SYLWEK

Sylwek was a short, skinny boy. A boy – not some camp queen! I watched him with fascination, even though the park queens didn't speak very kindly of him. And despite that unpleasant episode when his pretty body suddenly became covered in thin, thread-like lines – supposedly an allergy to dog fur. Back then, any skin issue made you think of the disease we didn't even dare name.

Sylwek was friends with Jolka, who often complimented me. I wasn't interested in him. Long hair, passing himself off as a girl when straight-acting thugs were around – which actually worked quite well – it all repelled me. I wanted a boy, not something pretending to be a girl. Sylwek was completely different. He was already twenty, sure, but still so deliciously boyish that something inside me would melt just thinking about him.

We were chatting in a little group in the middle of the path: me, Jolka, Sylwek, and the old guy from Gostyń. I kept glancing at Sylwek. He quickly noticed my lingering looks and almost immediately started looking back at me the same way. We kept inching closer and closer, until we were hugging and kissing.

– God, what a pathology! – Jolka giggled, clutching his head. Half jealous, half serious.

The old guy from Gostyń suddenly turned around and started pacing back and forth near us. I knew him – forty-something, reeking of stale cigarette smoke, driving a beat-up Golf. He gave a damn good blowjob with a swallow.

Love in a cruising spot. Two guys kissing. A rare sight.

I wanted him. We were making out hard now, touching each other. I asked the old guy from Gostyń if he'd drive us to the Cytadela, because I didn't want to do it in the park with so many familiar queens around.

We sat in the back. I don't remember the drive. My eyes were closed, Sylwek's tongue was deep in my mouth, my hand wandering under his shirt across his smooth chest. When we arrived, we went straight into the bushes. The place was overgrown with tall thujas, and you had to go up a few small steps. The old guy walked along the path below, throwing greedy glances our way the whole time.

Our flies were open and we were fondling each other, kissing passionately. But something was holding me back from going all the way with him. That nagging thought about his dermatological horror, that "dog allergy," kept coming back. So I nodded toward the old guy from Gostyń and let Sylwek in on the secret:

– He gives an amazing blowjob.

Sylwek had no objections. I called the old guy over. He came running like a dog with his tongue hanging out. I pulled him by his rags, brought him down to the ground. He did it obediently and greedily. Sylwek and I never stopped kissing. Neither of us could stop smiling after that little episode with the old guy. It was heavenly to taste Sylwek's saliva on his tongue while feeling my body pulsing and sensing climax approaching. I came when I wrapped both arms around his neck and thought only of him.

The old guy from Gostyń licked his lips and turned to Sylwek. He went at it fast, like a madman. Probably he'd been waiting for this the whole time – he already knew my taste well, but he had the honor of servicing Sylwek for the first time in his life. Sylwek moaned and groaned. We stayed in that embrace, in that endless kiss. It felt so good when he came. In that moment I loved him and was incredibly happy about this wonderful adventure.

I never saw Sylwek again after that. I accidentally deleted his number from my Yari. Two queens had his contact, but they wouldn't give it to me. I had the feeling that the fags didn't want us to meet again. Together we looked like we were in love. There was beauty in it, and love, and life. And seeing such things in the sad life of an average queen was unbearable.

INTRUSION

 

1. You down for something?

A young guy on a bike was circling the park. He'd stop by the benches, step onto the seat and sit on the backrest, look around, and ride off. I watched him from a distance. Dark hair, fair complexion, sharp features, a prominent, masculine nose. He noticed me, rode past me twice. The third time, he asked straight out:  

–  You down for something?

It was raining. We went to Wolne Tory – a place where decommissioned, rusting trains were stored. We stood under a leaking roof of a littered wooden shack. He kissed me passionately, licked my ears and neck, took me in his mouth. I returned his caresses. I licked raindrops off his forehead. I was struck by his body heat and the youthful smile that never left his face. 

Afterwards, he sent me a missed call. I saved his number – Kamil. I promised I'd get in touch. I bragged that I had a cool place at my disposal right in the city center, because Piotrek – my Guardian Angel – worked in Scandinavia on a daily basis.

I went back to my parents' and the little dog on the post-communist housing estate. In the evening, I texted Kamil. He replied with a missed call. After a while, a message came from his network via a free SMS gateway: "I can't text." I topped up his phone using Inteligo. He wasn't the first straight-acting thug I'd topped up.

2. Shelter above the town hall

That apartment was my treasure, my shelter, my refuge, where I often went at night. I walked there from the Polonez bus stop across the hill of two churches – guidebooks describe it as "picturesque like Tuscany." From the balcony of our tenement, there was a view of the Renaissance town hall. 

The envious park queens who didn't have their own place scornfully called it my garsoniera, and the most malicious ones – a "flophouse" or even a "fuckpad". I wrote poems about this place, ran to the post office with every parcel notice, once even intervened about a pigeon trapped behind a grate that had suddenly appeared on the staircase leading to the attic.

3. The doors

Kamil arrived on his bike. He parked it under the balcony window. I was surprised that he immediately started examining every door very carefully. About the entrance door, he said that the lock could be picked in three seconds. About the living room door: they were so old they'd give way under the slightest pressure. 

I didn't ask how he knew. 

I invited him inside. I told him that I didn't actually live here – during the day I slept at my parents' on the post-communist housing estate and had my phone turned off. 

We sat down at the oak table. I opened YouTube, my favorite tracks – Polish, pre-war. I opened a beer. Kamil wasn't much of a drinker, he drank symbolically. We made love.

4. Morning

At dawn, Kamil was dragging his feet, wanting to stay in the apartment as long as possible. He kept urging me to wait until evening. I reminded him that I didn't stay there during the day, that I had to go back to my parents' on the post-communist housing estate, so he had to leave. When he clearly refused, he left me no choice. I grabbed him like a big tomcat, led him – clinging to the doorframes – to the exit, and shoved him out the door. Then I carried his bike and backpack out to the staircase. 

I turned the key. I stood in the hallway. I didn't turn my head. My cheeks and ears were burning. 

Years later, Kamil said he was impressed by that decisive move of mine. And that having to submit to me gave him pleasure.

5. Break-in

I woke up at three in the morning in my little room at my parents'. I turned on my phone. One missed call. From Kamil. I dialed the number. 

"The person you are calling is not available." 

I called again. Same thing. I jumped out of bed, got dressed, quickly left the block, and waited under the shelter for the 235 bus. 

I ran up the stairs of our tenement. On the half-landings, I stopped and dialed his number. No signal.

The apartment door was open. In the kitchen, a drawer was pulled out. On the counter, a screwdriver I hadn't left there. 

The living room door – the broken lock lay on the floor. Metal parts. 

Cabinets open. The Sony digital camera was gone, the DVD player, the CD collection, Piotrek's old Nokia, watches, and small electronics. 

I dialed the number to Stockholm. 

– Piotrek, we've been robbed! – I sobbed hysterically. I told him quickly, chaotically. 

– What do you mean? And what exactly was stolen? You absolutely have to go to the police! 

– Okay – I hung up. 

I called again. 

– I need to ask you something… Let's not report it. I can't handle testifying at the police station. It's too much for me. Can we not report it? Please.

Piotrek, with love and care, calmed me down: 

– Alright. They're just things. Your health is what matters most.

6. Train station

I texted Kamil: "You've really hurt me. Give back what you took. Write back." In a series of messages, I described the situation in the simplest language. I explained that it wasn't the loss of the items that hurt me, but how he repaid my hospitality. And what hurt most was that because of this stupidity, we'd lost the chance for any further relationship. I convinced him that I didn't intend to go to the police, and that his greed was pointless, because if he'd kept seeing me regularly, over time he'd have enriched himself much more. 

There was no reply, but when I called, the call was finally ringing. I wrote that I'd wait for him at midnight at the Western Station.

At night, I wandered around the empty station. The entrance to the main hall was covered with plywood, there were no hot guys in the internet cafe. In the dingy tunnel, there was a smell of microwaved toasties and cheap perfume. I browsed the newspapers at the kiosk at the Western Station. Bubel's antisemitic magazines in a small format, partially covered by crosswords. Computer magazines with CDs, a huge banner for "Fakt" with the wreckage of the presidential TU-154M on the cover. You used to be able to get "Adam" or "Nowy Men" there, but now people sat online and torrented stuff for free.

Someone tapped me on the shoulder. Him. Dressed in that black security uniform of his. He had a serious expression. He apologized and thanked me for not reporting it. On a bench at the back of the station, he told me everything in detail, as if he needed to confess. He'd done it at night, in a balaclava and gloves, panicking that he might run into a neighbor in the shared hallway. Now he took out some of the electronics from his backpack, including the precious silver-bodied digital camera with which Piotrek and I had taken so many unique photos in Prague. He'd already pawned most of the heavier stuff, but what he could, he returned.

I wasn't thinking about him. I was thinking about myself. About how I'd shown him myself how easy it was to get into my place. About how I'd told him myself: during the day I'm not there. And that I'd just stared like a deer in the headlights at a bike with an empty rack. The one he later packed all the loot into. 

I thought I should feel regret.

I didn't.

7. Kamil

Kamil had thick eyebrows and a typically straight-acting thug look. He looked unmistakably straight. But there was also something boyish about him – in his almost childlike smile and his eternal, stubborn optimism. 

– What would I even have to worry about? – he used to say – I've got arms, I've got legs, I'm not in a wheelchair. 

He could selflessly help others – like an elderly man he successfully resuscitated at a bus stop. Even Radio Merkury reported on it. He dressed unusually: in a security uniform – black trousers and a t-shirt with the word "security" on it. That way he didn't have to change. He came from a town near the border with the Kaliningrad Oblast, but he'd settled here for good. He spoke the city slang and the fag park code better than many locals.

8. Rituals

He started coming to me more and more often. He'd shower like any straight-acting thug and, like all of them, he'd get underwear and socks. I'd specialized in providing thugs with a warm shower, underwear, and t-shirts. They'd become part of my duties. For Kamil, I happened to have a whole pack of Swedish branded t-shirts from my guy. He used them all. I don't know where he went when he disappeared from my sight. For me, my own bed, home, parents, a loving partner were as natural as breathing. 

I heard all about his past. I learned the stories of juvenile detention centers, the secrets of the so-called "małolatka" in Garwolin, where they'd once locked him up. Unlike in prisons, relationships between boys there were a normal regulator of social behavior – establishing hierarchy, control, punishment, satisfying physiological needs. It was a bit similar in the psychiatric wards, where he'd been held when the police picked him up off the street for vagrancy.

Our meetings were governed by a pattern. After two Dębowe Mocne beers, I'd start emitting loud drunken monosyllables. Kamil would immediately handcuff me and ask:

 – Are you going to behave?

– Yes, Sir – I'd answer, staring at him with wide eyes. 

He wouldn't release me, just watched, reveling in the power. 

Jolka, our mutual acquaintance from the park (a long-haired guy who passed himself off as a girl to lure heterosexuals), once told me that he'd handcuffed him too and taken him from behind.

9. Traditionally

At dawn, I was still drunk. The windows remained covered with blankets, the room was in semi-darkness. I had a thug at my place. Perfect conditions for pleasure. I'd sit in front of the computer, put on a YouTube playlist, and open more beers. I'd wake Kamil and ask him to do it to me.

 – Alright – he'd say – Traditionally. 

We'd replay our ritual. I'd position myself in front of the old dresser, facing the wall, elbows on the top. Pants down to my ankles. Kamil was right behind me. Slowly moving his hips. That feeling of being used and worn out by a handsome guy was worth every price I paid.

10. "I thought it would be worse"

One night of another summer, me and Kamil were chatting with Sylywek. That's when I asked Kamil about those meetings of ours in the tenement – about how it had been for him with me. 

The answer came after a long moment: 

– You know what. I thought it would be worse.

I froze. They changed the subject. I didn't even hear what Sylwek asked me, I just stared into space. Kamil waved his hand dismissively:

 – He's having a moment right now. 

I thought: my age. Kamil liked them young. And I was already in my thirties. At our first meeting, he'd taken me for a twink. Later he looked at me more closely and lost interest.

He probably didn't feel disgust towards me. But I'd long since fallen outside his preferred age range – the one he'd set somewhere around 16 to 25. 

In the park, he'd do it with his mouth for 65- and 70-year-olds. For 20 zlotys. They told me themselves.

11. 1939

I remember walking down with Kamil from the church hill to the Citadel. We were passing a monumental monument. There was a date written on it in big letters: 1939. Kamil asked what it meant. 

I said he was joking. He replied that he wasn't joking and that "he's weak at history." I explained. He repeated that history was never his thing. 

I said no problem. Because there wasn't.

12. Scars

I have one photo in my collection from my Yari: Kamil in the armchair in the little room in the tenement. Behind him, a tiled stove. He's looking into the lens with a serious expression and the self-confidence of a straight-acting thug. It's a shame, because his youth hit you when he smiled – then a roguish glint in his eye gave him away. 

In the photo, his hair is cut very short. The shorter he cut it, the more clearly the scars showed. He had over a dozen of them. On his head, shoulders, chest, back, legs – everywhere, traces of injuries. A whole history of a life full of dangerous, chaotic adventures etched into his body.

I thought about all those thugs who came to me back when I was experimenting with alcohol. During that period, the door to my garsoniera was almost never closed. I didn't tell Piotrek those stories. The silence swelled inside me. I carried it inside me like a weight, like a huge tumor. 

One day I couldn't take it anymore. The words started pouring out of me: 

– If the walls of our tenement could talk, they would have collapsed long ago from shame. Or from laughter. I don't know which would be worse.

Wiktoria

That was a busy night in the park. On the bench to the right of Słowacki's bust, a woman was riding a man – an unusual sight in that place. The queens passed them without a word. Only a few stopped and stared in surprise. A middle-aged couple, they looked homeless, drinking non-stop, and honestly, there wasn't much to watch.

At some point, a guy in his twenties showed up, perfectly normal, not homeless at all. He leaned over the old man. After a moment she got up, and the guy started thrusting into her from behind. Then there was something worth looking at – the youth's slender ass caught everyone's attention. The queens watched the spectacle with interest, three or more stopping nearby. I watched from a distance. Back then, I felt like a hundred-percent gay and was proud of it, which is why such spectacles generally disgusted me.

There was also an older gentleman with us, exceptionally elderly. Hard to pigeonhole him as just another pathetic old queen. Masculine, with sparkling eyes and a ruddy complexion. He had noble manners, with traces of pre-war polish in them. I immediately recognized him as an educated and valuable person, so he didn't bother me at all. On the contrary, I thought it was beautiful that such a dignified senior had come to the park.

Unfortunately, after a while the man took in so much stimulation that he felt faint, sat down on the bench, and we had to ask if he was okay or if we should call for help. A buddy of mine, a skinny blond in glasses, commented:

– You know, he saw all those handsome guys and couldn't handle it.

I understood. It was a warm summer night and there was really a lot going on in the park. Queens kept pairing off and heading into the bushes together. And later often threesomes, group stuff. And through the undergrowth almost everything was visible.

That night, the pigs didn't drive into the park with their headlights off, aggressive straight-acting thugs didn't attack us, there was an atmosphere of carefree fiesta. I wandered through both parts of the park until four, five in the morning.

Then a very young guy showed up, eighteen at most. Slim, average height, dark blond with regular features. Several queens were hitting on him. I was jealous and stayed nearby. I wanted him to notice me. At some point, when the area around him briefly emptied, he turned to me.

– Are you gonna sit on him? – I heard.

He looked at me with a focused, intelligent gaze.

– Unfortunately not – I replied.

I couldn't imagine it. I would never do such a thing in the park. Without preparation and probably without a condom? I'd taken risks my whole life, but exposing myself to that extent would cross my red line.

I was convinced I'd just lost my chance to get close to a fantastic teenager. I already felt the loss, the regret, the grief.

– Will you at least suck with a swallow? – he offered suddenly.

– Yes – I answered enthusiastically, with great joy and hope.

The boy stood up and let me take the bench. It happened right next to Słowacki's bust. I took him in my mouth, savoring the taste of delightful youth. I received him with adoration, fascination, devotion, and love. And when he filled me with warm liquid, I swallowed it like a precious treasure, unable to believe my own luck.

Then he wiped himself with a tissue taken from the pouch on his shoulder, zipped up his pants, and adjusted his T-shirt.

He said goodbye with a brief "thanks" and a specific gesture – two fingers in a victory sign pointed in my direction. The ending of the adventure was fantastic, so youthful, rarely seen. I thought about that gesture for a long time on the night bus from Kaponiera – a comfortable DAF bus, a gift from Utrecht, whose high seats made the ride feel like a little trip.

At home, I described everything on GG messenger to Horus, a buddy from Łódź, a bartender a year older than me from the forum where I held the rank of "admin's dog." That night, or rather that day, I slept fulfilled and happy.

I got up, as usual, late in the afternoon. I turned on the computer – a desktop with a CRT monitor – and immediately read Horus's reply to my account of the unearthly adventure with the wonderful teenager who had ended the encounter with an unexpected gesture.

Horus wrote:

"You know what that gesture meant? It was a gesture of victory over your life."

ORGANISM

When Marcin was approaching the park, you could hear him from far away. A stadium, drunken roar: "Lech! Lech!", "Arka Gdynia!". Thrown out with tremendous, animal force, it tore through the night.

He walked down the middle of the path. As if the park was his fucking backyard where no one had the right to mess with him. As if the whole world belonged to him. As if it had never occurred to him that it could be any other way. Trash bins that weren't even in his way got kicked. They simply disturbed the harmony of his straight-acting thug world. He had to set them straight.

The trees trembled. The queens fell silent and parted before him like a flock of pigeons before a dog.

I saw him for the first time near Słowacki. He was pure light. Some incredible glow surrounded him. Mid-summer. He was wearing a sailor-striped white-and-blue T-shirt and shorts. A white baseball cap on his head. He was twenty-five and his face, despite the dark blond hair, simply shone. It had perfect symmetry and boyishness. Only those big, protruding ears broke it. They ruined everything and fixed everything. Because of them you couldn't take him completely seriously as a threat, nor stop looking at him.

He had a slim, almost skinny body. But with that springiness that doesn't yet know what a hangover or decay is. No gym. No sculpted muscles. Just natural strength. On his arms, tattoos done in some basement by an idiot with a machine. Dark blond thick hair on his legs. An insolent, self-assured gaze. Unapologetically alive. He looked like a typical straight-acting thug from the post-communist housing estate who had just learned how to drink and fuck.

My total opposite. I watched him like I was hypnotized. Absolute fascination.

I started desperately asking around about him. I found out quickly: straight. He came for resources: money, beer, a roof over his head. Nothing else interested him. Pure pragmatism. In the park he was a separate phenomenon. He didn't belong there, and yet he was at home. And he couldn't give a shit. He was a force of nature, feeding on whatever he needed. He removed obstacles from his path with threat and violence. He was completely natural in it. Like an animal that doesn't know the concept of shame.

At Wolne Tory, by the rusted, withdrawn train cars, he let me get close for a few dozen zlotys. The whole time he was rushing me. He looked at me, kneeling in front of him, with an indifferent expression. He ordered me to hurry because "the mosquitoes were biting." He kept saying he didn't have time. He was soft. A pure transaction that gave him no pleasure at all. A duty to be ticked off so he could buy beer as quickly as possible.

Those flashes in the bushes in no way violated his masculinity. He was a parasite feeding off the environment that kept him alive. He maximized profits. He accepted no loss. I remember once at night he first pulled thirty zlotys from me, then ripped out another twenty. He took fifty and promised he'd just run to the station for beer and come right back to the bushes. Of course he didn't come back.

Despite all that, Marcin could be a shield. In the park, muggings, beatings, and robberies were everyday occurrences. Once some unhinged guy with long, dirty hair cornered me. He threatened me. I froze with fear. I was sure he was going to beat me. Then Marcin appeared out of nowhere. He calmed the guy down — they knew each other.

— Leave him alone, he's my buddy, he's cool — he kept repeating until the other guy backed off. He saved me because I was his "resource" that needed to be protected.

Marcin never pretended. He didn't pretend to be better than he was. Vulgar, brutal, insolent. He could scream straight into someone's face for a few zlotys for beer. And then come to me calm as a cat and sit down next to me on the bench.

Later there was that plot in Suchy Las. He got off the tram at the loop in a T-shirt stained with blood.

— What happened, Marcin?! — I asked, terrified.

— Nothing. — He shrugged. — I got into it with some guy.

We went to the plot by taxi. It was hot. There was drinking. It was summer. In the wooden shack he drank himself senseless. I never really saw him completely sober. Beer was his only rightful drink. "Nature's gift" — that's what he called Żubr. He hated drugs. He approached with disgust the fact that I had to take psychotropics.

He demanded money upfront, but then avoided contact. "Not now," "later." When he was completely shitfaced, he finally let me pleasure him with my mouth. He always treated it as something that in no way undermined his masculinity. This time too, I didn't feel him get hard.

In the morning we walked several kilometers back to the city. The sun beat down on the asphalt. At the Narutowicza viaduct I stopped and said:

— Marcin, look. That's a beautiful viaduct, it looks like a ship. It's named after the president who was shot in an assassination.

He looked at the structure, spat to the side and said:

— Fuck him.

— You probably don't like books?

— Fuck, I hate them more than anything in the world.

I laughed. Not because it was smart. Precisely because it wasn't. Marcin never pretended. He didn't pretend to be sensitive. He didn't pretend to be curious about the world. He didn't pretend anything. He hated books, hated talking, hated posing. He was simply himself — brutal, simple, alive.

He walked on with his hands in his pockets. Slightly hunched, kicking stones along the way. And I again felt that strange tenderness. I never told him. For him I was probably just one of many queens hanging around the park. And I collected him piece by piece, storing him inside me. His voice. Drunken singing. Protruding ears. That brutality mixed with boyishness.

And that's exactly why I loved him.

He could protect me, let me get close, and then disappear for a week without a word. He was like a wild dog — sometimes he licks your face, sometimes he bites. I collected him. Every "fuck him," every kick to a trash can, every drunken roar across the entire path. I buried it deep inside my head and carried it like a treasure. He never knew he was being collected. And he never had to know. He just was. And that was enough.

Today I see him sometimes in bars. He sits with some older gay guy who buys him rounds. Marcin doesn't change. He's still that naughty straight-acting thug with protruding ears. He takes from the world what he needs and never apologizes for it. He just is.

The years passed. Life played a film with Marcin — or maybe just a looped gif. Smoothly transitioning from a bright angel under the poet's bust to a man with sun-damaged skin. When I saw him as a thirty-seven-year-old, he still wore the baseball cap. But biology had sent the bill.

Skin, burned by the sun without any filters, had become brown and worn. The hair on his legs had darkened and thickened. I checked it later on Wiki: in guys like him the sun doesn't lighten the hair, it stimulates the follicles to produce darker pigment. His body was simply armoring itself against the heat. Gaps in his teeth were striking with every smile.

The last time he burst into my life uninvited. He showed up at my place with a repulsive, fat guy. He didn't ask for permission — he came like it was his and took two hundred zlotys for nothing. I smelled the street, sweat, and stairwells on him. It took away my desire for closeness. I felt only enormous regret. A great sorrow that this time nothing would happen between us.

Because my fascination with him never faded. Over the years he only became more valuable. He gained character, like everything in my collection that I can't and don't want to abandon. On his way out, standing in the doorway, he snapped straight into my face:

— Stop pissing me off with that neurosis of yours! You have to quit that!

Then I understood the abyss. He went through life like a battering ram. He completely didn't understand that you could be afraid of something you can't touch. I compulsively analyzed, collected moments into a collection. He just was. He was the present — brutal, simple, and unapologetic about devouring what others were too scared to even touch.

The Panacea

At the bottom of the screen, a yellow-orange bar was flashing. On the desk, among scattered papers, crumpled tissues, and blister packs of my meds – a few glasses with green tea sachets. The silence was broken by the rumble of passing trains. Reflexively, I kept opening and closing the tilt window so it wouldn’t disturb my playlist – “Relax. Take it easy” – because my idol, the forum moderator where I had the rank “admin’s dog,” was still listening to it. And Israeli oldies: Et mi at ohevet? Et mi at ohevet? Betachanat harakavot shaaalti – Who do you love, who do you love? At the railway station, I asked.

To the right, down the hallway, the closed door of my parents’ room. My father’s snoring. They were sleeping as they did every night, with the little dog dozing in the armchair. Their night, my day.

I clicked on the chat window. He was two years older, twenty-nine. He lived in the neighboring housing estate. Tall and lean. I didn’t register size, it had never interested me. What did I care? The face matters, and the feet – big feet. Small ones are for women. And the Adam’s apple – preferably a protruding one. I love that.

He was looking for a top – like everyone else. I wasn’t really suited for it, but I wanted to meet. I hadn’t done this in a long time. His name was Radek. Not particularly attractive. I gave my real name too. We agreed on neutral ground, a nice spot – the basement in my stairwell. He said he’d get into the building easily with the police code.

For a long time I felt relaxed, even while getting dressed, then quietly left the apartment, went down the stairs and opened the basement door. The adrenaline felt good. A fucking awesome vibe of waiting for an exciting adventure.

Then the conversation moved to texts. I grabbed my Yari. He wrote that he was on his way. He found my block and stairwell without any problem. I got a message that he was already there, waiting in the agreed place – straight ahead and to the right, right next to my parents’ storage locker. I grew serious.

For a while I still felt pretty normal. A nicer T-shirt and hoodie. Mirror, a bit of fluid on my face, deodorant and cologne. Jacket. I left the apartment into the hallway, locked the door. Slowly I descended the stairs to the ground floor.

As I passed each floor, my face fell, my legs started to buckle. After all, he wants to get fucked like a rag. The last time I was a top was with that massive whore at her place, where I had time to get used to the situation. This time it was going to be different – right away, fast.

I entered the basement. The darkness didn’t bother me. I knew the layout by heart, and not long ago I had given head to some random ugly but insanely hot guy my age right here, who kept saying: “But we care about discretion, don’t we?” I didn’t give a shit.

I smelled cat droppings and rat poison. I passed the fork I had warned him about and found him in the half-light – somewhere in the distance a lightbulb was burning. He was tall and beautiful. Fashionably cut hair, leather jacket. He smelled of expensive cologne. I walked up. He looked at my face.

And then he burst into sincere, booming laughter.

I understood immediately. I was so tense, practically terrified, that I was completely useless. For nothing. Me, a top? With what, for fuck’s sake? With my social phobia, neurosis, chronic dysthymia? Fuck that, not a top. I was sure he’d blow me off and leave. Everything was over. A complete mistake. And it was my fault, all mine.

And then he pulled a beer out of his pocket.

— Drink it down fast — he ordered.

I was twenty-seven and I didn’t know alcohol. I had never drunk before.

But now I grabbed the can and obediently drained it. He waited. He didn’t have to wait long. Soon I felt a buzz in my head. Suddenly I was cut off from myself. I felt raw, animal lust. I threw him against the wooden grate, unbuckled his belt and pulled down his pants. I was rock hard. His body was wonderful, his ass perfect. I entered him quickly. I thrust into him like a conqueror. I was a wild, untamed warrior. I took him like a man takes a bitch. He didn’t moan, he stayed silent. He had control, he was experienced. Soft, gentle and defenseless inside.

— You’re gonna cum! — I heard.

— Where?

— Wherever you want!

Well, fuck, obviously I wanted it inside. I wanted him so badly, I wanted him to be mine, mine to the very end. I did it. I came inside him. I collapsed onto him. And without pulling out, I gently, tenderly kissed his wonderful, masculine, fragrant neck. A feeling of satisfaction and masculine pride filled me. I had conquered him. I was the victor, an undefeated soldier, the owner of a slave I had taken and used like my property.

Later there was a short exchange of words. I said “thanks” or something, but he wasn’t in the mood for conversation. He stuck to the script and quickly disappeared.

I was left alone with my pride, satisfaction, the story, the lived adventure, and the narrative slowly building layer by layer. And with a completely new experience — the knowledge that alcohol ultimately banishes fears into oblivion and awakens the beast in me, turning a trembling queen into an invincible male.

I had found the panacea for the social encounters I had dreamed of. From then on everything was going to change. I had received a powerful tool for modifying my mood. A tool far more powerful than I had imagined.

I returned home. I fired up my blog called cwelik and in one breath described everything I had just experienced. I was the king of the world. I was a man.

And yet I could have, like Radek, simply gone back to my life and stopped acting as if something monumental had happened.

I wrote to him on GG. He replied laconically, with humor. A cheerful emoji with its tongue out appeared.

I didn’t understand that for him nothing extraordinary had happened. There were no wild beasts, no alphas, no conquerors or slave owners. Just another encounter, a quick one in the basement.

Thirty Złotys

I was sitting on the backrest of a bench by a cobblestone street where trams had run long ago. That’s where the motorized fags and old queens well into their thirties used to stop — the ones ashamed to show themselves in the park because of their age or their looks. Or both.

Not long ago I had slipped Jolka my old, scratched MP3 player with some tracks from the thirties: “Not to love on a night like this is a sin. Let’s love while there’s still time…” Now, dosed up on a few 5 mg Valiums, he was drifting along the paths with his hands pressed to his ears. He babbled that he felt plushy and got excited by the pre-war diction. He was thrilled by that half-closed, back-tongue, “dark” o, and the kresy ł — that soft, Eastern Borderlands lilt from pre-war Poland. The whole old stage accent.

To me Jolka always evoked a sociology script: inverted vertical migration. From a top student at a prestigious high school to a park whore who slept in stairwells with the homeless.

Around me circled some twenty-eight-year-old, not fat, more of a bear type. Nothing special, but not repulsive either. Acceptable. He approached slowly and spoke in a lowered voice:

— Sorry, do you maybe meet for money?

I said no, but I dragged out the syllable and my voice hung in the air. The guy walked a few steps away but stayed close.

I stared into the void. Jolka was turning tricks. I was surrounded by people just like him. I myself had been offered money many times in my life. I always refused. Not out of prosperity, but because of a mindless belief drilled into me at home that prostitution was something shameful. But was it really worth clinging to that illusion any longer? How many experiences, sensations — beautiful, terrible, intense — had it made me miss?

I jumped down from the bench. I walked up to him. We discussed the rules, got into the car. He turned the key, the lights flashed on. The queens, including Jolka, noticed us and started wagging their tongues. It was getting better with every second.

He drove me to the Citadel. We climbed the stairs almost all the way up to the plinth. We turned right and veered off the path into the trees.

He was calm, quiet, and kind. He unbuttoned his pants, took a condom from his pocket, tore the foil with his teeth. I don’t know why, but he took it out. And now I was crouching in front of him like a regular whore. And I felt that this was what I had been made for.

Afterward I stood up, put my arms around his neck and brushed his sweaty skin with my lips. He politely asked if we could stand like that a little longer. We stayed in the embrace for several minutes. Neither wanted to let go. I felt his warmth, the beating of his heart, his breath — first heavy, then steady and deep. In that moment everything was exactly where it should be.

He gave me thirty zlotys. I kept them as a souvenir.

In the future he picked me up from the park a few more times. What he always wanted most was the long hugging. Jolka went with him once too. He later thundered across the whole park:

— That man should be ashamed! Paying for plain cuddling! Absolute rock bottom!