(how had I not noticed that was there?). Then he plopped it right into the center of a little coffee table between us. It flopped a little just like, well, the real thing.
"First, always use latex condoms with water-based lube," Brent said. "It’ll say so on the label. And if you use massage oil, or Vaseline, they’ll make the condoms break."
Now Brent grabbed a condom from another shelf, and a tube of lube too. "Keep condoms cool and dry," Brent said. "Pockets and wallets can work for a night, but not over the long-term." He opened the condom and positioned it at the top of the dildo. "Wait till your dick is hard. Then make sure you put the condom down the right way on the tip. You don’t want any precum getting on the outside of the condom. Pinch the tip of the condom, so there’s room for the cum. Then roll the condom all the way down to the base of your dick."
And then Brent proceeded to roll the condom over the dildo. I tried to look away, but the truth is, I couldn’t. It was one of those things that it was kind of impossible not to stare at.
"Use lots and lots of lube for fucking," Brent said. "If the top cums inside—which you don’t have to do, by the way—grab the base of the condom right after, before you pull out. That way the condom won’t slip off. Then pull out, tie it up at the end, and throw it away. You know never to flush a condom down the toilet, right?"
I was pretty sure this question was rhetorical or whatever.
"When condoms are used correctly and consistently," he went on, "they're very effective in preventing HIV. But sometimes they break or leak or slip off. The cold hard truth is that fucking even with a condom is probably riskier than sucking dick without a condom. So you should think about that before you decide who you are and aren’t going to let fuck you. But if a condom does break, or if you accidentally have sex without a condom, there's a treatment called post-exposure prophylaxis, or PEP, where a doctor can put you on antiviral medications for a short time, and they can really reduce your risk of becoming infected. If that happens to you, go to your doctor or to the emergency room as soon as possible, definitely within twenty-four hours."
"But…" I said.
Brent looked at me. "Yeah?"
"Well, what if two guys are both negative? They don’t need to use condoms, right?"
"It's impossible to transmit HIV unless one of the two guys is infected," Brent said. "But…"
But what ? I thought.
"If they're only having sex with each other, lots of guys do stop using condoms. But can I be honest with you? We do HIV testing here, and I talk to a lot of guys, and…" Brent peered at me from over his wire-rim glasses. "Well, sometimes guys cheat. And sometimes they lie. Remember that if you decide to stop using condoms with another guy, you’re literally putting your life in that guy’s hands. If you and a boyfriend do both test negative and you both decide to ever stop using condoms, make sure you both agree that you can start using them again at any time, no questions asked, and no breaking up the relationship, even if you'd agreed to be monogamous. That way, if one of you has sex with someone else, you’re not putting the other person at risk."
That might make sense for other people, I thought. But I'd never be dumb enough to be with a boyfriend who would cheat on me. But even as I thought this, I remembered: I had been dumb enough to be with a boyfriend who had cheated on me! And I hadn't had a clue.
It had been different with Otto—the only guy I'd ever fucked. We'd trusted each other completely, and that's why it had been so good.
"Are you sure you wanna do this?" I asked Otto.
"Yeah," he said. "I'm sure."
It was Thanksgiving week, the time that Otto had come to visit me from his hometown eight hundred miles away. He'd stayed in the guestroom in Gunnar's basement, and late one night after his parents had gone to bed, Gunnar had snuck me in too,