Be a rebel, boy, and take off your clothes.

Be a heretic, boy, and show me your prick.

Be an outlaw, boy, and let me kiss you.

Only one way now to be shocking.  You want Mom and Dad to choke on their Cheerios then you gotta wear tight shorts and show your legs and be sexy and let us see your big nasty bulge and your sweet ass, oh christ your ass, and let me kiss you.  Rebel, heretic, outlaw.  Because tight shorts are treason.  Let me touch you.  Because bare legs are terrorism.  Let me taste you.  Start a revolution.

This is what I said, what I say, what I'll say to that kid who delivers the newspaper every afternoon at four o'clock, such a silly cliché, a paperboy, I mean come on!  I created you, young teenaged archetype, reddish-blond crewcut and freckles and sun-paled eyebrows, sun-paled eyelashes, slender boybody drooped in clownshirt, drooped in clownpants.  What looking glass did we step through, folks?  When did the dimensional portal open and swallow us?  This ain't right!  This male culture of shapeless anonymity, of boys freakishly elongated and distorted in their saggy bozoclothes like figures in a funhouse mirror.  This baggy-pants farce.  This  burlesque.  This cosmic deadpan joke played out in the garb of the clown, the jester, the fool.

This paperboy's name is Timothy.  Timmy.  Tim.  One who reveres God. 

His name, yes, is Tim.  OK, let him star in a movie where he ends up slashed and bloodied and disemboweled.  That's fine.  That's entertainment!  Let him play football, wrestle, go to the Olympics, skydive, rock climb, surf, ride horses, perform on stage, model on the runway, fly a plane, swing on a circus trapeze.  He's old enough, right?

But I'll jerk him off and they'll lock me up.  Wow.  Jerking off isn't dangerous.  It won't hurt him.  This must be wrong, must be wrong, must be wrong.

They'll take him scuba diving, let him swim with sharks, if he drowns or loses an arm, hey, that’s life, it’s risky, it’s an adventure.  He’s old enough, right?

But I'll give him a blowjob and they'll lock me up.  Wow.  Getting a blowjob isn't dangerous.  It won't hurt him.  This must be wrong, must be wrong, must be wrong.

I invite him into the house on a firecracker-hot July day and he stands at the sink to guzzle water from a Star Wars cup and I stand behind him and smell the randiness of him, ripe adolescent odor, and I lick the boysweat warm and salty from his neck.  Sun-goldened fuzz on his neck that disappears into his T-shirt along the treasure trail of his spine.  Red T-shirt with a giant yellow Smiley Face on the front.  Rubbing my hands against the baggy seat of his denim shorts.

Finish your water and I'll take your shirt off.  Hold still and I'll get these pants off.  And these underwear, goddamn, so sweaty, they're soaked.  Yeah.  Must feel better.  Tim.  Must feel better.  Good-lookin' boy.  Your cock wants to be sucked, it needs to be sucked, twitchy red thing.

Tim can't believe what's happening when he cums in my mouth.

I shouldn't be telling you this.  No, fucker, this ain't for publication!  This ain't for your worthless fuckin' amusement!  I want this to burn your eyes and make your ears bleed.  Happy endings are forbidden.  Next time I see a frilly girlie-girl in her tight little short-shorts like some smug monopolist of the Body Erotic, oh yeah, just wait, I'll gut her and use her for bait!  It'll feel good, I promise!

Hey, listen to this, Tim has a friend.  Mexican boy with crazy curly black hair and slanty-eyed cat face, pushed-up nose, highly curved feline top lip, flash of white teeth when he smiles, front tooth chipped, cute young punk.  Tim calls him Stevie.  Stevie Zepeda.  Timmy and Steven.  Stevie and Tim.

Together, holding hands, they could start riots.

Together, kissing, they could bring down governments.

Together, fucking, they could end civilization.

I'll put them in skimpy gym shorts and knee socks and cut-off T-shirts and it'll be 1984.  The final year of paradise.  Before the Fall.  1984.  You see, Orwell was right but nobody got it!  What happened?  What went wrong?  Now they dress to hide themselves.  Why?  Now they dress to make themselves buffoonish.  Why?  What went wrong? 

I'm telling you, boy, believe me, you'll never get sucked by a chick without thinking of me doing it better.  You'll never fuck a chick without remembering us having more fun.  Never, Tim.  Never, Stevie.  Never.

Listen, this is true:  They'll give him a gun, take him hunting, make him a man, tough guy, too bad if he gets shot, just an accident.  He's old enough, right?  He's old enough to decide, to make his own choices, to play games with life and death.  He's old enough, isn't he?

But I'll take his picture naked, he'll smile and show off his boner, and they'll lock me up.  Wow.  Being photographed isn't dangerous.  Being naked isn't bad.  It won't hurt him. 

Age of consent.  Reasoned consent.  Just a child.  Innocent child.  Defenseless child.  Helpless child.

Tim has a funny grin, one eye squinted and side teeth clenched, young Popeye, like someone smiling into the sun.  He always wears that goddamn Smiley Face shirt.  Well, not always.  He has freckles on his arms.  No hair in his armpits.  Strange.  He has pubic hair, coppery blond, but no hair under his arms.

Stevie and I, we're playing checkers on the living room floor and Tim, watching us, getting bored, big joke, he pulls down his pants and moons us, and Stevie, even bigger joke, calls him a faggot and sticks a checker into his butt, a red one, a red checker, wedged into Tim's butthole like the tip of a bloody turd.  They think it's hilarious, both of them, I mean it comes right out, no problem, the checker, it pops right out when Tim stands up.  Big hilarious joke.

Put boxing gloves on them and stand them in the ring and let them beat each other goofy, too bad if one of them ends up concussed, injured, worse.  Nobody's fault.  But too young for sex.  Too young.  Age of consent.  Reasoned consent.  Just a child.  This must be wrong, must be wrong, must be wrong.

That same night, I think, that same night I dare them to suck each other's dicks.  Why not?  They think I'm being funny, another big joke.  Stevie does a quick blowjob pantomime with his own thumb and then laughs and Tim imitates him and also laughs.

This is more than you need to know.  Goddamn busybody creeps.  This ain't no story!  This ain't for your useless fuckin' magazine!  I send you my blackest wishes.  I stick pins in your ragdoll effigy.  I want to burst your arteries and stop your heart.

So this is what I did, what I do, what I'll do:  I keep daring them and daring them in the following week, two weeks, three weeks.  I bet you wouldn't, I bet you wouldn't.  Tim says just for five minutes?  Stevie says fuck that, man, make it two and maybe, yo.  Two minutes and maybe?  You guys want to be timed?  Wussy motherfuckers!

OK, they make the rules, I can agree to whatever they want.  And  I did, I do, I will.  Sunday afternoon and the Cubs are on TV playing the Dodgers and I'm teasing them again, Stevie and Tim, I'm daring them again, sure, for two minutes.  No longer than that, they say, nervous smiles, Tim grinning like Popeye with side teeth clenched and one eye asquint.  His eyes are grayish, greenish, changing with the light.  He wears glasses to see the blackboard at school.  His sweat smells like oranges and ginger.  Stevie is beside him, black-haired and brown-eyed boy, chewing his dirty fingernails, backwards Jack Daniels cap, that one chipped tooth when he smiles.  He says two minutes only, yo, and I'll do it, we'll do it, I guess so, shit, OK, we'll do it.

I should tell them, I need to tell them that they're more beautiful than any goddamn girls.  More beautiful, luscious, desirable.  You've been scammed, Tim.  You've been conned, Stevie.  When I snap my fingers you will wake up!  What have they done to you?  You should strut down the street naked and have people applaud, for chrissake!  It's not right, it's not right.  Your bodies are illegal contraband, dangerous, terrifying.  You've been censored!  You've been deleted!  Your enemies are hetero bigots and pigs.  Your enemies are homo traitors and cowards, homo sellouts, homo rats.  A conspiracy of dead souls.  They've made you the clown, the jester, the fool.

Cubs against the Dodgers, baseball announcer's voice on TV, no one listening.  Tim stands in the middle of the room with his baggy shorts and his white Hanes underpants down to his knees and his red Smiley Face T-shirt held up with both hands so that Stevie can get at his cock and suck it.  Stevie kneels there with the oscillating fan behind him ruffling his hair, his hair like glossy black fleece, no cap now, and he leans forward with both arms kept rigidly at his sides and he takes the other boy's penis in his mouth, soft penis, and he holds it, just holds it in his mouth and breathes through his nose and looks at me sidelong as if I'm timing him with a stopwatch.  He keeps his lips and tongue carefully still, Stevie does.  Tim, head down, watches him and laughs once, glancing my way, with a sound like gurgling in his throat.  When his dick comes out  after those brief two minutes, out of Stevie's mouth, it's rudely stiffened and shiny with spit.

Stevie's turn now, an eager exchange of positions, Tim quickly on his knees while his friend unfastens dirty grass-stained cargo pants and pushes them down underwear and all and pulls up his Brookfield Zoo T-shirt with parrots on the front, uncut penis already erect enough and hard enough to be poking its reddish raw-looking head above the foreskin, excited puppydog pecker.  Tim makes a comical "holy shit, look at that" face and uses one hand to hold Stevie by the hip while cautiously getting the aroused thing into his mouth, the whole big thing into his mouth, sweaty black pubic hair against his nose, balls saggy against his chin.  He does several minutes of genuine sucking with no regard to the time, oblivious to the time, using both hands now to grip Stevie by the ass,  Stevie's eyes focused raptly downward to watch, not so funny now, not such a big joke anymore, this boy suddenly getting a real blowjob from his buddy.  Tim keeps sucking until he has Stevie’s jizz dribbling from his mouth, glistening obscenely on his chin.

Epiphany, revelation, enlightenment.  A new way to spend Sunday afternoons.  Any afternoon.  Erections and orgasms.  Hard dicks and cum.  True power.  Liberation.  A fearsome anarchy of the libido.

They tell you to stay away but you don't listen.

They tell you to hate me but you don't feel it.

They tell you I'm dangerous but you don't believe it.

Stevie Zepeda is a few months older than Timothy.  Timmy.  Tim.  He wears a Jack Daniels baseball cap, usually backwards, over his tangly mop of curls.  Green-and-brown camouflage cap with a Jack Daniels logo on the crown.  He wears a silver stud in his left ear, a silver crucifix around his neck.  He has a fuzzy boymustache like a shadow above his top lip, darkest at each corner of his mouth.

He and Tim use my home like a clubhouse, safe here and they know it, instinct bringing them here, keeping them here.  I'd like their parents to see them.  I'd like their teachers to see them.  I'd like to cause strokes, fibrillations, brain damage, heartbreak, anguish, despair.  I'd like to bring apocalypse.

Steven and Timothy.  Stevie and Tim.  They have a new game after school, after Tim delivers his papers, very funny, locking themselves in my bedroom, locking me out, this is true, I'm not making it up, I'm just telling you as a courtesy, asshole.  I'm doing you a favor!  They spend forever in my bedroom, those two guys, like boyfriends, like lovers hidden away, a great giggly prank to shut me out and keep me wondering.  All this since that one Sunday when they accepted my dare and tasted between each other's legs.

This is what I asked them, what I ask them, what I'll ask them:  Hey, what do you guys do in there?  Jerk off?  Suck each other's cocks?  Or, like, actually fuck?  Because I know you guys are sexing it up together, that's obvious, horny little bastards.  They laugh, but they won't tell me.  So I bribe them, OK, I admit it, harmless enough, parents do it all the time.  You know, ice cream, a video game, extra allowance, maybe you'll get that new bike for Christmas if you bring home an "A" in math.  Good old-fashioned parenting.  So, I tell them, let me watch next time and I'll get you, hmm, well, let's say a new Walkman.  They look at each other, sly dogs, and they laugh and say yeah, for a new Walkman, a new Walkman for each of us, we'll let you see.

Yes, that's what I'll do.  I'll buy them each a Walkman and I'll get to watch them in my own bedroom, on my own double bed, they'll be naked probably, they'll put on a show.  For me.  I hope they'll do it naked.  They should be naked.  Timmy and Steve.  Stevie Zepeda and Tim.  Can you imagine, can you picture them, these two kids, my paperboy and his pal, bedsprings creaking, clothes on the floor, yeah, T-shirts and pants and underwear and socks all over the floor, a jar of Vaseline, Kleenex, stiff red peckers and tight balls, boystuff messy on the sheets.

You see, I don't need your hetero bullshit.  Your baggy clothes, your clown posses, your scummy hip-hop thuggery.  I don't believe in heterosexuality!  It doesn't exist!  It ain't real!  I'll take your goddamn Swedish Bikini Team and use them for fertilizer!  I'll take your supermodels and your cheerleaders and your pretty little divas and I'll burn them at the stake!

Listen to me, trust me, if you're reading this, fuck you, you're my enemy.  If you walk and talk and breathe, you're my mortal foe.  I have no time for you!  I'm busy with rebels, with heretics, with outlaws.  I'm preparing for revolution.  I'm hungry for fire and flood.  I'm praying for the end.