That's How You Know...

Yes kids, it's the debrief you've all been waiting for.  First, I provide you with these lyrics, which my mind seems to have associated as the soundtrack to this weekend, it's not entirely hard to work out why:

one of the boys, he took me under his wing, spoke words of wisdom to a fool, young kid.
he said, "you can be a golden boy, you can rule this place. all you've got to do is sell your face."
so now i wear my rainbow flag on my sleeve.
i'm always ready for another shopping spree, stocking up on shirts and shoes that i can't afford; anything to make me one of the boys.
but i've got this feeling, something just isn't right.
can't shake this feeling inside.
i sleep all day and dance all night; hug with the left arm to scratch with the right.
i don't have a dollar to buy something to eat, but i think i've got some credit left up at the beat.
and that piano that i used to play is collecting dust, my stradivarius is starting to rust.
but screw vivaldi, because you do what you must to be one of the boys.
but i've got this feeling, everything is all messed up.
can't shake this feeling inside.
cos i am one of the boys and i am afraid.
will i dance into nothing, burning away?
how did this revelation, liberation get to the stage where i'm just another pretty bird in a cage?
my rainbow flag is looking goddamned old, because ben sherman re-released it long ago.
strutting in and butting in, because it's fun to be dramatic; wearing a smile that's oh-so-automatic, stylishly cynical and fashionably informed about anything of interest to one of the boys.
but he's got a cock ring and a sachet from the wet arcade.
he's got a boyfriend at home.
and i've got this feeling he knows i'm onto him; so liberated but not free.
cos i am one of the boys and i am afraid.
will i grow into another golden boy, caged, or a man?

Jacob Diefenbach - Golden Boy, Caged

I had this weekend off work.  I'm leaving my job and had 3 days holiday left so managed to wangle the weekend that everybody needs to work off.  This was great, meant I could attempt my friend's halloween housewarming party and generally actually be sociable.  Having worked most weekends/evenings for the past year or so, being sociable has been problematic.  It's frustrating, but at the end of the day it's part and parcel of working as a theatre tech, and if you really hate it you shouldn't be working in theatre.  I also booked tickets to see Naked Boys Singing at the Charing Cross Theatre on Friday night for me and some friends.  I'd wanted to see it for some time but as it's only on at 10pm Friday and Saturday nights which are the hardest to get off from work I hadn't had the chance yet.  So I dragged a group of us out, including my new best friend from America with the intention of going to heaven afterwards.  Sooner or later I will need to get a new job, and so I'm making the most of my free time whilst I can...

So my american friend and I headed into town Friday evening to meet another guy who was back in the UK that week from his year abroad in France.  We started drinking in Soho, and persuaded the boy to buy a ticket to the show on the door and come to heaven with us after.  I have plenty of spare bed space at weekends so he could come back to mine anyway, though we were flirting a fair bit so it was entirely likely the spare bed space would be the other half of my bed, but everyone was happy with this arrangement so off we went.  The show was great, funny and enjoyable and plenty of cute boys that you were SUPPOSED to perv over.  Starting from a group of me and americaboy we managed to persuade some of the others to stay out late and come to heaven.  My friend Sal had persuaded two guys to come meet us for a drink after the show, although that plan went awry as one of them had no ID on him.  However I managed to persuade the IDless boy to come to heaven with us (because lets face it, no-one gets ID'd to get into heaven), and pointed out there was a spare, SEPARATE bed he could stay in at my house.  So off we all went to party the night away.

The boy is very cute, super smiley and awesome though somewhat shy and nervous, he has the same cheesey taste in pop music I do so we were jumping up and down together to every 80s camp anthem blasting out of the speakers but eventually the night had to wind down, and after some crappy chinese food off me, the new boy and frenchboy went to get a nightbus back to my house.

And then of course 3 of us ended up in the same bed.  And yes 3 mildly drunk gay boys in a bed inevitably leads to things happening but I'm not going to give you a play-by-play account of all that.  And the next day frenchboy left to go visit his family before travelling back to France, and I had a rather panicked boy to deal with.  Because it was fairly obvious he's not the sort to end up in a bed with a guy he met 6 hours earlier, let alone 2 of them at once.  He wasn't quite rocking back and forth in the corner, but he wasn't far off crying and having somewhat of a breakdown.  Full blown crisis of self moment.

And whilst it's not fair to reveal all the things he told me whilst I held him and didn't say a word, because there wasn't anything to say, he just needed someone there to make him feel safe, to sum it up, he's still in the process of discovering his own gay identity, and working out what the entire gay world is, scene/non-scene, what he likes, what he doesnt, where he fits in it, to what extent his being gay affects his life as a whole etc.  To be fair, I think we're all working this out constantly, but most of you reading this are at least fairly sorted on what the whole being gay thing means to you.  He's not.  Don't get me wrong he's known he's gay for a good while and he's out and everything, but he doesn't have it all worked out yet.  And he doesn't have any gay friends to go out with or talk to or ask questions of when he gets confronted with experiences he has no idea how to process.

So I dragged him to my friend's halloween party, and forced him to meet lots of kinky, perverted, but ultimately lovely and affectionate gay boys.  Of course I noticed all the cheeky looks from my friends to me. Yes, believe it or not I can be perfectly nice and protective and honourable when I want to.  Though admittedly even I had to crack up laughing when he leapt into my arms for safety from all the scary people around him...

It was the right thing to do for him.  He went from full blown crisis mode saturday afternoon, to a bundle of nerves and insecurity at the start of the party, and by the end of the night he'd hugged and been hugged by everyone in the room.  He had multiple phone numbers and offers of coffee and films and food from people he'd met that weekend, and whilst we were watching films all day sunday together 3 of the people he'd met at the party actively sought him out on facebook to add him.  So thank you to all of my friends, for being the fantastic people I love you for in the first place, and making someone feel 100% welcome, instantly one of the group, and making it obvious to him it wasn't just a one time politeness thing.

So that's pretty much all the context of the weekend for those who didn't already know.  But onwards to how this all affected me.  It was a completely crazy weekend.  Which to be fair, always happens when me and americaboy go out on the town - it's one of the many reason's he's such a good friend despite only meeting him about a month ago.  I was cycling like crazy through mood swings all weekend - though hiding it mostly well.  I had some intense highs and intense lows, as evidenced by the range of facebook and twitter posts I made.  But ultimately, it was the most amazing weekend I've had in months, due to the boy I met.  I met him Friday night and he didn't leave my house till about 9pm Sunday which should give you a good idea of how well we got on.

In short, I REALLY like him, which was pretty much blindingly obvious to everyone at the party on Saturday night.  In fact 3 people asked me on separate occasions throughout the evening if the two of us were going out.  It's like the first time I met Joel is happening all over again :P  The boy makes me smile a lot, in fact since I broke up with Chris he's only the second boy to ever make me feel those kind of feelings again (and incidently he, and the first boy who did are both named Chris.  Hmmmm....)  I'm happy to just spend hours hugging him.  And I like him so much that just hugging him gets me half hard.   Also something that has only happened with one other guy since I broke up with Chris (obviously if they're groping me and rubbing up against me then yes I get hard, but just on hugging alone, that only tends to be people I really like.)  I've been grinning like an idiot all day today because of him and the texts he's send me.  I had to forcibly stop myself from asking this boy out properly countless times over the weekend.  This was for various reasons.

Firstly, I think he DEFINITELY needs time to process the whole weekend and what happened and all the good and bad and new and everything.  Secondly, so do I actually.  Thirdly, I want him to make friends, and if I asked him out and we dated and then broke up, I don't want him to lose the people I've introduced him to this weekend because he feels awkward talking to 'my' friends.  Fourthly, I don't want to risk anything that might mean I might not like him at some point, and fifthly, probably the most obvious point in a way, whilst I'm really into him, and I think he's really into me (he text me to say he missed me already within 30 seconds of leaving each other at the tube station), on some rather big levels, I'm not a good match for him - me the  promiscuous boy in love with 3 other people who kinda needs an open relationship and is into all sorts of fairly extreme things - ff, rough/aggressive sex, blood, needles etc.  and him, the innocent, inexperienced guy just starting to find out who he is and what he likes.  Let's not throw him in at the deep end shall we...  You can tell I must really like him because I actively DON'T want to corrupt this one or jump straight in his pants :P

But I have invited him out pretty much all of next weekend, I'm out with people Thursday and Saturday nights so will no doubt drag him to that and that leaves potential options for Friday/Sunday too.  He needs an education in various gay and/or classic films, having never seen Moulin Rouge, Legally Blonde, Bring It On, The Princess Bride, Another Gay Movie and so on and so forth, so I have plans to monopolize his Sundays with films and food and hugs because that's a great way to spend a lazy weekend, and I guess we'll see how it goes.  You will all no doubt see me dragging him to various social gatherings over the next few months and for those who saw us on Saturday that probably comes as a surprise to none of you.  At any rate he's a great hugger and a great kisser and amazingly warm which is always good in the winter months ^.^

Of course now he'll probably read this and I'll be horribly embarrassed for revealing a little too much of my feelings for a boy I met less than 72 hours ago, but it was honestly the most amazing weekend in ages and all thanks to him, so thank you, don't hate me, and Thursday can't come quickly enough for me to see you again and give you a hug :)