Wednesday, Nov. 26, 2003 - 10:09 p.m.
The Places I Used To Play

It was almost two weeks ago—later the night I last updated, actually—that I ventured out to the bathhouse up the street. I was moderately horny, Adam was out on a date, and I felt like being naughty.

Or at least watching.

As I was signing in at the front desk, the attendant—this tall, muscular, effeminately beautiful Latino guy—cruised me intensely. "Hmm, this could be an interesting evening!" I thought.

Soon after I arrived, I happened upon Scott, a cute 20-something Asian guy I'd nearly had sex with this spring. That night, I'd gone out to the new bathhouse, a venue that catered to an older, raunchier crowd. Sounds like heaven, you say? Well, yeah, maybe. But it was also mostly older S&M guys there, so it wasn't exactly what I was looking for. That night, Scott was the only guy I found attractive, and he was cruising me too yet I didn't make a move. I wandered around the place for a couple hours, then decided to leave.

As I was getting dressed, Scott wandered by smiling yet pouting, and I decided to go up and talk to him. He was very friendly, and of course he wondered why I was leaving. I began to wonder why, too. But there was something not quite right inside me, and sex didn't feel like a good idea. We kissed a bit, incongruously, him in his towel and me fully dressed. I said I'd like to give him my number; he followed me to the checkout booth so I could get a "come fuck me" card out of my wallet.

No sooner had I handed it to him, then I leaned in and tasted those lips of his again. Then—in the most well lit, improbable part of the premises—I ripped off his towel, knelt down and tasted him, front and back. Scott seemed to particularly like the way I made myself at home with his back turned to me. "Are you sure you won't take me home with you?" he moaned. I was sure, but I encouraged him to call me and we'd hook up some other time.

He never called, but I recognized his pic on gay.com shortly after, and we chatted online often. Scott was eager to hook-up ("I want you to come over and finish what you started. My ass is twitching just thinking of it"), but it always seemed to be a bad time for me. Then I had my "summer horriblis"; the last time I saw him online was when I was getting over the chickenpox.

The other night, he looked abso-fucking-lutely delicious. I remembered he had a great body from that first night, but now he was leaner and more toned: drooling, I stopped to talk and we chatted pleasantly for a while, just beside the showers. I wanted to jump him, but I was unsure: after all this time and all those near-misses, was the iron still hot?

He certainly seemed friendly enough—I really enjoyed the giggly conversation—but beyond that, I couldn't get a read. So after a bit I left Scott and kept on wandering around.

Only to be cruised, again, by the hunky nelly Latino attendant. Oomph!

The place was busy, and there were a few guys besides the one employee whom I wouldn't have minded licking. But I wasn't sure what, if anything, I wanted. (I'd come out here one other night, maybe a month or six weeks back, and had been perfectly content to just wander around for an hour, watching, soaking up the sexy yet detached vibe, and leave without having sex. The only cute guy there that night was an Asian fellow—20ish, short and deliciously slim and smooth—who tried to hook-up with me in the sauna twice. The second time, I let him undo my towel and fondle me; the fact that my dick didn't get all that hard despite the attention and his cuteness made me realize that, no, sex was definitely not what I was needing.)

I just kept walking around, open and curious. A bathhouse is an interesting place to be when you don't have an erection.

Leaning into the drinking fountain, I looked at the phone sex ad framed on the wall. It must have been there before, but I hadn't noticed. The ball-capped model—naked and wagging his dick at the camera—was Garth, a Caucasian guy I dated this spring. I knew he'd done porn stuff, so that wasn't a surprise. But it was weird to see him splayed out like that on the wall.

The night we met, Garth was behind me in the grocery line and cruised me fiercely while I paid. Shaved head, hunky and strikingly handsome, his attention caught me pleasantly off guard. I took my time leaving the store, but he was still transacting as I walked by the window. I kept walking slow until I had to turn the corner and he still hadn't come out, dammit. Got two or three blocks down towards home and kept looking back and hey there he was after all. I slowed down to a snail's pace; he caught up with me. Instead of hooking up right then, we chatted, exchanged numbers, and I called him a few days later. We started dating; Garth, who was in his late twenties, told me he'd been a porn actor, and had learned the hard way that if a relationship was going to be about more than just sex he needed to get to know me first. He had a "ten date rule"; no sex until we'd spent that much time together. I was intrigued, and it felt like the right time in my life to be meeting someone so open and mature about sex and relationships.

Puh.

He was an interesting guy, but notoriously unreliable. He cancelled dates at the last minute umpteen times over the couple months we hung out, and seemed to have a lot going on in his life. Yet the time we spent together was so great, he seemed totally into me, and I felt myself warming up to him and looking for more. (And not just date number eleven.) Yet his unreliability bothered me, and I kept expecting him to disappear. (We'd never made any pretence about monogamy, and meanwhile I was enjoying two other sizzling flings, one with a Japanese sexpot, another with a sweet humpy black guy, both in their twenties.) Garth stood me up at around date number eight. I was really hurt. We've never spoken since. The black guy disappeared soon after, and within a month the Japanese guy did too. Then I met a luscious young Chinese guy who I quite liked: after a couple erotically-charged dates, he vanished too. I was extremely demoralized. I'd given relationships an honest try, I seemed to conclude, and sex for sex's sake was all I wanted in those weeks leading up to my assault.

Seeing Garth's engorged picture at the bathhouse brought all that back. The confusion and the searing lust and the disconnect between hard-on and heart. I remembered all that, walking around in my towel, smiling at the riches my relationship with Miles offers now, smiling at the beefy attendant with the off-duty eyes, and wondering what to do with myself.

I kept walking, looking and thinking.

A short young Asian guy arrived. I leaned against the wall, hoping it wasn't too obvious that I was standing there to watch him undress. Oh my god, what a beautiful boy. He donned his towel and I don't know how he got it to ride so low and so loosely on his curvaceous hips without it falling off. But what a sight to behold! A few minutes later, we met up in the darkroom. He strode right up and began tweaking my left nipple. Moaning, I ran my hands over his smooth torso, beneath his towel at front and back. My cock sprang up as I caressed a firm buttock, and then he was gone.

I could have been chagrinned, but it was all I could do not to giggle. I've had guys grope my dick and find it lacking, or touch my belly and walk away. But this was a first. He only touched one of my pencil eraser nipples, and if he found that not to his liking, well it was just not something I was going to choose to get all bent out of shape about. (Speaking of bent out of shape, I walked around with a tented towel for the next while.)

I walked by Scott several times; we'd always smile at each other impishly. I poked his hard flat tummy once on my way by, eliciting a giggle. I wanted him, but I didn't know if I wanted him right then. But I stopped to talk to him a few times, always teasing him about what mischief he was getting up to, and the more we talked the more I could see that he was a decent, friendly guy. Someone I'd enjoy hanging out with.

Later I was in the sauna, sitting on the top bench, and it was crowded. Lots of groping and cruising going on. A tall muscular jock walked in, and had to stand against the wall because there was nowhere to sit. An older pot-bellied fellow was sitting across from him on the bottom bench, and he leaned over so far I was worried he'd topple over: he stared intently at the muscular jock's toweled crotch, hoping, I guess, that the stud would take a step forward to be serviced. But nothing doing.

Another white guy was standing against the wall right beside me. I couldn't see him too well through the steam, but I liked the arch of his big nose. He looked over and smiled shyly at me a couple times, and I liked that too. When he wasn't looking, I admired his slim torso. Not bad. Next thing I know his hand was crawling up my thigh like a spider. He looked at me, shyly, made an silly "oops" face, and snapped his hand back. I hadn't necessarily wanted him to remove his hand, but I didn't necessarily want him to put it back either. He stole a few more inquiring glances at me, some of which I met and others which I ignored. Eventually, he wandered off.

And I teased Scott a few more times, cruised the Latino attendant a few more times, and thought about Garth and the boys of the spring. And I thought about Miles, what we've made, what my life will be like, again, when he leaves town just after New Year's, and I felt a calm wash over me.

It was good to here and check everything out, I thought . It's fantastic that I've availed myself of the emotional and sexual bliss that Miles and I have. I'll be alright when he leaves, and these kind of places might turn out to be important—potent—again.

I dressed, and went home. Thinking about how much less baffling love has become.