PrivateTim

Brad and Cam Heely? WTF is wrong with these people? It isn't the age thing, it is the "this is my son's friend/former lover" thing. As incredibly hot as my son's water polo and surfing buddies were, it would have been incredibly creepy to date (read 'fuck') any of them. Hot, but creepy. 😲

"Like a virgin, touched for the (almost) very first time..." I don't remember how Jeremy went from sweet kid to bitchy diva, maybe it was the skating, but it is nice to be inside his head. I remember this story far better than I did Flux, but I am still looking forward to the details I've forgotten. Those reading for the first time, buckle up and then do it again....

As I said in another book, seeing the world from the POV of the narrator, softens that character; makes them more human, more sympathetic and more understandable. As I have said before, I am not a fan of Hayes boys, Frank, Robbie, Matt, Gathan and Zach, in general. Brent is the only one I like, maybe Trent too, but we haven't seen much of him. But in the last book, Flux, Matt took a turn to the good and got to a decent place long before Robbie ever did. Zach as the narrator of the prologue appears more sympathetic, but I've already read this book and Gap Year so that clouds my ability to like Zach. To me he has never really changed from the guy who hurt Will through John, both of which are unforgivable to me. I remember the overarching storylines, but not the details and I am looking forward to reliving them.

OMG, my A1C just shot up to 15%, quick someone stick me with Trulicity!!🤣🤣😁 Seriously Mark, a really nice story that captured so much of that era and the angst as undergrad years come to an end and real life rears its ugly head. I think I appreciated the story much more this time through and 9 more years of maturity helps that too.

The curse of the gay male; the ability to never grow up. You can act like life is one big frat party.... until the twinks stop responding to you in the clubs and suddenly you've become that which you used to mock and deride with your friends, the older gay male desperately trying to hang on to youth and relevance. If you don't have Stefan Schluter or David Geffen money, you eventually cross the Rubicon. Gay men didn't use to have the normal markers of life; marriage, then kids, then teens, then college kids, then weddings, then grandkids, as so on as the cycle goes. That is changing and has been changing, but in 2002, that was not the norm. There were more party boys then not, even those in grad school, except the med school guys. I lost more friends to drugs, choking to death on their own vomit, than I did to AIDS. Matt at 22 is already a father and about to have his second child. He's finally come to the realization that it really is time to grow up. I think Cam will be an easy issue for Matt to handle. Tell him the truth. Matt does not know what his status or future is with Wade, but the epiphany he has had is about his children, his responsibility and the need to be in their life. Cam will understand and appreciate that. Pawk da caw, Matt is Boston bound.

I don't get why Matt goes along with Alex's shenanigans. Certainly Matt can get sex other places. If he allows Alex to play his Saint/Sinner scenario he is making Alex the Puppetmaster. Can I get a 'what what Homey don't play that' from the crowd? Even though Matt only went to a junior university (Leland Stanfurd Junior University) he is still pretty smart.

I don't get why everyone is shocked. One of Barry's strategies for keeping Zach 'undercover' was a religious bent to explain why he wasn't porking girls left and right. Perhaps he has implemented the strategy. He might NOT be doing that, but it was mentioned previously. You called it before they did. You nailed exactly what was in Alex's mind. Only a few chapters left, so I guess these storylines will carry over to the next story. I DO recall some of the intrigue there 😄

I think this is how I remember it. Wade is wife/delicate flower and Matt is the mistress/stable boy; spurs and a riding crop are probably next 😄 As Flux winds down I am looking forward to Streak so I can crack on Zach some more 😁

Matt the ASS who had sex with 50 guys in college while Wade accepted the situations? Just because he has matured in the last 8 weeks doesn't excuse the previous 208 weeks. “I just got some important news, but if you don’t want to hear it, I’ll just tell you in the morning,” he said, and made to walk out of the room. He was such a little shit Fuck you, you douchebag, cunt lick, juvenile, piece of human excrement Will. YES, you DO wait to be invited into a room with a closed door after you knock. And hey, Mr. Fucking Hypocrite of all Hypocrites, YOU are the one who just a couple of weeks ago DEMANDED that all HIV information in the family be transparent and open, yet here you are being your usual petulant, arrogant, it's-all-about-me, shithead self withholding family HIV information as part of your fucked up game playing. Grow the fuck up.

Not to compare authors, which I would never do, because each author brings his own, unique talents to each story, but there is a wide gulf between a perfect teen and a 13 year old who ejaculates while dancing naked in a gay club in Italy, destroys two very expensive cars and very expensive wardrobes and then runs away to Maui, and who is screwing adults from gay clubs when he is 15. Rory and Owen were not perfect teens, but they also never pulled the bullshit that Prince of Malibu Will does.

I was never a fan of Lark's, but in the end, he did come through for Brad at a critical time. Wade's read on Alex is correct, as we see later on. The need for a legitimate heir is too great. Wade's heir is technically illegitimate, but it isn't a term we use in the U.S. much and not even really that legally significant anymore.

Thanks for the review, although it was a little confusing. I'm not sure how Robbie and fisting work into this? And I'm not sure what you were referring to with the 80%? I think he means that Brad discovered how important the pleasure of fisting was to Robbie and that made their relationship work, otherwise it might not have. So he thinks Alex and Wade's sexual incompatibility will doom their relationship, and increase the odds that Matt is who he winds up with. He is not a snob. People feel more comfortable around people like themselves. A plumber is more comfortable hanging with other plumbers than he is art critics. I am not sure what caused Wade to act so uncharacteristically. He threw out almost every standard he had to pursue Alex. His self-awareness seems to be returning. But as I observed in an earlier chapter, he is still very young, very immature. We forget he is just 22 or so. At 22 and a college grad entering law school, I felt very adult, but now I recognize I was not. I was still at the very beginning of maturity.

Nothing to hate about Will in this chapter, except everything. It would be easy to hate Will because he is a pampered, indulged, self-indulgent, arrogant, self-important, spoiled little Malibu Colony douche who's never really had a care in his life. But none of those are the reason to hate Will in this chapter. The reason to hate Will in this chapter is his complete lack of self-awareness. He can tell Wade how to run his life and what he should be doing, where he is fucking up, but if anyone dares tell Will that, he pours acid on your $200,000 car and destroys a $100,000 wardrobe. Will is a callow 15 year old who has lived a very sheltered, insulated life. The great thing about reading my own comments from 10 years ago is seeing where I agree with myself and where I've grown to a different perspective.

I think you are misreading what Brad said; he said: “I’d like to wait to tell Will and the others until I find out the results,” he said He wasn't trying to "have a strangle hold on the information about Kevin and Cody's HIV status", he was wanting to avoid telling Will he'd been tested for HIV until he got his own results back so Will (and the others) would not worry unnecessarily. They took our info, took our blood, took our money, and sent us on our way. Funny, I don't remember ever paying for an HIV test. I got tested on a pretty regular basis in my 'active' years and then took a bunch of friends to the clinic, who NEEDED to go, but would not have unless I dragged them there. I would get tested too, even if I'd been tested recently, just to show them it wasn't a big deal.

I felt like everyone was in limbo Dude..... no, no, no! I felt like everyone was in flux. Fixed it for you 🤣 Ah yes, AIDS. There was a movie that came out in 1996, It's My Party. It was a movie about a man who is HIV+ that finds out he has a rare disease that will completely destroy his brain and it will be a bad death. He decides to die on his terms. He throws a 2 day party at the end of which he is going to end his own life with pills and alcohol (and enlists a friend to help with a pillow, in case it is going to slow). He was an accomplished architect with a fabulous life when he was diagnosed as positive. Then his whole world turned upside down. I watched the movie with a friend, 20 years older than me, who was helping me as a 19 year old work through my life as a bi man in the closet because of my athletic career. The story was true. My friend, we will call him John, lived in the last house ever designed by the architect. John was at the party. There was a scene that deeply effected me and John. There was a chart of sorts, posted on a wall, of all the people who had died from AIDS. John said that more than 50% of his friends and acquaintances had died. John's entire generation was wiped out with much more devastation than the generation of his older brother, who had died in Vietnam. I haven't watched the movie in awhile, so I don't know how it has aged, but I long thought it should be a mandatory requirement to have watched it to be allowed into a club in West Hollywood or San Francisco. It drove home "this shit is real". To so many young gay men now, it is just does not appear to be a concern or given a thought. So sad.

Doh! You are so close! I remember the outline of where this all winds up, but not the minutia. My esteem for Wade dropped because he bailed on a commitment; just like with Will, that is a big deal to me. Don't make plans with me and then drop them (and me) because a "better offer" comes up (as if that would be possible. 😄

It would appear Wade is back on track and has woken up to his commitment to Matt to have this trip with him. I don't think Matt has magically transformed in the six weeks since graduating college. He still has a long was to go. “So they’re together?” Zach asked again. If it is not too much trouble Mr. Arbour, could you have this dumb motherfucking douche fall off a balcony in Paris and die and then rewrite all the stories he is in, to write him out of them? You would save young Will and me, and countless others, much irritation over the next 10 years.

Hunh? Are we reading the same story? I am at a loss where Wade has "thoughtless selfishness" or is showing "arrogance and demeaning attitude". I think he has been a little clueless and I think it is out of character for him to be acting like a besotted tween girl, arrogant? Demeaning? Selfish? Not a chance on any of them. I think I DO remember what the Cody/Kevin issue is. Yuck.

Or someone's time more interesting 😄 Cody and Kevin's names come up a lot, but they still seem so peripheral. I do remember Flux now and all the future drama with Alex, the Danfield's, the Marquis.... 🤣🤣

A good, insightful thought. I NEVER would consider bringing in a third or a fourth this early in a relationship. It would be one thing if they were friends, then friends with benefits, but they are not at this point. They are in the beginning stages of a relationship. This is one of the problems (to me) with Will's sluttiness since 13. He is too immature to see other viewpoints that regard sex as more than recreation or to understand that Travis is too immature in his sexual development as a gay man to see the dangers promiscuity can lead to both emotionally and physically.

I don't remember if Robbie left trusts for the Hayes boys (Gathan, Zach, Brent and I think there is one more?), but in his case, emancipation would have been easier in the sense that he was 17, and would have financial support. The only reason he probably would not go that route is because his parents might threaten to out his relationship with Zach. I don't remember exactly what they know, but I know what they suspect. Happy Flag Day (in advance), June 14, 2023 As much as I have issues with Will, I have many more with Zach. To me he is still the same Zach who messed with Will through John and the same Zach who will mess with Will in much worse ways over the next two years of CAP time. Will would have been ahead of the game to let Zach go and move on. DAMN that was insightful, if I do say so myself. Oh and Zach should have stuck with his goal of going to USC. UCLA never did beat USC the three years he would have been there if we are using MJD for the model 😄

Alright... I'll make a confession here. The competition is largely a created event, although loosely related to the showcases/combines you mention. This is definitely poetic license. Besides, Zach plays for De La Salle, and they have constant summer practices. It is weird, but I so do not remember this book at all. I don't remember if Zach goes to Paris or not. But if he doesn't, THIS is where Will should have dumped him forever and moved on. I think he did have the "right" to call Josh on his bullshit because a) this is a family business and he looking out for his family's interests and b) Matt is his brother and he doesn't want Matt to have to put up with Josh's bullshit for two years while getting his MBA. I don't think for a minute Zach respects his parents. I am not sure he likes Wally much, but he does love Clara. That doesn't mean he respects them. He has that reflexive response where you do what your parents tell you to just because you always have. Zach has shown a little independence, but then he falls back on reflex and I think he uses his parents as an excuse when he wants. I had a mule once that wouldn't do a dang thing you told him until you hit him across his forehead with a 2 by 4. I think Zach is like this. Yes Will is volatile and no one is harder on Will than me (except you maybe), but I think this is the right approach to get Zach's attention. The Paris trip for me would be a redline in the sand. If Zach cannot honor that commitment then will he ever honor any commitment? I fucking hate little prima donna, spoiled, self indulgent, arrogant, hypocrite Will, but Arbour don't dare ever stop writing from Will's point of view and deprive me of such a cathartic release of anger and vehemence at a fictional character 🤣😄 Again, I think Volcano Will is justified in how he reacted. Will is NOT perpetuating a "football vs him tension". Will is reacting the same way when John did not honor his commitment to him and ironically broke that commitment with Zach. This is not about football, it is about a commitment that Zach made, and secondarily that Barry made. Will does not suffer people who do not honor commitments AND when breaking one of those commitments was also breaking it to the most respected, trustworthy person in his family.

It is great to see a new chapter in Gap Year as I work my way through Flux for a second time. If I was Will, I'd blow off what ever is going on in the house with the party crowd and just find a place to be with Travis where it is quiet and we could chill. This world where all teens want to do is drink, do shots, some X or whatever and get fucked up is completely foreign to me. I didn't do it as a teen, Matt didn't do it much as a teen and Thomas, our son, didn't do a lot of partying in high school. He did more than me, but still not a lot. I mean how many times can you get drunk, puke all over yourself, wake up with a raging headache and not even remember what you did the night before, before it gets old? I am a lot like Wade I think in that I a pretty low key, not wear my emotions on my sleeve and try not to give it away when things irritate me, unless I want it to be know without saying anything. Travis is a bit more introverted even than that. I wouldn't think non-stop drinking would be his scene.

I like Chicago a lot..... in very small doses. My fraternity house is headquartered basically on the campus of Northwestern University. I've been privileged to be on the staff of our Leadership School, which is in August, several times. It usually involves a few late nights on Rush Street and I do love the whole scene and vibe. But I am very glad to return to CA when I leave. Matt and Wade are very young still. Even by Gap Year they are still very young. I don't recall where the Cam storyline goes in this story or the future, but I like him. It is a shame the nice guys in the CAP series never get ahead. I get nice guys make for a boring Mark Arbour story, but maybe you could lend them out to one of the authors who writes less dramatic stories! 😄 I don't like the Hayes boys, except Brent, but Matt has matured this story. In just the last month he has grown up a lot.

Nine years later and this chapter is still powerfully emotionally in the context of the story and twenty-three years after 9-11 it can take me right back to that day and the days that followed. I think this is one of the best CAP chapters ever. And this also felt like the ending of the book, but we now know Flux had more false endings than Glenn Miller's In The Mood. Bravo