Black students at FDR High School in New York City in the late 1970s. Yep, I used to dress like this when I was a young teen.
His mother and my mother were best friends for years so it was natural we saw each other alot.
I would spend weeks in the summer with his family at his grandmother’s small house nestled in the farmland and pastures of Montgomery County.
And he would come to my home in the suburbs of Washington D.C. and go see Trouble Funk and the Barkays and The Jacksons at festival concerts at the Capitol Center.
“Barry” and I were like night and day. He was average height but muscular and strong and a star athlete on the football, baseball and basketball teams.
And I was the tall lanky geek who made good grades and could answer alot of the questions on trivia game shows.
But we got to be fast friends. Almost inseparable.
I still had an Afro, which was going out of style in 1979.
“You should cut your hair Manny and wear it in waves.”
“Okay cool,” I said, eager to to fit in and look hip.
First the barber did it but Barry had clippers and would touch up my hair.
Alone in his grandmother’s dark basement.
And he would lean over and would rub his crotch against me, his thick dick hard and hot against my arm.
And my heart would beat faster and I would move closer to him and put my hands in my lap to hide a burgeoning erection.
But we never said a word about it.
And at night we would sleep together and he would lay his thigh against mine.
At first I would pull away, embarrassed. But each time he would put his thigh back against mine and I would relent and let it stay. And we would snuggle closer.
I am 50 years old now but I can still close my eyes and remember how his muscular thigh felt against mine.
Smooth. Hard. Hot as an iron in a fire.
But we never spoke about it and things never went further.
Years later we are still friends but mostly on Facebook.
Like alot of former athletes he has gained weight and is pudgy. He got a couple of women pregnant and had to move back home with his mother to make ends meet.
So we are still like night and day.
Some of his cousins are gay and know me. So I know he knows I am out now. He has said in so many words he doesn’t care and accepts and loves me.
But we don’t really talk about it.
So I still wonder. What if we had taken it further? Way back in 1979.
