It was the early nineteen seventies in England, and I was working my first corporate job after university. I liked the job, and I liked my boss, and I was beginning to find my way around gay life in Manchester, my new home. However, I missed my friends from the college town in the south of England and regretted that I couldn't easily travel to the East End of London on weekends to see my best friend, Chris.
Chris and I had been pals for a couple of years; partly because we were the same age, with the same interests in sports and entertainment, and a similar sense of humour, but mainly because we complemented each other sexually. I didn't hear the word until years later, but "twink" would have been a good description for us both in those days, since we were young, tall, skinny, dark-haired white boys in our early twenties. We looked so alike that people mistook us for brothers, but there was one major difference between us, however. In "real life" he was a gentle sweetheart devoted to his Mum, but in the bedroom, he became a stern, dominating top; an ideal partner for this bottom boy who liked to suck cock and get fucked up the arse, preferably while in bondage.
I'd only made it down for one weekend with him in the six months since moving to Manchester, so I was delighted when my boss told me he wanted me to replace him at a sales conference in London. Since the meeting would be on a Thursday I asked for the following Friday off and arranged to stay with Chris for the rest of that weekend.
The sales conference was dreary, in the way such corporate affairs usually are, and wasn't improved by being held in the same kind of anonymous, beige meeting room found in every hotel in every city in the world. As this was my first time, I concentrated hard on the presentations and took lots of notes for my boss, hoping he'd be impressed enough to send me again. However, while I was being "Mr. Keen" I'd been stuck at a table with my boss' opposite number, an older man called Howard, from the company office in Birmingham. After telling me that he'd been to hundreds of sales meetings just like this, he spent the rest of the day looking bored while doodling pictures of naked women.
I wasn't impressed, but since he was way up there in the company, I figured I should make a good impression. I spent the day running for his tea at the breaks, laughing at his bad jokes and pretending to be impressed by his stories of successful girl-chasing. The latter were particularly hard to believe, given his objectionable personality and nondescript physique. He was a pudgy, middle- aged guy with a big belly hanging over his belt, a ridiculous comb-over that only served to exaggerate his lack of hair and a face that only a mother could love. He was such an asshole that it occurred to me that the only reason I was there was because my boss couldn't stand another meeting with him. I gritted my teeth and consoled myself by thinking about the evening ahead at the premier boxing venue in London, the National Sporting Club, courtesy of a corporate ticket.
I'd been looking forward to the evening from the moment my boss had told me about it. The fights, featuring leading international boxers, were held in a large ballroom with an all-male audience sitting at tables surrounding the ring; a posh affair, with everyone from the waiters on up dressed in dinner jackets or tuxedos. Most guys rented theirs, but luckily for me, my dad had recently passed down his evening wear to me. I was as skinny as he'd been when he'd bought it, so the suit fitted me like a glove.
It's almost impossible not to look good in formal wear, and since Dad had bought himself a topnotch suit, I felt like a million bucks while waiting in our hotel lobby for Howard and two guys from the Cardiff office that were joining us. When I saw them walk out of the lift, I felt even better. I was twenty years younger than any of them and a head taller, slim rather than paunchy, had all my hair and was wearing a suit that flattered me, rather than badly fitting rental tuxedos.
Once we were sitting at our table at the Club, I gazed around in amazement at the crowd, most of whom were either puffing on cigars or gulping down expense-account tumblers of Johnny Walker. My companions behaved as badly as everyone around us, puffing away on the cigars, downing whiskey like water, being rude to the waiters, laughing at awful "fag" and "Paki" jokes and telling stories about pussies, tits, and cunts. I tried to tune them out and concentrate on what I'd been looking forward to this evening ever since I'd heard about it; the men in the ring.
The fights worked their way up the weight chart, starting out with the smaller men and getting bigger and heavier, making me more and more excited. I stared hungrily at the boxers, loving how their sweaty, muscled bodies glinted under the hot lights, and was so concentrated on them that I didn't notice my glass being continually refilled alongside those of my obnoxious table mates.
Watching sexy young men, wearing just shorts and boots got me excited, but also reminded me how much more I'd have enjoyed the evening if it had been spent with my friend Christ, rather than this stupid, bigoted threesome. Then, as if I wasn't already aroused enough, the last but-one bout was announced and I saw a vision from heaven climb into the ring; a six-foot tall light heavyweight boxer from Nigeria, whose two hundred pounds of defined muscle and gorgeous face seemed to have been chiselled out of black marble. I'd been mentally drooling over the men before him, but the sight of this beautiful demi-god warming up gave me an instant hard-on.
Right from the start, it was obvious that his unfortunate opponent was badly overmatched. The object of my desire hardly broke a sweat as he toyed with the poor guy in the first round, knocked him down for a mandatory count near the end of the second then finished him off at the start of the third. With the fight being over so quickly, there was a longer than usual wait for the start of the next bout, and while listening to my table mates' "expert analysis" of the fight, I began to feel light-headed and a little dizzy. I realised I'd ended up swallowing far more Scotch than I was used to. Telling myself to be more careful, I sat back for the final bout of the night, between two big heavyweights, which sadly turned out to be even more one sided than the earlier bout. The matchmakers were having a bad night, since it resulted in a knockout in the very first round, ending the evening far earlier than advertised.
I was far more drunk than was good for me, and with our hotel being a mere fifteen-minute walk away, I told the guys I was off to bed. That didn't go down well with the others and Howard called me a party-pooping pussy, amongst other charming insults. As he said this very loudly while we stood with the rest of the audience streaming past us, I was embarrassed enough to agree to go for "a nightcap" at a club he knew of "just around the corner."
A few minutes later the four of us stumbled drunkenly into a sleazy strip bar, complete with bored looking girls and humdrum looking punters. Since he'd dragged us there, Howard bought a round of ridiculously priced drinks and we sat down to watch a dreary floor show. This was my first-ever visit to a strip club, but with no interest in watching the girls, I soon got bored and started to look around the room. I caught sight of a bunch of younger guys at a table across the room, laughing and joking and making eyes at the strippers. Since a couple of them were serious hunks, I spent the next few minutes gazing longingly at them rather than the floor show.
Eventually one of them caught me staring at him, which made me look away and lock eyes with the barman instead, a young, dark and sexy looking man, who I could have sworn was cruising me back. Figuring I'd got too aroused by the boxers and the cute boys in the corner I turned to look at one of the strippers, hoping to calm myself down. Naturally, she took that as an invitation to walk over and start a conversation. She was good looking and pleasant, and most straight guys would have found her very attractive. But aware that her job was to sell the club's overpriced boozed booze, I didn't respond to her charms and eventually she gave up with me and decided to try her luck with my companions instead.
Two minutes later she was sitting on the lap of one of the Cardiff blokes and a waiter had delivered a bottle of cheap champagne to the table. As I breathed a silent sigh of relief, Howard leant over to whisper in my ear.
