twenty-something

This is how I got there: Brandon and I spent all of January, after school, going to the local college's library to do research for our big History term paper. We would then go home and chat all night on Instant Messenger. Before long, I had either gained his trust or set off his gaydar enough for him to become more... playful.

Chats turn more suggestive. Brandon types and types about sex -- but mostly about masturbation. It takes a few weeks of this -- with me playing dumb or playing along -- until I send him a link to some masturbation homepage. He sends back a link from within the site -- a story, about two buddies, jacking off... together.

The next day, we are parked in his car, and we are beating ourselves off at the same time. Before I know it, we are jerking off together every day after school. Brandon wants to do more, but I am hesitant. I totally like him and I am still playing the part of curious straight guy -- I don't want to reveal too much or go to fast. But he pushes -- and he plays that song.

Yes. Brandon seduces me with Merril Bainbridge's one-hit wonder, "Mouth."

"Would it be so bad if I could turn you on?"

I'm ashamed to say it works. Before I know it, we are jerking each other off. Then he sucks me off. And then I am giving my fateful first blowjob.

I have to say, I'm not a big fan. His belly and thighs are too pale and doughy, and I don't like how his blonde bush stares back at me while he's pushing down on the back of my head. The cock is nice -- but I like the view from the comfort of the passenger's seat much better.

Pandora's Box is open. I am now sexually active. And, as he forces his dick down my throat, I think that I am falling in love with Brandon, my only real friend at school.

Speaking of pale, slightly chubby, and inexplicably sexy men, Prez Bill Clinton begins his second, more interesting term. I'm getting ahead of myself (and the 90s) here -- but I totally would've blown him. I miss him. He should be our king.

Pop culture in early 1997 sucks! It's all "I Believe I Can Fly," Star Wars special editions, Heaven's Gate, and shit. BLAH. The good stuff comes later in the year... Did somebody say Beanie Babies? Spice Girls? Titanic?! Oh, just you wait...

Brandon and I have been pulling down our pants and getting off together for nearly a month. I am uneasy with our sexual relationship -- and completely infatuated with him. It's like any discomfort I have with the physical stuff is channeled into a hopeless, hidden crush on my buddy. After all, we are just two straight guys that go out of our way to have man-on-man experiences with each other in his car during the cold Vermont winter.

One night in February, he comes over to my house after work. It's late and I sneak him up to my room to "watch a movie," hoping he'll sleep over. He doesn't -- but we do get fully naked and things get more involved than ever before. It's not intimate -- but we are closer. When it's done, we wipe up with eucalyptus-scented tissues and he leaves. It's scary -- right now, I can smell that eucalyptus in my apartment in 2005. And it's freaking me out.

Soon after that night, we are again parked somewhere, but this time we actually get out of the car. He pushes me up against a tree and we rub our bodies together. We almost kiss -- but we don't. We never, ever kiss. We get off, get back in the car -- and we are stuck. I am late for work and we are bitterly arguing as we desperately try to get the car out of the snow. It's a miserable experience. Brandon, luckily, has a cell phone and, eventually, calls his parents to have them get us, suspiciously stuck in the middle of nowhere. Eventually, his angry mother and father come help us. I get to work. And Brandon is grounded.

It is the last time we fool around. A few days later, Brandon tells me he's "fallen in love with a girl" he works with and he wants nothing more to do with me.

And it is Valentine's Day.

Thank God for Jewel's "You Were Meant For Me" and U2's "Staring at the Sun." And thank God for getting my braces off. I wear my retainer for about one month, and then I loose it under my bed.

I am miserable. Life sucks. I walk around school as a sad nobody, lonely, heart-broken, depressed. The closet sucks -- I miss the days when I ignorantly obsessed about Adam. Now I listen to sad songs and try to avoid Brandon at school.

Fast-forward through a few weeks of this:

His name is Tom, and he's a freshman at Dartmouth. At nineteen, he stands 6'7" and dazzles me with his blonde hair and brown eyes. He's a well-built crew team member with a body to die for, 200 pounds of pure, unadulterated sexiness. He's a fantasy come true: a rower, a frat boy, a Dartmouth boy.

We meet online, of course. We chat. In March, I come out to a friend from New Hampshire -- the first person in "real life" that I tell -- just to get a ride to meet Tom. The date goes alright -- we go to dinner, then see the Empire Strikes Back rerelease -- but said friend is a major third wheel. We manage a kiss good night outside his dorm -- my first intentional romantic kiss with another man.

Tom should be a dream come true. But things get complicated.

The whole experience seems like one of those extra-special episodes of Beverly Hills 90210 where everything comes apart and explodes just because its "Sweeps Week." Everything does explode and not for the sake of ratings; it seems for the sake of my torment.

Before I know it (and before either of us is ready), my mother discovers I am gay. She claims that I left an email open on the computer; I still believe she was snooping. Either way -- I am minding my own business in the living room when she says, "So who is this 'great guy'?" She's talking about Tom -- and the next thing I know, I am curled in a ball on our back porch, sobbing, being forced to admit to her that I'm gay. She says, "Tell me! Tell me!" I cry, "I'm not ready! I'm not ready!" Until, finally, I say the words.

Now let's ad insult to injury.

With my mother's discovery of my sexuality, I am torn away from my (online) support system. She does not understand my innocent friendship with Chris in Australia -- even threatening to press charges in a ridiculous email she sends him after going through my account again. She refuses to let me see Tom or even use the computer for anything but school work. (I fill my pockets with change to call him from the school payphone during study hall.) I am thrown into therapy -- probably a good idea, but for the wrong reasons. I hate the therapist and, I'm still convinced, he hates me. I'm heart-broken over Brandon, wanting to be closer to Tom, working too much at the grocery store, and constantly fighting with my mom. And there's something else, a feeling, something humming right below the surface, something I can't put my finger on or understand, that's pushing me further down.

Suddenly, the term paper that I was researching with Brandon comes due. I haven't done any work on it since we ended our thing. So what do I do? I cheat. Desperate, I grab pieces of some paper from the net to fill in gaps in my own. And I get caught. My bitter former-nun/current-repressed-and-closeted-lesbian History teacher goes the extra mile to torment me over my mistake.

Now I'm going to get kicked out of school.

I don't feel comfortable at school or at home. My life is out of control and I am powerless -- and this is all my own fault. Because I am gay. Because I am a cheater. Because I am worthless. I entertain thoughts of running away. Or worse.

All I'm left with is Sarah McLachlan. And myself.

Pulled down by the undertow
Never thought I could feel so low
In all the darkness
I feel like letting go....