Before I drew submarine duty I was completely straight--or thought I was. I guess the experiences I had in the Navy at sea drew something out of me that was nascent before, but I hadn't been aware of it.I confess I had some homoerotic thoughts in my teen years, though nothing I was willing to act on.But being locked in a steel tube for months on end with 77 other guys definitely does something to you.If you have any of those kind of desires, an experience like that will definitely make you think differently about it.

My first assignment at sea was on a Barbel-class diesel sub, about 2600 tons submerged.This was in 1966, and the boat wasn't that old, only eight years or so, but the diesels were already being phased out by nuclear submarines.It wasn't glamorous.We didn't carry nukes and only rarely came toe-to-toe with the Russkies, though occasionally we came close to them.In those days we were doing a lot of monitoring of surface ships off the coast of Vietnam, where the war on the ground was just then beginning to heat up.I was 20 years old but people said I looked 14--considering that I was still getting carded to buy beer when I was 32 gives you an idea of what it was like.Aside from a comic opera fumbling in the dark with my girlfriend back in Omaha the summer after high school graduation--a shameful episode that ended with me coming prematurely on her favorite childhood teddy bear--sex was a completely unknown quantity to me.But on that first long voyage I began noticing things.Submarine sailors at sea are a pretty lax and casual bunch.I worked in the forward torpedo room, which was always very hot.Guys used to strip their shirts off much of the time while working, and I found my eyes lingering over an endless parade of sweat-greased muscles, puckered nipples, and navels gently dusted with hair.I have to admit I liked it.The showers were the best thing.We had to conserve water on the boat of course, and each guy got about a minute to shower in a tiny cubicle about the size of a coffin, so naturally there was a line to use the showers sometimes, and seeing a bunch of well-toned, muscular submarine guys queued up with towels wrapped around them, or coming out of the cubicle with their dicks dripping cold water on the stainless steel floor of the head, became a very pleasing sight to me. Luckily I had self-control, and, excited though I was, I never got a boner in front of anybody.This was decades before "don't ask, don't tell," and any hint of homosexual desire would make life exceptionally rough for anyone who exhibited it.

It sounds pretty gross, but the smell turned me on.At reunions and such, so many of the guys who served on the old diesels still say that the smell was one of the things they remember the most, and I do too, though it wasn't oppressive to me as it was to most others.It was the thick aroma of diesel fuel mixed with the reek of sweat.Because we showered so seldom and it was always hot, especially in the torpedo rooms or the engine room, 70-something guys sealed in a steel can have a tendency to make quite a stink.That smell was always unmistakably masculine to me, and exciting because it reminded me of some of the beautiful boys I sailed with on those early cruises.There was a guy named Timmons, from Ohio, who was especially cute.He had green eyes, blonde hair and very pale skin, and his dick was enormous.I also remember Rodriguez, the cook's assistant, who had a dark Hispanic beauty about him that was very enticing.But none of them could hold a candle to Graben, who came aboard in the fall of '66 when we stopped at Pearl, and who, luckily for me, also got assigned to the torpedo room.

Seaman Terrence Graben was one to behold, though I can't really tell why he turned me on so much.He was tall and thin and not nearly as musclebound as most sub sailors; I remember him telling me he played basketball in high school, which made me think lustful thoughts of seeing him in those silky shorts and a tank-top.His arms and biceps and shoulders were thin but well-rounded, powerful in kind of a subtle way.I saw him bare-chested often.Graben actually had to be ordered to keep his shirt on.As soon as Lieutenant Frietas or the chief of the watch was out of sight, off would come the blouse.Graben was as smooth-chested as they come, not a single hair on him from neck to navel.His hair was blonde and shaved to a brutally military eighth-inch stubble.He had mismatched eyes--one blue, one brown--which gave him an eerily piercing stare when he looked at you. When he looked at me, I actually got erect.My mind would race with thoughts of giving him pleasure, licking up and down his hard pole, backing him up against the torpedo rail and molesting every inch of his lean tall body with my tongue.Every time I worked with him in the torpedo room I stared at him, wondering how big his penis was and what it looked and felt like when it was hard.He was the first boy I ever had really consciously dirty thoughts about; all the others I simply admired from afar, while being aware somewhere in the back of my mind that part of me badly wanted to have sex with another male.Still, I never approached him or said anything.

Graben was a good guy.He was from Mobile, Alabama, though his accent blended right in with many of the crew because we had a lot of Southerners on our boat.He was very funny, always the first with a quip or a joke, and he had a very sardonic sense of humor.He had this great talent of making up words, especially acronyms.Life in the military is filled with acronyms, and Graben loved to spoof them.On the sub we often drank this nasty concoction the men referred to as "bug juice."It was sort of a cross between Kool-Aid and an energy drink, with lots of vitamins added to compensate for the fact that we rarely breathed fresh air or saw the sun. Graben invented an acronym for it: PUSHLICAUTI (pronounced "pushlicotty"), which stood for PUrple SHit LIkely to Cause Urinary Tract Infections.He referred to the shower as the "SMC" (Stench Mitigation Chamber), the head as the "SES" (Shit Evacuation Station), and girlie magazines as "MFD's" (Masturbation Facilitation Devices).As we got to know each other better working in the torpedo room, after Lietuenant Frietas would chew us out for another inadequate torpedo-loading drill, Graben would smile at me and say, "Fwidgey-double-L."That was half-acronym, half-code word for Frietas's Wife Didn't Give Head Last Leave, as Graben loved to joke that sexual frustration was the ultimate cause of every rebuke ever heard aboard our boat.Graben tried to act older and cynical, as if he'd had years of experience in subs, but in reality he was younger than me, and one time in the torpedo room he told me that he had joined the Navy solely to pre-empt the arrival of a draft card and an inevitable journey to the front lines in Vietnam.The almost self-conscious way he told me this was my first clue that under his carefree, humorous exterior, Terry Graben was deeply insecure, even terrified of his surroundings.I didn't say anything about this either, but I went out of my way to be a good friend to him, hoping to make him feel more comfortable on the boat.

Because we were on the same shift and generally had the same daily routine, it wasn't long after he came on board that I got to see him naked.One day I managed to get in the shower line right behind him.This was one of the last times that we had the luxury of "real" showers on the boat.The reason for that has to do with garbage.On a sub, trash is collected into lead-lined cylindrical sacks that, when full, are jettisoned out small chutes, and come to rest on the ocean floor.(It's not too environmentally friendly, but very few people had any environmental consciousness back in the '60s, least of all the military).However, larger pieces of trash that can't fit down the chute have to be stowed until we make port.Guess where they're stowed?You got it--the shower.On the day I was right behind Graben in the line, one of the two shower stalls was already blocked off and being used as a trash stowage area, and we all knew the second one would be next.When that happened we'd all be sentenced to wash ourselves from wash basins, which is a poor substitute.But for me it meant less opportunity to see my favorite male bodies, Graben topping the list.So I made sure I got a good look.After his one-minute shower he came out of the stall casually rubbing the towel over his stubbly head.He made no attempt to cover his privates."Hey, Neil," he said to me casually as he pushed past me.I had only a few seconds to look, but I made sure the image was indelibly etched into my memory.Graben wasn't tremendously big, but his dick, even in a flaccid state, was something to see.He was circumcised like me, and his head looked like it'd be very large and full when he was erect, a mushroom at the top of a long, straight shaft.His dick was perfectly proportioned, hanging there like the head of a snake, and his almost hairless balls hung down invitingly.With sheer willpower alone I managed to prevent my own dick from hardening, but it wasn't entirely successful.Luckily I was just stepping into the shower stall and with my back turned to the rest of the guys waiting in line no one would notice.The combination of the ice-cold water spray and my sudden deliberately intense thoughts of one of my dad's interminable church lectures killed my arousal, thankfully, but I determined I would not forget the sight of Graben's penis.

Masturbation is a pretty difficult thing to do on a submarine, but it is done; hell, in the real world, nobody really expects seventy-some guys to not get off at least once on a three-month cruise, and it's not like you can lock yourself in the head or the shower with an MFD (even if you had one) because there's virtually no privacy on a boat, not even at times or doing things when normal people would take privacy for granted.Guys jacked off in their bunks at night, and generally unless you were making a disturbance nobody mentioned it or acknowledged it.Both good and bad for me, shortly after Graben came on board my bunk assignment was changed, and I was given the starboard bunk of what was known as the "bridal suite"--two bunks just under the torpedo loading hatch in the forward torpedo room, which were close enough together that you were basically sleeping with someone else.It was good because the bunks in this area of the boat at least had some head room and you didn't have to crawl like a slug in and out of your bed.But it was bad because, no matter how quiet you were, the risk of disturbing the guy in the port-side bunk of the bridal suite was much greater than the risk of disturbing your neighbors (close as they might be) if you slept in any other part of the boat.And, if the port-side bunkmate happened to be an attractive guy, it was all the more tormenting to lay there with a hard-on inches away from him and not be able to do anything about it.So, I learned to cut down masturbation to the absolute bare minimum, and to savor it when I could do it.The maybe two or three times I was brave enough to jack off on that cruise, every time I thought about Terry Graben.I imagined myself kissing the head of the lovely penis I'd seen, gently urging it to erection, and then sliding it into my mouth.My fantasies were so real I could almost taste the salty flavor of his skin and feel the silken wetness at his tip.I thought of other things too.By that point in my life I'd never had anal sex and wasn't that interested in it, but somehow I couldn't stop thinking about the idea of Terry penetrating me, moaning softly as his penis entered my butt.I didn't dare hope he was gay or bisexual, although there was something in his mannerisms that suggested a bare hint of it, and it was true that he talked about girls a lot less than most guys on the boat. Nevertheless I didn't get my hopes up.

That changed one day in late November.We were patrolling near the coast of Vietnam, evidently listening for Russian and Chinese cargo ships supposedly resupplying the Viet Cong.The war wouldn't stop for Thanksgiving of course, so our cooks served turkey dinners and stuffing in three shifts in the crew's mess.The food was better on submarines than it was in any other branch of the Navy, or the rest of the military, and we'd just had a resupply ourselves, so there was fresh meat and real potatoes, which were a wonderful treat after months of powdered eggs and bug juice. It was announced that our shift from the forward torpedo room would be part of the crew that would take their Thanksgiving meal at 8PM.The crew's mess, which adjoined the galley, was a pretty cramped area just ahead of the engine room, with various tables and bench-style seating about on the order you see these days at the lunch counter at K-Mart.I had the good fortune to be in the mess line right behind Terry."First good food on this bucket we've had all week," he said to me as we moved forward to get our vittles."And last we'll have 'til Christmas dinner, probably."

It was fortunate that I was in the line right behind him, because it was likely I'd get to sit next to him, and I did.Rollins, one of our other crewmates from the forward torpedo room, was on Graben's left, and I was on his right, at the end of the bench so I had no other neighbor.We shoveled the food into our mouths as quickly as possible, and I remember that as being one of the best meals I ever had on that particular boat.That night we got a special treat: a movie.The morale officer had broken out the clunky classroom-style 16mm movie projector which was set up on a counter facing a pull-down screen in the corner of the mess compartment.The film we had for this cruise was "Thunderball," the James Bond movie, and a particular favorite among the crew.Watching a movie on a boat with a bunch of sub guys is an interactive experience.Everybody is shouting things at the screen--"Aww, that had to hurt!" and "Get him, Bond!" or wolf whistles at the attractive ladies--and as we sat there eating ice cream, which was a luxury beyond imagination for most of our voyages, I began to enjoy myself in the same way as if I'd had a few beers back home.Then, about midway through the movie, I felt something along the edge of my left thigh.It was Graben's hand.We were pressed pretty close together just from the close quarters, and what he was doing wasn't overly familiar.He had his left forearm resting on the tabletop and his right hand ostensibly in his lap, but in fact it was pressed between his right thigh and mine. There was something very absent-minded about it, because it was the kind of thing that a person could do, especially in close quarters, without really meaning to, such as on a bus or something.But it was also the kind of thing where, if it happened, you'd say "Excuse me" or shift position or something, thereby making the person aware of what they were doing unconsciously.This petty little invasion of space was even more likely to occur on a submarine, where the concept of personal space was denuded of much of its meaning simply by the conditions you existed in day after day.

But there was another meaning too.I wondered suddenly if Graben was probing, doing something that seemed innocuous and unconscious, but was in fact a conscious attempt to see how I would react.A wonderful thought suddenly sprang into my head: what if he really WAS gay?

I firmly decided I would do nothing about Graben's hand.I tried to sit as still as possible, while continuing to join the crew's banter at the screen."You think that chick's tits are different sizes?" I said to Graben when Bond's latest femme fatale showed up in a bikini.I had chosen to speak at that moment, directly to him, as kind of a signal: I wasn't just being absent-minded, my attention was focused on him, and there was no way I couldn't be aware of his hand between his thigh and mine.

"Shit, I think you may be right," he cackled, after squinting at the screen.

The next second Graben's hand began to move, imperceptibly to anybody but me.He flexed his fingers very slightly, bending the knuckles and increasing the gentle pressure on the outside of my left thigh.Even this simple touch, invisible to anyone else, caused me to react.I got hard.I hoped no one noticed, but probably they couldn't; the lights were kept to a minimum while the movie was being shown.There was no mistaking it now. Graben had moved one step beyond, from a touch disguised as an unconscious lapse of personal space-respecting, to one that was definitely deliberate.

A few seconds later he took his hand away, and used it to seize his plastic glass of bug juice and take a drink.At first I thought I'd gotten my hopes up for nothing.Maybe it was unconscious.But he kept his right hand around his glass, and I realized he had moved to step three: asking for an answer.It was now my turn.

I put my left hand in my lap.I reached down to my left thigh, ostensibly to scratch an itch.But in doing so I inserted two fingers, my pinky and ring finger of my left hand, in the warm fabric-covered groove between my leg and Graben's.I made sure I lingered for a while, as if it was a really bad itch, and then took my hand away.

The next move was his.I was kind of enjoying this game.He went about it in an inventive manner.A minute or so later he bent over the table and reached underneath it with both hands.He was reaching for his sock, as if to pull it up, and he did.But just as he let go of his right sock his right hand brushed my ankle in an unmistakably familiar, tender gesture. He then straightened up and took hold of his glass again."That chick is hot," he said, looking me directly in the eye.

"Yeah, she is," I replied."REALLY hot."

"You think so?"

My heart was pounding."Yeah."

He smiled in a very knowing way, and I suddenly understood.I was on cloud nine.It may seem totally obsessive to read so much into these little gestures, but you have to understand that on a submarine, in a homophobic Navy, even the slightest expression of desire was dangerous.Yet Terry Graben and I had just had a conversation, and it went like this:

His first touch: "Hello there, am I bothering you?"

My inaction to stop him: "No, not at all."

Him moving his fingers: "I kind of like you."Him taking his hand away: "Do you like me?"

My touching him while scratching my thigh: "Yes, I do."

Him touching me while pulling up his sock: "I want this to go further." Him commenting on the girl on the screen: "I think you're attractive."

My reply: "I think you're attractive too.VERY attractive."

That night I went to bed feeling totally invigorated.It was almost too good to believe--Graben, the guy I found most attractive on the whole boat, seemed to like me!There was still the very large question of what we were going to do about it, but at least we had a start.My lustful feelings toward him began to amplify themselves.Suddenly there was no place else I'd rather be than sealed in a stinking steel canister under the waves with him.

*** *** ***

I'm still amazed at how Terry and I eventually came to communicate.The day after Thanksgiving dinner, when we were working in the torpedo room, as we labored to lift the end of a torpedo onto the cradle, he said under his breath, "How's your Morse?"

"Huh?" I replied.

"Morse code.You in practice?"

"Yeah, I guess."

After we loaded the torpedo we didn't have much of a chance to talk, but a little later as Terry passed me by he said, "Try to sit by me whenever you can."I didn't have to answer him.He knew I would.

I wondered what he had in mind, but had no idea, other than to expect some kind of message from him in Morse code.That night before going to sleep I took out my manual and brushed up on it.

We didn't get to sit together at a meal time until three days later.I sat next to him, except this time I was on the left and Graben on the right.I ate; he was almost done with his meal, and lit a cigarette afterwards.We were engaged in a discussion with the other guys at our table about the various bars in various ports of call we might encounter."There's this great place in Manila called Crazy Wah's," said Timmons, scooping up a forkful of the odd mixture of shredded pasta, tomato sauce and ground beef that was often served as an entree."It's great, until the MP's show up--which they do just about every night."Suddenly I felt a knock of Terry's knee against mine.He was signaling me somehow.I glanced at him; he took a drag on his cigarette and glanced back.Then suddenly I noticed something.He was shaking his leg, the heel of his shoe bouncing up and down up off the floor, the kind of nervous habit that any number of people do while they're sitting down.But every time the heel came down, it clipped the very edge of my left shoe.I realized he'd been doing it for a little while but it was so subtle I hadn't paid attention.The sudden bang of his knee against mine, and the look in his eyes, was unmistakably a statement of, "I'm talking, pay attention!"

I tried to focus on the movements of his shoe while at the same time keeping up with the "real" conversation that was happening at our table.

"What's that place on Oahu?" I asked."Up by Haliewa--the one where the barmaids wear the grass skirts..."

>From the timing of the flick of Terry's shoe I could make out dots and dashes.I felt: dash-dot-dash-dash, pause, dash-dash-dash, pause, dot-dot-dash, pause, dash-dash-dot-dash, pause, dot-dot-dash, pause, dot, pause, dot, pause, dot-dash-dot, dot-dot-dash-dash-dot-dot.

Quickly my mind translated, straining to recall: Yankee Oscar Uniform Quebec Uniform Echo Echo Romeo, and then one other letter I didn't recognize; it was a few seconds before I realized it was a question mark.

YOU QUEER? he had asked me.

His leg was still now.My Morse was rustier than his, so I didn't bother with full words.I tapped back, dash-dot-dash-dash, the symbol for Yankee. YES.

His response was: --. . ..--- That spelled "ME2."

HOW LONG? he tapped back.He was now on his third cigarette, and the conversation at our table was centered on the hula bar on Oahu and how Wycoff, a crusty lieutenant who was no longer on board our boat, got completely wasted there one night a few months ago and made a fool of himself.

4EVER, I replied.

ME2, Terry responded for the second time.Then he tapped: I LIKE U.

I L U 2, I responded.

U BOSS, he said."Boss" was a slang term from the mid-sixties, equivalent to "cool" today.

U 2, I replied.Then I got bold.WHEN?I hoped he understood I was talking about sex.

He seemed to understand.SHORE, was his reply.I guessed that was understandable, but it deflated my spirits.We'd have to wait until we got on shore to have any real contact.Dinner ended at that point and I didn't get to say anything else.Later on in my bunk--hoping my hard-on would go down--I realized Terry was absolutely right.It was insane and dangerous trying to do anything on this boat.The only person who had any privacy on the boat was the skipper, and trying to sneak into the captain's cabin would get both of us court-martialed and probably imprisoned, as would any other kind of intimate behavior anywhere else, if it was discovered.But it was exciting just to know there was someone else on the boat who shared my feelings, and we had a secret.I couldn't wait for the next time we were able to "chat."I spent the next few days reacquainting myself with Morse code.

A few days later at dinner--thankfully Terry and I were on the same shift--we repeated the performance.VIRGIN? he asked me.

I tapped back, W MEN.U?

HAD FEW, he replied.NOT SINCE NAVY.I took that to mean he'd had no action since joining up.Then he tapped a fairly long message--at least, long by Morse Code standards--SUB DUTY MAKE ME HORNY.

ME 2, I replied.U CUTEST ON BOAT.

FLATTERED, he said.

By now my lust had become a madness.It was torture, knowing that this beautiful boy wanted to be with me, but there was nothing we could do about it.Whenever I collapsed into my bunk after a long day's work, as soon as my eyes were closed I dreamed about Terry's hands on me, the sounds he would make as he approached orgasm, and the warm wet feeling of his cum spurting against me or inside of me.It got to be that thinking of my own pleasure was irrelevant, because just thinking of getting Terry off was the hottest thing I could ever imagine.I hoped he felt the same way about me, but there was no way to judge the depth of his feeling, whether it was just hormonal attraction or whether he actually felt something for me emotionally.Our Morse code conversations were very good at keeping the engines running so to speak, but they were pretty short on actual substantive content.

Finally one day we were working in the torpedo room and the ship's loudspeakers crackled to life."Now hear this," said the crisp voice of Captain DeWeese, who'd been our skipper since I had come aboard."The [boat] has received new orders.We'll be putting in to Manila on 9 January for resupply, mail exchange and refueling.I have authorized liberty privileges for members of the crew who qualify.That is all."

A great whoop went up through the boat from stem to stern.Graben looked at me, his eyes ablaze, and he howled like a dog at the moon.I could already feel myself stiffening in my skivvies.Liberty!Unless one of us was unlucky enough to have to stand watch on 9 January, we would finally get to consummate our nascent relationship."Boss out of sight," Terry muttered, still smiling, as we went back to work.The ninth of January was still two weeks away, but it didn't matter.We were finally going to get what we wanted.

*** *** ***

When we got to Manila, the whole boat went crazy.We had not been on shore for months, and the Philippines--or anywhere in Southeast Asia, for that matter--meant one thing to the members of our crew: sex.This was in the days before AIDS, and a shore stint in Manila, Bangkok or any port in South Vietnam meant you could get basically whatever you wanted or needed to fill your needs and not have to worry about the consequences, so long as you were reasonably careful and had the money to spend.Graben and I were not worried about that, however.The only money we would spend ashore would be at the bars, because the sex we wanted was from each other, and it would be free.It was only a question of where and when, and how to get together so that the other members of our crew wouldn't suspect us.

Thankfully neither Graben or I had to stand watch on January 9th, and we were free to go on liberty.Lieutenant Freitas gave us a long lecture before we went ashore about "responsibility," mainly how to protect ourselves against venereal diseases and that we should keep in mind that we "represented Uncle Sam."He seemed dreadfully embarrassed the whole time, which meant to me that some one of the officers--probably Evanston, the doctor--had put him up to it.As soon as we descended the gangplank guys were whooping and hollering about all the "poontang" they were going to get, and they meant it.Graben said something too."Man, I can't WAIT for the hot fucking pussy I'm going to get tonight...can you?" he said, winking at me.From the dynamic of our own sub rosa communication I know that he was asking me if I still wanted to have sex with him."I can't either," I replied, with as much gusto as I could muster, hoping to impress on him how badly I wanted to fuck him, or be fucked by him.I didn't care what Graben wanted to do.Back when I first discovered my sexuality there were certain "lines" that I didn't want to cross, but now they seemed curiously quaint. If Terry wanted to pound his dick up my ass for hours on end, I was more than happy to let him do it.I just wanted to be with him, and I hope he knew it.

We went with a couple of the other guys to Crazy Wah's, the bar that was a frequent hangout for submarine crews.It was every bit as cheesy as you would imagine a Navy bar in the '60s--the bar had a big thatched awning over it, drinks were served in tiki cups, and the lights were always bright red or magenta or emerald green.Timmons was with us, and we had several beers there, though I noticed Graben was kind of slow in drinking his. Naturally the hookers showed up.All of them were extremely attractive women, exotic Asian beauties with olive skin and beautiful curves, and if my lust for Terry wasn't controlling me I probably would have purchased the services of one of them.Terry pretended to be interested, but as the two of us went up to the bar to get more drinks he whispered to me, "Get a girl and I'll get one too.We'll ask one of the guys where to take them, a hotel or something.Then we'll ditch them on the street, I'll go first, and you follow later."He waved at the bartender."Two beers, please." Then again to me, in a low voice: "Last beers for us.I want you sober."

I just nodded.My penis was rock-hard.Being given orders by Graben, in anticipation of consummating our desire for each other, was incredibly exciting.We got our beers.Terry smiled and sidled up to one of the beautiful Filipino whores."Hey, baby, you got a date tonight?" he said smoothly, and the way he did it and the look in his eyes would have convinced you that there wasn't a gay gene in Terry's entire body.But I knew he wanted me, and not that beautiful woman.It was incredibly flattering.

I got a girl too.I didn't even catch her name; she was a short lady in a colorful low-cut flowered dress, and her English wasn't too good.The other guys from the sub kept pounding back the beers and the juke box kept wailing Beatles tunes.Finally I saw Graben tap Timmons on the shoulder and whisper to him.With his head he motioned toward his own hooker. Timmons smiled, tipped back some beer, and told him something.Timmons's beer was almost gone, so he accompanied Graben back up toward the bar, where I stood."There's a little hotel down the street," Graben said, his eyes glistening."What say we take these beautiful ladies and go have some fun?"He winked at me.Timmons whooped.

"You torpedo room guys are smooth!" he said, almost dropping his new beer.

"Let's go," I smiled.I took the hand of my Filipino escort.

We walked out of Crazy Wah's and down the street toward the hotel, just like any other sailors with their temporary girlfriends.In front of the hotel--it had ancient shutters with peeling paint and looked somewhat seedy--Graben said something to his date, and she stopped and waited for him by the door of the hotel.He walked over to me, and whispered in my ear, "I'm going to go up with her and then send her back.Wait five minutes and come up and in the meantime ditch your date.Pay her a few bucks just to get her to go away.Come up and stand in the hallway and wait 'til my chick comes out so you know which room it is."

"Yes, sir," I replied.

He went back to his whore, all smiles, and the two of them went in.He still had a bottle of beer in his hand from the bar.My date, who had not heard Terry's whispered commands and probably wouldn't have understood them anyway, smiled at me and ran a finger down the back of my tunic."We go up?" she said cheerfully.

I put my arms around her neck and smiled sweetly."I'm sorry, honey," I said.I reached into my pocket and pulled out a ten-dollar bill."You're really nice, but I don't think so.You take this."

She didn't seem to understand."You no want?" she said.

I shook my head."No.No want."I thrust the bill into her hand.These whores, I knew, were just trying to scrape by, to make a living; this woman probably had children to feed or elderly parents or some other story. "Thank you, though."I kissed her on the neck.

My dick was stiffening in my skivvies again when I casually walked into the lobby of the hotel, lighting a cigarette.There was a rickety staircase on the far wall, and I ascended.There was a tattered old U.S.O. flag, probably dating from World War II, hanging on the back wall of the lobby. This hotel probably did half its business from horny sailors hooking up with the local women.

I paused at the top of the stairs.The dingy corridor was lit with bare light bulbs.The doors were all louvered, but the rooms seemed reasonably private.I waited, smoking.Terry seemed to be taking a very long time. I could feel a slight wet spot in my underwear right at the tip of my dick. The thought of finally getting it on with Terry was making me wet!I'd been waiting for this night for months.I hope it didn't go too fast. Terry didn't have to tell me not to drink too much.I wanted to remember everything.

Finally a door at the far end of the hall opened and the whore strode out. She looked indignant, but she was stuffing a bill into her dress, so I know that Terry paid her something.I dropped my cigarette, crushed it to ashes with my boot, and waited until her footfalls died off at the bottom of the stairs.Then I went to the door at the far end.I knocked three times. There was a response knock, also three times.I opened the door.

He already had his shirt off, and his dungaree pants were unbuttoned, revealing his starched white briefs.He still held the beer bottle.He turned away from the door and walked over to the bed, which had a rusty iron frame."Stay where you are," he said.He sat down on the bed, leaning up against the wall, legs outstretched in front of him, and tipped the beer bottle to his lips."I want to look at you a minute."

Suddenly I was nervous.I wasn't sure what to say.This moment that we'd been anticipating for months was now here.I hoped I didn't disappoint him.

"Strip to your shorts, sailor," he commanded me.

I did.I took off my shoes, tunic, undershirt, and dungarees, and stood there in my underwear, which was tented out by my dick.Terry seemed to like the look of me.He put the beer bottle on the table next to the bed, and beckoned for me to come closer.I stepped over to the bed.With one hand Terry gently caressed the wettening bulge at the front of my underwear.With his other hand, he reached into his own underwear, touching himself, but not really stroking.

"You're wet," he said, touching the damp fabric at the head of my penis. "I do that to you?"

"I want you so bad, Terry," I whispered.

"I want you too."

He let go of me, pulled off his pants and his underwear, and then slid off the bed and knelt on the floor.A moment later I felt his probing hands pulling down the band of my underwear, and the warm, soft touch of the tip of Terry's tongue on my dickhead.I moaned.He pulled my underwear down to my ankles, and then caressed me with both hands, moving up and down my shaft, rolling my balls gently in his palm, and even reaching back to probe my butthole.At the same time he licked the precum off the tip of my dick. It sent a bolt of electricity through my entire body, and I gasped.Then I felt his warm lips close around my penis.He pulled my shaft in and out of his mouth with a rhythm that I soon fell into with my hips.The pleasure was incredible.He knew right where to touch me with the tip of his tongue, the sensitive spot on the underside of my dick.With my hands I started to caress his stubbly head and his bare shoulders."Oh, Terry, that's so good," I moaned."Don't stop, man.Aw man, that's great...that feels so good...you're gonna make me cum, sweetie, you're gonna make me cum in your mouth..."

I doubt Terry gave me head for more than a minute and a half before I was on the brink of the most explosive orgasm I'd ever experienced.I could feel my balls pulling up tight against my body and the cum was welling up in them.The feeling of Terry's tongue against my slippery tip was incredibly gratifying."I'm coming," I warned him."I'm gonna cum, I'm coming in your mouth, I'm coming in your mouth COMING IN YOUR MOUTH UUHHHHH!"I fired my hot load down Terry's throat with the force of a torpedo.He swallowed my cum, licking and tonguing my tip as if begging for more, and the pleasure would not stop shooting out of me.I don't know how many spurts I had for him but it was far more than my usual ejaculation, and much more intense.When it was over I was gripping his shoulders hard enough to make red spots, and I was sweating and dizzy. When he was done swallowing my semen he licked my slackening dick and my balls and then down the insides of my thighs.Then he sat up and pulled me down onto the bed with him, and the burning thing I felt brushing against the hair of my thigh felt like a bar of hot iron.

"You've got such a nice dick," Terry whispered, kissing me on my ears, down my neck, and to my shoulder."I want to suck you off as soon as you can get hard again."

My hands were already caressing his penis, feeling its length and girth and warmth between my palms.He was about six and a half inches, cut, and his dick was thicker than I anticipated; on the whole he was a little bigger than me but not by much."I want to make you cum," I told him.I felt something wet ooze against the skin of my palm."You've already got some cum on your dick."

"Reach down into my pants, they're on the floor," he commanded me."My pocket."

"What?"

"Something we need so I won't hurt you."

With those words suddenly I understood his intentions: he was going to butt-fuck me, and what I was looking for was something to lubricate with. I was nervous, but I knew I wanted it.The bed was low and I could easily reach down with my hand--my right hand, for my left was busy wiping Terry's slippery precum all over his dickhead--and find a pair of dungarees.I had to root around in various pockets but finally found a small tin of something.I pulled it out and gave it to him.It was Vaseline.Today it's said that petroleum-based lubes are harmful, but in the '60s it was basically all you had.Terry took the tin from me and opened it.He kissed me several times, forcing his tongue into my mouth.I could taste the beer on his breath, mixed with a stale, sour flavor that I realized was the taste of my own sperm.After several long kisses he began smearing Vaseline on my hands."Put it on my dick," he said."Come on, grease me up."

I obeyed him.We were now laying together in a spooning position, so I had to reach behind me.He moaned softly as I greased up his member.I could feel his slippery head moving warmly against the crease of my ass.It felt so good that I wiggled closer to him so I could get more contact with his penis.His hands were slippery with jelly too; he was working it into my asshole."Relax," he told me, when his fingers met resistance."Deep breath."I drew it in and let it out, and let my body go slack.I felt first one, then two jellied fingertips penetrate my sphincter.It was intrusive, and almost on the verge of pain, but it started to become quite pleasant.I was still lubing Terry's dick, wiping jelly on his tip and all the way down to his balls.He moved his fingers inside of me."Feel good?" he said.

"Yes."

"You scared?I don't want to hurt you."

"No.I'm not scared."

When he had three fingers in my butt comfortably he knew I was ready and he slowly slid them out.A moment later I felt the pressure of something hard and rounded, poking right at my loose butthole.My body resisted for a few moments, but Terry pushed harder, and then I accepted him.His head slid inside of me.I felt the ridge pass through my sphincter, and then the hard roundness of his shaft.Terry grunted.He pushed his penis as far up my butthole as he could go.I felt a very pleasant pressure deep inside of me, on my prostate.My own dick began to harden again.

"I'm not hurting you am I?" Terry whispered.

"No," I said.It did hurt a little bit, but I didn't mind it at all.It felt warm and intimate.Terry wrapped his arms around me.He fingered my hard nipples as he drew me close.With a grunt that told me how good he was feeling, he started to hump me very slowly, drawing his rigid penis in and out of my butthole.I kept telling myself to relax.

One of his hands wandered downwards and found my own dick, again erect.He started to masturbate me slowly in rhythm with the thrusting of his hips. We both groaned.The pleasure of having a penis in my butt was greater than I'd anticipated.And it was exciting knowing that I was making Terry feel so good.

His thrusts soon became quicker and more powerful.The iron frame of the bed began to creak."Feels...so...good," he was whispering.I could feel sweat dampening his smooth chest that was pressed up against my back.Soon he was panting and pumping faster and faster.His hand was clutched tightly around my dick, now slippery from my own precum.I wasn't too far away from orgasm myself.Finally he started to moan.His last few strokes against me were the hardest yet and I could feel his entire body tense as he neared climax.His sinewy arms clutched me tightly."UNNNGGHHH!"I could feel the wiggling, jerking spasms of his penis as he came in my butt. The heat of his semen deep in my bowels was a very curious and pleasurable sensation.Only when his body relaxed, and his dick--still buried in my ass--began to slacken did he resume masturbating me.I was almost to orgasm."Oh Terry, yes, yes, I'm coming!" I gasped.My eyes were open. In the first shot of my orgasm I watched my semen fly two feet away from the bed, landing on the floor beyond the crumpled pile of our dungarees and our underwear.As I continued to come Terry wiped it all over my dick and my balls, covering my groin with my own fresh sperm.It felt good. Finally we lay together, relaxing our bodies, still breathing heavily.His half-limp dick pulled out of my butt and he hugged me close, his hands still wet with my cum.The bed smelled like sweat, shit and cum, but it was mixed with the aroma of diesel from our clothes just underneath us on the floor.It's that smell that I remember about my encounter with Terry Graben that's almost more real to me than the memory of the sensations. Almost 30 years later, the memory of that smell still gets me hard.

We slept fitfully that night, and enjoyed each other some more.Towards dawn Terry sucked me again.I came in his mouth and he swallowed my cum. Then I made him lay on his back and I masturbated him.For some reason I wanted to watch him cum, and when he did I licked all the semen off my hands, his dick and his balls.Then we showered together in the tiny grimy bathroom of that hotel room.The soap was pretty coarse but we still played a little bit, stroking each other, lathering up each other's dicks and I put my finger up his butt which he seemed to like.When we got out of the shower the advance of the morning light against the moth-eaten curtains told us that our night of passion was over.We were both sad to see it end.But we said nothing as we got our uniforms back on and prepared to go back to the boat, and our strange encapsulated existence in the steel tube under the waves.

Terry and I always planned to have another tryst, and we continued to talk to each other in Morse code.We decided we'd take advantage of any shore leave we could get, but even then we knew it might be months before we had another chance.Unfortunately we never did.In April 1967, Terry Graben got new orders transferring him out to another boat."It's all right, we'll get together back in Norfolk," he told me cheerfully as he left, but I knew that he was very frightened, and very sad that we might never see each other again.That was a depressing spring for me.I still loved the sub service and there were plenty of other hot guys to serve as eye candy and fantasy material, but none that quite matched the feelings I had for Terry.

Terry Graben wound up on one of the Skipjack-class nuclear submarines, called the Scorpion, SSN-589.If you know anything about the history of submarines, you'd know that was a doomed ship.The Scorpion was lost with all hands on May 22, 1968, and the remains of Terry Graben and all his shipmates lie to this day on the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean, 10,000 feet down.I won't say that I loved Terry, but the feelings we shared and enjoyed were very special to both of us.I never spoke to anyone about Terry.Our pleasure was his and mine, and after he was gone, it was mine alone.But now you know of it too.