ME AND ALL THE REST OF THE BOYS on the block had adopted a very trash-and-burn style with sex: no guilt, no morals, no new boyfriends. It was the rule.
Every once in a while some random two would pair up and monogamy about it. The rest of us talked shit: “Not cool, not anarchist—hoarding all that dick like that. Sexual cap!” (We said shit like this.)
Sometimes the need for something new would pinch me in the ass. Some young thing I was dating would seem like a good idea and I could go wander off in bliss with him for a while. But under no circumstances could he meet my slutty best friends—they would all fuck his brains out, for sure. I would look at the little chicken and think, The second I wife him he’s gonna fuck all my friends, or, Actually he’s probably already fucked all my friends, or, the even more precise realization of, Wait—I’VE FUCKED ALL MY FRIENDS.
(I wanted to go bathe in penicillin.)
It was a peculiar coven and we kept the circle open. I had many “brothers”; I often called on Nathan on nights when I couldn’t scratch my own itch. Nathan lived next door. I had fucked him for five years. His name was Nathan Alexander Carmichael. He was a white boy (hence the name Nathan Alexander).
We had fucked each other so much that sex at times felt like we were scraping the last bit of toothpaste out of a tube that shot its last load two paychecks ago. We had to reinvent our fuck-buddy-hood. The world moved goddamn fast—it was all bills, heartache, and defeat. Those moments of tenderness sometimes had to be engineered.
We did terrible things to each other. It was exciting.
It was his turn to top. He made all the rules for the session. We sat on a clean white bedsheet, naked in his room and across from each other. We were only allowed to talk through text messages. He texted, “Let’s pretend we’re boyfriends and make love.”
“Ok,” I texted back. He moved to my side of the bed, and I got a text: “You’re not allowed to speak. Lay on the floor.” He bound my hands and feet together with suspension ropes and blindfolded me. He left the room and I heard him set something on the floor. I heard him rubbing his hands together and he put something under my nose. “Smell,” he said out loud. It was basil. He had to have seen me smile. He put another object to my nose—it was a cloth of some sort with Terre d’Hermès on it, his favorite cologne. I couldn’t feel my body anymore. “Open your mouth,” he said. I did and he put a piece of cake in it. He rolled me on my back and undid the ropes on my ankles. He pulled my legs up and wrapped them around his hips and entered me. “I own you,” he whispered. He forced a pillow on my face and began to fuck me with force. Within a minute he was done, and he put a blanket over me and lay on top. He rubbed my lips with his fingers and kissed me gently. He lifted up the side of my blindfold and exposed my left eye. I saw him wink at me. I was freed.
I put my clothes on and walked out the door and turned to see him standing in the doorway waving at me. I looked at him and saw the same thing I saw when I looked at my right hand: a lifeline, running strong and clear through the center.