Craigslist

Craigslist 87

WARNING

This story details explicit gay sex between men, teens and boys. If you find this kind of thing distasteful, or if you are underage wherever you live, then stop reading this now, and delete this file. The story is completely fictional; the author does not condone or encourage any of the acts contained herein.

Craigslist

Chapter 87

By: Tim Keppler (nemoami@yahoo.com)

 Edited by: Bob Leahy

"But, what would you have said to Michael Hardwick back in 1986 when the Bowers v. Hardwick case was tried by the Supreme Court? Would you have told him not to contest his arrest and conviction? Would you have told him that his civil rights would not be protected, and that his case would set the gay rights movement back fifteen years because the Court was loaded against him? Should he not have taken on the Attorney General of Georgia because there was the possibility that he might not win? Is that how we gain our rights in this country?"

"We don't gain our rights in this country!" Kenny responds tartly. "You more than anyone should know that. Prop. 8 won because of catholics, mormons, and African Americans -- African Americans like Obama -- who don't consider gay rights to be a civil rights issue. They think African Americans have a monopoly on civil rights. Once they achieve some level of equality, the civil rights movement is over. Gay people, after all, can change their stripes. We choose to be gay. You have to strategize. You have to plan your attack, because if you just shoot from the hip like Bowers v. Hardwick, you end up waiting fifteen years for Lawrence v. Texas. The Olson / Boies challenge to Proposition 8 is destined to fail. That's why they brought the challenge in the first place. They want it to fail. They want the U.S. Supreme Court to rule against us, something that will set gay marriage back years. They're challenging it to lose. And, do you really want Ted Olson advocating for gay people, a guy who was the Solicitor General under George W. Bush?"

"If he can win it, I do," I respond. "What will Anthony Kennedy do in a challenge to the Defense of Marriage Act? Did you expect him to rule in our favor in Lawrence v. Texas? I didn't. If Ted Olson can make the case for Kennedy, I want him to do that. Why is it that the bigots get all the brilliant lawyers? In some cases it's ideological. Ken Starr, for example, is a prick, though a brilliant prick. He's an ideologue. But Olson? I dunno. I think he's a lawyer for pay. Sorta like gay for pay -- all those straight boys acting in gay porn for the money. I think Olson takes it where he can get it. God knows, he can't be any worse than who we've had working for marriage equality, people like Geoff Kors of Equality California. What a complete and utter waste of oxygen. I think I'd rather have Ken Olson working on this than Geoff Kors."

This is a discussion Kenny and I have had over and over again. Kenny doesn't like the idea of the enemy working for us, and Ted Olson is almost certainly the enemy. But what is Barack Obama? Mr. Obama's Justice Department recently wrote quite a scathing indictment of gay people in its endorsement of the Defense of Marriage Act. Ultimately, he didn't have to defend DOMA at all, but Mr. Obama chose to, comparing gay people to adulterers and worse, and tarting out all the old stereotypes. And, I see that Dan Choi, an Arabic specialist and West Point graduate has just been court-martialed for admitting to being gay, like 12,500 other gay people over the course of the last fifteen years. What has Mr. Obama done for them? He recently told Sandy Zao that repealing Don't Ask, Don't Tell would take time because it required congressional action. So, rather than moving forward now, while he has a congressional majority, he's waiting until the mid-term elections when, traditionally, the sitting president loses a fair number of seats from his own party. If you think back...carefully...the last gay-friendly president was Bill Clinton. From him we got the Defense of Marriage Act and Don't Ask, Don't Tell, repressive laws explicitly designed to marginalize us. He was even more helpful in 2004 when he suggested that John Kerry, then the democratic candidate for president, support George W. Bush's proposed federal constitutional amendment outlawing gay marriage federally. It would get him more votes, he said. Kerry, thankfully, demurred. He lost the election, but maintained his dignity. Sun Tzu, a Chinese general and military strategist living in 400BC suggested that you "Keep your friends close, and your enemies closer." For gay people, the opposite is true. For gay people, you need to "Keep your enemies close, and your friends closer." Why? Because "friends" will turn out to be your worst enemies. Like Bill Clinton, for example, and maybe...just maybe...like Barack Obama.

Kenny and I have had this discussion over and over. There's one feature of the discussion this morning, though, that makes it very different from last time, that makes me less attentive to the subtleties of my arguments. That difference is...umm...that I'm concentrating less on rhetoric and persuasiveness, and...umm...more on...balancing a bottle of warm milk in the mouth of a suckling child! I dunno. Did I scream that loudly enough?

The day after Thim's birth (and the death of Meilin), Dinh and I went back to O'Connor Hospital. The doctor wanted to keep the baby one more day for tests, but you're allowed to see newborns. They have them in a little viewing room. You tell the attendant who you're there to see, and she wheels the plexiglas bassinet up to the window so you can gaze at him or her. Dinh has already seen him. This is my first time, and I...umm...just can't...fucking believe it. As I think back on this now, tears are leaking out of my eyes. This kid is unbelievably beautiful. He's a tiny little angel. I really want to touch him, but they won't let us do that. I don't necessarily need to hold him. In fact, I think I'd be scared to do that. I guess I just want to...pet him...to stroke his hair, and there actually is some to stroke. It's very, very dark brown, like Dinh's, or at least like Dinh's is when he doesn't color it. Right now Dinh's hair is dark brown with light-blond highlights. It cracked me up the first time I saw it. "You are such a fag," I said, and he giggled.

"You like it?" he asked.

Actually, I really did. He'd wanted to go blond, completely blond. I told him if he did that he'd get so punished. This was his compromise, and it really did look good.

I don't want to gush...or maybe I do want to gush. This baby is just the cutest thing I've ever laid eyes on! Dinh has a fairly-rectangular face. Meilin's face was much rounder, much more Chinese. The baby's face is rounder than Dinh's, but a little...oblong. The nose is Dinh's, but the lips are Meilin's. The baby's hands are just...so small. He's clinging to the top of the blanket they wrapped him in. His hands are tiny. And his feet, which are sticking out of the bottom of the blanket, are adorable. I have any number of fetishes, but feet have never been among them. But...I...umm...really want to...suck on these...umm...toes. I can't believe I said that, but it's true. I want to lick his toes and see if I can make this baby smile.

So, we're standing at the viewing window staring at our baby. I'm crying. Dinh is crying. This mountain of a guy is standing to our left. He must be a football player. He's probably 6'5" tall, and weighs maybe 300 pounds. He's huge. He's staring at a little Caucasian kid next to ours, and this monster of a guy is sobbing. To our right is a cop. He's black. He's staring at a black baby on the other side of ours. The nurse has taken this kid out of his bassinet and is holding him, and the black cop is sobbing. He's making faces at the kid, but he's sobbing. And after maybe twenty seconds of this, the cop reaches over and hugs Dinh. He is just so...euphoric at this moment. "Your first?" I ask. He nods, unable to speak. He's a very happy daddy, as is each of us, all sobbing away happily. The nurses, I understand from a friend of mine, volunteer for duty in this part of the maternity ward because they get to watch men invariably reduced to tears. I mean, there are a finite number of events in which the most macho man will give himself permission to emote. When your spouse dies, when your son is killed in war, and when your child is born, you're allowed to cry. The nurses like this duty because they get to see the more tender side of men who would otherwise hide their emotions. The minute they see their children for the first time, though, their babies, they dissolve. I can see where it would be sort of fun to watch, and be very touching.

"What are we going to call him?" I ask, turning to Dinh. "I mean, what are we going to really call him?"

"Thim," he responds, confused. "What did you think we'd call him?"

I lean over and kiss Dinh, something that causes the football player finally to eye us suspiciously. We hug, and then we leave, holding hands. I am just so in love...with so many people!

I spent the rest of that day trying to figure out what to do about Meilin. She didn't have any relatives in the states, she'd told us. I guessed that meant that all her relatives are in China. The only thing I could think to do was to call her former roommate, who was shocked to hear about Meilin's death. "She have sister only," the roommate told me tearfully. "Mother and father dead. I not know sister's name or where she live. I not know how to contact." Okay. I ask her to forward any mail that comes for Meilin to me, hoping that Meilin's sister will eventually contact her, and we end the call.

Given that she has no family to tell us how to proceed, I decided that we'd be her family. I called a local mortuary and arranged to have her cremated. They asked me if I was the deceased husband. This innocent question, I knew, represented a mine field that we were going to have to tiptoe through very carefully. "No," I replied, "I'm a close friend of the deceased's husband. He's distraught and asked me to handle the arrangements." This was, believe it or not, all it took. They took her name, the name of the hospital, and agreed to handle transporting her body to the crematorium, and the cremation itself. There were other questions, of course, like the kind of urn we wanted, and how we wanted the urn packaged. They were all questions intended to jack up the price. What surprised me, though, was that there was no request for identification from her husband. I guess in their business, they don't sweat it if they have a paying customer. They take the money and run. I mean, she's dead for god's sake. How many complications can there be? We'll hold a little memorial for just the family when we have her ashes. We need to give the boys some closure, to give them a sense of what death means, because they don't know. Well, Kevin does, and Kai sort of does. They remember the death of their mother. But Feng, Tan, and Quan have had no experience with someone they know dying, and they're really confused about why Meilin isn't staying with us any more.

Dinh and I returned to the hospital the next day to pick up our baby. He is such a sleepy boy, but I guess that's par for the course. I called Dr. Cohen's office to find out what to feed him. We'd planned to have Meilin breast-feed him for a while, but that can't happen now. Cohen's nurse is sweet. I know her well. "Start with Enfamil," she said, "but let me give you the phone number of a breast-milk bank, a place you can buy breast milk supplied by mothers who are lactating but who have extra milk. Mama's milk is much better from the immunological perspective. It's full of antibodies that you just don't get in formula. Of course," she says with a laugh, "in order to prescribe the appropriate nourishment for him effectively, you'll need to bring him into the office and let me...umm...snuggle with him for a while. I'll be able to give you better information about how to feed him after I give him a thorough snuggle exam," she said, giggling.

"Yeah, right," I replied, laughing. "I don't think your motives are pure, madam. You just want to cuddle this boy."

"Umm...yeah," she said, giggling.

"But...umm...when do we feed him?"

"Oh, he'll tell you when. You'll know."

And, god, was she right. When this boy is hungry, he cries, and cries, and cries, until you pop a bottle into his mouth. And then there's silence. It did sort of freak me out early on when he kept falling asleep while feeding, but Cohen's nurse straightened me out. "Yeah," she said, laughing, "they do that. Rub his back while you feed him to keep him awake, and if he does fall asleep, pull the bottle out of his mouth. Is this your first baby?" she'd finally asked.

"Yeeaaahhhh," I whined.

She giggled. "But...umm...you have, what? Six other kids?"

"Seven. But never a baby."

She laughed. "Well, keep calling. If you need advice, call me. I've done four kids...from scratch. Just keep calling." She's so sweet! In the course of that first month I must have called her once a day, sometimes more often, and she patiently answered all my questions, teaching me to be a mother. Sigh.... I sent her two-dozen long-stemmed pink roses as a thank you.

So, this morning, Kenny and I managed to argue about Ted Olson, the Defense of Marriage Act, Bower v. Hardwick, Lawrence v. Texas, and Don't Ask, Don't Tell, all while little Thim was contentedly suckling away. Who knows what other great and historic issues might have been settled? But, Thim got a dazed look in his eyes and stopped suckling, both sure signs that it's nap time. So, I took him to his room, and tucked him up, and he was out nearly the instant his back touched the bed. Thankfully, this boy sleeps very well and nearly through the night. He likes to be up by between 5 A.M. and 6 A.M. for breakfast, which is a little early for me, but with four fathers, his schedule is mostly manageable. Well, four isn't exactly right, is it? More like seven, because Nathan, Thao and Evan also dote on him, and, to my complete amazement, Kevin also wants to help. Kevin amazes me, frankly. He takes his big-brother status so seriously, something Jason has relentlessly drummed into his head for years. He feels responsible for all his younger brothers, and he considers Thim to be one of those now. We taught him how to pick the baby up, how to hold him, even how to feed him, and he seems to relish all that. He wasn't especially happy the first time Thim spit up on his favorite "High School Musical" t-shirt, but he got over it. "That's what washing machines are for, Kev," I told him. "That's why we have soap." He nodded and giggled, and then ran off to clean himself up. Crisis averted.

The first several months with Thim are a learning experience for all of us, and it's amazing the shit you have to think about. What do you feed him and when do you move from breast milk to something more solid? Jason doesn't like the idea of commercial baby food, and so has been researching how to make baby food himself from fresh ingredients. What about nap time? Do you lay him on his belly or his back? Thim likes to be on his belly, but Dinh discovered that this position is associated with a higher number of cases of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. And what about immunizations? Thankfully, Dr. Cohen is very proactive about this, and has laid out schedules for all the boys that cover what we have to do medically -- what shots they need, when and how often he wants to see them for checkups. He wants to see Thim frequently -- every couple of months -- and I wonder whether Gloria, his nurse, didn't influence this timing. Her "snuggle exams" are always a part of Thim's appointments, a part that seems to delight him because Gloria is better at drawing a smile out of this boy than anyone else. Well, she's better than anyone but me, because I suck on his toes, and when I do, he smiles and flails his limbs. I've been sucking things for a long time. I'm good at it! He agrees, I think.

We get into a routine. Kenny, who usually gets up early, takes care of Thim's first feeding when he first wakes up in the morning. He punts to Nathan, who's up next, and who gives him a bath and plays with him until around 7:30. Then he's down for his first nap, and when he wakes up, usually about two hours later, he's hungry again. Evan rescues him when he starts to cry, changes him, feeds him, and entertains him until he falls asleep again. I'm next, taking over at around noon. Thao is next at around 3 P.M., followed by either Kenny or Jason, depending on which of them gets home first. And then it's Dinh's turn. He feeds him and puts him to bed for the night, and if he wakes up, Dinh gets to pace the carpet with him and get him back to bed, although, because Thim's room is right next to the boys', it's often Kevin who's in there first. He'll check his diapers, lift him out of bed, rock him, and cuddle him a little before putting him back down. Some nights we don't even know he's been squalling because our eleven year old has handled it. I have no idea what to say about that. As an eleven year old, I wouldn't have been equipped to do that, but Kevin is. He'll be a very good father some day. Hell, he's not bad now.

Thim's schedule crimps our style a little. We're not going to be taking any significant vacations for a while. It's hard enough to travel with five small but ambulatory children. Five small children and an infant is not doable. Still, we can split up. A subset of us can take short vacations while the rest of us babysit, and that's what I have in mind for Kev. He really needs a reward for how responsible he's been, and I think an overnight trip to Monterey is the perfect answer. Kevin likes animals, and has gotten really interested in jelly fish. No aquarium in the world has a better exhibit of jelly fish than the Monterey Bay Aquarium.

The Aquarium must be twenty-five years old by now. It was the brainchild of one Julie Packard, David Packard's daughter. Yes, this is the David Packard of Hewlett-Packard fame (H-P). A more unlikely fellowship between two entrepreneurs cannot be imagined. David Packard was a prick, an ultraconservative prick. Bill Hewlett was quite liberal, very laissez-faire. Why they didn't kill each other I have no idea. They formed the company in Hewlett's garage, and the rest is history. They made a fortune, and to give credit where it's due, David Packard rolled a large portion of that fortune back into the community. The Lucile Packard Children's Hospital, a part of the Stanford Medical Foundation, was financed by David Packard, as was the Monterey Bay Aquarium, one of the finest aquariums in the world. It's built in an old fish cannery, which I find supremely ironic. This building has gone from orchestrating the slaughter of marine wildlife, to engineering its preservation. And, part of what it preserves is the best collection of disparate species of jelly fish anywhere in the world -- literally. And Kevin has never been there. Well, he has, but it was a long time ago. He probably doesn't even remember.

"I propose to take our Kevin to Monterey," I say to Dinh, Jason and Kenny one evening over tea. "I think he'd like it. We haven't been there in a long time, and he's been a real trooper lately. I'd like to take him this weekend." Dinh and Jason both nod, smiling. Kenny looks sad.

"I can't come, hunh?" he asks, pouting.

"You can if you can convince everyone else to tend to Thim for the weekend."

He looks around with a plaintiff look in his eyes. I'm not sure Kenny has ever been there. I know Jason and I have, but I can't remember whether Kenny was with us. Jason smiles and nods, followed by Dinh, followed by Evan. "I will help take care of little Mr. Thim," Joaquin says, nodding as well. Kenny is elated. It'll be a little mini-vacation, and we're going to camp. We're taking the Westfalia to a little public campground between Monterey and Carmel. It has a very nice lake, so we'll also get in some swimming.

When I tell Kevin on Thursday evening, he is nearly beside himself with excitement. "Really?!"

"You've been so helpful with Thim, Kev, that you really deserve this. And Mr. Park (his sixth grade teacher) is really pleased with your work. This is a reward. We're all so proud of you."

He rushes over and hugs me.

"So, take a pair of shorts a pair of jeans, a couple of t-shirts, a pair of tennies, a pair of flip-flops, underwear, sox, and your bathing trunks."

He's nearly frantic, jumping up and down, and is packed by the time he goes to bed Thursday night. We don't leave until Saturday morning. He's very excited.

And when Saturday morning rolls around, Kevin's dressed and ready to go way too early. It's not that I need my beauty sleep; it's that, unbeknownst to me, Kenny has arranged to have Evan take the first shift with Thim, and a part of Dinh's shift as well. At 7:30am Kenny wakes up and flips over in bed so that he's now facing me. He snuggles in close and very softly licks the bottom of my nose. It's a snaky little lick, and it tickles. I reach up and scratch. Then he does it again. I scratch again. Then he does it a third time, and my eyes open. Kenny is grinning. I smile. "What are you up to Professor Hsia?" I mumble drowsily.

He laughs. "Well, I could say that I'm just so excited about going to Monterey that I want to get under way. But...umm...that wouldn't really be true...."

"He wants to get laid," Jason says, giggling furiously from just behind me.

"Umm...and so do we," Dinh says, from behind Jason."

"Ahh...I understand. You want to satisfy the carnal desires of the dick that's poking me in the belly."

"Umm...more or less."

"Well, which is it? More, or less?"

"More," he says, pressing his lips to mine in a kiss that starts out rather subdued, and then fires up as he flips me onto my back and crawls on top of me, grinding his hips, and sliding his hardon between my legs.

"Can we play?" Dinh asks, leaning across Jason and nibbling on Kenny's ear.

"Mmmmm," Kenny replies with a shiver. The way to my dick is through my nipples. The way to Kenny's dick is through his earlobes. I've never thought of earlobes as erogenous, but all you have to do is lick Kenny's, or better yet, bite one softly, and his dick will instantly guide you to the location of the North Star. Breaking our kiss, Kenny smiles at me. Then he slides across to the other side of the bed, across Jason, and lands on Dinh, whom he begins to kiss passionately.

"Does this mean you're done with me?" I ask, trying desperately to repress my laughter.

Kenny breaks his kiss, staring into Dinh's eyes. "For the moment," he says. Then he returns to that passionate kiss as though there'd been no interruption.

"I'm available," Jason says, grinning as he rolls on top of me. "My dance card isn't full yet." Where the hell does he get lines like this, I wonder? Probably from me, I conclude self-consciously.

Jason, too, is packing a weapon. He manages to slide it between my legs just behind my balls, grazing my perineum all the way down until his dick head is nuzzling my pucker. This feels like an electric shock. We begin to kiss, and I have to tell you, Jason can kiss. But, his kisses are different from Kenny's. They're usually gentle and sensual. Not this morning. This morning, Jason is kissing frantically. He's kissing as though he'd like to slide himself, all of himself, right into my mouth. This morning he is kissing with a vengeance. We all continue to kiss for many minutes, and then, finally, Jason rolls off me, to the side, and on his back. He spreads his legs and raises them into the air, showing me his asshole. He's smiling. That's not true. He's leering. I reach for the tube of lotion, move between his legs so they rest on my shoulders, lube myself, and slide into him slowly and gently. I move forward to kiss him as I begin to fuck him slowly. Jason looks up at me and whispers. "I'd like it to hurt today, Tim. Please make it hurt."

The other thing about infants is that they sort of...hinder the natural rhythms of life. It's been a challenge to find a time to get laid, especially for all four of us to get laid. So, we've sort of...missed each other. I think this may be why Jason is so...wound up this morning. I was going to say overwrought, but that would imply that I don't like it, and I do. I'm just surprised. This isn't Jason's usual style. I know what he's asking, though. What he wants is something I do to Kenny sometimes, and something he'll sometimes do to me. You back your dick all the way out of your partner, and then slam back in. Once you're out of him, his asshole contracts so that when you slam back in, you're basically opening him up all over again. It hurts, but it's definitely a good hurt. I establish a rhythm with Jason that has him screaming, so I lean forward and seal my lips to his, muffling his cries. There's no sense in waking the whole household. You can't really fuck like this for very long. If you do, you'll tear your partner apart. But, the good news is, you usually don't need to. The experience is so intense that both you and your partner will usually cum pretty quickly. In our case, it takes around five minutes. Jason cums first, squirting spunk all over us, and as he scrunches his asshole around my dick, I cum with a shriek, thankfully still muffled by our kiss. As I cum, I break the kiss, rear up, and drive my dick so deep inside him that I think it must end up between his lungs, and with such force that his head bangs against the headboard. This orgasm seems to last forever, aided by the fact that my nipples are on fire because Jason is pinching them really, really hard. This is a brand-new Jason. Abstinence has made him a very different lover than he was before. I like this one, but then I liked the other one, too.

Eventually, we change partners. I take Dinh and Kenny takes Jason. That, too, is spectacular. I mount Dinh from behind as he lays on his belly, nibbling on his neck as I pound into him. His head is buried in the pillow, and when he cums, his screams are muffled by down and feathers. Finally we do a three way with Kenny fucking me and while I fuck Jason. Dinh plays voyeur and jerks himself off as he watches us.

This was a very nice breakfast in bed, a real treat given all the impediments to lovemaking that seem to have invaded our lives. I wouldn't trade any of those impediments, but they make sex a challenge. And that leads me to wonder -- how do these families with dozens of children do that. Yeah, I know. The "Octomom" did it with fertility drugs, but what about that weird christian family that's got something like sixteen kids. Time Magazine recently did an article on them because they'd just had another one. None of their kids is adopted. How do they do it? They have to be fucking like rabbits, but when do they find the time for that between feeding the herd, getting the older ones dressed and off to school, changing diapers, and breast-feeding the infants? Doesn't it make you wonder what's going on in that house? As I read the article in Time, so many lurid possibilities came to mind that I just had to put the magazine down. "Naahhh, couldn't be," I thought to myself. But you gotta wonder.

-------------------------------------------

We get to Monterey at around 10:30am and hunt for parking. A business like the Monterey Bay Aquarium is a gold mine for a city like Monterey. First, there's all that delicious tax revenue, and then, because they're no longer a sleepy little town, they put parking meters everywhere. Meters are good for two hours and charge you 25¢ for five minutes. That's 24 fucking quarters to stay a lousy two hours. I decide to park in one of the lots across from the Aquarium instead of on the street. At least there I don't have to come out and move the car after two hours, and I imagine we'll spend a lot longer than two hours inside. The last time I was here, we were in there for seven hours.

The only problem I have with the Aquarium is that there's so much to see, you really don't know where to start. To your immediate right when you get in the door is the jelly fish exhibit, but I don't want to start there. I want to save that for later because I'm not sure, once inside, we'll ever be able to escape. Kev is going to flip when he sees it. So, instead we move to the left, to the octopus tank, and we have a treat today. What's the plural of "octopus"? I wonder. "Octopussies?" "Octopuses?" I'm not sure, but Octopuses are sort of grayish, and often spotted. And, they're big, well, some of them are big. The one before us is huge. It has a cross-tentacle span of what looks like eight feet. I know this, because he's spread himself out across the glass of his tank, and is literally climbing it as if it's a wall. And...and...he is bright red! Octopuses change to red when they're angry, and this fellow must be apoplectic. He's red, and rushing back and forth across the entire span of the glass, which is probably thirty feet long. Kevin is fascinated. "Wow!" he exclaims, "Look at him!"

"Big, hunh?"

"He's huge."

"Wouldn't you like to have him wrapped around you?"

"Umm...not really."

"He's cute, though, isn't he?"

Kevin rolls his eyes, smiling.

So, I have to admit that I've been talking more to myself in this dialog than with Kevin. Yeah, I've been teasing him, but about something he knows nothing about. We subscribe to a number of magazines -- Time, Sunset, Gourmet, The Advocate, Out, and Instinct. But, occasionally, one of us will buy a magazine, and when we do, well...it's usually porn, soft porn, albeit. There are lots of issues of Freshmen and Bel Ami stacked in the closet in the living room along with a small collection of videos, mostly VHS tapes that we no longer have a machine to play. There are some DVDs there as well. A week or so ago, when Kenny was taking clean laundry into the boys room, he noticed the corner of a magazine sticking out from under Kevin's bed. The only reason it caught his eye was because the corner sticking out had the word "Bel" on it. He lifted the bed ruffle, and sure enough, it was an issue of Bel Ami from a year or so ago, and under it was another issue from two years ago. Kenny came into the office giggling, and dragged me back to the bedroom, showing me the magazines. I smiled. Kevin's started to get curious. He's started to think about sex, and I'd say that's pretty normal for an eleven year old these days. In sixth grade, I wasn't thinking about sex, but that's only because I couldn't. By then I knew I was different because the people I had a crush on were other boys. What the other boys had a crush on were girls. I knew I couldn't admit my crushes to anyone, so I watched the goings on. Boys in my day weren't thinking about fucking anyone. It was more romance. It was a crush. Times have changed. We've sexualized everything. My third-grade teacher-friend has told me about sexually-explicit notes passed between girls and boys with pretty graphic pictures depicting any number of things that I had never thought of at that age. I can imagine that Kevin is very curious.

I'm not suggesting that Kevin is gay just because he has our gay magazines under his bed. I mean, what would you expect him to have under there? We're four gay men. When we buy porn, it isn't Playboy or Hustler, is it? But I think that's what we need to start buying, because in all likelihood, Kevin isn't gay. In all likelihood, he's reading our gay magazines because he's become interest in sex, and Bel Ami is all he can find in the house. He can't exactly go out to the local newsstand and buy his own porn, so we need to provide it for him. The question is how to do this subtly, without raising his attention. It's not like we can go out and buy the latest issue of Playboy. He'd know instantly that we were on to him. He knows what we are. He knows what we do. He's seen it. What we need is a stack of old issues of Playboy in the living room closet. We need to make it look like we've just been consolidating our magazines so if he ever asks, "Gee, where did these come from?" I can say something like, "Oh, those belonged to a straight friend who stayed with me for a while. They were in the garage." There's a used bookstore in downtown Mountain View that specializes in used magazines, including Playboy. When I have a chance, I plan to head over there and stock up on maybe six issues. That should be plenty to whet his appetite, if he has an appetite. I mean, how much pussy does a eleven year old need?

After watching the octopus for nearly fifteen minutes, we move on to the display of the big fish -- Tunas, Stingrays, Sharks, Burundi, and others that I don't recognize. I find this particular exhibit incredibly serene. I love to watch the huge silver Tunas float by, slicing gracefully through the water, buoyant and beautiful. They're probably five feet long, and barrel-shaped. If reincarnation actually exists, I want to come back as a Tuna, an enormous, graceful, silver fish. I can't think of a better life, except the one I have.

From there we go to the "petting zoo". Have you ever petted a fish? Kevin is mesmerized. He gets to lift a small crab, swish around with an eel, and to feel a "Sea Cucumber." A Sea Cucumber is basically a very large slug. They're a delicacy in China, but here, they're marine wildlife, something to be protected. "Oh, my god," Kenny breathes softly. "I haven't seen a live Sea Cucumber since I was maybe five. They were all over the beaches in Hong Kong. We used to stretch them out, and watch them retract." And that's what he does. He stretches this Sea Cucumber to twice its length, and we watch it retract.

"Umm...how would you like it if someone did that to you?" the attendant asks. "Don't do that to him," he says grinning.

Kenny looks up guiltily. "Sorry," he says, chastened.

"'Sokay," the attendant says. "Just treat them well." Kenny nods.

Five hours we spend touring the exhibits. Somewhere in the middle of that we have lunch in the cafeteria. I have to admit that as often as I've been to Monterey, I've never found anywere to eat here that I've liked. You'd think that a place like this, a costal town, would have lots of good seafood, but if it does, I've never found it. The cafeteria at the Aquarium may be the best restaurant in town. It really is pretty good. I have a Shrimp Cocktail and some Chowder. Kevin has Grilled Mackerel in Miso Sauce, a Japanese dish that's one of his all-time favorite foods. Kenny has the Calamari Salad. All are delicious. When we go out to eat we typically share everything. Somewhere in the middle of the meal, we simply exchange plates. Kevin's Mackerel is the best, and he knows it, so he watches carefully as we taste. He wants it back. At this moment, he doesn't want to share.

After five hours, we make our way to the jelly fish exhibit, and the minute we're inside, Kevin's eyes light up. Jelly fish are amazing animals. Properly lit, they become iridescent. They seem to glow in the dark. The exhibit hall is nearly pitch-black with tanks of jelly fish lining the perimeter walls. Each tank is lit from above with a single halogen bulb. They absorb this light throughout every inch of their bodies, throughout every inch of their tentacles, which technically are called "lappets". They become art, exquisitely beautiful and exotic art, as they undulate slowly in the water. Kevin goes nuts, and runs from tank to tank. He is absolutely rapt, in a world of his own, mesmerized by the beauty of these strange creatures. It takes us nearly two hours to get through this exhibit, and even then we have to drag Kevin out minutes before the Aquarium is scheduled to close. "But I haven't seen it all yet," he whines.

"Are you kidding. You've `seen it all' six times, Kev," Kenny says, giggling. Kevin smiles. He knows he's obsessed. This is a passion for him right now.

We drag him out of the Aquarium and back to the Westfalia. Now the dilemma is where to get something good to eat for dinner. I am not hopeful. But...Kenny has done some homework. He's visited Yelp and identified the Monterey Fish House as the place to go based on customer recommendations, and that's where we head now. It's small and unpretentious, and has hoards of people waiting for tables. Thankfully, Kenny made a reservation, and we're seated on a patio behind the restaurant after only a short wait. We stare at the menu for a while, and end up ordering Grilled Oysters, a bowl of Large New Zealand Mussels in a wonderful Marinara Sauce, Steamed Halibut in Ginger and Garlic, and Mahi Mahi. This should be a feast. And mostly it is. It's way too pricey, but the food is delicious, the stuff sea-food dreams are made of.

After dinner we head toward the campground, arriving maybe 20 minutes later. It's picturesque and very secluded. By now it's dusk, and the sunset is spectacular, leaving a crimson glow that swathes the sky before it's swallowed by darkness. The three of us sit outside watching the spectacle, and as we do, Kenny and I begin to kiss, a comfortable, affectionate kiss that becomes more passionate as darkness envelopes us. Finally, we break the kiss, and get Kevin ready for bed. The plan is that Kenny and I will sleep up top, under the pop-up tent. Kev will sleep on the lower bunk, and the minute his head hits his pillow, he's asleep. This means that Kenny and I can sneak outside for some more kissing. One thing leads to another, as it often does, and we soon find ourselves naked, lying on a bed of pine needles, bathed in moonlight. Well, "find ourselves" isn't quite right. I've planned this. I've wanted to take him again in the middle of nature, in the middle of the woods. So, I've brought one of those little packets of lube that they give you at gay-pride events. I have to admit that I don't like standard lube very much. It inevitably gets sticky and uncomfortable well before I'm finished with it. I prefer lotion, which is not something you get at gay pride events because it's not water soluble and eats holes in condoms. But, ours is an isolated environment. We're monogamous, and don't use condoms for the most part, so lotion is a better answer. This time, though, the little packet of lube will have to do.

I enter Kenny from the front with his legs on my shoulders because, at this moment, I'm not able to conceive of fucking him without being able to kiss him. He is just so beautiful, so smooth and soft, and his skin feels so good rubbing up against mine. It's so warm, and this contrasts with the cool breeze that licks our bodies as we make love. Finally, we break our kiss, and I rear back, intending to drive my dick as far into him as I can possibly get it. Then, out of the corner of my eye, I see a rustling of the curtains in the Westfalia and realize we're being watched, but we're too far along for me to pull back, because Kenny is cumming and milking my dick with his sphincter muscles. I can't hold back, and start to cum, groaning. Finally, I collapse on top of Kenny and we hug as we catch our breaths.

"We have an audience," I whisper.

"Where?" Kenny says suddenly, glancing around.

"In the Westfalia. It's Kevin. He's been watching us."

Kenny leans his head back to get a glimpse of the van, but Kevin has vanished. We pull on our shorts and t-shirts, collect the rest of our clothes, and climb back into the van and up to the rooftop tent. After five or so minutes, just as I'm beginning to doze, there's a rustling below us. Then Kevin pops his head up. "Are you awake?" he whispers.

"Yeah," I mumble, vaguely.

"Can I...umm...sleep with you guys? It's lonely down here by myself."

"Okay," I say, pulling him up.

Kevin slides up between Kenny and me, and snuggles up to me. He's really not used to sleeping alone.

I'm the first to wake up the next morning, and as I turn over, I wake Kevin. We lounge for several minutes, and then I turn toward him. "So, did you enjoy that last night?" I ask softly, trying not to wake Kenny, who's still sleeping. I think Kevin knows he's been caught, but tries to bluff his way out of it.

"Umm...you mean dinner, or the sunset?" he replies softly.

"I mean watching Kenny and I make love. I saw you at the window. You were there, right?"

"Umm...yeah," he says, a little guiltily. One of the many things I like about Kevin is that he doesn't lie to us. If we ask him something that's incriminating, he incriminates himself. He doesn't try to lie his way out of it.

"Why'd you watch, Kev? That wasn't very nice. We have a right to some privacy, don't we?"

"Yeeaaahhhh," he whines. "But...umm...I was curious."

"What about?"

"About what you and Kenny...umm...do...together, what guys do together...guys who are gay."

"Sometime we kiss, sometimes we do what we did last night, sometimes we sit and hold hands, and sometimes we take trips to Monterey with one of our wonderful sons. Being gay isn't just about sex, Kev. It's more about love, and love and sex aren't the same. We just like to be together whether we're making love or not."

He nods.

"What do you know about what men and women do together?"

"Umm...nothing really...."

"What would you like to know?"

"Well...umm...do they...umm...make love like you and Kenny?"

"Sort of. Women have something called a vagina instead of a penis. A vagina is an opening near where your penis is. When men and women make love, the man usually puts his penis in there rather than in her butt. It feels good to her. It feels better to her than what Kenny and I do, although what Kenny and I do feels really good to us. Women are really sensitive in there, so it feels really good when men make love to them that way. When a guy makes love, whether he's gay or straight, he shoots a liquid out of his penis. It's not pee. It's called semen. If his penis is inside the woman's vagina when he shoots the semen, it sometimes makes her pregnant. It sometimes means she'll have a baby. This is where babies come from. Do you understand?"

He nods, uncertainly. I'm not sure I would have understood this at his age. I have to admit that as an adult, I find the terms "penis" and "vagina" the most obscene terms for the human genitalia I've ever heard. I think my father probably felt the same way. They are just so ultra-clinical. It's like talking about a "pudendum" or a "frenulum". They give me the creeps. But, thankfully by the time I was ready for the birds-and-the-bees routine with my father, he'd already taught me what he considered to be appropriate language for a child. "A man has a cock," he'd said, "and a woman has a coochie." And because I'd seen my mother naked many times, I knew what a coochie was. He had faith that when I needed the ugly clinical terms, I'd learn them. So, when I inevitably asked him where babies came from, something that struck me as a Dad question rather than a Mom question, we already had a mutually-acceptable vocabulary. I have no such advantage with Kevin. He knows he has a "penis," and discovers that women have "vaginas". I wonder if he can even pronounce that word, or will remember it tomorrow, or really has any concept of what a vagina is. I realize that I've neglected to pick up the Playboy magazines I'd planned to get for him, and wonder now whether they're the best option. I'll need to handle this when we get back.

I decide to leave Kevin's sex education there for the moment. At this point, he looks sufficiently dazed, as though he's trying to process what he's been told. We've opened the dialogue, and I'm confident that when he's ready for the second lesson, he'll come to one of us. There are honest to god just so many things I want to ask him. But these are things I can't really ask until our next lesson. So, instead, I suggest we get dressed and go down for a swim in the lake before we go back to Monterey looking for breakfast. He likes this idea, and rolls over, tickling Kenny awake, initiating a wrestling and giggling match as each tries to inflict the greatest damage to the other's tickle-bone. Kenny wins, of course, and when Kevin is sobbing with laughter, Kenny gives him the option of "saying uncle," an option Kevin ultimately elects to embrace.

We swim, we eat, we do a bit of sightseeing, and then we drive back to San Jose. It's been an interesting day.

Two days later, I have a care package for Kevin. One of our friends, Jerry Bucknell, runs a porn distribution business. He's straight, and he's very successful. Why would I know a porn distributor? I met him at the Unitarian Church in San Jose. He was part of a men's group I joined. He has a B.A. in math, and an M.A. in software engineering, both from U.C. Berkeley. He's my age. We established our respective sexual orientations, as one does in these settings, but when I asked him what he did for a living, where he worked, he evaded the question. "I'm self-employed now," he said, "since getting laid off from Symantec. I'm a publisher."

"What do you publish?" I'd asked.

"Oh, pretty much everything -- magazines, books, videos."

It was the "videos" that got my attention. "So, you're a pornographer," I said laughing. "So is one of my husbands."

He went crimson, but didn't back away from answering the question. While he didn't produce any of what he distributed, he said, it was porn, mostly straight porn, with some gay titles aimed at specific audiences that he found...lucrative. He did a fair business in the...fetish trade, he said, looking a little sheepish.

"Fetishes don't worry me. To each his own." Over a couple of years we became friends, and it's Jerry I call when we get back to San Jose. "My eleven year old is becoming sexually curious. He's been quietly perusing our porn collection, such as it is, but all we have is gay porn, and there have been no indications that he's gay. I need a book or magazine that shows attractive and loving heterosexual couples making love, and a DVD video that shows the same. Nothing especially prurient. They need to be pretty soft-core, but they need to show penetrative sex between men and women, especially the video. They also need to show commitment and love."

"This is your way of placing him in the hands of a whore, isn't it?" he laughed. "You've become a southern gentleman, and it's time for your son to become a man?"

I giggled. "No," I reply. "He's going to have to find his own partners. That's not my job. My job is to give him an equal-opportunity education and let him figure out for himself who he really is. Right now, all he's seen are men making love. He needs to see straight people doing the same thing in order to understand his own desires."

"Yeah, I got it. Give me a day to mull it over, and I'll give you a call back."

And what he prescribed was perfect. He called back the next day and suggested a book that excerpted photos from a number of magazines. They all showed couples making love. They showed intimacy. They showed ecstasy. They showed passion, and desire. The video was a romance. A couple meets, they date, they kiss, they make love, and, believe it or not, they marry. The messages are perfect: commitment, responsibility, and love, mostly love. Of course, my mother would tell me that the order is wrong. You get married first, and then you make love. That's not a reasonable progression in this day and age, especially if you're gay, but you'd better be damned sure you love him or her before you make love to them. I realize that I haven't always followed my own advice, but I've tried to. Anyway, once the book and DVD are in my hands, I slip them into one of the drawers of my desk and wait for the right opportunity to pass them along to Kevin.

And that opportunity presents itself maybe a month later. Kevin and I are out swimming in the pool in back of Evan and Joaquin's house. Well, Kevin is swimming. I'm sort of splashing around. After maybe forty-five minutes in the water, I climb out of the pool and go stretch out on one of the chaise lounges, sunning myself. After a while, Kevin joins me, pulling another chaise lounge up beside me. We lay in comfortable silence for a few minutes before Kevin asks, "Daddy, how do you know whether you're gay or straight?"

I pause for a few seconds. He's sort of sprung this on me. "Mostly it depends on who you're attracted to," I reply finally. "No, that's not exactly true." We're "attracted" to many people, aren't we? And for many different reasons. I've been "attracted" to a number of women I've found exceptionally beautiful, either physically or spiritually. I had a serious crush on Katherine Hepburn for the longest time, and on Coleen Dewhurst, one of the most gifted interpreters of Eugene O'Neill's works. I'm "attracted" to Angela Merkel, the current Chancellor of Germany, for her intellectual honesty, and to Cindi Lauper for her tireless advocacy of gay rights. It doesn't mean I want or ever wanted to get physical with any of these women, but strong women do attract me. (Well, with the exception of Margaret Thatcher, whom I detested.)

"I'm attracted to a lot of different people, Kev, but that doesn't mean I'd ever want to make love to them. I guess the best way to describe it is `physical attraction'. Who do you want to kiss? Who do you want to touch? Who do you want to be naked with? Who excites you so you think about them a lot? That's sort of what love is. But, you can't know from just one person or experience. Being gay or straight doesn't mean that you're physically attracted by just one guy or just one girl. It means you're almost always attracted to guys or girls. After several years of those attractions, you realize that you're gay or straight."

"When did you know?" he asks.

"Umm...I knew I was attracted to certain boys in my class pretty early, maybe by eight or nine years old, but I didn't know why. That took another five or six years. I started out knowing I was attracted to this or that boy, but it wasn't until I was maybe fifteen that I realized that I'd always only be attracted to boys."

He nods, thoughtfully.

"Have you been attracted to someone?"

"Yeah," he nods. "But I don't think I want it to be physical. I don't think I'd want to kiss him, or be naked with him. I just really like him."

"Like a best friend."

"Yeah."

"It's complicated, baby. Whether you're straight or gay isn't something you can decide quickly. It takes a lot of time to figure out who you like and how you like them. But it's also not something you really ever have to `decide'. Some people will try to make you declare which you are, but it's an irrelevant question. You'll love who you love, ultimately. Some people are even physically attracted to people of both sexes. Take it slow, Kev. Don't rush it."

By this time the sun has dried us, and it's nearly dinner time. I get up from my chaise lounge, and motion for Kevin to follow me. We make our way back to our house, and I take him to the office. "Last time we talked, you said you really didn't know much about how straight people make love. So, I got you these," I say, pulling the book and DVD I got from Jerry out of my desk. "These'll give you a better idea of how men and women make love. These are for you, though, Kev. I don't want you sharing them with your brothers or your friends. They might not be ready for this stuff, yet, and it's their parents' responsibility to help them with this, not yours. Okay?"

He nods, solemnly. I lean over, kiss him on the head, hug him, and he pads out of the office in the direction of his bedroom. He'll probably make a quick pass through the book before getting dressed for dinner. I have such bittersweet feelings about this, and find myself close to tears as I watch him disappear around the corner. On the one hand, I adore this boy, and welcome the opportunity to help him understand who he is and who he's becoming. On the other hand, my little Kevin is growing up, and who he's becoming is replacing the child he was, a child I expect I'll miss before long. I suppose I should think of this as an opportunity to love someone else, someone older and more mature, rather than thinking of this as a loss. But, at this moment, it's loss I feel, and it makes me profoundly sad. But, we grow up. There's no escaping it. It's my job now to help him do that, to help him get through a period in his life that's deeply confusing for most kids. When Kevin is 25, I want him to be as happy and well adjusted as he is today, and that's going to take some work.

Published first at: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Nemo-stories/