I had heard many warnings and cautionary tales about this fragrant secret garden from friends and college advisers alike:. Were they really talking about the park with the huge fountain, the one where the Mount Pleasant abuelas paraded their tricycling grandchildren like show ponies, where the men gathered to play soccer or chess?
The answers could be found everywhere I roamed that first humid and curious night. On all sides of me were men gathered or alone, strolling or walking briskly as if late for an appointment, only to reappear minutes later on the opposite side of the grand fountain, as would a shark or vulture tightening its circle around tempting prey. Truth be told, I checked my watch to make sure it was really 11 p. Did this many people hang out in a moonlit park this late at night, even if it was a Saturday in the middle of summer?
I pulled the bill of my dark baseball cap farther down my forehead to ensure my anonymity. After all, I reminded myself, I have only come to watch. I had to know if any of the strangely arousing urban legends I had heard about this infamous place—stories that portrayed it as a rare haven where gay black men could search each other out—were true.
He was young like me—his Nikes and peach-fuzz goatee gave him away. I knew exactly what he meant, but did not immediately respond. This only happened in really bad pornos, right? He had the whitest teeth, smooth skin the color of wet sand…. Here, I remember him motioning me to follow him down into the valley. I remember that we scaled a stone wall, stooping as we walked between the brush of a gardenia and hibiscus bushes.
I remember a clearing in these bushes with low, scooping branches that. I remember the half moon, and I remember that we ravaged each other that night. I never saw him again, never knew his name. At times, I go stoned, drunk, or aroused with specific objectives in mind: oral sex, voyeurism, conversation. Unfortunately, these nights are rare, for very few of my boys share my enthusiasm for outdoor casual sex. The occasional crack smoker or deranged derelict who drifts into the park for shelter reminds all of us of the dangers involved should we decide to venture deeper into the world of midnight cruising.
