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  The night I received my final year results Johnny came and dragged me away from my parents who were screaming abuse. So he failed, Johnny told them, you’ve got one son at university already. How many do you want there? My father started screaming at him as well. We left the house and he told me he had a surprise for me. We went back to his house and he lit me a joint and left me sitting on his bed flicking through movie magazines. He went off into the bathroom and emerged, twenty minutes later, in a red dress, thick make-up, his hair up in a bun, looking like a woman in a black and white photograph, a scared young woman on foreign soil. What do you think? he asked me. I groaned. Johnny, Johnny that’s too much.

  –I’m disappointed in you, Ari, he retorted. Never, ever, ever think anything is too much. He sat beside me on the bed. This life is shit, man, uncompromising. He put his arm around my shoulder and I smelt perfume. Haven’t we always said, he continued, that what we hate about the wogs is that they are gutless? They don’t take chances, don’t upset the status quo. He fiddled with a strand of long black hair. Well, Ari, it’s not just the wogs. It’s all of them. I’m not scared, he shouted defiantly in Greek. Maybe so his old man could hear. I remained silent.

  –Don’t die on me, Ari, he implored me, don’t become like the others. I took his hand and led him out to the lounge room and his father stood up and started yelling at him. Johnny ignored him and I tried to hide in a corner. His father grabbed the bottle he was drinking from and rushed towards his son. Yianni, he screamed, you go out like that, you go out like that you slut, and I promise you, Yianni, I’ll fucking kill you. Johnny didn’t flinch, didn’t make a sound as the bottle smashed on the wall next to him. I’m not Yianni, he told his father, slowly, deliberately, Toula is back. He spat at his father. Toula is back from the grave, papa. He called out to me. Ari, let’s go, we’ve got some celebrating to do. I waved goodbye to Johnny’s father, wanting to say something to wipe away the man’s shame, staying silent because there was nothing I could say; and walked out into the twilight, Johnny on my arm.

  Five transcendental moments in my life, five moments in which my desire, my sexuality, my dreams were not clouded by confusion, ambiguity and regret. By which I learned the five commandments of freedom.

  One. Walking out of the house with Johnny, dressed as Toula, walking past the stares and whispers of the neighbours. Thou shalt not give a shit what people think.

  Two. My father screaming at me, you failure, you animal, and my soaking in the contempt, suffocating in my guilt. Then watching my mother throw the same words, the same expressions to my brother as he is walking out of the house. Seeing him drenched in the stench of her venom. Not believing them for my brother. Not believing them for my sister. A glimpse, a slither of light in the darkness of the Greek family drama. Thou art not responsible for thy parents’ failure.

  Three. Watching Marlon Brando take off his T-shirt in A Streetcar Named Desire, a young kid watching the tiny image on a black and white screen. A young kid bursting with semen and sex. My first conscious desire for another man, a man I would like to grow up and become. Thou can have a man and be a man.

  Four. The accumulated media crap in my head. The endless list of atrocity, so persistent, so constant that evil becomes banal. The four men of the Apocalypse riding on, again and again and again, through the TV set at six sharp every night. I grew up with these images, thought I had become immune to these images until one night I watched a community service ad sponsored by McDonald’s, in which a Somalian woman placed her hand in boiling water, then ripped off the burnt skin from her arm to feed her dying child. At the end of the ad a journalist on behalf of McDonald’s asked us to dig into our pockets in order that women like this may live. Thou shalt despise all humanity, regardless of race, creed or religion.

  Five. An old man, effeminate and frail, fearfully offers me fifty dollars if I let him suck my cock. I let him do it for free. Next night I go to my first gay bar and pick up a handsome young guy with a good car and a good job. I only agree to fuck him if he gives me fifty bucks. He argues, but can’t resist me. I’m sixteen. Thou shalt never steal from the poor or the old but fuck the rich for all it’s worth.

  Transcendence is the acceptance of the original sin. Realising that to be born human is to be born fucked up. Transcendence is realising that people do not deserve pity or love or compassion. People deserve contempt. Or, as Johnny says, I may see no future but I got ethics.

  A twirling ship comes for me and I try to hide in the left-hand corner. The shower of missiles, however, attack my ship and the screen flashes Game Over.

  Con comes up and passes me a drink. He sits on top of a pinball machine and takes out a cigarette. He offers me one and I take it, light it and lean against the machine. He adjusts his position so his leg is resting against my side. I don’t move away. His foot taps along to the exaltations of the disco chanteuse. Drags, they’re bitches aren’t they? he says. Waits for my answer.

  –Sometimes. I take a puff of smoke in my lungs.

  –She’s not your girlfriend, is she? he asks pointing across to the bar.

  –Who Johnny? No he’s just a friend. My mouth is still dry, and I take a large sip. The blouse on the woman opposite is moving, small waves running up and down her back. Silk material which catches the flashing lights and sends moonbeams straight into my eyes. I force my eyes away to stop the hallucinations. Con is smiling at me. I never met a wog drag before. He drinks from his beer. Her folks don’t know, do they?

  –Sure, his old man does. I’m pissed off he keeps calling Johnny a she. His mother is dead.

  –Sorry, I didn’t know. It’s probably for the best. I look at him, not understanding his response.

  –I mean, he continues in Greek, if she wasn’t dead seeing her son in a skirt would have finished her off. Con begins to giggle. I can’t help it, I find myself giggling as well. His whole body is shaking and he puts his hand on my shoulder to steady himself on the machine. He doesn’t remove his hand, and I let it stay on me. Do your folks know? he asks me.

  –Know what? I reply sharply. The hallucinations don’t stop. Con’s face is large, imposing, the bristles on his cheeks are making waves. My folks know shit about what I do, I answer, it’s better that way.

  –Sure is. He gets off the pinball machine and leans over to me, his mouth whispering words close to my ear. A streak of saliva hits my earlobe and I get a hard-on. You’re a good-looking guy, Ari, he tells me and runs a hand over my thigh, across my crotch. He strokes my dick and laughs. Seems you think I’m a good-looking guy as well. I try to keep a straight face. The drugs, however, are making me giggle. An older man in a yellow top walks past us and stops to look at us. Con gives a disgusted groan. Fuck off old man, he says loudly, the words lost in the sounds of the arcade games. The man doesn’t hear. He keeps looking at us.

  –I want to fuck you. Con whispers the words hard against my ear. I’m drifting, I’m adrift on a chemical sea and the words take some time to connect with my brain. His hand is still stroking my cock, the older man watches us. My breathing is creating sonic commotion inside my head. Con is looking at me, waiting for an answer.

  –No one fucks me. Con laughs. Sure, Ari, he says, moving his hands away from me. I didn’t figure you for a girl. He says the word in Greek, koritsaki, a little girl. It sounds like he’s laughing at me. Can I fuck you? I ask. Con stops laughing. For a moment, I think he’s going to bash me. But he doesn’t, instead he puts an arm around me and points a long middle finger to the man looking at us. Fuck off pervert, he yells loudly. The man blushes, throws us a dirty look and walks away. Other people hear us, they look up, murmur to each other, then look away. I catch sight of Con and me, reflected in the black screen of a video game, two dark boys, handsome, strong. We look good. Can I fuck you? I repeat.

  The club is now crammed tight with people, mostly men. The music is a savage ceremony, men walking around each other, making eye contact, flirting, but flirting in a detached, cynical manner, to av
oid the humiliation of rejection. The women are mostly on the dance floor, thrusting their hips to one another, oblivious to the games of male sexual conquest around them. A few very drunken men, or out-of-it men are putting on an aggressive manner and asking for sex from strangers, loudly and insistently.

  It is nearing three o’clock and the club is drenched in sweat and amyl. The whole atmosphere is making me want to puke, I can’t create a space to separate me from the other bodies milling around me and Con. I place a hand on the pinball machine, to steady myself. As from a distance I hear Con say something to me. Come on, his words make contact with me. Come on, he starts walking away, let’s get out of here.

  We walk past the bar and Johnny and Crystal look at us and I avoid their eyes. Past the bouncers and we are in the night air. A hot-dog vendor is selling hot dogs to some leather men. He looks stoned, bored and doesn’t respond to the good-natured flirting. Taxis abound on the street, and the drivers have formed a small circle across the street from the club, big men with beer guts, slagging off the queens. Con walks in front of me and I follow him down an alley at the side of the club. Two young blond men are sharing a joint and we walk past them. Have a good time one of them calls out in a high falsetto.

  At the end of the alley Con scales a brick wall and I leap up after him. The night is warm. We are in an abandoned factory yard, bricks, high grass and broken glass around our feet. Con looks around then he is on top of me, pushing me back against the wall and kissing me hard on the mouth. I kiss him back and he drags down the zip of my pants and grabs my cock. He kisses me. On the mouth. On the neck. On my chest. He pulls his dick out and thrusts it against my balls. Suck me, I order, and he gets on his knees.

  Shadows move and mutate across the walls of the derelict building.

  –Suck me. I thrust my cock deep into Con’s throat and he pulls away. I grab the back of his head and force his throat back onto my cock.

  I look up to the night sky and a star bursts.

  –Don’t come. Con is back on his feet, both of us with our pants around our ankles. He thrusts against me and has a small brown bottle in his hand. He takes a sniff and passes it to me.

  –I want you to fuck me. He whispers the words into my ears and the amyl takes effect. I eat his mouth, grab as much of his flesh as I can in my hands, lick my palms and knead the head of his cock with my fingers. He groans. Every breath he takes envelops my body, makes my flesh burn. I run a hand across his arse. It is taut and hairy. The rush of the amyl subsides.

  –Okay. Let me fuck you. I turn him around and take a condom out of my wallet, slip it on my dick, spit into my hands and rub the saliva over the rubber. I push hard against his arse, find the hole and try to push in. He is tight and I can’t enter. I lean back.

  –Lick my fingers. He sucks on my fingers, then I push them into his arsehole. His head is leaning against the wall. A spider sits placidly inside a hole in the mortar. Above my head more stars are bursting. I kiss the back of Con’s neck and push my cock into his arsehole again. This time I’m in and I start a hurried, frenzied fucking.

  –It hurts. A whisper through clenched teeth. I ignore him. He groans again, bends completely over and searches the ground for a bottle of amyl. He sniffs and his cock starts to get hard again. He passes the bottle to me.

  –Fuck me, wog. He groans.

  The spider sits placidly.

  My thrusts are getting faster.

  Above me the stars are no longer bursting, instead some of them emit long rays to one another, a silver cobweb in the sky.

  My thrusts are getting faster.

  Con’s cock feels huge in my hand.

  I thrust hard into Con’s arse.

  –Oh God, this hurts. His pain excites me and I throw all of myself violently into his arsehole. I look up. The cobweb disintegrates in the sky, an explosion of silver light. I burst inside of Con and fall, slumped onto his body.

  I pull out. The wet condom hangs loosely on the tip of my still erect dick, wet, full of my white semen. I dump it on the ground and Con stands up tall and forces me on my knees. His cock rubs against my lips and I take it in my mouth.

  Con takes more amyl.

  –Suck it, wog. His body is sweating. I close my eyes and concentrate on not throwing up. A deep thrust. A sudden stream of liquid. I drink it in. I don’t spit it out, I keep his cock in my mouth drinking in all the sperm he is emitting. I think; is he clean? I stop thinking. Drink in the last of his come and he is groaning. He falls to his knees, sits beside me. I look up. No spider, no fireworks in the sky. We are two boys, sitting on tall grass and broken glass, our pants around at our feet. Our wet dicks fall limp across our sweaty legs.

  Con takes out a hanky, wipes himself and passes it to me. He pulls up his pants and takes a cigarette from his pocket. He hands it to me, lights it, then lights one for himself. I am silent, slightly sullen. I’m no good at conversation after a fuck. I suck gladly on the cigarette. It clears the taste of come still on my tongue.

  Con gets up, cigarette hanging from his lips and pisses against the wall. He takes a long time to get a stream going. Junkie.

  –You clean, aren’t you, Ari? I nod. I don’t bother to ask him the same question. He answers it for me, anyway.

  –I’m clean. You’re one of the few people I’ve ever let fuck me. He sits beside me again. It’s because you’re a man, he adds. I look over at him. He no longer seems quite the masculine Greek man I met a short while ago. His voice sounds an octave higher, he is waving his arms around. Fucking him has feminised him in mind. It could be the drugs. I hold out the handkerchief. You want this?

  Throw it away. Save Mum from having to wash up my dirty work. He leans over and kisses me on the mouth. My desire has gone. I close my eyes, think of George and kiss him back. He’s not George. I pull away. You going to tell Crystal? I ask him.

  –Shit no. He throws me a puzzled look. What business is it of hers?

  I stand up and take a piss. A long stream of urine, pissing out alcohol, water, amyl, marijuana, speed, LSD, ecstasy. Fuck, I groan, I’m drug-fucked. Con gets up as well and starts scaling the fence. I’ll buy you a drink he calls down to me. Sure, I answer, I’ll have a scotch. We jump the wall and head back to the loud music, to the cruising crowd. The sex we have just had is already disappearing from my mind.

  I became a slut. It just happened. First time, the first time remains crystal clear. A middle-aged guy in a tracksuit blowing me in the bushes at Burnley Oval after school. The first time with a girl, a bedroom at some party. Getting off on licking her breasts, she wouldn’t let me fuck her, coming on her stomach. A parade of men in toilets, cousins of friends or friends of girls at school. Getting fucked once by a good-looking Turk with a big cock. Hating it, it hurt. Not using a condom and going into an anonymous surgery to do tests. Finding out the results, feeling like I received a second chance and going straight down to a toilet block and getting sucked off.

  Fucking Betty, a condom splitting and worried about her getting pregnant. On the phone every day, hoping to hear the magic word: period.

  Going to clubs, straight clubs, gay clubs, mixed clubs, grunge clubs, wog clubs, skip clubs, black clubs. Asian boys. Contemptuous Greek and Arab boys. Scared Greek girls, wanting you to bugger them so they can maintain their virginity. Stoned Anglo girls, their cunts smelling of fruity perfume.

  Fucking in bedrooms, toilets, cars, under railway bridges, on the beach, in strange lounge rooms, in the back row of porn cinemas. Coming home, late from school, Mama asks Where you been? You answer, out with friends. Having a shower to get rid of the smell of perfume, of aftershave. Getting rid of the smells that linger from a five-minute thrashing of bodies.

  Fucking, not falling in love. I’m not much for conversation. Even with girls (and it’s easier to converse with girls) I don’t seem to have much to say. The more they talk the more you realise you are not the same. Sometimes, it happens, you are in the middle of a fuck-looking into the eyes of a girl on top of you,
her hair framing her beautiful face; a young guy on his knees in front of you and he looks up and smiles-and I have felt a certain tenderness, have felt I want to just lie on a bed and talk to this person, share jokes, fantasies, share some time. A tenderness that while he is sucking me, she is thrusting her groin down on me, I think, this tenderness, this must lead to love. Then I blow, I come and the tenderness goes. Then all I want to do is go away. Put on my pants, wipe my dick and go away.

  I ask myself how many people I’ve had sex with. I’ve lost count. I’ve become a slut.

  They are playing bad Abba. Dancing Queen. I hate this song, I say to Con as we walk back in. Johnny and Crystal have moved from the bar and have found some seats near the entrance. Maria is with them, and a striking woman with platinum-coloured hair. The Abba song is playing but they have a Madonna video on the screen. A black and white video in which some Latino guy is licking her out.

  I go up to Johnny and put my arm around him. A sign that I want a truce. Maria pecks me on the cheek and introduces me to her friend, Serena. Italian? I ask. Croatian, she replies. Johnny winks at me and whispers, no relation. Maria hears. Relation to who?

  –A guy Johnny’s been dating. I shuffle. Maria notices my frown. What’s up? she asks.

  –I hate this fucking song. Serena is asking Johnny what it’s like dating a Croatian man. Johnny is weaving bullshit. Maria tells me I’ll never make a good faggot. You hate Abba and love early Rolling Stones. She shakes her head at me. What kind of queer are you? Crystal giggles in my face. The Rolling Stones, he squeals, how boring.

  –Early Stones, I correct him. Even more boring he replies. He is no longer friendly. Con comes up with both our drinks. Crystal glares at me. The Abba song is finishing and some good Detroit house comes blaring through the speakers. I grab Maria’s arm and we move to the dance floor.