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Wednesday, Nov 25, 2009
All I want is a boyfriend. But as a black gay man, I keep hooking up with men who not only shun commitment -- they don't even want to come out of the closet.
Aug 16, 2004 | I met Rick on a Thursday night at a club called Vapor. He was somewhere below average height and stood against the walls, away from the light. Even in the dark his brown skin glowed. All the men at Vapor were dressed similarly: long shirt, baggy pants, jewelry, scowl. Rick had on a Chicago Bears jersey that he seemed too old and too serious for. Ditto for the thick gold chain that he had the good sense to keep inside the jersey. But he wore them the same way he held his plastic cup of ice and liquor: with an attitude.
I could feel his slow eyes on my back. I knew that eye contact between us would collapse into a staring contest. He was very sexy, hiding in the dark. He looked guilty, scared of getting caught, but kind of turned on to be doing something he obviously thought was bad.
It's worth noting that Vapor's black gay night was called "Taboo," where most white bars used campy names like "Paradise," "Oasis" and "Heaven." You had to pass through a sort of ectoplasm of shame to enter Taboo. And "gay" night is what I call it. The management, if they called it anything, used the word "alternative," as though upon entering you might find Bjork or a Foo Fighter. "Alternative" was the safe word bouncers used to make sure the seemingly straight people had come to the right place.
After over an hour of staring and several rounds of the slow motion nod that confirms attraction, Rick finally came over and spoke to me. He had a smooth, husky rasp and a gentlemanly approach to conversation. He said he had just moved to our northeastern city from Chicago. I told him that I'd just moved from New York. He was a salesman, and he'd just finished with some clients.
"Dressed like that?"
He said he had the jersey in his car and often changed clothes out of the trunk. "I travel a lot," he said. "Why did you move here? Work?"
I told him yes, and I kept talking because he kept listening. When he spoke, there was sex in his voice and sex in his eyes, and I tried to put some in my voice and eyes. He asked if he could drive me home, and I said yes.
So we got in his very clean car, and he drove. He told me he was on the low, or the DL -- which is short for "down low," but could just as easily mean "dumb lie" or "devoid of love." A lot of men on the DL just want sex with men, and will usually commit only to a woman -- and they'll never acknowledge what they do as gay behavior. It's a game, like that staring contest, that's hot because they have this idea that it's, well, taboo.
