Ode On A Grecian Turn

ODE ON A GRECIAN TURN

By Katharine Sexkitten

By anyone's standards, he was an exemplary man, inside and out.

Tall, and handsome, fit, and gregarious.

Appealing to those he met, with his open vitality and his natural enthusiastic curiosity about everything and everyone, he had an honest care and concern for people from all walks of life, and showed it. Not a single human would ever spend any time with him and not think of him as charming, affable, and kind, intelligent and quick-witted. Most women, and if they were honest with themselves most men, were captivated with the obvious twinkle in his eyes, and the burbling cauldron of positive energy that glowed from within him, which, combined with his early-middle-age mature runway model rugged out-door appearance, just added to his allure.

Highly-educated, he was a teacher, and a scholar, and a modestly-successful writer of three well-received non-fiction books. His lectures were almost always standing-room only. Tenured, with enough of a 'celebrity' that students paid big money to attend the university just to study under him, he was one of the institutions biggest draws in their never-ending recruitment drives. Their most famous alumnae, it was said. He'd been on a few national television shows over the years, doing interviews for his books, or as the occasional 'expert' brought on to discuss issues relating to events around the world, as they applied to his area of knowledge.

There were photographs of him with movie stars, from chance encounters at various media events he'd been invited to over the years, which he refused to put on the wall of his office or his classroom, because to him they were trivial, and unnecessary distractions, but which hung with pride near the administration offices, enlarged and formally framed, and were known to the entire student body. One of the more popular pictures of him, the one that usually got published in the local papers whenever there was any mention of him, was taken within the last few years, with an Oscar-winning actress, all the rage at the time, hanging on his arm, a look of rapt attention and desire on her face, gazing into his clear blue eyes, her smile inimitable, her gown daring and brazenly showy, her excitement evident. People assumed they were a couple, or had been one for at least some period of time, and occasionally he was asked about her, and though he found it all unconnected to education or any relevant discussions of knowledge, he would smile politely and say something genuinely nice about her, something warm and sensitive, while making it plainly evident that the subject was off-limits because it wasn't germane to learning.

And yet he was as down-to-earth as your next-door neighbor.

No one could imagine a single human being on this planet not liking him. No one.

Which was what generated the most shocked reactions, when he received a death threat.

An envelope, lain discretely in his mailbox one day while he was out, without a single fingerprint on it according to the police, that had a sheet of folded paper inside, with four words spelled out in smaller pieces of paper cut from random publications, so there was no handwriting that could be analyzed.

Four words.

You will die soon.

Interviewed by detectives for days, they kept asking him for a name, any name, of anyone who might have reason to dislike him, even a little, or want him dead, and he honestly couldn't find a single one, searching his memory banks the whole time, which is what frightened him the most.

Former lovers? No, he was on good terms with them, not that there were many, but all still strong positive relationships to this day, as far as he knew.

A disgruntled former student, who didn't get the grade they'd expected from their semi-famous professor? Not a single one sprung to mind.

Angry neighbor?

None. They were all visited, quietly, and to a person they had nothing but good things to say about 'that nice Mr. Diakos', and were believed.

Had he written something in one of his books that pissed somebody off? A theory or conjecture that offended someone's sensibilities enough to threaten death? He had no way of knowing, of course, but rational thought said no. He studied and taught history, for gosh shakes, that's all, and anything he'd written about or published was academia, pure and simple. He hadn't advocated for any particularly scandalous philosophy or political bent, or argued against some standard or accepted belief system. Looking for whoever was threatening him using that train of thought seemed like folly, and a gigantic waste of time.

He genuinely couldn't find a reference in his own life that would lead someone to hate him, even a little, let alone enough to threaten to kill him. The very idea of it seemed impossible to believe. But, not knowing anything, it turns out, even the tiniest little sliver of a clue or a hope, was worse than the alternative.

The cops checked all his medias, of course, his online presence, and found nothing, no emails or texts or posts of any kind, anywhere in cyberspace. It was all quite the opposite. Everything they read just supported their own opinion, that he was a decent friendly successful man, with no enemies at all. The publisher he'd signed with included a staff of hundreds, and none of them could name a single person that had ever said anything negative about the man. There was nothing to go on, and the investigation naturally ground more or less to a halt.

Until the second threat, a few weeks later, after he'd begrudgingly adopted new routines, taking different routes to work, leaving and arriving home at unpredictable times, while keeping his outside activities to a subdued level, even knowing that the police were actively patrolling his area, usually in unmarked cars.

Delivered in the same way, with no neighbors or people out and about seeing anything, this time the accompanying letter had five small pieces of paper, glued-on.

I will kill you soon.

The detectives were baffled, and they were honest about it, their frustration and lack of any clues adding to his growing concern, scaring him even more than he'd become used to, and for a man who'd spent his whole life confidently safe and free of threats, someone strong and physically capable of defending himself against the same dangers every normal person faces, a blizzard of worry began to eat at him, from the inside, because none of this was normal.

He wasn't without money, his books successful by contemporary standards even if they weren't best-sellers, and he wasn't anybody's idea of someone without smarts, so while it disgusted him to even consider the idea of hiring security guards to watch him, day in and day out, completely eliminating his privacy, he mused and mused and came up with an idea that might succeed.

At work he felt safe. Even in the hallways of academia, or the giant lecture rooms, delivering his lessons to a sea of faces, all above him, the rooms built like small concert halls, he didn't feel cause for worry. These were modern times, which sadly dictated security in all the buildings, cameras and metal detectors and armed personnel everywhere. Sure, he rationalized, someone could sneak a gun in and shoot at him, but unless they were in the front row they'd probably miss in the first place, and in the second place there didn't seem to be any chance they'd get away with it, so many witnesses and all, and the very idea of it seemed far-fetched.

So his biggest concern was at home. Years ago, flush with book-sales money, for the first time in his life he'd splurged. He bought an impressive-sized house and property on a quiet street in an upper-middle-class neighborhood, which over the years he had filled with art and his treasured library, and other than his cat, Scout, the place was empty during the days. His property backed onto a city parkway space, with copses of trees and walking trails, lots of land but no buildings, which is what had sold him on the house when he was shopping, where it was easy for him to slip out the gate in his tall privacy fence and go for a run, or a hike, or just immerse himself in nature when he felt the need, but made it equally easy for anyone with a grudge to get close to him witness-free and get away even safer.

He considered moving. Some of the police officers suggested it, from a purely prudent point of view. As one of them uttered, "it's kinda hard for them to kill you when they don't know where you are."

But the idea of giving into the threat rankled him. It felt, to him, like he'd be letting the bad guy win, in some small way. It felt like admitting defeat, admitting that he'd been gotten to, and that he'd been affected by the nonsense.

A mostly quiet-living private man, his solution was to do something he'd been hesitant to do most of his life. He would offer up space in his house to a room-mate. Or, more appropriately, a house-mate. A boarder. Not a room-mate, per se, because he wasn't thinking along those lines at all, but someone to live in the house, hopefully being there as much as was reasonable, when he was there or when he wasn't, a presence in the building that might deter anyone from breaking in and lying in wait. Just having another soul in the house seemed like it would increase the potential danger for any would-be assailant, doubling the risks and therefore halving the opportunity.

It was a big step for him. He preferred living alone, and always had. A naturally gregarious man, he also treasured his quiet time. Like his cat, he could easily spend his free time eschewing interaction with others. He'd had chances and opportunities to cohabitate in the past and he'd always managed to avoid them. Not the traditional definition of a loner, since he was quite out-going and socially-enthusiastic, he still preferred his 'me' time to be solitary, and without having to share space with others.

And besides, every woman he'd ever tried to form a permanent relationship with had turned out to be exactly what he couldn't bear, controlling. Not to mention that their promises of 'not trying to change him because he was perfect just the way he was' always quickly became lies. They all tried to change him, in various ways.

Call it vain, he didn't care. There was no reason for him to change anything, was how he viewed things. He was, as they'd said, perfect.

Perfectly at peace with the world, at all times.

Perfectly serene, and tranquil.

Perfectly programmed to work hard, and play even harder.

Most of all, he was perfectly dedicated to hedonism, every second of the day, that gloriously selfish pursuit of pleasures, wherever they can be found. Art, nature, athleticism, wine, food, and best of all, sex, they were the goals, and they were the purest and highest form of truly living. He was perfectly capable of living on that elevated plane, one of joyous positivity, every second of the hour, taking the stark realization that every day could by your last to a natural extension, which is to live like you mean it, and adopt the philosophy that you must not just give in but blatantly and vigorously go after your desires and your lusts at all times, in case you don't ever get another chance.

So his plan to open up his house to a stranger had some serious conditions in it. Whoever he chose, they had to be respectfully quiet, and they had to enjoy their own solitude as much as he did, as much as possible, while still being sociable when necessary. Easy to get along with, but never overbearing, or prone to soap-opera behavior. And most importantly of all, they had to be self-sustaining and meticulously neat. He couldn't stand disorder of any kind, in his work or in his home, and, again, like his cat, he was fastidious, and expected nothing less from everyone else.

He didn't want a live-in bodyguard, which is what some of the police were suggesting. He didn't want to deal with that intimidation, that competition of testosterone that almost inevitably rises up when two men live together, even if one was working for the other. He'd learned in his younger days, in the dorms of the very university he now worked for, that more than one alpha male in the vicinity always affected everybody's morale, sometimes up, sure, but most times down, often in small niggly ways, but still. Too much testosterone in the mix could result in minor inconveniences, if nothing else.

Equally, he didn't want a woman, for a couple of reasons. One, that a woman might perhaps be seen by the bad guy as a weak point, as less of a challenge during an attack, and two, because living platonically with women was never his strong point.

Neither was living with women romantically, as it had turned out.

He loved women. He'd loved several women, over the years. They could be so beautiful, and alluring, and enchanting, and flirtatious, and playful, and soft, and wonderful to hold, and touch. He loved their gentle spirits, so yin to his yang, and their softness, and grace, and the way they responded to romance, and intimacy, when they allowed themselves to.

His life's one failing, though, was he'd never found a woman who had all those qualities but who also shared in his insatiable lust for pleasures of the flesh. Not just love-making, in all its varieties, although that was certainly a significantly major part of it, but also the other pleasures to be found in daily life, at a moment's notice, if the will was there. The sights and the smells and the tastes of nature, the breath-taking exhilaration of revelry, the celebration of bacchanalian pursuits, the pursuit of knowledge, those were all characteristics that defined pleasure to him, the fuel that burned in both is body and his soul, that drove him forward every second of the day.

More years ago than he cared to remember he'd given up hope that such a woman existed, and despite his miniscule amount of 'fame', which he found odd to begin with, he'd spent the vast majority of his life working, and alone, by choice.

But he was never lonely. There'd been lovers.

One in particular became the very source of his plan, the wellspring of the idea.

He knew what he wanted, in terms of a housemate.

If he was going to go to that length, and share his home, there was only going to be one possible way it could work.

He'd have to buy some things, first.

I was an avid student of history. I always had been.

Of Scottish and English descent, on both sides of my family, I was raised and surrounded by the centuries-long story of the British Isles, the rich mythological saga of what became the most powerful imperial force ever. We weren't wealthy enough to actually go there, but I grew up with a wide array of books and videos and television and the internet, and it always seemed pretty obvious to everyone that I was enrapt by it all, the royalty, the battles, the different races, the conquerors, the language, the culture that evolved, all of it. So with most of their life savings my parents splurged and paid for me to go to a prestigious university, to study history, even though they seriously doubted that there would be any worthwhile jobs available once I got my degree. I think they assumed I'd end up as a teacher of some sort, which made them worry about my chances of success at that, because I was not the most out-going person in the world, not even close.

I was of two minds about being at school. On the plus side, I loved the studying, and the research, and the work. The atmosphere of being on campus, in this lauded institute of higher learning, it all enthralled me. Men and women, all of us now adults, beginning our outward journey in life, and the very fact that I was there among them elated me. And yes, being away from my family was a little scary, especially at first, but I managed to feed myself and clothe myself.

On the negative side, everything else, most particularly my dorm life, just made me uncomfortable, with one minor exception. My room-mate was okay. An even bigger nerd than I was, he practically made me look cool, and he was quiet, and kept his nose in his books most all the time. So I lucked out in that respect, and we got along fine. But the house itself was raucous, and raging most hours of the day, and none of that was anything I felt like doing. I'd never been much of a party guy, or a rah-rah guy.

My efforts paid off. By my junior year, not only were my grades excellent, because I loved the subject matters, but that lead to plum assignments assisting Professors, mostly organizing things and helping with boring paperwork, but occasionally researching certain claims made in various submissions, getting to dive headlong into discovery, learning from scholars of every age and the tomes they'd written. I was majoring in British history, and getting paid the small dollar to further my own education!

I'd heard of Dr. Diakos, of course. Everybody had. He was a bigger star than the football team or the basketball team. He'd written books, and dated an actress or two, what's-her-name from that weird spy movie, and been on CNN a few times, and got talked about more often than anybody else, from what I heard. His specialty was Greek history, of course, with a name like that his heritage must have inspired him directly backwards just like mine did to me, and while I had never taken in any of his lectures I knew they were popular, with people standing in the aisles, his reputation as a spell-binding and entertaining speaker preceding him. He was a celebrity, of sorts.

So I was surprised when one of my Professors, after a lecture about politics in England during the Renaissance, told me that Professor Diakos had put a quiet word out amongst his peers that he was looking for someone for a specific task. What that task was he had little idea, but the requirements were such that I more or less fit the bill, if I was interested.

An appointment was set up. I was excited, although a little nervous, since I had no idea what a person of his stature would be looking for in his staff that he didn't already have. I wore my best shirt, and pants.

Walking into his office was like walking into a curated museum. There were relics and statues and carvings and stuff my mom would call knick-knacks everywhere, every inch that wasn't covered in piles of books and papers, some of them looking older than the university itself. And yet none of it looked out-of-place, or disorderly. I got the immediate impression that this was a structured headquarters, which made me presume he was a structured person. There was art everywhere, on every wall, neatly hung, all of them level. A few were diplomas of his, the number of degrees he had, some honorary, more than I could hope to attain in a lifetime, but most of the frames held reproductions of classic Greek art, portraits of gods and heroes and historical figures.

His specialty.

Why, I wondered, would he want a British history major to work for him?

Rising from behind his desk, he was larger and taller than I'd imagined. At full stretch he was an inch or two over six feet, and he had the long arms of a tall person, one of them pointed at me, offering to shake my hand. The smile on his face was radiant. His teeth were snow-white, which contrasted magnificently with the deep tan of his Mediterranean background. And he had the most amazing clear blue eyes. I felt like I was in a spotlight, he was glowing with so much energy, and it all seemed to be aimed at me.

The skin of his palm was warm, my hand barely over half the size of his, and his heat, combined with his charisma, which didn't seem put on at all, was mesmerizing.

It ran right through me.

He had a thick head of tousled curly and curvy coal-black hair, all of it swept-back, naturally. He'd probably shaved in the morning and yet he had a thick five-o'clock shadow at noon.

He had tufts of black hair jutting out from the top of his equally-snow-white shirt, a collared one, unbuttoned down two. His suit jacket was hung on the back of his office chair, and he'd rolled up his sleeves, displaying thick hairy wrists on deep brown skin and long thick fingers. His pants were a crisp dark grey, ironed and pleated, and he had dark loafers on his bare feet that were polished so well they shone in the rays of the overhead fluorescent lighting.

"Thank you for coming," he said, his voice deep and rich and full of life, "won't you have a seat?"

My presumption was that I'd sit opposite him, at his desk, for what was a job interview of some sort, but instead he'd pointed to two over-sized leather chairs with a small table between them, under the windows, bathed in a dappled sunlight from the trees outside. It was a far more informal spot than I was expecting.

"Can I offer you any coffee? Or tea, perhaps?"

I opted for the coffee.

As he poured two cups for us he spoke.

"Dr. Taylor speaks very highly of you," he said, before asking me if I wanted milk or sugar, and after adding my little shot of whitener he delivered our mugs to the table, sitting down opposite me, continuing, "he's most impressed with your work, and your work ethic."

I felt my face flush a little red.

"That's really nice of him to say."

"Alastair is not usually easy to impress," he added, almost conspiratorially, with a wink and a smile, "in my experience," and he smiled again, wider, with that million-watt energy, "so I congratulate you, sincerely. Getting his seal of approval is no small accomplishment."

I couldn't think of a thing to say.

"More importantly," he continued, "he has only the most positive things to say about your character, your demeanour, and the way you interact with others. And, to top all of that, he praised your obvious enthusiasms, your love of history, the lore, and your natural desires to learn. Those were his words, not mine."

He took a sip of his own coffee, and looked at me. I didn't feel like I was being judged, based on his stare, but I did get the impression he was taking me in, analyzing my shape and my appearance. It just seemed like he was interested in knowing me, all the aspects of me, including how I looked.

"And those qualities," he said, "those are the most commendable, so bravo, young man."

I could tell he meant it.

"Tell me about you," he suggested, so I gave him the cleaned-up story. Age, family, general background, etc. Then I gushed a little bit talking about my love of the history of the British Isles, how it had captivated me since forever, and I could see my zeal was infecting him, his smiles getting bigger when I mentioned certain milestones in my life and education, as if he shared the same kinds of desires and appreciated the same kinds of steps along the path, because, I realized, his life had also been dedicated to history and academia, so we had something in common.

When I mentioned how I loved reading ancient manuscripts, detailing life from long ago, and that England and Scotland and Ireland and Wales provided so many that were just so old, he grinned, and shook his head.

"I applaud your enthusiasm and your ardor, my young friend" he said, "but those aren't old. If it's the truly ancient that fascinates you," he bragged, "transfer your major right now, and come study with me. Come study Greece. That's old."

With a chin dip, I acknowledged that of course he was right.

"And rich," he added, "a rich tableau of subject matter that still resonates to this day in almost every part of the world and every aspect of modern life. Philosophy, politics, science, the arts, they were all cornerstones of a truly advanced society, and continue as we speak. Now, many of my contemporaries label the Middle East, most specifically parts of modern-day Iraq and Iran and Jordan, as the 'birthplace of civilization', and I'm not disagreeing with them. But," he added, emphatically, "if the Middle East is the birthplace of civilization, then Greece is where it grew up and became an adult."

I could understand why he was an occasional guest on television shows. He had a confident easy manner, combined with an obvious wealth of knowledge, and he was a great communicator.

Without trying to sell me on switching things up and diverting to Greek history, he tried to sell me on switching things up and diverting.

He was a very charming and persuasive talker.

"No matter," he grinned, "I'm sure that the study of more modern-day Celts and Normans is equally stimulating."

We both had a laugh.

"So," he began, a more serious tone forming on his face, "you're wondering why I asked to meet you, yes?"

I nodded.

He smiled, a tinge of nervousness appearing.

"Before I get too far," he said, "I should state the obvious, which is that anything we discuss here today, no matter the conclusion, is strictly between the two of us. Do I have your agreement on that?"

I nodded again.

"Because," he added, a slight hesitation in his voice, "there are aspects of what we're about to get into that could easily be construed as personal and nobody else's business, and there are some aspects that must be understood to be possibly hazardous, or even dangerous."

That last word made a flare of worry shoot up my spine.

His face was watching me, and he was immediately taken over with consideration and empathy for me.

"Don't worry," he said, softly, "it's nothing all that devastating, really. I promise."

For some reason, even though I didn't know him, I got the immediate feeling that he meant it, that his promise was good.

"I am hoping to find someone to assist me, temporarily, in my home," he said, matter-of-factly, and before I could ask what kind of assistance he needed, he continued, "although at this point I can't begin to guess at how long it's required. It could be a matter of a few days to a few weeks or even months. Hopefully not too long, if everything works out well. But in any event, it would be a live-in position."

"Live-in?" I asked, surprised.

He nodded.

"Doing what?" I asked, tentatively.

He smiled.

"Sharing my home."

I could only imagine that a person of his stature lived in a nice place, presuming it would be upper-class, and instead of any of the other subjects I could ask about, probably because I was a typical example of the starving student cliché, the question of money immediately popped into my brain.

"How much would that cost, for my rent?"

He smiled again, and shook his head.

"I would pay you."

It was easy to see that I had a confused look on my face, just based on his reaction, which was to lean forward, closer to me, creating a kind of intimacy, and his eyes softened and his voice got quieter.

"Here's the part that must stay between us," he said, and raised his eyebrows to silently make a point, "I have received two death threats against me," and I burst out in pure unfiltered reaction, "oh no!" but he shrugged a look of 'don't worry' at me, and continued, "the police assure me it's almost certainly a prank, that sometimes famous people get these kind of messages, even minor-leaguers like me. No doubt it's some bozo that gets his jollies being a jerk. That's all. And if the pros think it's probably nothing, I'm going to listen to them. They're the educated ones in that subject, not me."

That made sense.

"But a rational person also has to make some changes, sometimes, just to be able to look in the mirror and call themselves responsible. Nothing over-the-top, mind you, but something. So I could hire security. I could hire a bodyguard. But those are all unnecessary over-reactions, in my mind, so I'm thinking that a perfectly acceptable and reasonable decision is to just increase my awareness by a step or two by increasing the presence around me a step or two. And the best way to do that is to find someone to be there with me. Just having more than me in the house increases the odds that no one will try anything, plainly put. So," he paused, "so I am simply hoping to have someone to keep me company and keep my mind off things, until it all settles."

I couldn't think of a thing to say or ask.

"It'll be a blessing to have another soul around," he admitted, "I have a rather busy life, between my classes and my research and my writing. I have an agent, as well, who only makes money when I do and is constantly harping on me to do more personal appearances, lectures and speaking engagements, so there are times I'm on the road, leaving the house empty and cold. Plus," he added, with a warm smile, "my cat would probably appreciate the occasional head rub as well."

"And," I started to ask, and then paused, and then started again, "and you'd want to pay me?"

He smiled again, warm as sunshine.

"Of course," he stated, adamantly, "I'm the one asking for help, it's only right."

"What would I be expected to do, while I'm there?" I asked, nervously.

"Live your life," he said, his voice bubbly, "study, relax, exercise, watch t. v., whatever it is you would normally do. I have a small home gym, and a media room, with a large-screen for watching movies, there's a hot tub, and a patio, and a big back yard with a huge tall fence that no one can possibly see into. Use them, whenever you want."

"That's it?"

He nodded his head.

"That's it. A house-mate, is all I'm looking for. Now, it goes without saying that there are basic things that must be done, like cleaning up after yourself and respecting my property, naturally," and I nodded my agreement, "and there'll be no parties with scores of rowdy university students," and I shook my head no, like, that's a ridiculous concept, "but other than that, there are no chores, or duties that you'd have to do."

I took the last sip of my coffee and thought of what I would say.

"There's no Mrs. Dr. Diakos?" I asked, remembering the pictures of him with women, famous or not.

He leaned forward and touched me on the lower arm, a warm and reassuring gesture.

"Please," he asked, "call me Theo," and before I could say anything he answered my question.

"And no, I'm not married."

He looked at me, with an appreciative mien.

"Like you, I suspect, my life and my time are predominantly dedicated to my work," he explained, rising to his feet while offering me a refill of coffee and pouring himself one as well, "and between teaching and writing and the occasional public appearance, I've neither the time nor the energy to dedicate to a relationship like that. It would be completely unfair to any prospective partner of mine to even consider such a move, to be honest. A wife would quite naturally expect to be front and center, which she should be, of course," and he sighed a little, "so I've never even considered the possibility."

Taking a sip of my second cup, the coffee hot and rich and strong, he sat again and looked at me inquisitively.

"And you?" he asked, "anything serious going on in that department?"

I shook my head, emphatically.

"No sir," I said, a little meekly, partially embarrassed to even consider talking about my love life, which was more or less non-existent.

"Mmm," he hummed, "well, you're young, and there's plenty of time for that, but if I can offer one piece of advice, it's this," and he paused, and I found myself leaning forward, eager to glean anything that might help me out, "live and love every day like it's your last day on earth, and do them both wholeheartedly. Those are the fires that burn within each of us, in this world of ours. They're the pleasures historically reserved for the Gods only, of course, but I've always maintained that each one of us have the same opportunities, the same available pursuits. And I'm not the only one. There are the true livers of life out there, believe me."

I had no reason to disbelieve him.

For a few moments, we sat and stared at each other. I felt again as if he was analyzing me, perhaps assessing me, but in a purely curious way.

"So," he began, "the offer."

Surprisingly, I found myself more interested in what he was about to say than anything I'd seen in my studies.

"As I mentioned, there would be no rent, no room and board fees. All the bills will be paid for, food and utilities and the like. I will pay you financially for your time. Do you currently live on campus?"

I nodded.

"Paid for, no doubt, for the entire year?" he asked, and I agreed, "well, then the compensation I provide will be nothing but profit for you, which I'm sure most starving students would jump at," and he smiled, and I got the sense he'd been in the exact same position in his younger days, "and as I said, it might not last very long. The detectives tell me that they're dedicated to finding the person, and they seem sincere and professional, so this could all get wrapped up sooner than later. Nonetheless, for however long it lasts, you will be my house-mate. Everything in the house will be available to you, as much yours as mine. If our schedules work out on certain days, perhaps I could even drive you to or from the campus, who knows? My goal is to increase the humanity around me, and bring more life into my home."

Getting a break from my room-mate, even though he wasn't all that difficult to live with, that by itself made me want to agree, and I was just about to, when he held up a hand, drawing my attention.

"However, before you decide, there are certain things about me and the way I live that you must know and accept."

I couldn't imagine what he might be talking about.

His voice became stronger, and almost commanding.

"I'm a passionate man. I'm a natural man. I live as organically as I can, in the food I eat and the ways I spend my free time." He gave me a second to consider those ideas, staring straight into my eyes, seemingly challenging me to raise my game to his level, as if what he was about to say would surprise me.

"As a natural man, I am almost always naked in my house, or close to it. Like my ancient forefathers, if I wear anything at all, I will be clad in a tunic, or what you'd call a robe, but they're all finely woven and more-or-less see-through," he explained, proudly, "because unlike the way modern society has evolved, I do not hide my body."

He paused for a second, before finishing his point.

"I celebrate my body."

For some reason my brain went through the exercise of imagining him in the nude, trying to picture him without his clothes on, based on what I'd seen so far, his hairy muscular frame on display, and then I switched gears and started wondering if I could ever be that open about myself, assuming he'd expect the same thing from me if I moved in with him, nerves running up and down my spine, tingling with the potential embarrassment and the fear of not living up to his standards.

My body wasn't like his at all, it was quite the opposite. And sure, I knew, it wasn't a competition, but we were in different leagues, physically. He was above-average in size, and I was a smidge under. Where he was tall and thick and tanned, I was shorter and thin and pale. Where he was an obvious example of solid masculinity, I was less so, and I'd never had that openness that he and his forefathers apparently had, or pride in my body and the way I looked. I wasn't the kind of guy to go strutting around at the beach, or anywhere else for that matter.

He gazed at me, his stare strong and fixed.

"I would expect everyone in my house to choose to live the same way," he added, the corners of his mouth rising a little, in a tiny proud smile, "eating healthy food, all organic of course, and making healthy lifestyle choices, with exercise and activity. I can't imagine anyone having any objections to those simple requirements, could you?"

I shook my head, no. It all seemed perfectly rational, even if it was totally outside of my own personal experience.

"Most importantly," he continued, his demeanour getting serious, "I am a man who is set in his ways, and smart enough to know he won't be changing. I make no apologies, nor do I feel the need to, especially in my own house. Any putative house-mate of mine must understand this. While you would be free to be yourself, of course, there is one reality that must be agreed to, which is this."

I hung on his words.

"I," he said, his voice instantly calm and quiet, "I am the head of the household," and I nodded to show him I understood that, "I am ultimately in charge. I am what today's society would label as the 'alpha' male, and there isn't any room for more than one of those in my house. So if you decide to accept my offer, you would be expected to assume the role of 'Eromenos'."

That was a word I'd never heard before, and it must have been obvious on my face.

"Let me show you something," he said, softly smiling, and stood, beckoning me to follow, and he began pointing at artwork on the wall, explaining who and what the people were. The more famous ones were known to me, vaguely, as they would be to most people. Zeus, Hera, Aphrodite, and so on.

"That," he said, pointing at one particular reproduction, "is Eros, a name I'm certain you're familiar with, the Greek god of love?"

I nodded my agreement.

"Eros was also part of a trinity of Gods, along with Heracles and Hermes, who are over here," and he pointed at a different painting, "who all celebrated their roles in their relationships with other men. They bestowed certain qualities unto their companions, things like beauty and loyalty and strength and eloquence, openly and without shame."

Pointing back to the painting of Zeus, he continued.

"Zeus himself was the god of thunder and lightning and ruled over all the gods, and of course had multiple children with multiple women. But he also maintained a long-term loving relationship, which was also a sexual relationship, with a young man named Ganymede." He pointed at another picture. "That's them there."

I gazed at this hand-drawn image made thousands of years ago and saw a mighty warrior with a great beard and a huge barrel-shaped muscular chest, with one arm pointed to the sky, where there was lightning bolts blazing, and one arm wrapped tightly around a smaller man, who was smooth-bodied and naked, except for a thin, gauzy gown draped on his shoulders, who was gazing at the larger man with abject adoration in his eyes, his head cradled in the crook of the neck of the ruler of the Gods.

"Hercules, over there," and he pointed at a different painting, "is said to have had several male companions during his many adventures, including Lolaus, who helped him defeat the Hydra, and their love is physically enshrined in Thebes, where ancient Greek male couples would exchange vows and pledges with their same-sex life partners."

Pointing to yet another painting on the wall, he explained.

"This is Apollo," he explained, "the god of the sun. Amongst his many accomplishments, he was most proud of his loving relationship with Thamyris, who was a young male artist, a singer with what was said to be the most beautiful singing voice in the world. In his lifetime, Apollo also had a similar relationship with Hyakinthos, the young Prince of Macedonia. And amongst his fellow gods, Apollo himself married Hymen, the Greek god of marriage."

All of the characters in these works of art he was pointing out were males.

"He married the male god of marriage?" I asked.

Dr. Diakos nodded.

"Indeed," he said, "Apollo was, like many important men in ancient Greece, a Pederast."

Which was another word I'd never heard of before.

"Here," he pointed, to yet another piece of art, "this is a wonderful example."

The picture showed two men, both seated and both naked from the waist up. One was stretching a hand to caress the other's chest, while the second had his hand behind the first one's head, seemingly pulling at him, lips pursed, as if he was trying to get a kiss.

"This one," and he pointed at the slightly-smaller of the two men, "is the 'Eromenos'," again using the word he'd said earlier, "and his companion on the right is the 'Erastes'."

Standing right next to Theo, our bodies were close enough to accidentally touch, briefly, a couple of times, as we both moved, and while I was not normally an outwardly affectionate person, I realized I was enjoying the contact.

Like the best kinds of teachers, he further explained.

"Greek society, for the most part, accepted same-sex relationships thousands of years ago. There are far too many examples for me to cite here and now, but 'gay unions', to use our current words, were normal. As were deviations such as cross-dressing. It was quite common. Now, it must be stated, and understood, that many of them were non-sexual couples, we know this, oftentimes older men with younger ones, acting as mentors, in all the different aspects of socialization, from athletics to the military to hunting, as well as in the intellectual and artistic pursuits."

He gave me a moment to continue staring at the pictures before me. For some reason I could feel the blood flowing through my veins a little bit faster than normal, pushed by an excited heart, and there was an odd but noticeable rush of attention to my groin.

"Make no mistake, though," he continued, "many of them were not only mentor/mentee relationships, but also sexual, to be sure."

I nodded my understanding, without looking him in the eyes.

"Look here," he said, pointing at yet another picture on the wall. This one wasn't an artist's rendering, this was a crisp clear photograph of a round object, a small bowl or dish, with a dark black background and two lighter figures in the foreground.

They were kissing.

They both wore draped gowns of some sort, perhaps tunics, although one was much shorter than the other, both of which were open enough to show genitalia.

They were both men.

"This is a cup, discovered years ago and dated from as early as the seventh century B. C., that shows the 'Eromenos' and his 'Erastes'."

They were two men, kissing, which was unique enough to me already, almost staggering, but the shorter one was draped in the much more flowing gown, longer and softer, almost touching the ground, making him feminine-looking, the opposite of his partner.

"And here," he announced, showing me a framed photograph that had three separate panels, each a different subject.

"This picture on the left is an agate gem, with an inscription in early Greek, dated to the first century B. C., showing two men on a raised platform, making love, the top man entering the one below, who is face-down. Next to it we see a clay drinking cup, also from somewhere in the first century B. C., maybe earlier, carved on the outside, that graphically shows anal sex between two males, in the same flat position as the men in the gem, with this last cup on the right showing the same two men carved in a different position, with one on his knees, the other entering from behind."

I'd never seen such powerful images in my life.

"Male same-sex relationships included fraternal kinship, sponsorship and aegis, those were absolutely the primary motivation for the mentors, the 'Erastes', but many were romantic and yes, sexual. Those men were called 'Pederasts'."

His smile was easy, and almost paternal, as I looked up at him.

"Pederasty," he explained, "describes a kind of relationship that some men had with other men, in a society that was extremely hierarchal, but also extremely enlightened. It was accepted. Men had loving relationships with other men, and women did the same with other women. They were connections that are as basic as the elements of the universe themselves. Men loving men, platonically or otherwise, was accepted and encouraged. The Greeks recognized reality. They understood that there is a natural connection that can happen between two men, a potential joining of their souls, at levels that are different than what they can achieve with women, and therefore cannot possibly be reached with women. The relationship between men was deemed the noblest of associations, and the only true means of spiritual exaltation."

His enthusiasm for the subject was pouring out of him, which was almost intoxicating.

"Many scholars actually refer to classical Greece as a 'homoromantic' society, which I think may be apt, but which also leads me to wonder if that also means they were so arrogant in their misogyny that they considered the male form to be more 'beautiful' than the female form? Perhaps. The point is, there are multiple writers of the time who chronicled these truths, Herodotus, Xenophon, Athenaeus, and even Plato himself, who wrote about men loving men, on a variety of levels. Sapphos wrote of the same kind of bond between women of course, a different kind of love than they could find with men, for the very same natural reasons. And, it must be recognized, of course, that some men had intimate relations with other men at least in part because women were in many cases considered primarily for procreation only, for continuing the family line, and couldn't possibly replace what strong and caring men could achieve, in that most sacred of brotherhoods, a male/male union."

He took a sip of his coffee, and let me think about what he'd said.

"The 'Erastes'," and he pointed back at the character trying to get a kiss, "was almost always the older of the two, and always of a higher social status, decidedly more masculine and, to use a word that sometimes has negative connotations today, more dominant. I prefer the word 'active', myself. The 'Erastes' would have always been the 'alpha' male, in today's vernacular."

Pointing back to the man caressing the other's chest, he continued my lesson.

"This man is the 'Eromenos', or the more passive of the two, the 'beta' male, although again today many people would use the word, 'submissive'. He was a man with traits and characteristics that are more associated with femininity, and youth. These kinds of relationships were not just tolerated in ancient Greece, they were cherished and revered in many circles."

Two steps away, hung head-height on a wall, he pointed out four round discs, made of what looked like pottery, about the same diameter as the steering wheel in a small car. All four had been hand-painted, and looked as old as the wind.

"These are reproductions, of course," Theo said, good-naturedly, "found a century ago and carbon-dated recently to over six thousand years old. Pederastic relationships were so commonplace, so accepted and admired, that artists took the time and effort to honor them."

All four of them depicted men penetrating other men, sexually. 'Erastes', or alphas, making love to their 'Eromenos', or betas. The alphas all had beards, while the betas were smooth-bodied and shaved, with longer hair.

In all four of them, no matter their position, both men were intently staring into each other's eyes, like laser beams, every ounce of their souls concentrating on that connection, both the obvious physical one, one penetrating and one being penetrated, but the emotional and spiritual penetrations as well. The images on the plates were staggering in their frankness, and their honesty.

Theo put his hand on my shoulder, gently, getting my attention off of the openly gay sexuality in front of me, and I almost jumped from his touch, not from any fear or shock, but from the warmth he gave off, and the piercing positive energy he gave out, and I tore my eyes away from men buggering men and looked around and up at him, and he smiled, as if we were sharing something wonderful, and then nodded his chin towards the chairs we'd been sitting in, and with a third cup of his strong dark coffee in my hand, we went back to chatting.

"Suffice to say," he began, "these special relationships between men, sexual or not, and, again, not all of them went that far, they were as normal and as necessary as any other. And they continue to be, to this day. So that," he paused, "young man," and he paused again, "that is the kind of house-mate I'm hoping to find."

Before I could say anything, or think of anything to say, he continued.

"If that's something you'd be interested in."

Of all the questions I could have asked, dozens of them swirling around in the cavity where my brain used to be, only one came out of my mouth.

"Would I have to...?"

Theo shook his head gently.

"No," he said, nothing but grace and respect in his voice, "of course not. It would be not only unconscionable of me to even think it, but also highly illegal for me to suggest such a thing in the first place, for lots of reasons, not the least of which is I would be paying you," and he warmly smiled, "but no, you would not have to become sexual with me, because I would never dishonor anyone with such a personal presumption."

My small wave of confused fear ebbed, by a little.

"I am by nature a solitary man. The decision to open up my home to the presence of another is, if I'm honest, a difficult one to make, not one I take lightly."

He smiled, ruefully.

"But as I mentioned, another soul in the house," and he paused, "the right kind of soul, mind you, an 'Eromenos', that would be a blessing now, considering the threat against me, whether it's a prank or not."

Fixing me with a look that told me he was staring right into my soul, baring his own, he leaned towards me, and his voice got deeper and softer.

"I am an 'Erastes'. In search of his 'Eromenos'. Both of us men, yes, but different in ways, each with our own plusses, our own strengths. I will use my natural active masculine strengths to feed us and dress us and protect us, and you will use your natural passive feminine strengths to support us and nurture us and, most importantly of all, at all times, I will need you to physically and spiritually remind me of the essence of beauty, of all the beauty in this world, and do it at every possible moment, because it's something I know I'll need very much, considering the ugliness I unfortunately have in front of me."

He sat back in his chair, slowly, his eyes never leaving mine, the warmth of his natural twinkle almost mesmerizing.

"Let me show you," he whispered, "the pleasures and joys that two men can achieve together, in the most special of relationships. Let me be your mentor, in the life outside of these ivied walls."

The way he was staring at me, it was like there wasn't another human being on the face of the globe, that I was the only person he'd ever seen or would ever see.

"I realize," he said, quietly, after a time, "that this is all probably shocking to you, certainly. No doubt you came here today thinking you'd be offered a position connected to my academic work, yes?", and I nodded slowly, "and you've been blindsided with what you've seen and heard?"

I nodded again.

"And I imagine it's fair to say that you're asking yourself a question or two," and he smiled, "am I close to correct on that?"

I nodded a third time.

"It's perfectly natural," he admitted, "and perfectly normal. Were the roles reversed I would ask the same questions. And any relationship in this world," he added, "any connection between two people, at work or school or in a personal capacity, it should be based on complete honesty and openness. That's the cornerstone of respect. In class, you know your responsibilities, not just to the curriculum being taught but the one to yourself, to learning, to your education in life. And I, as an educator, I know my responsibilities as well, which are to open minds to new ideas, even if they're thousands of years old. They're the rules of the road, so to speak."

Then he paused, and just looked at me, with what looked like nothing but good thoughts emanating from him.

"So ask your questions," he suggested, "you are a free man, and entitled to know the truth."

I finished my third cup of coffee and placed the cup gently down on the table, brushing a small speck of something off the table, which seemed out of place and didn't belong, as if it was spoiling the aesthetics of the furniture and the room.

Looking up at him, I could see he'd watched me cleaning, and he appreciated my tiny little attention to detail.

I had to ask two questions.

"So Dr. Dia..." and then I remembered his earlier instruction, "so Theo," and he smiled like a thousand-watt light bulb, "what if this person is real, and tries to attack you, god forbid, in your home. Wouldn't it be dangerous for you to be there at all? Or me? To, you know, live there?"

His response was immediate and assured.

"No," he said, "quite the opposite, I believe." Then he leaned over towards me, and lowered his voice. "The police are patrolling the area constantly, day and night. They've increased their presence, specifically to counter the threat, and decrease the opportunity. And," he added, smiling, "having a second person in the house more or less eliminates the chances of an attack, it stands to reason. Two people," he added, "doubles the risk. So if this isn't a prank, if it's a real person, which the detectives tell me is unlikely, then having you in my home makes me safer."             

Then he smiled again.

"Combine that with good company," he grinned, "and to my mind it's the ideal situation."

His confidence beamed out of him, and any worries I'd immediately had seemed to vanish.

"Now ask your other question," he said, as if he knew what it would be, which, I realized, a learned man might.

"Why me?"

He nodded, confirming his earlier guess, as if it was the most logical of questions, and therefore fully expected.

"I made my requirements known to a few colleagues," he explained, "I told them I needed someone bright, someone responsible, I stressed someone pleasant to be around, and someone I could immediately trust in my home," and he paused to smile again, "as well as someone with certain obvious but perhaps more esoteric qualities, such as gentility, and sensitivity. But most importantly, I was looking for someone who has the joy of life in them, someone who can appreciate beauty, a man who is kind and peaceful, and someone who would complement me, who would mesh with me, the yin to my yang, as it were."

He fixed his eyes on mine again with that elevated level of intensity.

"You were the first and only person Alastair could think of, and none of my other peers had any potential nominees. As I said earlier, Dr. Taylor is, as I'm sure all you students have already discerned, he's not the easiest man to impress. So his recommendation was most welcome, and now that I've met you, I can see why he did so."

"You can?" I asked, surprised.

Theo nodded, confidently.

"From the second you walked in, you've struck me as exactly what I'm looking for. For some people the word I'm about to use is considered stale, but I'm a firm believer in vibes, those immediate feelings we pick up from all living things, if we're open to their spiritual vibrations, and I instantly felt a distinct comfort, the moment you walked in the door."

"You did?" I asked, somewhat astonished.

"I did," and he grinned, "I've been picking up nothing but positive vibes from you, all of which suggest to me that word, comfort. You're polite, you're intelligent, you're obviously exuberant about your education, and best of all you're not aggressive in your manner, and I say that with enormous respect, mind you," and he reached over and laid his hand on my arm, just above my wrist, and again I felt the heat of his skin, and the power of his energy.

Then his eyes seemed to focus on me even more, and his smile almost disappeared.              

"I'd consider it an honor to be your mentor," he said, his voice low, "your 'Erastes'," he added, "even if it's just for a few days, as the police are hoping. And who knows?" he asked, and his smile returned, "perhaps it's an opportunity for the both of us to have a little adventure, a vacation of sorts, to learn a little bit about another culture, if nothing else."

I said yes.

Later in the afternoon, as planned, I met him at his office and we went to his car, walking briskly, Theo's head scanning left and right, and he drove me to my dorm, waiting patiently outside while I packed all my clothes into the two suitcases my parents had loaned me, as well as my laptop and some books and all my course materials, filling the back seat and trunk of his SUV.

The entire drive to his house was delightful. His conversation was animated and interesting and filled with humor, and he drew me into every discussion, keenly wanting to know my thoughts on this and that. By the time we arrived, after he'd driven slowly up the road, the only time he didn't talk, his eyes and head scanning both sides of the street and everyone's properties, I felt like we were quickly becoming friends.

Just inside the front door, he stopped, and chuckled.

"As I mentioned, I have a cat," he said, peering this way and that for any sight, "her name is Scout, and she's cuddly and loving with me, but has always been standoffish with visitors. So please don't be offended if she ignores you, or, even worse, if she swats at you if you get too close. Don't take it personally."

His house was bigger than any I'd been in. In every respect. Larger and longer than the house I grew up in, and all the residences of my neighborhood, and all my friends. It wasn't a mansion, not in the traditional sense, but it was spacious, every room bigger than all the places I'd ever seen. Wider, and longer, and taller, with ten-foot ceilings, the walls were covered in art and the floors were tastefully decorated with area rugs and the furniture was all designer-approved without looking pretentious, all warm and lived-in, and there seemed to be discrete bookshelves everywhere, around every corner, filled with hundreds, perhaps thousands of spines.

The back of the house seemed to be floor-to-ceiling glass, in every room, on both floors, so there was a veritable wall of natural light streaming through the entire place. The formal living room and the dining room both had gas fireplaces, which he showed me with just a flick of a switch, and suddenly there's flame and heat. There was one in the family room, or den, as he called it, too. The gym he'd mentioned was spacious, with lots of equipment, and had a sauna room big enough for more than one person, with two small benches. The kitchen was vast, with cupboards everywhere, copper pots and pans hanging from a rack hovering over the island in the middle of the room.

Upstairs, he showed me his guest room, which would be my space, and it was warm and inviting but did give off a vibe that felt like it hadn't been used in a long time. Theo pointed at a large walk-in closet, as well as a private bathroom, which was way bigger than I'd ever had, with a huge spa tub as well as a separate shower, luxuries to someone like me. Another bedroom down the hall had been turned into his home office, which resembled his work office, in that it was filled with art and knick-knacks and papers and books, all perfectly in place.

His master bedroom suite was huge. A king bed looked almost tiny, even with a couple of dressers on the walls, and he too had a huge walk-in closet and bathroom, as well as a deck, out of a sliding glass door, that was bigger than the living room in the house I grew up in, and in one corner was the hot tub.

Together we unloaded my bags and boxes from his car, his long legs bounding up the stairs faster than I could walk, and after everything was in my room he walked to the door, and looked back at me.

"I will give you time to settle in," he said, happily, "and while I put dinner together, why don't you get comfortable? Perhaps a hot soak in the bath? All the supplies you would need are there for you, if you like."

I nodded a thank you at him. My heart was racing a mile a minute but in some ways I felt strangely like I was at home, or in a home, a real home. I felt welcome, and appreciated, just from his gaze and the obvious energy he was giving off.

"I took the liberty of purchasing a few things for you to wear, around the house," he murmured, swinging the door behind him as he gracefully left the room, "and I know I'll be delighted at whichever one you choose."

At the snick of the door closing I ran as noiselessly as I could, on my toes, around the bed and straight to the closet, and quietly flung open the doors. My curiosity about what he'd want me wear was making me almost explode from the inside, one of the dozen or so questions I had circling in my brain the whole drive over, completely nervous, even at the same time as being thrilled with excitement, over something new, and, as Theo had said, a bit of an adventure.

Most of my life had been about not taking leaps into the unknown, but his sunny personality was hard to resist. He was seeking his 'Eromenos', his passive male companion, his beta, his man-friend who was naturally feminine, and I couldn't wait to see what he thought that would look like, and how he thought I should dress for him.

On hangars were a half-dozen robes, of varying lengths, all of them gauzy, and more-or-less see-through, with intricate edging, some of lace and some of beadwork. They looked as light as a feather, and instantly made me wonder what it would be like to wear something that delicate on my body, and how it would feel up against my skin. I'd never really thought about soft before, when it came to clothes, but these seemed like the textbook definition to me.

Next to the robes were several formal gowns of various colors, long and flowing and satiny from the waist down, but from the hips up they were more or less halter tops, baring most of the chest and all of the shoulders and arms and back of whoever wore them.

I couldn't think of a more feminine image, seeing my own body dressed like that in my mind, something unimaginable up until that precise moment. There'd never been a time in my life where the very idea of the very idea would ever have entered my consciousness.

It felt like what the cavemen must have felt like, discovering fire.

One question kept reverberating in my brain.

Could I?

One stack of built-in drawers was off to the side, next to a floor-to-ceiling mirror, and I silently pulled each one open, one at a time, to see a variety of femininity, as in women's lingerie. There were dozens of panties, skimpy and lacy and every hue imaginable. There were multiple pairs of stockings, soft and silky, most the stay-up kind, with elastic around the thighs, though some needed garter belts, which were also inside. There were bras, all the cups designed for someone with small breasts, in a rainbow of colors. There was one drawer of camisoles and teddies and slips.

In a zombie-like daze, almost overdosing on softness and femininity, I gingerly padded into the bathroom and stared at the tub. On the surround, there were a bevy of shampoos and conditioners and a variety of different soaps, all labelled as organic. There was also, I noticed, a set of six disposable razors, with pink handles, made for a woman.

For having smooth skin, obviously. Legs, primarily, I imagined, but maybe one other place too.

In the drawers of the vanity were body lotions and creams, as well as combs and brushes and hair appliances, as well as toiletries, toothpastes and mouthwashes and Q-tips and piles of round white pads, which I assumed were for daubing on or wiping off make-up. There was a potpourri display in a small basket next to the sink, filling the room with a lavender scent, which was delightful.

There was one whole drawer of make-up products.

I'd never seen that many lipsticks in one place, outside of a department store. There were slim tubes of mascara, for thickening and lengthening eyelashes, like the ones I'd seen women use, my Mom amongst them. There were trays of tiny round mounds of color, powders, I realized, for the eyelids, and brushes to use. There were powders for the face too, to smooth out the skin's appearance, or to add a glow to cheekbones.

I was awash with questions and concerns.

He wanted me to be an 'Eromenos', that much I knew. He desired me to be a man, but one who has feminine traits and characteristics, which he firmly believed I had inside me to give, but how far does he want me to go?

Is he hoping I'll wear make-up?

Is he wishing to see me in lingerie?

He'd talked about the robes, obviously, and I just assumed I'd always wear one, not having the nerve to walk around anybody's house stark-naked all the time, not even my own home, if I ever had one, but does he actually expect me to wear any of the formal gowns too?

The one thing I didn't see anywhere were shoes, high-heeled or otherwise, but he'd already mentioned at one point that as a natural man he was always bare-foot, in part so he could 'feel that connection to the earth', as his forefathers did, so I realized I wouldn't have to worry about wearing those.

That is, if I ever got to the point where I wanted to, or where it was even remotely an idea.

It didn't take long to put away my normal clothes, my 'outside-his-house' clothes. There was no sanity anywhere in thinking that part of me would change. I would still present everywhere else as the normal me.

And then, like a siren of lore, the bathtub seemed to call to me, after Theo had already planted the germ of the idea, and as the tub filled with bubbles from a bottle on the shelf I'd spied, and the water steamed with heat and filled the room itself with additional warmth, I found my nervousness and fearful anticipation of what was to become of me drifting away, surprisingly. It made me titter a bit, out loud, at how this entirely bizarre situation was going.

I'd expected I would be constantly on edge, and tense, full of minute-by-minute apprehension. Those were what would have been predictable emotions and reactions.

Instead, I slipped my body into the soothing heat and sighed with a genuine pleasure, with a kind of frivolous delight, as if I'd arrived at a hotel assuming it would be a no-name dump and found out I'd been booked into the penthouse suite of a five-star private resort.

Up to my neck in warmth, I closed my eyes, the steam rising and opening my sinuses as I breathed in, and I probably dozed for a few minutes, almost overwhelmed at how life was suddenly treating me.

I felt like a rich person, a suddenly-rich one, like they'd done the draw for some amazing lottery and pulled my name out of the barrel, on a ticket I couldn't remember buying.

When I snapped alert again, it was with the strangest of thoughts, but I looked to the surround, and reconfirmed what had startled me awake.

There were razors.

For making skin smooth.

Legs, primarily.

But one other place too, as I remembered thinking earlier.

Or anywhere, I realized, doing a quick inventory of myself and remembering that there were a few stray hairs on my chest, especially around my nipples, as well as a skiff around my belly button. And, if I'm honest, there might even be a few on both of my bum cheeks. Not many, but some. A soft down of them.

Should I?

I thought of Theo's words. He wanted his house-mate to be feminine. The yin to his yang, was what he said.

Theo was a hairy masculine man. He was the 'Erastes', no question.

I only made one nick in my leg while shaving, which I thought was a really good outcome, considering that I'd never done it before. Running the razor over my own ass took some stretching and turning of my shoulders that I wasn't used to, but when I was finished my skin felt like the softest smoothest surface ever known to mankind, as did my legs, which startled me, at how much I liked it. It was so different than my norm, how things generally felt before, which had always been just plain old boring. But not now. Now, it felt like a new day. It was like a breath of fresh air, in a way.

Even the difference in my chest and belly was noticeable, and pleasing, which was saying something considering that there wasn't much to remove in the first place.

My nipples were puffy, I noticed, as I was carefully making them bald. And for maybe the first time in my life, I actually noticed the color of my own areolas. They were a deeper red than what I thought would be normal, if only by a little. Not enough to cause concern, but I was struck with the thought that they almost looked like they'd been artistically painted or decorated, or even kissed, by lips perhaps coated in lipstick.

Shaving my pubic hair was as foreign an act to me as anything, the idea of even nicking the skin of my penis or testicles sending shoots of jitters up and down my spine, never having liked the sight of my own blood, especially if it came from either of those parts of me, which it never had before.

After drying, my body no longer damp, I discovered an entirely new feeling, one that I never would have imagined even imagining, at any previous point of my life.

The skin of my testicles, now smooth and bare, felt so completely and distinctly different up against the skin of my inner thighs, where they have met forever. It was almost like my bag was sticking to my legs, adhering to my own flesh in a remarkable display of tensile strength, my balls having entirely new properties about them, so I scanned all the jars and bottles until I found a body lotion, which smelled faintly of something earthy and flowery, and coated my entire body, from neck to toes, finding a delightful new experience in smoothing things into my own skin.

Never before had I paid that much attention to my own flesh, or treated it so nicely. It was a literal joy to rub the lotion into my body, marvelling the whole time at how my now-hairless skin actually felt, and how it was responding to the stimulation, and how delightful it felt to be touched.

Even if it was by my ownself.

The first robe I slipped onto my shoulders, standing in front of the long mirror, felt like the gentlest whisper on my skin. The bath and the shaving and personal attention I'd given myself had left me in a state of half-erection, the whole time, but looking at my smooth body and wearing what looked like a woman's robe, my excitement was record-setting.

I'd been masturbating for years, of course, every chance I got, like any guy suddenly shooting through puberty, and I'd had erections every day since puberty, of course. I was a man, and as full of those kinds of desires as any other man, maybe more than some, even if I wasn't the textbook definition of masculinity. But now, staring intently into the mirror, I was what I could only describe as the ultimate feminine version of me, and I was as hard as steel.

It was poking out from the gap in my robe of choice, the longest one in the closet, that went all the way to the floor, and swayed with a sweeping arc at the bottom every time I moved.

I could hear Theo downstairs, in the kitchen, making lots of pots and pans noises, preparing our supper, and standing there, dressed as I was, hairless as I was, I was dumbstruck by two thoughts.

The first one was that there was no way I could walk downstairs and be in the same room with him with my little hard-on leading the way. I couldn't imagine a more embarrassing situation for me, let alone him, seeing my less-than spectacular shortcomings, so I had to do something about that.

My second thought was that my legs, sleek and smooth, that showed through the gap in the robe when I walked and even when I was standing, were so white that they almost seemed incongruous with the rest of me. They seemed out of place. Everything above felt pulsing with life, and more than room temperature. My legs looked like an afterthought, almost cold.

I knew which drawer to go to.

The packaging said the color of the thigh-high stockings was 'ecru', which is another word I'd not run into before, but to me they looked tan, without being tanned. They looked like a person with normal skin tone would look, not someone like me who couldn't be out in the sun for more than a few minutes without burning and turning red as a lobster.

Slinking the first stocking up my right leg, I had to stop for a second and catch my breath, and fight off the impending orgasm I was feeling, amazed that the touch of the fabric to my smooth skin could elicit such sharp and vibrant reactions in me.

Putting on my own clothes had NEVER touched me like that.

This was exciting, this was daring, this was sensual and this was a pampering I never knew I'd needed, or deserved.

By the time I got the first one all the way up, with the huge eight-inch strip of lace at the top smoothed-out with no wrinkles, I'd promised myself that I'd be pampering myself this way as much as I could, forever.

Theo had talked earlier about hedonism, and the pursuit of pleasures, and boy, did I get it now. Putting soft and silky things against my body was as satisfying to my soul as anything I'd done.

Mustering up all my courage, and yet feeling like it was also as easy as pie, I began to open my bedroom door, to begin this new chapter in my life, to walk down the stairs and let another human being see me, all of me, in such a brazenly brazen manner, and begin becoming the feminine companion to a man, when one last thought hit me.

Slipping back into the bathroom, I looked in the mirror, close-up. My face stared back at me. It was a fine face, I guess, but my first and immediate thought was that it was bland. Not in a horrible way, no, but just there. Just average. Maybe even boring.

It took me more than a few seconds to decide which shade I wanted on my lips. I had so many sensibilities running through my noggin. I'm a man, one who's never worn lipstick, and traditionally isn't supposed to, at least in the general rules of my upbringing. But having some on, I knew, would give me a little spark, a little color, a little bold statement, and perhaps add to whatever allure I'd created, even though allure wasn't something I was trying to do. No, nothing like that. So I don't want to look silly, or childish, or, worse yet, slutty. Sure, a little color would improve the overall look, that much was apparent.

But which one?

My feet, in the stockings, padded down the curved staircase slowly. Controlling the pace was part of keeping my heart from exploding out of my chest, which was a looming concern, but also felt natural in some way. Walking slowly felt relaxed, it felt languorous, it felt comfortable. I felt like a tigress, in the jungle.

Theo was turned sideways to me when I softly came into the kitchen. He had a tunic on, which was, as he'd promised, more-or-less see-through. It came down to his mid-thigh level, and there was golden highlights trimming the garment. He was washing green leafy vegetables under the sink.

He sensed my arrival, and the side of his face that I could see, once again shaven, I noted, gave me enough of a view to watch that corner of his mouth curl up in a smile.

"How was your bath?" he asked, keenly interested.

"It was wonderful," I replied, honestly, stretching the word out, the luxurious way I was feeling reflected in my voice, which just came out of me softly and gently.

Shaking the last of the water off the leaves, he laid them in a bowl off to the side, and then turned to look at me.

I watched his eyes.

They slowly and methodically took in all of me, from the top of my head, my hair thick but short, an unmanageable mop, to the tips of my toes, and everything in-between. The robe, lustrous and gauzy, and showing all of me. The slim high-cut soft-gold panties I'd slid on, my solution to cover my excitement. The creamy-pink lipstick, slick and shiny, and not much lighter in shade than my own lips, but with enough of a difference to really highlight my mouth.

He could see my body. Hairless, and shimmering, still showing the sheen of the body lotion.

But he wasn't the only one of us staring.

His turn to gaze at me gave me my first chance to see all of him.

Under his gauze, his body was impressive, as I'd suspected. A strong upper chest, with a v-shaped forest of hair, wide at the shoulders and tapering down to nothing just below his breastbone, a few stray strands surrounding his nipples, which were a healthy pulsing brownish-red and had large round darker rings around them. His belly was moderately hairy, and wasn't cut like a champion body-builder, but even with the slight 'spare tire' of middle age I could tell he was an active person, someone who exercised and kept in shape.

His legs were strong, and thick, and hairy.

His skin everywhere was the same golden brown as the only parts of him I'd seen earlier, his face and neck and hands. He had no tan lines anywhere.

Surprisingly, considering how hirsute the rest of him was, his groin was comparatively sparse.

Or, maybe, he had a normal amount of pubic hair, but it was diminished, or hidden, paling in relation to the size of his cock and balls. I'd never in my life seen anyone so large. Entirely in keeping with the rest of him, his genitalia was outstanding.

Hanging straight down, his limp cock was longer than my limp one is by more than twice, and had an absolutely astounding thickness to it, even flaccid. I couldn't get over how much of him there was, or the spherical roundness of his shaft, and the bulbous shape of his helmet. Behind all of that, his bag held two orbs of a significant-enough size that they bulged out from around the curves of his inner thighs.

His body reminded me of some of the art he'd shown me earlier, of heroic-looking men from ancient Greece.

He was the 'Erastes'.

The smile on his face was like a super-nova.

"Thank you," he whispered, "my 'Eromenos'."

Suddenly nervous about being good enough for him, I fidgeted on my toes slightly, my hips doing a little hula dance, and I asked him.

"Do I look alright?"

Theo laughed out loud, but not in a derisive way.

"Alright?" he asked, perplexed, "you have to ask? My God, you're positively beautiful! You've honored me," he boomed out, and began walking towards me, his arms held out, silently asking for a hug.

I don't know why, but for the first initial second, I balked. Hugging meant touching, and touching meant contact, and contact with a nearly-naked man while I was also nearly-naked meant things could be construed as sexual. Things getting sexual was not what I signed up for.

It wasn't. He'd assured me, that wasn't to be involved.

Thankfully, that initial second went away, and I took one step and we met in the middle and he wrapped me in his arms, mine going around his trunk, feeling the strong muscle groups in his upper back move as units, sensing through the material of his robe the hairs on his back.

His hands landed on my lower back, just one little bit above what anyone would consider the start of my ass.

Earlier he'd touched me with his hands, and I'd felt his energy and his heat through his mitts. Suddenly wrapped up in him, my body crushed into his, my face resting with my right cheek on his left pec, feeling his heart beating directly through his skin, I absorbed the same fire from his soul into my own skin, all over. The heat in my core went up about ten degrees, just like that.

The panties could barely contain my erection.

If he felt it, he didn't give any indication.

Finally, he pulled his head and upper body back from me, and looked down into my eyes.

"In my culture, men kissing each other is a normal and natural expression of affection," he said, once again the teacher, "and must not be construed as anything different. The puritans of the world have done their best to inhibit it, or, worse yet, demonize it, but, like so many other aspects of life, the ancients understood reality. A kiss is simply one man telling another man that he respects him, and admires him, and that he's cherished."

I looked up at him, rapt in the obvious enthusiasm in his face, at being the teacher and mentor to me, and was happy with myself for having put on a little bit of lipstick, if for no other reason than it might make the kiss enjoyable for him.

Because I had no idea if I'd like it, and while a good part of me was willing to bet folding money I wouldn't, never having wanted to kiss another man in the past, the new adventurous part of me thought that with my lips painted, maybe I'd enjoy it too.

Whatever my nerves, my face must have agreed with him, or gave him the go-ahead, because the next thing I knew he'd pulled his hands up and then off my lower back and cupped my face, on both sides, holding me at the perfect angle for his kiss.

When his bigger lips met mine, I was tense.

For a second or two.

Okay, maybe three.

But then I realized that the world hadn't stopped spinning, and the floor of the house hadn't cracked open revealing the gates of hell, and then I further realized that while I was thinking about that first thing I was totally missing a key fact, which was that I was liking getting kissed so much that I was kissing him back.

We both had lip movement. We both had emotion flowing through our kiss.

If you ranked all the kisses I'd had with women, which was a few during my high school and university years, their grand total combined wouldn't have even made the same scale of measuring how much joy there was in a kiss, compared to Theo's.

Like the painting of Zeus I'd seen earlier, in his office at the University, who was throwing lightning bolts and blazing up the sky, Theo's was equally powerful, the only difference being his zaps were through his lips.

When he stopped, he moved his head back slightly and opened his eyes, perhaps worriedly scanning my eyes as they opened, searching for any clues I might give off as to whether I'd enjoyed the kiss or whether I was about to run screaming out of the house, but I could see from his reaction that all he could see from mine was pleasure.

Then he welcomed me to his home again, and handed me a tall glass of wine, which was red and dark and fiery looking. And as if we were old friends, completely comfortable, he began explaining what we were having for dinner, and how he'd prepared each element, and the rapture he had with cooking, and the way he described the ingredients, with such passion and love, made me realize that the joy wasn't just in the eating, it was in the work involved to create it. He saw what most people considered a chore as something entirely different.

To him, everything connected to living his life were joys.

I stood and watched him work while we chatted, taking every opportunity I could to admire his body, discretely, without being obvious about it, whichever parts were facing me. I marvelled at the way his chest rose and fell with his breathing, like a stallion. I glowed at watching his strengths, the way his leg muscles flexed and released as he walked from countertop to cupboard. When he turned his back to me, to grab some tool or ingredient, I practically swooned at the sight of his ass, round and strong and rugged and rife with dark hair.

But mostly, I took every opportunity I could to snatch little glimpses of his cock. And who wouldn't? That didn't make things sexual, at all, it simply recognized the obvious. And each time I stared, the size of him continued to shock me, at how we were both males and yet so completely different, most especially at the sizes of our organs.

I kept thinking that I shouldn't be so forward, defying the rules of proper puritan society, and yet I couldn't deny the inescapable truth, which was that seeing his member as it bobbed and sidled with his movements gave me shoots of thrills that ran up and down my spine and then echoed all around my insides. I'd never felt naughtier, or more wicked.

As we ate our home-made Greek Salad with a finely braised lemon-chive chicken breast and orzo, he topped off our wine glasses, reminding me again about the pleasures previously reserved for the Gods, and how we mere humans could have just as much fun.

More than a few times, I caught him not-so-discretely eyeing me, in the same way I'd been doing to him. What struck me as interesting was that more often than not, it was my chest he was surreptitiously admiring. My nipples seemed to have some sort of appeal to him, which surprised me as well as tickled me.

Our conversation was easy, and flowed without awkward silences. Theo asked me many questions about myself, and my studies, keenly interested, and I answered as honestly and passionately as I could, trying to remember his request for me to be his constant reminder of beauty. No matter the subject, I tried to only see the positive in everything, and voice those thoughts.

And it was so easy! Dressed as I was, bare and open to this man, displaying a look and an attitude that tilted towards the feminine, there was no need for pretense, or caution. His experiences in life and his wisdom were such that no matter what we talked about, he was able to share insights that I may not have thought of, being the true definition of a mentor to me, as he'd said he'd be, and I found myself trying to elicit his thoughts at all times, because I felt like I had so much to learn and he had so much to teach me.

At one point he'd asked me about my artistic pursuits in life, and I was proud to talk of my creative writing, which he seemed truly engaged in hearing about, most especially lighting up when I mentioned that I had, for a time, written poetry.

"Wonderful!" he exclaimed, "the language of love!"

"Poetry?" I asked.

He nodded strongly.

"Oh yes," he said, grinning, "poetry, and not just ancient Greek poetry, but all of it, from all over the world, it is the language of love, and the language of passion. Look at your beloved Britain, for example, and count the number of acclaimed poets that hail from that island. Byron, Eliot, Keats, Shakespeare, just to name a few. They all wrote from their soul, from their very being. Do you still write?"

I shook my head and sighed.

"Not for a few years," I said, somewhat sadly.

"You must start again," he encouraged, and I laughed, and in doing so turned my head slightly away from him, in an almost coy motion, and when I looked back, he was staring at me intensely, which he couldn't stop doing, after a few seconds making me a small bit nervous.

"Is there something wrong?" I asked him, finally, curious and worried to his reaction.

He thought for a second or two.

"Forgive me," he said, "no, of course there's nothing wrong. Far from it," he grinned, "I can't possibly imagine a more enjoyable way to spend an evening, here with you, such a lovely companion." Then he smiled. "It's just... well, I saw something, just now, that reminded me of something else."

My curiosity was piqued.

"You saw something?" I asked.

He nodded, happily.

"Could you turn your head again, like you did a few seconds ago?" he asked, with kindness, and I re-enacted the movement, holding my head away from him on an angle, and he asked me if I could hold that position while he took my picture with the camera in his phone, assuring me before I could object that it was just a one-time thing, and he'd erase it if I wanted, but he'd seen something and wanted me to trust him.

So I turned, and I heard the snap sound on his phone, and when I finally turned back, he was thumbing the screen and every once in a while looking at me, a boyish excitement on his face, like, just wait, this is going to be good.

Finally he grinned, and turned his phone towards me.

I leaned over, to get the best look.

"This is you," he said, and it showed my head turned mostly away from him, the side of my face visible, my nose elevated upwards slightly, almost hidden by my cheekbone, and then his big forefinger touched the screen and swiped, showing me a close-enough likeness of me, from some work of art I'd never seen before.

"This," he explained, "is a painting by a German named Feurebach, from the late eighteen-hundreds, where he reimagined a scene from Plato's famous Symposium, which of course was written thousands of years earlier."

Then he used his finger and thumb and widened out the image for me.

"It shows," he continued, "the fourth-century B. C. Greek poet Agathon, welcoming the Athenian hero Alcibiades into his home."

Swiping again, he refocussed on what looked like my face, attached to a nearly naked man, with a billowy cloth the color of bricks wrapped around his lower body only, barely covering up but leaving a teasing hint of his genitals, his body lean and lithe, with his nipples reddish and prominent, his right arm around the shoulders of a half-naked woman who looked like a goddess.

"This is Agathon, a poet, just as you are," he taught me, "he was also mentioned as a prominent character in a work by Aristophanes, a comedy, called Thesmophoriazusae."

Then Theo's smile turned in to a grin.

"Agathon was cited in a variety of sources over the years, so he was obviously well-known, and in every one of those documents he was noted for his extraordinary physical beauty, many of them reporting that Agathon usually appeared in public as a clean-shaven man, who dressed in women's clothes."

I was once again moved by his knowledge.

"He was a... a cross-dresser?" I asked.

Theo nodded, proudly.

"And most famously, he was the lover of Pausanias, another man, who is also mentioned quite prominently in Plato's Symposium, as well as at least two other dialogues by Socrates, and in several other books of note."

I studied the painting, really focussing on the face of the ancient Greek poet, reimagined by a nineteenth-century German.

"Agathon was an 'Eromenos'," Theo said, "and a proud one," he added, "sadly all his work was lost, so we can only imagine what he wrote about, but he was said to have been a tragedian, which can sometimes make for darker emotions, but they are as much a part of the beauty of life as anything else."

Then he put both images up, side by side.

"You and he share the joy of the written word, and you are his spitting image," Theo said, his voice taking on a tone of admiration.

I was thrilled to even be considered like that.

"Do you really think so?" I asked, eager to hear.

A softness came over his face.

"You are as beautiful, or more," he said, and nodded, assuring me he meant the words and the sentiment, and I flushed red all over my body, and had to look away, and then he rose and began clearing our dishes, sorting them in the dishwasher and cleaning up the kitchen, all the while engaging me in talk about every subject under the sun, whatever came into our minds, before offering me one of his favorite delights, an after-dinner coffee, made strong and dark, which we could enjoy on the back patio, under the approaching stars.

I will admit to one or two seconds of concern, stepping out of the door to the outside world, dressed as I was. But he'd mentioned earlier that he had tall fences, which he did, and any fears I had about being discovered by other people vanished pretty quickly. We lay on lounge chairs, the backs tilted upwards and sipped our rocket fuel quietly, admiring the setting sun off to the west, and the first appearance of stars above us.

Theo pointed out certain celestial highlights for me, reminding me of the history of astronomy and how the ancient Greeks embraced all the sciences, his knowledge of so many subjects astounding me, and I soaked up his teaching, every word. Off in the distance there were the occasional sounds of civilization, traffic noises and the constant hum of the electrical and neon buzz associated with cities, which you can feel, if you're open to the spiritual vibrations. Every once in a while we could hear a dog barking, which I assumed meant people walking somewhat nearby, in the city park space.

I wondered. Did any of them have any idea they were so close to an oddity like me? A man, his body newly shaven smooth, wearing lipstick, and panties, and thigh-high stockings, and a gown that made the whole package unquestionably womanly, in the company of another man who embodied the exact opposite? And if they did find out, would any of them think it normal?

Would any of them think it was sexy and wild?

For some reason, the idea of me being sexy and wild gave me goosebumps. It was just so unlike my previous life.

Our conversation was relaxed, and delightful, the both of us laughing at times, fully involved in the reality we were creating. As Theo pointed out at one point, "this is what life should be," and he reached over and touched my bare arm with his hand, "two people at their most natural, blessed with the bounties of good food and surrounded by the beauties of art and literature, sharing their journey together, and I can't thank you enough, my Agathon."

Then his focus got stronger on my eyes.

"Agatha," he added, "a more modern variation on the name, I suppose."

He was looking for something, some reaction from me.

"Would you allow me the honor to address you as that, when we're together? May I call you Agatha?"

Just the very fact that he was asking my permission made me realize the level of respect he was treating me with, which is the only way to live, he'd said in his office, the only way to truly live, and I nodded my approval with a smile.

"It is I who would be honored."

His smile was as warm as the sun, which we'd watch set.

"My Agatha," he murmured.

"I'm sorry for not knowing," I said, "but how does an 'Eromenos' address his 'Erastes'?" I asked, a little hesitantly. "Is there a particular title, or word that I should know?"

He smiled.

"A title?" he asked, rhetorically, "no. That would imply superiority, in some way or other, which is not what the relationship is about. The 'Erastes', as I mentioned, was almost always older, yes, and from a higher social status, true, but the two men were equals in all the ways that count. They were equals, contemporaries, in all the ways of the soul, and the heart, and, for some, the body. They didn't compete with each other, they complimented each other."

Then he paused.

"They completed each other."

His voice got softer.

"That is what you and I have to look forward to, Agatha. We have in front of us this amazing and wonderful opportunity to complement each other, and complete each other. It's a journey of growth, and understanding, for the both of us. We have this chance to join two souls together at the most spiritual levels, knowing that the result will enrich our individual lives by the thousand-fold."

My feeling from earlier, at having just won a lottery or something, came back upon me, awed at how lucky I was to be around someone with his outlook on life.

"But," he added, "if you're wondering what to call me, you can of course use my name, Theo. Theodoros is the root, which means 'God's gift', a concept I must confess has more than a tiny bit of pomposity to it, so I've always been just plain Theo."

I smiled at him.

"If you don't mind me saying, you are anything but plain, Theo."

He grinned back at me, with a soulful fire in his eyes.

"There is, though, if you'll humor me, a name that would please me. But I hesitate in suggesting it for one reason, which is that it might seem presumptuous to you, and I would not want to offend."

Once again, he'd piqued my curiosity.

"What is it?" I asked, intensely keen to know.

"Latria mu," he said, the syllables rolling off his tongue in that deep rich voice.

I repeated it out loud.

"Latria mu."

He nodded his approval of the slight roll I gave to the 'r'.

"And what does it mean?" I asked.

I watched a slight flush come onto his face, but one of pride.

"It translates to 'my adored'."

The implication of that almost stunned me, but in a completely positive way. I thought, wow, what a wonderfully enriching thing to call another person, and that there were so many levels on which I already did adore him.

"Traditionally, it is used as an expression of profound love."

It took no longer than a second for me to reply.

"Then 'Latria mu' it is."

I instantly felt awash in a sea of gratitude, just from the look on his face.

We shared the evening with spirited conversation, and not once did I feel awkward, or sense any discomfort on his part. The time flowed, easily and readily.

At one point, while we were talking, we heard an insistent 'meow' from behind us, and we turned and looked, where a cat, mostly-black with white and tan highlights, meandered towards us, head bouncing. It was my first sighting of his usual house-mate.

"Ah, there she is," he cooed, and stuck his free hand down and out, by the side of his chair, to attract her, to offer her some attention, while he turned and looked at me, "and again, as I mentioned, she's not overly friendly with strangers, so don't be surprised if..."

She jumped up onto my lap, kneading at the delicate fabric of my robe, the tips of her claws barely touching my open skin underneath, sending little shoots of harmless pain all around me, and then plunked herself down on my lap, purring.

Theo roared with laughter.

"Honestly, Agatha," he chuckled, "this just proves my vibes about you were correct."

I crinkled my eyebrows.

"How so?"

"She's never this affectionate with anybody, except me," he bragged, "and getting her seal of approval so quickly just shows me that you are the perfect young man to share my home with. Even Scout agrees."

Though the night had turned a little chilly, and I could feel it on my skin, so much of it exposed, I was being bathed in a shower of warmth and love from him, one that made me more comfortable, and more at peace.

"And now, my sweet Agatha," he pronounced, slowly rising to his feet, and standing in front of me, "I must bid you a good night. I have some work to do in my office in preparation for tomorrow, and then it's off to sleep."

With my back elevated in the lounger, my head was almost perfectly at his crotch level, and while he leaned over a little and extended an arm and started caressing his cat behind her ears, as she lay on my lap, I couldn't take my eyes off his meaty thighs and what lay between them.

As when I first saw him, in the kitchen, I couldn't get over the size and shape of his genitals. They were so impressive, so substantial, and entirely in keeping with the rest of his body, toned and masculine and strong, that they mesmerized me. Like many of the paintings he'd shown me in his office, he was an almost-classical image, stark and graphic in two-dimensions, but outrageously beyond surreal in three.

My attention to his crotch was broken when I heard him say, "good night, my sweet Agatha," and looked up to see his top half bending towards me.

I knew in a heartbeat he was nearing himself to me, to get close enough to kiss me again.

A simple physical act of affection between two men, meant with admiration and respect.

And love.

Perfectly acceptable between two men.

I found myself raising my upper body to meet him.

His first kiss earlier had thrilled me, had sent my senses soaring, the whole idea of kissing another man pushing all my envelopes, and when his lips met mine for the second time I sighed out an enormous sound, a happier noise than the purring cat could ever hope to make.

As he walked back into the house, he explained that he'd be awake at five in the morning, to spend an hour in the gym, because a healthy body was as important as a healthy mind, and invited me to join him, which I promised I would.

His last words to me were striking.

"Men exercise in the nude, the way nature intended. Good night, sweet Agatha."

"Good night, 'Latria mu'."

I'd just told another man that he was 'my adored', what I knew to be an 'expression of profound love', and never felt more delighted in my life.

Before today, before meeting Theo and having my eyes opened up to so many aspects of enlightened living that I'd never dreamed of, I would have never said it, ever. To anyone. It just wasn't done. It would have been inappropriate, even if I'd meant it about somebody, something far more emotionally-revealing than my previous definition of a man would have remotely considered.

And yet, in just several hours with Theo, I'd realized that those levels of emotion, those depths of connection with another person, they were indeed the fire in our lives. It was as if he was opening me up to the possibilities of a deeper, purer existence.

I kept the panties on, when I went to bed. Before sliding under the covers, I added a camisole, at the last second, because it just looked so dainty and sexy, and felt even better, the two tiny spaghetti straps adding a hint of weight on my skin I'd never felt before, the material, soft and satiny, delighting every pore of the skin it touched, most especially my bare hardened nipples. I kept the lipstick on as well, because it reminded me that I could get kisses while painted, and they were great kisses, really really great, and who wouldn't want more of those?

Hard as iron, I was going to masturbate, the excitement and originality of my evening, the make-up and the panties and the robe, all sending my emotions in titillating ways, but decided instead to deny myself. I wanted to see what might happen if I went the whole night with a hard-on.

When my alarm went off, I sprung out of bed, with more energy than I usually had. Bright-eyed and bushy-tailed didn't even begin to describe how I felt. I was excited, agog, and bubbly with starting my day.

I wore a shorter robe downstairs, to the gym, but without any panties on. I should have been nervous, at least a little, about to bare my complete nudity to another man, but if I was it didn't register. In all honesty, I was actually looking forward to it.

Theo was already in the room, stretching his body in a yoga-like pose, feet on the floor, arms and hands thrust toward the ceiling, his entire body taut and virile.

His cock was just as long and thick as I remembered, and still flaccid.

He smiled and beamed out a "good morning, my sweet Agatha!" and walked towards me, his arms opening up for a hug, as I gently shrugged the gown from my shoulders, proudly displaying my entire body to him, letting him see me in the early morning light, the sun outside the floor-to-ceiling glass just cracking above the horizon to the east, baring my flesh and soul to him, knowing I'd be crushed if it didn't please him.

"Good morning, my 'Latria mu'."

We met flesh to flesh, no thin layers of soft thin woven fabric between us, skin on skin, as natural as two living creatures can ever be, and his hanging penis hit me on my lower belly, and made me gasp just a little, before lifting my head and seeing his face coming towards mine, for a kiss.

I welcomed his kiss, with every erg of my energies.

For an hour, we worked out. I wasn't a gym guy, and never had been, so I followed his guidance to the letter, beginning with stretches and warm-up, through some light cardio movements, almost dancing, until he showed me some exercises with weights that would work best for my body, which he praised as being beautiful, again, which made me blush, advising me to aim my workouts at merely toning what was already there, ever the teacher and mentor.

At the stroke of six, he ushered us into the sauna, and put fifteen minutes on the timer, and we sat opposite each other, on little benches, two naked men, sweat pouring down our bodies, most of his getting caught up in hairs, mine sliding down smooth uninterrupted skin.

Caught up in the staggering heat and steam, I closed my eyes to just loll in pleasure. I couldn't imagine a better way to start every day.

A few times, while we sat, I cracked my eyelids just enough to get a tiny horizontal sliver of sight, and admired his body. So unlike mine, everything about him defined rugged, and solid, and strong to me.

A couple of times, I'm pretty sure I saw him doing the same discrete eyelid opening move on me, pleased as punch to espy the slight smiles he'd produce.

We both had our showers, in different rooms of course, and then we dressed, him as usual and me in my boring boy clothes, and met in the kitchen, where he threw together a quick nutritious breakfast for us, of yogurt and fresh fruit and granola sprinkled on top. It was the yummiest meal I'd ever had, delighting my taste senses and giving me fuel to burn for my approaching day.

Just before we left for campus, I ran upstairs to grab my backpack, and threw caution to the wind, stripping off my pants and underwear, and slid the panties from last night on. It shot my excitement level up a few notches.

All day long, I knew, I'd be on a slightly-raised plane of existence, knowing I was being so naughty, secretly wearing women's panties in public.

At the front door, he handed me a key to the house, with a warm smile, and showed me how to use the alarm panel, including the code to turn it off and on. He took a second to recommend to me that I should have it on, at all times, if he wasn't home. Just in case.

And, he added, his voice serious, I was to never let anyone else into the house, even if they claimed to be his family or his publisher or anybody important.

On the drive to the university, he veered from his normal route and showed me the neighborhood I was now living in, including the bus route that ran a few blocks away, where I would be able to get to and from school or anywhere else I wanted to go, when he couldn't provide me with a ride, or when our schedules didn't sync up and allow it. All the way along the forty-minute trip, we talked as easily as we had last night, as we had since meeting, smoothly and effortlessly, like old friends, in total comfort in each other's presence.

His wink at me after he'd parked his car and I scurried off to my first class of the day made me smile, all the way inside.

I'd made a new friend, a best friend, my first ever, and it elated me.

Our second evening together was much like the night before. He made us a lovely dinner of stuffed eggplant and lamb kebobs, while I watched and listened and learned, our conversation delightful and inspiring.

The two biggest differences on night two were that Theo had chosen to be completely naked, with no tunic at all, and I had worn the shortest robe that hung in my closet, pale and gauzy and delicate, over top of a coal-black bra, panty and stocking set, and I'd had time to experiment with things beforehand, visually impressing him with my cherry-red lips, subtle rosy cheekbones, and soft golden eyelids.

"Agatha!" he'd shouted, when I softly stepped into the room, "you are more beautiful than ever! Am I not the luckiest man in the entire world?"

His hug was vigorous, and long. And when he bent down to kiss me, I stood up on my tippy-toes faster than a ballet dancer, because I couldn't wait to be kissed.

And kiss him back.

The stoic tradition of little affection of my English and Scottish heritage meant I was raised in an atmosphere where it didn't happen all that often. A few times, the supportive hug here, the congratulatory hug there, but not much else. So this new-to-me lifestyle of frequent and fervent physical attention was like the flame to a moth.

We both murmured when our lips met, his from deep in his chest, and once again I was wrapped up in his arms and body, like a suit of armor, protecting me from any possible dangers and filling my emotional and physical tanks inside to the brim.

It seemed perfectly natural to open my lips to him, when he made it obvious it was something he desired. His gentle tap on my lips with the very tip of his tongue was loving, and gentle, respectfully making the offer without any pressure, allowing me the decision. His tongue was welcome in me, I took it in with glee, understanding anew, remembering his words, that men could be intimate with each other, and perhaps should be, as they naturally desire.

I was chock full of desire.

I felt a rise in him, as we stood pressed together.

That made me happier than everything else about my new life, combined.

Dinner was splendid, organic foods made with care and delicious wine, not to mention the easy conversation. Our subject matter weaved from one to another, our days, politics, the arts, and he had plenty of opportunities to educate me on Grecian history as it applied, and how advanced they were, with public health care, and commerce, and education. And he was also up-front about how all of that had to be balanced against the negatives of their time, slavery being the big one.

As always, it was the passions of life that became the focus of every subject we discussed, his exuberance for art and history and health and love shining through, and truly affecting my attitudes, my state of mind, more to the positive, and finding those joys in every second of the day.

Celebrating those positives.

After dinner he had work to do, in his office, and gently reminded me that the entire house was mine to use. The hot tub, on the deck outside of his bedroom, for instance, which made me think he was trying to encourage me to enjoy the pleasures to be had, so I took him up on his offer.

Right after he kissed me again, a soft gentle brief kiss, before taking his leave.

My soak was perfect, after I wiped off all my make-up, deciding I'd apply everything again, after. As relaxing as anything, burbling steaming hot water on my naked smooth skin soothed me, and nurtured me, filling me with a gloriously-subdued energy. I felt like I'd suddenly had a small power plant installed inside me, running on low but making everything I was going through so much more exciting and invigorating than the old me ever experienced, and absolutely joyous in knowing there was so much more power in reserve to go.

I felt so much more alive than my normal life.

My attention to detail was focussed like a laser beam as I put on my make-up, learning from the night before that less is more, properly applied. With my pale northern European complexion, my cheeks almost always had a little flush to them, so it didn't take much to make them shine a little brighter, while a sky-blue eyelid, tastefully minimal, brought out the dark blue of my eyes, and made them pop. The cherry-red lipstick was the only one I even considered putting on.

The longest gown slid onto my shoulders like a gentle breeze, after I'd sensuously slid the pair of bubble-gum pink thigh-high stockings up my newly-shaved legs, almost groaning at their touch, and then completing my look for the evening with the smallest, sexiest, pink G-string panties, barely a tiny triangle of shiny fabric and some rope. But the effect on how I saw myself, in the mirror AND in my heart, was staggering.

I fell in love with me.

I fell in love with the very sight of me, stem to stern, my stiffy making the panties bulge perhaps the most erotic sight I'd ever imagined being part of.

A glass of wine beside me, I'd strewn myself on the sectional sofa, in the den, a roaring fire in the gas fireplace, with a book in hand. I'd seen it while scanning just some of his collection, one out of hundreds, but the title on the spine leapt out at me.

Pederasty and Pedagogy in Archaic Greece.

I loved textbooks. Facts, and conjecture about known facts, seemed far more interesting to me than made-up stories and fiction, as entertaining as some of them could be. So I was several pages into the first chapters dealing with Indo-European Pederasty, and how multiple cultures and peoples, not just the Greeks, had some levels of pederasty in them, in what felt like no time at all.

Sadly, of course, there was a cold hard reality to the facts as I read them. It was undeniable that some of these cultures, and some of their Pederastic relationships, were horribly exploitive, at times violent and disgusting. The very idea of grown men forcing themselves on boys, barely in their teens, was abhorrent and made me shake from the inside out. How could anyone do that to a boy?

But grown men with other grown men, that was different. People of age. People of adulthood, men themselves, who chose of their own free will to pursue relationships with other men, older or not, that was completely acceptable to a civilized world, and, as I was learning every second, something to be celebrated and cheered on. And most of all, completely natural. Just as mature women mentor younger women in many aspects of their lives, so too should older men give the same of themselves to their younger counterparts. Their years of experience and knowledge were the sweetest fruit from the tree of life, it stands to reason, and what younger man like myself wouldn't jump at the opportunity to learn and grow in the ways of the world?

Art, culture, politics, science, philosophy, they were all wisdoms to be passed down.

As were love, and passion, and, yes, I realized, could include sensuality and sexuality as well.

My life felt enriched beyond compare, at just a couple of days of getting to know another man on the levels Theo and I were roaming on. This journey of mine felt spiritual, as if the previously-unknown presence I had in me, soft and lovely and feminine, had finally been allowed to bloom. Like a beautiful butterfly, suddenly coming to life, springing from the ugly cocoon and flying free, and taken by the winds, I was blossoming.

I was so engaged with my reading that I didn't hear Theo enter the room, but I did eventually sense him, and, turning to look, I could see him absolutely beaming at me, just radiant, standing with a wine glass in his hand, naked.

What thrilled me the most was that for the first time, Theo wasn't completely flaccid.

His cock had a bit of an upward angle, just a little, but enough to be noticeable, and while it didn't seem longer than normal, it might have been thicker.

"My Agatha," he murmured, "your passion for reading is evident," and then he casually moved his chin, pointing it at my body.

Looking down, I could see my erection, poking out from my robe.

The head was shiny with moisture, trapped in the levee of my raised foreskin.

It looked delicious.

What should have been a complete embarrassment for me, sporting a stiffy in front of another man, as a guest in his home no less, was, I quickly realized, a concern for the less-enlightened. I knew almost instantly that Theo wouldn't be offended. How could he?

I was doing what came naturally.

"Good for you, Agatha," he said, and I could tell he meant it, "expressing yourself in the most beautiful way possible," and he raised his wine glass to me, in a toast, "you are a lovely young man, full of energy and passion. Cherish it. Celebrate it."

Then he toasted me again.

"I'm celebrating it," he added, "I'm overwhelmed by it, because a more welcome sight in my own home I can't imagine. And I can't help but be moved by it, by you, and how quickly you've taken to being my 'Eromenos'. It's far more than I ever could have hoped for, so I thank you, truly, from the bottom of my heart."

His stare at me was frank, and honest.

"I couldn't have dreamed of a better companion," he continued, "enriching my life as you have, as you are."

It was impossible to take my eyes from his, the earnest admiration for me obvious on his face, a riveting truthfulness as serious and real as a stroke, filling me with the first real pride I'd ever felt in my life, and yet in my periphery I could see something that made me even prouder.

His cock began to rise upwards.

Of all the accomplishments of my relatively short life, none could even compare to the elation that swept through me watching Theo get hard, because of me, right before my eyes.

Right before both of our eyes.

He was tall, and proud, with no reservation at all at showing me how he felt. An 'Erastes', in his own home, himself reacting naturally to the energy of life around him, and the energies he was getting from me, as I lolled in my splayed robe and panties and stockings, with make-up on my face, reading about men loving other men, as erect as I'd ever been able to produce, throbbingly so.

We stared at each other, in the warmest silence known to humankind, locked in each other's vision, two men reacting to each other's vitality and desires, both of us in awe of each other.

"My beautiful 'Eromenos'," he whispered, his cock finally at full-mast, pointed at the sky, pulsing with his heartbeat, a little longer than I'd ever seen and thicker as well, his helmet shiny with his own juices. I'd never seen an erection like his before, even in the porn I've watched over the years, so strong, so masculine, and so monumental.

"My 'Latria mu'," I answered, softly, "you deserve all the credit. It's you who've made me feel this way. Being here with you, surrounded by your wisdom and your energies and your zest for living, I feel alive, for the first time. I feel like a door has been opened, and I've stepped into a world that had always been waiting for me but I didn't know was there."

Theo's face seemed to become determined, a steely resolve settling in.

"Never be afraid or ashamed of expressing yourself, as you are now," he said, pointing a hand at my body, "wear what makes you feel the most excited, the most beautiful, and what makes you shine with your graces, which I knew you had in you, from the first moment I met you, and never," he said, adding stress to the word, "never inhibit your true passions, your true desires, and your true beauty."

We lapsed into the warm silence again, eye to eye, on display to the other, nothing shameful or uncomfortable about the situation, two men, one masculine and one feminine, both erect, each aware of our strengths and each aware of the others.

His seriousness was replaced with a sly grin.

"And never be afraid to express your desires, here, in this house," he warmly advised me, "if something arouses you, then you should do what comes naturally, just as men have done for tens of thousands of years. Since time began."

Then his voice got soft, and soothing.

"Love yourself," he almost-whispered, "and make love to yourself, whenever you can. Seize the moment! There's nothing shameful about it. In fact, there's everything that's perfect about it. Every one of us radiates the purest ecstasy when we express our love, for others or ourselves. And, it's only in the ultimate moment of release that we can truly be at one with the universe, where we join the Gods on Mount Olympus, that moment of climax when the brain is wiped clean of all thoughts, and we can only see heaven. And it fills my heart with joy to know that being here with me inspires those feelings in you."

Then he paused.

"And," he added, even quieter, "it pleases me more than I can express to watch my 'Eromenos' as he grows, as he learns about that higher plane of existence. And as he loves himself."

He was touching me, emotionally. With an openness and frankness the normal world doesn't have, he was encouraging me to go with my feelings, the ones that were raging to be sexual.

I wanted so much to touch him, physically. I knew I was touching him emotionally, that much was obvious, but he was telling me that I would take it all to a profoundly new and attractive level for him, just by letting go of anything holding me back.

He was encouraging me to masturbate.

For him.

While he watched.

I placed the thick book down on the coffee table, next to my wine glass, and rolled slightly on the couch, turning my body more towards him, my robe sloughing open, exposing me to him, wantonly, nothing brave about it, just a pure desire to add to his happiness.

There were no reasons for shyness. There was no need for propriety, or the various ways different cultures have historically defined it.

There was every reason for truth, and honesty, and blatant diving into the pool of life.

With my eyes firmly fixed on his, I gingerly wrapped the fingers of my right hand around my shaft, while my left hand slid down my smooth belly and then in a curved pattern over my thigh and instantly began caressing my balls.

We both made hums.

With an exaggerated movement I peeled my erection downwards, watching my foreskin go from totally covering my helmet to exposing all of it, the lake of shiny syrup sliding in every direction, wherever gravity would pull it, streaming over the curves of my head and making it almost glow in the fireplace light.

Theo's eyes were as at attention as they could be.

"Make love to yourself, my sweet man," he encouraged.

"Yes, my 'Latria mu'," I answered, my voice quivering, "I am," and I took a big gasp of air in, "for you," and I stroked back up again, slowly, and Theo's cock bobbed in the air, pointing straight up and almost taut to his belly, and then I smoothly pulled down a second time, exposing the head again, making me actually utter the syllable, "oooh", something I've never said before, but I felt it now.

"Show me your love," he whispered.

"Always," I uttered, my head falling back slightly, as I continued to lovingly stroke up and down, masturbating in front of this man, in front of another person, for the first time in my life, wondering why I hadn't done it before, blown away at how free I felt, how daring I felt, and how totally one-hundred-and-ten-percent hit-it-out-of-the-ballpark sexy it made me feel.

The hardest thing for me was to keep my eyes on his, while I quickly built up and up and up towards a climax. Each new ramp of increasing euphoria, as I got closer and closer to my goal brought us closer together, emotionally, I could tell, I just knew it, and I became prouder and prouder to be displaying my sexuality in front of Theo as I went along.

For his part, he stood silently, other than the huffs and puffs of his breathing, which got faster and faster to match me, which just increased my pride and my determination to make him understand that his coming into my life was a game-changer for the timid old me, and how having the integrity to go through with bringing myself to orgasm in front of him was as much an homage to him as it was a pleasure to me, and he knew it, and I knew that he knew it.

Our breathing got intense. My face flushed red, as did his, when the last delicious level was met, the penultimate one, just before the explosion, and he knew it, because he was a man, just like me, and those moments are as ingrained in our DNA as anything, and recognizable, to those open to picking up the spiritual vibrations.

"Do it, my love, my Agatha," he encouraged, his voice tense, obviously emotionally charged, just as eager as I for what was approaching, and I knew what he meant, that I should take the final leap into the void, and once and for all banish any hesitations or uncertainties.

When I came it was a full-body explosion, my back arched off the couch, and my lungs screamed out a roaring moan, which made Theo grunt, a deep powerful sound that echoed off the walls, and my first spasm was so powerful a rope of my ejaculate arced out of me and landed all around my left collar bone, wet and sticky and exuding a heady odor, the male musk of passion, followed by three more spurts, all of them in decreasing levels of pressure, landing further and further down my body, until I lay there, wetness in viscous blobs all over my chest and belly, panting and mumbling, breathing like I'd just run the world record in the hundred-yard dash, and Theo watched every second of my experience, revelling in it, taking it in and adding it to his wealth of pleasurable moments.

Some of my cum had dribbled down my shaft, not powered enough to shoot anywhere that gravity couldn't immediately pull it downwards, and in a matter of moments my hand was dripping with cum.

Theo's eyes were blazing with fire, and his erection was almost giving off steam.

I didn't even consider the idea of doing anything else, no matter what kind of society I'd been brought up in. I raised my hand, wet with my cum, and without taking my eyes off of his I began licking at it, savoring it, the taste, tangy, and the texture, thick. Up until that moment, I'd never considered the idea of tasting my own cream, it just wasn't even thought about based on the sensibilities of the modern world. Of course, I knew some women did, when making oral love to their men. And, obviously, some gay men did it as well.

But those were labels, and I instantly made the decision to banish them, once and for all. Theo was teaching me that, just by being himself. Perhaps it was best described, I realized, as enlightened people tasting the most natural product there is, like any food or drink, just laying around, amongst all of us.

The look on his face as he watched me eat my own cum was as priceless as the biggest diamond in the world. He was vicariously enjoying it just as much as I was, and I was! The taste of it resonated in me, as natural and earthy and rare a treat as the nectar of the Gods, and my initial casual licks soon enough became long slurps, cleaning my own skin, wanting more of the taste of semen in my world.

Semen. It gave life, when placed in a womb.

It was giving me life too, voluntarily and eagerly placed in my mouth.

Wordless for minutes, he watched me come down from my orgasmic high and I watched him come down from his excited high, and then he finished off the wine in his glass in one swallow, showing me a decision had been made, a resolve had been determined.

Walking towards me, he kneeled on the floor, next to me, bringing his head close to mine.

"That was the most beautiful act I've seen in many a year," he confessed, "and I thank you, my sweet Agatha."

Leaning over to kiss me, and just before his lips got to mine, his tongue darted out and licked at a stray bead of my cum, under my lower lip, his eyes blazing with excitement, before taking my mouth in his, honoring me as I honored him, tasting me and the remnants of my seed, vigorously.

For minutes on end we kissed, softly and gently, with tender tongue stabs, until he broke it.

"And with that, my 'Eromenos', I bid you a good night, and the sweetest of dreams," and he stood, gazing down at me, while I looked up at him, like a tourist at the bottom of an inspiringly tall statue, of the perfect-looking classical man, but unlike all the statues I'd seen in my history books, none of them had pulsating erections to visually adore.

"My dreams," he added, "will be especially sweet tonight, blessed as I am with what I've just seen, and how our time together continues to get more delightful, by the second."

As he walked away, giving me another chance to admire his round firm hairy ass, he stopped, and turned his head to gaze at me again, and reminded me about the gym, and five o'clock.

I was so turned on, so over-the-moon with simmering energy, that I didn't go soft and wilt immediately after cumming, my traditional response, especially the few times I'd been to bed with women. Instead, I stayed erect, and there was more than enough of my cum on my body to use as lubricant over my sensitive skin, and once again I began masturbating, closing my eyes, imagining in my mind how mind-blowing it would feel for me to do the same to his cock, to touch his cock, to take it into my grip, to masturbate him, to love him in that way, one man showing his affection for another man in the most primal and feral manner as possible.

Or, maybe, even more than just touching his cock.

Images of myself, in flowing gowns and strewn with glittering jewelry, came popping into my consciousness, titillating visions sending my soul soaring into the stratosphere, of laying between Theo's legs, while making love to him.

In my mouth.

When I strolled into the gym, I was naked, wearing nothing except for lipstick, which I didn't want to ever be seen without as long as I stayed in his house. Just adding color to my lips felt natural, and filled me with the certainty that I was attractive, that a thin sheen of waxy coating changed everything, and turned the timid boring hum-drum me of twenty-one years into a person of maturity, a person who knew how to make their own life exciting, and could therefore make other people feel the same way.

One other person.

I was also as hard and erect as I'd been last night.

Theo, to my utter joy, was sporting an erection as well, as if an unspoken barrier had been broken, by me, and now the playing field was changed, entirely for the better.

He was standing and stretching, and when he saw me he almost jumped towards me, his arms pulling me into his body, his lips finding mine, his tongue instantly in my mouth, surprising me, and delighting me, and I wriggled my torso like a belly-dancer, trying to rub at his cock, trying to give him pleasure.

Our work-out, after he reluctantly broke our kiss, was spirited and lyrical, and I got to watch his musculature at work as he pumped and curled and pressed, seeing how his stellar cock would shimmy and wriggle with his movements, while he practically undressed me with his eyes as I worked on toning my ass and legs, two of my best assets, according to my 'Latria mu', and I was already naked, so undressing me with his eyes felt as if I was prey for his sustenance, the lion eyeing his next target.

I gave energy I didn't know I had to my exercises, wanting to make my ass rounder, and my legs sexier. I couldn't imagine not wanting to do whatever I had to do or could do to be more feminine, and more attractive to my host.

The sauna was sweltering and steamy, and there was no need for pretense or reservation.

I began masturbating after a short time, sitting opposite Theo, on the little wooden bench, openly, and proudly, and he stared at me, and I could tell that every synapse in his brain and therefore his entire soul was rapt at watching me, and being part of the experience with me.

Never taking my eyes off his, after just a minute or so I knew I'd seeped out a small pond of pre-cum, so I used the tip of my forefinger from my free hand and coated it in my own juice, the added delight of the contact with my penis making me shudder, and then brought it slowly to my mouth, shiny and drippy, making sure that he saw every movement, and every nuance, and when I opened my lips lewdly and placed that wet finger in my mouth, I watched Theo's entire body shudder, and I had to summon all my mental strengths to not explode in orgasm then and there.

He watched me lick my fingers. He watched me savor the taste, the clear liquid offering a distinct if not mellow hint of what I'd eaten last night.

Twice.

I'd gone to bed with two loads of my own cum in my tummy.

Theo's eyes blazed with life, and with lust.

I knew the man well enough, even after only a couple of days, to know he was bubbling with desires inside, the way his chest rose and fell, and the way his meaty cock was pulsing, covered like the rest of his body was in sweat, dripping everywhere from the steam of the sauna, balls of it trapped by the hundreds in his hairs. I knew I was causing it, the new me, the one he'd mentored, the fire in his eyes the greatest gift he could possibly give me.

As I got closer and closer to my release, he began whispering encouragement.

"Let it all out, Agatha," he moaned, and it was a moan, "show me your beauty."

When I came, I saw white stars in my vision, like people do when they've suffered a minor concussion, their brains overwhelmed, their entire nervous system overloaded, the limitations of their conscious mind on full display, not strong enough to overpower the lustful actions of their soul, and in my case, never wanting that to happen.

What I didn't shoot in arcing gasps on the floor of the sauna, my cum dripping down and into the thin gaps of the wood, landed on my belly, and after taking a few moments to let calmness take over again, to let the heights of ecstasy of orgasm trickle away, I stared at Theo and once again ate my own semen while he watched, slowly, humming with delight at the first reaction of my taste buds to the salty goo.

Theo's eyes burned a hole in mine.

He was working harder than in our gym session at keeping himself from exploding, wanting nothing to interfere with the visceral pleasures he felt watching me, witnessing my boldness, and my expression of love, for myself and for him. Twice I saw his right hand begin to move, as if he was going to touch himself, and perhaps masturbate for me, and both times he somehow found the discipline inside himself to stop.

The third time, after I'd exploded, he didn't stop himself.

I watched his huge right hand slowly wrap around his own shaft, gripping like it was a life-line.

"OH GOD," I moaned out, "YES! PLEASE!"

I'd never wanted anything more in my life, than to watch him love himself, and me, by proxy.

I'd never wanted anything more than to witness him and his ministrations, to watch him pleasure himself, and I'd never wanted anything more and never would want anything more than to see him cum.

Theo stroked himself, agonizingly slowly, up and down his mighty oak of a cock, the lecherous grin on his face something I'd not seen yet in my stay with him, his eyes burning me alive with energy, his chest going up and down almost as fast as mine was.

Then the timer buzzed, the most annoying sound I'd ever heard.

Our fifteen minutes were over.

If ever there was a look of disappointment that could be shown to every human on the planet as the textbook definition, it was on his face.

"Let's be late," I whispered, not wanting him to stop.

He thought about it, for a second or two, his hand paused, still gripping his shaft.

Reason fell over him, as a thoughtful intelligent person would be expected to do. He was a structured person, out of respect for others mostly, but also himself.

"We both have schedules to keep, Agatha," he uttered, resignation in his voice, "and there will be other times."

On our drive to the campus, our conversation was easy, and relaxed, and charming.

It was entirely focussed on masturbation.

"Last night was beautiful," he said, admiration in his voice, "more beautiful than I can properly describe. Perhaps even the most beautiful night of all my life. To see you grow so much, so quickly," he said, and paused, "it brings joy to my heart, knowing that my mentoring of you has inspired you to travel so far along the pathway to enlightenment. You should be very proud of yourself, my Agatha."

I told him I was, more and more with each passing moment in his tutelage.

"Tell me how it felt to make love to yourself, in front of me," he suggested, and the words just poured out, all of them speaking of the beauties I felt, the joys, the emotional thrills, the naughtiness that wasn't naughty at all, all while easily fulfilling his desire for a feminine outlook in my words, without even trying.

"Your greatest gift to me, my 'Latria mu'," I breathed out, "is freedom. Showing me the wisdom of the ancients, that we are all free beings, free to follow our urges and our desires, and free to revel in the joys of pleasure," and I watched him smile as he drove, his eyes forward, "and if we weren't out in the public right now I'd be hugging you and kissing you, as long as that didn't distract you enough to crash the car."

He laughed.

"Any pain from a potential accident would be worth those kisses," he murmured, "of that I am certain, for they are the most wonderful parts of my day."

His schedule was full for the day and into the evening, while mine was brief, with just one lecture to attend and some studying to do in the library, so I got home hours before he did, after making one stop at the pharmacy.

In my explorations of the house, I could not find the one thing I was hoping, more and more, that I would need.

One thing.

An enema kit.

To clean myself out.

Because, more and more, every second I was around him and every second I wasn't, I knew I was moving down the inevitable path to giving myself to Theo, sexually, freely, if he'd have me. And maybe it should have repulsed me, or offended me, according to the prudes of the world, but it didn't, it was the exact opposite.

It enthralled me. It inspired me.

To know he desired me in that way, even if he wasn't saying it yet, even if he was performing his originally-stated role as a non-sexual mentor to perfection, out of respect for me, I had grown enough in my own self-awareness in just days to understand and accept one very plain conclusion.

He was the 'Erastes', and I the 'Eromenos', and I wouldn't want it any other way, ever, and like the ancients, famed in story and lore, we were going to complete our love.

I was sure of it, and I adored the idea, even if there were occasional snippets of worry, about his size, and how it would fit into me. But those concerns were quickly doused, with the realization that he was a thoughtful man, and a caring man, and he would never allow anything to happen that way that could possibly hurt me.

Once in the door, I stripped and headed for the shower, to shave and clean and douche, a habit I instantly became accustomed to, the necessary preparations for the most heavenly of outcomes. It brought back memories of my Mom, on days she was getting ready to go out somewhere with my Dad, without us kids, a date, or dinner party, and how she'd take what seemed like forever to get ready, make-up and hair and dresses and high-heeled shoes, so much longer than it took Dad to shave and shower and change, enchantingly and joyfully humming and singing quietly to herself the whole time, which any of us could hear if we got close to her bedroom door. She was going through her motions, the same ones I was now learning to go through. To prepare ourselves, so we could present ourselves in the soft womanly ways we had in us.

Like my Mom, I found myself humming and singing happy lilts. I didn't even recognize them, but they bounced and floated as if on the very air around me, and reminded me of how simple and beauteous life could be, with a positive attitude behind you.

Scout even came in to my room, a first as far as I know, and watched me get dressed. Bra, panties, garter belt, stockings, robe, mid-calve length.

After some leftovers of mostly vegetables that I found in the fridge, I settled again in front of the fireplace in the den and continued reading about Pederasty.

At some point, I fell asleep, the second glass of wine hitting the new relaxed me in the most delightful of ways, coming to life again when I felt Theo's lips on mine.

His kiss was soft, and tender.

"It's late, my Agatha," he whispered, "let me take you to bed."

Still wearing clothes, which meant he'd just gotten home, he slipped an arm under my knees and one under my shoulders and lifted me up, like I weighed nothing, and he walked us to the stairs and then up.

I spent the whole time snuggling my head into the crook of his neck, and kissing his skin, gentle little touches of my lips, which made him breathe out a soft sound, from deep inside him.

Placing me on my bed, and covering me with the sheets and blankets, he reminded me to set my alarm clock, for our work-out, turning out the lights for me as he left, after another soft tender kiss good-night.

We began exercising ten minutes late, the next morning. That's how long our kiss lasted.

Into the sauna I knew what I wanted, and instead of laying back and enjoying the steam and the heat for a time, I sat erect, upright, facing him, and immediately began masturbating, staring him in the eyes, showing myself at my most basic, and therefore my most vulnerable, letting him see the results of his mentoring, the broadening of my sensibilities, and the widening of the scope of my existence.

I wasn't more than four strokes in on my erection when Theo leaned forward himself, sitting as upright as me, and without breaking the searing eye contact we had, he grasped his own magnificent cock and began stroking.

I'd never imagined eroticism could reach heights like this. And yet, I couldn't imagine a world or a life where eroticism like this wasn't recognized, or taken advantage of. Or just plain standard, as it should be. This! This was as intense and thrilling as any human interaction.

The emotions that ran between us, in gaze only, were as raw and unvarnished as anyone ever needs, the rarest of depths and heights that sadly only few people seem to reach, and yet were as easy as breathing.

We were both breathing harder and harder.

The timer was running.

We stretched it out for as long as we could, but our workout had got our blood going already, and we were two healthy men, both pulsing with the flames of lust, and it didn't take too long before I felt the signals, the ones that tell you that the train is just shy of arriving at the depot, but will soon, and I sensed the same from Theo, and by unspoken mutual agreement we both stood up, right in front of each other but not touching, even with our strokes out in front of us, even with his impressive length, but close, and I watched him watch me, neither of us breaking our stare, neither of us allowing the situation to be anything other than what it promised to be.

The perfect moment of discovery.

We'd find out what's it like to cum at the same time, each onto the other, expressing our admiration and affection and, yes, love, in the most natural and physical of ways.

Amid oceans of sensorial input, we leaped together. The steam rose around our heads, my sweat pouring down my body and his clumping in the hairs of his body, our nostrils flaring and our skin flush with blood from all the excitement, our hearts connected and beating as one, faster and faster, when the last signal my system usually sends me blared straight out of my mouth.

"I'm going to cum," I seethed out, my voice high-pitched and taut.

"Cum with me!" Theo bellowed, in that deep baritone, and then his pelvis rocked backwards as his big hand slid forwards and he blasted a shot of his cream right into my belly-button, which is an innie and actually held a bunch for a few seconds before gravity took effect, his cum warm to the touch, almost hot, the rest sliding down me, but I didn't notice, because I reached my plateau a second after he did, and showered his groin with my sauce.

My knees almost buckled, but I held on, and stood, the both of us groaning and pumping out secondary splooges, and then tertiary, and so on, until the both of us had no more to give, panting and huffing and reopening our eyes, our laser-like stare picking up where it had left off.

"I love you, 'Latria mu'," I gasped, and I meant it.

"As I love you, my beautiful 'Eromenos'."

I knew he meant it too.

His Friday was a little longer than mine, so I hung around campus for a couple of hours, which normally I would have spent studying somewhere, but instead I found the base of a tree on the grass of the common and sat and took in the beauty of nature, and the world around me. The grass, the sky, the wind, the clouds, the trees, the flowers, not to mention the dozens or even hundreds of young vibrant human beings that passed by, it all inspired me, and filled me with elation. They all give off amazing feelings and energies, if you're open enough to grasp the spiritual vibrations.

At one point my room-mate walked by, at the last second looking over at me and stopping, and then, surprised at seeing me, asking how it was going, with the 'house-sitting' thing, which is what I'd told him I would be doing.

"It's the best," I said, no shame in my sincerity, "I love it."

He laughed and said that maybe he should hang out with me for a while, and enjoy the house as well, but he lost his smile when I told him it was strictly a no-no for me to have any guests, and there was no way I was going to risk losing the gig.

I didn't mention that it was the best gig in the world, and I never wanted it to end.

Never.

He just nodded, a little disappointed.

On our drive home, Theo suggested a movie night, since it was Friday and neither of us had any specific plans for the next day. He had a classic of Greek cinema, on DVD, he told me, and thought it would show me a different style of movie-making from the usual Hollywood fare I'd seen. Dinner, of course, and then a movie.

A date!

I was going on a date! With another man!

With MY man. My 'Erastes'.

And I couldn't have been happier if you'd given me every single ounce of gold on the planet.

Getting ready for my date was an exercise in pure lovely joy, every step of my cleaning and shaving and dressing and decorating done with care and precision, wanting to look my very best for him, wanting to look my most feminine for him.

I was his 'Eromenos', and not only was it expected of me, it was the very basic minimum I felt I had to do, that I wanted to do, not for his sake, but for mine.

I needed to be lovely. It was the underlying truth of what I'd learned in my time with Theo. It was the rapturous goal, attainable within these walls, a moral imperative second to none.

Be lovely, was my mantra, for being lovely was the most laudable accomplishment I'd ever attained, and, as I was learning, was the aphrodisiac of my world.

Being lovely, to me, literally equated to being alive.

Being lovely, to me, meant overflowing with desires, spiritual and physical.

Being lovely meant being sexy, and sexual, and more and more, every minute of every day, I could feel that aspect of existence coming closer.

I'd thrown off the psychological cloak that covered me when I'd agreed to the proposal and arrived, just a few days ago, the cloak that had convinced me that there would be no sexual entanglements in our relationship because I wasn't 'that way' and never had been, and Theo had guaranteed me of that, that this was a purely professional arrangement, nothing untoward or physical, and I'd believed him, genuinely, and while I sensed he was still struggling with crossing that line, trying his hardest to stick to the deal as planned, it was, in my mind and soul, an inevitability.

It seemed to me as obvious as the sun rising in the east.

This 'Eromenos' would eventually make love to his 'Erastes'. This lovely feminine man would take his counterpart, his masculine man, into his bed, and into his body.

The only question was when.

There seemed only one way to dress for him.

A formal gown, with the long flowing skirt and the halter top, called out to me. It looked exactly like something that would have been worn in an epic motion picture, the attendants to an ancient Greek Queen, or even Her Majesty personally. Almost touching the ground, the material was thick and lustrous, a deep green, like jade, and when I turned my hips the bottom swayed in lyrical sweeps.

Theo was in a tunic again, this one longer than the only other one I'd seen, from our first night, but equally impressive, fitting him like a gauzy glove, showing me his burly body and his gorgeous cock, a feast for the eyes to me.

The look of joy on his face when he turned and saw me became hotter, in seconds, as he gazed at me. In keeping with nature, to the jade color of my gown, a natural element, I kept that theme, and powdered my eyelids in copper, my cheeks rosy, and my lips a deep red wine color.

And for the first time, I'd painted my fingernails and toenails, both a popping neon orange, like the setting sun.

His cock made a noticeable upwards movement.

His hug was crushing, to my joy.

His lips were hungry for mine, as was his tongue.

I was his muse, his 'Eromenos', his feminine man, and he was my guide, my 'Erasmes', the both of us completely devoted to our roles, our natures shining, and mixing to create a mosaic of colors and sounds.

Wine and good conversation followed, each of us involved and engaged, occasionally challenging each other's statements or opinions, good-naturedly sparring in intellectual ways, men, in the purest of enriching competitions, while he finished the spinach pie he'd prepared and got it into the oven, adding another pan with a pile of fresh tomatoes, all doused in garlic and oil and peppers. They smelled heavenly, and I just knew they'd taste that way as well.

While we waited for the food, and during admiring long gazes at each other, and mutual compliments, Theo suggested a game of chess, which I'd enjoyed playing in the past, and we began the battle. In-between telling me how much he loved my willingness to let the inner 'Eromenos' in me out, and in-between when I honestly thanked him from the bottom of my heart for giving me this chance, for being my mentor, the man who'd shown me so much more than I ever dreamed about, in life and love and freedom, he talked about his love of the game, owing to the strategizing that must be done to think multiple moves ahead, and the two of us had testosterone blazing, both of us wanting to win, and some of my moves made him roar in delight, not expecting what I'd done, and the game was good-natured and fierce and we were about even.

Until I made one tactical mistake, and I knew it as soon as I took my hand off the piece. We both were down to only a few men, such was the carnage of our attacks, so with an almost-wide-open board, I missed one potential move of his, and when I realized it, before he made any motions, I looked up at him, and he was grinning.

He knew he was about to win, and he knew that I now knew it as well.

Traditionally, when one accepts the end is near, one is supposed to topple one's king over, onto its side, as a sign of surrender.

I chose a different tack.

I looked Theo in the eyes, and spoke.

"Mate me."

Suddenly his face got serious.

"Agatha," he cautioned, "there is an old saying, an aphorism, a cliché, even, that might apply here."

"Which is?" I asked, a satisfied smile on my face.

"In all aspects of life," he whispered, "you should be careful what you wish for."

I knew what he was referring to.

So I said it again.

"Mate me, my 'Latria mu'."

He wanted to say something, that much I knew. I could see the lust for me on his face. I watched the corners of his lips move upwards, just a touch, and his eyes flared a little.

And then the oven timer went off.

Theo looked at me and grinned, and I couldn't help but grin back.

Dinner was delightful, as was our conversation. I did most of it, explaining a paper I was writing, regarding the Battle of Hastings, and how I'd always believed that it was William against Harold, a man trying to establish a republic versus one trying to reinstall a monarchy. But the joy of research and learning had opened my eyes up.

"The more I dig down, the more it makes me realize things weren't that simple. For instance, it turns out their families were inter-related, in huge ways. So it wasn't just the textbook us-versus-them war I thought it was. It wasn't just England against France. It was in many ways a family feud."

Theo nodded, knowingly.

"Internecine wars," he prompted, ever the teacher, "the most senseless of all, proving once again that man can be brutal, even to his own brother, when we forget the teachings of Eros," and he glared at me in what I took to be a romantic way, "love, my sweet Agatha. Love is all we need."

I giggled.

"John Lennon said the same thing," I joshed.

Theo laughed.

"Then there must have been some Greek blood in him."

We ate and talked, and cleaned up and talked, with touches and caresses and the occasional soft kiss, two men expressing their affection for each other in the most natural way, and then Theo walked to the sliding glass doors and stared outside, at the sky.

"The stars are just starting to come out," he said, and then turned to look back at me, "but they cannot compare to your beauty," and he held out one of his arms towards me, "so elegant and womanly, in your gown. You could not have pleased me more, my 'Eromenos'. So come, Agatha, come join me outside for a spell, let's bask in the glory of the nature, under the canopy of the universe."

Slowly padding my way to him, stretching out my arm and hand to take his, I felt like royalty, like a Queen, escorted by her King, my gown flowing around me as I moved, and this time there was no hesitation in me, no trifle of nervousness, about possibly being seen outside.

I didn't care if anybody saw me.

I didn't care if everybody on the planet saw me.

I was steely and determined to live this way, prouder than a trumpeter swan, ready to announce to the world my presence, this was me, as I was in that moment, filled with gentle fluidity, and a burning fire of sensual energy.

We stood, silently, gazing above us, holding hands, the both of us taking in the awe of what we could see and smell and taste and feel, reveling in the power of nature, sensing it course through our veins. There was a wind, occasional little tugs on my hair noticeable, and with so much of my skin exposed, after a few minutes, the height of dusk, I could see myself becoming chilly, imminently, and like the most empathic of lovers, Theo must have felt it in my aura, and before I could voice a worry his big arm came around me and pulled me to him gently, feeding me warmth, body to body, my face on his chest, one arm around his back and one hand on his chest, through the opening in his tunic, and I closed my eyes and soaked in the exquisite sensations I felt in the tips of my fingers, all his hair and his skin sliding underneath them.

"Mmmm," he murmured, "Touch is wonderful, isn't it?" and I nodded into his skin, "like a kiss, it conveys emotion, and affection, and respect. And of course, love. And we should never inhibit ourselves in this life, Agatha, the way the puritans want us to. We should touch people more often, especially those we want to show our love."

One of his hands fell upon the rise of my left buttock.

"I adore touching you," he whispered, into my ear, his head so close to mine, just above it.

"And I adore being touched by you," I answered, and we stood in the gentle breeze and swayed lightly back and forth, holding and touching each other. Two lovers, at peace with themselves and their world.

Finally, after minutes, I felt Theo's head move, so I turned mine upwards to see him and he smiled a satisfied smile and leaned down and kissed me, softly. It lasted for a long time, just lips to lips, no tongues, and we let each other know how much we cared for each other, strangers just days ago, now intertwined in the exploration of the ages.

Love.

"Come," he said finally, after breaking our kiss, his eyes sending me fiery energies, "let me show you a classic of Greek cinema."

Moving in any way while wearing the gown felt like I was floating on air. The fabric billowed in and out as I walked, my bare feet daintily touching the floors with the lightest of taps, each new stretch of my legs sending tiny gusts of air under the hem and up my bare skin, teasing my hairless balls, unconstrained by panties, yet another new experience for me, another opportunity to compare men's clothes versus women's, reaffirming for about the hundredth time that I much preferred the female garments.

It was so much more freeing to wear feminine clothes.

It was so much more freeing to let my feminine traits rise to the surface.

It was so much more freeing to let them take over my head and my heart.

While I refilled our wine glasses, he put a DVD in the machine, and the giant screen in the media room came to life. He'd manoeuvered the two single leather chairs out of the way, and slid the two-seater sofa to directly in the middle of the room, and as we sat, each of us close to the other but not touching, he explained, ever the teacher and mentor, about the history of filmmaking in Greece, including the decades of government repression and censorship, and how auteurs had to carefully hide the messages they were hoping to convey, burying them in allegory.

"This movie is called 'Mikres Afrodites'," he said, "or, 'Young Afrodites', as it was called in the limited release it saw outside of Greece. It was made in the early nineteen-sixties, at the height of government interference in the creation of art, a horrible period of time, and told as a faithful reimagining of one of the classic tales of Eros himself, the God of love. Essentially, it shows the dichotomy between the brutal nature of man and the delicate essence of woman and how they are inextricably intertwined, and always have been. And it shows how when the two are thrust together under any conditions it will always inevitably demand the recognition of man's carnal instincts, which themselves always demand the total surrender of the flesh, as it always has."

With my legs curled up underneath me, I sat against one of the arms of the deep soft sofa, the black leather rich and luxurious, a pleasure for our sense of touch, and we began watching. Initially, I was bound and determined to soak it up, and continue learning about other cultures, and history itself.

But it wasn't more than a few minutes in when I realized my attention was waning. I wasn't in the right frame of mind for education, or advancing my esoteric knowledge base.

My thoughts were elsewhere. There were other things I wanted to learn, things far less intellectual.

Stealing glances to my right, I kept watching Theo, as his rapt attention to the movie showed, his eyes glued to the screen, while the rest of him reacted naturally. I watched his breathing, and the way the skin of his body moved as his lungs filled and emptied. I took glee and delight in seeing his emotional reactions to the film, in the light of the screen bouncing back at us, his smiles and his grimaces and his recognition of basic human emotions and experiences.

Mostly though, I watched his cock.

It moved as he did, of course, in tiny little motions when he was mostly still, but from side to side and up and down when he repositioned himself, shifting his weight to and fro, as we all do, without thinking about it. I watched it fill with blood at times, over the course of minutes, in little bursts, and I watched those moments ebb away too.

When he shifted into one particular spot on his end of the sofa, I found my opening.

Noiselessly, I slid over and lay my head on his chest, snuggling into his body all along his left side, trapping my own right arm, and with the greatest of delight I felt his long left arm wrap around my shoulder, his hand landing on my left hip, his fingers beginning instantly the dance of caressing me, lightly.

Touch. Physically conveying emotion.

Theo practiced what he preached.

Remembering his words from just minutes ago, outside, when he advocated for more touching, my left hand with the painted nails softly landed on his chest, again delighting in feeling the hairs beneath my fingertips, and he murmured from somewhere deep inside his chest.

So I explored.

Instead of paying attention to the movie, with its intricate telling of an ancient tale set in modern times, my eyes were firmly fixed on his body, from my vantage point, my right cheek lain on his left pec, loving the slight tickling his stray hairs were giving me, and the way his belly quivered the tiniest little bit when I ran the tips of my fingernails across the skin of his chest.

Slowly, with an almost agonizingly-structured pace, I let my hand explore his upper body, wanting to feel every square inch, every in and out of his form, every nuance, subtle or not. I wanted him to believe that my motions were entirely distracted, simple rhythmic movements while the majority of my brain was busy concentrating on the film.

Soon enough though, those idle touches became focussed, and determined.

When my thumb and forefinger found his right nipple, my left arm across the breadth of his chest, I squeezed, ever so slightly, and brought out two distinct reactions from him.

The first was that he moaned, just a little, in that deep baritone voice, letting it escape his lips, which were just above the top of my head.

The second was that his cock jumped up, and got thicker, in a second or two.

So I squeezed again, and got more of both reactions.

With my head where it was, it didn't take any thought at all, or much effort on my part, being so close to it, and moving only an inch or two at most, I was able to wrap my lips around his left nipple, for the first time tasting his flesh.

Theo sat up, with me connected to him, his big arm pulling me into him even harder than before.

"OH MY GOD, AGATHA, THAT'S WONDERFUL!" he seethed out through clenched teeth, "Women are not the only ones with nipples," he breathed, while I tongued his engorged nub, wetting it through the hairs and then caving in my cheeks as I sucked on it, "we men have just as many nerves and sensory points as they do, something lost on modern sensibilities. I absolutely LOVE that you're honoring me that way."

I took his nipple out of my mouth long enough to speak.

"And I absolutely ADORE tasting your nipples, and honoring you this way, 'Latria mu'."

I went right back to sucking and licking.

My left hand gradually explored more and more of his torso, wanting to touch every part of him, leaving nothing unattended or feeling left out. I traced his shoulders, and his collar bones, I felt the curve of his chest, up and down and side to side as well, all of him so masculine, so defined, and so inspiring.

When I started feeling his body lower than his chest, Theo took a gigantic lungful of air into his body, and held it, while I moved further down, feeling his belly, the slight roundness to it, tracing all the hairs, dipping my fingertips into the well of his belly-button, each of them, one at a time, slowly. Teasingly so, but with the air of refined politeness, I bypassed his groin and slid my hand up and down the top of his left thigh, revelling in the strength and power of him, and then with an equal tease bypassing his groin again and doing the same thing to his right leg, dragging my fingernails as I explored, deliberately wanting him to feel those tiny shards of attention on his skin.

Theo's breathing was increased, and while I couldn't see his face, with my lips still wrapped around his left nipple, I somehow knew he wasn't paying any attention to the movie anymore.

Finally, I had to know. It had been percolating in me since I walked in his door, that first day, and now I had to know. There was no holding back the flow of my energies, no dam strong enough to stop me.

The greatest desire in the world, the culmination of my new direction in life, it had all been building for days, and despite the previously agreed-upon nature of our relationship, I had to know.

I had to take my actions beyond our original agreement.

When I wrapped my fingers around the shaft of his cock, it was as if Zeus himself was above us, hurling his bolts of fire, and I was hit with two of them.

The first one was of abject joy.

I was touching him! I was holding him! His cock, his shaft, his tumescence! It was alive with heat, and tremors matching his heartbeat, and it was strong and mighty! AND I WAS HOLDING IT! I WAS HOLDING ANOTHER MAN'S COCK! My skin, gripping his skin! as close as two humans can get!

I was honoring him, and adoring him, and what was even more important was that I was equally honoring and adoring myself, and my own desires! THIS TOUCH! THIS GRASP OF HIS POWER! Holding him this way, we were joined! My next poem was writing itself, in my soul. It was the complete antithesis of everything I'd been taught and everything I'd dreamed of, up until this moment.

It was satisfaction, pure and simple, right down to the depths of my being.

It was my complete and utter peace of mind and body, and I was fulfilling what was obvious to me, that it was my destiny!

The second bolt of lightning hit me a different way.

Theo's whole body tensed up, and he gasped.

"Agatha," he spoke, cautiously, "are you..."

I let his nipple go from my lips, and raised my face to him.

"I want to," I said, a desperation in my voice, as I felt the heat of his penis in my palm, his hairs tickling the soft skin of the outside of my hand, and his eyes sparked with a multitude of emotions, "please," I begged, "let me show you how much I adore you," and my eyes began to get wet with tears, in this moment of pure revelation, all the pretenses of life gone, nothing but bare and raw emotions revealed, one man to another.

I could see the reflection of those same honesties in his face.

"I know you adore me," he answered, softly, "perhaps even as much as I adore you," and tears of his own began to well in his eyes, "these last few days have been the happiest of my life. I never dreamed, when I was deciding to find a temporary house-mate, I never imagined that it could ever become as meaningful, and wonderful, as you have made it feel."

Still holding his cock, but not stroking him, I felt one tear run out of my left eye and stream slowly down my cheek, and I watched his eyes follow it, before returning to mine.

"My best-case scenario was that I might be lucky enough to find someone I could get along with, and live in the same house with, without too much nervousness or awkwardness, or any discomfort," he continued, quietly, "and then when you walked into my office, I felt your warmth, and your gentle sensitive nature, that vibe I told you about, and it gave me comfort, and my hopes for more than just co-existing with someone began to rise. And my god, Agatha, MY GOD! You've become more than either of us could have imagined!"

I nodded.

"You've taught me, 'Latria mu', you've shown me how to live, as nature intended us. You've taught me that there's book smart, and life smart, and you've begun the journey for me, towards life smart."

He nodded a quick thank-you to me.

"But this," and he shrugged his chin towards my hand, still wrapped around his cock, "this is different than all the other things we've shared, all of which I treasure, of course, because having you here has brought me nothing but joy..."

Before he could continue I interrupted him.

"And being here with you has brought me nothing but joy as well," I said.

"But my sweet 'Eromenos', I didn't think for a minute, or plan, or hope for anything more. Not this. Becoming sexual wasn't part of the deal," he said, matter-of-factly, "I said it and I meant it."

I smiled.

"You also advised me, and I quote, to 'live and love every day like it's your last day on earth, and do them both wholeheartedly. Those are the fires that burn within each of us, in this world of ours'."

Like any good debater, he offered up a counter-point.

"I'm paying you," he softly argued, "for companionship only."

I shook my head.

"Keep the money," I almost shouted, a huge grin on my face, "I don't want the money. I'd pay you to live here, if I had to, just to be a part of this, what he have here, the two of us, the pleasures of the mind and body and soul you've shown me. And again, to quote the wisest man I've ever met," nodding at him, "those are the pleasures historically reserved for the Gods, but I've always maintained that each one of us have the same opportunities, the same available pursuits."

Theo's smiled returned, instantly.

"You remembered it word for word," he said admiringly, "that's the sign of the best student."

"I have the best teacher," I grinned.

I was still holding onto his cock, which wasn't losing any of its size or strength.

"You added that there are the true livers of life, and that you're one of them. Well now, thanks to you, I am as well."

He gave me a look, telling me that he was in almost complete agreement with me, but there was still some line, some issue unresolved, before he could finally let go.

"I'm a free man, 'Latria mu', an adult, free to make his own decisions, free to learn, from everything and everyone around me, free to celebrate my desires and my dreams, free to go after what I want, what I need, and what my soul has to have just to go on."

His voice became a low whisper, and his fiery eyes got serious.

"You are a free man. I respect that. I admire that. We're equals, in all the aspects that matter. Of course you're right. It would be a sign of disrespect were I to ignore your needs, or belittle them, or not take them to heart. Anything less would leave me with shame. So tell me, Agatha," he implored, "look into your soul, as honestly as you can, and ask yourself the question. Think about all the potential consequences of your actions, good and bad, as I know you always do, for one of the things I admire most about you is your intelligence. It's as big as your heart. But ask yourself the question."

He paused.

"What does your soul truly want and need, right now?"

I waggled his cock, with my hand.

"This!" I said, my voice strong and assured, "I need this. I need to taste you, I need to take you inside my body. I need to make you feel the same heaven that I feel. I need to complete myself. You said once that an 'Erasmes' and an 'Eromenos' complete each other, remember?"

He nodded.

"That's what my soul needs. Completion. To give you the most ultimate pleasure I can, that any man can give to another man, if he's willing and wanting."

I stared him in the eyes.

"Let me complete myself, 'Latria mu'," I begged, "let us both complete each other!"

"You're free to take what you want?" he asked, almost rhetorically.

I nodded.

"And I know in my heart that you want it as well. I can feel it, I can sense it. I've been reading all about it. One of the biggest traits of the 'Eromenos' is that he's sensitive to the needs of his 'Erastes', at all times. It's in our fundamental nature. It's in our programming."

For several seconds he gazed at me, our eyes locked, both full of wetness, the starkness of our reality eternally significant.

Finally, he slowly smiled, a plateau reached, and spoke like a mentor.

"Then be the beautiful man that you are, and take what you need from me."

In my elation I squeezed his cock as hard as I could, and it caused him to moan out loud, which I softened with my lips on his.

"I need your cock in me," I bragged, sliding off the sofa, from beside him, onto my knees, and then using the sleek fabric of my gown against the hardwood floor I slid in between his splayed thighs, not losing my grip on him, or my gaze, "and then I need to feast on your cream."

Lowering my head towards his crotch, I watched Theo's eyes widen, all the way, his nostrils flared, as excited as I'd seen him yet, but at the last second I teased him, and dropped my mouth and nose, to under his shaft, nuzzling his balls, the great sac holding his eggs, breathing in his musky odor, letting the tip of my tongue loll out and lap at him, tasting his hairs and the faintest tang of perspiration that clung. Still holding his shaft, I ran a finger up to the tip of him, the great curved spear, where he was wet, with a slippery syrup, that I spread around his head, lightly, trying to drive him wild, suckling at his balls.

Finally, I couldn't take it anymore. I had to taste him.

I had to take him into my mouth, and orally adore him.

There was no other desire in me, not even to continue breathing.

Just my 'Erastes', and his cock.

Sliding my tongue up the underside of his shaft, up the bulging tube, I simply opened my mouth and when I crested the top I sucked his mighty helmet into my lips, and it was alive! It pulsed and ticked and throbbed against my tongue and my cheeks and the roof of my mouth! It was like eating a plum, taking the whole thing into your maw in one gulp.

Theo made an animalistic sound and his hands came down on my upper back, massaging my skin, which just spurred me on, my tongue zipping back and forth along the curving under-ridge of his helmet, which made him push out a big blob of pre-cum, and OH MY GOD! it tasted sweet and salty and smooth, my taste buds going ballistic, a tiny voice in my head telling me that no matter what else I did in my life, I had to get more of that sauce!

Venturing further down his cock was arduous work, even with the small river of saliva I was coating him with, his amazing thickness something I'd never encountered before, but I managed with multiple bobs to get a couple of inches more, before the tip of his warrior slammed into the back of my mouth, and I gagged a little bit.

Ever the sensitive lover, he pulled his groin in while still sitting, trying to ease my discomfort, knowing this was the first time I'd ever performed fellatio, but I was having none of that, so I bobbed further still, and tried to open my throat, which worked a little bit, but not much, and there were half a dozen more gags before I decided to go back to just loving the head of him.

I could learn to take him into me, to deep-throat him, over time. I'd already decided there was no way this was a one-time event.

From his breathing something told me Theo wouldn't object to that at all.

I grabbed his shaft with both of my hands and worked them up and down, stroking and squeezing, while I suckled on his head, my eyes closed, bathing him and tonguing him, and even though my lips and tongue were already getting tired, there was no way I was going to stop.

It didn't take more than a couple of more minutes, before I heard Theo take in a huge gasp of air.

"I'M ALMOST THERE!" he seethed out, giving me the respect to decide on my own whether I wanted to finish him off with just my hands, which I knew wouldn't disappoint him at all, but I was hell-bent for doing a complete job.

A complete blow-job, one tiny whisper in my head said, stressing the word, 'blow', perhaps the last shred of my trained-in normal-society closemindedness, but he was drowned out about a millisecond later by a booming chorus of other voices, all of them shouting with pride.

YOU FUCKIN BETCHA IT'S A BLOW-JOB!

YOU FUCKIN BETCHA I'M SUCKING A MAN'S COCK!

YOU FUCKIN BETCHA I'M GOING ALL THE WAY.

I'M GONNA GET ME SOME CUM.

I took him out of my mouth long enough to open my eyes and gaze dreamily at him.

"FEED ME, 'LATRIA MU!'"

Taking his cockhead right back into me, decision made, just a few moments later I sensed the end was nigh, so I pulled him almost all the way out of me, with just the rounded tip of his head in-between my painted lips, and I opened my eyes, staring straight into his.

The first blast of his cum was smaller than I expected, and I thought, well, this is good, I won't be drowned in...

His second shot filled my mouth, to complete capacity, my inexperience not helping me, not prepared for or remembering how quick it is between pulses, and I couldn't risk letting it fall out of me, onto the floor, my need to taste him so strong, so I opened up my throat, easily this time, and let it all slide down, without gulping or swallowing, just my brain sending the signal to the flappy thing down there to steer everything to the stomach, and not the lungs, like getting the last dregs out of a cough syrup bottle by just holding it upside-down and tilting your head back all the way and letting the ooze follow gravity.

The third and the fourth shots were smaller, and slid down just as easily, every atom of skin they touched absorbing his seed, his strength and power, and his essence.

I could only see a lifetime of doing it again. Every day.

Theo's cum was so rich! It was so strong-tasting, so earthy, as base and natural as the air I breathe. An unmatchable mix of creamy, salty, and savory, parts of it thick and parts thin and watery, for the first time in my life I realized that another man's cum was a one-of-a-kind taste, unmatched in mortal terms, like manna from heaven, and truly the nectar of the Gods.

When there was no more left to swallow, I bathed his cock in kisses, up and down the shaft, both sides and all around, while Theo went from snorting loud breaths to quiet satisfied breaths.

Finally opening his eyes, his gaze was transfixing, and made me once again feel like the only other person in the world, in his world.

Love, lust, passion, desire, they were all in his eyes.

But they couldn't match mine.

Leaping to my feet, I jumped up and spread my legs and landed on the sofa with my knees outside of his hips, and thudded my body onto his torso, my lips finding his, desperate for his kisses and his tongue, moaning like a wild animal into his mouth, and as his big hands came down on my ass, squeezing both of my cheeks like he owned them, and pulling my throbbing erection into a crush against my gown and his body, all rational thought left me.

I started humping him.

My whole pelvis started rocking, pushing my groin against him, squeezing my hard-on into the fabric and his belly, and his big hands immediately began helping me, by pulling me as I pushed, which sent me into the stratosphere, and I couldn't kiss him anymore, my head just falling onto his shoulder with a thud, unable to hold it up anymore, having no energy to even have my spine work correctly, and his voice became ragged and breathy as he began encouraging me.

"Let it out, Agatha," he cooed, "let it all out, my 'Eromenos'.

I just kept humping him, the smooth feel of the gown up against the hardness of his body feeling better than any vagina I'd ever been in, which was only seven. I couldn't imagine a more wonderfully soft and tight grip on my pulsing stiffy.

Through my gown, and in-between my legs, I could feel Theo's cock again, risen anew, banging on the crack of my ass whenever I rocked down, the abject joy of knowing I was turning him on this way just adding to my hysteria.

"Be the man you were meant to be," Theo whispered.

I exploded.

I came so hard that while I didn't technically lose consciousness, it was touch and go. Like little waves of narcolepsy, I shuddered in and out of awareness, as he held me, crushed to his body, and shared with me in my moment of unparalleled bliss.

He knew I was back from my little vacation from reality when I began planting kisses on his neck.

But I had to stop, suddenly.

Like getting hit by a foul-ball, I started alert and awake.

His cock, ramrod and staggering, was literally wedged in the valley of my buttocks.

I raised my head and peered into his eyes.

"You're hard again," I said, and he smiled and nodded.

"What man wouldn't be?" he asked, rhetorically, "when his lover is so beautiful?"

That was worth a kiss, and then I leaned my forehead against his, so our eyes were almost touching.

"I need your cock inside me, 'Latria mu'," I confessed, "I need you to make love to me. Please? Please? Put it in me? Let me feel you inside of me?"

Theo's face took on a determined look.

"No, my sweet," he said, softly, and sadly, triggering a wave of defeat to settle on me, which he must have sensed, "not yet. You are a virgin, back there," and then, like a teacher, he gave me that moment's lesson. "Like a soldier, you can't just rush into the battle unprepared. And like a scholar, you can't learn everything all at once. It takes time. You have to exercise, and be trained. And I," he said, and smiled, "I am of a certain size that could do you irreparable damage without that kind of preparation. Believe me."

A realization hit me. I wasn't mad, or jealous, it was just a matter of fact.

"I'm not your first 'Eromenos', am I?" I said.

Theo's eyes lost none of their sparkle.

"No, Agatha, you're not," he said, with no shame or misgivings, which he of course shouldn't have had. "There was one other, a few years ago."

Then he studied my reaction.

"Long before I met you."

All I could do was nod my head, because it had nothing to do with me.

"Did he make you happy? Did you love him?" I asked, genuinely hoping his answer to both was yes.

For a moment, he thought, and his smile became rueful.

"I was a mentor to a young man. His name was Jigme, which is a Korean name. And yes, being a mentor made me happy, very much so. And yes," he paused, "I did love him. How we met was unimportant. I saw in him so much promise, so much intellect that the entire world could benefit from, and, yes, no question, a certain feminine presence in his spirit, which attracted me to him. I've been bisexual for all of my life. I love women, almost everything about them. But," and he paused again, "I've always loved men as well. And, as I'm sure you've figured out, I've only ever been drawn to betas, to men who, like you, are in touch with those traits and characteristics that tend to the passive."

Then he paused.

"But he never came close to your blossoming, my beautiful 'Eromenos', not a bit."

That was worth another kiss.

"Why did it end?" I asked.

He shrugged.

"His dedication to the feminine was more of a fetish than a revelation, I suppose," he offered, "and he had desires that were at times different than mine."

"How so?" I asked.

"Jigme wanted ours to be an open relationship, for one. He wanted the freedom to sleep with whoever he wanted whenever he wanted, more or less. He became almost addicted to the idea of quick hookups, at first just as a concept, but over the course of months I began to suspect he was actually going through with some of them. And while I wished that he didn't, I had to respect his desires. Who am I to try to control him, or restrict him, the way nature seemed to have made him? The clinical term for Jigme would be 'hypersexual', I suppose. He was young in both age and naiveté, and full of a kind of wildness, so our connection ultimately became strained. We wanted different things in life. So, we separated as good friends, by a mutual decision. I wished him all the happiness in the world, and I meant it."

Then his face became a teeny bit darker.

"I've been alone ever since."

I felt my eyes begin to tear up again.

"To be honest," he admitted, "I'd begun to suspect I might spend the rest of my life alone, with only my work to satisfy me. And it does, it does. But the dream," he added, "the dream of one day meeting someone who would be my true lover, a true 'Eromenos', it stayed with me, a kernel of hope planted in my soul, trying to grow, trying to bear fruit," and I watched his eyes get teary, "and then this happened, this horrific ugliness, this threat against me, and, well, hope springs eternal, so I quietly put the word out, assuming nothing would come of it."

His eyes got wet, almost snuffing out the enormous fire that was always there.

"And then I met you," he whispered, "and all those dreams came true. More than I thought possible," he said, "you have made those dreams a reality."

I felt a tear run down my right cheekbone.

"I love you, Agatha," he quietly said, "with all my heart."

I felt tears run down both of my cheeks.

"I love you too!" I cried, "more than anything. More than everything!"

Our kiss was as sweet as the ripest berry on the vine.

"So make love to me, my 'Latria mu'! Please! I know it will hurt, but I can take it, just to have you inside me!"

Theo's smile lit up the room.

"I would love nothing more, my 'Eromenos', I would," he said, lust in his voice, "but you are not ready for that, my love," and then his eyes flashed with his normal intense heat, "and so here's what we'll do. Tomorrow is Saturday, so I'm certain you don't have any classes, and I know I don't, and unless you already have plans for the weekend, we can begin your training first thing tomorrow. How does that sound?"

I nodded my head.

"Normally I'd be studying, but my only plan is to be with you."

"Good," he said, slowly, and teasingly, "but right now, let me show you something wonderful. There is a way for us to make love, a different way."

I didn't have any idea what he was talking about.

"Stand up for me, Agatha."

Once off his body, I could see his cock again, pointing to the ceiling and wriggling with his body movements, and I wanted it so badly.

"Now," he bade, "strip for me. Bare yourself to me."

Like a patron in the VIP room at a strip club, he sat back and lolled while I teasingly reached up to undo the halter of the gown, letting it fall forward, exposing my bare chest, with my rosy nipples. Undoing the belt at the waist took a bare second, and the next thing we knew I was standing in front of him, naked, save for my make-up.

At any other time in my life, I would have been embarrassed, or nervous, standing naked in front anyone, let alone another man, but I was flying high on pride and lust and desire, so I straightened my spine and thrust out my chest and gazed at him with confidence. I was his feminine beta man, and no one and nothing would shake that from me.

Theo gazed at me, up and down, with a look of hunger.

"Turn for me, Agatha," and he made the twirly motion with his finger, so I slowly spun on my feet, letting him see all of me in detail, until I faced the large screen, where the movie was still playing, but silent, making me realize at some point Theo had managed the wherewithal to hit the mute button.

I stuck my ass out at him, up on my toes.

Cranking my head as far as I could, I watched Theo rise up to his feet, shrugging off his gown, completely naked, his cock leading the way, and the next thing I knew he'd enveloped me from behind, both arms wrapping around my body and pulling me, gripping me tight into his body, from my shoulders to my toes, gasping at the feel and heat of his cock, pressed into my upper left buttock.

In-between kisses on the side of my neck, Theo became the mentor again.

"It is a fact that a percentage of Pederastic sexual relationships, perhaps even a slight majority, didn't actually involve penetration," and as he talked he took his right hand and trailed his fingers in the cum still sticking to my belly, those fingers travelling down past my erection and onto the insides of my thighs, both sides, smearing my soft delicate skin, "there were elements of society, including some in the community of Pederasts, who felt that penetration of one man by another was distasteful, or perhaps demeaning. Other scholars suggest that it was considered a way for the 'Eromenos' to preserve his own dignity and honor, which, as a man he was fully entitled to do."

Smearing more of my cum onto my thighs, he used his large right hand to push my thighs apart, spreading my legs a few inches, interspersing his words with kisses and nibbles on my ear lobe, his deep breath almost directly in my ear.

"It's called 'intercrural' sex," he breathed out, as his right hand and arm left his grip of me, passing over my right hip and then around my cheek, grabbing onto his own mighty erection and wriggling enough to pull it down and position it under my sac, between my legs, "so my sweet 'Eromenos', if you will do me the honor of closing your legs," and I met his suggestion with instant squeezing, trapping his cock in my flesh, and when his arm and hand came back to continue his clutch of my body, his thumb and forefinger landed perfectly on my left nipple, and he squeezed it, making me moan, my head falling back onto his shoulder, "and now, Agatha," his voice getting deeper and breathier and softer, "now we make love."

His first thrust between my gripping thighs banged his entire body into mine, with a resonant thud, forcing all the air out of my lungs, and he waited long enough for me to take a quick deep inhale before doing it again, with the same result, and then again, and again, speeding up the tempo ever so slightly each time, making me speed up my breathing to match, his lips latched onto my neck, sucking at my skin as if it was life-giving. Every stroke would slam into me, a bone-shaking collision, and as his pace picked up to match his increased breathing, I closed my eyes and saw stars.

Like a human-sized ragdoll, I had no control. My body was limp, devoid of tension anywhere, given up completely to the fates, to whatever happened, and however he took me. I was his to lead, and he was my guide.

When Theo started seething, his breath blasting out of his mouth between clenched teeth, and his slams into me became constant, and insistent, and my wet thighs were getting wetter with his oozing syrupy prelude, he took his right hand off my nipple, now sore and distended, and wrapped it around my hard-on, so sensitive after so soon, and I began moaning out high-pitched gibberish.

I was not far off, and Theo sensed it.

His last dozen thrusts into me were like being hit by a jackhammer.

I came, my whole body shuddering in his tight grasp, and screamed out a shriek, and one thundering pound later Theo screamed into my ear, almost deafening me, with a roar as loud as a lion at the circus.

We poured our cum out onto the floor, in two separate streams.

If I couldn't have him in my ass, intercrural sex was about as close to perfect as I could possibly imagine.

Cradling me in his arms, he sat us back down on the sofa, and flicked the remote, the light from the screen suddenly gone, the room instantly dark. We cuddled, the both of us slowly coming back to earth over the next few minutes, before resuming our soft, gentle kisses.

While Theo cleaned up the room, our cum hardening all over the parquet floor, I cleaned up in the shower.

His shower.

We'd shared a look. Neither of us had to say it.

I'd be sharing his bed tonight.

And every night.

I was already dozing when Theo came to bed.

We slept against each other, spooned, all night long, his arm around me, keeping me close. A few times, as happen to us all, I stirred from total slumber enough to realize his cock was in-between my thighs again, half-hard, while he slept, and smiled, before drifting on back to dreamland.

In the morning, we skipped our gym session. Theo made us a delicious breakfast, and then, after I grinned and eagerly asked when we could begin my training, he proposed our schedule for the day.

"Look outside, Agatha," he advised, "the sun is shining this morning," he grinned, "so we should take advantage of nature's blessing, and bask in the rays, soaking up all the energy of Mother Earth we can."

Laying outside was never my favorite thing to do, owing to the fact that as a fair-skinned person, I burned far too easily, but Theo assured me that there were natural oils in his pantry that would protect me, just as it did for his ancient ancestors, and while I laid face-down on one of the lounge chairs on his patio, he zipped inside the house and a few moments later came out with glass jars, each filled with differing shades of murky clear.

"We must protect this lovely skin," he said, as his hands, wet with the oils, began rubbing my shoulders, kneading my muscles like the finest masseuse at a top-dollar spa, making every inch of me inspired and relaxed and at ease, my erection pressed into the fabric of the chair. For minutes on end he slowly applied his touch to every inch of me that was visible, spreading the oils down my back, stopping just above my ass, until he began again at my feet, even working the oil into the gaps between my toes, his rubs getting stronger and longer the higher he got up my thighs.

For a second I worried that he was done, until his big fingers gripped each cheek and pulled me open, exposing my hole to his view.

And his tongue.

Never in the history of the world has anything felt as mind-blowing and life-altering as his tongue in my hole. Like a wet, wriggly creature, alive and curious, he licked and stabbed at me, flicking and teasing and tasting and pushing inside me, sending sparks of delight pulsing through my body, and generating loud groans and moans from my lungs.

Wet with oil, his hands began coating my ass, both sides, powerfully kneading and gripping, making me realize he was in complete control of my body, never wanting it any other way, vocally gasping that I was loving it, every second of it, and urging him on.

And just when I thought my life couldn't get any better, and that there was no further joy to be felt in this new and wonderful journey of mine, a long wet oily finger slid into my ass, forcing me open, spreading my hole, the shock of the intrusion making my breath catch in my throat, and making all my insides dilate.

When he added a second sloppy finger inside me, like an animal I began humping the lounge chair, much like I'd humped his body in the media room last night, and he growled out a happy sound, once again encouraging me to "let it go, Agatha," the rough canvas underneath me the perfect fabric to give me friction, hoots of pleasure escaping my lips, and Theo pushed both fingers to the max inside me, spreading them, opening me up inside, making the tissues flex outwards, as if there was some immediate and large bowel movement that needed to come out.

Except, there was none of that.

Nothing required me pushing outwards.

Everything inside me was trying to suck his fingers further in.

Between his spirited pushing and his finger-splaying and my humping of the lounge chair, it didn't take long at all for me to ramp up to the point of imminent release, and I told him so, in breathy rushed gasping syllables, and my 'Erastes' doubled down, pushing harder and faster, in and out and in and out, his two big digits turning and skewing with each new entry.

I screamed out his name as I came.

If there were any people in the park behind his property, they heard the unmistakable sounds of a man blasting out his release. I can't imagine any adult hearing me and not knowing what was happening, even if they couldn't see it. My mewls were loud, as I exploded out my cum, pressed between my body and the chair, my ass full of his fingers, and he held them there, with one big hand on my lower back, pressing at me, aiding me in my rubbing and helping me over the top.

It was almost as nice a cum as the night before, when Theo had made love to me, intercrural style.

When his fingers finally slid out of me, I groaned a disappointed sound, my ass suddenly feeling empty, the whole idea of it hitting my brain like a tragedy. No, my id argued! I should be full!

The next thing I knew, Theo's large hands easily flipped me, so I was laying on my back, staring up at him, a big wet spot of my own ejaculate hitting me near my kidneys, sticky and cooling, and he got onto the chair on his knees, holding my legs straight up in the air in a giant 'v', until his cock, hard and turgid, landed between my thighs, almost touching my balls, and he closed my legs easily, as if they were a bi-fold door in a closet, trapping his erection between my wet thighs, again, like last night, and without taking his searing gaze off of me, he began humping, controlling how much pressure was on his cock himself, by little pushes and squeezes on my legs.

I watched him, our eyes glued to each other, as he began taking his pleasure.

"You make me insatiable," he whispered, in-between grunts.

Gulping at air myself, I gasped out.

"I am yours, Theo, whenever you need me."

We made love, intercrural, for the second time.

This time, though, was better.

I got to watch his progress, and he mine. His grip on my legs was strong, so strong I couldn't have stopped him if I'd tried, but we both knew that wasn't going to happen, far from it.

My words, when I could find enough energy to create a voice, spurred him on.

"Take me," I kept pleading, "I am yours!"

His answers were all unintelligible, and throaty, and sweat beads had begun forming on his skin, trapped in the forest of hair on his body, and in my periphery I could see his cock head, purple and shiny, appear from between my legs and then disappear, like a telephone pole coming in and out from my skin, or a pneumatic drill, outside to inside to outside to inside and over and over again.

Theo's head dropped backwards as his eyes closed, which told me he was close.

"Shower me!" I cried out, "paint my body with your cum!"

His first shot, after a series of powerful final thrusts, hit me on the forehead, with one strand of his jism instantly sliding past my eyebrow and oozing into my left eye, which stung, and I moaned out in pain, stunned at his energy and his drive, his following spurts landing in a pattern down my torso, starting right under my chin, each progressively smaller in thrust and size, arcing shorter distances, me trying to lift my head and catch some on my outstretched tongue, desperate to taste him again, but with only one eye working and a total lack of depth perception, I missed every chance.

Once I calmed down, I got to spread some oil on his back, and his tree-trunk like legs, and his round thick ass, and when I spread his cheeks and dove my face down and licked his hairy hole, my 'Erastes' made a sound like a wounded animal, and before I knew it he'd flipped himself over and I'd sucked his cock into my mouth, as far as I could get it, humming on it, my cheeks caving in to touch every inch of his skin, and just like his cum the night before, I let his round head into my wide-open throat, so unlike the cough syrup feel, completely blocking me, the both of us making noises of surprise and joy.

I didn't have all of him in me, but I had more than last night!

Swallowing and swallowing, as if his cock was a stuck piece of meat, all the tissues in my throat and mouth milked at his shaft, and it only took about thirty seconds before he roared and pulled himself out in a hurry, his first shot going off just after he'd slipped out of my lips, some of it blasting into my nostril, but most of it coating my lips, like the sweetest balm, and I managed to get the head back into my mouth in time for the next three shots, all smaller than his first orgasm, his system not having had any time to build up a new reserve, savoring his cream again, like a fine earthy wine.

We showered together, after laying in the sun and taking in Mother Nature's beams of health, casually engaged in relaxed conversation, as we always seemed to be, each of us open and honest, no pretenses or bias, no awkward moments between lovers, no time for either of us to wonder if we were good enough, if the other was truly satisfied, which was always my reaction after any kind of sex with women, never being sure if they weren't just being nice to me and perhaps lying, or, worse yet, faking it, because Theo and I were connecting on every level, as only two men can do, and I knew in my heart that Theo was more satisfied than he'd been in years, and that I was more happy than I'd ever been, because we existed on a plane of total equality and frankness.

Two men, giving and taking of each other and themselves.

The 'Erastes', and his 'Eromenos'.

Hopping in his car, me sadly dressed in guy clothes, with panties underneath, of course, we gabbed and talked for almost an hour before we reached our destination, a high-end adult boutique Theo knew of called 'Blush'. Inside was a supermarket of products for the erotically-inclined, as the sign above the cash register said, and while I gazed about, wide-eyed and in some cases almost shocked at what I saw, Theo went straight for a display stand, and while I took in the sights of toys and games and trinkets, giggling out loud at a pile of rubber molds, all for filling with water and making ice cubes, but instead of the normal cube shape these were all different body part shapes, boobs and pussies and erections.

There was clothing, for both men and women, from leather shorts to lingerie, as well as novelty costumes, like Naughty Nurse and Teasing Teacher, their cover art giving my stiffy a little throb, at how feminine I might look in them.

Behind the cash-register counter, on shelves above, were styrofoam heads with wigs on them. Most of them looked cheaply-made, as if they'd fall apart easily, and their 'hair' looked almost plastic. A couple of them were in neon bright colors, one electric blue and one bubble-gum pink.

One wig, though, looked rich, and thick, and life-like.

Curls and waves of lustrous shine, all flowing as if by nature, in warm auburn tones, mostly brown but some red, instantly grabbed at my imagination, wondering if I could even afford something like that.

Theo stood beside me, his choices on the counter.

A three-pack of rubber butt plugs, short medium and long, all three of them thin at the top and thick at the bottom, and two rubber dildos, representations of thick cocks, with veins running up and down them, one of them as black as ebony and the other a pale-skin tone, the dark one having attached rubber balls.

When the man behind the counter asked if there was anything else, Theo pointed at the wig, and it just reinforced what I already knew, that we were on a joined wavelength, in body and spirit, and he'd noticed my gazes at it. The price though, when the guy rang it in, made me sputter, and I looked at Theo, like, 'no! It's too expensive!' but he smiled and ignored it.

Starting up the car, my 'Erastes' turned and looked at me and whispered.

"I can't wait to see you in that wig."

After a brief trip through a drive-through for a quick lunch, we drove all the way home while he explained how my education would work. He'd start putting the smaller things into me first, and get me used to them, before gradually increasing the size and the amount of time, training me, as he delicately put it, to be ready for him.

Laying face-down on his bed, naked, with just make-up on, and the wig, I revelled in delight as he slicked me up with oil, his big fingers toying and teasing my hole, until one eventually slid in, making me groan and making me hump his mattress, just a little, Theo talking calmly and softly about how beautiful I was and how excited I made him, every second of the day, while he added more and more liquids into my channel, and until I was as relaxed as a ragdoll again, which is when he slid the first butt plug into me.

Narrow led to wide, and even though it was only four inches long, the thickness at the bottom opened my ring up more than two of his fingers had, pushing me into modest levels of discomfort, which he sensed in my movements and my immediate tension, but his encouraging words and his massaging of my lower back brought me right back to relaxed again, and the next thing I knew my hole had swallowed the plug up, literally, making a goopy shlup sound, the whole thing buried in me, except for the rectangular base now wedged between my bum cheeks.

"OH MY GOD, 'LATRIA MU!'," I groaned, "I'M SO FULL!"

Leaning his head over next to mine, he giggled.

"Not yet, my sweet Agatha," he said, "but you're on your way!"

I kept the butt plug in me for almost two hours, as we enjoyed each other's company, our discussions intellectual and challenging and at times flirtatious, the both of us floating along on an emotional magic carpet ride, and I enjoyed a wonderful nap in the late afternoon while he worked on his next book.

Dinner, as always, was fresh healthy food and wine, the both of us in robes, his shorter than mine, the wig firmly on my head, making me gasp at my first look in the mirror, my normal average face, even with make-up on, suddenly alive with attraction, my hair cascading down onto my shoulders and back.

Other than high heels, which I thought of again, I felt and looked as much like a woman as any genetically-born one, in bra and panties and stockings, which was easily reflected in my behavior and my mannerisms, and my voice, which just became softer and gentler without me even trying, and the effect it had on the both of us was evident and profound.

Theo touched me and kissed me more often than our previous evenings, and I did the same to him.

Any excuse to caress his skin, or to flash my hungers for this new life into his eyes, were as welcome as my dinner, feeding my fires inside, fueling my lusts.

We watched the movie all the way to complete this time, since we'd failed at it the night before, and it was indeed a striking example of film-making, and allegorically like a ton of bricks, with very little subtlety.

Males were brutally primal, and females were undeniably beautiful and passive, and, as Theo had mentioned, everything in life always becomes about the power of the flesh, and sating man's animalistic desires.

For the first time in my life, I watched a movie with a five-inch butt plug in me, discovering the complex range of thrills that can be felt just by sitting, or moving, or breathing, or, well, just existing. It made me realize that while I was filling my soul with experience and filling my intellect with knowledge, I was far more importantly filling my body with flesh, even if it was only the rubber kind.

We spent almost an hour outside again, wordlessly watching the starry skies, in awe of their majestic beauty, and feeling the wind around us, through the nearby trees, hearing the leaves shake and rustle, tasting whatever nature had to offer through our noses and tongues, using all of our senses to recharge our internal batteries, and sate our connection to the earth.

In bed, we kissed for almost an hour, just holding each other. It was a moveable feast, soft and delicate through hard and fierce, the both of us erect and pressing into each other, until my need for seed grew too much, and I slid out of his arms and down under the blankets into the stark darkness, feeling my way, until I had his gorgeous cock in my hands, aiming it like a flashlight straight into my mouth, tasting his emerging essence, his pre-cum, reminding myself again of how much I loved it, before going to town on him.

I gave him the best blow-job anybody could ever give. Theo's moans and gasps told me so. I went slow at times, and bobbed fast at other times, not able to get enough of the taste of his skin and gentle tang of his syrup, almost making myself sad when he started bucking his hips a little bit, which I knew was the sign he was on the countdown, knowing I wouldn't be sucking him for very much longer, but any negativity about that disappeared in an instant when I realized I was about to get fed again.

My 'Erastes' didn't disappoint me.

He filled my mouth three times with his cum, his rich creamy musky earthy cum, and I quickly swallowed each one, on top of my game and always ready for the next shot, my tongue and lips going into overdrive to get more from him, to fill my stomach with more of his life-giving seed.

After some soft cuddling, Theo hopped out of bed and returned with the smaller-sized dildo he'd bought for me, and after covering it in a thick oil, he lay between my spread legs and began pressing it into me, with gentle pushes, at first pinching but then spreading me open, my rings giving way, at first grudgingly but then out of necessity, finding it so much easier, and feeling the pressure in me increase, as all the tissues and flesh got pushed outwards, in every direction, making me gasp and moan. My 'Latrui mu' was always observing my reactions, physical and otherwise, never giving me more than I could handle, inch by inch, listening to my increasing noises, blurted-out groans and shocking momentary trills, as each new sensation registered in my nervous system, fuller than full could be, until all six-and-a-bit inches of it were inside me, and he roared with delight.

"YOU'VE DONE IT!" he cried, happily surprised, and I moaned out the words, "I'M SO FULL!" and he chuckled and the next thing I knew he was holding my legs up, in a v-shape, placing his shiny-wet cock in-between my thighs again and then closing me up, trapping himself in the flesh of my legs, and instead of starting slowly and ramping upwards he began all-out humping, like he was an automated machine and someone had just turned the breaker on, his hips rotating at a thunderous speed, shaking my whole body with his movements, almost rattling my brains, inside my skull, doing what came naturally to him, and to the both of us.

He was taking out his passion and his lust on me and with me, boldly, without reservation or regret, truly a man expressing his love for another man the way nature intended, wholeheartedly, to the max.

Like combat, there was only one tempo. All-out, and overwhelming.

Luckily, there was no war between us. Only the greatest of loves.

As bone-rattling as it was, I was aware enough to know when the final thrust was coming, and therefore when he was coming, and I raised my head up off the pillow, a bit of a feat considering how much my whole body was shaking and contorting at his whim, a tear of astonished joy leaving my right eye when I was perfectly placed to take part of his first shot straight into my mouth.

YUM!

We were both exhausted, quickly spooning and falling asleep, our spirits as sated as our bodies.

Sunday morning came with breakfast in bed, courtesy of my man, followed by a long soak in the spa tub, recharging my batteries, and a day spent wearing the softest of clothes, with a butt plug inside me from time to time, and while Theo worked on his next project to be published, I listened to music and read poetry and did some cleaning up in the flower beds in the back yard.

There was something indescribably decadent about being outside, in the sun and wind, wearing nothing but panties and lipstick and wig, trimming leaves and tending to the overgrown azaleas. Once in a while I could hear the sounds of people in the nearby city park space, joggers' feet thudding across the ground, or casual hushed conversations between people out for a walk, their words unrecognizable, and it made my nipples hard just thinking about how they might react, were they to witness the new me.

Not that it mattered how they felt. It made my penis harder than my nipples knowing that I was proud to be me, proud to be a man who is in touch with the feminine qualities within him that nature so obviously gave him, the tools the fates armed him with to live a life of immeasurable bliss, and proudest of all to have found someone to share it with.

Late in the afternoon, Theo walked by me as I lolled on the couch, reading another selection from his vast libraries, the smile on his face warming my heart again, from hot to scorching on the meter, and then asked me if I'd been practicing with my dildo enough, and when I realized it had been hours since my last attempt he pretended to "tsk tsk", and raised an eyebrow, letting me know what was about to happen.

He joined me in the bedroom after I'd already spread a blanket out and lain on it, pinching my nipples, my legs spread, the glass jar of oil beside me, and I heard him growl out his approval, and moments later his tongue began teasing my hole, after he'd pushed my legs back and spread my cheeks apart roughly, and he ate me for minutes, bathing my hole in his saliva, getting me wet, and then two fingers covered in oil came into me, at just the perfect pace of slow to fast, opening me gently and then filling me harshly, and we both moaned at how obvious it was that I was getting better and better, closer and closer to our ultimate goal.

His cock, in me.

When his fingers came out of me, the largest dildo he'd bought, fully seven-and-three-quarters inches long, which I knew because I'd measured it earlier, it came into me, in one long slow but insistent push, like a plow moving a bank of snow, inching at first and then gaining traction and going faster. Theo had to use his left hand on my belly, just to hold my body down, I was jerking and lurching so much, while he withdrew, slowly, almost agonizingly, until just the wisp of the tip was in my slowly-receding hole, and then plowed me again, doing that five more times, each thrust delicious and determined, until push number six, which he used a lot more strength with, slamming me and ramming me, burying the entire length of the rubber tool in my innards, sparking zaps of vibrations inside me, concentrated and centered just outside where the dildo was, and I cried out in worry, that I was about to pee myself, and all over him, but Theo just smiled in his mentor way and shook his head, panting out, "that's your prostate, Agatha," and then he slammed me again and again, each time increasing the buzzing, and the worry, and he kept going, until I got to the point where I figured I wouldn't pee, probably, and then, like an erupting volcano, my whole belly exploded from the inside, my pelvis shuddering, and I pushed out a gush of my cum, landing all over my groin and Theo's hands.

Cuddling after, my 'Latria mu' whispered in my ear.

"You're almost there, my 'Eromenos', you're almost ready," and when I asked him with glee if he meant that, happily surprised it had gotten to that point so quickly, he kissed me softly and winked, adding "tomorrow, my love," and he kissed me again, "I will be inside you tomorrow, and that," he claimed with calm honesty, "will be a day we'll both remember, forever."

I had an early morning class, and then another one in the afternoon, and he had a noon meeting with some grad students, so after wolfing down another of his delicious breakfasts, and after my requisite five minute kiss inside the front door, I almost skipped down the streets, a couple of blocks away, to the bus stop.

The most amazing thing about all of the changes and experiences I'd been through in the last week was that my concentration levels had improved, over and above what I'd always thought was a seriously-high level. Everything about my studies became easier, thoughts in my writing became clearer, faster, and my conversations with everyone, faculty and students alike, were enlivened, and engrossing. That morning class was one of the most invigorating and learning times in all my schooling, and I owed it all to the abject freedom and joys I was feeling and living with, being with Theo and allowing my inner energetic femininity to shine out.

Our love was making me a far better person.

Plus, the eager anticipation of knowing that later on this evening, I'd be finally taking him into me, into the very core of me, it sent my soul into delight, wishing for the hours and minutes to burn by at record speed. TONIGHT! I'D FINALLY BECOME THE COMPLETE 'EROMENOS', THE COMPLETE ME! TONIGHT! I'D OPEN MY BODY TO A MAN! I'D WILLINGLY AND EAGERLY BE FILLED WITH HIM, WITH HIS COCK!

When I found out my afternoon class had cancelled, that the Professor was down with a cold or a flu, the potential timeframe for my deflowering changed, almost making me cum in my panties with the realization, and I raced to the bus loop and rode the whole way home thinking that I might get to finally feel Theo's cock in me sooner than this evening.

If everything works out, I would get to make love to my 'Erastes' in the afternoon!

I practically skipped the three blocks from the bus stop, and up the driveway to the house, suddenly even more eager because Theo's car was still there, which meant he was home!

MAYBE I CAN FINALLY EXPERIENCE HIS COCK BURIED IN MY BODY RIGHT NOW!!!

But I stopped short of the house, six feet away, jarred in shock.

The front door was open.

A crack.

A sheet of genuine worry raced through my spine.

Scout could get out, I realized, and she was an indoor cat, and other than occasional cautious jaunts to the fenced-in back yard, she didn't get to leave the house. That was the deal. My head swiveled to and fro, back and forth, looking for any signs of her, ready to chase her if I had to, just to get her back inside.

Back inside the opened door.

Open door.

The wave of worry I felt for the cat got drowned by the tsunami of fear that suddenly crushed me, that enveloped me, instantly making me shiver, all over, a chill pallor taking over.

THEO!

Creeping to the opening, I put my ear to the crack and listened. At first, I heard nothing, and began to formulate scenarios in my head to explain things, all perfectly safe and reasonable reasons why the front door might be ajar while Theo lived with the threat on his life.

None of them made any sense at all.

My shivering became full-out shuddering.

Then I heard a muffled voice, from what sounded like upstairs, which was probably Theo's voice, if I had to bet money, but there was anger in the voice, or stress, as if he might be on the phone, irate at somebody, so I cautiously pushed the door with my finger and it slid noiselessly back on its hinges, making a space big enough for me to slip into.

Standing in the foyer, I concentrated on letting my vibe-picker-upper go to work, because you can tell a lot about what's going on in the area if you're open to feeling the spiritual vibrations around you.

I wasn't getting anything. No vibes at all.

Either I was jammed, which was understandable considering the stress I was suddenly under, or nothing really bad was happening and I was overreacting, and I tried to convince myself that was the case, it had to be, since it was the preferred outcome, so I could begin relaxing and not worrying, my self-delusion abilities working perfectly.

Until I heard a different muffled voice, not Theo, shouting.

THERE WAS SOMEBODY IN THE HOUSE!

His words, and it was a male voice, were totally unintelligible to me, but the mood was as clear as a bell. Anger and rage were suddenly filling the house, shaking me to my core, destroying the normal atmosphere, from one of love and joy to one of instant fear.

The voices both got louder, both of them strident and demanding, but one of them was tinged with worry, or fear, or something bad, sounding defensive, and when I realized it was Theo's voice any rational thinking I should have exercised got completely ignored.

I should have silently crept back out of the house, far enough away so my voice couldn't be heard by anybody inside, and called 911 with my cell.

I should have protected myself completely, and let the professionals arrive and deal with the problem, because they're the ones trained to do those sorts of things, they're the ones experienced at dealing with danger, and I'm not.

I should have done those things. I should have.

But the man I was in love with was in danger, and logical rational thought disappeared.

Shoes quickly slid off, I crept up the first flight of stairs to the landing, and then laying on the same angle as the second flight of stairs, I bumped myself up one stair at a time, keeping low, like a tiger hunting, so as not to be seen, until the top of my head got just above the level of the upstairs floor, just enough for my eyes to search for what was going on.

At first, there was nothing to see, no people anywhere in sight, and while I had no definitive idea where the voices were coming from, my best guess was that they were in Theo's bedroom suite, maybe in the spacious bathroom, and I decided to finish climbing the flight, planning to duck into my room first and search for a potential weapon, or the faintest idea of a plan, and I silently managed to creep up just onto the second floor, stockinged feet on hardwood, in the middle of the hallway, no one the wiser, when sudden movement caught my eye and I froze like a statue.

In the open doorway of Theo's room, I suddenly saw him. He was wearing pants, with no shirt or socks or shoes, his hairy chest and upper body bare, and he was slowly walking backwards, edging one careful step at a time, past the foot of the bed and then out of my sight, picturing his movement, knowing he only had a few feet to go before running into the nightstand on that side of the bed, in front of the back wall. But what made terror begin echoing through my bones was that his hands and arms were held up, in the universal surrender pose of someone under enormous threat.

As quickly as he backed out of my view to the left, the worst possible image came into view from the right.

I watched the cold sharp hardness of a handgun appear, something dull black and boxy, held out on a stretched arm, inching forward to match Theo's backwards steps, followed by the body of the man holding it. Dressed in dark clothes from head to toe, and with what looked like garbage bags duct-taped around his feet and lower legs, he was someone Asian, about my height and my weight, and he stopped, eyes glaring and teeth bared.

"SHUT UP!" the stranger yelled, "YOU SHUT YOUR LYING MOUTH!"

Barely twenty feet from me, the man didn't see me through the open door, in his periphery. He was far too busy intently staring at his prey to notice little old me, frozen in fear, standing in the middle of the hall, my knees shaking, never so frightened in all my life, and totally unable to make any kind of decision about what to do, or how to stop the horror I somehow knew was imminent.

I was unprepared. I was untrained. I was a fish out of water, in a life-or-death situation, a failure in every way. I had no clue what to do, or how to protect the life of the man I loved.

Or my own, I realized.

Theo said some words. I could hear his voice, without being able to discern what he said, but the man with the gun wasn't having any of it.

"SHUT YOUR MOUTH! YOU KILLED HIM! AND NOW YOU'RE GOING TO PAY FOR IT!"

The arm holding the gun straightened a bit, and I could somehow sense he was getting ready to shoot.

"I DIDN'T KILL ANYBODY!" I heard Theo shout, matter-of-factly, "YOU JUST TOLD ME HE SHOT HIMSELF, FOR GOD SAKES!"

I watched the gun wobble a bit.

"YEAH, MAYBE YOU DIDN'T PULL THE TRIGGER," the man spat out, "BUT IT WAS ALL YOUR FAULT!"

"LOOK - " Theo said, his voice a soft-shout now, "I WASN'T THERE. AND I'M SORRY, BUT HE MADE HIS OWN CHOICES, AND..."

The man shrieked with rage.

"HE WAS MY ONLY BROTHER! YOU TURNED HIM GAY! THEN YOU REJECTED HIM, AND NOW HE'S DEAD!"

Theo's voice took on a tone of sadness.

"NOBODY TURNS ANYBODY ELSE GAY! HE WAS GAY TO BEGIN WITH! AND I DIDN'T REJECT HIM!" he said, defensively, "I LOVED HIM!"

In the space of the blink of my eyes, I knew who the man was. Jigme's brother. The sibling of Theo's former lover.

And Jigme was dead.

Suicide.

Anguish filled my soul. How terrible, I thought, that anybody ever gets into that headspace, where they think death is the only option.

"AND NOW," the guy shouted, "IT'S TIME FOR YOU TO DIE!"

The guy's arm straightened out, perfectly horizontal from his shoulder.

I couldn't stop myself.

"NOOOOO!" I shrieked, and I watched the guy's head snap left, towards me, immediately followed by his arm, arcing in my direction, as he reacted without thinking.

It's staggering, realizing in that first second that you're about to get shot, and die.

I had nowhere to go. I was standing in a wide-open hallway, the closest doorway, to my own room as it happens, where I should be safe, too far for me to get to in the barest of time available to me, and I knew it, icily understanding.

I'm going to die.

Three scenarios screamed through my head, in the shortest measurable amount of time known to mankind; my parents being informed about my death, and their horrible grief, as well as Theo's debilitating and abject anguish, absorbing my murder on his emotions for the few seconds he'd have before the guy spun back and he too was brutally killed.

Mostly, though, I thought about what would be my eternal sadness, at never having had the chance to love Theo to the fullest, at never knowing just how soul-altering it must be to take him in me, to be penetrated by his cock, making his body a piece of my own body, embedded in me, and at never having reached the summit of Mount Olympus with him, as we should, man with man, man in man, man filled by man, the 'Erastes' and his 'Eromenos', the way nature intended us.

Despair made me give up. I lost all my will to fight, because it was obviously futile.

I dropped towards the floor, all hope lost, my body no longer able to stand.

There was a flash of bright light. The crack of the report was shatteringly loud, and reverberated over the walls of the long hallway, so loud I could feel it.

A split micro second later a searing fire of pain erupted in my left arm, up near my shoulder, and I shrieked a god-awful wail as I hit the floor, on my right shoulder, and watched vivid drops of my own blood burst into my vision as they floated in the air before gravity took over.

Screaming and gasping and screaming, I had a second to look to my left arm, and saw a gash of my own flesh, bubbling with blood, the pain excruciating, and through a sea of tears in my eyes I looked up again, to see the man settling his feet, fully turned towards me, facing me, and aiming.

The stairs were right behind me, and without thinking about it my legs swung backwards, and I rolled, trying to slide down before he could get me, but rolling put me onto my left arm, which shrieked in agonizing pain and I screamed again, ending up half-on and half-off the stairs, clutching my left arm with my right.

At that exact moment, I watched the hardwood floor in front of me explode, right where my head had been a mere second before, and a small chunk of laminated wood flew up and slammed into my forehead, knocking my head back.

In the second it took for my head to bounce the return, I could see he was aiming again.

Through the scorching pain, I knew I was done, and I couldn't bear to actually watch it happen. I didn't want the brightness of the muzzle flash to be my final sight.

Just before my eyelids closed forever, the very last thing I would ever see was odd, the briefest of images, something flying through the air, from the left, towards the man's head, long and rounded and curved and an off-white color, with blue patterns painted on it, striking me as one of the bedside lamps Theo owned.

The three sounds that followed all happened so quickly it would be impossible to time them. I heard a solid deep crashing thonk, and then a blisteringly-loud snare-drum-like crack, and finally a vicious thundering deep thud in the wall to my right, about a foot above my head.

I screamed and screamed and screamed.

Theo was on me in seconds, screaming himself, a repetition of "NO NO NO!", seeing my blood, most of it on me but some of it pooling and staining the floor, and then he was gone again, while I writhed and screamed in pain, and then he was back, with a thick bathroom towel in one hand and his cell phone in the other, wrapping my arm and pressing hard while he boomed at whoever was on the line, through my agony hearing words like, "AMBULANCE!" and "SHOT!"

Bawling like a baby, the rippling burning pain was more than I could handle, and I found myself lapsing in and out of being fully awake, while Theo cradled me in his arms, on his knees, the knees of his pants slipping in my blood, crying himself, sobbing out the words, "I'M SO SORRY", again and again and again, until I heard the front door get booted wide open and men screaming and Theo screaming back and through the curtain of tears in my eyes I saw two men skitter past us down the hall, the both of them on edge, with their guns out in front of them, the first one holstering his weapon after he kicked away the gun on the floor, by the unmoving Asian man's feet, whose head was covered in blood, the second man, gun still aimed at the perpetrator, reached up to his collar and clicked the button on his microphone, and I heard words like, "AMBO", AND "CRIME SCENE TEAM".

The paramedics had to physically pull me out of Theo's arms, when they arrived. The first team went to the bedroom, huddling over the body, and I heard a woman's dull uninterested voice say, "I've got a pulse," and then the second team arrived, to deal with me. When he finally let me go and stood up, no longer cradling me in his arms, I could see the tracks of his tears on Theo's cheeks.

He had some of my blood on his skin, close to his breastbone, from cradling me, the whole time sobbing almost as much as I was, his words repeated over and over.

"I'm so sorry."

Whatever they gave me for the pain worked really fast, and combined with my adrenaline crash, which happens to all of us after big moments in life, I got sleepy, overwhelmed with exhaustion, both the physical and the emotional, and when they told me that my wound was minor, luckily, just a graze from the bullet that ripped a little trough through my hoodie and the outside of my arm, they cleaned it and wrapped it and told me not to get it wet for a few days. There was a small nick of blood on my forehead, from the piece of floor that hit me, which got a band-aid.

Job done, they turned me over to the cops, who, naturally, had questions. They let me wrap a blanket around my shoulders, because I was shaking, a mild state of shock they told me, but nothing unusual or worth worrying about, after helping me to my feet and assisting me all the way down the stairs to the living room, which I assumed at the time was an act of genuine kindness, until I realized they'd done that so I didn't have to watch them get the gurney with the bloody body of the shooter down the stairs and out the front door.

I didn't have to see him, the man who tried to murder me.

Through my shock and my dawning realization that I came THAT close to dying, something initially frightening but slowly changing into anger, I answered their questions, while they kept Theo in the den, the two of us separated for interviews. I knew the detectives did that to then compare notes and see if either of us was lying.

But neither of us was.

One of the men asking me questions kept returning to the same issue, wanting to 'understand' why I was in the house in the first place, and quizzing me about any previous connections to Theo I might have had, how I met him, how I was offered the job of being a house-mate, those sorts of things. I got the impression that he was fishing for any reason to doubt my word, to 'crack' some imagined lie open, to dig up some back-story that would somehow net them even more charges. Maybe that's his job, I don't know.

Theo's house was full of people for hours. Between crime scene technicians and all their processes of photography and measurements and detailed analysis, including fishing out three spent bullets from two walls and the floor, and the detectives going over and over the timelines and doubling back on their interrogations of us, just wanting to 'understand' everything, it took what seemed like forever.

At one point, one of the detectives casually said to me that since the threat was now over, and the bad guy on his way to jail, after a stop at the hospital, that my 'job' must be over too. "I guess it's back to the dorm for you, huh?" he asked, and all I could do was nod and say, "I guess."

It was after seven in the evening when the last cops left, Theo thanking them at the front door before closing it, me, still wrapped in a blanket, drained of energy, on the couch.

Theo came in and stood by the fireplace, roaring with heat, on the opposite side of the room, fully clothed. I'd never seen a more serious look on a person's face, ever. I could read a myriad of emotions in there, as I'm sure he could read on mine.

"You and I are intelligent men," he said, his voice low in volume, "and we're both aware that the best advice from mental health professionals in the aftermath of any trauma is to talk about our feelings, and voice what we're going through, and not bottle anything up."

I nodded my understanding and agreement.

"So tell me how you're feeling, right at this moment" he suggested.

I almost laughed.

"A couple of the cops," I began, "they told me that I'd go through a whole range of emotions in the next twenty-four hours. Reliving the moments, in my head. The fear, and the terror, and the helplessness, things like that," and I watched Theo nod his head, like that all made sense and he'd probably been advised of the same things, "but I've already been through all those, over and over again, all afternoon, since it happened, and I'm so done, I'm so done with the whole 'what if' stuff", and the whole 'I came that close to dying' stuff."

Theo waited me out.

"So now," I added, "mostly," and I paused, "I'm just angry. I'm angry that any human being thinks they can hurt or kill anybody else just because their own heart is broken. Like, I'm sorry the guy's brother killed himself, I am, but that doesn't excuse what he did. So I'm pissed off, I'm angry that the world is made up of people like that, people who think someone has to be to blame for the stuff that happens, even though at the same time we all know that 'shit happens'."

Theo kept waiting me out.

"How did he get in?" I asked, changing the subject, genuinely trying to understand.

"My fault," Theo admitted, and I watched a serious amount of regret wash over his face, "I let Scout out, and left the sliding glass door open a big enough crack for her to get back in while I got ready to go to work," and I nodded, because that was a completely rational and normal thing to do, and I would have done the same thing, never expecting the horrors to begin, "he must have hopped the fence, from the park space. That's why he had garbage bags taped on his feet, according to one of the cops, so he didn't leave a trail of footprints in the dirt or on the grass. The police can trace shoeprints."

It all seemed to make sense.

Until it didn't.

"So if he came in the back of the house," I asked, "then why was the front door open a crack?"

Theo shook his head, as if the answer was almost funny.

"I came downstairs after shaving," he said, "to close the sliding door, assuming that Scout was back inside already, because she never stays out for long. I'd only just started getting ready for work, so all I had on were my pants, and I barely got down the stairs to the front door when I heard a noise that most definitely wasn't the cat. In a second," he said, his voice getting quieter and his eyes getting darker, "in that exact second, I knew something was horribly wrong. You were at school, which struck me as a blessing, that you wouldn't be in danger, but I knew that if there was any noise I could hear then that meant someone was in the house, someone who shouldn't be. So I reacted. I reached for the front door, to escape. I was going to slip out that door and sprint, in my bare feet, faster than I've ever run, to get away. Live to fight another day, that seemed like the only rational plan. The only realistic plan. I managed to crack it open, noiselessly."

I let him take a breath and calm himself, with a huge sigh.

"But then he came around the corner with his gun drawn, pointed right at me. My one chance to save myself disappeared."

For a second, he looked away from me, behind me, but he easily could have been gazing a million miles away. He was reliving the moments, right in front of me. I watched the emotions flicker. Fear, terror, the reactions to the threat, and the resignation to imminent death, they all played out in his face.

I knew all of them, for I'd been playing them out inside my head for hours, while the cops grilled me.

"You loved Jigme," I said, with no emotion tied to it, more as just a statement of fact, and he nodded, "so I'm so sorry that you had to find out about him shooting himself."

Theo grimaced.

"When we parted, I knew he had a wild streak in him. I tried to caution him. I tried to mentor him, that the lifestyle he was sliding towards was risky, but it obviously didn't work. In-between the rants and the threats, according to the brother, Jigme lost his way, and descended into a life of drugs and anonymous sexual encounters. Those are cheap thrills, which never can sustain. That was a lesson I gave many times, in our time together, but he didn't take to heart."

"So what happened?" I asked.

Sighing, Theo's eyes filled with tears.

"He slept around. He slept with anybody who wanted him, apparently, and he was a lovely young man, so I imagine there were plenty of men who wanted him. He partied, he did drugs. He lived the life. He did all the wrong things, and it caught up to him."

Theo swallowed, like somebody does when they're going through something emotionally serious.

"Jigme got sick," Theo said, sadness in his voice, "and ignored it, didn't get it treated, probably embarrassed or ashamed, and when it turned into full-blown AIDS later on, he couldn't see a way out, and he took his own life."

There wasn't anything I could say.

"Poor Jigme," Theo whispered.

"Amen," I whispered back.

Out of the blue, with a resolve that suddenly appeared, Theo spoke.

"You saved my life, Gregory, and for that I will be eternally grateful."

A small shiver of shock went through me, at his use of my given name. It was the first time he'd ever called me that.

"If you hadn't arrived when you did, in the nick of time, and distracted him," he said, his voice suddenly steely, "then you would have come home later in the day and discovered my body. That's a fact. And," he grimaced again, "the thought of that makes me almost sick to my stomach. Killing me is one thing, but if he'd ended your life, you, who had nothing to do with Jigme, I don't know how I could have gone on."

Now his eyes became wetter than could be held, and tears ran down both his cheeks.

"I'm filled with sadness, a profound sadness, and anger, seething anger, growing by the minute, that he injured you. The cowardice of taking his fury at me out on you, a completely innocent bystander, it fills me with rage. You were here to make it safer for me, you were never supposed to be in danger. You were never supposed to be hurt! Another person in the house, to increase the safety, that was the goal. That was the plan. I can't face the idea that he might have killed you," he breathed out, "I'd never be able to live with myself."

I felt tears running down my cheeks as well.

"You saved my life," he said, "and, in a way, come to think of it, in a bizarre twist of fate, you also saved his life as well."

The look on my face asked the question.

"I had to tend to you," he sighed, "with all my heart, and all my energies. There was no other option, of course. How could there be? And to my utter relief, and I'm not making light of the pain you've been put through today, but my heart finally began beating again when I saw that you'd only suffered a flesh wound. If you'd been seriously hurt, or, God forbid, killed," and then he paused, and the tears stopped, and his face got a fiercely hard look on it, "then I would have beaten him to death with my own hands."             

There was no ambivalence in his tone. I knew in my heart he would have done exactly that.

And I also realized that I would have done the same thing, were the situation reversed. I knew it. I would have, or died trying.

I felt a warmth slowly building inside me, deep down, as if maybe the brutally cold shocks of earlier were perhaps beginning to lessen.

"I'm so sorry," he said again, "you saved my life," he almost-whispered, "and I don't know how I can ever repay you."

My arm was throbbing, and I realized it was probably past time for me to take another of the painkillers the medics had given me. But then I nixed that idea, immediately, because I wanted a clear mind, uncorrupted by drugs.

"Theo," I said, and then paused, and then tried to smile, "my 'Latria mu'," and I paused again, "I can't take credit for that, for saving you. I felt like I failed you, at the time."

His question was easy to read on his face.

"I was so frightened," I admitted, "so horrified, when I saw that gun moving towards me, because all I could see was the end, all I could rationally understand was my imminent death," and I began tearing up again, shuddering under the blanket, reliving the ordeal just a few short hours later, the visceral shock of 'what could have been' weighing again on my mind, like the police had said it would, "and I felt like such a failure, because I couldn't save you. I felt like a fool! I walked all the way up the stairs without a plan or a weapon or any hope of doing anything good, and the truth is I wasn't brilliant at skillfully dodging the bullet, like one of those cops said. I wasn't," and I choked up, my voice becoming strained, "the truth is I gave up. I didn't even try to fight. I just stopped being alive, knowing I was a goner, and everything inside me gave up, and I dropped to the floor. No heroics. No bravery."

Tears began rolling down my cheeks, again, something I'd been doing off and on most of the day and something I was getting tired of.

"But you didn't fail," Theo said, softly, "don't you see? You decided, whether you were conscious of it or not, you decided to create a moving target, of yourself. You forced him to move with you, an almost impossible task for someone pumping with adrenaline and rage and anger, like he was, and it's only a bad stroke of luck that he managed to get the bullet close enough to graze you. I'd bet money most people would have missed by a mile. And it was that distraction you created," he added, "that saved me, that gave me the time to grab the lamp and throw it at him."

Through wet eyes, I gazed up at him.

"If you hadn't come home early," he whispered, "I'd have been killed. He had me. It was over. There was nothing I could do, except..."

He choked up, for a moment, and then regained his composure.

"There was nothing I could do except thank my lucky stars. If I was going to die, I was going to go knowing that for a few days, for these last few days, with you here, I lived! I truly lived! I lived a full, rich life, surrounded by your beauty and your intellect and your company."

Then he cleared his throat.

"So I refuse to accept your belief that you failed me," he said, confidence creeping into his voice. "As far as I'm concerned, like the man of honesty and integrity that you are, you saved my life, by doing what you did, what you had to do, giving the both of us the chance to get another second of living in, a chance to get out of that situation alive, and to be able to continue living and loving, every day that the Gods give us the strength to wake up."

He smiled, ruefully.

"You stepped up, and did what you had to do," he said, "like the honorable young man that you are."

I looked up at him, switching subjects again.

"I told the police that we were friends, nothing more. They kept asking me about 'our relationship', like they didn't believe me, or were trying to come up with a weird love triangle story. But I know you have an image to uphold, in the public, with your books and media and such, and it's none of their goddamned business anyway, so I gave them nothing."

He shrugged his shoulders.

"They quizzed me about our relationship as well," he said, "as if they were, I don't know, paparazzi, or gossips. I got the distinct impression they were looking for anything they could disapprove of in some way or other. The semi-famous scholar and his student."

I nodded my agreement.

"That's one thing they asked me about more than once. They couldn't seem to accept that I wasn't your student, that you somehow didn't corrupt me from the front row, or blackmailed me for a good grade. I kept telling them I don't have any of your courses and I've never attended any of your lectures, and I don't study Greek history at all, and it'll take them about ten minutes to learn that's true when they check it out, which they will. But I'm not sure they wanted to accept the truth."

"Makes no matter," he said, standing up straighter, "I told them the truth, which is that I hired you to be my house-mate, during my stressful time, and that in just a few short days, a week, actually, we'd become as close as two people can get, and that we'd become lovers."

"You told them that?" I asked, shocked, and when he nodded, I added, "but what about your press image? Won't...?"

Before I could finish the sentence, Theo's eyes moved off of mine, and he looked away, blankly, for just a few seconds, and then came back to me, and I saw worry and fear and regret pop up in his eyes, and then Theo moved his long legs and in an instant stood before me, and I looked up at his face, seeing a grim determination.

"And now I realize I have to confess how sorry I am, Gregory. You see, they can tell the whole world whatever they want about me. I don't care what anyone thinks. Well, except for you, of course. But, if it becomes public that I'm in a loving relationship with another man and people decide it's tawdry or scandalous, that's their problem, not mine."

I admired his strength of character. He is who he is, and there should be absolutely no shame in that at all. Quite the opposite, in fact. He should be able to shout it from the rooftops.

"But," he added, and paused, "here's where I made an error. I realize now that by possibly outing myself, I also possibly outed you, Gregory, something I'm sure you've never thought of nor have we ever discussed, and for that," and he paused, and I could see his jaw clenching "for that there is no excuse, and I can only humbly beg your forgiveness."

I started to wave him off, but he wasn't allowing it.

"Not only did you save my life, for which I feel I owe you my eternal gratitude," he said, somberly, "but I also owe you my eternal shame, for potentially exposing you to the world as a gay man, not even knowing if that's what you truly are, but that's how many people will see it, and all against your wishes, and without your consent."

He looked at me again as if I was the only human being on the planet.

"I can never say thank you enough, and I can never say I'm sorry enough."

For the longest time, we stared at each other, our communication noiseless and rich. We were reliving not just the compelling moments of the ordeal, the both of us coming so close to being killed, startling and horrible thoughts to have to be reminded of, but more importantly we were also reliving all of our private moments together, from our first meeting in his office at the University, the beginnings of my education about Pederasty, and the whole idea of men in the closest of relationships, from mentoring to romance and even sexuality, through our initial getting-to-know-each-other stage, bodies exposed, senses heightened, to the speedy growth of intimacy we created, minute by minute, the touching of our souls, the freedoms of our honesty, particularly our desires and lusts, and finally to our natural progression of sharing physical and romantic and sexual moments.

With determination, I stood, standing right between his legs, our bodies mere microns away from touching, and shed the blanket off my shoulders.

"I love you, 'Latria mu'," I said, plainly, "as a friend, as a man, and as a mentor. You've opened my eyes, and taught me, about so many things. Life, and love. History. Beauty, and strength. All the things that can't be taught in classrooms. And for that, I will be grateful until the day I leave this earth."

His gaze at me was rapt, and tender.

"But the most important lesson you've given me isn't a book fact. It's an existential one. The lesson of nature. Of our nature. Yours and mine. Our nature. You are an 'Erastes'. That is a life fact. To suggest otherwise, or try to deny it, is foolish. You just are."

I watched him slowly nod.

"What's equally true," I said, frankness in my voice, "is that you've helped me learn that I am an 'Eromenos'. I just am."

The twinkle in his eye finally returned.

"That textbook I've been reading has completely corroborated what you've told me. Not all Pederastic relationships were physical. Facts are facts. Some were simply the union of two men, on intellectual and spiritual levels, and emotional levels. Mentors, and mentees. Equals, in all the ways that count, fulfilling the other, the combination of strengths. And those are unions that are beautiful, and should be celebrated. I know it now, as a basic truth. An elemental truth. Because that's what you've given me! It's what you've shown me is possible. That joining, that union, I've lived it! Here! With you!"

Theo smiled.

"It has been a priceless joy to me," he said.

"Give me an hour or so to get ready," I whispered, "and meet me in your bedroom."

His eyes seemed to begin dancing.

"There's one more union for us to create," I breathed out, not a request but a demand, "which is the ultimate union, the highest union. The physical one. The sexual one. The 'Erastes', taking his 'Eromenos', who isn't complete without being taken."

I saw his eyes light up.

"I'm serious! From the second I woke up this morning, until I stopped outside the front door, seeing it open, I have been floating on air! Because today! This day! This is the day! This is my day! Our day! The day we've been preparing for, the both of us. And yesterday we got there, and you told me I was ready. Today! The day when I take you inside me, and we complete each other. Today! And there's not a chance in hell I'm going to let that little bastard deny me my destiny."

As I walked away from him, after the softest of kisses on his left cheek, which made him shudder, I stopped and turned, and looked back coyly over my shoulder.

"And, 'Latria mu'?" I asked, "don't feel any shame, about possibly 'outing' me. You haven't done anything except speak the truth, your truth and my truth, and be an honorable man. I'll gladly tell anybody who asks. Yes, I'm in a relationship with another man, a loving romantic relationship, soon to be a sexual relationship, and then I'll brag that it's the kind of relationship that most of them can only dream of."

We were both grinning.

"So just like Agathon, I'm going to walk in public with my head held high, everywhere. But," I paused, "unlike him, maybe I won't go quite as far as he did and actually walk around outside cross-dressed," and we both laughed a little, "but, you know what?" and I paused again, and contemplated, and then giggled, "maybe I will! Who knows! I love doing it, I love wearing that softness over my skin!"

Theo nodded his approval of my open mind, and whatever choice I made, ever the mentor.

"But no more 'Gregory', please?" I asked him, gently.

He shook his head.

"Never again, my sweet Agatha."

Like a skilled craftsman, I followed the routine calmly, without rushing anything. Anticipation is a delightful aphrodisiac. Do it right, the first time. Enema bag, in the shower. Clean inside, and then clean the outside. Pink razor, attention to detail. Body lotion. Oiled anal plug, the shape of a traffic cone, a pale sunflower yellow instead of gaudy orange, gently but insistently pushed in, creating ripples of tremors throughout my trunk. Bra, panty, garter belt and stockings, the loveliest of sets, still in their packaging, all lacy and shiny and as stark white and brilliantly bright as a mountaintop in the blazing sun. Virginal. Only to be worn once, I decided, because after today it wouldn't apply anymore. Eye liner, mascara, blush, and lipstick, cherry red, shiny and luscious. And finally, wig and robe, the longest one, flowing like a gentle river.

I ignored the obvious mess of the floor in the hall as I padded softly out of my room, ready to meet my man. And despite wanting to sprint to him, I instead became the tigress again, slowly and stealthily approaching, long purposeful strides, on soft stockinged feet.

Theo was standing by the foot of his bed, naked, facing away from me, staring out the floor-to-ceiling windows, patiently waiting.

He'd placed what looked like a large beach towel over the area on the carpeting where our assailant's bloody pulpy head had landed, a sweet gesture. But he needn't have worried about how I'd react to the aftermath.

I'd have walked through a river of blood to get to my 'Erastes'.

I'd have walked over the man's body itself, if he were still laying there. I'd have bent over and looked him in the eye and said, "you were trying to end a life? Well, guess what? You failed! We're going to begin a life, right here and right now! We're going to begin the life of the Gods! The life of Eros, Hermes, Apollo, and Zeus himself. The life of some of the greatest minds in history, Plato and Socrates! The life of countless men, billions of them, throughout the history of mankind!

Theo was naked, and when he heard my footsteps he turned.

His cock was pointing at the ceiling, and wobbling.

His legs were spread, solid and firmly on the floor, and his big hairy balls filled the space between them, at the top.

When I got to the doorway I shrugged off my robe, and walked into his outstretched arms.

We kissed.

We stood and held each other and kissed, for minute after minute, without tongues, conveying to each other all of our emotions through our lips. I felt his hunger, and he felt mine. I felt his passion, his energy, mirroring it back at him.

I felt the snorts of his breath, out of his nostrils, right onto my cheeks, getting faster and faster, matching me. I felt him picking me up at one point, his big hands just grabbing my ass and lifting, and with my feet dangling he carried us around the end of the bed, and lay us down, and I got to feel the monumentally-glorious elation that comes when a man lays on me, covering my body with his, pushing me into the mattress, absorbing his weight and his presence.

Without breaking our kiss, one now driven on tongue caresses, he slunk his right hand down and around and pushed at the back of my left thigh, so I pulled both of my legs up, my knees towards my shoulders, around his torso, curving my spine outwards, raising my ass to him, and he grabbed hold of the base of the butt plug in me and pulled, not too fast, and there was an audible 'squish' kind of sound as it came out, and the next thing I knew I could feel the rounded end of his cock, stabbing me halfway between my hairless sac and my hole, poking a blob of his sweet pre-cum right onto the skin of my taint, before a tiny grunt left his lungs and travelled up into my mouth, very much like a, 'damn, I missed it', kind of sound, and our overall balance of weight on the bed shifted ever so slightly, and my miracle began.

His helmet settled into the curved entrance of me.

With a little considerate push, he'd lodged himself into the entrance, the ring, nothing actually inside me, but ready to go, in place, prepared for action, like the truest soldier, giving me the chance to understand the real size of him, and how much I was going to have to work, to be my own kind of soldier, in the ordeal about to begin.

Our ordeal earlier was life-threatening, almost life-ending.

This particular ordeal would be life-changing.

No words were spoken

We both had our eyes open, barely a few inches apart, with our lips touching softly, and I saw his signal to me, letting me know, through his look, and then he began to sink in.

The butt plug was wide, at the bottom, so I was almost fully prepared and loose enough to take him into me without discomfort.

Almost.

He was at least as thick as the base of the anal plug, maybe thicker, but so much longer, with no tapering, and after the initial moments of exhilaration occurred, I realized that millions of nerve endings in my tissues inside me were screaming in enormous discomfort, suddenly, and my back arched, pushing my chest up at him, only my ass and shoulders on the mattress, and the gasp that came out of me was almost a shriek.

His eyes never left mine. He watched me go through the pressure, absorb the pains, and begin dealing with the shock to my innards, an unmistakable resolve on his face. We were doing this, no matter what, and all I could do was know that he could see the same emotion in my eyes, because that was how I felt as well. As committed as he, I squeezed at him with my legs, which were wrapped around his hips, letting him know that there was no going back.

There would be no failure this time.

But it was a daunting challenge.

Grinding my teeth and seething bursts of air out of my lips, the moans coming out of my lungs were sounds completely unknown to me. Groans mixed with whines mixed with frailty mixed with extraordinary power.

Theo seemed to be able to read from my eyes when to pause, and then when to push.

Inch by inch he slowly pushed me open.

His size stretched me, it made tissue and flesh inside me have to move in ways they hadn't before, involuntarily. The pressure inside me seemed to rise and never stop rising, pushing my limits, shards of momentary pains and throbs rippling up my spine, and he watched me go through it all and I watched him watch me.

We were sharing everything, including how we felt in our souls.

When his cock was almost all the way in, and I was as filled as I thought possible, the fire in his eyes exploded, as if he knew there was only one more push until he was buried, until he was completely inside me, until he was at the ultimate joining with me, our destiny, two men as one, with no possibility of being closer, spiritually or physically, and I had just enough time to steel myself, a soldier in the battle of penetration readying for the final assault.

Not that it mattered, but it was a good thing that Theo's house was on a quiet street, with lots of distance between him and his neighbors, because I screamed louder than a herd of stampeding elephants. I screamed louder than a jet airplane. My eyes filled with tears and overflowed, my hands gripped onto his upper arms like talons, almost to the point of bruising him. My legs clamped onto him and shook in muscular overdrive, shuddering at how hard I was gripping. His belly molded over my sac and my erection, trapping them with his flesh, and the hairs around his cock brushed my taint, like a million little feelers.

I screamed and I screamed and I screamed.

Totally full, completely full, unprecedentedly full of cock, everything inside me roared in the most brilliant combination of joy and stress.

I HAD HIM IN ME!

ALL THE WAY IN ME, I WAS FULL OF HIS COCK!

Blubbering like a baby, through my sea of tears I watched his eyes get wet, never dousing the flames but making them shimmer, and without moving for minutes on end, he let me absorb him, and absorb all the emotions I was going through, and deal with the pains, shooting and pressurized.

He allowed the both of us to simply be at the pinnacle, together. Two men, the 'Erastes' and his 'Eromenos', one mounting and one being mounted, living in real time the glorious fusion of the Gods.

Masculine, and feminine.

It seemed that the both of us began to sense it, when my body and my feelings went from all-time stressed through the journey to acceptance and finally to desperate desire, as if nature herself was sending us a signal, to begin.

To begin the journey.

To begin the coupling.

To begin the exquisite, and the sublime.

To begin the sheer unequalled experience, the unmatched physical endurance test, and the unimaginable emotional magic-carpet ride.

"TAKE ME!" I shouted out, "TAKE ME, 'LATRIA MU'!"

We began slowly.

Gentle long and thoughtful movements.

Over the course of minutes, we began to speed up, ever so slowly.

Thrusting became harder, and then more so, which became banging, which became slamming, which became thundering pummels.

The vibrations inside of me that I was familiar with were pale comparisons to the buzzes he instilled, his cock viciously massaging my prostate, and I came just from the pressure of his skin crushing my erection, a back-seizing ball-draining explosion, somehow managing to keep my eyes locked on his during my thrashing, restrained as it was with his weight on me, and Theo smiled, his forehead shiny with beads of sweat, and then we got down to serious business.

My man closed his eyes and drove me, in rapid sharp battering-ram thuds, and it made my heart smile amidst all my euphoria knowing that he was going into all-out mode, as an 'Erastes' should naturally do.

The end stretch lasted a few minutes, my body taking the blows from his, the fiercest work-out of my life, as if I was the voluntary punching bag for his cock, taking the punishment gladly, and I had two more little cums, oozes of my juice seeping out between the skin of our bodies, until Theo roared like a lion and his head bent up to the ceiling and his eyes opened in shock, and with the strongest lunge yet, he slid all the way into me like a spear, and held himself there.

I could feel his life-giving seed pooling in me, as he finished, hoping that I could leech from it every bit of his energy, and I cried again, tears of joyous gratitude, and wicked pride.

I'd given him the greatest experience of his life.

As he'd done for me.

He was my 'Erastes'.

I was his 'Eromenos'.

We were complete.

THE END