PRÉF: The Closed Mouth

The January/February issue of PRÉF has three different covers. Fancy, huh? Queerty.com thinks so. As usual, here's my piece, unedited and in English.

The Closed Mouth

I would venture to say that the mouth is as vital a sexual organ as the genitals. First of all, there’s kissing. It’s like the gateway to sexual activity. It’s how you get things started. Once I start kissing someone, my cock instantly stiffens. And there’s everything else you do with your mouth. Sucking cock, licking ass, nibbling nipples. Having sex is like trying to shove someone into your mouth, one body part at a time. It’s as visceral and primal an urge as eating, so it’s no wonder we use our mouths so much.

Actually, I never realized how important my mouth was in having sex until I couldn’t use it…

I. Seth
I hate Gay Pride. I hate the parade. I hate the street festivals. I hate the way we’re supposed to believe that partying all weekend is at all politically relevant. Most of all I hate the crowds.

It seems like every fag in the US descends upon New York at the end of June to celebrate the anniversary of the Stonewall Riot. Our Pride parade is one of the biggest and loudest in the country, and in the days leading up to it the city becomes one big gay party. Queers come from all over the country to get drunk in broad daylight, in the sweltering heat, and wave little rainbow flags. And the masses only increase at night. Normally quiet gay bars are filled to capacity with obnoxious tourists from New Jersey, Florida, D.C., and, worst of all, L.A.

This year my friends convinced me to join in the festivities by going to Avalon, a club that would have been packed on any normal weekend. On the night of the Pride Parade, however, it was wall to wall flesh. Sweaty, shirtless boys squeezed onto the dance floor like sardines in a can. Toned bodies glistened and pressed against each other as the music thumped. It would have been kind of sexy, except that I couldn’t speak, couldn’t breath, could barely move. It was exactly how I’d imagined gay Hell.

I managed to find the one room in the place that that didn’t feel like a sauna. It was a sort of hidden lounge area where everyone seemed a little more fabulous than those writhing in the sweltering darkness downstairs. I was thinking about going home when a hand grabbed me and pulled me down into the banquette behind me. The hand belonged to Seth, a massage therapist from West Hollywood. The first thing I noticed when I saw him was that he looked sort of shy and guileless, and that that was almost certainly a pose. The second thing I noticed was how cute he was.

I don’t exactly remember what we talked about. I think it went something like this:

Me: “L.A. sucks.”

Him: “No one would talk to you in L.A.”

Me: “Fuck you!”

Him: “Want to come back to my place?”

Me: “Sure.”

We hopped in a cab and, on the way to the fabulous Columbus Circle apartment he was sharing with a B-list gay celebrity, I sent my friends a text message: “Getting Laid!”

It didn’t occur to me until after we were on his bed and he had taken his clothes off that Seth had not tried to make out with me yet.

“I have a boyfriend in L.A.” he said. “We have a couple rules about sleeping with other guys: No kissing and no fucking.”

I didn’t mind the no fucking rule, but no kissing? I had no idea what to do. A sexy, mostly naked guy was lying in bed with me and my first impulse was to put my tongue in his mouth. It was like sitting behind the wheel of a brand new BMW with miles and miles of open road ahead of you, but no keys. I needed something to ignite the two of us. I needed the warm wetness of his mouth on mine. I needed to feel like we were connected, however tenuously. Without that we were just two random, fumbling people clumsily trying to get off.

I started half-heartedly stroking his cock, but didn’t get much of a response. I think he could sense that I wasn’t into it at all.

“Guess I had too much to drink tonight,” he said. “I don’t think I can get hard.”

I left hating Pride and L.A. and boys from L.A. just a little bit more.