Longo Bros.

“Yeah, the music is like,” Tony said matter-of-fact-ly, “fun to fuck to.”

Clark wished he could say that he had never been dumped through an email before, though the automated message he got was, at least, an original angle. It came from the reservation app Brandon had used to book their dinner, the kind that notifies all guests once the reservation holder cancels. 

“Your reservation for two at Lucky Charm Thai has been canceled. Please call us if you have any questions.” He had plenty of questions for CounterTop customer service, the first being why Brandon was too chicken to dump Clark to his face. 

It shouldn’t have been a surprise; they didn’t really have anything in common. The dates were mostly good sex and boring dinners, Clark always carrying the conversation. The thing was, dating a foodie never went well for him anyway. He had a very sensitive allergy to nuts, and so someone like Brandon — always wanting to experiment and share and treat a menu like some sort of adventure — thought Clark was no fun. 

Still, they’d been dating for two months and Clark was finally admitting to himself that he wanted a boyfriend. A few days earlier, he’d made up his mind to ask Brandon if they were on that track. He’d timidly waited till the end of the night, after sex, when they were drunk and Brandon was kicking him out of his bed. Clark asked when they could see each other next. 

“Saturday might work. I can find a restaurant near you,” Brandon said, sinking into the gray sheets of his gray bed. 

“Where do you live again?” 

“Fort Greene,” Clark sighed, annoyed that Brandon still didn’t know his neighborhood. 

“Oh, that’s right!” Brandon perked up and shook the dark bangs out of his eyes. “I’ll be there on Saturday anyway.” 

“What for?” Clark said, pulling his pants on. 

“The play party on Oxford Street.” He was looking at his phone, and its glow revealed streaks of sweat from the great sex they’d just had. “Have you been?” 

He’d heard of it. It seemed like gays from across the city brought up the infamous party any time they learned Clark’s apartment was just down the street. While he hadn’t been to the party itself, Clark knew it was downstairs from the Longo Bros. supermarket he went to every week. When it came down to it, Clark wasn’t “anti–sex party”, but the party was one of gay Brooklyn’s hallmarks of sexual intrigue and intimidation. Not really his scene. 

“Nope,” Clark replied. “I heard you had to get invited — ‘hot people only’, or something.” He laughed uncomfortably. 

“No, no,” Brandon shook his head and smiled, reassuring him, “Longo Bros. just wants your fifty bucks. They’ll let anyone in.” 

Almost every time Brandon opened his mouth, Clark doubted whether he even truly liked him. 

“Isn’t the rule a little fucked up, though? Like it’d scare certain people away?” 

“I mean, it’s kind of better that way,” Brandon shrugged and laughed again. The gap in his teeth was so cute and harmless, Clark thought, that it would always filter whatever was slithering off his tongue into something innocent. 

“All those fat old dudes hanging around at the door would just be out of place downstairs anyway.” 

Clark’s bright blue eyes widened, stunned and annoyed, but he shifted the conversation away. “Do they really call it Longo Bros.?” 

“The real name is Bad Boy Bootcamp, but it’s right beneath the Longo Bros. Supermarket. And the real name is fucking stupid.” 

Clark was fully dressed and considered leaving without another word. He figured it was now or never, though, and sat down on the corner of Brandon’s bed. 

“Hey,” he said, while Brandon stared at his phone, “can I talk to you about something?” 

It was awkward. Clark couldn’t forget the look of genuine shock on Brandon’s face while he explained he was looking for more, or the condescension in his voice when Brandon explained that his feelings were “obviously casual.” Clark played it off as cool as he could and walked under the cold street lamps while he turned the conversation around in his head, desperate to find out where he went wrong. 

The word casual always felt sanitized; if it was brought up, it was necessarily a sort of red light. Casual situations didn’t need any kind of classification — that was their nature, that was the point. Far from stopping Clark, however, the discussion ignited an even more desperate determination inside of him. 

He could be casual — he’d prove he could be casual! But Brandon didn’t text him back all week, and then, out of nowhere, came the email. It may have been a blessing in disguise, saving him from another uptight moment of explaining that Thai food had too many peanuts. So what could be more casual, he figured, than showing up to the supermarket that Saturday night? 

The winter so far had been mild, but the late January air was finally flexing its strength. The wind clammed up Clark’s fingers — raw and pink as newborn mammals — while he swiped through his phone to find his ticket. 

To get the invite, Clark had to submit a picture of his face, a picture of his body in underwear, and a picture of his ID, to prove he was under 40. The whole thing felt dirty to him, but it was hard to deny that being accepted was a boost to his confidence, and helped him believe maybe Brandon wasn’t out of his league. 

It was just after midnight, hours since closing, but the red and blue Longo Bros. sign still illuminated the sidewalk. A pack of four gay men passed around a cigarette in front of a door that Clark had never noticed in all his years going there, and a couple of them smiled at Clark while he walked inside. 

The entryway was mysteriously typical — mailboxes to the right and a door to the stairway on his left. Toward the back, a twinky-looking white guy stood behind a makeshift ticket booth, built from a music stand and long strips of black construction paper. He was wearing a backward baseball cap, like Clark, who flashed a big nervous smile. 

“Ticket and ID, honey,” the man said with a chipper friendliness that Clark handn’t expected. He checked both, handed them back, and followed up with the casually personal question: 

“Top, bottom, or vers?” 

Clark gulped and let out a sheepish “bottom”, and gave another self-conscious smile. The ticket man leaned over to grab a blue glow stick without breaking eye contact, snapped it onto Clark’s wrist, and said “slay.” 

He nodded toward the stairs right behind him and Clark started down them. He crept slowly, and a funhouse universe began to reveal itself: flashing lights, thumping bass, fog. The air around him seemed to get heavier with each step. Then, all at once, he felt underwater; a thick, musky scent saturated the air so completely that he could almost feel the smell on his skin, like he had just been dipped into a bog. But it wasn’t necessarily foul or putrid— it was the unmistakable scent of human bodies exerting their energy somewhere in the dark. He felt like he was a tiny germ living on someone’s crotch. 

The stairway funneled him immediately into a changing room, where eight or nine men — each with a glowing wristband of red, green, or blue — were stripping down. It was tiny and oblong, lined with benches and hooks on either side. The walls were covered in stickers with images of lockers and towels. Chipped and peeling and old, the stickers must have been pasted on a decade ago by men who probably wouldn’t be allowed inside anymore. Apart from the stickers, the Bad Boy Bootcamp theme was only present in the party dress code, which demanded on the invitation email, “jockstrap or naked. wear boots.” 

Clark was wearing the boots already and dressed down to the first jockstrap he had ever owned; a garish red and blue with a mesh pouch. He didn’t know until he got there that he should be embarrassed. Everyone else had a white one, meant to pass for a real athlete’s, he supposed. Beyond that, they were all the same Instagram-sanctioned brands: “Bike”, “2(x)ist,” and “Pump!”, which had always made Clark roll his eyes but now, he admitted, would have helped him fit in. 

He saw the other men handing off their items to a clothes check and followed behind. The man at the check was fully clothed, and Clark was surprised again by how kind he was. He paid the three dollars, wondering what the alternative was supposed to be, given the dress code, and stuck his ticket under the strap on his right hip. He walked through the hall and stopped at a plastic-curtained doorway. He took a deep breath and heard his mind scolding him: what the hell he was doing, giving his money to a place that was so shamelessly judgemental? But he imagined the moment when Brandon saw him stripped down to his uniform, game for a situation without strings. 

“Okay,” Clark inhaled and coached himself, “no sex. In and out.” He pushed through the curtains toward the deep red light, flashing slowly like a lava lamp. 

He got spat out into a much larger room. There were around 50 people, all dressed to code with a healthy mix of both jockstrapped and fully naked men. This room, it seemed, was a central watering hole for the party, complete with a DJ (jockstrapped), bartender (naked), and large buffet of snacks (unmanned). 

Some men were kissing, some performing handjobs, but there was no penetration that Clark could see through the shadows. 

He felt heat and breath on his shoulder before he saw the man’s body walk up to him. He was shorter than Clark, muscular, tattooed, and smiled in a sort of creepy way while he wagged his dick around. Clark smiled and said “Hi,” and the man got closer and started to slowly rub his naked pelvis on Clark’s leg. He stood there, just letting it happen, not knowing why. The man’s glowing red bracelet led Clark’s hand straight to his dick. He stroked it, figured maybe it wasn’t so bad. The guy was hot enough — deep eyes, chiseled body, and the dick was large and unselfconscious. Just as Clark was beginning to lose himself, he felt the man’s dick start to get wet. 

“Sorry!” he yapped, pulling away, “I’m REALLY drunk. I have to go.” 

He scampered away in a panic to a foggier area where he felt out of sight. Just as he was trying to orient himself, a shadow walked behind Clark and grabbed his ass. He turned to see him waiting —  he was tall, had a square jaw with detailed beard lines, and a red glow stick on his wrist. As soon as Clark noted how hot he was he snapped his head forward, severing eye contact. He didn’t want to give anyone the wrong idea— it seemed like, without the formality of a date or a message on Grindr, they must use some kind of nuanced visual vocabulary of glances that signaled the difference between “Hi, what’s up?” and “let’s fuck right now.” 

Clark needed to learn. Everything he knew about social niceties was irrelevant in that room. It was like crash-landing in some far-off galaxy where bodies — his, others’— belonged to everyone who could see them, or to those who could get close enough to touch. 

Beelining through the men, he arrived at a bench in the corner. Before sitting down he grabbed one of the free beers from the bartender and sat, glancing down to make sure his stomach wasn't rolling up. He felt anchored here, and settling into his seat observed the room more carefully — limbs elbowed their way into his peripheral vision as they stroked; hips thrust against bodies, sending them pulsing upward; necks swerved from side to side, making room for other necks; soft moans floated in the air. These rhythms all occurred alongside a constant march of men, circling in and out of the main room like ghosts, desperately in search of whatever couldn't be found in the light of day. 

As he looked around he couldn’t help but think about the front door policy. It worked. Everyone there was young and hot. For maybe a moment, Clark felt something sparkle inside him, a recognition of status that he mistook for the belonging he so badly craved. From the outside, he hated the exclusion this party practiced. It was everything that was wrong with gays, he thought; this idea that they should be able to openly objectify each other, rank and sort themselves through the BMI scale and willingly chop their already vulnerable community into pieces. All this, however, happened more outside this party than within. Every gay bar catered to a certain crowd, and obvious cliques formed wherever and whenever a little skin could be shown. Summer in New York was open season for this kind of thing, and Longo Bros. was one of the few spaces that was honest about it. 

Clark wasn't shocked that he didn't find the sex party all that sexy. He'd had a threesome once and found it anatomical — too many legs and limbs and moving targets. For better or worse, one of the things he liked best about sex was feeling like the main character, and Longo Bros. was an exhausting ensemble cast. There was something beautiful, maybe, about the excitement and abundance of sexual opportunity there, an innocent hope that "more is more" when it came to sex, but Clark could only think about Brandon, who was nowhere in sight. 

The moment he’d see Brandon had played in his head hundreds of times already. Would Brandon say hi? Totally ignore him? Try to fuck? It felt like each next man who emerged from the shadows was going to be him, and Clark’s heart kept skipping beats, discordant with the bass also thumping inside his chest. He set his beer down on the floor. 

Two men sauntered over toward the table next to Clark’s bench. He saw them holding hands— the fiery red glow around the larger man’s wrist that contrasted against the blue halo of his conquest created a cloud of purple harmony around their clasped fists. And in the next instant, the blue wristbanded bottom was bent over on the table while the other man penetrated him from behind. Clark just watched, surprised that no one stopped him. 

The top pulled out faster than was courteous and walked away. Totally unfazed, the bottom rose and sat on the countertop, casually, as though he’d just had a mediocre massage. He was tiny and looked maybe 22 years old, with great big eyes and a thin layer of fat that, when you’re that young, simply passes for teenage softness. He turned to Clark and, after glancing down at Clark’s wristband of the same color, gave a nod of solidarity. 

“Sometimes I don’t believe these guys actually come,” he said, looking forward and giving the room a brief scan. “Does anyone have more than two, maybe three loads inside him? These dudes are fucking each other till 5 am.” He turned to Clark, scrunched his cute little nose, and declared, “Fake.” 

Clark considered the question seriously.

“I think everyone here is pretty impressive,” he said. “It’s intimidating.” His new friend tossed his head back a little and scrunched his eyebrows. 

“Whyyyy?” he let out, long and baffled. “You’re so hot.” 

Clark sat up a little and adjusted his backward baseball cap. 

“Thanks,” he said. “I just haven’t done this before.” 

“Me either,” moaned his new ally, looking almost bored. “Not sure if it’s for me.” 

“What’s your name?” he continued, shouting over the music. 

“Clark,” he smiled, leaving his anonymity behind. “What about you?” 

“Ahmed,” he said. “Have you walked around yet?” 

Clark looked out onto the room, watching the march of men disappear through the doorways. 

“Not yet.” He shrugged shyly, then, not wanting to be too lame, finished up with a lie, “I smoked an entire joint before I got here.” 

“Oh shit,” Ahmed laughed, “no wonder.” He leaned in toward Clark and blinked with his long, dark eyelashes, placing a supportive hand on his shoulder, “If you want, I can walk you around.” 

Just then, a naked man walked up to the two of them and grazed Ahmed’s thighs. He had thinning hair but seemed just under thirty, like Clark. When he turned to Clark he gawked and smiled, then asked,

 “Wow, who’s this?”

“My new friend Clark. He’s hot and he’s nervous,” Ahmed said, like a big brother. 

“I’ll say,” said the man, scanning Clark up and down.

“Clark,” Ahmed continued, “this is my boyfriend, Dave.” 

“I’ll bet you’ve had quite a busy night,” Dave said, locking fingers with his tiny boyfriend and leaning his head on his shoulder. “How long have you been a Longo Bro?” Clark noticed his glowstick was green, the most common color in the room, that signaled he would play the role of top or bottom depending on the circumstances. Clark couldn’t imagine the confidence he’d need to go to this party with a partner. 

“Actually, it’s my first time,” Clark said, “and I’ve been keeping to myself.” 

“Oh, shame,” David smiled, “any guy in the room would be lucky.” Ahmed raised his eyebrows and nodded in agreement before patting Clark’s lap. 

“Clark’s a good boy tonight.” 

The conversation ended, and the three of them swayed to the loud, beating music while Ahmed and Dave rubbed against each other. It seemed like the two of them had been there for hours already, but it was clear they were starting to make each other horny again. Ahmed shot up from the bench and, being pulled away by Dave, told Clark, 

“I’ll be back. Let me know if you need anything?” 

Clark didn’t respond and watched them disappear. He was sitting on his own again, watching people watch him. Despite all his doubts, and despite his fears he was about to run into Brandon, something was beginning to feel validating. He sat right next to one of the doorways, and as the men marched past him, many of them stared, a good number of them smiled, and the boldest ones stroked a finger across his torso. 

Clark stood up, just confident enough to explore. He stepped through the doorway across the room, following the flow of traffic. It was muggier in the crowded hallway, and starting to feel lightheaded, Clark tried to picture what must be in the market above him– the greasy blocks of shortening, or gallons of frying oil lined up in rows. 

The hallways off the main room were made of thin black wood, with a bloody glow in the red light. Clark tried to slow his pace to match the relaxed and indulgent speed of everyone else. He stretched his head around the hallway corners and peeped into baseball-sized holes that were cut into the wood. He stuck a couple of fingers through first, to warn whoever was on the other side, and then peered through. The tiny dark rooms usually had just two men: one lying face-up on a sling with his legs flailing and the other standing just in front, thrusting into him. Clark rested with his eye in one of those holes for a moment longer than he thought he would, waiting for something to seem sexy. 

He felt a pinch on his ass and shot up. Another man passed behind him and turned to wink at Clark as he continued. There was no denying that he felt visible and desired, despite his initial certainty that he wasn’t there for pleasure. But maybe he didn’t need Brandon — or any guy — to make him feel special. It was the closest he’d been all night to getting an erection, but he looked down in disappointment— still no dice. 

Around another corner he passed a big, caged room. He stared through the metal bars in the window at the 15 to 20 men inside, most on top of each other in a big heap, some off to the side. 

The bodies he’d seen so far all seemed to be on their own mission, but the bodies in this room —  even the pockets of bodies off to the side, watching or touching themselves — were conspiring. It was almost like gazing into another world, and he recognized something in the wild tangles of flesh and heat. All set up like an exhibition, the men were engaging in activity that, while deeply familiar, felt fundamentally foreign; Clark realized the last time he’d felt this way was standing in front of cages at the zoo. 

Embarrassment started to heat up his face. He worried what everyone might think if they knew he was just a spectator, as though he were some cruel scientist there to judge and evaluate. The hallway started to feel claustrophobic, and he thought about the chilled beef cuts that must be right above him, the icy ribeyes slapped onto his face and cooling him down. 

Maybe it was time to leave. Clark figured it had been an hour or two, and all the insecure reasons he’d come there in the first place had dissipated with the attention he was getting. Sure, the door policy was fucked up, but these guys didn’t make the rules, and the whole operation seemed so clandestine that there was no way to know who the big boss might be and give him a talking to. He had to reconsider his judgments after meeting Ahmed; quickly becoming allies and maybe even friends at daybreak. What did he have to prove to everyone else? 

He figured that, before leaving, he might as well make a full round. The hallway spat him back into the main room where there were more men than before, some having various versions of sex, but most just standing around and being kind. He shot straight toward the doorway across the room, which he assumed led to beds or something similar. 

On the other side of the doorway, he found smaller, contained areas, which were divided by chest-high black walls that suggested the privacy hospitable to one-on-one sex without actually offering it. The area to Clark’s right was something like a waiting room, where a row of naked men sat on a long upholstered couch and gazed upward at porn flashing on a large television while stroking their dicks. Their eyes looked only half-awake. A line of arms moved up and down almost in unison, as though they were held captive in an assembly line, or all part of some machinery that lucid dreamed the fantasy on the TV in front of them. 

The stench in the air felt heavier there, probably because there was more space for more bodies. Nothing felt shocking anymore and Clark started to feel almost silly to have been so afraid and so convinced that he would never be welcomed there. Maybe he’d come back someday— with a tighter revenge body, a name-brand jockstrap, and the triumphant knowledge that he had always belonged among his people. 

Two large hands wrapped around Clark’s waist, making him jump. He turned to find a handsome guy behind him, about his height with two nipple piercings and long black curls that were slicked against his head. He smiled softly.

“Wow,” he said, nodding at Clark as he looked him up and down. “You’re really beautiful.” 

For the first time that night, Clark was hot and bothered; being seen like that turned him on far more than even the hottest man he saw that night. And there was something about this guy’s skater-boy relaxation that he found kind of dreamy. 

“Thanks,” he gave him a big smile back. “What’s your name?” The guy blinked in surprise and said, 

“Uh, Tony.” 

Tony was nice, the kind of person Clark might want to be friends with in real life. He could tell how gentle Tony was, despite his forward approach, so Clark wanted to chat a little. He stood silent and bounced to the familiar dance-pop beat on the speakers, and said

“I wonder if they bring this DJ in often,” Clark said. “I like the music here.”

“Yeah, the music is like,” Tony said matter-of-fact-ly, “fun to fuck to.”

 Clark gulped as he saw Tony’s red wristband reach toward his waist again and his face lean in for a kiss. 

“Sorry,” Clark interrupted, coughing away a whiff of the room’s stench. “I was just about to run to the bathroom. Be right back?”

 Tony smiled and leaned against the wall, nodding his head along with the music. Clark rounded the corner toward the bathroom and turned thoughts in his head, planning his next move while he peed into the urinal. His interest in Tony, somehow, made him not want to have sex with him. It was too vulnerable for the moment. He should have just left. He shouldn’t have asked his name. 

On the way to the sink, Clark noticed a big black video camera, pointing towards a strange alcove. He didn’t remember anything about cameras, and he definitely didn’t sign anything letting them film him. He took careful steps toward the camera, leaned into the alcove, and gagged. He was hovering over a bathtub full of bright yellow piss. A handwritten sign on the tile next to the tub read, “play with caution!” The gallons of piss were what smelled so dank, not the sweaty bodies. Clark looked up toward the ceiling, realizing that sitting right above that bathroom was the produce.

 It was definitely time to go. He rushed out of the bathroom, barely rinsing his hands. When he stepped out, he was facing the back of a couch, where he saw Ahmad’s little body shooting up and down like whack-a-mole while he bounced on someone’s dick. For a strange moment, Clark thought he’d walk up to him and tell him goodbye, and thank you, and let’s keep in touch. But as he walked closer and saw the couch from a new angle, he tasted vomit creep up his throat in the instant he realized it was Brandon fucking him. 

All of his confidence drained. The hope he’d built that maybe Brandon’s approval didn’t matter after all was suddenly a pathetic lie. Who was he kidding? Brandon didn’t even care enough to actually cancel their date, and here he was enjoying himself. He was obviously casual. More is more.

Clark couldn’t be seen standing alone. He gulped down his vomit and found Tony leaning against the wall in the same spot. He looked down at Clark and his eyes glowed with delighted surprise. 

“Thought you’d left,” he said, chuckling. 

Clark grabbed him in a frenzy and kissed him. Tony started to lead him toward one of the more private spaces, but Clark forced him against the wall in plain sight. He turned around and, with a little saliva and maybe vomit, helped Tony’s dick slide inside of him. His face started to feel hot and uncomfortable and his hands got sweaty. He brought Tony’s head forward so they could kiss while he fucked him, and the close touch soothed him for a moment or two. 

Tony wrapped an arm around Clark’s throat and at first it made him feel sexy, like he was under someone else’s control. Each time he was thrust into, though, it felt like he lost oxygen. The contact that he normally loved was now suffocating, itchy. When he felt his eyes start to water, he decided the air was too much. He wanted to go home.  

Before he told Tony to stop, Clark saw Brandon and Ahmed rise from their couch. Ahmed walked off to the bathroom unceremoniously and Brandon, looking satisfied in a way that made Clark want to cry, walked right next to Clark on his way out of the room. Clark rolled his eyes back and bit his lip, trying to perform the time of his life. Brandon, when he was right next to him, stopped for a moment and stared. Slowly, he tilted his head, scrunched his big eyebrows, and walked out of the room. Clark wasn’t even sure if he’d recognized him. 

Clark pushed away from Tony, who put his hands up in a gesture of innocence. 

“Sorry,” he began to say, “was that too much?” When Clark turned to face him, he stepped back immediately. “Whoa,” he shook his head, “are you okay?” 

Clark took a deep breath and realized that, even set free from his chokehold, he could hardly breathe. Tony stepped closer. 

“Your face is all blotchy. Are you like, allergic to something?” 

Clark felt his blood freeze. He cleared his scratchy throat and said, mostly to himself,

“I . . I didn’t look because I didn’t eat any snacks . . .” His voice trailed off as he hurried to the main room and leaned against the snack table, starting to wheeze. There was chocolate, small crackers, and a big plastic barrel. He turned the barrel around to see the label, which showed a grinning cartoon monkey above the words “Peanut Butter Pretzels. Extra chunky!” 

Clark hadn’t eaten anything, but the giant barrel was half empty— people had been snacking on the pretzels all night. And then those people were slobbering all over everyone else, including Tony. 

He stumbled around the main room, feeling his throat close in and his vision started to blur. He sat down against a dark wall where no one was having sex. Clark knew how to use his Epi-pen and always kept it in his pocket, which, now, was in the coat check somewhere beyond the dungeon mazes. 

Strangers came up to him and laid his body down, touched his face. Clark could feel their genitals dangling against him, now awkward, flaccid, and in the way. One man wasn’t sure if he should blow air into Clark’s lungs; another tried to open his mouth and pour water inside. Clark was able to hand someone the ticket to his coat check, and he hoped they knew what they were looking for. Fluorescent beams shone down from the ceiling, illuminating the room’s naked bodies, which seemed to transform from suits of armor into shaved animal skins— vulnerable and out of place. A shout of angry protest emerged from somewhere in the dungeon, 

“This is a play party,” he growled, “turn the fucking lights off!”