This is a work of fiction. Names of characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination and are used fictitiously; any resemblance to any actual persons, living or dead, events, or locations is entirely coincidental.

Copyright © 2015 by Dennis Milholland – All rights reserved. Other than for private, not-for-profit use, no part of this work may be reproduced, transmitted or stored in any form or by any means, other than that intended by the author, without written permission from the copyright holder.

Careful! This is a work of fiction containing graphic descriptions of sex between males and critiques of religion and governments. And last but not least, Nifty would like your donations.

Farewell, Uncle Ho

by Dennis Milholland

questions and comments are welcome. www.milholland.eu / dennis@milholland.eu

Chapter 96 (Saturday, July 22, Sunday, July 23, 1967)

The remainder of Saturday was lazy. The most strenuous thing we did was to accompany Linh to the New Market, a very modern two storey building, built with a curve on one side, to complement the grass traffic circle. The ground floor was full of unlikely produce. Stalls extended out onto the street, where two jeeps of MPs were trying to look as if they were policing the market through posturing.

As Linh had told us, Dalat was the only place in Vietnam where fruits and vegetables, which required a moderate climate, like strawberries, tomatoes, and turnips, and onions, cabbage, and cauliflower could be grown. This was produce, native to Europe, once grown here in Dalat to feed the homesick French and now used to augment the Vietnamese cuisine.

Needless to say, Linh went on a food-shopping binge. I was glad that Gerry had reminded me to bring some potassium permanganate, or it wouldn't have been only the anti-malaria medication challenging our digestive tracts.

Carrying his purchases up the serpentine roads and connecting stairs was not nearly as exhausting as it would have been in the heat of Saigon, but we were ragged by the time we got back to the house. That is, except for Linh. The man was a powerhouse of energy. Although he was several years older than me, he had the energy of a twelve-year-old.

As we were in the kitchen, helping Linh put the fruit, vegetables, cheese and meat away, Jules came into the kitchen to get a fresh bottle of Dubonnet out of the pantry, and Gerry asked him why we hadn't heard any war background noise, as we sometimes did in Saigon.

"As rumor has it," He closed the pantry door. "Hanoi and Saigon met an agreement to keep Dalat a neutral zone."

"The even bigger rumor is," Wade appeared in the doorway to the kitchen. "that military bosses on both sides use it for rest and relaxation."

"Even though the South-Vietnamese Military Academy is located here?" Jules laughed. "Wouldn't that be like Ben Bella relaxing at Saint-Cyr?"

Linh and I laughed along with him. Wade and Gerry looked lost. So, I stood behind Gerry and put my arms around him in a hug. "Back when you were just starting school in '51, Ben Bella was leading up the Algerian revolution--"

"--yeah, I know who Ben Bella is." He laid his head against my arm. "It was Saint-Cyr that threw me."

I kissed the side of his head. "It's outside Paris, where the French Military Academy is located."

I glanced at Wade, who smiled and nodded, seemingly appreciative that I hadn't exposed his lack of trivial, Weekly-Reader knowledge. Yvette was hanging off his right shoulder, trying subtly to attract affection like Gerry was getting.

Pity for her and millions of her sisters around the world; hetero men are much more concerned with guarding their macho image than showing their softer side. Someone could have thought them to be Queer.

***

Shortly after dinner, Gerry and I retired to take a quick nap. We had hardly been able to control our yawning. After what seemed to have been an hour or so, I opened one eye to sunshine bouncing off the highly polished, mahogany floor.

My watch on the nightstand told me that it was just before five in the morning. Still in our clothes, Gerry and I needed to freshen up.

By the time I got both windows open, to let in crisp, clean air, and my clothes off, Gerry was sitting on the commode, using the enema bag. "Just seeing if the loose bowels have stopped." He held it until I got into the tub. "Looks okay." He climbed into the tub and drew the shower curtain.

"Just to be on the safe side, let´s make love in here." I chuckled with a noticeable tinge of embarrassment. He brushed two fingers down my cheek and kissed me, smiled, took the jar of coconut oil and slowly retracted my skin to work the oil into the area normally constituting the hood. He slathered some onto his hole, wiped his hand on his own genitalia, turned with his back to me, spread his legs, and bent forward, holding himself steady on the window sill. He was looking back at me over his right shoulder.

My cock knew where to find its nest. His hole was tight enough to push back the skin, but not too tight to cause any discomfort for either of us. My glans loved being uncovered inside my Gerry. His slick mucous membrane was hugging my slick inner skin. His blond ringlets surrounding his anus rhythmically embraced and released the jet black hair around my cock.

I brought my hands up to fondle and lightly pinch his nipples. He moaned.

He always moaned at this point in our mating, when I was inside him. In just a minute, I would slide the tip of my right index finger under his tight skin. It would move in circles around his corona. We would enjoy my playing with the highly sensitive tip of his cock.

Just as I felt his cock grow, almost ready to ejaculate, I pulled the finger out and held the little nipple at the end of his phallus shut, to let the pending ejaculation subside. We both took and held a deep breath.

Now, it was time to start pumping his ass. I pulled out of him, only to plunge back inside. This caused him to expand his sphincter, to maximum opening without stretching it. Again, he moaned, bordering on an initial growl. That was the signal to pick up the pace slowly, to run the final lap.

I took hold of his hips and started plunging in and out as deeply as I could until I felt his muscles locking onto my cock. My punching his prostate was what made him spurt, and his sphincter's trying to expel me by rhythmically contracting around my dick in what felt like a sucking motion was what made me cum.

In the past six months, this has become a routine. But similar to masturbation, it has become a routine of which no man could ever grow tired.

***

Wondering what to do in Dalat on a Sunday afternoon, was about as challenging as wondering what to do on Fire Island in the winter. "We could always go visit the three royal palaces." No one could tell whether Jules was joking or serious. His faint smile was unreadable. Everyone was just short of dismissive, except for Gerry.

"Cool." His child-like face expressed wonderment. At that moment, I wished that I could regain some of his innocence. "Never saw one from the inside."

"I don't think that he's talking about visiting them from the inside." Yvette, seated on the massive, well-cushioned window seat, glanced over the top of her magazine.

"Ah, but I am." Jules' smile became just slightly devilish, as he flipped his cigarette into the fireplace, behind where he was standing under the huge, dark-framed, planning map of Dalat.

Wade, stretched out on the window seat, next to Yvette, snorted. "The next thing you'll be telling us, is that you're related to Bao Dai."

"Bao Dai?" Gerry wondered aloud. The name sounded familiar, but I kept my ignorance to myself, thinking that I'd get the connection out of context, at some point. Had to hand it to my guy, though, he wasn't afraid of showing weakness.

Jules smiled genuinely at Gerry and sat down next to him on the brown-leather couch. "He was the last king, or emperor, if you will, of Vietnam and the only head of state of the State of Vietnam."

"And a fucking playboy." Wade snickered and Yvette clicked her tongue admonishingly.

"What?" Wade looked at Yvette. "Gerry's over twenty-one."

"Just." I added and Gerry turned beet red.

"Anyway," Jules got us back on track. "he abdicated in-"

"He didn't abdicate, Diem threw him out." Wade growled from the window seat.

"He abdicated in 1945, when the Japanese surrendered." Jules' voice was forceful, but he wasn't looking for a fight.

"Jules is right." Yvette laughed. "He abdicated in '45; Diem threw him out as head of state in '55."

Wade grumbled something that nobody understood. But it did sound like Pig Latin, slightly reminiscent of: Uck-fay ou-yay.

"Anyway," Jules cleared his voice, glaring at Wade. "when he left, the Republic of Vietnam inherited quite a few palaces, three of which are here in Dalat."

"And how do you propose getting in?" Wade sat up, now glaring. "You don't just drive up to the front gates of government summer residents and official guest houses and toot your horn."

Although he hadn't yet said a word, Linh sat there, on the other side of Yvette, who had been translating for him, grinning at Jules. "Il s'appelle Bond, James Bond."

***

"The only other city, I've ever visited, which had comparable, wide, serpentine boulevards, letting altitude drop or increase a couple hundred meters within only minutes, was Monte Carlo." I informed no one in particular as we made our way down into the city from Jules' villa.

Jules took up the thread. "As opposed to the Principality of Monaco, where the Roman-Catholic House of Grimaldi has profited quite nicely from the casino and several major luxury hotels, the Roman-Catholic House of Ngo, in a fit of economic narrow-sightedness, outlawed gambling, thus quashing the plans for a luxury casino, to go along with the already existent luxury hotel." He had to downshift since the roadway became steeper.

"To tell the truth, the Catholic House of Ngo, prohibited gambling in all of South Vietnam. It was the Vichy-approved Governor General of French Indochina, Decoux, who canceled the plans for a casino in Dalat much earlier, still during the planning stages. Above the fireplace in the family living room, my parents hung a large map of the development and extension plan of Dalat, to monitor the major and minor fuck-ups. The map was signed in 1943, where the casino was still drawn in, but they never built it." we pulled up in front of Hôtel du Parc, the more moderately priced sister to The Dalat Palace and about 150 meters behind the Palace to the south.

"Decoux, by the way," Jules sounded sarcastic, as he handed the keys to the valet. "was the Governor General, who encouraged the Japanese occupation forces to make off with the ornaments on the façade of the Municipal Theatre in Saigon. He thought that he was bringing the architecture up to date, instead of ruining an established architectural style, par for the course for self-serving, uneducated Nazis."

After I'd finished translating, Linh added softly in French: "And he was the one who built for himself, what was then known as the Résidence du Gouverneur Général, but now known as Dinh II, Dinh being Vietnamese for palace, which designates a real palace, as opposed to the title of a five-star hotel, as in The Dalat Palace."

As Jules offered cigarettes all around, he laughed along with Linh,. "Decoux was also the crackpot know-it-all, who wanted The Lang Bian Palace updated into something it was never meant to be: an Art Deco hotel, named The Dalat Palace with a concrete staircase and awning entrance, weighing some 80 metric tons, killing six, when it collapsed on 6 March 1943, a month and twenty days before Decoux signed off on the plans for the urban area, divided into mainly ethnic zones."

"Was that why your dad built your villa, outside the incorporated city of Dalat?" Gerry asked Jules.

"Not really." He patted Gerry's shoulder. "It was mainly for the view." He laughed and pocketed the parking number.

"Are we going for a drink?" Wade asked as he and Yvette caught up with the four of us, quickly turning his car over to the pleasantly smiling valet.

"If you want." Jules chuckled.

***

"Bonjour, monsieur Landry." and a wave came from the receptionist behind the mahogany front desk to the right.

Jules replied, waved back and led us by the ornate, wrought-iron-encased elevator, nestled into the well of the stairs, and around the corner to the right, where a European man of about thirty five, in an odd uniform, stood, sipping his drink. When he saw us, he approached and gave Jules a real hug. "It's been far too long, my Friend." I translated the French for Gerry.

"It's true." Jules remarked solemnly. "This is the first time since…"

"My condolences." He hugged Jules closely, again. "This damned war…" After almost a minute, he released Jules. "Who are your friends?"