Date: Sat, 10 Jul 2010 01:09:26 -0400
From: pertinax carrus <perti@live.com>
Subject: Bryce Chapter 6

This story is fiction.  The city of Clifton, and the University of Clifton,
exist only in my imagination.  Any resemblance to real persons, living or
dead, is purely coincidental.  These stories have as their main character a
sexually active gay college student.  If this is offensive to you, or if it
is illegal in your area, or if you are under age, please leave now.

This story involves a search for personal acceptance, worth, and meaning.
There is a religious element in these stories.  If you don't like that,
maybe now is a good time to leave.

My stories develop slowly.  If you're in a hurry, this is probably not for
you.

Thanks to Colin for editing.

Constructive criticism is welcome on my e-mail at perti@live.com.

____________________________________________________________________

Bryce, Chapter 6 - Queer

     Bryce just stood there for several minutes after Damon left.  He did
not know how to react to his neighbor.  There were powerful feelings
surging within him that he did not want to face, but knew he had to deal
with, and Damon touched on so many of them.  Did Damon have any idea what
he was doing?  Bryce was uncertain.
     Okay, let's be rational about this.  Calm and orderly.  None of this
is Damon's fault.  If there is fault, it's entirely my own.  This is why I
had to get away, isn't it?  This is why I need to be in a position where I
can examine myself, where I can really think about where I'm going.  If I
can't do that at home, and I can't do it here, then I can't do it anywhere,
and I am one screwed up bastard.
     It started years ago.  It's insidious.  It creeps up on one.  Twelve
years old, and taking peeks at the other guys when changing at the club
swimming pool.  Fourteen years old, and getting hard at swim meets.
Sixteen and discovering my first gay web site.  That was a real shocker.
It was finding that I got hard looking at two guys doing each other that
led to the hard drugs.  One hard leads to another.  Okay, this is not
funny.  Escapism?  Sure it was.  I needed to escape from that realization.
I couldn't handle it.  It just could not be true.
     It would ruin my entire life.  Blot it out!  Don't think about it!
Escape!
     Escaping can be dangerous.  I remember Dr. Stovall shaking his head
when I finally went to him about having those blood tests.  That was after
I woke up to the mess I was in.  I had to prove I was as masculine as
anybody.  I was fucking every cunt I could entice into my bed.  Or anywhere
else.  It was like I had to prove I was male.
     "It's a damn good thing you came to see me, Bryce." the doctor had
said.  "Somebody should have told you about safe sex."  Well, of course
somebody had.  Starting with sex ed in the sixth grade.
     But I had to be macho.  Alpha male.  God!  Some of the girls I fucked
were really sleazy, now that I look back on it.  I don't remember much else
about them, but they sure as hell were not the types to take home to
Mother.  I wonder what they were escaping from.
     I can't be queer!  I can't!  It would ruin everything.  Can you
imagine what Grandpa Winslow would say?  If my joke about the Mayflower
travel agent ticked him off, he would really go ballistic over something
like this.  'Besmirching the family escutcheon.'  Isn't that the phrase?
He was upset enough about Dad becoming Catholic.  Still not over it.  "Not
the Winslow way, Son."  And he was really ticked when Cousin Lowell married
his secretary.  "A woman of no family."  And Dad?  Would he care?  He's
pissed enough already that I want to study history, and maybe be a teacher.
"How can you make a decent living that way?"  I don't think Dad would give
a fuck about being gay, but he sure would throw a tantrum about something
that would affect the market value of the Winslows.  And being queer would
decrease my market value for sure.  It might even have a spillover effect
on his business affairs.  Can't have that.  Then there's Chip.  Good ole
Sterling Morton Winslow Jr.  He's not one to let something like that get by
without making the most of it.  Chip is okay in his own way, I guess.  He
is my brother.  But he's so much a part of the consensus that I don't think
he ever had an independent thought in his life.  I know what he would
think.  I heard him and his buddies going on about queers only a month or
so ago.  Peer pressure?  Not with Chip.  No pressure at all.  He
automatically goes with the crowd without the least pressure being
involved.  And Nan?  Dear Nan.  Probably my best chance of finding
acceptance there.  Nan has a big heart, and is more adventuresome than
Chip.  More like some of those colonial ancestors.  Oh sure, she was a
cheerleader and was in beauty contests up until she got into high school,
but that was Mom's doing, not hers.  Nan has brains as well as a heart.
Maybe ....  But, what the hell!  No way I can be queer!  Even if Nan could
accept it, no way!
     Mom.  My silly, over-protective, smothering ... what other adjectives
can I come up with?  Doesn't matter.  Mom is the love of my life.  Sounds
perverted, but God knows I don't mean it that way.  Mom is always there.
Always loving.  Always protecting.  The guide.  The lode-star.  The solid,
reliable foundation.  There is no way I could ever do anything that would
seriously hurt Mom.  Even when I was using, I managed to hide it from her.
Even spaced out, I never let her see me like that.  How could I tell her
I'm queer?
     Queer!  That's it.  Different.  Odd.  Peculiar.  Bizarre.  An anomaly.
An aberration.  An abnormality.
     Just think of Kyle Logan.  The only homo I know.  I sure as hell don't
want to be like him.  Kyle is small, with no physical attraction I can see.
Thin shoulders.  No chest.  Spindly legs and arms.  Sharp nose.  A damn
walking skeleton.  Walking?  Prancing is more like it.  Mincing!  Yeah,
that's the word.  He always looks like he's sneaking up on someone.  Sickly
complexion.  Even in summer he looks like a ghost.  Remember the time he
showed up at the club pool?  Looked like a dead fish.  And don't even
suggest talking to him.  His voice puts me off before he even gets a single
sentence out.  High pitched, like someone is squeezing his balls.  Can that
be natural?  He must be putting us on.  But it's not just the voice.  It's
what he says.  Always over the top.  Always exaggerated.  Always too much.
Never calm and orderly.  Who was it Chip said he was copying?  May
somebody?  Old time film star.  Oh, yeah.  Mae West.  I never saw Mae West
in a movie, but she must have been something else if she was anything like
Kyle.  No, if being gay means being queer like Kyle, there is no way I can
be gay.
     But, what about those urges?  I don't want them.  I don't invite them.
I don't go looking for them.  They sneak up on me.  Like Kyle.  They take
me by surprise.  Everything is going along just fine, then, all of a
sudden, I'm getting a boner from looking at some guy.  How weird is that?
Already in just two days I've had those feelings about Damon and Curtis.
Can't I be around a decent looking guy without going all ... queer?
     Curtis has a girlfriend.  That's what I need.  But it never seems to
work out.  I've had girlfriends.  Never had any trouble getting one.  It's
keeping one that's the problem.  Somehow, it never seems right.  Girls are
fine.  I like girls.  Shit, I've fucked enough of them!  ...  Oh, come on,
Bryce!  You know damn well a lot of that had nothing to do with liking
them.  You were trying to prove something.  You were trying to prove you
weren't ....  No!  Don't go there!  I just need to find the right girl.
     If Curtis knew what you were thinking back there in that hot tub,
you'd never get into that fraternity of his.  Fraternity guys are like Dad,
or Chip, or Grandpa, aren't they?  I mean, they're normal men.  They don't
let queers into fraternities.  Fraternities are an important part of the
college experience, aren't they?  Make friends for life.  No one in a
fraternity would want someone like Kyle as a friend for life.  Fraternity
guys are decent, ordinary, normal guys.
     Normal?  What's normal?  Damon says my family is not normal.  Is his?
God, I hope not.  But he has a point.  Lots of kids, even Catholic kids,
have parents who are divorced and remarried.  A dad you see every other
weekend?  Is that normal?  A mom who is so busy making a name for herself
in some career or another that she has no idea what's going down in your
life?  There's even Uncle Arthur and Aunt Evelyn.  Dad's brother and his
second wife.  Both of them married before, both divorced.  Three kids.
Yours, Mine, and Ours.  Family joke.  But they're in the country club, and
they go to their church, and nobody seems to think they're all that out of
line.  Maybe Damon is on to something.  And the movie stars.  Always
changing partners, and never bothering to get married before having kids.
Well, as Mom says, nobody decent is a movie star to begin with.
Exhibitionists!  But there are the Bergers.  Mr. Berger was married before,
and they say his first wife is still alive, although nobody has ever seen
her.  Every Sunday, there's the family in church.  Five kids.  All the kids
go to communion, but the parents never do.  I remember asking Mom about
that.  She just said it was private, don't ask.  How are you supposed to
know what's normal?  Nobody seems to be normal any more.  Now I'm sounding
like Grandpa.  Better quit while I'm still sane.
     Better get some sleep.  Got that Milton class at nine-thirty in the
morning.  Don't want to get off to a bad start with the instructor.
     Bryce began to prepare for bed.  He methodically placed everything he
would need in the morning on his desk next to his computer.  Fairly light
schedule tomorrow.  Just English from nine-thirty to eleven, then Biology
lab after lunch.  I'll see Damon in that lab class at one-thirty.  I wonder
what he's doing for lunch.
     Stripped to his underwear, Bryce entered the bathroom to brush his
teeth and relieve himself before bed.  As he did, Damon stepped out of the
shower.  God, that man is beautiful.  All over.  "Oh, sorry.  Didn't know
you were in here," Bryce mumbled.
     "Hey, no problem!  Plenty of room.  I'm just about finished here
anyway."
     Damon just stood there, drying off, stark naked.  There are those
feelings again.  Damn!  Bryce approached the sink, preparing his toothbrush
and paste for use.  He tried not to look at Damon in the mirror.
     "You're in that Biology Lab with me tomorrow afternoon, right?" Damon
asked.
     "Right," Bryce replied through a foamy mouth.
     "What'cha got in the morning?"
     "English.  Nine-thirty."
     "Oh, yeah.  Your Advanced Placement English class.  Damn freak.  Well,
I've got English, too, but since I'm a lowly poor boy from the projects,
the best I could do was sign up for the literature survey," Damon said,
with a twist to his voice which made Bryce wonder.
     "Not envious, are we?"
     "Damn straight!" Damon responded, as he flicked Bryce's ass with his
towel.
     "Ow!"
     Damon just laughed as he left the room.
     After finishing his preparations, Bryce returned to his own room.  He
checked his e-mail, and responded to a message from his mother.  Then he
climbed into bed and turned off the light.  But he did not sleep.  His
brain was too full of worry, his heart was overflowing with competing
emotions.  He tossed about, getting totally tangled in his sheets.
     What about God?  Didn't Father Flannigan say God hated homosexuals.
It says in the Bible that homosexuals are an abomination before the
Lord. ...  I don't like Father Flannigan much.  He's such a bossy guy, it's
a real pain to have to work with him.  But Dad likes him.  Says he's solid
on keeping social order, and on illegal immigrants.  What if he's right?
     Bryce tried to block out the disturbing thoughts.  He tossed and
turned some more.  He tried thinking of other things.  For a while, he was
able to distract himself by replaying the state championship soccer match,
but then he had flashes of the guys in the showers afterwards.
     After a couple of hours of tossing about, he was still torn.  If
Father Flannigan is right, and if I really am gay, then I'll go to hell.
But that's not right.  Didn't Father Quinlan at school tell us you couldn't
go to hell by accident?  You've got to reject God. ...  Wasn't there
something about accepting gays?  Not really.  Yeah, homosexual orientation
is not a choice, but it's still unnatural and inherently disordered.  Some
acceptance!  But how can something that is not a choice be rejecting God?
Shit!  I don't know fuck about anything.
     About six in the morning, Bryce gave up the battle.  He simply was not
going to get any sleep this night.  He sat up.  Still three and a half
hours before that first class.  My stomach is tied in knots.  Can't turn up
in class like this.  What can I do?  He paced back and forth.  He looked
out the window at the first streaks of dawn.  Gym!  Work out the kinks.
     Bryce dressed in his gym clothes again, and set out across campus.  He
arrived just as the facility was opening for the day.  This time, he
remembered the locker room, just in case Bick showed up, although he did
not see Bick as a morning person.  Bryce threw himself into his work- out,
raising a sweat, and straining such that his mind went blank, registering
only what to do next, and counting how many times.  About thirty minutes
later, Curtis arrived.
     "Hey.  I see you learned about using the facilities first thing."
     "Yeah.  I need this.  I'm really stressed about the first day of
classes and all," Bryce replied.
     "Don't let it get to you.  You'll do fine," Curtis attempted to
reassure him.
     "Hope so.  Can't take any chances."
     "Here, let me spot you.  Can't have you pulling a muscle or
something."
     After about an hour, the two were ready to call it quits.  Bryce had
been frantic too much, and Curtis had done his best to calm him down.  By
quarter to eight, at least some of it had rubbed off.  Showers and hot tub
next.
     "Don't forget the party tomorrow night," Curtis reminded Bryce as they
sat in the swirling waters.
     "No way!  I'm looking forward to that.  Oh, and I passed the
invitation on to Damon," Bryce reported.
     "Damon?"
     "Next door neighbor in the dorm.  Nice guy.  Uh, he is black.  How
will that go down with Bick, or anybody else?"
     "No problem with most of the guys.  Like I said, Bick is not really a
force to be reckoned with.  I'm not real sure about him.  I wouldn't be
surprised if Bick made some shitty remarks just because he's obnoxious, but
nothing really serious.  He makes shitty remarks about everyone, as you
know.  As Pledge Master, I'd like to see this guy come out if he's any
good.  We only have three black brothers right now, and one of them is
scheduled to graduate this year.  It doesn't look good if we're too lily
white."
     "I don't think Damon would take to being a quota," Bryce conjectured.
     "He wouldn't be.  Not any more than you would be because we need a
soccer player.  Ask our black brothers.  But we do have high standards as
far as grades and the like.  What's his SAT?"
     "Don't know, but he says he's on an academic scholarship."
     "Well, hope it works out.  Bring him to the party in any case," Curtis
insisted.
     After some time in the sauna, they split, and Bryce returned to his
dorm room.  He prepared himself for the day.  Then, remembering that Damon
also had a class that morning, and not hearing anything from the
neighboring room, Bryce decided to investigate.  He knocked on the door,
but received no response.  Cautiously, he pushed the door open.  The room
was dim, with the blinds pulled.  In the light from the bathroom, Bryce saw
Damon sprawled out on his bed, much like the previous morning.  Checking
his wristwatch, he decided to 'help' his neighbor.
     Bryce essayed into the room, raised the blinds, then turned to the
bed.  Damon had sheets in some kind of star burst pattern, all orange and
red and yellow.  How could anyone get to sleep in that?  Damon was still
beautiful, totally nude, on his stomach on top of the sheets, with the top
sheet almost entirely on the floor.  Looks like he did some tossing about
as well.  Bryce approached the bed.  He shook Damon's shoulder.
     "Hey!  Wake up!  You've got class!"
     "Fuck off!"
     "No.  Come on.  Get up and have some breakfast," Bryce insisted.
     Then, all of a sudden, Damon turned over.  Bryce got a flash of an
erect cock only moments before he was grabbed in a head lock and pushed
face down into the bed.
     "Hey!  What the ...."
     His words were cut off by a hand on his head, smashing him into the
mattress.  For a moment, his senses were overwhelmed with the smell of
masculine body odor, followed by fright that he could not breathe.  Then
Damon let up.
     "Sorry.  I don't react well to someone waking me up in the morning,"
Damon apologized.
     "Geesh, tell me about it," Bryce replied, feeling his nose to make
sure it was still on straight.  "I was just trying to make sure you got to
your class on time.  You told me yesterday you sometimes slept in."
     "Yeah.  Sorry.  Defensive reaction learned at home.  At what used to
be my home," Damon clarified.  "Told you I was tough."
     Massaging his neck, Bryce chuckled, "I believe you.  You're stronger
than you look.  I though I was in the hands of some sort of Incredible
Hulk."
     Damon was standing right in front of Bryce, his morning wood still
pointing directly at his neighbor.  Bryce tried not to look, but could not
help himself.  Damon was very well endowed, clearly bigger than Bryce.
Damon grasped his cock between his finger and thumb and shook it.
     "I've got to go take care of this.  Wait around for a few, and I'll go
to breakfast with you.  You can stay here or in your room," Damon said.
     "Now that you're awake, I'll leave," Bryce said.  "If I stay here, I
might be blinded by all the color," he joked, looking over all the bright
colors scattered about his friend's room.
     Damon laughed.  "Suit yourself.  Better than being put to sleep by a
dull, lifeless decor like in the room of somebody I could name."
     All this was not doing much to help the problems which had kept Bryce
awake all night.  Damon was as attractive as ever, and the view of his hard
tool certainly did not help.  Still, Bryce thought he had done his good
deed for the day in awakening Damon, even if it did nothing to put to rest
his own demons.
     Not long after, Bryce and Damon made their way across campus to the
student center and breakfast.  Seated, Damon admitted, "I'm glad you woke
me.  I set an alarm, but I've been known to ignore an alarm."
     "I'll bet!" Bryce replied forcefully, massaging his neck.  "Either
that, or destroyed it entirely."
     Damon laughed.  "Yeah, I've been known to do that, too.  How would you
like the job of waking me up in the morning?"
     "Like hell!  You nearly killed me," Bryce replied.
     "Come on.  I can't afford to screw up this scholarship, and if I'm
late for class, that's not a good sign," Damon entreated.
     "Maybe.  Provided I can do it at a safe distance," Bryce capitulated.
     "I don't care how you do it.  Just make sure I'm up in time for all my
classes in the morning.  Seriously.  I'll owe you big time, man."
     "Okay, okay.  No big deal.  I'll play alarm clock.  I actually went to
the gym before I woke you this morning.  Should I get you up for that,
too?"
     "That would constitute cruel and unusual punishment," Damon insisted.
"Just get me up in time for class."
     "Okay.  But from now on, I do it at a distance.  I don't especially
like being mauled first thing in the morning," Bryce agreed.
     After a simple breakfast of cereal and coffee, the two boys made their
way to the building which housed the English Department, the Stuart-Warren
Building.  They entered, passing the dedication to Jesse Stuart and Robert
Penn Warren, then parted, each going to his own class.