The Inner Room

For Franz

There must have been four dozen of us. All males, of course. We were lined up around the perimeter of a barren room facing the walls. We were naked. The room was cold.

Upon arrival at the facility we’d each turned our clothes in and been given two plastic chopsticks. Someone joked, “We’re having Chinese!” After that we were led in groups of four into a side room staffed by an equal number of technicians wearing white labcoats and rubber gloves. Each of us was told to hand over our pair of chopsticks and bend over and put our hands on our knees. This room was quite warm. In fact I almost immediately started to perspire.

Each of the technicians then reached under and pulled our testicles back behind our legs, clamped them between the two chopsticks, banded the ends and let them snap against our flesh. The chopsticks, our balls protruding from them, were now perpendicular to our cracks, and just below them where buttocks meet thigh-tops. The arrangement was very secure. Someone in my group asked “Why chopsticks?” and his male technician replied, “Why not? They’re the ideal solution. Why go out and manufacture something when it’s already readily available? Besides, they’re dishwasher safe and can be used over and over.”

“Yeah, for lunch,” my cohort cracked.

After each of us had been trussed up we were made to line up in a hallway outside a distant door. We were instructed not to speak to one another. I obeyed; many others did not. The common thread in their conversations was:

“How did you come by your low-hangers?” And, “How long have you been stretching?”

To the uninitiated the lab’s ad would have seemed mostly cryptic: “Seeking men of any age with low-hangers. Stretchers welcome. $100 for three hours’ work.”

Another set of technicians in labcoats, however only two this time, led us through the door at the head of the queue into a barren room. The cold room, we would come to call it. We were made to put our hands on our hips with our elbows protruding and space ourselves accordingly. The rectangular room contained a second door, this one in the far wall as you entered, in a wall perpendicular to the main doorway. This second door ended up just to my right, meaning I had a colleague two elbow length’s away to my left, but none on my right. This man stood a door-width away, was my age and good-looking. I wondered if he felt the same about me.

We were instructed by one of the technicians, who held a tablet in his hand, to remain in position facing the wall and not to move. Once again we were directed not to speak. “Be patient,” he advised. “This may take some time.”

The man to my left, who appeared to be in his sixties, proved quite chatty, and irreverent. He was the same one who’d made the crack about Chinese food out in the hallway when we first turned in our clothing. As soon as the technicians left the room he said:

“So let’s see. They got all these chopsticks. They got all these pairs of balls. What’s next, testicle soup? Can’t you see them floating in it?” he laughed.

I kept silent; did not take the bait. For all I knew the man was a plant. What if they paid you your hundred dollars only on condition you obeyed the rules, endured the pain, the numbness, faced the wall, kept silent? He went on:

“And what’s the deal with the temperature. It’s like a meat locker in here. First they stick you in a room that’s hot as a sauna then they put you in here.”

Someone else nearby said, “Yeah. And we’re the meat.”

“And what’s the point of this anyway? Binding our balls up with chopsticks? It doesn’t make sense.”

I whispered, to my left: “I really don’t think we should be talking.”

The elderly man once again laughed. “Fuck that. What’re they gonna do punish me? They already have. Face the wall and don’t talk? Reminds me of detention in the seventh grade.” He went on: “It’s a free country. What’re they gonna do, not pay me my hundred bucks? Cause I talked? Fuck that. Give me my clothes back and I’ll be outta here in five minutes.”

“Me too,” someone agreed.

A nervous voice from off to my left offered: “I heard a rumor they’re going to inject our balls with something.”

“Fuck that. Just try it. I’m outta here.”

But the man next to me didn’t move. He fell silent. I was relieved.

Moments later the man to my right, a door-width away, said: “So what’s through this door here?”

“That’s where they take you next,” someone to his right replied.

“Maybe that’s where they keep the syringes,” the nervous voice said from down the way.

“Fuck that. I’m outta here.”

“I think they’re gonna pick the ones of us with the biggest balls.”

“Well that won’t be me!” I surprised myself by blurting.

Someone hushed us. “Shhh!”

“Oh fuck that. It’s a free country.”

The handsome guy to my right said, “I’m curious. I wonder if it’s unlocked. I’m gonna try it.”

Through clenched teeth I advised: “I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”

“Why not? It’s like the guy says. What’s the worst they can do? Not pay us our hundred measly dollars?”

“Well I happen to need that money!” someone said.

“Well keep your trap shut then!” replied the man to my left. “Jesus, what a bunch of ‘fraidy cats…”

To my dismay the good-looking man on my right moved over next to me and tried the silver doorknob. It turned. He opened the door. Went in.

“What’s in there?” someone asked.

“Nothing,” the reply. “It’s just a smaller version of that room,” meaning the one the rest of us were in. “It’s warm in here, though.”

I leaned to my right; dared to peer in. The man smiled at me. He was getting an erection. He had a beautiful, upcurving cock with a rosy head. It was the perfect cock, to my way of thinking. He beckoned me forward saying, “Come on in. It’s warm in here.”

Against my better judgment I stepped to my right; then forward. I entered.

The room was not just warm—much warmer than the outer room—but had a kind of aura about it I cannot quite explain. The closest to it I can come is saying that the room was like leaving behind a chilly beach at dawn and wading into warm ocean waves—warm as a bath—as the sun rose in a spectacular, variegated display in front of you. It invited you in; it was like a warm embrace.

I too, as soon as I was inside the room, began to get an erection. It seemed to be catching. My new friend, seeing it, reached out, as I did for his.

Our naked bodies came together. We embraced. We kissed. He pushed his tongue into my mouth. I reciprocated. Our hands roamed over each other’s firm flesh. Naturally, we each felt compelled to reach low and feel the tight genital knot behind our thighs. He said:

“Let’s make love.”

I said: “Where? Here? Now?”

“Why not?” he shrugged. He left me behind briefly to close and lock the door. We were alone now. The other poor freezing souls were shut out.

“There’s a mat,” he said, pointing. It was grey like the floor. I hadn’t noticed it. It was the kind of narrow mat people did exercises on or performed yoga. “We can lie there. Let’s suck each other. We can do 69.”

I was thinking about my—our—poor tortured balls. “We’ll have to lie on our sides.”

“So?”

My new friend led me to the mat, which was flush against the back wall. He lowered himself first—carefully. If he’d landed on his buttocks for some reason the pain would have been excruciating. He might have ruptured a testicle.

The image of the man’s joke about a soup with floating testicles crossed my mind. I followed my friend’s lead, though lowering myself on my left side, in the opposite direction. There was barely room for two of us on the narrow mat.

“It’s as if they put it here for us,” my friend said.

“I just hope we don’t get into too much trouble.”

“You worry too much,” he advised, before taking my penis in his mouth.

I took his in mine, grasping the beautiful thing by its base, my hand in his golden pubic hair curls. I sucked him, eagerly, his flesh warm and delicious. I no longer cared what trouble might await us. This moment was just too wonderful. It was exquisite.

I came first, quickly, surprising him. “I wasn’t expecting that,” he smiled, wiping his mouth on the back of a hand after swallowing my semen.

For my part, I had a new experience. For the first time in my life I didn’t lose interest—interest in sex, interest in my partner—the second the last drop of sperm left my body. I kept sucking him with renewed eagerness, coupled with feelings of gratitude and, even, the first stirrings of love. Was there a chance we could continue seeing each other after the experiment? Become boyfriends? Marriage partners even? Was I, as always, getting ahead of myself?

He finally came and I swallowed, his semen both copious and sweet. I was reminded at that instant of the coconut sprinkles my mother used to put on top of her ambrosia when I was a child.

The sweet aroma filled my nostrils, filled the air after I pulled my mouth away.

“Thank you for that,” I said.

“For what?”

“That treat.”

“What about my treat? Thank you!”

I found myself growing suddenly weary. Was it the heat in the room, the dry heat? Was it because all the tension I’d felt had been released when I ejaculated in my lover’s mouth? He must have been experiencing the same feelings of exhaustion, of weariness, because we both soon fell asleep, our heads resting on each other’s thigh.

I awoke from a dream. The most wonderful but odd and querulous dream.

I raised my head, blinked. No, I had not been dreaming. I was in a narrowly rectangular room lying on a mat with a lovely man’s naked body next to mine. I’d drooled on his supporting pillow of an inner thigh.

I rose up momentarily forgetting about the torture device enclosing my poor testicles. They were numb but the rest of my body was not, and the pain from sitting on them shot all the way up to my throat.

“Jesus!” I cried.

As I quickly rolled onto the safety of my knees my lover stirred beneath me. “What’s wrong?” he frowned. Though even when frowning he was beautiful.

“My…this…thing we’re wearing!”

My lover rose up on an elbow. “This is ridiculous, you know that.”

“What?”

“That we’re still wearing this…contraption. Here, I’ll take yours off. Back up a bit. Then you can remove mine.”

“You think we should?”

“At this point I don’t give a fuck. Do you? They can have their experiment. They can have their hundred dollars. Fuck it.”

My lover was beginning to sound like a younger version of the old guy who’d stood to my left in the outer room. The one with the huge balls.

Releasing my purplish testicles from the vise of the chopsticks had the effect of lifting me to my feet. Not literally. I was still kneeling. The sense of relief, however, made me feel like I was levitating all the way to the ceiling. There was an eye above. Circular. A black half-moon. Presumably an all-seeing one. I hadn’t noticed it before. Or had it, somehow, only just appeared? Popped through an opening while we slept?

“Christ,” I said.

“What?”

“They’ve been watching us.”

“So? They got to see some X-rated action then. Hope they enjoyed it.”

“We’re screwed.”

“Fine. They’ll come in, throw us out. So what? I don’t know about you but I got a very pleasant blowjob out of the deal.”

My lover was an eternal optimist, it seemed. I, on the other hand, was a perpetual worrier. Nevertheless I said: “Roll over, sweetheart. And I’ll remove your…thing.”

“Sweetheart?” He seemed to find this amusing—up until the point his balls were liberated and he, just as I had done moments before, rose metaphorically off the mat toward the heavens. The room’s white ceiling at any rate.

We both stood up. We stretched.

“What time is it?” I asked.

“Beats me.”

“I feel like I was asleep for hours.”

“I feel like I was asleep for ten minutes.”

“Really?”

We were so different, he and I. If we ever made love I realized, real love, he would take the role of the top and I the bottom. I was fine with this. I relished this thought.

He went over to the door and turned the silver knob, unlocking it. He opened the door. The outer room was empty. There was not a trace of the four dozen or so men who’d recently occupied it.

I watched as my lover walked to the outer door and tried the knob.

“It’s locked. From the outside. We’re fucked.”

He banged on the door. Twice.

There was no reply; not a sound.

“Well…,” he said, leaving behind the cold room for the warm one, where I still stood, “they’ll come and get us eventually.”

“What makes you think that?”

He pointed at the ceiling, the black eye. “They know we’re in here. They’ll probably make us sweat for awhile.”

“Why?”

My lover shrugged. “Who knows? We may’ve ruined their fucking experiment.”

“What was the experiment, exactly?”

“You’ll have to ask them. When they come for us.”

Ever the pessimist, I had doubts they ever would. I was hungry; famished. I hadn’t eaten breakfast before I left for the lab. My only sustenance that day had been the tablespoon or so of sweet semen my lover had deposited in my mouth.

I looked down. He was getting hard again. So was I. There was something instantly magical about this room. It was like a fairy tale set in a small, bleak, barren, minimalist enclosure.

“Too bad there’s no lube,” my lover smiled, “or I’d fuck you.”

“I’d like that,” I said.

“Some other time.”

“I’ll hold you to that.”

All we had was the thin mat, and each other. “At least this time we can do 69 the proper way,” he said. “Why don’t you lie down on the mat and I’ll get on top. Or we can do it the other way, I don’t care.”

I lay down in response, and looked down the half-length of my slender body. My penis was standing straight up. He took it in his mouth even as I, pulling myself up by his firm buttocks, took his in mine.

I had better stamina this time but I still came before him. We switched positions. It was so much easier to suck his erection this way. I became aware of my head’s furious, bobbing motion. It seemed rather comical. If it’s possible to smile while sucking a man’s cock, I smiled. Eye in the ceiling or no eye, it was wonderful.

The volume of his sweet cum seemed less this time, which was to be expected. Afterwards we sat next to each other on the mat, our legs drawn up.

“My balls ache,” he said. I looked down. They were slack now and lay on the mat. His sack seemed almost liquid. A puddle of balls. A not-quite entirely deflated balloon.

“From the chopsticks?”

“That too,” his reply.

Mine also ached. The pressure of the sticks, which had flattened our sacks out like the thinnest of dough under a roller, had left a mark on the skin, one darker, redder than the surrounding, enclosing, stretched flesh, which otherwise was returning to its natural pinkish-brown color.

“You have beautiful balls,” I said.

He shrugged.

I moved closer. Put my arm around him. He seemed slightly distant. I kissed his left cheek. “I think I’m in love.”

He pulled away; laughed. “I know you’re in love with sucking my cock.”

“It’s more than that. This has been something special.”

“It’s been different, that’s for sure. Too bad there’s no lube or I’d fuck you.”

I had a sense of déjà vu. Like a needle stuck in an old-fashioned phonograph record, a phrase or lyric repeating itself. It felt creepy. I played along.

“I would like that.”

“Maybe some day.” Adding, “When we’re out of here.”

“But for me, with you,” I said, “it’s more than just about sex.”

“What else do we have in a place like this?”

“We have each other.”

“Don’t go getting all mushy on me,” my lover said.

“You seem down.”

“No. I’m just wondering what happened to all the others, that’s all.”

I thought about the man in the outer room, earlier, the nervous one, who’d speculated they were going to stick hypodermics in our testicles. I passed a shiver.

“You cold?” he asked.

“In here? Never.”

He kissed me suddenly, violently, on the lips. We turned to face each other, our legs entangling. We necked. We caressed each other’s bodies. Incredibly, we were both getting hard again.

This was better than sex, however. Far more intimate than blowjobs or fucking. This was passion. It was tender and sweet. I thought: He likes me!

We were still kissing, like bedazzled, horny teenagers in the back of a car, we were kissing obliviously, no cares in the world aside from each other…when the door to the outer room opened and a cart on wheels rolled in.

The door slammed.

“What the…?”

My lover jumped up and I followed. He tried the door. It was locked again. “Fuck!” he shouted. He banged on it, to no avail.

On the tray, which was aluminum and had two levels, the lower one empty, were three silver platters with ornate, handled domes covering them. While my lover banged on the door and cursed, I lifted the nearer lid.

On the oval platter were club sandwiches, cut small, bags of chips, two cookies in cellophane, a can of soda and a bottle of juice.

I lifted the middle platter’s lid. The contents were the same.

“What the fuck is this?” my partner asked, turning impotently from the door.

“Food,” I replied, welcoming it. You can only survive on kisses and blowjobs so long.

He lifted the third lid. He laughed, grudgingly. It started as a snicker and rose to a taut belly-laugh. “They read our minds!” he said.

There was nothing on the tray but a boxed tube of lubricant.

“It’s a joke, right?” I speculated.

“They’re fucking with us.”

“Or listening to us.” It was odd. Now I sounded like the optimist and he the pessimist.

“It’s freezing in here,” my naked lover said, crossing his arms.

There was one other thing on the tray: a note, a printed card, black on white. It read:

“Congratulations! You are the only two who properly deduced the purpose of our experiment. Please return your chopsticks to the tray so they can be reused. When you reenter the Inner Room you will discover that by pushing on the wall to your left it will open to reveal another Inner Room. This one contains a bed—one—a closet and shower and toilet. Feel free to avail yourselves of these amenities. Your meals will be served twice daily. Enjoy your stay!”