Email address: pplesko@hotmail.com
Series/Sequel: Part 9 of the Rumors Series, Brian's back-story.
Pairings: Brian/Emmett
Category: Angst, Drama
Rating: NC-17
Date: 8/4/03
Summary: Brian's trip to Pittsburgh takes him to LaCage, the gay club the preceded Babylon on Liberty Avenue.
Spoilers: None
Warnings: No insults intended to our southern friends...I have it on good authority that they really DO talk this way...
Author's Note: If you don't like the boys in the pictures, it's not my fault. This is what you find in Pittsburgh.
“Five bucks,” he said without looking up. “And an ID.” I had never been to a bar that had a cover-charge before, so it took me a minute to pull my wallet out of my tight jeans and to dig-out the bills and the driver's license.
He looked up then...from my knee to my pelvis and up the centerline of my black lycra muscle-shirt. "For you....only two," he said as he gripped a pair of the bills I held out for payment. "A discount for guys like you,”…he checked the drivers license, “...Brian." He smiled as if he wanted something.
I stepped past the small table and entered the dark front-room. "La Cage" was a typical, small gay-bar in a large city...about fifty feet wide and a hundred-and-fifty feet long...an old building with its deterioration covered-up by too many coats of paint, the most recent one black...a floor of worn linoleum... booths and mismatched chairs and tables placed too close together. I learned later that there were two bars, one in front for the regulars who simply wanted to drink and converse, and a second, in the rear, with loud music, a bar upon which boys could dance, and a small stage just one step down for more sensuous, public “activities.”
The only lights in the front barroom were beneath the array of bottles behind the bar...brown, clear, green, and gold...they made the swarthy bartender glow like copper. A small candle flickered on each table in response to muttered conversations of faces hunched forward and lit eerily from below. They contributed more heat than light. The low rumble of male voices...the clink of ice-cubes...the distant throbbing of augmented-bass...the ripple of suggestive laughter.
I strolled through the milling crowd almost unnoticed and sat on the first available barstool. I spun to face the crowd, feet on the stool-rail and legs spread casually and invitingly. I was in no hurry for a drink; the night was just beginning.
To my left, hunched onto the bar on his elbows, was a lanky young-guy staring dejectedly at the scuffed mahogany surface. He held a glass of partially-melted ice cubes which he swirled occasionally with a supple wrist. His tight, white, boot-top jeans and florescent orange Hawaiian shirt practically glowed in the dim light.
"Drinking alone...on my birthday," he said, finally looking my way with big, sad eyes.
"Well, your glass is empty," I said. "Let me buy you another one...for the occasion."
"It's an Orange Blossom," he said, swirling the cubes again. "...with just a touch of Cointreau and real orange-blossom-water....and a dusting of powdered sugar on the rim...but just cheap champagne."
I turned to the bartender who had stepped-up behind me. "A Jim Beam with water on the side," I said. "And a..."
"One of his Orange Blossoms. I know... and I know the recipe." He turned and started mixing the Orange Blossom.
"You from around here?" the lanky-boy asked with a soft southern drawl indicating immediately that he wasn’t.
"I've been in Pittsburgh since I was 13...but now I'm away at college. Just came home for....for some clean laundry." I lied. My mother hadn't done my laundry since I'd gone to school... but the real reason for my visit would have required a long explanation. "You don't sound like you're from around here," I added.
"The pride of Hazlehurst, Mississippi....well, not exactly the pride...more like the pussy-boy," he said with a sad grin. "My name is Em...short for Emmett." The drinks arrived as we shook hands...pseudo-formality for a gay bar.
"Happy Birthday," said the bartender. "I hope you have many more."
"I'm Brian," I said. "You don't look old enough to be in here," I said, checking out his youthful face and soulful eyes. "Did the bouncer card you? He did me."
"I gave him a blow-job two weeks ago...and he feels a little guilty because he shot his load into my eye...and I made a big scene out of it, like I'd been shot...so he lets me in now...with no charge. I'm not sure how long it'll last before I have to blow him again."
I laughed aloud at the image of him writhing on the floor with an eye-full of cum. "So how old are you?" I asked.
"Almost 19," he said.
"How can you be ALMOST 19...unless your birthday is within the next 3 hours?"
"That's just a ploy to get guys to buy me drinks. Sorry. But you'd be surprised how often it works," he said shamelessly. "You should try it. You're gorgeous. You'd never need to buy a drink in a million years. 'If you got it, flaunt it,...make it work,' my Aunt Eula used to say. She was an exotic dancer in her youth."
"I've never heard of....Hazelhurst, was it?" I said, trying to remember the name of any town in Mississippi.
"About two miles from Slopjar and a loud-holler from Scrofula...that's what we used to say." He paused. "It's a joke. It's near Jackson...and only a few minutes from Hell to any gay-boy who happens to grow up there. But, I think I was the only one."
"And you live here now?"
"Yep. For the last month. I've got a job re-stocking the CDs in a music store...and wiping the drool off the Sting posters. Bless his heart." He gave a cute little smile that let me know whose drool it was. Suddenly he looked serious again. "And what's a good lookin' guy like you lookin' for on a Saturday night on Liberty Avenue? Do I have a chance?" Before I could answer, he reached out tentatively and stroked the backs of his fingers across the tight fabric covering my pec. "I wish I had those," he said, nodding at my chest. "I'm as flat as Liza Minelli. Maybe someday they'll have pec-implants for guys and I can look like you."
"All it takes is some time, some determination, and some sweat," I said. "You could whip that body into shape in no-time."
"Does that mean you don't like it the way it is?" he asked with mock disappointment as he slumped in his bar stool. “One thing about us southern gay-boys, we have slim hips, fluffy biscuits, and a wide smile."
I laughed and put my arm around his shoulder. “I think tonight may be your lucky night.”
He crossed his fingers behind his back, for luck, and gave me that big, southern smile. “Oh, My! I think my rectum just winked. Have you been in the backroom?” he asked, nodding toward the closed doors.
“This place has a backroom?” I asked, remembering the backroom at Rumors and hoping that there was a similar place to get this guy on his back with his legs in the air.
“It has go-go boys and good music,” he said. “Some of them are a little lame, but they also let amateurs strip during their breaks. They’d love you,” he said, pointing at me in a sexy way and giving me a wink. “Come on…I’ll show you.” He gripped my forearm and literally dragged me off the barstool.
“You say that a lot,” I observed. “…bless his heart.”
“Oh, that,” he said. “…It’s just southern gay-boy slang for ‘I’d fuck him.’” We both laughed at the foibles of southern slang.
“Do you meet many guys here…you know, for sex?” I asked, trying to decide whether this place was somewhere I’d frequent when I was in-town.
“Yep!” he replied with a wink. “Honey, even a blind hog finds an acorn once in a while! But, so far, it’s only been blow-jobs in the alley...getting or giving...but I don’t complain.”
“No, no...” I said with a grin. “My best moves are in a prone position. I’m no dancer. But, go ahead, Em. Show me what you can do.”
He smiled and batted his lashes. “Sugah...when you’ve got show-business in your blood, you don’t need to be asked a third time.” He stood...posed demurely as those at surrounding tables started to applaud. By now, the two boys were naked and stroking themselves in-time with the music. Em climbed the short stairs to the bar, stepped past one of them, and took his position in the center. His movements were minimal, at-first... just swaying and stroking the contours of his body with sensuous hands...but as the audience began their rhythmic clapping, he unbuttoned his outrageous shirt slowly, feigning embarrassment, which drove the audience wild. With his back to the audience, the shirt slipped slowly from his broad shoulders revealing the V-shaped back and narrow waist. As he turned, he threw the shirt directly at my face, and I caught it in a quick grab. He smiled that crooked smile and raised an eyebrow as if to say, “Come and get me, Big Boy.”
He kicked off his loafers behind the bar and began to open the fly of his white jeans ever so slowly. The other two had joined him and were stroking his chest and shoulders as he exposed the faint treasure-trail and flat lower abs. At that moment, I realized that he was making eye contact with only me...as if he were dancing to seduce me. I gave him a raised eyebrow, a crooked smile, and a slight nod. We would fuck later that night. The pants were so
“I don’t know what comes over me,” he said. “Some of Aunt Eulah’s influence, maybe.... Although she used a lot of feathers and fans. But when I get up there, you could butter my butt and call me a biscuit...I’d do almost anything.” He looked embarrassed again. “I hope you liked it.”
“My Aunt Eulah used to say ‘There’s no such thing as ENOUGH’…but, of course, she was married to Uncle Silas…..”
“I plan to put some of those moves of yours to good use,” I said. “But…where can we go? I don’t have a place here in Pitt to sleep…and my dorm is two hours away. How about your place?”
“I don’t exactly …have …a place,” he said haltingly. “I’m staying with this guy, or ‘woman’ I met when I got to Pittsburgh. His, ...or her, name is ‘Godiva’…and she’s a drag queen who lives almost exclusively as a female. She’s never said I couldn’t bring someone home… I have my own room… but I haven’t done it in the 3 weeks I’ve been staying with her. Maybe I should give her a call.”
“Sounds like a plan,” I said. “Tell her we plan to let her get SOME sleep.”
“I’m not sure about that,” Em said. “I’m as noisy as a hog-caller convention when I get wound-up.” He left to find the pay-phone.
One of the dancers, wearing only his white bikini underwear, sidled over and leaned on the table with a muscular arm. “Care to join me on-stage?” he oozed. “I’d love to open that ‘package’ in front of these guys and let you fuck me with it. I’ll bet you’d like performing for an audience.” He reached back to stroke his ass through the soft, white cotton. “You could make it hurt…and I’d like it.”
“I’m saving it for later,” I said confidently. “Some other time. I’ll be back…”
“He’s taken…” I heard him mutter to another table as he passed.
Em returned, wending his ass through the crowd like a car careening through traffic. “She says it’s OK…as long as you’re cute. I told her to have her smelling salts ready. And we need to wait a few minutes so she can get her girdle on. She’s not working tonight, so she was just hangin’-out around the house.” Somehow that thought made my cock soften a tiny bit. I grabbed his ass as we left the table. I could tell it was gonna be a fine night.
The house was an old Victorian a few blocks off Liberty Avenue…partially restored, with a jungle of a flower garden in front…broad steps and a porch swing. I’ll forgo the long narrative of my first meeting with Godiva. Suffice it to say that she was more quiet and demur than I expected…almost motherly to Em. And she disappeared quickly leaving us alone in the broad front hall.
“Y’all come on in and stay a spell,” he said, sweeping his arm into the front parlor. “I never dreamed my White Knight in shining armor would be driving an ’81 Ford,” he said as he draped his arms around my neck. “On second thought, take me to the turret.”
It was almost a turret, actually. His room was a circular room on the corner of the third floor…the summit of a round tower reached by its own tiny staircase. There was a mattress in the center of the floor and a large shoulder-harness backpack spilling its contents onto the floor. The rest of the room was bare. The only ‘decoration’ was the surrealistic pattern made by the peeling multi-layers of wallpaper. The only light was a bare bulb hanging from the high ceiling.
“It’s not much,” he said apologetically. “And if I’d known you were coming, I woulda straightened up a little.”
“No problem,” I said. “We both know why we’re here.” I turned off the light. The curved windows which stretched three-quarters of the way around the room admitted enough light to find each other in the darkness.
“Well, yes. That’s true,” he said, unbuttoning his shirt. “But we southern boys have our manners to maintain.”
“Bless your heart,” I said.
He paused, unsure of my meaning, then laughed. “My thoughts exactly,” he said, stepping forward to help strip my shirt from my torso. He kissed the back of my arm as I raised it over my head to finish removing the tight shirt. We undressed quickly, then stood facing each other, naked in the moonlight reflecting from the floor and the rumpled white sheets of the bed..
I paused for a moment...not only to enjoy the view of his slender nakedness, but also to recognize the unique character of this moment. Not since my childish sex-play with Lee had I been totally alone with someone my own age in a sexually-charged setting. The long hours of nude modeling for John, and the infrequent and unsatisfying sex faded in comparison with this moment. There was no intimacy at Rumors; even the private cubicles were just one thin wall away from the sounds of the sexual pleasure of others. Hammer and Troy were more like mentors than partners; the sex was hot, but they ran the show. But here, it was just the two of us... standing ready to explore and to share pleasure and passion. No encouragement from others... no need to “perform”... no expectations beyond a juicy, sweaty climax... no bondage or domination. He simply wanted me... and I wanted him. He reached out slowly with an upturned palm to invite me into his bed on the floor.
I stepped forward and slipped a hand behind his back and pulled him against me. He gave a little moan of pleasure as if I had already met one of his needs, then lifted his thigh to stroke along the outer margin of mine. I felt him tremble slightly. This was new for him, too... the only gay-boy in a small town was finally finding what his dreams had led him to pursue. I turned him then, with my hands on his waist... pirouetting on one foot, his back slipped against my chest. My cock nested in the vertical cleavage of his ass as my arms locked around his torso. His head tilted back against my cheek; his hand reached back to stroke my hip. He trembled more noticeably now.
“I’ve waited so long for this,” he began, sounding as if he were choking back tears.
“I know,” I murmured.
“No, I don’t mean I’m a virgin,” he added hastily. “I’ve been fucked in-anger many times...the anger for being different... the punishment for being queer... the advantage of knowing they could get away with it.” He paused to suck in a new breath. “But this is different. You want me.”
“Yes,” I murmured. “For all the right reasons.”
“I’m trying not to cry,” he sobbed. “And I’m not doing a very good job of it.”
“Just let it out and let it go,” I said. “We have all night.”
I felt him tense in my arms. “There! No more.” He shook his head emphatically. “It’s just that you’re the first person who ever wanted to touch me that way. And I’ve wanted it for so long. And here I am, making a perfect fool of myself.”
My hand slid down his flat belly and through his soft bush to grip his cock. It was totally soft... cut with a flared head...with ample skin so, even when he was hard, it would slide easily.
“And here I am, soft as a ripe persimmon....” He reached down to feel my hand on his cock.
“I can remedy that,” I said. “I’m an expert.”
He chuckled and turned his head sharply to kiss my cheek. “Well, do your magic,” he whispered.
We moved sideways onto the mattress, then knelt, then lay side by side. I pressed him down with one hand while I reversed direction and rolled onto him in “69”-position. His mouth eagerly sought-out my cock as I kissed his inner thighs and spread his legs wide. With a mouth full of saliva I pressed my lips to his shaft, then opened them to take his softness into me. Hard cocks are fine... aroused and ready for action. But soft cocks are like delicate fruit, ready to devour.... full of the promise. I had seen his cock hard during the strip-tease, and it was hard to imagine that this velvety mass of malleable flesh could expand to the size I remembered. As I thought about it, it began to swell in my mouth. And I began to work it as I had been taught....slow, sensuous moves...concentrating on the tip...constricting the base...teasing the slit.
He already had my hard shaft deep in his throat and he was working on my balls with one hand. I began the pelvic thrusts that would test his gag-reflex... he passed the test with flying colors.
The feeling of a cock growing in your mouth in indescribable...arousal made-manifest.... sexual urgency you could hold in your hand... Nature’s was of saying “I find you incredibly attractive and I’m ready to enjoy you.”
His hands traced the contours of my ass and lower back, guiding my rhythm to match his swallowing. Without some quick prevention, I would have cum almost immediately. I gripped his face between my thighs and shove it deep, driving my cock into his throat and leaving it there. He gagged then, and quickly recovered. But he got the message.
His cock was pressing against the back of my throat, so I slid off of it slowly leaving a sheen of wet saliva. The head twitched in my lips as I held it momentarily before releasing it. “Grab my knees,” I said, “and lift your knees up into my pits. I’ll show you something.” He paused a moment as if it took a few seconds for the message to penetrate the sensual fog, then he followed my instructions. I rose onto my knees, then bent at the waist and lifted his ass upward with my hands at the juncture of his ass and lower back… where the pronounced dimples were. Then I buried my face between his thighs, spit a wad of saliva into the puckered well of his anus, and began to rim him. He reacted as if I had penetrated him…an initial jerk of repulsion, and then a relaxation into the pleasure of it. He lifted his head to kiss my cock-tip swaying above his face.
I gave him the full treatment. No boy who has been forcibly sodomized has any idea about the pleasure of rimming, despite any pleasure he has given himself with his fingers. The wide, bathing tongue-licks and the rolled-tongue penetrations are new sensations that focus one’s attention on that three-square inch area like a camera lens shutting down to f22. He moaned with pleasure as he tried to capture my swaying cock-tip like a dog leaping for a hotdog on a string. Every time he got close, I’d press into him with my long tongue. I added a probing, wiggling finger to open him wider… which simply made him moan louder.
“You want my cock in there, don’t you?” I said, shoving the finger in deeper.
“Oh, yes,” he moaned. “Oh,…YES!”
“Like the gay-boy you know you are,” I continued.
“Yes, I want it…” he whined, almost as if he were in-pain.
“Like you’ve dreamed about it… even when guys were forcing you,” I added.
“YESSS,” he hissed.
“Tell me,” I said. I reversed my position as he spoke, lifting his knees over my shoulders and rolling his ass off the mattress again. I placed his hands on my shoulders and went down onto my elbows, ready to penetrate him.
“I want it,” he said. “I’ve wanted it since I was eleven… but I could only play with straight boys. I never read about getting fucked…I never had anyone tell me about it…I just knew it, deep inside.” He paused as I pressed my shaft against his opening. “Do it,” he begged. “Take me.”
Balancing on one arm, I reached for his right hand with my left, putting my fingers into his clutching palm. We held hands for a moment, acknowledging the mutuality of our need... and then I began to press it into him. At first there was great resistance…the memories of prior forcible penetrations…the reflex to escape…but then his eyes opened, and as he studied my face memorizing it for future recall, I felt a wave of relaxation flood over his body, letting me enter. I took him as quickly as possible, not to prolong the pain. He gasped once, with a furrowed brow and a grimace, and then he settled into the peaceful euphoria of fulfillment… savoring the moment… rocking his pelvis in-rhythm with my in-and-out fucking.
“I knew …it would be …like this,” he said as he clutched my shoulders in a vice-grip. “I knew… it COULD be… like this.” His fingers interlocked behind my neck as he pulled himself up to kiss me. I met him with wide-open lips and an exploring tongue, fucking him at both ends. He moaned into my mouth, almost rattling my teeth. He broke-away, gasping for air. “I knew…” he began. His eyes rolled back in the rapture of complete euphoria.
I didn’t let him go there completely. “Stay with me,” I said. “There’s so much more.” I kissed him again, driving my head deep into the pillow. He struggled then, momentarily, as I felt his ass tighten on my hard shaft…memories of being forced… cloudy images of humiliation and punishment.
“ No… do it,” he said, not making complete sense. His hands stroked down my back to grip my hips in an effort to force me in deeper. “I want it.” Then he forced a hand between us...to feel the shaft penetrating his ass...to grip it on the outstroke...to feel its hardness as it pulsed into him with increasing force. Then he gripped his own cock as it bounced against his abs and pounded it feverishly as he had done all those years in the privacy of his room. Rising to the pinnacle of sensuality, we soared into the unknown like hawks mating in mid-air. The moonlight made our skin as white as milk, with dark shadows like a Rodin sculpture ...bodies interlocked like wrestlers...the clutching and grasping of need... the raw sounds of primitive desire... the sharp gasps of surprise and exceeded expectations.
Further details are hard to relate. He had pushed me beyond the normal awareness into sex-by-reflex… doing what felt good… testing the boundaries… making-it-up as I went along. I remember rolling him over to fuck him in that position, too… and we continued on-and-off all night.
I awoke in the morning to find him propped up on one elbow, looking at me.
“You are SO cute when you sleep,” he said, running his finger along my profile. “Your nose sorta wrinkles and your lip curls...like Billy Idol.”
I smiled, but brushed his finger away. It tickled. My body ached from the physical punishment of last night. I felt like I’d done the decathlon.
“Do you drink coffee? Of course, you do...” he continued, prattling-away as I imagined Aunt Eulah would do. “I’ll get some. You stay right here.” He arose, unfolding that lanky body, and slipped into his white jeans that were crumpled on the floor.
When he opened the door, he paused, then released an “Ooooooohhhhh” of surprise and pleasure. “Isn’t she sweet? Thank you, Godiva, Sweetie... Look, Brian...she brought us two breakfasts on a tray.” He planted the tray on my belly, which was a surprise since my morning hard-on was still at half-mast under the sheet. I struggled to balance the tray while he pulled off the jeans and got back into bed. Orange juice in stemmed glasses, chocolate croissants on doilied plates, mugs of hot coffee, and a single rose in a slender bud vase.
“I’m not letting you get-away,” he said, biting the end off the croissant suggestively. “We’re gonna shop for china, silver, and linens this afternoon, and...”
“Hold on,” I said. “You’ve got the wrong idea about me. Last night was just a pleasure-fuck...not a proposal of marriage.” I took a gulp of coffee to prevent me from saying something hurtful.
“Oh. I sorta knew that...but you can’t blame a girl for trying,” he said, wiping some chocolate off the corner of my mouth. “I’ve heard about you guys...love-’em-and-leave-’em.” He settled back onto the pillow in mock disgust. “But it was mighty fine while it lasted,” he said, back-of-hand to forehead like the heroine in the B-movie.
“Listen,” I said, breaking the dramatic moment. “I’ll probably be back in Pittsburgh someday. It’s my home...as much as it can be...and the closest big city. Our paths will cross again... as long as you keep hustling drinks, I’ll be there to buy you another someday. But don’t expect a long-term affair. It’s just not gonna happen.”
“I’ll whisper farewell...and wave from the front porch...like a southern belle biding adieu to her soldier going off to the Great War,” he said, suddenly cheerful again. “Not expecting you to return, of course.”
As silly and as overly dramatic as Em was, I still found him pleasant and delightful. He made me laugh... and I hadn’t been doing enough of that lately. The memories of Rumors came flooding back then... the tug-of-war between Troy and Hammer... the fight... the opening of the Labyrinth next weekend. Life’s little diversions could distract for a few moments, but Reality was only hiding in the wings, waiting for her grand re-appearance. I had expectations to meet, actions to uphold, territory to defend. But for what reason?
I collected some of the melted chocolate on my thumb as I raised the sheet with the other hand. “I have this little problem....down here... that maybe you can help me with? Oh... there I’ve gone and smudged some chocolate on it. I’ll try to keep it off the bedclothes...”
“Imagine that,” he said rising onto one elbow again. “And how did you know I’m a sucker for chocolate?...”
...................................
"Don't ridicule our Southern manners. We say sir and ma'am. We hold doors open for others. We offer our seats to old folks because such things are expected of civilized people. Behave yourself around our sweet little gray-haired grandmothers or they'll kick some manners into your butt just like they did ours." Emmett Honeycutt, 1991