Knots 4

Chapter 2

Andy

Randy finally came to the hospital a couple days before I got out. We had a long heart-to-heart talk. The nurse was tampering with my tubes and catheter when he sauntered into my room like he didn’t have a care in the world.

I turned to the nurse. “Would you mind? We’d like to have some privacy.”

She knew my story and had heard the rumors because we’d talked some, so she gave me a knowing look that seemed to indicate she hated to leave. “I’ll be back in fifteen minutes.”

Randy pulled up a chair next to the bed. “So how you doing?”

“Better, but thanks to you everyone around here, at school, and at home thinks maybe I got hurt whoring around.”

He smiled. “You did.”

“You may think that’s funny, but I don’t. What the fuck’s the matter with you? Why did you open your big mouth?”

“I said it jokingly. I didn’t expect anyone to take me seriously. After all, you’re only sixteen.”

I leaned up on my good arm. “I’d beat the shit out of you if I wasn’t stuck in this bed. You can be stupid sometimes. Maybe it’s because you’re fifteen and not sixteen. You act like you’re proud of what you’re doing. I was too and now look at me.”

“It’s not a matter of pride except when I count the money. Hell, I’m getting rich.”

“Are you still taking single clients?”

“I did a couple more and made damn good money. Almost three thousand. But after looking at you, I’m thinking of telling Derrick he needs to be there with me and I’ll give him a cut.”

A surprised look crossed my face. “You mean he hasn’t asked for one yet?”

“No, but he’s been hinting at it. He backed off when I found him a couple guys who graduated last year and needed some college money. They’re in a better position than we are. They can actually spend it. They’re eighteen, but he’s passing them off as sixteen. We’re all making a lot of money.”

“You can do whatever you damn well please, but please keep Matt and me out of it. Tell everyone you were joking. Get the monkey off our backs. If the police find out that some nice middle-class kid like you is prostituting himself, you’re going to get jail time and a fine. I was reading up on this shit before this all happened and a lot of street kids are victims. They’ve been kicked out of their house for being gay and became prostitutes to survive. The police try to find them help, but in your case, they’re going to take your money and probably throw you in juvie.”

“Nice speech. But no one is going to find out.”

“That might be true if you keep your fucking mouth shut. But if you get beat up like me, or some john reports you, then you’ll be in deep shit and so will the rest of us. Keep your fucking mouth shut.”

“Derrick said that from now on he’s going to screen clients more carefully. That will help. Hell, he’s just been pimping since you and Matt came on board. He has a lot to learn himself.”

I shook my head. “Yeah, and when he does, he’s going to treat you like every other pimp treats his whores, like shit. Maybe it seems okay now, but that could change overnight. Keep that in mind. My suggestion is that you leave this shit to the older guys and go back to being an everyday high school student. That’s what I’m going to do.”

He stood. “Being an everyday high school student is boring shit. This is fun. I’m not going to play football this year so I have plenty of time. My parents are pissed and they’re wondering what’s going on, but now I have all the time in the world after school as long as I get my homework done and stay out of trouble. Fortunately, my parents are a bit clueless. They know I’m gay after everything that happened with Dillon, so while they have some concerns, they know I’m having sex. So as long as they don’t know I’m prostituting myself, I think I’m fine.”

Suddenly, I felt like a parent. Go figure. “What kind of life is that? It seemed cool to me too, but I’d rather be playing football right now instead of missing one more football season. This makes two seasons I missed. I never knew how much football meant to me until I couldn’t do them. You can’t spend the money without someone noticing and you’re going to miss three years of basketball and football. That’s something you’ll never be able to get back. Do you really think it’s worth it?”

He shrugged. “That’s something like my parents might say if they could be as rational as you. But my motto is to live life now. I’ll sock that money away and when I’m eighteen, I’ll be out of here and be way ahead of the game. While other guys are taking out college loans, I’ll be able to pay for college.”

I couldn’t help but laugh. “You obviously don’t know how much college costs. You’ll have to do a lot of whoring between now and then to earn enough for one year of college, never mind four. And aren’t your parents going to wonder where you got the money?”

“I’ll go to community college for two years and keep on whoring. By then I’ll have enough to pay for the last two years.”

His thinking impressed me even though it shouldn’t have. “So you have your whole life planned out?”

“Yep.”

“That’s great unless you happen to get killed or get so badly beaten that you’re handicapped for the rest of your life. How would you manage if someone cut up that pretty face and body of yours and left scars from one end to the other?”

He shrugged again. “I don’t have time to worry about that. You know what they say, take it one day at a time. That’s what I plan to do.”

I pressed the button to tilt the head of my bed up more. “It’s your life, Randy. You can do with it whatever you want, but just leave Matt and me out of it, okay?” At first I was going to threaten him but figured it would cause a negative reaction. Plus, I wasn’t in any position to do anything about it.

“Okay. I’ll stop the shit,” he said. But sometimes it’s hard to put the genie back in the bottle.”

“Just do your best.”

He smiled at me and patted the cast on my arm. “Gotta go. Hope you’re better soon.” Randy backed toward the door, still looking at me, his eyes and face showing some doubt. But it only lasted for a second before he turned and left the room.

My nurse returned. “Did you get everything worked out?”

“Yeah.”

“Isn’t he the boy that’s been spreading rumors about you?”

I tightened my eyebrows. “What do you know about that?”

“Just the rumor mill around here. Nothing goes unnoticed.”

“He was just joking around. That’s what we were talking about. He’s going to make sure the rumors stop. I’m too young to be doing whatever you heard. What did you hear?”

She fiddled with the heart monitor as we talked. “The rumor is that the boy who was just in here started the story about you being a prostitute and he said one of your customers beat you up.”

I frowned. “Why would anyone believe his story over mine? After all, I was there.”

“I believe you. Relax, your heart rate is going up.”

Matt

The first few days back at school and at lunch were tense because of the rumors about Andy being a prostitute. Gina and Emily defended him. Ollie, Alan, and Ernie remained neutral and of course everyone wanted to know what I thought. I defended him when in fact I was also defending myself. The conversations didn’t do much for my self-image.

“Why would anyone accuse Andy of being a prostitute? He’d never do anything like that,” Emily said. “He’s done some stupid things in his life, but he’d never go that low. It’s about the lowest thing a person can do, having sex for money.”

Gina added. “It disgusts me to think about the whole thing. Think of the guys you’d have to have sex with. And you have to please them all. Disgusting.”

Alan pressed his lips and nose together as if something smelled. “Yeah, I can’t imagine. What do you think, Matt?”

“Uh. I agree.”

Ernie pointed at me. “Is that all you have to say? After all, rumor has it that you were involved too. Doesn’t that kinda piss you off?”
“Hell yeah! But they’re just rumors, and since neither Andy or I would do anything like that, why bother with it. The idea is disgusting, but after all, prostitution is the oldest profession.”

Ollie jumped into the conversation. “So you’re saying it’s disgusting, but it’s okay with you?”

“I didn’t say that. Anyway, I’d rather not talk about it. It seems like lunch is always full of drama. Can’t we just eat and enjoy the fact we’re finally juniors. Plus, I’m thinking about running for junior class president.” That got everyone’s attention.

“Do you think that’s a good idea? Gina asked. “With all the rumors going around, even if they’re not true, the rumors will be used against you. They don’t run campaigns like they used to.”

“I know. But I have to give it a try. I need to get my life back on track. I’m fighting for the starting QB job, and I’ve planned on running for junior class president since I was moved up to the varsity last year when I was a sophomore.”

“They’re going to use Andy against you too.” Ollie motioned at Thomas and me. “Everyone already knows the four of you messed around together. Kids may be more open minded than they used to be, but I’m not sure they’re into foursomes and voting for an orgy master.”

That pissed me off. Everyone stared at Ollie and then me.

“That’s almost as disgusting as prostituting yourself for money,” Gina said.

“So why are any of you bothering to have lunch with me if I’m so disgusting?” I got up, gave them a hurt look, as if I was innocent of all charges, and left the cafeteria like a ship lost at sea. Andy wasn’t around and I had nowhere to go. I heard someone calling after me and turned around and saw Thomas. I remember thinking, Yeah, Thomas will understand. The other’s might not, but Thomas will.

Andy

By time I got out of the hospital, the news about my beating had been on TV and in the newspapers. All reports indicated that there were a lot of unanswered questions, but that the victim (me), was out of the hospital and at home.

I may as well have been in prison. My mom took time off work to stay with me. They set up a hospital bed in the formal dining room so I didn’t have any privacy. And of course I had a lot of regrets for my stupidity, not just for selling myself and getting beaten, but because it seemed like no matter what I did, someone was going to discover that I was prostituting and it was a john that beat me up. My only hope was that Randy could put an end to the rumors.

There were plenty of visitors at our house and of course a lot of questions, most of which I managed to pass off by repeating my story. Just like my parents, everyone wanted to know what I was doing in Rockbury when I should have been at football practice. How do you explain that away when you have the potential to be a starting halfback? I kept thinking, It would have been easier to explain if the guy dropped me off in a field outside of Canby where we lived. I couldn’t help but think about what Matt’s dad said a lot: “Hindsight is always 20/20.” How true that is.

Emily brought my schoolwork and scolded me every time she came by. “What the hell is the matter with you? You disappoint me sometimes. I thought your lowest point was when you broke your leg when we were sophomores, but here you are in bed because some fag hater beat the hell out of you because you decide to hang around with Randy, of all people. What the hell were you thinking?”

It was almost the same speech every time she came by. It pissed me off at the time, but now I know it was because she was really scared for me. But at the time I told her to get off my back and let it go. She did for the rest of her visit and then it would start all over again the next time she came over.

In the meantime, I was stuck in bed and couldn’t even go to school. Matt came by every day after practice and told me about the battle going on between him and Frank Kutcher. Matt said Kutcher and Jackass Barnes kept hinting that they knew Matt and I were into prostitution. Fortunately, Randy did what he was told and did his best to quell the rumors. But you know what they say about letting the genie out of the bottle: You can’t put it back in. And like Matt said, you un-ring a bell or untie a ganglion of rope that that doesn’t have a name and follows no rules. Well, it was something like that.

A lot of GSA members came by. Like I said before, I thought it was the one good thing I’d done in my life. But hell, I was only sixteen and how many great things were you supposed to have done anyway. The thing is that if you put that one good thing on a scale on one side and the stupid things I’d done on the other, it would be way out of balance. And like the quote Matt placed at the end of the last chapter by Benjamin Franklin: “It takes many good deeds to build a good reputation, and only one bad one to lose it.” I pretty much had a damn good understanding of what he meant. I’m not sure it would have made any difference if I’d have heard it before I tied all the knots in my life, but I sure understand it a lot better now. Too bad we sometimes can only learn from our mistakes. Teenagers are too often unwilling to listen to the wisdom of those older and wiser than them because they think they have all the answers.

It’s just like a quote I heard that went something like this: Those who do not learn from the past are doomed to repeat it. I wanted to know who said it so I looked it up on the Internet while I was lying in bed and found out it was said by some intellectual dude named George Santayana.

So here I was in bed, having known the highs and lows of sex, been a male prostitute, a starting football player, organizer of the GSA club and wondering exactly what I had learned from my past. Sex became meaningless once people paid me for it and I was performing for people I didn’t know and might not even like. Yeah, it was cool at first, but in the end, I was lying in bed broken in pieces inside and out. Maybe I wasn’t beaten by one of our regular customers, but if I hadn’t been prostituting myself, it might never have happened. It would have been different if one of the anti-GSA guys actually did pick me up while I was walking and beat the crap out of me, but this guy was a paid customer. I figured he got his money’s worth.

At least I was alive. But I laid in bed with visions of dicks and assholes dancing in my head. Maybe the images, which used to be so hot, would fade over time, but who knew when that would happen. At least Matt had football and his campaign for junior class president to keep him busy. But when we talked, he told me he had the same problem of seeing dicks and assholes dancing in his head as he laid in bed at night or sat in class daydreaming. The Matt I used to know when we were young was no longer there. Yes, he looked the same and sounded the same, but inside his head, he was different. I understood just how he felt, and it made it all the worse for me because I knew exactly what he was feeling.

Matt

Thomas caught up with me as I started out of the cafeteria. “Don’t let those guys get to you. We’ve made some mistakes, but we’ll get over it. The rumors will end eventually. Plus, I know you’d never prostitute yourself for money. You’re not like that.”

Tears started to well in my eyes. “Do you really believe that?”

“Yes, Matt. You’d never do something like that.”

I wanted to tell him he was wrong and that his trust and belief in me was misplaced, but I thought it would hurt him as much as it would hurt me to admit it. “Thanks, Thomas. That means a lot to me.” I changed the subject. “How are you and Colton getting along?”

Thomas smiled. “Great! We’re going slow. I’m a lot more experienced than he is and that has its drawbacks because I want to just plunge right into his ass and have him plunge into mine. But I think I’d lose him. We kiss, make out, and rub each other when we’re alone. We’ve been naked together a few times, but he’s shy and self-conscious. We cuddle a lot and I tell him what a beautiful body he has. He does, you know. You’ve seen him. He’s tall, maybe almost six feet. His dick reflects his height.” Thomas smiled. “His body is hairless and smooth. I love just lying next to him naked, our dicks hard and pressing against each other. It takes everything in my power to hold myself back.”

“Have you asked him if he’s ready for more?”

“Yeah, and he always says he’ll tell me when he’s ready. Do you have any advice, you know, you being an experienced prostitute.” He gave me a loud laugh as if it was just a bit of funny satire.

“Well, being the experienced prostitute that I am, this is what I think you should do: Take your finger and stick it in your mouth. Get it all lubed, nestle it against his asshole, and rub around the edges. Do it nice and slow while you wait for his moans, and then slowly slip your finger in so he has a chance to experience the pleasure of having something in his ass. That would be a good warm up. If you’re lucky, before you know it, he’ll be pleading for you to stick your cock in his ass.”

We both laughed.

Thomas patted me on the back. “Ah, you are so wise, Master. I may just do that.”

I put him in a headlock. “Report back to me on the results.”

He pulled loose from my hold. “Well, while I welcome your advice, I think what we do is private, so you’ll just have to figure it out with a glance at my face. If you see me smiling, you’ll know the answer.”

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Chapter Quotes

Reality is easy. It's deception that's the hard work. - Lauryn Hill

An offended heart is the breeding ground of deception. - John Bevere

Now I believe I can hear the philosophers protesting that it can only be misery to live in folly, illusion, deception and ignorance, but it isn't -it's human. - Desiderius Erasmus

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If you like this story, please write a review, click like, and follow me. Contact me at eliassctt@gmail.com I answer all emails.

I’d like to thank Lisa for taking the time to edit Knots 1, 2, & 3. As the author, I take final responsibility for all parts of the story, including any errors.

This story is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author's imagination and are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, events or locales, is purely coincidental and no slanderous intent is implied.