A gay story: Sex Education
The phone rang and I said, “Hello.”
“Is this Jonah Carter?”
“This is.”
“My name is Cody Fennec. I heard you are looking for a housekeeper.”
“I am,” I said tentatively. In the past, I had attempted to hire houseboys, but it often ended in disaster. Many of them turned out to be criminals who stole money or sold drugs. Those who weren’t criminals were often lazy and entitled, treating me more like a source of money than a employer. They acted as though it was the highlight of my day to give them money for nothing in return, not even a simple greeting. One even became aggressive when I refused to give him money and I had to obtain a restraining order. Cody mentioned, “I am currently attending college and need a job with flexible hours. Is that acceptable to you?” I replied, “I don’t want you to just show up whenever you feel like it, but I am willing to accommodate your schedule.” Cody inquired, “I heard you pay thirty dollars an hour. That’s a high rate for housekeeping.” I explained that I expected more than just housekeeping and that the thirty dollars was the base pay, with the potential for more if he exceeded my expectations. I made it clear that this was a houseboy position.
Cody said, “Listen, I’m from farm country and not familiar with all your fancy city words. Jeremy told me that a houseboy was just a person who did the cooking and the cleaning.”
I couldn’t help but laugh. “Would you be talking about Jeremy Whitaker?”
Cody said, “Yea, he’s in the frat I’m pledging.”
It took a while for me to compose myself from the fits of giggles I was having. Jeremy had been the nicest of the guys who tried to be my houseboy but he too was a lazy, spoiled brat.
Cody asked, “Are you laughing at me, sir?”
In between giggles I said, “No, I’m not laughing at you. You might just be exactly what I’m looking for. But I do need you to understand what’s expected of you. It’s not just cooking and cleaning. There really is no limit to what I might ask you to do. As an example, I have time to interview you now and see how you would do as a houseboy so let me give you your first task. I will place an order at the Mediterranean Hills Restaurant. All you have to do is stop by, pick it up and deliver it to me and then we can both eat while I interview you. You’ll earn your first thirty dollars just by delivering food and letting me interview you. How’s that sound?”
“That sounds great.”
So after giving him further instructions on how to find my place, we ended the phone call. Then I wondered about what to wear. I didn’t want to wear anything too obvious that might frighten the naive boy off but I didn’t want to wear anything that would be hard to remove if it felt right to remove it. I settled on a tank top, thongs on my feet, and some running shorts with a slit up the side but no underwear of course.
I tried to tidy up a bit but it didn’t take long before I heard the doorbell. I opened the door to let Cody in.
He wore a genuine cowboy hat and I don’t mean the kind of hat Hollywood cowboys wear. His hat looked cheap and beaten up as if he’d worn it for years back on the farm.
He was a ginger with messy hair and freckles. He had silvery blue eyes. He had the build of someone who was used to doing labor. He was just a little shorter than me but then again, I’m tall and almost everyone is shorter than me.
He wore a white t-shirt with an unbuttoned cowboy shirt over that, blue jeans with a giant belt buckle, and worn out sneakers. I refrained myself.
He set the food on the table and started setting the table. I hadn’t asked him to do that yet. I was liking this houseboy already.
As he worked, I learned a little more about where he came from and why he was in college. It was clear that he was very intelligent but he was struggling in college because his rural high school had failed to give him a proper education. He struggled especially with history and science. He also never had a computer before. I felt more and more compelled to take him under my wing, to protect him from the dangers of the internet but to also mentor him and help him catch up with his lack of education.
Then I started the interview. “I have a swimming pool and a fireplace. Have you ever cleaned either before.”
“No, sir. We’d always just go swimming in the quarry and our home had electric heat.”
“Well one of the things that I insist upon is that if you don’t know how to do something, don’t do it. I would rather have you wait for instructions or ask questions instead of trying to do a job you don’t know how to do and making a big mess of it. I will be very happy to give you hands on instruction on how to clean the pool or the fireplace or how to do any other job you don’t know how to do. I do expect you though to learn how to do things so I can have you clean the pool, clean the fireplace, wash the car, change the oil, maintain the garden, and all kinds of other jobs. What do you think so far?”
“Sounds reasonable to me. I do already know how to do some car maintenance and gardening.”
“Glad to hear that. Now many of these jobs are messy jobs. I don’t want you to ruin your clothes.”
“Don’t worry about it. I’ll only wear old clothes that I don’t care about anyway.”
“That’s not good enough. You will have to wear some protective clothing like garden gloves but I insist you avoid damaging any clothes that you don’t absolutely need. I don’t even want you ruining your old clothes that you don’t care about. I insist that you wear as little as you absolutely need.”
“Don’t you think the neighbors might complain?”
“I have a privacy fence and also this neighborhood doesn’t really care.”
“Well as long as everyone is okay with it, I don’t mind working shirtless.”
I grinned. Before I pushed any further though, I needed to know more about where Cody was coming from.
“So tell me a little more about Starwood. Is it a religious community with a heavy emphasis on modesty?”
“I don’t know. I’d say it’s pretty normal. We’re not a bunch of prudes that insist everyone wear their Sunday best all the time but we don’t have any queers running around either.”
“Have you seen any queers since you came to college?”
“Not really. I’ve seen a few but I grew up hearing stories that made me expect to see queers everywhere but they really aren’t everywhere.”
Cody obviously didn’t know what a queer looked like.
“Would you be okay hanging out with a queer?”
“Absolutely not. Sodomy is a sin and they’re all going to Hell.”
That let me know I needed to move slowly. I couldn’t introduce Cody to any of my queer friends right away.
“So what did you like to do after church?”
“Oh I never go to church. I don’t believe any of that stuff. I’m a scientist and only believe what can be proven scientifically.”
What a paradox, an Atheist who believes that queer people are going to Hell. Then again, it just reinforced the fact that Cody was an intelligent but uneducated man. He just needed a good education.
“So what do you usually do no Sundays?”
“My buddies and I would often go down to the quarry to swim.”