Rent Boy

by James Anthony Ford

  I was realised I was coming of age, heading into my early thirties, and I was starting to lose interest in the party scene. I was well and truly over it. I was also over sex. I even got to the point that I would not even look at another guy but i think Steve had a lot to do with that. I still had strong feeling for him. But I have to confess, and it this is a confession of great courage for me to admit this, I did on a rare occasion have a fling or two with Matthew. I just couldn’t resist. But I never told Steve. I couldn’t tell him, it would crush him but I just could not resist Matthew and I hated him for that. But Matthew and I was purely a physical relationship, nothing else. So it didn’t matter. Will had an opinion about this and believed that I was playing with fire. I knew he was right but I ignored his advice to break away from Matthew.

  Life was quite normal for me for a while until my world came crashing down with some news. I received a handwritten letter from Steve stating that he wanted to come to Melbourne to visit for a couple of days and he has something to tell. He didn’t saying much in the letter, it was short and simple and just said that he was staying at some hotel in the city and to call his mobile when he arrived so we could meet up. My instinct told me something was up. Then it clicked. He was going to tell me he was HIV positive too. My heart started to pound and felt immediate responsibility. But why tell me in this sort of manner, why not just tell me over the phone or in an email?

  Anyway, I contacted Steve and he asked me to come to his hotel room and 12 pm and we would have lunch in the hotel restaurant, his treat. I thought well, telling me he is HIV in a public place like that was not really appropriate so I thought it must be something else but I could not even think what it could be. When we met, he seemed a bit distant. Not as joyful and happy to see me as we normally do. Something was definitely up. But we sat down to lunch and just blurted it out without beating around the bush. “Jay, I’ve been offered a job back home in Sweden” he said as he looked at the table in front of him. “That’s great, I can come and see you sometime and then you’ll come back to Oz, yeah?” Steve shook his said as if to say ‘No’. “You don’t understand, this is the job of a lifetime, it’s a job working for the park and gardens department in Stockholm, but I will stay only if you want me to” he said looking directly at me. I froze. I was speechless. I couldn’t let him lose this job of a lifetime that he has worked so hard for all his life and take that away from him. That would be cruel. I told him that he must go. But he didn’t respond. He just stared at me. “You still don’t understand do you....?” he pleaded. I didn’t know what he meant. “I’m love with you, but I’m also in love with my work, I need you to be with me” he said. “Steve, I can’t just drop everything and go to live in Sweden, it’s too cold” I said. Then he gave a half giggle and smiled. “So, I guess we have a problem” he said in a convincing voice. “Steve, you are my everything, but I really don’t want to let you go, but you can’t not take up this huge opportunity” I said trying to stop myself from breaking into tears. Then he put his hand in his pocket and pulled out a small black leather case. He held it in front of me and opened it. There were two shiny silver rings. He put one on my finger and one on his. I felt like I was marrying him, like it was some sort of proposal. My heart was pounding with pure excitement. Then Steve put the case down and slowly tears ran from his right eye and he said “Well, this is it, you and I will always be together in one way or another, but as we will now be living in separate worlds away, this relationships has to end”. “No! Why can’t we still be friends at least” I gasped. “You don’t get it do you James, the fact of even assuming that you would be with someone else would drive me crazy with jealously and let’s face it, we would both be jealous of each other with us both living so far from one another” he said with sincerity. He made perfect sense. This was not a break up, but the start of a bond we will share forever.

  Steve returned to Sweden not long after that liaison and I had never heard from him again. I still wear that ring to this very day. He is always with me and I am always with him. The fact is that remaining just ‘friends’ would not work between Steve and I. We had such a passionate love that there was no other way to go. It was lovers or nothing. I know it sounds a bit silly, but that’s just how it is and was. He will always have a place in my heart and quite frankly I don’t think there is another man out there that would measure up to Steve. So saying that, I don’t think I will ever fall in love again. I know I won’t.

  ......................................................................................

  After Steve had gone my life slowly stated to feel strange. I felt alone. The two most special men in my life had deserted me. My ‘clubber’ friends really couldn’t give a shit about me. I had no one and nothing. I began to feel the daily grind of the nine to five syndromes and was feeling quite bored with everything. My moodiness was also showing as well. People have told me. After months of crying myself to sleep after the departure of Steve I woke up one morning and thought “Stuff it”, I’m a free man, I can do what I want”. So I contacted Matthew for a hot rendezvous. And hot it was. I think I was playing with fire though. But I wanted more out of life. I wanted to squeeze every ooze of blood from life and strangle it. So I asked Will if I could come up to London for a few weeks. So I did.

  Once again I jetsetter off around the world, well, direct from Melbourne to London, that is. Will was actually quite excited about me coming up there. Will had a huge apartment arranged for him and paid for by his work so accommodation was sorted. I arrived in London with a ‘go get ‘em’ attitude. I wanted to do everything and anything. It was like my mind was controlled by an outside force.

  When we arrived at Wills apartment he spoke enthusiastically about the touristy things he had planned for us to do. I remember just sitting there listening to him talk and all I really wanted to do was have sex. Not with Will, but other guys. My sex drive started up in wild drive again. But whilst in London during the day Will and I would go to say the museum, or art gallery, one day we went to Stonehenge, and all sorts of touristy stuff. But by night I would make my way to the gay saunas of London and fucking my brains out whilst I was there. I might though, I was very mindful of the HIV thing, there were always condoms in play and I never put anyone at risk.

  About the second or third week I was in London I began getting strange bouts of sudden sadness that set. It would last for about an hour or so. It was weird and hard to explain but it was like within that hour of sadness it was really intense depression. I never told anyone, not even Will, about it. I never thought anything about it. I thought maybe it was a side effect from the Tramadol and Valium. So I ignored it. I also remember one day Will and I hit the street of London and did a bit of shopping. Half way during the day Will had to go back home to do something for work and I said I will just keep roaming around and meet him back there later.

  After Will had gone I came across Bond Street. This was designer label heaven. Suddenly I felt a rush of energy to flash out my plastic and spend, spend, spend. It started in Chanel, then to Gucci and on and on. I was out of control. I don’t know what came over me. It was like I was on some sort of drug. This shopping frenzy of buying designer goods was addictive. I really couldn’t afford any of it, it was all on my plastic. I never had any thought to how much of my credit limit would be eaten up by this attack of shopping addiction. I finished up at Prada buying a pair of runners for $1500.00 Australian dollars. When I returned to Wills he was standing in the kitchen and he looked at me with dragged down with a load of designer label shopping bags and said “Oh my god!, what have you bought now?” he laughed. He nearly fell off his chair when I told him how much the Prada shoes cost and he just looked at me as if I was insane. I think I actually did experience some kind of insanity as I added up the receipts of all my purchases. The amount was a ridiculous amount. I was headed for financial trouble but told myself “Oh well, doesn’t matter, I will pay it back.......eventually” I think Will also was detecting some str
ange behaviour about me but never really wanted to say anything. I think he saw the change even before anyone else did. I didn’t realise there was anything wrong with me. But there was. I was yet to discover it.

  On the day I had to depart London bound for Melbourne, I arrive at the dreaded Heathrow airport departure terminal. I said bye to Will, it was never a sad goodbye, we always were in contact and he was coming back home anyway. But I remember in the departure terminal it was crowded. Very crowded. Will had gone and I was on my own. Heathrow airport is so confusing and so disorganised you don’t know where you were supposed to check in. So I just guessed which line I was meant to line up in. All the lines at check in were enormous and the wait was hours. It was ridiculous. Anyway as I was standing there I noticed that I started feeling a bit strange. I had a sudden headache and my body suddenly started aching. At the same time I felt very sad. It was like a panic style of depression that overtook my body and it was painful. I thought I was going to faint and collapse as I kept blacking out on and off. I was going to ask for help but I thought I would just ride it out and it would go away. This strange bout of sudden attack of illness lasted for a good hour or so and then the pain went away but I still felt sad. I didn’t feel content or happy or anything. I felt almost numb.

  I was relieved one I got to sit down on the plane as I could get some rest and hopefully this illness would go away. Lucky for me I had some ‘wanker of the year’ sit next to me on the plane. He was such a loser. Apparently he was some Qantas executive and was sort giving me a bit of an attitude like deliberately bumping his drink on me and shit like that. He was a complete fuckwit. I’m not going to go into details as it’s not worth it and I wouldn’t waste any more paper space but the point is, is that it was not a pleasant ride home. It just made me feel worse.

  Once I arrived back in Melbourne I felt exhausted. I felt more exhausted than I usually was from a holiday. Especially if it was a holiday full of sex, which London was. But I was not feeling myself. I was due to go back to work next week and for some reason I was not looking forward to it. In fact I had nothing to look forward to. Life was feeling a little grim. I thought I need to do something about it and get rid of this sad thing. I was always an upbeat and energetic person and I did not feel like myself. So I decided it was time for a career change.

  I was going to take the plunge and apply for jobs in the travel industry. I had to do it even though I knew the pay would be terrible but I needed to find happiness. I was finding it difficult to be happy in normal life so I thought a career change would solve that. It didn’t take me long until I found the perfect job. It was a job working for a major advertising company and selling one of their travel publications. The salary and conditions were great. So I applied and got the job almost on the spot.

  So after seven or so years for working for the bank it was time to go. I made a good contribution to the bank and I actually liked working there. On my last day at the bank it was an opportunity for everyone to express how they really felt about me. It was a mixed reaction. 50% liked me and said they were sorry to see me go whereas the other 50% said they hated my guts and told me to ‘fuck off’. People either loved me or hated me. There were many people at the bank that I hated too, including one little creep of a manager, who I won’t name for legal reasons, gave me the shits to high heaven. He was a little shit who got off on getting his employees into trouble and he better watch his back! But enough of that, I’m going on to bigger and better things! The rest of you can fuck off!

  I started my new job, in a brand new Gucci suit, and arrived on my first day with enthusiasm and drive. That was until I met the rest of the induction team I was with on our first day. One word to describe them- WANKERS!

  I’m sorry to say but that first impression of the company I was about to work for gave me great doubts but I was determined to give it my best shot. In fact, I want and will excel at it. I found the people that worked at this company were completely different from the people I worked with in the bank. They all seemed so full of themselves and I didn’t understand why, I mean, if they took a good look at themselves in the mirror then that would change their attitude, if you know what I mean. This was pure wanker territory and it was every man for him or herself. Everyone was sales hungry. There was this ridiculous team meetings that everyone had were they would cheer and throw bloody streamers in the air when someone gets a sale. I mean, PLEASE!, Get a life but I just went along with it all putting on a brave face.

  I actually ended up being one of the top sales reps at the company and was quite admired for my work. I was getting a lot of recognition for my work too which was gratifying. But there was something else going on in my mind and I didn’t know what it was. The job itself was actually more demanding than my job at the bank and I kind of stopped going out on weekends. My lifestyle was slowly changing and I was not aware of it at the time. I continued going to the gym, missing out a lot of karate classes, hardly keeping in contact with friends apart from Will, my appetite was decreasing as well. I didn’t feel sick but I didn’t feel as energetic and vigorous as ‘Jay’ normally is. But one day at work, just out of the blue, some guy in my team said ‘Why don’t you smile very much?”. I was stunned. I didn’t know how to reply or what to say. I didn’t realise I didn’t smile much. I knew I was not myself. But kept pressing on. With life, that is.

  After two or so years I was still working with the advertising company and had been relocated twice. I went from department to department, all specialising in different mediums. They were sort of promotions but sort of not. It’s hard to explain. Then I got another move. I had to relocate to the Richmond office, where as I was working in the city at the time, and this move was mandatory. Basically it was the same role as I was doing and the choice was take it, or lose your job. So I took it even though I was happy where I was.

  Once I started working for this department in Richmond the people were of a younger age bracket so I thought I would be able to relate to them a lot better. I was wrong. I was introduced to my new Manager. Her name was Sharon. She seemed quite nice at first and it appeared she had a lot of respect for her staff. She gave the impression that she took a lot of pride in the company and valued her employees which I found inspiring. I ended up working within a small team of about 10 or so reps. Across the whole department there about five or so groups.

  I was working with Sharon as my manager for about a year and was one of her top reps. I noticed that since day one at started in the new location of Richmond, the other employees took and instant dislike to me. They were either very cold towards me or gave me some sort of pretentious attitude. I also noticed that homophobia thrived in this environment. There were a handful of people I got along really well with but some reason they ended up either leaving or getting the sack for an unknown reason. Thoughts about the company politics grew with suspicion that this was one company that thrived on ‘flexing their muscle of authority’. I found it hard to prove the homophobia. I made a complaint about it that I overheard some guys call me a ‘fag’ and it was instantly dismissed, like I lied about it. The thing is, is that I am quite straight-acting and don’t fit the clichéd interpretation of a gay man. I also ensure to maintain my masculinity as I hate the label as ‘camp’ because I am not. All my life I been pressured to prove my gender and masculinity. There were times where I went out to lunch at work, some work colleagues saw me and with my intention to buy a healthy salad, I bought a sausage roll with tomato sauce. Just so I would not be bullied and verbally harassed.

  I think it was the fact that some guy, being me, suddenly appears in their department wearing designer clothes, looking good, and does well at sales, spread jealously across the department. They gave me an attitude because they thought I had an attitude. But it didn’t make sense as the never gave me an opportunity to show that I really am a nice guy. So I thought fuck ‘em, I’ll do my job to the best of my ability and if anyone pisses me off then they will get it! That was my new attitude, I had no
other choice to act in this way.

  During that year I felt my mental health decline as well and it getting clear to me but was still in denial. I was refusing to believe that perhaps the HIV was catching up with me and I was feeling down. I was not very enthusiastic about life and my work environment was making things worse. However because I was so determined to excel at my work it somehow kept me going. I showed a lot of drive and it impressed my manager but I soon got a reputation for having a bit of an ‘attitude’ problem. Quite often my manager, Sharon, would take me away into ‘the office’ and talk one on one and give me a verbal warning about things like rude comments or being rude to customers. I was rude to people, even my own clients, and I didn’t realise that I was even doing it. Sharon was losing her patience with me and I don’t blame her. But she herself had a dark side too which only I could bring out of her. She had a bad temper and displayed it whenever one of her staff did the wrong thing. But the thing was, if it had have been anyone else being rude to a customer, they would have been sacked. As I was one of the higher achievers, she was afraid to lose me. So she never sacked me, but she did threaten. I then dubbed her as not Sharon but a ‘Shazza’. This pretty much explained her general mannerism.