible (hey! Truth of the matter aside, being angry at
them helped me cope). At any rate I was 12 and at this point in my life the
world had let me down.  Over the next few years the situation didn't
improve any, either.  Shortly after I turned 15 I also lost the one
confidant I had within my family -my grandfather.  He died after a painful
battle with cancer, leaving me absolutely devastated and with no one to
turn to.  After that day any immediate emotional support I had was gone.

Don't get me wrong, from what I can tell, my parents love me to this day,
but they are as unable to express emotion as I am.  Non-demonstrative
doesn't begin to describe the dysfunctional quasi-unit that is our family.
I certainly never talked to my parents about what I was going through at
school or how I felt in general and they certainly didn't do any digging or
hug me and tell me that everything was going to be ok.  They gave me all
the space they thought I needed and I went about learning to deal with
things myself.  I just sort of accepted that this was what being a man was
about and given my sexual confusion throughout my early teen years, I
didn't want to do anything which in the eyes of my parents or the kids at
school would paint me as less of a man.  Truth told, part of me also
believed that I had been lucky in my pre-teen years anyway.  This in as
much as I have a speech impediment and most kids with such a noticeable
difference are usually tormented in elementary school. I guess I got by on
the fact that I was good at almost all sports and generally carried myself
with a sort of naive happiness.

Fast-forward to last fall and where am I?  Starting with the basics I am
20, and I guess I look ok...  At least people keep telling me that.  The
body is a spin-off benefit of taking refuge in competitive athletics.  It
really didn't matter on that particular night, though...

It was late - almost last call- and the night had been sort of a bust
anyway.  As I stumbled out of the club the fresh, cold winter air of
Vancouver hit me.  In any other Canadian city there probably would have
been snow and ice but here it was just cold enough to make me wish that I
had worn a jacket.  Whatever.  By that point I really didn't notice the
cold too much anyway.

As I began to walk I asked myself why I even bothered.  The clubs weren't
fun.  They weren't fun before and they weren't fun now.  This being my
second time at a gay club I don't know what I was expecting, but in the end
the night had progressed as per the usual order which had become all to
familiar over the last few years: come in, order myself a few straight
shots of vodka to get loosened up and then a nice import beer to slowly
milk, while I watched the place fill up and making talk with the few people
I had come with.  I didn't really know these particular people, aside from
the fact that they were gay.  I had only met them about a week previous at
a pride meeting on campus which I had attended as the culmination of years
of loneliness and frustration at my inability to meet any gay boys anywhere
else.  Long story short, they said they were going, and that I should come
along.  Truth told, I could already tell that I probably wasn't going to be
good friends with any of these people.  All of them were pretty concerned
with Gay issues, and basically fit into the crowd whom I would describe as
defining themselves and their lives by their sexuality - a concept pretty
foreign to me and one which I am still not too comfortable with to this
day. The fact of the matter, however, was that I had nothing better to do
that night, so I decided to go along anyway despite the fact that I sorta
got the impression that they had no interest in getting to know me as a
person and that the underlying motive for the invite, was to get to know
the 'new meat'.  Whatever.  None of them were all that good looking, they
certainly weren't going to be getting anything, and when the place got full
enough I could just ditch them anyway, which is exactly what I did.  At the
first convenient exit I ducked off to a corner to do a little people
watching and finish off my latest drink.  Once the bottle was gone I then
made my way onto the Dance floor and started to move around -probably
pretty awkwardly- to the music. At some point I was approached by a random
Asian guy who started grinding his ass into my crotch which was a pleasant
and mildly stimulating experience.  After a few songs and then some making
out off to the side he eventually left, leaving me horny, frustrated and
somewhat annoyed at the little fucking tease.  Why did they always leave?
After a good little bout of drinking alone at the bar and brushing off a
few of the guys from the pride group that attempted to talk to me, I
decided it was time to call'er a night.

So there I was out in the chill air stumbling my way home.  'Fuck paying
for a cab', I thought to myself.  The hour-or-so walk would probably do me
good anyways and it would definitely save me from catching the end of the
party that was going on across the hall, where a lot of my school
'acquaintances' were.  I would also end up less hung-over in the morning
and save myself getting the 3rd degree from my unit-mate, and the first
person since I was twelve whom I could actually call a friend -Alex.

I was probably no more than five minutes into my jolly little stumble when
I bumped into another a few guys exiting from the cities main other gay
club looking about as depressed as I felt.  I made some wise ass comment to
the order of the group having the makings of a threesome, to which one
responded in a cute, but obviously put on whiny voice, "well now it could
be a foursome if you wanted" and then flashed me the puppy eyes...

The speaker's name turned out to be Mark; a decently built kid, slightly
smaller than me with a sort of boyish face and a mischievous grin.  He had
spiky blond hair and blue eyes that sort of sparkled in the street lights
but also seemed to convey a sense of longing.  We got to talking a little
bit and he invited me back to his place where we enjoyed a few drinks...
and then a few more as the night wore on.  Things got a little bit wild.
There was definitely a little bit of wrestling that probably didn't involve
some groping and touching, and certainly didn't involve myself allowing
Mark to pin me so's I could check out his chest through his sweat-soaked
shirt and inhale the sweet mix of sweat, Hugo Boss and the faint smell of
some kind of Shampoo.  After a while the others turned in for the night as
the impromptu 'party' wound down. Then it was just Mark and I.

He told me to follow him, and then proceeded to lead me into his bedroom.
Once inside, he turned to me and in a soft almost compassionate voice said:

"Hey, man, it's really late and you'll have difficulty getting a cab at
this hour and you probably shouldn't be walking home alone"

I nodded

"Stay here and you can head back in the morning"

His eyes were almost begging me to stay but I said nothing.

"Look, Dan" he finally said, "I'm not trying to make you do anything you're
uncomfortable with. You seem like a nice guy and all, just stay the night.
We don't have to do anything.  We could just cuddle"

And there it was!  God knows that I was starved for any type of intimate
contact or affection but I really couldn't cuddle.  I hadn't had what you
would call real, intimate contact with another human being in almost a
decade and even in my drunken state I knew that I would tense up and things
might get awkward or I might get emotional.  I didn't want Mark to think I
was some kind of freak and I certainly didn't want to explain why close
contact made me uncomfortable, so I avoided the whole situation by stating
that it sounded nice, but he may be more comfortable inside of me.  At
least this way I could pass off any mistakes due to my relative
inexperience, and I wouldn't be in the even more awkward position of
attempting to give him a blowjob, having never done it before.  He almost
seemed to frown at this for a second but then with a resigned expression,
he asked if I had ever done it before.

I lied.  I told him I had but only a couple times.  I didn't ask him to go
slow or anything and he didn't.  His briefs quickly fell to the floor and I
helped pull his shirt off.  The previous wrestling-come-strip-show had left
me in just my underwear which he quickly removed for me.  I finally got a
good look at him.  He was... cute.  Slim, toned muscle and a pretty decent
sized cock of about seven inches which was starting to show its excitement.
I might have smiled at him because he gave me this sorta goofy grin and
then approached me. He lubed my hole some and then after fooling around
inside with a finger, turned me over, lifted my legs onto his shoulders and
slid himself somewhat roughly in.  I don't even remember if he wore a
condom or not.  Anyway, there was a quick surge of pain, but it slowly
quickly subsided.  In fact the whole thing wasn't nearly as bad as I had
been lead to believe it would be from the little reading I had done; just
some dull pain now and then and this not-unpleasant full sort of feeling.
Maybe it was all the alcohol.  Mark eventually settled into a rhythm,
unceremoniously ramming his cock into my ass, and aside from the occasional
grunt or moan I basically just passively took it.  The feeling was
intrusive, but at the same time kind of nice.  I never experienced the
waves of pleasure that some said were supposed to accompany it.  It could
have been that mark was a bad fuck or maybe it was me but in reality at
that point he probably just didn't care.  Some stupid sloppy college kid
was lying on his bed and whether or not it was what he had really hoped for
out of the evening, he was going to take full advantage.

After about fifteen minutes Mark finally came, and we got dressed.  He
walked me to the door, we made some small talk and he put his number in my
cell phone.  After that, he gave me a quick -appreciative?-kiss and then I
headed out and hailed a cab just as the sun was peaking up over the
horizon.

The experience wasn't awkward, it wasn't emotional, it wasn't anything.  He
had taken my cherry, I had let him, and although it wasn't what I had
dreamed it would be when I first accepted that I was gay a few years ago,
or like all the fairy-tail love stories suggest it would be, it wasn't a
devastating loss.  Even in my drunken state, rationalizing it was easy.  I
wasn't good at talking on anything more than a superficial level, I had no
idea what to do in intimate situations and since I clearly wasn't going to
meet someone anytime soon, fall in love or anything like that, I may as
well give it a try.

So what was the outcome?  Well... really nothing.  The experience was empty
and I felt no better about myself when I woke up.  Deep down I was still
lonely and unhappy.  On the other hand I didn't really feel dirty or
disgusted with myself either.  In fact, my only real concern was my
inability to remember whether or not he had used a condom, and how I was
going to get rid of my force five hangover before my German quiz in a few
hours.

After that night things just settled back into their regular routine; my
reality... training, classes, As and Bs, victories on the field and in the
water and some defeats as well.  I go to parties and chat with people at
school but rarely do any real talking.

Lately I am seeing Alex settling down with his new girlfriend.  He really
does know how to pick'em.  Despite what the name would lead you to believe,
Brandy has substance.  She is pretty, but more than that she has
compassion, she is intelligent, but above all she conducts herself with a
real sense of poise and dignity while managing to maintain a sense of
humor.  That's you don't often see.  Truth be told, I am happy for both of
them.  Alex is a great guy and he hasn't always had it easy.  He deserves
to be happy. In a way I am envious of them.  It really seems like they have
something special.

As for myself I will be finished my degree in a couple years, after a
prolonged six years of study.  My life isn't a fairy tail and things
haven't necessarily worked out the way that I would have hoped up to this
point.  In the end though, I can't dwell on the past.  I am still young, I
have my health, and above all, I still have hope that someday I, too, will
find someone.  Change is sometimes painfully slow, but as far as I can tell
the recent steps I have taken in my life have been somewhat positive.  For
example, I recently came out to Alex, and because of it we have become
closer.  I still live my life predominantly alone, and drink and/or cry
myself to sleep on a regular basis but as long as I have hope I have
something... and that's my reality.

Comments? Please write to dgwhatever@yahoo.com

-Dannyboi