I spent my thirties distrustful of Open Relationships. Mainly because the people I knew who had them never seemed happy. Most of them either divorced or separated. People freaked out when unexpected pregnancies occured where the paternity was questionable. People got mad because an Open But Don't Tell Me Partner would violate that rule. Things like that.

The worst, of course, was Zuzu and her husband. Twenty-something years of an open marriage fell apart when he had unprotected sex in a Jacuzzi (has anything good Ever Happened in a hot tub?) and got a stranger pregnant. His solution was that they would be some sort of Sister Wives thing and all live in the same house and raise kids together. He was kicked out of the house almost immediately and they never reconciled. But he was the one who called me and let me know Zuzu had been found dead in her house. Nothing more violent than cancer. But I hadn't know she had cancer, as she'd received her diagnosis while I was in a coma. And we hadn't spoken for three or four years before that. Our open friendship had deteriorated as she grew more and more venemous towards the people I cared about.

As this played out, another friend broke up with his primary partner when she got pregnant from another man. Only to find out a few years later, it Was his child but his partner wanted to raise the baby with someone else.

Shit is messy, y'all.

But I'm in my mid-forties now. I have been with more than my and your, and all our mutual friends' fair share of guys ranging from homophobically straight to offensively stereotypically gay, and everywhere inbetween.

I am Comrade's first boyfriend.

Fear not, this isn't a sad breakup story. Or a happy one. Calm down. OUR open relationship works great for us. We've lived together almost since we met. Every few months, Comrade goes on walkabout. It's pretty much building his own Insafemode Journals. I have never feared he was going to leave me for any of the men he's met. I know gay men. Most of us are garbage. We are Very Lucky together.

I also have permission to walkabout. But my legs are So Tired.

In Florida, last fall, we tried to set up some sort of threesome situation but we aren't interested in the same type of guy, which is obvious to anyone who's ever seen a picture of us. So nothing happened.

We each talked to some potential partners. As you might imagine, the skinny, effervescent, twenty something year old gets more messages than the exhausted, overweight middle aged guy who hates everyone. But the percentage of messages that we receive that we are interested in are very similar.

While Comrade anded up meeting some photographer who was nice and respectful until he was creepy (his story to tell, not mine), I met someone I'd been talking with for a few days. A chill guy in his thirties who was on vacation at Disney with his partner. They had a similar open relationship. He'd been skittish about us meeting at the house Comrade and I had rented but eventually relented.

It was a tired trope when I was writing the Insafemode journals: His picture was ten or fifteen years old. For me, it doesn't matter how attractive you are. If you are so terrified of what you look like that you have to send fake or antique pictures, I don't feel comfortable even spending time with you, nevermind pursuing any sort of emotional or physical relationship. I let him have a sandwich (we had too many groceries) and then told him he had to go.

That was in October. Since then, I haven't had the urge to meet anyone outside of our relationship.

Grindr is hilarious to me. I keep thinking back to when Ben invited me over for dinner one night in Allston, and showed me his OK Cupid matches. There were none.

"I've blocked EVERY gay guy in Boston." He bragged, fluffing his hair. "No one is good enough for me."
This was patently untrue. But funny.

I haven't blocked Everyone on Grindr but it is the thing I do The Most. Does a person's profile mention they wouldn't be interested in someone my age or size? Blocked. Why should I bother them? Does someone send me an unrpovoked naked picture or demand one from me? Blocked. Is someone just not my type? Blocked. Is someone aggressive or problematic? Blocked. Does someone have an incompatible kink? Blocked. There are so many great reasons not to waste my time trying to get laid. #1 is ... Comrade.

I had no plans to do any sexual adventuring in Vegas, but we did decide to check for possible threesomes in Vegas, as there's a wider age spectrum here than in, say, Orlando. (We are not going to try it out close to home.)

Nobody that was interested in us particularly sparked mutuality. But.

It's been, what, a decade since I regularly updated The Insafemode Journals? But there are people out there who read them regularly and remember them. People who saw pictures of me that I posted for Coming Out Day or other events. Maybe once or twice a year, I get a message from someone who recognizes me. And such a thing happened in Vegas.

Their opening message was unspectacular. Inoffensive. Fully clothed. Just a mention that I looked familiar. Which was funny to me because they looked familiar to me, too. But I knew why. They were in porn. Not a porn star. But someone who was in a couple of videos that were from a studio that amused me. Not aroused me. Amused me. The acting was terrible. The storylines were Awful. The camera angles were weird. His accent was spectacular. He could have been from the Midwest, Florida, Boston, England. His speech pattern needed a passport wherever he was.

So I told him that I used to have a sex blog, and he admitted to having some videos and asked if I wanted a link. I declined. But we decided to meet up. I wasn't quite sure sex was going to happen. I had seen his porn many years to a decade ago, and his pictures look freakishly similar. I just expected him to look as different from his 2012 self as I do.

We agreed to meet at the resort he was staying at at 9pm, while Comrade was going to have dinner with someone else. The thing was, this porn guy, Carter, was staying at Harrah's. I fucken hate Harrah's. Their signage is terrible. None of their employees know where anything is. And it was just as shut down as our casino because of the stupid the NFL Draft. But it was where he was staying, so I headed over there at 8:30, even though it was a 5-10 minute stroll.

I texted him that I was on my way, and was unsurprised when he wrote back that he'd be late. I wondered if he was having second thoughts. My shitty sense of self kept thinking "I'm not his type at all. I'm way too old, fat, boring, etc. for this kinky porn star." But, like, many of his partners in those videos were Older Then than me Now. And he is also ten years older than he was in those videos, so Shut Up Self.

I sat down at a bar near where we were supposed to meet. I ordered a soda but tipped like I bought a real drink, which caught the attention of the bartender.

"Do you work around here?" He asked.

"No. Boston. But I'm industry."

He nodded. "Ok. Well, thanks." and then he turned his attention to a Very Drunk woman who wanted to find the "valley", which I'm pretty sure meant "valet".

"Oh, it's..." he waved in a direction.

"NO NONO NO NO NO." Drunk Lady scolded. "None of you know where Anything is. Just walk me there."

"But I---" he looked around the bar, there were four customers and two bartenders. "Sure. I'll help you."

I put down another couple of bucks. Because fuck that particular casino. He was too nice to work there.

"Adam?" I heard.

"Oh, hey Carter." I said, getting up. "Good to see you."

"Likewise." he said. His voice was the same as in the videos. I had assumed that was a fake accent. Whoof.
He was wearing a cast on his right arm.

"What happened?" I asked, pointing to it.

"Oh, I just had surgery. Glass." As though that explained anything.

"Oh? Car accident? Walk into a sliding glass door?" I asked.

"I forgot." He sighed. "You're a writer. It's just glass."

"Oh. Ok."

Long, awkward pause of doom.

"What have you done so far in Vegas?"

"Oh." I said. "We went to the neon museum, Area 15 and Omega Mart, we saw The Beatlles Cirque Du Soleil show.--"

"Was that any good?" He asked. "I saw the Michael Jackson show last night, and I had No Idea what was happening. The plot was, I don't know. Maybe I'm just too stupid for theater."

"Noooooo." I said. "The Beatles show had some connecting scenes but it made No Sense most of the time."

"Did your partner like it?"

"He thought it was okay." I said. "But he didn't love it, either."

"How old is he?" I was not expecting to be asked.

"23."

"So you're sugar daddying."

I frowned. "No. We each have our own jobs and share of the finances. I can't afford to be anyone's sugar daddy."

"But you're in Vegas." he said.

"So are you. And you're on a floor so high you have to have a special card and elevator access to get there."

He almost smiled. "The view is pretty nice. Oh, don't judge the room. I'm usually military clean but--" he wagged his cast.

"Of course." I said.

He flashed his key at the door. A red light turned on. He flashed his key again. Same red light.

"Fuck. Again?" he said. "I've got to call security again."

"Ok." I said.

I was assuming, at this point, that he wasn't into me, and was using his key on the wrong door. His way of politely getting me to leave. So I started texing Comrade.

Comrade's Meanwhile Story is that the person he'd been texting decided to go to bed but wanted to talk later because .... he is from Boston.

Sure.

"Hi. This is Carter in room ... Yes. Yea. I got the new key but it doesn't work, either. Could you send someone up? Five to ten minutes? Would it be faster for me to go down there? Yea. Yea. Would I have to wait in line? I don't want to wait in line again. Ok. Five to ten minutes? Ok." He turned to me. "We've got to wait a bit. You're from Boston, right?"

"Yea."

"What happened to your acccent?"

"I broke it." I said "I moved around for a while and it disappeared."

I have never had a Boston accent. I'm from Connecticut and grew up on Cape Cod.

"People always make fun of my accent."

"Where are you from?" I asked.

"Iowa." he said.

Iowa? "Huh."

"You were going to guess Florida weren't you?"

I shrugged. "Gainesville, specifically."

"That's where my mom's from." he said. "God, what is taking them So Long?"

"It's only been about two minutes." I said. "Didn't they say it would be five to ten?"

He sulked. "I wish they'd stop giving me broken keys."

"Yea." I said. "This place is a steady shitshow."

"I'm going to call them again."

My turn to shrug. "Ok."

"Hi, this is Carter from Room...yes. Do you know when you're going to be able to send someone up? We've been waiting a long time. Do you know how much longer? Should I just go down there? I just don't want to wait in no lines again. It takes so long. No. No. No, don't send a medical team. No, jesus, I'm fine. Ok. Ok. I'll go down. No lines, though, right?"

Every flag in the building was red. His shirt was a red flag. His pants. His shoes. His accent. His impatience. Everything red. Everything flag.

"We've got to go downstairs so I can get a new key."

"Ok." I said, following him into the elevator.

I don't remember what we talked about because I was thinking I should probably just leave. I was beginning to think the accent included some slurring as the effect of a substance. Couldn't place which one, though.
It took less than a minute for him to get the key, and for us to get back in the elevator.

"I don't know why they keep doing this to me? I paid good money, you know? Hotels are expensive here. In Iowa, I can get a room for thirty a night. Nobody visits me but at least nobody's breaking my keys all the time."

We got out of the elevator and walked further down the hallway than we were before. It was 100% a completely different room than he'd tried to get into earlier. "Don't forget." He said. "My arm hurts, so it's a little messy."

I am, at my best, a little messy. Clothes piled in one place, a nightstand covered in chapstick, breath mints, change, and books. A little messy.

This was an addict's room.

Three whiskey bottles that I could see. Clothes everywhere. The TV on some random channel about Las Vegas culture. Both beds absolutely destroyed. Condom wrappers (but not condoms) on the desk. I didn't see any paraphenalia, but I also studiously avoided the bathroom because I was pretty sure that's where it was.

He took off his clothes. "Do you have any condoms?"

This was not quite what I had expected. "No." I said.

He shrugged.

"I'll just go back downstairs." and shake my head a bit. "They must have condoms in the little convenience store by the front desk. Should I get lube?"

"I'm allergic to lube." he lied.

"Ok. Can I have your room key? Otherwise, I won't be able to get back up in the elevator."

"Oh. I don't remember where I put my key. Did you see me put it down somewhere? I have this problem where I always lose things."

I shut my eyes. Red flags. "In your pocket?"

He produced two keys. "I don't know which one works."

I plucked them both from his hands. Opened the door, and waved each of them by the door. They both worked, of course. There was never anything wrong with the keys. There was something wrong with the keyholder.

I took the elevator down to the lobby, walked to the convenience store and took a picture of the condom display. "These are all lubricated." I texted. "Is that a problem?"

"Nope." He texted back. "Whatever."

I bought condoms and a soda, took the elevator back up.

He was ass in the air.

"Ohhhhhhhhhhhhh. Fuck me dadddddddddddddddddddddddddddddeeeeeee. Daaaaaaaaaaaaaaaadeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee."

I Hate Age Play Sex. There is no faster way to kill the mood for me.

"Please don't say that." I said.

"You want to be my coach?"

"No."

He turned around and looked at me. "Why are you still wearing clothes? What's the matter, I'm not young enough for you?"

"What?" I asked.

"I get it. I don't look like I'm twelve anymore so none of the fifty year old guys want to fuck me anymore. I should just kill myself."

I threw the condoms on the bed. "You can keep these."

"What, are you just going to go? Can't get it up because I'm so old, Mr. Writer?"

"Here are your keys." I threw them on the bed with the condoms. "Don't lose them."

"Oh, you're going to take care of me now? Don't want to fuck me, you just want to be my daddy?"

I walked out his door. He did not follow.

I texted Comrade. "Well, this went to super shit at the speed of drug addict. Can I come back?"

"Yea." he texted back. "My guy bailed. Guess we'll have to debauch with each other."

"I'm going to need a few minutes."

"Should we meet for ice cream?"

"Yes. That sounds great." I replied.

"Can you at least come back and eat my ass?" Carter texted. "I'm horny and my arms no good."

I blocked his number.

I unblocked his number. I didn't want to be named in a porn not star's suicide note, even if it was just as Insafemode.

Comrade was waiting for me in front of the ice cream/cupcake place. He kissed me Hello. "Waffle cones?"

​"Waffle cones." I said.

Comrade: I was going to lie down on this seat but it's not very comfortable,  and it smells. 

Me: Well, an infinite amount of butts have been pressed to it.

Comrade: Now that you're here,  I'll just lay my head in you lap.
​
Me: But an infinite amount of butts have been pressed to it.

I’m on fire every day. It’s just that you live far away, and some times I only burn blue.

Yet another school is several months delinquent in paying me for a gig. Ugh. Zuzu is still dealing with the divorce from hell. Ugh. Two out of my three new roommates are fighting so fiercely, they can't be in the same room with each other. Ugh. I had to interview for a room I'm already living in. That's not so much of an ugh as a huh.

This month has been ughly. The first weekend I lived in the new house, I lived here alone, terrified that all of the other roommates had been killed in some sort of Satanic ritual, and that their ghosts would soon be back to begin haunting me. A few days later, I came home drunk after a night of poetry and Bikey and her boyfriend were in the kitchen. They both appeared to be alive.

"Yea, we were in VT for the weekend. I rode my bike up there to play recorder in an early music festival."

She rode her bike from Boston to Vermont?

I was about to ask her more intriguing questions when The Sole Remaining Gay Roommate, Dale, and The Other Girl, Chippy, entered the room. Upon their arrival, Bikey and her boyfriend vacated the room. "I fucken hate her." Dale said. "Dirty ass bike dyke with her ugly ass hobbit boyfriend."

Ugh.

"It's a good thing you're not judgmental." Chippy said to Dale.

"I'm not judgmental. I just don't like people who are ugly. Or fat."

I went upstairs to my room, trying to guage if a jump from my window would kill me. I decided it would only bruise my shins, and there's little as embarrassing as a botched suicide attempt during your first week in a new apartment.

By the end of the first week, Chippy had moved out, replaced by her friend, Allison, who was subletting. The two of us enjoyed watching Dale and Bikey not interact with each other. One of us would talk with one of them, the other would talk to the other, and we'd try and see how close we could get them before Bikey (clearly not the alpha in the situation) scurried into her room. We couldn't even get them on the same floor.

On the rare occasions that I've left the house, I've either been hanging with Celeste, or dropping off mail at the Post Office. Apparently there is a LARGE PACKAGE waiting for me in Quincy, where I haven't lived in over four years. But if there's a good reason to go to Quincy, it's to get my hands on a large package.

I was discussing the mail situation with Chippy, who was moving some of her stuff out, when I mentioned how the last night I went to pick up stuff at Landlord's, I found that he had unpacked MY belongings from MY suitcase, and hidden it, claiming MY suitcase, which had MY name written all over it, wasn't mine. This inspired me to make several other Landlord rants prompting Chippy, who I'd only spoken to once before, to say "These stories sound familiar. I think Feral (the roommate I had replaced) told them to me. He got them from some guy's Livejournal. Oh my God, you're that guy!"

"Really?" Dale asked.

I am that guy. So I told them how I met Feral via Livejournal, and how we'd had dinner a couple of times, how I'd met his boyfriend, yadda yadda.

"So what's your journal about?" Dale asked.

"Embarrassing stories mostly. It started off as anonymous gay confessions, but it's sort of expanded into embarrassing everythings."

"Wow. There's this guy who lives down the street that Feral knows who writes a journal filled with awkward stories. You should meet him."

Chippy and I stared at him for a full minute and a half of awkward silence.

"I am that guy who lived down the street."

"Oh, right."

I really hope he was drunk.

Personally, I've been finding myself getting drunker than usual lately. After several months of not really drinking so much, many people and bartenders are determined to dehydrate me via alcohol. Jim Beam's been winking at me, and Captain Morgan has officially appointed me as first mate. I was relieved to discover that Midori is actually a man. No reverse Crying Game incidents for me.

At some point this week, I really have to stop putting off going back to my old jobs. There's only so much ramen noodles my digestive system can take. Ugh.

When I was living in Burlington, Vermont, a few of my friends were discussing how often they masturbated. I was distracting myself by imagining what our waiter would sound like with my dick in his mouth.

"And I bet Adam masturbates at least a dozen times a week." Dagster said.

"Probably more like twenty." said The Soggy Blind Lesbian.

They'd have been pleased to know that my actual masturbation per week average was comfortably between their guesses. But I wasn't going to tell them that.

I'm an incredibly sexual person. Deviant some might say. Still others would shout "Whore!". One of the things I'm proud of, though, is I have (or had until this journal) a low sexual profile, and I'd never been caught masturbating. I've walked in on friends, roommates, the Brazilian water polo team...wait, no that last one was a fantasy. The point is, while I've walked in on easily dozens of people masturbating (though not at the same time, that would have been awkward), I have never been caught with my pants down.

*cue ominous music*

While I may have masturbated between fourteen and twenty times a week back in the good old days of 2001, lately I've been in a serious rut. My libido isn't shrinking, it's just that I live with two roommates, one of whom has a six year old child. There is nearly always someone awake at my house. Usually working on the computer which is within close visual/audial range of my bedroom.

This morning marked...entirely too many...days/weeks since the last time I had an orgasm. At around four-thirty my mentally six year old, physically thirty-something year old roommate finally stopped playing "City of Heroes" and went to bed. I made myself some apples and peanut butter to celebrate my domination of the room, and appease my inner-kindergartner.

At six, the child/monster roommate went off to school, and the other adult roommate headed for work. I decided to literally seize My Opportunity (that's what I call him).

I opened up a dozen or so various porn sites. Remembered that pictures on The Internet just aren't doing it for me these days, and opened up my Porn Playlist on Media Player. I clicked on "random" and hit the forward button. The first movie was twenty minutes long. I decided that would be the duration I'd, pardon the pun, shoot for.

About fifteen minutes into the session, the phone rings. I'm waiting to find out if my book about bad gay sex experiences is coming out, Luckily, caller ID is in sight. It's not my publisher. If it had been her, I still wouldn't have interrupted my special time with my long neglected right hand. After all, I could legitimately claim I was doing research for the sequel. While I lean back from looking at the phone, I accidentally squish my left hand into the plop of peanut butter that I had yet to eat. I go to shake the peanut butter off my hand (yes, I know that doesn't work, but my brain was lacking proper blood flow at the time), and knock the dish on to the floor. For whatever reason, my dick decides this would be a great time to come. So I do, loudly and messily. There is now a broken dish, come and peanut butter all over the floor. And I hear footsteps.

I'm not sure whether the footsteps are my roommate coming upstairs, or one of the people from another apartment going down the stairs into the lobby. Just in case it's my roommate, I leap up to get paper towels, only to discover my feet have fallen asleep. I have just enough time to yell out "Fucker of God!" before I fall, pants around my ankles, on to the peanut butter, come, and dish covered floor.

My shouting attracts the attention of the neighbor who was coming down the stairs. I am briefly thankful that there is a door between us. "Are you okay in there?" Then I remember the door is not locked.

"Fine. Just dropped a dish. No need to come in."

I realize that, as I made to brace my fall, I cut my right palm on one of the broken dish pieces. So now there's blood in the mix. Our floor looks like a discount tie-dyed t-shirt. God, what if my neighbor, whose name I don't even know, came in and saw me like this? Would he laugh? Dial 911? Be aroused?

I imagine my book being released posthumously. "It was the greatest marketing gimmick you could ask for." My publisher would say. "A guy writes a collection of awkward sex stories and is found dead of embarrassment after a stranger walked in on a bizarre auto-erotic ritual involving blood and peanut butter. It's like John Waters meets Mel Brooks in a dark alley and rapes him."

Luckily, my neighbor believes that I'm ok, and leaves. I fail to pass out or die. Instead, I hobble over to the kitchen and realize that we're all out of paper towels.

Earlier this month, for the first time, I met someone as Insafemode. It wasn't a date, or a hook-up, or anything remotely scandalous. I was meeting another writer for a drink (Cola, for those    keeping track of my alcoholism). I was curious how I would come across to someone who only knew me through this blog. The few people who know me in person, and who read this can probably vouch that I don't come across as...well, slutty in real life. Maybe if I wrote moreentries about my music obsessions or my recipe for Ground Nut Stew, Insafemode would be a more balanced me, instead of a cariacture. But who wants to read about how I couldn't sleep this morning because a pack of cute Latinos are scraping paint off the house?

Put your hands down, there's no nudity involved in the story.

Before I agreed to meet said writer for drinks, I tried to evaluate whether I should "Insafe it up." Should I be as catty and queercentric as I am in this LJ? Hell, no. I can't stand being around catty guys for more than a few minutes at a time, I certainly wouldn't be able to be one.

So I went as me. Straight seeming gay guy. Good listener. Inquisitive soul. Forever in blue jeans. I showered the "unemployed poet" stench off me before I left. I would have been early to the meeting had not my roommate said "What's wrong with your hair? Are you trying to look gay?" which meant I had to towel my hair drier so as not to have the "slick emo kid look." (I prefer  having the scruffy emo guy look)

As a regular reader of this LJ, the other writer remarked that I don't come across Insafemodish in person. I'll take that as a compliment.

In addition to learning that I'm not Insafemodish, I also learned that I have a number of readers not brave enough to put me on their friends lists (pussy pervs!) for various reasons. Some don't want their friends page covered in gay porn, some don't have LJs, others are just afraid I'm  contagious (they're just fucken freckles).

What I didn't realize is that there was at least one person not on my friends list who wascyberstalking me.

"Did you just call me Safey?"

"Yea."

I pushed his ass of my crotch. "Why?"

"I thought that's what some of your exes called you."

What would Clark Kent say if, one day, Jimmy Olsen was bouncing on his cock and said "Go ahead, call me Lois if it turns you on, Superman?" Fuck if I know. (author's note: I'm using fuck as an interjection, not a verb in that last sentence)

"Look." he said, as I pulled up my boxers. "I have a Livejournal. I've been reading your stories for a couple of months now. I kept answering Craigslist ads that I thought might be yours."

"How did you know when you found me?"

"Your e-mail address has Insafemode in it." Ok, it was my turn to be the moron asking about cancerous freckles.

I tried to rectify things in my mind. A cute guy had been searching me out because of my LJ. He'd found me because I, apparently, have no secret agent skillz whatsoever He'd invited me over to his house so that I could fuck him, and then he threw me the fuck out before I could even take off my shoes. Then, for whatever reason he'd gone to my house (since I'd foolishly given him my address & phone number). There, he threw me on the couch, took off his clothes and  proceeded to address me by a fictional alias.

"Um." was really the best thing I could come up with.

"I should go." Yes, you should go. But now you know who I am, where I live, what I look like. Fuck, I need a hypnotist or the MIB memory eraser.

Ethan.  Ethan?  On my front stairs?  How...how should I approach this?  Maybe start off smooth and snide. Pretend to ignore him and mutter "Man, I'd love to go home right now, but the vibe is all wrong." And then just walk on by the house. Then I would not answer his e-mails or phone calls (which I was certain there would be hundreds of) until that one day when I'd run into him at, of all places, Good Vibrations. I'd be by the vibrator wall. I'd slowly turn toward him, offer no proof that I recognized him, and say "Gosh. I want to get one of these vibes for my hot, eighteen year old poolboy/boyfriend, but I'm afraid I'll get the wrong type. You look like someone who knows his vibes, what would you get?" He would be not only crushed but rendered impotent by the exchange, and would spend the rest of his life breaking out into hives whenever someone  discussed sex toys, acoustics, or that Marky Mark & The Funky Bunch video. One day, five years down the line, he'd be at a party, doing lines of Pixie Stix off some skank's diseased    stomach when a certain Beach Boys song would catch his ear. At that moment he'd realize how empty his life was without me, and he would have no choice but to slit his wrists and throw  himself into a vat of Hydrochloric Acid and lemon juice. His stomach skank would think it was a bad reaction to the nose candy, but, even though I would have so moved on by then, when word of Ethan's death reached me, I would know that I was the reason he pulled his fizzing body out of the acid vat and threw himself out the plate glass window and on to the salt-covered barbed-wire electric fence.

When I realized how that scenario was far too good for Ethan, I looked him almost dead in the eye and said "Hey."

"Hey."

"Why are you sitting on my doorstep?"

"I felt like an asshole."

If I had written the experience, instead of living it, I would have said "You were an asshole. I hope you didn't come here looking for forgiveness or sex, because you can forget about either." Instead, I said "Don't worry about it."  I am a fucken pussy.

"Can I come in?"

No, you cockblocking, bad vibe having piece of spermicide, you can't. "Sure. You have to be quiet, though, my roommates are sleeping."

Let's pretend that we had some long conversation that completely vindicated why he essentially threw me out of his house. Maybe his Dad died, or his roommate urinated in his fish tank. The assumption that we'd reconciled our first encounter, makes us both sound a little less desperate than the truth: as soon as we were inside the door we began snogging.

"Before we go any further," he said with one hand down the front of my jeans, "I have to ask. Do you have AIDS?"

"No. I'm very much negative."

"So what's with all those spots?" I wondered if I'd had such a stressful night that I'd entered some sort of second puberty. Was my face a minefield of pustules? No.

"Spots?"

"Spots. They're all over your arm."

"My freckles?" Was it possible he'd never seen a person with freckles before?

"Freckles?"

"Yea. Freckles. When I'm out in the sun, instead of getting a tan, I get freckles. It's like low carb skin cancer. I've had them since I was born."

"So, they're not like lesions or an STD or anything."

"Unless you consider life as an STD, no. They're just freckles. No more contagious than my hair color."

"Oh." He pushed me on the sofa, slid off his Umbros, and sat his ample ass on my exposed cock. "Ooooh. You like that don't you."

I suppressed a snicker (and perhaps a Twix or two). Talking dirty is a fine art. Ethan was stillfingerpainting.

"I know you love my ass. Don't you Safey?"

I froze. "What did you just call me?"

At some point in the past month, I've begun to schiz. Adam flops between leather computer chair and leather sofa, watching TV screen or computer monitor. He lives on Ramen noodles and Cherry Coke. Insafemode leaves the house at odd hours, whether it's to meet strangers for sex, or just to mill around Boston.

It was Insafemode who left the house at 3:45 on a Friday morning, after Adam had been rejected. While Adam had fretted about what would happen on his way to meet Ethan, Insafemode was writing a LJ entry in his head as he swaggered over to James's house.

Neither personality had walked in this direction before. I'm not talking metaphorically, I'd never had any particular reason to investigate the area Southwest of Chez Insafemode. After a couple of blocks, the familiar multi-family houses gave way to apartment/condo/dorm complexes; the sort of buildings with broom closet sized rooms, where people who wanted to live closer to their sub-living wage jobs.

I envisioned entering James's terrarium. He would be standing on the not-so-far side of the room, that "come hither, even though you're only standing three feet away" look in his eyes. He would coyly offer me a drink from the water bottle hanging from his wall. After a few sips, he would start playing hard-to-get, running laps on his metal wheel.

At roughly the point where I was mentally envisioning leaving his house in a plastic ball, the quality of the buildings started to improve. Parking lots were filled with Maseratis and other mid-life crisis mobiles instead of 1984 Ford Tauruses.

James would answer the door in a cashmere bathrobe. In the middle of his room would be a    water fountain shaped like an erect penis. His chihuahua, Gates, would be shivering in his lush doggy bed. "Insafemode," he'd say, "so glad you could make it. Your picture doesn't do you    justice. Let's say we cut through the bullshit." At which point he'd, literally, disrobe, revealing his perfectly chiseled ass. We'd fuck until the Cubs won the world series. When we were both too spent to do more than twitch and moan, we'd fall asleep in each others' arms. The next day, my own private Dellionairre would take me out to brunch where we'd discuss those poor slobs running around the streets in plastic hamster balls.

As quickly as they'd popped up, the posh condorms disappeared. I arrived at the properly  numbered house. Hamster cage it was.

I buzzed the button with "james's place" written in cursive letters on a post-it note, a big smiley face dotting the "j". Nothing about our encounter was what I imagined. His condorm was  deceptively large. Two bedrooms, one kitchen, one bathroom, one den. His room was the  swallowing image of Ethan's. Madonna poster? Check. Computer with pretty boys fucking screen saver? Check. Rainbow triangle adhered to window? Check.

"Hi."

James was...not the guy from his picture. Heavy-set, but not fat, he was majorly stubble-faced. I imagined he had a thick carpet of hair covering his body from Adam's apple to toe knuckle. A theory that was quickly proven accurate.

He pulled me toward him, and shut the door in one fluid motion. "So," he asked, "do you like what you see?"

Wake up at noon. Shower. Put appropriate books and work clothes in my backpack. Get dressed. Check e-mail. Eat bagel. Drive to college. Park car. Walk to class. Alternate between paying attention and doing homework. Check e-mail from computer lab. Drive to work. Eat dinner. Throw on uniform. Earn money. When the restaurant closes, drink heavily. Return home. This was the routine for the first forty-five days after I drove Seith out of my life.

On the forty-seventh day, I couldn’t sleep. I tossed, turned, masturbated. Nothing. When seven o’clock rolled around, I conceded defeat, and went into the kitchen to make a bagel. On the way in, I turned on the TV. “Mourners are gathering for Matthew Shepherd who died at 12:53 this morning, nearly a week after...”

Apart from hearing his name mentioned in psychology class, and hearing someone at work mention the tragedy in Wyoming, I had no concept of who Matthew Shepherd was. On October 12th, 1998 that all changed. I didn’t go to class that day. Like most of my "alternative lifestyle" (actor) friends I went about making the tragedy of Matthew Shepherd something tangible. Something we could squeeze in our fists until it bled.

My name is Adam Stone. You might know me as InSafeMode, an all-too openly gay writer/pseudo-political activist. You probably think I can't leave the house without a cock in my mouth. The truth is, until October 12th 1998, only a handful of people knew my sexuality. Ok, a few handfuls if you counted the people I'd hooked-up with over The Internet. Since then I've become outspoken in a way that annoys a number of my Gay colleagues. I do things like use labels like gay and Gay.

I see men who like to love/sleep with men, and women who like to love/sleep with women as being gay. We don't let our sexuality define us anymore than our politics, our diets, our favorite Smurf. On the other side of the equation are people I consider Gay. They wake up in the Gay morning, eat their Gay Cheerios, put on their Gay Diesel jeans, and go about their Gay day, informing everyone who thinks differently than them that they're homophobic. While Gay people annoy the hell out of me, I'm glad they're out their doing what they need to do. There are obviously people in the world who need to hear "We're here, we're queer, don't be a homophobe, buy me a beer." I'm just not one of them.

I saw Shepherd's death as a time for reflection, and horror. Some people saw his death as an opportunity for rebellion against homophobic archetypes. Still others, like that demon "reverend" Phelps, saw it as an opportunity to spread a hateful agenda. He was as entitled to picket Matthew Shepherd's funeral, as I am to picket his when Satan finally comes to collect the withered prune that was once his soul. I'm all about freedom of choice.