Sharing the Optometrist's Boyfriend

Bloomington, October 1982

When I arrived for graduate school at Indiana University, 21 years old, fresh from a small town in the Midwest, my gay experiences were so limited that I never suspected Mark, the optometry student who lived down the hall from me in the graduate student dorm.

He was short and compact, with a flat face and a high forehead, cute, a little nerdy, not stereotypically swishy.

 I didn't suspect when he joined me in watching The Powers of Matthew Star on Friday nights, a superhero spoof notable only for teen idol Peter Barton.

I didn't suspect when I knocked on his door one Friday night in October, a couple of weeks after my visit to the adult bookstore where I found the Gayellow Pages, and Mark opened with his shirt disheveled, and I saw another guy with his shirt half off sitting on the bed.

I didn't even suspect when I noticed that the two twin beds in the room had been pushed together to make a double.

But I suspected the other guy -- tall, pale, with a slim, tight chest, blond hair, and a round, pretty face.  Effeminate!  Must be gay!

I grinned at the glimpse of beefcake as he quickly buttoned up.  My first gay guy in Bloomington!  "Hi, I'm Boomer."

Obviously unwilling to make introductions, Mark complied out of politeness.  "Boomer, this is Shaun.  My...um...cousin.  Visiting me."

Mark's cousin was gay!  Did he know, or was he oblivious?

I barged into the room, took Shaun's slim hand, squeezed it, and held it for a moment too long. He smiled. I began to feel flushed -- here I was, flirting with Mark's cousin right in front of him!

 "So...um...you guys up for The Powers of Matthew Star? It's stupid, but it has Peter Barton in tights."

"No, not tonight, sorry," Mark said.  I didn't catch his look that meant Get lost!

 "I'll go!" Shaun exclaimed.  Mark glared at him.  "Oh, relax.  It will be fun.  That other thing will keep!"

"Ok, then, you guys go ahead."  I didn't catch Mark's angry tone.  "I'll get some studying done.  But don't stay too long -- we don't want to be late for that other thing."

"Sure, sure.  See you in an hour." He touched Mark's shoulder affectionately, and stood, facing me.  Definitely cruising, I thought.  "Which way to the tv lounge?"

Each of the tv lounges in Eigenmann Hall was dedicated to a different channel (back then there were only six).  On Friday night, most residents were out, or watching Benson on the third floor or Dukes of Hazzard on the sixth.  We had the thirteenth floor lounge to ourselves.

Shaun and I sat on a big crimson-colored couch, so close together that I could feel the warmth of his thighs and glimpse his pale hard chest in the places where his shirt was still askew.

In those days you never just came out to someone -- the results were usually unpleasant, and sometimes violent.  You tip-toed around the question.

"So, are you in college?" I asked.

Of course, Shaun was actually an undergraduate psych major at Indiana, on a date with Mark -- this was their fifth date.  They had gone out to dinner, and they were just getting ready for intimacies when I barged in.  But he couldn't tell me that.  He had to stick to the "visiting cousin" story.

 "Oh yes, I'm a junior at Notre Dame.  My parents insisted -- I think they wanted me to become a priest.  Imagine, me a priest!  They about had a heart attack when I told them I wanted to major in music instead.  Voice."

We were good at making up impromptu stories in the 1980s.

"You'll have to sing for me sometime."

"Oh, I'll do more than sing for you."

I felt even more flushed with the heat of anticipation.  "Um...Peter Barton is quite an actor," I said.

"Yes.  I had a big crush...I mean, all the girls in my high school had a big crush on him."

That was out enough for me!  I checked the door to see if anyone was looking, then reached out and took Shaun's hand.  He squeezed it, and then moved it carefully to his lap.  "I haven't met anyone...you know...at IU yet," I said.

"Me, neither."

There was a gay student organization on campus, and a gay bar in town, but I was afraid to go to either.

"Does Mark know?" I asked.

You never outed a friend in the 1980s, so Shaun didn't say "He's my boyfriend."  He said "Oh, yes, he knows."

"And he's ok with it?"

"Perfectly.  You should tell him that you are -- it would be nice to have a friend on campus, wouldn't it?"  He paused.  "Besides me, of course."

"You'll be going back to Notre Dame soon."

"Oh, yeah.  Right."  The problem with making up stories is, you have to keep them consistent.  "But we have tonight, right?  And the night is young."

I wasn't much for hookups in the 1980s, but Shaun was the first gay person I met on a campus of 40,000, and besides, I hadn't been with anyone for a few months.  "You want to -- come back to my room?" I asked.

Now Shaun had a dilemma.  He had a boyfriend.  He was on a date.  But he  couldn't say so without outing Mark.

So he made a decision: "Let's go back to Mark's room instead."

"What?"

"He's got that big double bed.  We can really get to know each other there."

"But then he'll find out about me."

"Oh, don't worry.  He won't mind.  I'll...um...tell him to come in here and watch tv for an hour."

The prospect of being with Shaun trumped the fear of coming out to his "cousin," so I allowed him to lead me back to Mark's room.

Mark was sitting at his desk, reading a gigantic optometry textbook.  "Hi, how as the tv?" he growled without looking up. Shaun wrapped his arms around his shoulders and kissed him.

"What are you doing!" he yelled, pushing Shaun away.  "Um...Cousin Shaun, stop fooling around!"

"Yes, well, about that."  He carefully shut and locked the door, then put his arms around me. "I invited Boomer along on our date."

Date?

Mark stared for a moment, and then smiled.  "You mean he's....I really had no idea!"

Suddenly both of them had their arms around me. Shaun was unbuttoning my shirt and nuzzling Mark's neck at the same time. Mark was groping me.

"You're not really cousins, are you?"

And we were kissing.

Mark and I "shared" Shaun a few more times before they broke up. But the sharing wasn't as important as knowing that I was not alone at Indiana University.

See also: My First Visit to an Adult Bookstore and The Farmboy Butches It Up