show. Same enveloping sunglasses.

"I don't know about this," he said. "I figure you for some kind of sickie. Am I right?"

I told him I was a writer, that I was interested in writing about him. He looked at me blankly. We ate, hardly talking at all, talking when we did talk, about New York, about Fourteenth Street. "I love this street," he said. "I think of it as the metaphor of my life."

"The metaphor of your life?" I said. "For God's sake, what a phrase!”

He laughed. "Oh, shit," he said, "I can't do this straight. Let's finish here and go to my place and smoke."

He lived in a terrible building fairly west on Fourteenth. He had one room, totally bare except for a single bed and two Mexican chairs. It was scrubbed clean. "Sit on the chair,” he said. "I'm going to lie down. I like to smoke lying down." We smoked a joint in silence. "I'm twenty-four," he said. "I come from California. Bakersfield. Do you knqw it? Well, it's a shit place, hot as hell, dry. And so dull."

"What are you doing here?"

"Well, I don't come from too tight a family situation. Nobody really gave a damn about anybody else. After high school, where I was terrible, man, I went up to LA. Seemed like a good thing to do at the time. I really wasn't prepared to do much, you know."

"So I got there, and I couldn't do any thing. I stayed at a couple of crash pads, and I found the library and read a lot. But, you know, I had to do something. I'd never been into sex. Not any kind up to that point. Girls didn't really turn me off either, you know? I noticed all the hustling, of course. I'm not blind. So I thought, why not?"

"The first day I tried it I got picked up by an older dude in a Mercedes. Incredibly beautiful car. He had a house in the Hills. Not a fabulous place, but nice, you

58 VECTOR

know, better than I was used to. Swimming pool, fur rugs, all that. Well, I was a little nervous because I never did anything. I never used to even jerk off, right? I didn't seem to need that, or I was waiting for what I did need, or something. Anyway, it was like magic, man. You know what he wanted? He wanted me to undress. Slowly. And rub myself. It was fantastic. Suddenly I was so turned on I couldn't believe it. He wanted me to perform for him. And, man, that was what I'd been waiting for."

"Did you do anything else?" I ask. "Well, at the very end he wanted me to stick my cock in his mouth. And I came for about ten minutes, it felt like that. Man, it was like a clear bright light had been turned on us both. And I felt so fulfilled. Fantastic!"

"What happened next?"

"I stayed with that guy-his name was Robert-for about six months. We just couldn't get enough of our thing. And he started bringing friends around, and I'd put on the same show for them. We loved it."

"Then he got a job in England which was going to last for about a year; he was a movie person. He wanted me to stay there or come to England. But, I don't know, I didn't want to. He bought me a ticket to New York and gave me some money. I have his phone number. If I ever need to, I'll call him."

"Why'd you come to New York?" "I don't know. It seemed the right place for me, don't you think?” "Right," I said, "What'd you do then?" "Then I found Fourteenth Street. Man, that's perfection. It's all there. To be admired. But it's not real, you know. It's not really a destination; it's a stop on the way. That's what I meant when I called it the metaphor for my life. You laughed at that."

"Not because it was funny. Just because it was unexpected." "Well, it's true."

"How long have you been here now?" "About two years. I found some other guys who liked my thing. I worked in a bar. Go-go boy. That sucks. Then I got this job.”

"Do you like it?"

"Like it? This is perfection for me. It's the best. You want to know what I feel when one of those old men has my cock in his mouth? It's simple, man. I feel power. I own them, man. I own those old dudes. When they've got their hands all over me, they're mine. I'm in charge. It feels wonderful."

We paused. He is beautiful stretched out there on the bed, beautiful and so distant.

"Don't you want something more? Don't you want a real bond, a relationship?" I ask.

"No, man. This is my job. To be admired. To be wanted. I don't know where I'll end up. Maybe nowhere. But this is where I want to be now. I feed on these people."

"It can't last," I say.

"I don't need you to tell me that,"

he says. "I know."

We sat for a while longer.

"I should go," I said.

"Got everything you need?" he asked. "No," I said.

"Well, nobody can have everything, man," he said, looking unbelievably beautiful.

When I was almost out the door, he called me. I looked back. His sunglasses were off. "One more thing," he said, "my name isn't Robbie.'

""

A couple of weeks after our interview I went back to the theater. Clothes on,

I waited for the show to begin.

The first act came and went without Robbie.

During the intermission I asked the fat man, who was there again, what had happened to Robbie.

"Who's Robbie?” he said..