That Old Black Magic

The following is a true story, to the best of my 31-year memory of it. It is a good story, though not especially erotic, nor designed to be lurid. Rather, it is something I feel compelled to share with readers. Your comments/votes/personal contact are very welcome.

THAT OLD BLACK MAGIC

OR

Not Just Another Case of Finally Talking Her Into It After Weeks of Heavy Petting

Graduation was 28 days away for Parkway High’s all-white, sub-suburban class of 1973. Contemplation of that occasion brought great happiness to members of that class. Yet, for four close friends, there remained a palpable awareness of an unfulfilled goal – a poorly suppressed desire that haunted and marred the joy of their upcoming liberation.

These four friends – Rick, Mark, Schultzy, and yours truly – had agreed that to sally forth and face college as men, Boyhood must be quickly and unmercifully locked away in the closet of their collective past. Furthermore, it was quite clear how this was to be done.

Ask a random sample of high-school males how Manhood is established, and their responses will vary along socioeconomic and geographic lines. Fighting ... drinking ... competing in sports ... owning a car ... holding a job ... rejecting authority – these and other means are the time-trampled paths, imagined and real, that bring boys to the Holy Grail of Virility.

Nonetheless, within his anguished soul, every teen-aged boy knows that no matter what previous bids have been cast, he doesn’t buy into Manhood without first losing his virginity. It is an absolute truth; a truth we could not, and did not, avoid.

**********

We were spending a rush weekend with the brothers of Zeta Beta Tau at the University of Missouri in Columbia (known locally and hereafter as Missou). Most of the attending high-school seniors – Rick, Mark, and Schultzy included – intended pledging the house after fall matriculation. Moi? I was along for the ride, my commitment already made to Northwestern University.

And where did we believe that long ride halfway across the state would take us? To the usual modes of organized debauchery, certainly. But beyond the anticipated agenda of fraternal shenanigans, we harkened to the genuinely thrilling rumor of a very special Rush treat.

Word had it that the SAM house, notorious for its depravity, had booked a couple of Kansas City whores to dance for the boys. Our wallets held crisp, fresh-from-the-bank bills in high, but nebulous, hopes that the whores would do more than dance.

**********

About 9:00 pm, we gathered in ZBT’s rec room to drink, talk, solidify old friendships, and spark new ones. The majority of us came from St. Louis or Kansas City, with a handful of revelers from smaller Missouri towns or from out of state. Many of the weekend guests were acquaintances or relatives of the ZBTs and had arrived at the house earlier that warm, drizzly Friday evening. A couple of kegs and a small cluster of “little sisters” kept spirits buoyed.

The conversations around me ran a predictable course. Our hosts were checking us over, while some of us were checking them out. And all of us were scoping the little sisters.

-- “We have the highest grade-point average of any frat house here.”

-- “What are you thinking of majoring in?”

-- “A fraternity is like having a family away from home, but you’ve got your independence.”

-- “More beer?”

Neil (“The Creeper”) Goldfarb cornered me over by the makeshift bar. Neil was the house dork, his moniker fittingly applied in evidence of a pathetic pattern of creeping, unwelcomed, into the private space of his colleagues. If not for the exceptionally tasteful escort Neil had somehow acquired, I indubitably would have heeded the urgent twin calls from brain and bladder to depart.

“Hi, my name is Neil Goldfarb.” I shook his damp hand. Then she introduced herself.

“I’m Cindy.” I introduced myself with all the flair and importance of Gulliver among the Brobdingnagians. I riveted Cindy’s cerulean eyes, and struck straight for her heart. Too late. I lost it, as well as the rest of her, to a tall, dark-haired fellow standing just an “excuse-me-a-minute” away from us.

I strangled a dead-end dialogue with Neil by unearthing the loosely interred rumor of the SAM-house entertainment. “Say, Neil, did you hear anything about some whores over at the SAM house tonight?”

“Yeah,” he responded, “if you’re interested in that sort of thing, go over about 10. The SAM-ies usually deliver.”

Interested? Hell, this was the best news of the day -- maybe of my life. But I had to be cool. “Tenish, huh? At the SAM house. OK, I might check it out. Thanks.” And I sauntered away to confirm the rumor for my pals.

As expected, each took the news in his own self-reflecting way. Rick spoke first. We held him in high esteem because he actually had a girlfriend, rotund though she was, whom he had seriously groped, on numerous occasions, in the rathskeller of his home. “I’ll believe it when I see it.” Always the cynic. Yet I caught the gleam of excitement in his eyes.

Mark reported hearing that the whores would not only do a show but turn tricks, too! He insisted we were soon to set eyes on “naked dancing girls.” That was Mark, typically audacious, refreshingly optimistic.

“What time should we go over?” asked the timid third musketeer. Schultzy wouldn’t miss the dancing, but queasy doubts rattled me over his dedication to the coital possibilities being raised. I knew Schultzy better than the others, and if it were to come down to fornication, I just wasn’t sure he was ready.

**********

Two bare mattresses lay side by side on a long Formica table. To each side of the table stood two photographic lamps. It was a little after midnight, and the drizzle had become a steady rain. There had been a false call to the SAM house earlier, only to be told that the whores were on their way and to expect a delay.

Now, on our second visit to the house, about 50 intoxicated people crowded onto the soggy carpet in the SAM’s wood-paneled den. The bright beams of the lamps directed our attention to the "stage” up front, while, from somewhere close by, a stereo pumped out a healthy helping of rock ‘n’ roll.

It was every gaper for himself. I started way in the back, fought to stage right, then decided a left-flank position provided the best view. But of what? Certainly not any naked dancing girls. The few women I spied were, I assumed, girlfriends of some of the men in the predominantly male audience. A scattering of gray-haired and bald heads led me to believe that a few father-son teams were present.

The show began with little fanfare. A gush of music, some adjusting of the lights, and on the mattresses before us stood two black women in their early 30s. Neither was a beauty, but then this weren’t no beauty contest. The crowd offered an appreciative cacophony of whistles and cheers. With the ice broken, the women commenced dancing.

Both wore thin panties and sheer nightie-like tops. Fuzzy slippers would have completed the picture had the girls been kicking around their own cribs and not strutting nature’s bounty for dozens of libido-crazed white boys.

The one Rick and I later dubbed “Sylvia” had impressive mammaries and long processed hair. I liked her. Her partner, “Lyvesta,” needed orthodontia and promised lesser rewards to a breast man. Still, she had her following among the throng.

An argument developed over the lamps being used to highlight the action. “Too bright!” complained the performers. “Turn them off.” And off they went.

Then, annoyed spectators cried in unison, “Turn them on! Turn them on!” On…off…on…off. At first the dancers protested the excessive illumination by refusing to gyrate, but, ultimately, the lights were left on. There was no questioning the loyalty of the men operating the lamps.

Now, you will think I am making up this next part, but I swear it is as real and true as the Los Angeles smog. Some of the frat lads had consumed copious amounts of ethyl alcohol, as well as various pharmaceuticals on hand. Stripped to their Fruit-of-the-Looms and JVCs, one…two…three…then four of the assembly persuaded themselves – and the dancing girls – that it was time for audience participation.

Well, I had been to the Olympic XXX Drive-In Theater. I had run trembling hands over 17-year-old Linda Levine’s C-cups. Randy Osomo had allowed me countless hours of access to his father’s Playboy collection in the basement of his house. But the situation then and there rocketed light years ahead of anything my fledgling imagination could produce.

To the surprise, amusement, then raucous approval of the crowd, we were treated to a live sex show. This is to say fellatio, cunnilingus, and even down-and-dirty, might-be-fucking grinding, on stage, in full view of friends and numerous strangers. It took major cojones – as well as a peculiar brand of insanity – for those dudes to be up there. We respected this, and that closing act of the show set the mood for what we felt we had to do.

The group on stage melted away, and with them went the core of curious onlookers who had squeezed themselves into the SAM den. Word was passed that the whores would be tricking upstairs for $15 a throw. Schultzy found me. We waited for Mark and Rick. “You guys ready?” asked Mark, implying that our minds and bodies were as committed as his.

“I’ll take some of that brown sugar,” declared Rick. Schultzy was silent. I knew he was out.

“I’m in,” I said.

**********

On the second floor, we joined a line of five or six, jovial, beer-drinking boys standing outside of a closed door. The humor seemed forced. (Perhaps waiting to fuck a black hooker is not the funniest thing in the world.) Every few minutes, Sylvia or Lyvesta would open the door, beckon to the buyer next in line, and return inside to transact business. Mark, Rick, and I didn’t have much to say to one another. We each meditated on the personal significance of what was about to transpire. Our eyes stayed glued to the opening and shutting of the door.

Big-titted Sylvia drew Mark inside. I had to piss. Reminding those around me – now about 20 eager lads – of my place in line, I ducked into a bathroom down the hall.

Rick was entering the room as I returned, 60 seconds later. “Come on. You’re next.” Sylvia’s gentle hand took mine, and I stepped into the room. Mark was pulling on his pants. A minute to a minute and a half – that’s how long it had taken him. I vowed to get my money’s worth.

Rick was negotiating. “All I have is a twenty,” he said.

“Thass okay, Sugar,” replied Lyvesta. “Ahm gwan ta gif you fife dollas eggstra.”

“Yeah, well, I still want my five dollars change.”

I don't know whether or not he got it, but when I next looked over in his direction, Rick was furiously plowing his “date.” Sylvia took a moment to clean herself with a wad of toilet paper, while I slipped out of my clothes. She still had on the same flimsy negligee, but the gossamer panties were absent. I paid. She played (with me). We adopted the missionary position, and she fed me in.

There are few, if any, pleasures in life equal to the first time a boy enters the warm wet confines of a real live human vagina, and I almost lost it right then. But I acclimated myself, and began to thoroughly enjoy my first big love scene. It wasn’t difficult. She was soft and perfumed and, despite the seediness of the setting, quite appealing to me.

Her teeth were so white against her charcoal skin. Should I kiss her? Do you kiss a whore? No, this wasn’t the time or place for that, I realized. Five minutes later it was all over. I grabbed a bonus, a quick feel of those pendulous, inviting breasts – an opportunity I had ignored earlier. I dressed. And Rick and I met Mark and Schultzy outside.

**********

Back at the ZBT house we continued several rounds of hand- and back-slapping. “What was it like?” asked Alan, my obnoxious and obviously envious neighbor from back in St. Louis.

“Just like any other beaver,” I coolly replied.

Monday at school the grapevine shook, and in a couple of hours everyone heard what had gone down at Missou’s SAM house. Later that day, my brother stopped me by my locker, a distinct look of embarrassment on his face. “Do you know how many people have asked me if it’s true you paid to fuck a nigger?”

I pondered the depth of that question for several seconds, then smiled. “No. How many?”

**********

The End … and the beginning