1995 - 2. Chapter Two

Chapter 2
Several weeks later I had found someone to assume my lease in Hell’s Kitchen. This is one of those moments in my life where I look back and wonder what would have happened if we had stayed. This Hell’s Kitchen apartment was very special to me. It was my first New York apartment with just my name on the lease, and it was really cheap. I suppose that was because of the pigeons, prostitutes and brown water-falls. It was my place, and who knows, I might have stayed there for many years if it hadn’t been for Terry. Instead, we left the airy, spacious, sunny 4 room legally rented apartment in a crummy neighborhood for a small, low ceilinged, dark 3 room illegally rented apartment in the greatest neighborhood in New York. At twice the price, remember.

The only reason we could afford this apartment at all is because it was a member of a vanishing breed; an un-renovated, rent controlled apartment. The couple, whose names were still on the lease, had undertaken the renovation themselves. Since they couldn’t live somewhere else while they worked on the apartment, they did little chunks at a time, and it showed. It was horrible. The most interesting feature of their reno was the shower. Originally, the apartment had had a tub in the kitchen. I’d seen those before and usually people put a big board on top of it and it became the kitchen table. Well, they’d gotten rid of the kitchen tub and installed a shower. In the kitchen. Right next to the front door. It looked as strange as it sounds. I don’t know a lot about Fung Shui, but a shower by the front door can’t be good, can it?

We couldn’t do anything about the shower, or the unfinished walls, so we cleaned the carpet as best we could of giant black dog fur and moved in. I can safely say that we both loved living in the village. Within 2 blocks of our new apartment was a laundry, supermarket, gay bar, 2 ice cream shops, many restaurants, an off-Broadway theater, a cheese shop and a pork store. Oh - and a porn theater, but I never went in. In our last apartment we had to walk 2 blocks just to find someone who wasn’t talking to themselves and scratching.

I should go back to something I said earlier, that I just couldn’t stay faithful for very long. It’s not that I had affairs or fell in love with someone else, I would just have sex. A lot. There were public toilets that were exciting to me. Men would stand at the urinals and masturbate while looking at each other’s dicks. It sounds sort of awful, and it was not a good place, but good for an afternoon thrill anyway.

A few blocks from our new apartment were the notorious piers. In the summer, gay men would congregate on them for nude sunbathing and cruising, and every so often even a little action would occur in the bright summer sun. My strange work schedule would have me working some days from 6 am to 10 pm, but with large chunks of time in the middle with nothing to do. So, sometimes I’d go tanning. There was also a large secluded rock in Central Park where men would gather on top to tan, mostly in their underwear, and this was a big turn-on for me as well.

I really loved Terry, I did. But I just couldn’t resist a seedy, scary and usually unfulfilling anonymous sexual encounter. I figured out later, far too late for Terry and me, that I had a bit of a sex addiction, and that it really wasn’t Terry, the problem really was me after all.

I loved New York City. I was an expert in New York history; could tell you stories as we walked down the sidewalk about half the buildings we’d pass. I was also a closet expert about two New York topics. First; I knew everyplace to pee in the city. Sure you could go into any restaurant, order an iced tea and feel free to use the facilities, but that was for amateurs. There were free restrooms scattered all around, but you had to know where they were, preferably before you desperately needed one. And I knew. I kept a map in my head of where they all were. Remember, I used to commute between jobs on my roller-blades, so I was out on the street a lot. Second; I knew everyplace to have illicit sex in the city. All of the bars which had back rooms had closed by then, and I’d never gone to them when they were open, I’d been too afraid. But I knew which bathroom in Central park was cruisy during the day, (which was also a crossover to my other list of places to pee). There were porn theaters near Times Square and Port Authority, areas of Central park at night, and when going to the beach, I knew where to go to find the naked men. It was all so irresistible to me and yet really gross at the same time. I loved it and hated it, couldn’t stop. You know, the basic addiction thing.

Soon after we moved in the village apartment, Terry quit his job at the TV show, where he said they never appreciated him, and started working for an LGBT non-profit. The money was pretty good, and he got to hob knob with bigwigs and celebrities. Our new apartment fit into his life perfectly. We’d bump into his professional acquaintances on the sidewalk, or in some store in our neighborhood, and he’d always say, “Have you met my partner Duane? We live just down the street and were just out for…” Not that I was immune to using our apartment as a calling card myself. Dropping the location of my home into a conversation seemed to invite entry into people’s trust and admiration. It was as if by virtue of my address alone, I was a successful New Yorker who was going places.

I was also not the only one with problems in our relationship. Terry had a chip on his shoulder the size of his higher education diploma. He was a large black man traveling in mostly white circles, and it wore on him. For some reason he thought the world should be fair, and he should get the rewards he felt he’d earned, and he had a high opinion of the rewards he thought he’d earned. He was also really tired of being a representative, and of people only seeing his skin, and not the full person. All this expressed itself in a sort of entitled superiority which I got tired of trying to see past. All of this resulted in me starting to “step out”. The more sex I had outside our relationship, the more distant I became. The more distant I became, the easier it was to have sex outside the relationship. We were doomed.