"A BAD VIBE"

Garrick spoke up. He said he had had about ten threesomes— "Hey, I'm thirty-five, a lot of shit has happened to me" — and several were with another guy. "It was always with my best friend, Bill," he said.

Bill was a model, and Garrick and Bill met at a gym downtown when Bill asked Garrick to spot him on the bench press. "Most of the guys who worked out there were gay," said Garrick. "So after that, it was hke we were going out of our way to prove we weren't gay. The three-way was almost a validation of our heterosexuality. You're validating your masculinity to another guy.

"With me and Bill, it was about the thrill of the freak show," Garrick said. "Sometimes both of us had intercourse with the girl at the same time. Once a woman's submitted to that role of being with two guys, she's pretty much open to anything."

Garrick leaned forward in his chair and took a drag of his cigarette. "Bill once did it with another guy," he said. He laughed. "I always kid him about it. There was interaction between them. I don't know. To me, that constitutes latent homosexual yearnings. Do I have those yearnings? I don't know. Maybe Bill wasn't my

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The younger men got kind of quiet.

Instead, Peter spoke. "I'm not a homophobe—I did happen to be in a situation with my best friend once and another woman. They were sleeping in a queen-sized bed in the same room. And I remember the vibes of sex. And when it was over, his hand was burned. Even though he was my best friend, I saw that he was an extra man on the scene, and it was such a bad vibe. I just remember pushing his burned hand away. It was such a bad vibe."

We all sat back for a moment. It was getting late. Almost time to go for dinner.

"Aw, I don't know," Garrick said. "I'm convinced threesomes are good for your psyche emotionally. It's such an atypical sexual experience, it's almost like it doesn't count. As soon as it's over, you don't think about it. If you cheat on your wife or girlfriend, you usually feel guilt afterwards. With this, there's no way you're going to have an ongoing relationship, so it's no threat.

"Besides," Garrick continued, "it brings you closer to the guy. Cements the relationship. What else can you do that even comes close? You're sharing the most intimate experience." And what about afterward? The next morning? "Oh, no problem. I remember, once, we all went to breakfast," Garrick said. "I remember it, because I paid."