[cw: discussion of past CSA but nothing graphic]

*

You know, I was fine with some of the crew disliking me, or avoiding me, or being uncomfortable around me, or any of that. Like I said before, I understand most of the main reasons why. And I continue to see the crew, check in on them, make sure everything's running fine and they’re being treated alright, because that’s more important than their feelings about me. I’ve even cooked for them and ate with them from time to time, so they could have something fresh and nice-- figured out a simple enough way to bulk Mom’s spaghetti tahdig recipe (lamb for the meatballs unfortunately too expensive, had to substitute beef, but still tasted good). Phil hates when I'm there, of course, but I never minded that (and he ate his dinner without complaint :) ). If he had enough support, he could just kick me out, and he never has, so that says quite a bit.

But you still have to draw a line somewhere. And my line is finding about a dozen cute little Xeroxed cartoons of me littered across one of their buses that look like they're out of some 1930s Nazi newspaper (caricature side profile with exaggeratedly hooked nose, rubbing hands together, extra-crooked exaggerated overbite, the works-- and in a dress, too! Wow, what a twist on an old classic). None of that kind of shit happened when I was with Ben-- to either of us, and I hope we protected each other from it in our own ways-- and I was always so frustrated and disgusted on his behalf that so many of them were scared of him, but I suppose it had its merits, regardless of how awful the reasoning was. I thought I could make it by just being nice and respecting them: respect given, respect earned, and all that. It's what I generally believe in. And most of them seem to understand and buy into that just fine. It’s common sense enough. But some of them are too stupid for that. Some of them see me and still see a little faggot they can just knock over and walk across. So again, respect couldn’t be enough.

Anyway, a charming gentleman named Tyler is going to be cleaning up the port-a-johns and bus latrines by himself for a week, and I'll be around to make sure Phil doesn't let him off easy. He probably had others (Phil, even) having a nice giggle with him, but the example should hopefully be enough. --I say, but I still have a stupid ball of anger and disappointment and heartbreak glommed up in my chest.

*

Shows going fine enough, still. Not feeling as contemptuous of the audience or generally, recent bullshit aside. It has actually been gratifying to have such a positive response to the two or three songs of mine that made it on the setlist, too. They're unsurprisingly the easiest for me to sing, on multiple fronts. As much as Nate whined about having to play them in the beginning, he really does sound amazing on them. I felt a little spitefully rebellious not including a single live guitar on that record, and playing the songs live with other musicians was obviously incredible in its own right, but Nathan... ugh. Of course he's the missing fucking piece. Again. He probably knows it and loves it, too. Yeah, yeah.

I still can't do with/to him sexually what I can do to and with other men, but every time is a little closer. I told him, most recently, after I let him cum and he was feeling nervous about what we "were" (saves me from having to ask! But of course he still doesn't know what he's doing), that it was all simple, really. You get your love on stage, I put you back in your place and you like it, and then I send you off to play with the other boys and girls. Does that really need a name? "So does being a bitch to me just get you off or something?" Bright observation! But even without that-- something has to balance out Walter sucking your ego off everyday for free. And you do still like it, in the end. Because deep down, you know I always have a point. I'm a bitch to you because I want you to do better. I fuck you because I know you can-- and because you *have* been liking it so much.

I have noticed, and noticed from very early-on, because I'm not an idiot, that he’s called me things like "bitch" more than "asshole" or "shithead" or any other thing he'd call the others and has done so from the beginning, quite a bit before he knew about me. I've called myself a bitch even in writing often enough, even recently, and in some contexts-- gay ones, mainly-- it's fitting. Being a queen often entails and I daresay entitles one to being at least a little bitchy. Nate calling me that used to bother me, though-- it was a sign that he knew I was different in a way I could never fully obscure even when I was trying my utmost to, and it was a difference he considered less-than. It’s from when he was still completely straight, and something he still carries from it (that baggage is yet another reason why it makes more sense to fuck him than be fucked by him).

But now I just roll with it. Like yes, sweetheart, I AM a bitch, and you're bent over for this bitch and he's fucking your ass and you’re loving it (and you’re so LOUD about it, you faggot). That's another reason he needs this, really-- I know how he is around women. I’ve been around him long enough. It's sometimes bled into how he's been with me. The more he's with me the less they have to deal with his bullshit, so I'm doing multiple sides a favor. I have more power than those women have to keep things under my control and, moreover, to teach him some about respect and about the weaknesses of his stupid macho pasturing (Walt and Jeff like that kind of shit). He's strong, but he's just as short as I am (his old hairdo was hiding that some!); I'm fast and I'm not afraid or ashamed of fighting dirty or using anything as a weapon if I have to escape something. I haven't had to worry about it, though. It's like I said-- he likes it too much, at least for now, to pull anything on me. And he's right that it DOES turn me on doing all this to him, and even just bossing him around a little in silly, mundane ways-- it's even more fun than it is with random younger guys or even with Jack. They already know what they're about and they're eager to play a role for and with me. That's fun in its own way, of course, and some have played that role amazingly and have looked beautiful doing so besides.

But everything with Nate is pointed. I’m teaching him that role, as long as he's willing. But his brattiness isn't just a put-on. There's something of a challenge to it, a power struggle that I keep winning, because he doesn't really know what he's doing, because it’s not familiar terrain and he was trained by his "father" to be a blunt instrument himself (alongside the fact that I've known him for nearly ten years at this point-- well enough by now). And really, even if he does "win", its like how he "won" earlier-- sure, he was fucking me in the sense that his dick was in my ass, but I was controlling the tempo and virtually everything else. I had him begging me to let him cum, sometimes literally had him by the throat (and I have again and again by now, and he loves that far more than I expected he would...).

Regardless, I've won very straightforwardly most of the time, and I think he's let me do so, which excites me. At this point, I also can't help but become excited at the idea of introducing him to the character I used with Jack, use with the others. He's seen me in leather quite a bit by now, but that's mostly on stage. That's still different. That's Jules Riley. ...Ugh, I also still can't help but daydream of how delicious he'll look tied up. Like St. Sebastian as an idiot. And what'll it even take to get him to call me SIR... fuck even thinking about it's getting me hard. He might not be ready for that for quite some time, if ever. But every time is still a little closer, and he's still enjoying himself very much. I don't want to get my hopes up too much. Even getting this from him is a miracle. Maybe Walter's right that I'm never satisfied... ha. I think I can take that for this, though.

*

It's been interesting, tho a little awkward, doing interviews and things in the state I'm in, even with the others with me. Nate being there helps in some ways and doesn't in others. I feel more tethered to reality generally, but treating Nate the way Jules Riley would is something I really have to keep at the front of my mind. I get nervous even letting a little bit of myself through, even just in things like how I look at him, and it's difficult these days to look at him and not think of who we are, who he's becoming and what I'm helping him become, what we're becoming, when we're alone together. I can't blame myself much for it, either. So much of our lives are on fucking rails, limo'd and shuttled about from place to place on our little schedules and itineraries. Whatever space I can carve for myself, for us, is inherently more real and interesting, even to someone as used to the rails as he is.

In quiet moments-- well, not exactly "quiet", unless we're talking in the relative-- he'll reach out and play with my earrings like he did before we left for the road, before we did anything with each other. The playing now's even more flirtateous; not just his fingers but his tongue, his teeth. When the moments are quiet enough I'll be able to stand it 'til I feel the tip of his tongue on my ear before I turn and kiss him hard and grab one of his hands and press it onto what he's really playing with most. We’ve been able to feel each other up or frot occasionally like we did that first time and it's been lovely (and he’ll get so hard, eyes closed lips hung open just enough to invite my tongue in, and he’ll pull himself so close to me, moan soft in my mouth, sometimes a "Fuck yeah, Raj", and I breathe him in and of course he smells like fucking heaven and then I’m just as hard. The first time it was clear he was lost in it already; the most recent time I knew he was trying to get me there first. Either way is nice). When the moments are less quiet he still likes to sneak things like the earring/ear licks in, and I'll give him a little light punishment for it, but it's light enough-- a relative clucking of the tongue-- and he knows I enjoy it enough that he keeps doing it anyway. I don't want to spoil him in any serious way-- Walter's done enough damage-- but having Nathan Sorensen licking and biting my ears and earrings for my sexual attention is a delightful enough outcome that I can forgive myself for allowing it. And in another sense, it's actually nice that he feels comfortable enough to do things like that with me, so I don't *really* want to discourage it from him in particular, at the moment.

His getting-over-himself is unsurprisingly something that stops and starts and stutters-- he was near-completely straight for far longer than Greg, and this is all happening with the fucking plague in the background (always, constantly, unceasing, a mechanical unemotional relentless grinding through and withering away). Which was a worry of his, and I can't blame him for it, especially since he was actually as polite as he could be with the knowledge he had, and that's honestly big for him. But I'm thankfully still in the clear as of the start of the tour, and I told him so, alongside various other practicalities. Just bringing it down to the very level of practicalities was important for him, so that turned out well. And just doing so much with him, so often-- he can't just avoid it or try to banish it by laughing it away. I made him get it and I'll continue to do so, hopefully all the more.

But yes, everything feels like a blur except for any time we're on stage or alone together. I think that's why I can have the patience for him, even if he's something I swore to myself I'd never bother with again (that is, a straight man that has me as his exception). He admitted to me recently that he's had feelings of a kind for me for awhile, now, but he didn't know what to do with them, himself. "I guess being around a bunch of guys for half a year or whatever just does things to you, or something. And then one of the guys is some kind of gay, probably, but you don’t wanna get into it ‘cause he doesn’t, and you don’t wanna open that can of worms for yourself anyway, and you don’t really get him, but you still want to anyway, for some reason."

He never tried anonymous encounters or anything like that the way Greg had, though. It wasn’t something he wanted to explore. Just kept it all shoved away as far in the back of his mind as he could. Then came that day we almost kissed. Then came the tour the following year, the hotel room visits and all the drinking to make it happen. And then I was gone. And then I came back, and he was freshly single again himself (I never even learned the name of the post-Rita woman...), and a lot of old what-if's resurfaced for him, despite the circumstances of my return. --Which, that definitely wasn't the primary thing I wanted to happen out of that little solo excursion, but it's certainly welcome. "You were such a fuckin' bitch, but I know you went thru a lot, and then you gave yourself so much shit to do-- it's like you were trying to stress yourself out more. I always wanted to get you to cut loose, but I thought you'd fuckin' kill me for trying. But fuck, man, you stressed yourself out so much it stressed ME out." --Well, when you don't know who's reliable or trustworthy, it's actually easier to do things yourself. And I did get them done, and the album's charted up close to all the others, so me being a "bitch" paid off for us, didn't it? If you're even twice as useful as you were this time around, I'll have a lot less reason to be that kind of bitch next time. --He wanted to whine about that, but I just wrapped my arms around him, kissed his neck, sucked it, said that I knew he'd be more useful next time (whatever "next time" there is will be very different, if it even happens-- so much is up in the air now, but he doesn’t have to know that, not yet). There'd be quite a bit more reward in it for him.

Nate does want to hang around, chat over beers and such, be friendly, and I do humor him, and I feel awful for saying it that way, but I'm not entirely there for it. It feels almost like I've been with the crew, like I'm wearing a mask of myself. At the same time, I have to keep a level of awareness about me in order to shoot down any attempts to pry too deep into me. We can both be stubborn in our own ways.

*

Sometimes thoughts of him-- that choir director, of me with him, of that time-- will sneak in, regardless of anything I do to stave them. And of course I try to stave them; I don’t want to be curled up in the tub of my hotel room sobbing. But I still can’t always help it. I’ll be in the middle of something and it’ll flash into my mind, briefly, as a reminder of how ugly things really are. --They’re still so fragmented. Like catching reflections off water. I still can’t remember his name, even though I knew him for three years. Can only catch very brief glimpses of his face before they dissolve again (square chin, upturned piggish little nose, beady blue eyes behind little glasses, military blond buzzcut). The precise snapping of his fingers keeping time as metronome, as hypnosis. How cutting his critique could be, as if he knew exactly would would crush me (I was so young, I must’ve been an open fucking book); how sweet he could be after, how much of a kick he must’ve gotten out of building me up again after breaking me down. How sharp the divide could be between the strict disciplinarian he was during lessons and the way he’d dote on me outside of those Church doors.

There’s an anger, of course. But it’s not an anger I ever felt when I knew him. The anger is at myself, too, for not feeling that anger towards him until so close to now. For… ugh.

Mom loved him-- he seemed like a kinder version of granddad, a put-together version of my father-- and he said he loved both of us. I told him so much. I told him things and he touched me and those were both secrets to keep. Quid pro quo, I guess. Mom wouldn’t understand me, but he did. Granddad hated me, but he didn’t. --God, it’s still difficult to even write about; thinking about it’s enough to make me unbearably nauseous. All I can hear is Walter saying “I know what you are”. Like, I was fucking PROUD at some point. I loved Mom, obviously, I always did, but I was angry with her, too; I’d loved my father when he was sober and was terrified of him when he wasn’t but I still missed him so much, I didn’t know what to think about the awful things Mom told me about him, all I could remember was him singing me to sleep and then it was gone and it was like she made it happen and I was afraid she’d make the choir director leave, too, this man who said he loved me so much, who made me feel ~special~, who’d do so much for me that she couldn’t, who taught me how to fucking read with the strange difficulties I have--

UGH I don’t know whether I hate him or myself more. I’d still kill Lorenzo if someone put him in front of me, but him… it’s too late in so many ways, but it was already too late by the time we moved away from him. The damage had been done and I barely knew it was damage until he actually-- fucking christ I was twelve. And I couldn’t see myself the same after that. Even then I wasn't angry at him. He made me feel disgusting. Even more wrong than before, in a way that still feels impossible to erase. So many people have beautiful or at least decent ~first times~ and mine was THAT. I felt a distance from everyone. I felt like the monster so many people seemed to see in me. Sometimes I tried to use that to my advantage. I was a child yet also an ~adult~ already, or so I felt. And I’d feel that pride about it sometimes, of knowing things kids around me didn’t yet, of being "grown" and doing things with it, but more often than not it felt like a rot in me I couldn’t scrub out. I just felt evil. Once I was in high school I’d steal some of Mom’s liquor on the weekends and just… wander out. Get so drunk I couldn’t remember anything but pain. Pain, shame, a physical pleasure surrounded by those things, and then shame again, so much shame; it would all scream against my skull and I’d try to slice it out or puke it out and it would work just enough to keep going. "I know what you are".

“Why do you insist on ruining yourself?” The first time Mom sobbed that at me shaking me by the shoulders, I was around fifteen or sixteen. I didn’t have an answer for her, then. I never did. She always thought singing would make me good but even that was poisoned from so early on. There’s nothing really, fully good about me. There’s always that rot in the center of it all. Everyone sees it sooner or later and I can’t do a thing about it. I think about that and I can’t be quite as angry at Ben leaving, or Greg, or Luis. If things with Nathan lasted long enough he’d leave, too. I’d get too ugly for even him because I’m too ugly for anyone. It really is right that I die after all this is done. Part of me’s been dead for a very long time. Like, Jeff thinks he has it bad because he was stuck in a burning building once and someone yanked him free before he could even get hurt. What if YOU'RE the fucking burning building.

As much of a disappointment as I was, at least Mom never knew the full extent of it. That’s the only consolation I have.

*