by Rager, Bob
…He had seen this person before, a man almost young, a hairline beginning to inch backward, the restless motion of a man in his late twenties. He worked a block along the Avenue, at the corner so he could retreat down the street if he needed to walk away from the constant attention of the Avenues.
Here were easy, direct routes to the ramps for the Beltway and the suburbs of Virginia, convenient for the family man seeking relief in one of the neighborhood joints.
He was standing one step by the entrance of the metro at the Navy Yard, talking to a man in a torn raincoat with a plaid lining that flopped open across one knee in a light breeze.
The John nodded up and down to emphasize their agreements, then the John walked up the Capitol Street toward one of the parking lots and rooming house. Once they had catered to the gypsies of the Navy Yard, the young workingmen starting their climb into the city and paying rent by the week.
It’s hard sometimes to know who the score is among those passing by. Sometimes they’re on the young side, sometimes they want to pay for the convenience or the thrill. You can’t always tell by the clothes.
Most of the time though, they’re like the man in the rain coat; an older man, older as they’re called by the young men in the bars who hustle them, blatantly for money like the young man following raincoat guy down the block or for a place to stay and an allowance; the basics of any marriage.
The John took on the husband role; the provider who held down a job, while the trophy did something interesting and novel; it could be anything like working in a florist shop, or decorating the rooms inhabited by nervous women.
It all begins with the seemingly innocent invitation to have coffee, or a drink; a ploy for the John to watch his new find carefully and for that taste like battery acid and salt in the mouth, the taste danger; for all the changes of recent court rulings, and presidential decrees, and TV shows about effeminate men looking for Mr. Right, there was a blackout of the one fact they all had in common, that confirmed on these men a bond as strong and unyielding as the motion of the turning earth, they all had sex with each other, yet the act of sex was itself carefully left out of the TV shows, the lonely bachelor was never shown walking beside a dark stranger, or if central to a court decision, sex was described in such abstraction that most men, gay or straight, couldn’t figure out exactly what was legal and were left in the dark where these Johns seemed to want to keep it and keep intact their masculinity because they didn’t see themselves in the flouncing caricatures of television: They perfected their manliness by seeking out only the other weaker males.
Or some wanted a strong, real-man type, a man in a uniform, the military, a construction worker, a policeman, a lumberjack.
Like Cal; he was sitting on a brown stone doorstep a couple houses off 14th Street. He wore a sleeveless plaid shirt that bared smooth wiry arms like an adolescent boy’s. His blonde hair circled down around his ears and he said, “Hey,” in a soft drawl that was like a sigh. He was young, really young.
He glanced down at Cal’s forearms and was surprised to see the clear, healthy shine inside his elbows where he expected to see the shadow tracks of veins from injecting drugs. Cal glowed with a healthy beach boy’s ease in the world. And he might be the right age or look it just enough to pass.
‘But he was a blonde’ he thought, ‘the type everybody goes for, even the Johns who pretended not to notice.’ Cal was probably a real blonde, from the way the hair on his forearms shimmered pale strands of gold where sun was high overhead.
One night, Cal leaned up against the door of a Mercedes Benz stopped at the curb. The night as warmer than usual for the season and had brought out the locals who walked alone, or in twos or threes down the block, marveling at how wonderful the air was, how wonderful it all was.
And Cal and the John looked over at him, talking. Pretty soon, Cal pushed back the crown of his big, fawn, colored hat, and crossed the street.
“Hey,” Cal said and stood next to him, his hands dug down into the back pockets of his jeans. “That John says hello, he’s into men, likes the motorcycle jacket and the salt and pepper hair, he’s okay, he’s willing to pay.”
He didn’t have a choice now that his bluff was called by this street kid; he walked across the street. The score was maybe almost 40: You looked at a John, guessed his age, and added about 10 years. He wore a black close-fitting suit and a black shirt, no tie. He kept sniffing, and the scene didn’t look right, the John’s eyes were wet looking and rimmed in red.
He glanced over at Cal, who was staring at nowhere in particular.
“Hey man,” the John growled, “Come on, sit down.” The John sounded expensive, and he sounded loaded.
He leaned on the open window waiting; not wanting to rush to say anything:
“Hey man,” the John said again. “I’ve got a place nearby, let’s just play, horse around. I’ve got a couple of these for you.” The John waved two big bills. He didn’t like getting into cars with Johns, didn’t like being closed up with someone else in control, but Cal was watching and he knew this was a test of some kind.
When he sat down inside the cushioned leather interior – looking around, he realized that the man’s suit and the upholstery were the same color, a deep smoke, almost black grey.
He looked the other way when he rolled his eyes. One thing though, the traffic forced the john to drive not much faster than a walk, what with the lights, and the pushy pedestrians crossing in the middle of the block, or blocking the intersection way past the change in the lights. He could get out if he needed.
In the outside rear-view mirror, Cal and the metro entrance shrank until they disappeared behind them; they were on an Avenue going west, then, another turn…
“I like to drive,” the John said out of nowhere, talking to the windshield, “yeah, I like to drive.” He seemed to sober up with each block, each turn of the steering wheel.
“You hungry, you want to eat?” The question threw him off balance.
“Hey, are you hungry? Let’s eat,” the John drove into a parking lot and tossed the keys to the attendant.
At the entrance to a Thai restaurant, the John looked at him. “No, don’t worry, you’re dressed just fine,” then he chuckled to himself, having fun with his own little joke.
He let the John order; he said little; almost mute, he nodded deliberately on cue, but didn’t laugh at the John’s stories about famous people seen at swell parties.
“You’re hungry tonight? You probably don’t get regular meals out there.”
And then he understood the John’s scene; he was doing a kindness for, or to a poor unfortunate. In an act of charity he hadn’t found a homeless person and was giving him food.
Chapter 18
The apartment walls were covered with cloth in the same color of John’s suit. It was like a storm cloud on all sides. “You seem nervous,” the John said, “Make yourself comfortable, take your jacket off if you’d like.
“You know this scene, don’t you?” His accent slipped, betraying some suburban density between Washington and Boston.
Later, his thighs around John’s head, his groin pressed against the John’s lips, he closed his eyes until he heard heavy breaths and a sudden groan.
The John wriggled out from under and covered himself with a corner of the sheet. His shoulders were narrow, smooth, and pale against the charcoal of the walls, then he sat on the edge of the bed, his back a slab of pale muscles.
The John’s not bad looking, a little worn out after living in clubs and smoky rooms; he could probably find someone for mutual sex, but that takes time, and who has the time? He had heard all the excuses.
The John fished out a cigarette from the drawer in the night table. “You want one? You don’t?!” he said shaking his head, as he lit up and inhaled. “That’s one bad habit you haven’t picked up.
“You haven’t been in town long, have you?” the John said. The John had all the questions and all the answers, and all he had to do wa
s nod and grunt.
“I don’t get it,” he said, “You don’t want to stay on the streets, not out there.” He yawned a mouth of brilliant, white, perfect teeth. Then came the benediction that made everything that had just happened okay.
“You have to take care of yourself and get off the streets…” he looked sideways, “You can’t stay on the streets forever, not these days, not ever. The streets age you fast. Wherever you’re from, it can’t be all bad as that…” He seemed drunk again, “You and me aren’t so different, everybody’s got to hustle in this town.”
The John fumbled into the drawer of the nightstand again, and pulled out two bills. “Come on, take it, yeah, you’ve been great. These streets make you old real fast. I’ve seen kids out there, children, little boys. Take it,” said the John, trailing off. The John was falling asleep. “The stuff I’ve seen will make you old.”
He took a chance afraid the John would fall asleep; “I don’t do little boys.”
The John rallied, “I ain’t never done a little boy. What do you take me for?” in a blast and honk.
He figured the John was from along somewhere the New Jersey Turnpike. The John took the bait.
“Nah, I mean, I seen, I saw a kid out there, couldn’t be more than 10, 12, out there with an older kid, that they say they’re brothers. Real sweet, but the little boy, I’ve seen him go off by himself.” He put the bills on the nightstand.
“I’m still waiting for my money’s worth,” the John said, his words coming crisp and sharp, barking orders.
He was edging closer to fear now. The John’s mood had turned from a sloshy generosity to a jabbing urgency.
“Well then, ain’t like you’re interested anyways,” the John said and fell back into bed on his side. His bare shoulders were a stark white against the grey sheets. He glowed like an old statue of blue marble.
“I’m going to pay you, don’t worry. See – it’s right there,” the John flicked his wrist at the bills on the night table. “Now lie down…sit up against the…”
What he heard came across a distance, no voices, but grunts and later, another sigh except at a higher pitch.
“There’s your money,” the John said and stood up from the bed. He seemed weak and floppy now, and gone was the cool luster of his white chest; he just looked pale now. He pulled out a robe from the closet that was hidden in the charcoal room, and stuck his arms into it.
He took the John’s money with a quick glance to count it, and stuffed the bills into his jacket’s inside pocket.
“Here’s something for the cab ride,” the John said, and pushed another bill into his hand.
There was a long silence. “You can come back if you want…if you want, you can see me again. See, I’ll meet you at the circle,” he seemed confused again. “Just show up.”
In return he pressed, “Say, those two kids, the brothers, do they hang out at Dupont?”
“Whoa – who? Those kids…yeah, yeah, yeah. I think they’re from the, they show up on weekends. Say, I thought you said you didn’t do little boys? They’re a lot of trouble, you should stay away from that scene. Aww, why am I telling you about trouble?”
The John sank back into bed.
“Okay, I’m going now,” he said to the John. He thought the man was already sleep, but then the John’s eyes popped open and for a moment, he was startled by the sudden re-animation of this ghost-like figure in a paisley robe.
“So, if you want to see me again…”
For an instant he fought down an impulse to reach out and grab the John by his throat and pin him against the wall and keep him there until the John told him where to find the two kid brothers.
He took a deep breath. The John might still be useful later and he didn’t want the word out on the street that he was violent, that he was dangerous.
“So, what about it? Meet me at the Circle, at the…”
“Saturday,” he said, not waiting.
“Yeah, yeah, Saturday at the Connecticut side going downtown…if you don’t show up, that’s okay.”
The John took a deep breath, then the words rushed out, “there’s always others, yeah.”
Chapter 19
That Saturday, the cool spring night warmed by odd currents of almost warm air that came out of nowhere to hint at the coming heat and steam of Washington summer.
He sat on a bench, his legs apart, both arms thrown back along the top edge like a giant black bird spreading its wings on a branch. Around him, figures slowly wandered without destination, a man underdressed in a t-shirt and shorts sat at the edge of the fountain pool. In the center rose a statue of a general waving his sword overhead. At concrete tables, men played chess in the fading light. Rush hour and the flood of pedestrians fleeing downtown offices had passed and left the park free for rendezvous and meetings and transactions not described in the guidebooks to the city.
A figure walked out of the gathering twilight, a smudge of ash at first that gradually took on the outlines of a man. The John wore the same deep charcoal suit, making him seem smaller and older-looking in the light of the street lamps.
The John didn’t say anything – he stood a moment studying him then, “You wear that jacket all the time? It’s okay, we can get dinner in Adams Morgan, they don’t care how you dress in those places.”
He’s surprised at how he feels the sting of the John’s cutting remarks, the disdain and the superiority. Again he feels the urge to put his hands on this sad, useless man, but he nods silently knowing what he is expected to do and play out his role as the poor, ignorant, unfortunate recipient of the John’s superior attentions and charity.
They eat amid the clatter and bustle of an overpriced restaurant decorated like a plantation in French Indochina. He knows because the John points out the teak benches and teak shutters and the bowls of soup and hot noodles, and garnishes of cilantro.
That evening in the John’s apartment, the John said, “You’re more into it tonight, yeah, it’s not so bad, it just takes some getting used to.”
He has heard those same words before from a teacher at the popular but mediocre college where he fled to get away from his over-vigilant mother left behind by his father on a tour of duty in what was left of the real Indochina had abandoned him.
‘The trouble is’ he thought as he lay in the dark, his jeans around his knees, ‘you don’t really ever get used to it.’
“You look hot that way,” the John said, “I know a guy who’s always looking for models, you know the kind of pictures…”
He shot the John a dark glance.
“Okay, just saying,” the John said, “it doesn’t matter, there’s plenty of others all the time. Buses bring ‘em in everyday, dropping guys like you off, as country as chicken coups.”
The John talked about meeting again. “Try to wear something else,” the John said as the door closed.
On the night, the John and he had agreed on he walked past the bars along P Street; the tables on the sidewalks were full of men who sat with plates of whatever food was the talk of the moment. No one seemed to actually eat anything; everyone was careful to avoid gaining weight and that condition most dreaded by gay men even more than being old – getting fat.
He wore the motorcycle jacket in defiance mixed with annoyance and felt a strange satisfaction at the glances that came his way as he walked block after block. There were men interested in each other for sex, but not money. ‘They’re not commercial,’ he thought. They all seemed to go to the same barber or salon as the current fashion dictated, and wore the same close fitting shits and sweaters and the same dark shade of jeans. The men seemed in the same range of ages – thirtyish, forty years old. At first glance, they looked like the men in the bars and the restaurants along Connecticut Avenue, well-groomed, alert, laughing and drinking. But a closer inspection found the men here more carefully groomed, the clothes newer and more expensive, the laughter more forced, the faces more blurred by drinking as the night went on.
He
knew that many, perhaps most of them came from Virginia and Maryland where there were few, if any bars and clubs for these men.
He held back at the next intersection, he wanted to see something; not sure what he was looking for, he hung in the shadows of a clutch of trees. From where he stood, he had a view of the benches and sidewalks, but he himself was invisible to passers-by.
He spotted the John at the pedestrian island off Connecticut, waiting for the light to change. He wore a hat with a narrow brim and the charcoal suit, but his quick movement, glances here and there in ceaseless vigilance singled him out.
The John now stood at the same bench as before. He lit a cigarette and in the light of the flame, his hands were pale with long tapering fingers and carefully tendered nails.
‘If I meet him again,’ he thought from his hideout behind a tree, ‘he’ll want to meet me again.’
‘And what’s the point of that?’ He turned away quickly and hurried down the side street.
Chapter 20
These worlds existed side by side as in the city in parallel dimension one, a place that teemed with men available for a price and men who were eager to pay, and at the center of this twilight world was this traffic circle ringed by metro entrances and rays of streets and avenues going to and from all points of the compass.
The park was an open air marketplace where men with unruly urges bartered with men selling relief had its habitual buyers and sellers, and gaggles of young men talking too loud and erupting into gales of laughter even as they carefully eyed the park’s other visitors. A pair of black Queens pranced through, their chins in the air, condescending to let themselves be seen. The hustlers, careful to walk alone displayed themselves as they made slow, lazy circles past the rim of benches and tables. Whatever the type, whatever their specialty, the hustlers shared the same fundamental appearance: they were all young, the fraternity college boys in chinos and polo shirts, the working class youth in a package delivery service uniform; the tough kid in jeans and t-shirt, the rocker in bad boots and a torn shirt, the suburban boy next door with his big smile and low-slung pants.