Doodles of the Mind - 1. Like Those Men

I was about fifteen, maybe sixteen, something like that. My body had just about lost all traces of past puppy fat as it stretched across longer limbs and developing muscle. As a schoolboy I was only now beginning to notice the attention I was getting from the girls around my own age. I even imagined that some men shared that interest. After all this was Sydney. And I knew some men in Sydney were like that.

I remember the exact day and every detail of that afternoon. I was on my usual train coming home from school seated on the long bench seats that stretch the length of the lower levels when I noticed this guy getting on the train one stop before my final destination.

He was in his twenties, tall and very blonde, with a dark tan and a well-defined athletic build. He was dressed simply in a muscle shirt, straight cut denim jeans and sneakers. Nothing about his clothes said anything particular about him but something about the way he moved, the way he stepped off the platform and through the doors of the train spoke volumes to me. He was one of those men.

He walked over to the bench and sat beside me. As the train moved unsteadily away from the station I could feel the pressure of his thigh brush against mine. Each time the carriage jolted and rolled I could feel his thigh. Suddenly I had an erection. I knew men got that way about other men but I didn’t know I did.

Eventually the train arrived to a halt at my station. The guy, this stranger, got up and got off, but I sat frozen. As the train moved off from the platform all I could do was listen to the sound of my own breath slowing.

I guess it was then, in that moment, I awoke from childhood and discovered who I was. I was like those men.