Excerpt: Exactly What He Means

It’s starting to get really hot in the dungy Parisian club, and I can feel my shirt sticking to my sweaty back. The boys and I go over to the bar to order another round. He turns to me and says something in French, something he knows I won’t understand. The sentence is too complex, and the vocabulary is nothing they’d teach me in college. But maybe it’s his body language, how he got closer to me with every syllable uttered, or his facial expressions, how his eyebrows rose with excitement after certain words, or his eyes, how he looked at me and then down at my jeans. I may not understand what he says, but I know exactly what he means.

Excerpt, Confessions of a Boy Toy

Photo: Gerard Estadella

Excerpt: Risky Behavior

“Have you engaged in any risky sexual behaviors lately?” Billy asked.

“Doesn’t all sex come with a risk?” Wilde had a point. He had learned that not every risk involving sex manifested itself physically, diagnosable by a blood test. Some risks compromised things closer to the core.    

Excerpt, Confessions of a Boy Toy

Excerpt: We Shouldn’t Do This

A few seconds later he began rubbing his butt up against my thigh and caressing my lower leg with his feet. And when I rolled over and started spooning him and running my cold hands up and down his torso, he didn’t flinch away. I heard him exhale. Not only had he taken off his shoes before slipping into bed, way before the movie even began, he had also taken off his shirt and jeans. Meanwhile fully clothed I laid, even though you know how much I hate sleeping with my socks on.

Andrew exhaled again, and I started fingering the elastic on his boxer briefs and getting down close to his crotch. But then I stopped. He noticed I stopped. And I turned over and closed my eyes — tired, drunk and stoned. But then he rolled over and got so close to me that I could feel him breathing on my cheek as he poked my hips with his knees. And when I turned my head to look at him, waiting for an explanation, he didn’t look away. So I kissed him, and he kissed me back briefly, softly, before he closed his mouth, recoiled back gently and said, ‘We shouldn’t do this.’ 

Excerpt, Confessions of a Boy Toy

Excerpt: We Left Our Hearts in San Francisco

They say
the San Francisco Bay
is floored with the hearts of desperate men
who came to California looking for love
and never found it.

Excerpt, Confessions of a Boy Toy

Excerpt: Your Body On My Bed, Your Heart a Thousand Miles Away

It seems that the men inching closest to my heart are the ones already halfway on to somewhere else. Because when morning comes, no matter what happens between us, underneath the sheets, you will still have that flight to catch. Let me keep you at a safe distance while I indulge in self-sabotage. Your body on my bed, your heart tucked neatly in some other corner — a thousand miles away — where you belong.

Excerpt, Confessions of a Boy Toy