Sparkle: The Queerest Book You'll Ever Love (25 page)

Oohs
and
ahs
could be heard throughout the patio, but there was no screaming, no cheering, no shouts of lurid profanities. Admittedly, I felt guilty for coaxing our poor driver up there. Then, very slowly, Sven took off his shirt to reveal his glorious chest and tummy. The shouting picked up to a low grumble. Shouts of
More!
went up, but Sven stood his ground and waited for the crowd to urge him on with more gusto. When he felt they were truly wanting more, he, again very slowly, removed his snazzy slacks, leaving him standing there in his shiny black shoes, black socks, and black jock strap. Now The Eagle was starting to buzz with some excitement. The previous contestant may have looked great fully clothed, but our contender was fast becoming fully naked, and he was looking considerably better with each passing second to the horny bunch of revelers that stood before him.

Scout Daddy, sensing he was about to lose his title (or the butt-plug), reacted swiftly and bounded back onto the stage. (Loped was more like it, but you could tell it took quite a lot of inertia to move his heavy legs.) Rapidly, he removed his shirt to reveal the ripped and bulging pecs and abs hidden beneath. Sven just stood there and grinned. I sensed he had something up the proverbial sleeve. Shouts for Sven were outnumbering his competitor two to one, and, so, within seconds, both men were standing before us in nothing but shoes, socks, and jocks. (Kudos for their creativity in finding one black jock and one tan jock to match their respective outfits.)

When the chanting grew to a roar and it was unclear who the victor was, Sven calmly turned his back to the audience, bent down, and removed his undies. With his hands in front of him, he stood there with his glorious rear in our faces while he waited. When shouts of
Turn around!
filled the patio, he slowly put his hands behind his back and gradually turned to face his audience. Clearly, it wasn’t something up his sleeve that Sven had waiting to surprise us all with.

Like Thor with his mighty hammer, Sven stood there with a dick big enough and hard enough to crack the clouds open. The crowd, needless to say, went wild, until you couldn’t hear anything but the din of cheering. Then, as it subsided a bit, he turned to the other man on stage with him and gave him the
your turn
gesture. Red in the face, Scout Daddy picked up his crumpled outfit and stormed (loped again) off the stage. With renewed vigor, the crowd went wild. Never had a hundred bucks and a butt-plug been so richly deserved.

And that, friend, leads us to Gay Rule #9. Which, however much we hate to admit it, and it isn’t always necessarily true (keep telling yourselves), is: size
does
matter. It certainly did that night, anyway. And by the hungry look in Sparkle’s eyes as Sven approached us with his reward, it mattered an awful lot. I mean, we didn’t know whether or not to hug him or back up for fear of getting ram-rodded. What we decided on instead was that it was probably best to get him back to the limo and dressed before the revelers turned ugly (er) and started to pounce. It was getting awfully late, anyway, and we’d certainly had our fair share of excitement for one evening.

***

Well, of course, the excitement wasn’t exactly over. At least not for Sparkle, myself, nor our newfound friends. Still, I’m sure you’ve been over stimulated enough without having to hear the recounting of all the juicy details of our night of pleasure. (Separately, not together, as interesting as that may sound.) Suffice it to say, from what Sparkle told me the next day, both of us had our hands (as well as other body parts) full that evening. I think you can use your own imagination for the rest of it, but I will draw you one picture to start off with. See, it wasn’t Chester and Bruce that had sex so much as Chester and
Toby
. Get the picture? (Kind of freaky, right? But well worth it!)

More eventful than Sparkle getting fucked by Attila the Hunk or Toby getting some drag booty, however, was the addition to our little group the following week. As ordered by the court, Sparkle was sentenced to sixty hours of community service, and, through Allen, agreed to be a (cough) mentor to a needy gay teen. So, on a chilly, bright Sunday morning, the two of us drove his Corvette to a shelter for runaway teens located smack-dab in the middle of the seediest part of the Tenderloin district. We agreed (he forced me) that I should stay and watch the car while he went in to got his
little brother
. And, trust me, if you’ve never sat in a spiffy, red Corvette in the center of a slum before, you have no idea what you’re missing. Meaning, I was grateful that the two of them were back in just a few minutes. Needless to say, if there was a choice between Sparkle’s hubcaps and my life, I think you can guess which one I’d choose.

Coming out of the shelter, Sparkle was walking slowly on his new ward’s right. Neither one said a word to the other, and I could tell that they were both extremely uncomfortable with the situation at hand. The walk across the street afforded me a good once over of the boy, though, and I can tell you that what I saw was more than a bit disconcerting.

However old the boy actually was, he looked much older. Certainly much older than most of the teenagers I’d grown up with. In fact, he looked like the teenagers you see on TV, the ones that are twenty-seven in real life, but are playing high-schoolers. He was lean, but in an unhealthy way, and not at all like your normal gangly teen. His clothes were baggy and looked like hand-me-downs from hand-me-downs. I guessed that, because I didn’t think that anybody still wore acid-washed jeans and certainly no one his age could even remember the group Styx or would care to wear one of their t-shirts. As they got closer to the car, I could see, too, that he was, or at least had the potential to be, a real looker. With dark hair and piercing blue eyes, he easily could’ve been Sparkle’s real life little brother. Odd, but true.

As he approached the car, and I motioned for him to jump in the tiny area behind me that could barely be considered a back seat, I smiled at him and said, “Domo arigato, Mister Roboto, domo.” He gave me this strange look that all at once said a.) I have no idea what the fuck you’re talking about and b.) maybe you should avoid conversation with me if you know what’s good for you. Clearly, however, I didn’t know what was good for me. “Um, your shirt,” I said and pointed, “was from the Mister Roboto tour.” Again he gave me that look.

Luckily, Sparkle saved me by interrupting what was certainly a lagging conversation. “Secret, this is Peter. Peter, this is Secret. Peter please excuse my friend, he’s mildly retarded at times.” I smiled and nodded, and Peter gave a barely discernable nod in return. If first impressions were a sign of anything, we were both in a mess of trouble.

“So, Peter,” I tried again, “what would you like to do today?”

He paused for a second before answering. “I could use a drink”.

“Oh, sure, we could stop and get a soda. Or perhaps you’d like a smoothie or something like that,” I responded.

“No, a drink. You know, scotch, gin, vodka. A drink. I need a drink. Get it?”

I got it. “How old are you, Peter?” I asked, nervously.

“Sixteen. What’s the difference?” he answered, smugly.

“Well, where I come from, sixteen-year-olds don’t drink.” God, I sounded like my mom, which rightly scared the hell out of me.

“And where are you from?” he asked, with a slight sneer on his face.

“Kansas.”

“Well, Mister, where I come from, you drink. You drink, you get drunk, you get high, you get laid. You get whatever you can. Do they do that in Kansas?”

I shook my head. “Not that I ever saw, no.”

“Thought not. So how ‘bout it, Sporto? What say we go to the nearest queer bar and you guys buy me a gin and tonic.” (Common ground, but not exactly what I’d been hoping for.) When I was sixteen, I was still reading Superman comic books and eating Twizzlers. Now
that
was fun for me. I certainly wasn’t getting laid, and high was something you got on a Ferris wheel.

Again, Sparkle came to my rescue. “No queer bars,
Sporto
, and no drinks, drugs, or drama. Got it.” Sparkle put his foot down and I for one was shocked. Drinks, drugs, and drama were Sparkle’s idea of fun pretty much every waking hour. Now he was laying down the law, and it wasn’t the side that he was normally on. I wondered if my mom and dad said one thing and did the exact opposite as well. Funny, I never thought of my parents as anything but what they were. Maybe I was wrong about them the whole time. Spooky, huh?

“We’re going to get something to eat and then we can play the rest of the day by ear, okay?” Sparkle told us more than asked. I nodded an okay, while Peter just sat in the back and stared out at the passing scenery. I wished I could be back at the shop with Sharon instead of there in that car with them, but I knew Sparkle couldn’t handle the outing by himself, least not without a drink, drugs, or drama. (Irony. Woohoo.)

The three of us decided on pizza and drove to The Castro. Peter became noticeably agitated when he realized where we were going.

“Problem with the pizza idea, Peter?” Sparkle asked, while he parked the car.

“Um, no, it’s just… well… it’s… (there was now a look of pain on his face)… see that person over there?” he asked, pointing far down the sidewalk.

“The dyke in the chaps, the drag queen leaning on the ATM, or the shirtless guy that should’ve known better?” I asked, squinting in the sun and trying to see who was upsetting him. (P.S., yes, The Castro is that tragic at times.)

“No, on the ground,” he responded, with a total look of despair on his face. This time, when Sparkle and I looked up the street, we knew who he was talking about, because sitting on the sidewalk with a cup placed directly in front of him was a boy around Peter’s age. He looked dazed as he sat there. I’d seen the same kid sitting there several times over the past couple of months and dropped a couple of quarters in his cup not two weeks prior.

“Should we seek Mexican in The Mission, Peter?” Sparkle asked as he sat back in his seat. Peter nodded a yes and balled himself up in the rear of the car. I also got back in and the three of us drove away.

“Friend of yours, Peter?” Sparkle yelled back. The top was down and it was the only way he could be heard above the wind.

“Used to be,” we barely heard him answer.

“Not any more?” I asked, turning around to face him.

All of a sudden, Peter looked his age. He was small and scared and not nearly the adult he let on to be. “Not any more,” he repeated and shook his head to confirm it. He continued, haltingly, with, “Not since the shelter. His name’s Gus. Least that’s what he calls himself. See that look on his face? (He was looking down at the back of my seat and you could tell he was playing something over in his head.) That’s heroin.”

Nervously, I asked, “And you used to do it with him?”

That snapped him out of it, “No, Sporto, only the stupid ones do that shit, or the ones that really have something they want to forget. Not me; I stuck with the speed, the pot, and the booze. (Jiminy, I felt so much better at hearing that. At least he didn’t shoot up, right? Jeez.)

“But then you got yourself into the shelter, right? To get off the street?” I ventured.

“Not exactly. That was the State that decided that. I’d been busted a couple of times already and they said that either I clean up my act and go to the shelter or I go to some juvenile detention camp up in the north.”

“So you chose the shelter?” Sparkle asked, pulling into a spot not far from where we were headed. “Judging from your friend up there, I’d say you made the right decision.” Peter nodded that he thought so too and hopped out of the car. Sparkle and I quickly followed, and we were, thankfully, finally off to lunch.

“Are you glad you’re in the shelter now, if you don’t mind me asking?” I asked, before we reached the restaurant.

“Yup. Well, sort of. I mean, I miss my friends and I sort of miss the drugs sometimes, but I’d rather have the shower, the bed, and the food. I don’t so much like being told what to do and where to go, though.” Now he was sounding like a teenager. A fucked-up one, but still.

“And the State,” asked Sparkle as he held the door open for the two of us, “they told you to go with the two of us, am I right?”

“Now you’re getting it,” Peter said, with a sly smirk.

“And I take it you’re not exactly thrilled about it, right?” Sparkle also asked, bending down a little to look Peter in the eyes.

“No, not exactly,” he answered, staring right back at him, defiantly.

“Well, kid, the State is making
me
be here as well, so order up, chow down, and make the fucking merry best of it, because you and me got us fifty eight and a half more hours of this happiness to go. Got it?” he said as calmly as he could, still looking straight at a now not so cocky Peter.

“Got it,” came the reply, along with a nod, “if you’re paying for it.”

“Oh, I’m paying for it, all right. I’m paying out the fucking ass for it.” I don’t think Peter caught the innuendo. Instead, he eagerly ordered a super burrito. Sparkle and I ordered regular ones, as we were watching our figures. (In order to make sure other people watched them as well.) We ate mostly in silence due to the fact that Peter barely so much as took a breath between bites. I couldn’t imagine what they were feeding him at the shelter, but I took it that the food was not what was keeping him there.

I, for one, was glad for the lack of conversation. See, this kid scared the shit out of me whenever he opened his mouth to speak. For one thing, I wasn’t used to being around teenagers any more. And for another, I certainly wasn’t used to being around semi-homeless wards of the State. Sparkle was basket case enough for me to handle without Junior Sparkle thrown into the picture. Thankfully, once we finished eating, we all agreed that perhaps lunch would be enough for one day; there would be plenty of time for bonding in the weeks ahead. And so we drove Peter back to the shelter, with Sparkle dropping me off at the shop a short while later. Gladly, I went back to work, knowing that I’d done my good deed for the day. Next time, I would let Sparkle go mono a mono with the kid. (Though homo a homo was more like it.)