by Joe Keenan
I replied that at this point my secret career as a ghostwriter seemed the merest triviality compared to what was going on in the treatment rooms of Les Étoiles. What would Claire do when she found out about that?
“You’re not thinking of telling her?”
“I might as well. You know she’ll find out.”
“How’s she gonna find out?”
“She’ll find out! Claire always finds out!”
“Damn right I do!” snarled Claire from the other side of the door.
Gilbert flinched so violently he fell off the table even as I shrieked like a smoke alarm and lunged for the door, unsure if we’d locked it. Luckily we had and the knob twisted in impotent fury.
“Open the damn door!” hollered Claire.
“Far whom, please, var you luke-ing?” said Gilbert in a ludicrous attempt to sound Swedish.
“I know it’s you, you nancy jackass! Let me in!”
Gilbert clambered to his feet. “Follow me!” he mouthed and scuttled over to the room’s other door, which I’d taken for a closet but which apparently wasn’t if he was proposing we escape through it. He tried the knob and found it locked.
“Shit!”
He spun around, stamped a slippered foot in fury, and slumped, thwarted, against the door, which promptly opened into the room, sending him sprawling once again to the floor. His facialist was not, I presumed, the same staffer who’d been on fellatio duty earlier. This one was a formidable woman who reminded me of the late Lotte Lenya if Miss Lenya had abandoned the musical stage to seek fame as a competitive weight lifter.
“Sorry!” she exclaimed, helping Gilbert up. Riveted briefly by this spectacle, I almost failed to notice that the door to deliverance was even now swinging shut. I saw it in time though and, leaping balletically across the room, grabbed the handle.
“You can’t go out that way!” said Lotte sternly. “That’s for staff only!”
“First day!” I said and zipped through, locking it behind me. She’d have keys I knew, but it would take her a moment to fish them out and by then I intended to be as far away as possible. I skedaddled down a narrow, dimly lit hall, rounding corners twice before pausing to take in my surroundings.
I appeared to be in some sort of “backstage” area, a drably utilitarian warren of halls and cupboards. Doors to my left led, I presumed, to more treatment rooms; doors to my right might have been storage closets or God only knew what. I tried a few of these and all were locked save one holding towels and sheets.
“Mister!” called the disgruntled facialist, and I resumed my sprint, advancing through the maze till I came to a dead end at a door marked VIP ROOMS—AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY. I tried the door, which, not surprisingly, was locked. I doubled back, hoping to find a treatment room to escape through without bursting in on some poor überagent who wished only to be spanked in peace. I’d just pressed my ear to a door and was listening for voices when a door on the opposite side of the hall suddenly banged open.
Turning, I saw a fetching young man with short hair and very important biceps enter the hall carrying a garment bag. Both literally and figuratively dashing, he hurtled past me like a chorus boy late for a curtain. On reaching the VIP door, he waved a small card at a wall sensor. There was a click and he hurried through it into another hallway.
“Mister!” called Lotte, angrier now. I sprinted madly toward the VIP door, thrust my arm out to keep it from shutting, and hurried through it just in time to see Biceps disappear into what looked like a small dressing room. Seconds later the handle of the VIP door clacked up and down a few times but Lotte, as I’d suspected, lacked clearance for this area and could chivy me no further.
Glancing about, I found that I liked this hall much better than the last one. Apart from its welcome shortage of marauding facialists, it was sleeker, more like the spa’s Zen-chic public spaces. Assuming still that the treatment rooms were to my left, I went to the first door and listened a moment to see if it was occupied. Hearing nothing, I opened the door and immediately received a valuable reminder that sex is not invariably noisy. I don’t know if you’ve seen that famous statue of Romulus and Remus, the mythological founders of Rome, suckling a wolf who represents the city. The sight I now beheld resembled a living sculpture based on it with Rex Bajour as either Remus or Romulus and a nude, broad-shouldered café-au-lait youth in the role of the wolf.
“Sorry!” I said as politely as one could in such a circumstance. “Carry on!” I closed the door swiftly but not before Rex had recognized me and shot me an understandably disgruntled look.
I moved on to the next door, listened at it, and again heard nothing. I opened it the merest crack, peered in, and, finding no tryst in progress, entered.
The room was similar to Gilbert’s but larger and with more amenities. There was a leather sofa against one wall and the opposite wall had a counter with a sink and a glass shower stall. The wall between them had a large floor-to-ceiling mirror and in the center of the room stood a sturdy massage table draped in white sheets.
I crossed to the door that led to the public hall and opened it, cocking an ear for predators. I had no plan at this point but to make it back to my room without meeting anyone intent on either pummeling or purchasing me. I’d then barricade myself within, granting admittance to no one save Stephen till I’d figured out my next move.
I listened a moment. Hearing nothing, I set foot gingerly into the hall. The minute I did I heard approaching footsteps and retreated at once, closing the door. I pressed an ear to it and heard the footsteps draw near, then stop directly in front of it. Fearing it might be Claire, I raced over to the door I’d come in through and found it locked. Grasping at once my striking paucity of alternatives, I dove under the massage table, praying the long, draped sheets would serve to conceal me.
The door opened and two people entered.
“How are you this evening, sir?” said a low pleasant voice with a hint of an accent. Spanish? Italian?
“Tense, Ricky. Really, really tense!”
Stephen!
“Well,” said Ricky sexily, “we’ll see what we can do about that.”
It dawned on me that there was no further need to conceal myself. Stephen would have nothing but sympathy for my decision to flee from Claire and would, if anything, be amused by the misadventures that had brought me to my current absurd position. I shifted my weight, preparing to pop out with an impish “Surprise!” when a second more powerful thought struck me.
Stephen was about to have sex with this man.
Right on this table perhaps.
And I was leaving?
For leave I certainly would if I revealed myself, the odds of Stephen saying, “Hey, we were just about to fuck—pull up a chair!” being remote at best. Why choose exile when I could crouch here in thrilling proximity as the monarch of my fantasies surrendered to carnal bliss? There was, after all, no guarantee I’d ever win him for myself. This could, I reasoned, be as close to actual sex with him as I’d ever get.
“Crazy fucking day,” sighed Stephen as his exquisite ankles swam into view inches from my face. “We barely get here when who walks in but my batty old uncle. He’s harmless but my mom hates him. Now she’s all, ‘I thought you said this was a nice place. They let anyone in!’ ”
Ricky laughed at Stephen’s Diana impression, which was quite good. His ankles suddenly disappeared, obscured behind a heap of fallen terry cloth. I leaned forward, kneeling now in a cat stretch position, and lowered my face to the floor. I found that if I carefully adjusted the crumpled robe I created a thin space between it and the dangling sheet through which I could peer out at the mirrored wall.
There sat Stephen, wearing only a pair of white silk boxers, his godlike physique gloriously backlit by a pin spot over the table. Behind him, gently massaging his shoulders, stood Ricky, quite an eyeful himself, with auburn hair, sensuous cheekbones, and lips like two lovely little flotation devices.
“My uncle’s pretty damn no
sy,” said Stephen, “so if he should, you know, ask you about me—”
“He won’t hear a thing from me, sir,” vowed Ricky with becoming solemnity.
“Great. Did you remember the, uh—?”
“Right here.”
Stephen swung his legs around and sat facing the other way. I could only see his back now though I had no complaint about that. I heard the click of a cigarette lighter and soon the pungent aroma of marijuana filled the air. “Stephen smokes weed!” I thought, delighted to find he indulged in a habit well known to sharpen the libido while hampering judgment.
“Want some?” asked Stephen, holding his breath.
“I’m good.”
Stephen took a few more drags, then lay down on his stomach, his face toward the mirror. He seemed to be watching the scene as if it were a movie, smiling at the tableau they presented. Ricky, aware of this, peeled off his T-shirt, proudly displaying what a few thousand hours at a good gym can do for a boy. Stephen’s smile crinkled into a loopy grin that was equal parts contentment, anticipation, and pot. I was thrilled to be witnessing the scene even as I wished I could do so in a posture less reminiscent of a Muslim at prayer. I am, alas, tall, and didn’t dare lie flat lest my legs protrude.
Ricky removed his pants, revealing a tight pair of briefs. He straddled Stephen on the table and began massaging his neck and shoulders. This went on for two minutes, then five, then ten. My right thumb began twitching uncontrollably, a reflex that puzzled me till I realized that my brain, acting from long force of habit, was instructing the scene to fast-forward. Ricky finally leaned down and lightly kissed Stephen’s neck.
“You are so hot, sir.”
Stephen grunted in pleasure as Ricky teasingly worked his hands down Stephen’s spine till he reached the top of his boxers. He gently tugged them down, exposing Stephen’s bum, which was even more magnificent than I remembered it from its brief but oft-downloaded appearance in the first Caliber movie. Ricky massaged Stephen’s butt, kneading the cheeks in slow circular moves. After a moment, he gently parted them.
THOSE OF YOU READING this aloud to small children might find this a good time to tell them that the big strong masseur rubbed the handsome actor till he felt all better and who wants ice cream? Likewise, those of you whose appetite for hot masseur-on-film-star action is limited or nonexistent may want to start skimming now, as things are about to get pretty racy. I’m aware that certain of my readers (and you know who you are, Aunt Leslie) feel strongly that gay sexual encounters, when regrettably necessary to move the story along, should be described with all possible decorum, succinctly outlining the essentials before panning across to the fluttering curtains. I remind those who take this view that many others among my readership approach such scenes with positive eagerness, muttering, “Finally!” under their breath and complaining only when they feel the author has stinted on details. It is for their sake (and that of young Amos, who has to learn somewhere) that I relate what follows.
RICKY SLATHERED A GENEROUS amount of massage oil on his right hand and, with little fanfare, poked a finger into Stephen’s bottom. Stephen gasped, which was a damn good thing, as it kept him from hearing my own. This was not the sort of incursion one expected a rugged, humanity-saving action hero to countenance and I wondered if Stephen would turn to face his invader with a stern glare and a cry of “You go too far, sir!”
But Stephen did not protest. He groaned softly and wagged his bottom from side to side, a gesture Ricky correctly interpreted to mean, “More fingers, please.” He obliged with a second, then a third, performing this chore, I felt, in an oddly dispassionate, businesslike way, as though he were looking for his keys in there.
Some verbal foreplay ensued, Ricky drawing his inspiration from the screenplays of his favorite adult films. Rubbing himself through his briefs, he asked Stephen if he wanted his big nasty cock up his butt. Stephen replied that, yes, he wanted that big nasty cock real bad, lust wreaking its usual havoc on grammar. Ricky repeated the question and Stephen replied once more in the affirmative. “You like a big fat cock, don’t you?” asked Ricky, as though Stephen hadn’t made himself quite clear on the point. Stephen, polite to a fault, said yes, he did very much. “You want this big boy up your ass?” inquired Ricky, and by then I was ready to spring from under the table and shout, “He wants to get fucked! What do you need? A UN interpreter?!”
Ricky finally decided to oblige, ripping off his tear-away undies and exposing their impressive cargo, a sight that left me feeling both aroused and daunted; it was one thing for Stephen to be a bottom but did he have to be spoiled? Ricky sheathed it in a silvery condom that made it gleam like a hood ornament and I wondered frankly how Stephen’s garage was going to accommodate it. Ricky parked it though and with an ungentle velocity that caused Stephen to arch his back and bury his face in the massage table’s doughnut hole, a feature I hadn’t even noticed till I felt hot breath on my neck and gazed up to see Stephen’s face framed in it mere inches from my own. The eyes, thank God, were tightly closed, his lovely features contorted in a lip-biting wince. The thought bubble, had there been one, would have read, “Remind me again why I like this.”
I stared up at him, my emotions whipsawing between terror of being caught and the natural fascination one feels on beholding the face of a penetrated action star. Ricky delivered a second salvo that caused the table to shake and Stephen to whip his head up out of the doughnut. I ducked down and peered out from under the sheet again. There was Ricky, looking less lustful than diligent as he plied his trade, the strokes slow and regular as though quality control were timing him. But the sight of Stephen squirming in bliss was one I found overwhelmingly stimulating and soon old faithful was indignantly battering the walls of my trousers as if to say, “I’m here too, y’know!” I reached for my zipper then stopped, realizing how drastically this would compound my embarrassment were Stephen to peer through the doughnut and discover me. A moment later Ricky, bless him, growled, “Turn over, I want to see you!” and Stephen promptly obliged. Free now from fear of exposure, I exposed myself and soon they were at it again with yours truly downstairs playing the home version.
I could see Stephen’s face in the mirror through the whole thing. His eyes never left it, so transfixed was he by the view. There are those who might have called this narcissism, but I was inclined to take a more charitable view. There was, after all, not a gay man alive who wouldn’t have been utterly mesmerized by the sight. Why should Stephen himself find it any less engrossing?
This portion of the festivities went on for about five more minutes, Stephen’s low moans softly punctuating the hush, the erotic spell marred only once when Ricky, without missing a thrust, remarked, “You know, I’m an actor too.” But just when things seemed to be speeding toward the finish, Ricky abruptly withdrew and hopped off the table.
“What’d you stop for?” whined Stephen.
“I’m bringing in reinforcements,” teased Ricky.
“Huh?”
“I have a friend,” said Ricky. “Someone you know. I’m pretty sure you’ll be glad to see him.”
“Whizzy?” asked Stephen, sounding more out of it than I’d realized he was.
There was a knock at the door to the back hall.
“That’s him now,” said Ricky with a smirk. He scooped up his clothes and, fishing a key from his pants, opened the door and said, “Stephen, meet Oscar.” And in walked Oscar.
Or rather in walked the Oscar.
Or, more precisely, in walked a well-muscled young man costumed quite skillfully as a life-size replica of an Academy Award. The outfit subtly combined gold body paint with some skintight fabric, like spandex but thinner and with a metallic sheen. His face was masked, the features, like the statuette’s, barely suggested, and he held the requisite two-edged sword. There was one noteworthy departure from verisimilitude. Real Oscars lack genitalia and this one quite markedly did not, sporting a large gilded erection that jutted out from the costume just to the righ
t of the sword. Ricky cast his eyes on it, his exaggerated double take a clear sign that he’d do well to keep his day job.
“Whoa! I think he likes you!”
Stephen just stared for a long moment, then burst into a bizarre honking laugh that made me wonder again just how strong the pot had been.
“Hey, Oscar,” giggled Stephen, “nice to see ya, buddy. Watcha got for me there?”
Ricky, content now that introductions had been made and the new friends had found a mutual interest, bade them farewell and departed. Oscar advanced toward the table with small geishalike steps, as his legs were meshed together to enhance his resemblance to the statuette On reaching the table he tossed aside his sword and hoisted himself up to join Stephen, who wasted little time in demonstrating that his own legs were not similarly encumbered.
They soon found their rhythm and Stephen, who’d stared so intently into the mirror before, barely glanced at it now. He only had eyes for Oscar, gazing raptly into the inscrutable gilded face with a look unlike any Ricky had garnered from him. That, it appeared, had merely been lust. This was the Real Thing.
I asked myself, “Would he ever look at me with such rapture, such unalloyed adoration?” It seemed doubtful. It seemed more doubtful still that my plan to seduce him this weekend had even the paltriest hope of success. What would he want with the likes of me when his needs had already been amply met by a studly masseur and a famous award? It was a bitter pill to swallow but one tries to be philosophical about these things, so I just shrugged and resumed masturbating.
“Yeah, big guy!” cried Stephen ecstatically. “Yeah! Just like that, Oscar! Come to Poppa!”
Oscar picked up the pace and they began galloping toward the finish line with self barely a furlong behind. But just when Stephen seemed only seconds from shouting, “You like me! You really really like me!” the mood was shattered by a loud knock on the door.
“Stephen!” came Gina’s voice, muffled but unmistakable. “Stephen! I need to talk to you.”