There’s something sneaky going on in the subconscious — innocence, purity, chaos, sweat. Dirty white socks hit all of it at once. They spark that weird little thrill: the musk, the heat, the trace of someone’s body still clinging to the cotton. It’s a micro-kink, sure, but the power comes from whatever story you attach to them — private, charged, and way more psychological than you’d ever admit out loud.
“Shameless. He floats naked in the water, the light rippling over chest and stomach. His lips, as if caught between a breath and a moan, his hand loose at his side like he’s waiting to be grabbed. There’s nothing soft about it – just flesh, need, and the unspoken dare in his stillness. Every line built for touch, for heat, waiting to be claimed. The invitation to take what you want. The sight is blunt, undeniable: he wants to be used.”
Charlie had taken his art in a new direction. He was bored, disillusioned with paintings of landscapes, objects and street scenes. A flirtation with what he called ‘art contemporain’ had ended in frustration. “Circles, squares, solid colours, lines, zig-zags … they mean nothing to me!”
The first that I knew about this new path was when I returned home to find Levi, our former lodger, sprawled on the sofa in just his underwear. “It isn’t what it looks like,” he flushed. ”I’m only doing it as a favour.”
Charlie shouted from the bathroom. “I am ready now. The bathtub is full and my camera is ready.” I was bemused to say the least.
Charlie wandered into the room. “Ah, you are home, mon ami. I need the bathroom for thirty minutes while I photograph Levi.”
The Polish boy with the Yorkshire accent followed him along the corridor and into the brightly lit bathroom. With a certain amount of embarrassment he stepped into the bath. “Lay down, Levi, and put your head underwater. I am going to stand on both sides of the bath and take photos from above.”
I watched from the doorway and listened while Levi was told to take deep breaths and submerge himself. Then he had to raise his right arm, then his left, and then both of them together. All the time, Charlie was precariously balancing, taking shot after shot.
When they had finished, Levi stood up, looking satisfyingly toned, and dripping from head to toe. Charlie looked him up and down. “As I suspected, you have a little dick, but we cannot all be lucky. You can get dry now.”
“I feel stupid,” Levi told him, “and I haven’t brought any dry boxer shorts.” Charlie flicked through the images and appeared not to have heard him, so I went to a bedroom drawer and gave him a pair of mine to change into.
That night Charlie spent hours searching for the right photo. The next morning he visited a local print shop and had it blown up to the size of a small poster. He placed it on an artist’s easel and studied it. “I am going to use this photo to create my next painting,” he announced. “If it is successful then I am going to start painting beautiful men from now onwards.”
I reminded him that there had been a time when he would have considered Levi anything but beautiful. “That was the case,” he replied, “but I needed somebody that I knew who was willing to model for me, and when I have finished, I will make him appear extremely homoerotic which is something he is definitely not.”
Flup, flup, flup, flup. That’s the only way to describe it. Flup, flup, flup, flup. It dawned on me that the flup, flup, flup, flup had a regularity about it. Maybe every thirty minutes, never more than forty five, but the sound can be heard from early morning to late evening. When does a sound become a sign? I suppose it is when you want it to be. That flupping noise is made by Kieran, the farm boy who I’ve known since he was fourteen. That was five years ago, and now he’s grown into a handsome young man of nineteen. He works in nothing but a pair of filthy old denim jeans and a pair of wellington boots that flup along the road so that you are never in any doubt as to where he might be. I thought that farmers would be busy milking cows or ploughing fields, but Kieran spends his days flupping along. I end up waiting for flups and hide behind a wall to watch him stroll by. His bare chest will be covered in cow shit, and hay, or any other agricultural detritus, and it becomes fantastically homoerotic.
Something stopped me in my tracks.
“What’s the matter?” he asked.
I had to think before answering.
“The role that concealment plays in the eroticism of underwear calls attention to the body beneath. But at this moment, there is so much writing on the waistband of your Calvin Kleins that I need to make sure that there isn’t a warning attached.”
“It’s been a tough day,” Tom said. “Let’s take a walk and we’ll sit outside a coffee shop.” And in that cold winter sunshine things started to look up.
He sat back, put his long legs on the table, and drank his latte. I noticed that he had extraordinarily big feet.
“I’ve just realised that I didn’t put on clean underwear,” he remarked, and then he took one of ten thousand puffs on a blackberry, blueberry and raspberry vape. Tom was the coolest guy in the world.
I tried to say something clever, but it sounded like “mwah,” and he gave me a funny look.
And so, I made discreet notes on my phone before realising that the guy standing behind me was reading everything, and I hoped that he wouldn’t say anything that might embarrass me.
It was long overdue and might have been a mistake, but I checked the email repeatedly, and it was certainly meant for me.
The photographer was from Brazil, and he’d chosen me after looking at my online portfolio. This wasn’t going to be a fashion shoot for a glossy magazine. Pablo had a reputation for taking raunchy images, and I hoped that he might make me look like the boys who made me feel inadequate.
The email didn’t give a lot away, but I knew there would be a lot of flesh, and the images might end up on the right side of Tumblr’s community guidelines.
I’d been to photoshoots before and hoped that it didn’t involve a room full of ego-driven males.
Don’t get me wrong. I know a lot of easy going guys, but there are many more self-centred boys involved. It’s an insecure business, one where you’ll be gone by the time you are thirty, and beneath the bravado is the fear that it can quickly be taken away.
The reality is that agencies no longer look at your body or looks. They are far more interested in how many Instagram followers you have, and that puts added pressure on. But that isn’t everything. I have an Insta-famous friend who does a lot of major campaigns and almost nobody knows who he is.
On the day, I turned up at an old factory located in the East End. It was split into separate business units, and Park Studio was on the second floor.
I walked up the staircase with its peeling walls and realised that money hadn’t been mentioned. The shoot would offer little financial reward and fell into the category of providing exposure only. I wouldn’t be leaving my job at Waitrose anytime soon.
I was relieved to find that there were only a handful of people present, those who made things happen. Photography assistant, stylist, make-up artist and the guy who handed out coffee.
After the obligatory hugs and kisses, I was directed behind a screen that served as the changing area. There was another guy who was half-undressed. He was called Luca and was from Italy. We blushed as we swapped our cheap underwear for snowy white Calvin Kleins.
We walked across to the big screen that would serve as the background to the shoot and made small talk. I discovered that Luca’s girlfriend was waiting outside.
At times like this, you mustn’t be self-conscious. Even when you’re practically naked next to a straight guy who you’d assumed was also gay. I was anxious not to make a fool of myself.
Pablo ignored us, played with his cameras, and barked orders about lighting and shading. When he realised that the main event was before him, he gave instructions as to what we should do, explaining the postures he wanted, and the way we had to interact.
The theme was ‘Boys Who Tease’ and that required Luka to be the dominant one, holding, touching, slinging me over his shoulder and placing his arms around me.
This went on for hours, Pablo firing shot after shot, and inventing new angles in which to enhance his standing in the photographic world.
We’d arrived well-groomed and smelling sweet, but by the time Pablo had burnt through his umpteenth roll of film, we were sweating under the hot spotlights, and he complained that our bodies were wet and glistening.
The assistant threw us towels and we wiped each other down. I told Luca that I was enjoying the experience, and he cocked an inquisitive eye.
For the final shots of the day, I had to crouch in front of Luca, who stood motionless with his arms by his side. Pablo told me to close my eyes and tilt my forehead until it touched the band of his Calvins. I was only a hairbreadth away from his crotch, and the slightest movement would have meant that my nose rubbed against his dick.
This was a tricky situation.
Pablo said to hold the position. I tried not to breathe, but I could sense Luca’s trembling body, and smelt baby oil and talcum powder on him. I was scared that I might embarrass myself, and started thinking about my checkout job at Waitrose, about what I might eat later, and about Luca’s girlfriend waiting in the street outside.
Perfectly Hard and Glamorous 