I'm Usually the Drunk Slut

Jack and Eugene stopped on their run for some water on the edge of Studley Park, across the footbridge and up the hill to the drinking tap. Jack had been talking about his favourite subject, girls.

Eugene rested both his hands on his knees as he got his breath.

“You’ve got to be prepared to start them off with your tongue, then finish them off with your…” Jack pointed to the crotch of his shorts with a V shape of his hands. “Well,” Jack took a big breath in. “Even you know…”

Jack had finished speaking, Eugene could tell because Jack's mouth had stopped moving. Eugene had very little idea what Jack had just been saying, but he really liked watching Jack's mouth move. Jack had nice teeth.

“You’ve got to be in tune with her needs… guys.”

Jack had been talking about sex, the subject that, somehow, they often got around to talking about when they were together. Maybe not at first, but usually. They were talking about what girls were like, Jack had picked the topic, of course.

"I don't get it," said Eugene. He smiled. "The whole girl thing." He grimaced, tilted his hands in the air, several times. "It's, it's... " He shrugged. "It's all hidden, you know, who the hell knows what’s going on down there."

His buddy, Jack, smiled at him. Blond hair and blues eyes, white teeth. “Didn’t you have sisters?”

“No, three brothers.”

“I had sisters.”

“And?” said Eugene. “What are you saying you did with your sisters?”

“Oh, nothing, seriously?” said Jack. “They’d tell me. Three older sisters. I got a lot of information.”

"I'm used to my fun being out, where I can see it," said Eugene. "I don’t need that mystery in my life." He laughed.

“You will never experience the total joy of discovery of…” Jack closed his eyes and he looked upwards, just slightly, so the perfect light reflected on his perfect skin.

Was Jack remembering the first time, Eugene wondered. “Give me a break.”

Jack lent in close and said all dirty and gruff. "You'll never appreciate the feeling of a drunk little slag spreading her legs and letting you pound her beef curtains, as the sun comes up on a Sunday..."

“Euw?” said Eugene.

Jack was trying to sound cool and sinister, like it was a bad world out there. “…when they are drunk, they are really cooperative.”

Eugene could feel his face grimace. He didn't want to be one of those gays, but the grimace, there it was. "I'm usually the drunk slut, though,” said Eugene. “Straight guys say I’m tighter.”

"Oh," said Jack. He grimaced. It was like someone just told him that his favourite chocolate shop had been exposed as a fraud. Or that footy didn’t really exist. “Girls are smaller, delicate, makes you want to...”

“I can be softer,” said Eugene. “Is that what you want,” Eugene pouted and said breathlessly “Big boy.”

Jack suddenly looked alarmed.

“It’s okay, Jack,” said Eugene. It’s not compulsory. It’s just cho…”

“What’s not compulsory?” The light glinted on his blond hair. His blue eyes sparkled.

Eugene’s head spun. He was no longer sure what they were talking about. He felt naughty. "How hard do you want to fuck me?" He just said it to see the look on Jack’s face.

"What?" asked Jack. He pulled away from Eugene. He held Eugene’s gaze. Serious. Stern.

Eugene couldn't help but laugh. "That's what I usually ask them?"

"Them?" asked Jack. His eyebrows came together and both pointed down towards his nose. “There’s more than one?”

"Someone bigger, strong, taller," said Eugene. “Not usually at the same time… but, you know, maybe?” He shivered as though someone had just walked over his grave. He would swear they had.

Jack just looked at him. Blank. He had no information. Not a clue. “What?”

"You know what those girls are asking from you."

"What? Yes." He still sounded unsure. “What?”

"Same thing."

Jack's face scrunched up adorably. He didn't get it. Over his head, straight over.

“Oh, come on, you must have some idea?” said Eugene.

Silence fell over them. Eugene leant down to the drinking tap and took a drink.

"We're still talking about girls?" That was all that Jack could manage. “Aren’t we?” He looked kind of timid, scared of the answer.

“Jack, relax.” Eugene wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.

“I’m not going to fuck you? Eugene,” said Jack suddenly. “I just wanna get that straight. I’m not fucking you.”

“I know that Jack.”

“So, what is with all the crazy talk…”

“What crazy talk?”

“I don’t know what you are on about, half the time,” said Jack.

Eugene was hurt to hear Jack say that. “You don’t listen.”

“I’m usually the drunk slut?” said Jack repeated.

“You are taking it out of context…”

“How hard do you want to fuck me?” Jack repeated.

Eugene couldn’t help but feel a little turned on hearing Jack say those words. “Jack, the things you say.”

“Can you tell me the context that I am taking it out of?”

“You just need to calm down, Jack.”

“You’re my friend, Eugene,” said Jack. “It is just the same as any…” Jack laughed self consciously. He shrugged. “I don’t know, plain, girl,” Jack made parenthesis with his fingers in the air, “a friend, I have.”

“Yeah Jack, you’re my brother.”

“Don’t forget it.” Jack slapped Eugene’s arse. “Let’s go.” Jack jogged off ahead.

“It’s not always about you, Jack.” Eugene jogged of after his mate.

The track, barely a goat track, descended steeply down the embankment to the river, favoured by mountain bike riders and joggers and some dog walkers. Eugene followed Jack down watching Jack’s powerful thighs carrying him down the steep descent.

When the track flattened out the two friends jogged together.

“You’re not really the drunken slut with the other guys, are you Euge,” asked Jack.

“What?” said Eugene.

“You’re not just getting out of it and, you know, letting the guys… are you?”

“You can talk, Jack, girls are really cooperative when they are drunk.”

“Oh, yeah,” Jack laughed nervously. “But, that’s just talk…”

“What?”

“Talk, Euge, just stuff that guys say,” said Jack.

“Stuff guys say,” said Eugene. “When did I becomes a guy you just say stuff to?”

“You’re my main guy,” said Jack. “I say stuff to you always.”

“But not straight boy bullshit,” said Eugene. “I didn’t think.”

The trees were lush and bright green all the way along the river bank. They form a cathedral of green overhead under which the boys ran. The sun was dappled on the ground.

“But you, hey, AIDS is still a thing, isn’t it?” said Jack.

“Oh Jack, surely you know by now I’m not getting paralytic on booze like chicks do. I might get charged up on pills, or powders, you know, occasionally…”

“Occasionally?” questioned Jack.

“The point is, that I know what I am doing,” said Eugene.

“Always?”

“Always.

A dog owner comes walking towards them, their Golden Retriever with its lustrous coat glowing in the morning sun. It sniffed at the boys as they ran past.

“You wanna know the truth, Euge,” said Jack.

“Of course,” said Eugene. “Always.”

“I like girls to tell me what to do.”

“What?” said Eugene. “You mean, dominatrix style.”

“Well, no. I mean, well, maybe.” Jack laughed. “But that’s not what I’m saying.”

Eugene likes it when Jack Laughs.

“I like girls to talk.”

“Talk?”

“During sex,” said Jack. “I like girls to tell me...”

“How good you are?”

“Yeah, sure,” said Jack. “What I am saying is that I don’t get the unconscious chick thing, that’s just something losers get off on.”

The pathway opened up into the parkland open and green, picturesque framed by the river on one side. It is the off-lead park. A couple of big dogs gallop past.

“So, why do we do that?” asked Eugene.

“Do what?” asked Jack.

“Talk shit to each other, tell each other things we don’t, actually, believe.”

“I dunno,” said Jack. “Builds us up. Something to say. Habit.”

“Does it, though?”

“What?”

“Build us up? Do us any good.”

“No, probably not.”

“We need to say positive things.”

“It’s just talk, Eugene, don’t over think it.”

“Drunken sluts,” said Eugene. You know, it’s kind of okay if I own it, about myself, but you’ve got no excuses talking about girls that way.”

“It’s just talk.”

“Yeah, but, what about the dumb guys, the pissed guys, the ones that are, what are they called, incels?”

Jack rolled his eyes and bit his bottom lip, something he always does when he’s unsure of what to say.

“There must be lots of other talk you could be engaging in.”

“I guess.”

“Talk that is positive for both guys and girls.”

“I guess.”

“I know.”

They stopped and did jumps and squats on the grassland.

“I can see your dick bouncing up and down in your shorts,” said Eugene.

“That’s good, maybe some chick will like it too.”

Jack emphasised his cock bouncing in his shorts by swinging his hips as he did star jumps.

“You are just a fucken tease,” said Eugene.

“I just need the right girl to think so.” Jack flashed his killer smile.

Rick

He had nice hair,

but his eyes, 

nose and mouth, 

displeased him,

so, he had new ones,

sutured in,

after a night out

on the gin.

He is rather partial to his new pout

When he can, he likes to take them all out

Of course, the healing was gross

He hated that the most

But now he likes gazing in the mirror at his mouth.

"What Have You Been Doing, Cunt?"

"What have you been doing, cunt?"

Kane knew better than to answer that. “Hey Agro, whatch you been doin?”

Agro stepped in front of me, as I tried to walk away, blocking my way, not that that was hard, Agro being the size of a brick shit house, and me, shrug, the size of a mouse. That is what they say, Kane Mouse. That is what they call me. It’s the quiet ones you gotta fucken watch out for, I tell them to their faces. Then I shag their sisters.

“Do you know anything about what happened to Kipper?” said Agro, kind of all secret, like he didn’t want anybody to hear him asking.

Kane knew better than to answer that, too. I knew a little, I’d heard whispers, I will ferret out the truth pretty soon, but nothing, at this stage, I would bet any of my credibility on. “Some thing happen to Kipper?”

“Fuck off!” he pulled a pleading face. “Man?“

“Did something happen to Kipper,” I said. “You’re telling the fucken story.”

Agro suddenly got me in a headlock. We scuffled a bit. “You better not be bullshitting me,” said Agro. “I wanna know what happened to my boy.” He rubbed my hair aggressively up and down with his hand. He let me go.

I reeled around to keep my balance. “No use coming down on me." I straighten up, regain my balance. "I’m not your crew.” Come to think about it, it was rare to ever see Agro without his boys. There was very rarely ever a, shall we say, personal visit, as there was today. Kipper is his right hand man, sure, I understand that, but on his own? What did Agro suspect? Fear? A rat in his ranks?

I exhaled. My head stops spinning. “Where are your boys?”

I hear that Kipper was in very dodgy company, in a very dodgy part of town, and he got shanked in a robbery gone wrong. Getting into his Mercedes parked down some narrow back alleyway, in the fashionable inner suburbs, where parking is a nightmare and often has to be done in the shadows in which you wouldn’t normally find yourself. That is what the smart operators are saying. But, it is still only third hand at best, forth hand probably.

I shrugged like I knew nothing. Fuck it, I thought. “What are you doing here, anyway? On this side of town?”

“It’s a free world, maaaaate, just don’t you forget that.” He lent in closer, “Well it was, where I come from, last time I checked.”

“Yeah, well, keep off my back,” I said. “You’ve got Cone and Crack to do your dirty work. I can’t see them lurking in the shadows… anywhere close at hand.”

“You don’t worry where my Cone and Crack are, do you know anything about Kipper, or not?”

“Nothing.”

He poked me with his hard, pointy finger, his lips twitched, he pulled his quavering jaw in tight with his neck muscles. “You keep off my sister.”

“She’d woop your arse if you ever said that to her, so why say it to me?”

“She’s my sister, man, I can’t look at you when I know you are…”

“Tell her, not me,” I said. “I’m the free agent here. I don’t have a gorilla brother I have to answer to, you know what I mean."

“Don’t lead her on,” said Agro. “If I catch you making them fucken gooey eyes at her, I swear, I swear, I will smash your pretty face in." Agro's voice gets really high like he is really excited. "Do we understand each other?”

I seem to remember something quiet different with Rosie.

We were pashing up the walkway of a house party in the suburbs, the parents were at their beach house. We’d all just finished school, it was our year twelve end of year party. People were drinking beer out of long necks. All the globes in the house had been changed to coloured. There were lava lamps, incense, loud music. People were everywhere, back yard, packing the house, spilling out into the front yard, it was hard to find a private place.

I asked her what Agro was going to say, about me and her, hooking up.

“Are you bi?”

“No! Why?”

“If you want to sleep with my brother, honey, why didn’t you just ask him home.”

“What are you taking about?”

“Stop talking about him," she said. "if he gives you any trouble, I'll sort him out."

Then I asked her why she didn’t go for the over-sterioded crew that Agro was head of.

“I like greyhounds like you baby.” She grabbed my nuts. “Little jockeys, big whips.”

“Hey!” She had the grip of a truck driver.

“Less talk,” she said.



2am. Boozy loud pub, last drinks everyone out.

“Rosie, where have you been?” I was pretty sure it was Rosie. It looked like Rosie. Jesus what had I had to drink?

“Where you been Kano?” said Rosie.

“Looking for you, baby.” She smelt like Roses. “Have you been keeping away from me?”

In the back of the taxi, Rosie looked like the most gorgeous thing, and I was going to get my reward for living a good and wholesome life. Rosie was good and wholesome.

“I’m glad we left, it was stuffy and hot in there.”

“It’s hot in here, baby,” said Rosie. She put her leg over mine.

Rosie’s fake nails pushed into the palm of my hand but I didn’t want to let her go.

There was one point, where my cock was deep inside her pussy, “Yeah BABY!” doggy style from the rear, where she’d pushed back, “AAaaa a a a…AA!” and I’d thrust, “ErrrrrrrrrRRR RA RA RA RA RA!” And we’d stopped momentarily to suck breath deep from within both our fucken souls, I lay back, just slightly, and I looked down and I thought of Agro. Got his face in my head. Don’t tell me what I can and can’t fucken do! I felt smug. I felt smug ‘cause me and Rosie are tight, we always been tight, since prep school. So this was just us, being us. And it would get up Agro’s nose, anyway. Win, win. It was a victory, my powerbase was small. So, yeah, I felt smug… “AAAAAAAAAA! Gasp for breath. Jesus! FU…CKEN JE…SUS! AAAAAA!!!!!!”

“YEAH!"… she slammed her open palm down on the mattress. "BABY!”


8pm Sunday night.

Kane had felt much, much better. I was feeling so shit, I was willing to give anything a go, so when one of the boys said, “Cone,” I sat right up like I was resurrected, and I sucked on that bong with the skill of a pro, all down in one inhale, until the cone went pop and was empty.

I spat the ashes out onto the floor.

I was mistaken to think that I couldn’t feel any worse. At least, before the joint, I was fucken stationary. The room spun, as I rode the fast track to chunderland. Close your eyes. OPEN your eyes! NO, NO, close your eyes. NO, open them. OPEN. CLOSED.

“Ohhhhhhhhhhhhh.” I felt the bile come up into my mouth. The room was still spinning. After it had passed, I felt weak and powerless to stop myself from flying off of the planet altogether, I was drenched in sweat and shivering. I was slippery. I was foetal, just naturally, trying to hang on.

And then I dreamt.

Well, I thought I dreamt, when I woke up, I shook my head and thought, I gotta get off this shit! Man, I GOTTA get off this shit! That was until I spoke to the boys, Monday morning.

Someone boof-faced apparition in my vision, in my dreams as though it was all filmed through a cat-eye lens. I thought I had gone bi, but I wasn’t telling any cunt that. At least that was what I thought I saw, think I saw. Huge. Technicolor. Great big faces. I might have pashed. Oh? Wince. Maybe, there was a rollercoaster? There was a crashing helicopter. There might have been a gorilla. What the fuck!

Apparently, I found out after that… that mad cunt, Agro, had arrived and tried to wake me. He tried big time, apparently, shaking me the fuck about, slapping my face. Kane held his hands in the air as if to say, what’s that all about? Mum always said I slept like the dead. The boys stopped him… eventually. Someone had told him that I’d said something about someone who said something about Kipper. I don’t fucken know.

How out of it was Kane? Somebody must have spiked Kane's drink. I drank a shitload, but that was just a weekend, nothing new. There was no way I could have got paralytic on what I drank. Six, or seven long necks and that was about it. Jesus! Nothing. A couple of shots. One Daniels.

It was the cone. Had to be.

Do You Have a Minute?

Jon Austin must be the most boring man ever born, born with the most boring moniker, just in case people couldn’t tell on first sight. It was kind of a give away, Jon Austin. He took up the most boring profession, law. Oh, his parents must have been so proud. He had a boring child late in life, the perfect Charlotte, who he brings into the office from time to time, who questions all of the staff one by one, as her father works at his stand up desk. Sports casual, Mr Suburbs, his ensembles shriek. Mr Beige a.k.a. Mr FlatLine. That's what I call him. The fact that he was born into the dizzy environs of Canberra, escaped no one. Do people, actually, admit to coming from Canberra? Seriously? To Melbournians? Really? There’d be derision, even if the judgment was subconscious, that’s just how Melbournian’s roll. Melbourne, or Sydney, they are the cool choices – oh yeah, sure, Adelaide is pretty, but no – no other city really measures up. It had not escaped me, certainly, I felt my blood pressure drop just by working next to him in the office (As long as he stayed off his phone) I’m sure it would have the same effect as patting a small cat. How it escaped anyone is a mystery. 

“Oh really, how lovely,” says benefactor, Dowager Baillieu. Baffled look on her face. She held out a drooping hand. Her other hand reaching for her pearls, at the same speed as his puckered lips glided downwards towards her non-gloved skin.

“Yes, my wife Jane and I… like the writer?” He stopped, seemingly mid sentence.

“I’m sorry?”

“Jane Austin, my wife.”

“Really?”

“Got a good deal on a small apartment near work.”

“Oh.”

Anyone's guess, really? There is just something, an inescapable something. How he made it to Melbourne is... who knows? He’s the Zebra who dared to wear red shoes, back where he came from. No doubt. Barton, or Page, or Dunk, all those terrible Canberra suburbs have terrible names like that. More chance of winning lotto than a Canberrian, is that what the collective noun for them, fitting in with Melbournians. 

“He’s one of the Canberra Austins?” asked the dowager, mystified. “Apparently, his wife writes.”

The man is the embodiment of pain relief. Some, mostly the twinset brigade, say a voice as smooth as honey. I'd say a monologue as relentless as a tsunami, but not nearly as interesting. Have A Chat, that's what they call him, Mr Have A Chat, sadly no body listens, as those who do soon glaze over as they look down at their watch. For Jon is Valium in human form. He even makes ditch water look like a Monet painting. Five minutes in a room with him and sloths are trying to slit their wrists.

He's not even a nice bloke. Some would say rude. The chip of the colonies. I'd say who cares, as long as I don't have to listen to him any longer. Thank the universe for office reshuffles, my life is saved. Mazz hated him, called him non existent. "You can see right through him, almost as if he wasn't there."

He’s just a shadow, he works in the shadows. He is that moment that your reflection tapped you on the shoulder and said, Now about that misdemeanour, you know the one. Talking to the local media about Empire’s work, you thought nobody would notice. Ring, ring. “You got a minute.”

“What’s this about?”

“Oh, nothing heavy.” Just talking outside your role and potentially jeopardising your funding, but we will get to that.

Oh when I heard those faithful words, unexpectedly, first thing one Monday morning. "Jon Austin here, is it a good time for a chat?" 

NNNNNNNOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Anybody else in the department getting that phone call, with those opening words, they’ve told the rest of us. Compared stories, misdemeanours. How were you supposed to run campaigns, if you had to get every small detail checked off by the man himself, every time you wanted to make a decision? It bought shivers. Always, whenever you had strayed outside of the brief. Sometimes you knew when you did it. Oh, is that going to bring a phone call. Shiver. You know you just said what wasn't meant to be said.

"Is now a good time?" Jon asked.

Any sane member of the team would be begging, I begged kill me now, as the words were still passing, meticulously timed, out of his mouth.

"Yes." Meek. In reaction already. Flight or fight. Defence, be small, the smallest target that anyone could possibly hit.

Why me? Who have I spoke to in the last few days? What media releases says? Who said what? Why did you have to send in Jon Austin? Internal Investigation. Faceless auditor. The shadow behind every decision you have ever made.

"I just want to have a civilised chat about what your side of the story is..."

"What story?" I was stupid enough to ask once.

"Christian, you were named in the news report as the source."

"My side of the story."

"Why don't we start there," coo'd Jon's voice, less like a trickle of honey and more like being suffocated by too much rose scented talc in the air.

"Now just so we understand what we are dealing with." He would list the crimes with which you were now charge in order of least importance, finishing with the big kahuna, the most criminally damaging allegations on his list of you digressions.

Once your side was done, put out there, offered up, then he was relentless, the chilled voice, like a velvet tsunami, never stopping, never relenting, never changing speed, on how it was going to be in the future.

“You know,” Jon laughed for the first time. “Just so we are on the same page.”

What is he? COO Brand of Empire Group. CEO of operations of Service Empire International. Frightening, he truly is. What is he? He is so whacked up on his own self importance, that just isn't any questions coming from him re authenticity. You don't deign to speak to him, unless he has business with you. He's a cold fish. He gives me the creeps just now thinking about him.

“I didn’t realise the implications.”

“That is why I am here,” Jon coo'd.

He's neat. Shoes that always matched his belt, no matter what he was wearing, it was almost psychopathic in its adherence. Of course, he only wore camel pants, or jeans, a short-sleeved shirt, more often than not checked, leather moccasins, or a pristine runner, the occasional wow factor suit and tie, but that only if he was going out for some forensic smoozhing.


Friday afternoon he’d finish at 3pm, as he has a kid, he’d leave the office on his way to pick up the insufferable Charlotte wearing her pink backpack. Or he worked from home, three day weekend, those days are free and liberating, just a small taste of how things could be.

Fran and I have been known to crack a bottle of red Friday afternoons, once Jon had departed the building. He never knew. It was one of the perks of not driving to work. Fifteen years ago, we’d have been outside having a fag, but Fran and I had long since given up the gaspers. We’d go into Fran’s corner office and close the door. One of the few, still with an office, thank god. Let the inmates have full reign. Only occasionally, you understand, not every, single Friday afternoon. I’m not exactly sure what he would have said about that?

I don’t think he is as important as he likes to think he is. Fran Di Dio does a good job, what is she, COO Empire People, and is way more respected than Jon Austin. He’s not one of us, he never has been. Fran's a no-nonsense kind of, hands on her hips and knuckle down and fix the problem through hard work, kind of gal. I think of her as the Katherine Hepburn of the NGO world. She never has a need of the existential, like our boy Jon. He's the master of it. I bet you he does cross words.

Fran brings her dog in to work, Tilly, the standard poodle. You can bring your dog in whenever you want. Bruno knows the routine and is at the front door waiting for me, the only time he wants to walk with me, I have to add. Fran always arrives at your desk in person, if there is a problem, if she wants to "have a word." She has no tag line, no not for her. “Christian, about the Men’s Program?” She wouldn’t refer you to some mythical spirit of the organisation, she’d just give you an answer. Done. Short and sweet. Problem fixed. Tilly would often lick you, in Fran’s wake, when it was all done. Fran wouldn’t suck your ear down a phone for 3/4s of an hour on the philosophies of the organisation and where we’d like us all to be heading, together.

Fran’s alive and real and earthy. Fran photosynthesises.

Jon is a hologram, a perfect corporate image. Jon sucks oxygen.

Tilly and Bruno lay together in the after noon sun, in front of the floor length windows on the north side of the floor. Cindy, Jon’s Schipperke, cowers and growls from under Jon’s desk, when Tilly and Bruno go and sniff around her, whenever Jon isn’t around.

“Life imitating art,’ I said to Fran. It didn’t quite come out right. “You know what I mean?”

“They say it is all in the upbringing,” said Fran. She pointed to Cindy with her chin. “The first 6 weeks are crucial.” She laughed.

“They really should just beat her up one day,” I sneered, slowly, as I watched Tilly and Bruno sniff at the snarling Cindy, questioningly. Tilly, long nose down. Bruno, sniffing up close from behind.

“Oh Christian.” I felt a hand grab my arm. Fran was trying very hard not to laugh, but she couldn’t stop herself. She walked off chuckling, shaking her head.

“Do you have a minute,” she said, seemingly into the ether as she walked away.

Men in Suits

You know those young men, late 20 something, early 30 something, who are a part of the corporate world, who've well and truly lost their puppy fat, and have hit the handsome 30’s. They have grown into their style, smart and relaxed, and they have it all together. Handsome dark-blonde boys with short hair and blue eyes. Handsome dark-haired boys with green eyes and cheeky smiles. Striding some place in this world.

You know the ones who wear those suits that are snug fitting, that hug their bodies that don't have a gram of excess material in them. Those trousers that fit tightly around their, well exercised, arses. All those squats. Their, seemingly always, nicely padded out crotches. The ones who have those jackets that are cut just above the curve of their butts, that just finish above their… the tops of their legs, just enough to show their delights, their hours of training, their dedication and effort.

(It would be appropriate to woof whistle at this juncture, if you so choose)

I love those guys, they are my favourite suit wearers. Those suits make them look muscular and lean, all at the same time. I can see a singlet and jocks, not far from the surface. I imagine the jocks they have on. The contours their bulges and bumps form in the hidden cotton layer below the fine wool. The dark trail of hair that rises up out from under the thick elastic, embossed with large print, that rises in a line up their flat stomachs to their chests. Those perfectly shaped buns with a thick line of hair up the crack, maybe spreading in a fine downy covering across their arse cheeks. The blond ones. Those blond boy's hairy arses are hot, I reckon, all downy with fine hair.

I love it when they stretch at the lights to reach for the traffic crossing button, when their shirt untucks for the first time in the day, and suddenly there is bare flesh and white cotton undies, with a tick red elastic waist, and just the hint of a furry bum crack, snatched in a glimpse. Sometime they notice me looking. They don’t care, for the most part, they just smile. Dark-haired guys with olive skin. Italian and Greek men, hairy underneath that neat cotton dress. Blonde-haired guys, blue eyes, smooth as a babies bottom, no hair at all, down there, just their hard skin and their muscles to turn you on. It’s a modern world, streamline, smooth.

The Wog boys, the uncircumcised boys have to keep touching theirs, pulling at them, tugging them about. I never really understand why they have to tug so often, but then I wouldn’t. Bruno and Mario. Boyish-faced Alexi. You should have seen the massive bulge he had, whenever he lazily stretched his legs out in a meeting room seminar. He was always tugging at his too.

Uncircumcised Y Gen. I can't help but think about it sometime. You know, when they have a smiley face and a sweet manor. Ian Carter. The nice guy accountant, Tim. Tony, in his black bonds t-shirt. The big strapping blond dude in the café. Jason, the exc. He wore the pink top hat to our Xmas party and couldn’t have looked more adorable. I was surprised when somebody said he had a wife and kids. James in IT is smoking. Ron in IT is sexy. Ron and Alexi drunk and shirtless at the end of the Xmas party, that year, I wanked about that for weeks. If straight boys give bro jobs, then I reckon Ron would have got a gob full of Alexi, and Alexi would have got a gob full of Ron, by the morning, the way they were looking at each other when I left. That I would like to have watched. But I digress. I’ve thought about all of you.

We usually think about it, being gay men. Sorry straight guys, but for the most part, most of us have lied to you, you know, just to spare your feelings. We’ve thought about you. For the pretty, sexy, rugged, handsome, gosmackingly beautiful guys, we have ever set eyes on, we’ve imagined you in one of our wank fantasies. Don’t kid yourself

Y Gen are now running the world, and they are looking pretty good doing it to, I have to say.

Life Sentence

"Thank you Mrs Horton, can you tell Belinda I came to see her."

"Yes, yes, I'll tell her," said Mrs Horton. "I don't know what time Belinda will be home." She closed the door. She shuffled back to the sitting room, her fur-lined slippers felt sloppy on her feet, making shuffling easier than striding. Her towelling dressing gown was tied too tight around her waist. The television was set to the ABC. The peanuts in the bowl next to the one armchair were half eaten, broken shells litered the table top. She sat down making a noise as though she was exhausted. She grabbed a handful of peanuts.

"Muuuuuum," came the plaintiff call from beyond the room.

"Yes, honey?"

"Who was that?"

"Rachel."

"Rachel J?"

"Yes, honey."

"So where is she?"

"She's gone... honey."

"Why didn't she come in?"

"If you want her to visit, you know what you have to do, darling."

"Oh... mum!" came the angry voice.

"We've been through this, honey."

"I wanted to see Rachel."

"You know what you have to do."

"I can't, I just can't."

"Then you don't get to see Rachel."

"I'm not hungry."

"That is not the point."

"So, what is the point?" screamed Belinda. "What is the lousy point?"

Mrs Horton took a big breath. She kind of sighed on the exhale. She said very quietly. "Belinda, we have been over this many times."

"Muuuuuuuuuuuuummmmmmm."



Mrs Horton picked up her cigarettes and headed out into the garden to smoke quietly, it was the only thing she knew to do when Belinda got like this. Her only vice, the only one left, she would say, in polite company, and then she would laugh.

Got like what, Belinda would snap back if Mrs Horton ever approached the subject. "GOT LIKE WHAT!" she'd scream.

Got like what, repeated in Mrs Horton's ears as her hands shakily opened the packet and took out a cigarette. Got like what? She lit a cigarette. Got like... her nerves began to subside as she felt the calming effects of the warm smoke in her lungs, as she felt the fresh air blow on her face. Suddenly, not so claustrophobic. Even if it were momentarily, it was worth snatching.

She will never be the same again, the doctors words sounded in Mrs Horton’s ears. She's not coming back from this unscathed.

Secretly, Mrs Horton wished Belinda had, well, um… something she'd never say out loud, something that made her admonish herself if ever she thought it. Something she would deny, if anyone was ever to repeated it, not that there was any chance of that.

How easy life could have... no, she won't let herself think such thoughts. Belinda was sick and she needed her help.



She paced the garden. The grass was green, soft under her feet. The garden was lovely. Oh the Tiger Lilies were blooming. The Dahlias are beautiful her favourite pink.

She inhaled deeply. She held it until her lungs burned. She exhaled again. She coughed. She dragged on the orange filter again. Music started to play in her head. A waltz, from the country dances her boyfriend, who was to become her husband, took her to.

"Muuuuuuuuuuuum!" came the cry from inside the house.

The music stopped, like an old fashioned stylus skipping across a vinyl record. She took a few steps and slipped behind the large Camellia bush and out of sight of the house.

"Muuuuuuuuuuum!"

She didn't move behind the flower covered bush.



Belinda appeared at the door in her jogging clothes.

Mrs Horton dropped her cigarette to the ground, squashed it with her pump, and stepped out from under the under growth. "Oh no darling, not that."

"I'm going for a run."

"You know what the doctor said."

Belinda waved her away.

"Darling, please don't." Mrs Horton stepped through the garden towards the emaciated figure. "It's not a good idea."

All she could do, was watch her leave.



The house was quiet. She felt the stillness. How it used to be. She stopped and drank it in.

Scattering Your Bones in the Wind

“You’re vile,” I said.

“You are vile.”

“You’re vile,” I said.

“You are vile.”

“You stole my husband,” I said

“You stole my wife.”

“You stole my happiness.”

“You stole my life.”

“I hate you so much.”

“I hate you more.”

“It is eating me up, what you did.”

“Well, at least there is some good news coming out of this.”

“On which to dwell.”

“On which to dwell.” He spat the 'd', I wasn’t sure that was possible.

“You are vile!” I said.

“Absolutely hideous!” he said.

“Stay out of the rain or you will melt, today.”

“I am dead!” he said.

“You're still talking?”

“I can talk in death,” he held his hands out as if in a question. “2000 years of Christian dogma gave us that.”

“Good to hear,” I said. “Was it a painful death? I do hope it was painful!”

“The most painful death imaginable!”

“Lovely. That cheers me up no end,” I said. “Did you scream? Did nobody come to help you? Were you ignored and alone as you took your last breath?”

“Yes... with the lambs,” he said. “And there was no one, darling... No one ....”

“Just the silence into which you screamed for mercy... and the bleating of the lambs.”

“Yes,” he said. “That's all there was in the end, the bleating of the lambs.”

“It paints a lovely picture...”

“Dark green, echoing across the deserted, wide, flat land.”

“Midnight green,” I said. “With the moon reflecting on your misery.”

“The foxes would come in no time, sniffing at the cold, stiff corpse, chewing out the neck.

“And the birds?” I asked.

“Yes, the birds would come with sunrise, pulling at the larynx, supper on the oesophagus, pecking at the spine that would soon be exposed.”

"Pecking out the eyes,” I said.

“Like oysters.”

“Picking at the bones in the midday sun,” I said.

“Wah, wah! Wah, wah! Wah, wah!” He waved his arms as if they were wings as he squawked. Squatting on his haunches and for a moment, I thought he may have taken off, like the birds, entrails hanging from their beaks.

“Until you leached back into the soil,” I said. “Dissolving bit, by bit, by bit, until becoming just a stain on the grass.”

“A human stain.”

“A human stain,” I said.

“Bits of skin and fragments of bone.”

“Scattering in the wind.”

“Scattering my bones in the wind,” he said. “Scattering my bones in the wind.”

“Until there was nothing left.

“Just fragments, broken fragments.”

“And your vile life was over,” I said.

“All but the scratching, all but the scratching.”

“Under the light of the moon.”

“The silvery light of the full moon.”

“And the bleating of the lambs,” I said.

“Those god damn lambs.”