He's coming tonight. I don't know how I know, but he is. I woke up trembling this evening. I've been in such a state, pacing through the abandoned corridors and empty cavernous rooms, turning on all the lights because I was frightened (the place is haunted, I'm sure of it), and then I turned them all off again because he prefers the darkness. Now I'm sitting at my desk writing it all down. That's why he gave me a desk, right? And paper, and a pen. There is precious little else in this manor, except for the books in the library, and I can't focus on what I'm reading when I'm like this. My stomach is twisted in knots, and it feels like I swallowed an ice cube. If I write it all down, maybe it'll make sense. Maybe I can resolve this cold fear and gnawing anticipation.
When I first met him, I was at the end of my rope, and that rope was fraying and coming undone. Maybe I should borrow another metaphor. I was poised for a fall, and all I needed was a precipice. I was down on 13th Street. During the day, it's full of business suits and briefcases. At night, it's where youths with bad attitudes and nothing better to do hang out, lurking in the silent shadows of banks and office buildings. If you're homeless and not too picky about who you wake up next to, you can make a decent living down there. Plenty of rich men with hang-ups about fucking other guys come down there to pick up any young thing willing to go back to their hotel room and keep his mouth shut about it the next day.
That's where I was when I met him, shivering on a street corner watching every car that cruised past like a dog hoping someone will throw a scrap. I was eighteen. I might be nineteen now, I don't know. I've lost track of time. Sometimes it's like I've only been here a few weeks, other times there is nothing I wouldn't do for a glimpse in a mirror to see if I've gone grey and wrinkled yet. There aren't any mirrors here. No televisions or radios. No computers or phones. There is an electric lamp on my desk, a chair, and my bed. That's it, unless you count the library. There are books there. So many books! And then there's the fireplace and the fur rug, the leather couches. There's also a sidebar, but he keeps it locked. Heaven forbid I have a drink or two without him. Someone brings me food. I never see him, but I can hear his footsteps echoing through the halls at night. I swear this place is haunted.
So I was standing there on the street corner thinking about how cold I was and how my life was falling apart. Kicked out of the house, dropped out of school, down to thirty-seven cents and my last cigarette. I was smoking it, shivering as my frosted breath mingled with the smoke I exhaled. I really wanted to be picked up before Henry came by. He owned one of the offices on the street, and he was such a bore. Who wants to hear about someone's marital problems when you're sucking him off for twenty bucks? Maybe he thought it was cheap therapy, but I was starting to sympathize with his wife. I wasn't in the mood for Henry. Anyone but Henry. I swore, the next car that pulled up....
It was a black sedan with tinted windows. The passenger side window came down, and the driver leaned over to get a look at me. I felt like my heart was going to stop. To say he was stunning wouldn't have done proper justice to just how perfectly composed his face was, pale and classical as if chiseled from marble. His eyes were a bright, startling shade of green, so pale they were almost yellow. His long dark hair swept forward off his shoulders as he leaned, framing his face naturally in a way models probably had to prep hours for. He didn't look any older than twenty, and his casual jeans and t-shirt didn't go with the car. I wondered briefly if he'd stolen it, then I realized I didn't care, because I was going with him.
"What's your name?" he asked.
I blinked at him stupidly for a moment, then managed to get past the simple pleasure of hearing that soft and melodious baritone to stammer, "Uh, Eric. What's yours?"
He tilted his head speculatively, then smiled and said, "If I call you Hyacinthus, will you call me Zephyros?"
Shaking my head, I said, "I don't get it."
His laughter was pure music as he opened the door and said lightly, "Get in."
Usually there would be some kind of bargaining at this point. I like to know what I'm going to do and how much I'm going to get out of it, but when he said the words, my body just moved. The cigarette was flicked away, sending a trail of sparks as it skittered across the sidewalk. At the time, it didn't seem unusual that I got into this man's car without a single question as to where or what for. That's what he's like. At the time, it makes perfect sense, but when he's gone, I'm left wondering what the hell I was thinking.
That was my first night in the manor, and the last time I've seen the world outside its walls. He took me there, and when I asked why his beautiful old house stood empty, he said it was part of a family inheritance, and that he stayed somewhere in the city. He took me to my room, this room, and told me to get myself cleaned up and come out undressed. That was fairly standard, and I hopped in the shower, leaving my threadbare and dirty clothes on the bathroom floor.
When I came out, he was naked on the bed, stretched out on his side. The black coverlet made his skin look all the paler. Such a magnificent body. Michelangelo couldn't have sculpted a more perfect masterpiece. I remember thinking that he couldn't be real. I had seen my share of naked bodies, and they all had at least some flaws however small. He smiled indulgently at my staring and crooked a finger to beckon me closer, sitting up on the bed as he said, "Kneel on the floor."
I stepped forward without a word. It was the strangest sensation, as though my limbs were moving of their own accord, and my mind had little to say on the matter. I knelt on the floor between his legs and snuck a glance at his cock. Like the rest of him, it was beautifully formed, even when flaccid. I looked up at his face for some cue, though it didn't take a rocket scientist to figure out what I was supposed to do here.
He curled his fingers through my hair and whispered, "You have such lovely golden hair. It's like sunlight, and your eyes are as blue as the sky on a summer day."
I wasn't sure what to say to that. No one had ever waxed poetical on the topic of my hair or eyes before. About the closest thing to a romantic comment I ever got was that I had a nice tight ass, which was, after all, why they were paying for my time. "What do you want me to do?" I asked awkwardly.
"Whatever you want," he replied smoothly. "If you want to walk away, do so."
