Lando smooths out his non-existent moustache hairs. “What about the bartender?”
“Yeah, he’s cute.”
He’s a shorter skinny guy with bleached-blonde hair. Lando smiles, and I have no idea why.
“That guy?” He points to another lad with the slim physique.
“Also cute.”
“Okay, sure, okay,” he says while tip-tapping his chin with his fingers. He continues to point out different men, and I say yes or no based on nothing more than vibes. “You want to hear my conclusion?”
“Shoot,” I say.
“You like twinks, and twunks, and possibly otters.”
I have no idea what any of this means, but I’m logging the terms in my brain so I can google later.
“This is all about physical appearance, though?”
“Of course,” Lando says. We inch closer to the bar. “For hookups nothing else matters besides looks. Do you really care about someone’s personality if all you’re gonna do is shower them in cum and fuck off?”
I’m speechless for a few seconds. I actually don’t have a response to that. Lando’s right, in a way. I care about Lionel’s personality because I want more than a hookup with him, but if I’m looking for guys to practise on, what difference does it make?
“You told me the other night you go for jerks,” I say, feeling the random urge to turn this discussion away from the topic of me.
“I did say that.” But he doesn’t elaborate.
We’ve reached the front of the queue, and Lando is ordering our drinks. He’s having Disaronno with full-fat Coke because apparently the artificial sweeteners in diet soda trigger his IBS. We take our drinks and sequester ourselves in a more private space near the edge of the dance floor.
“Right, so, steps two and three of pulling. I have some absolute fail-proof methods I’m going to teach you. This is highly classified information, so Iexpect you to keep it to yourself . . .” Lando pauses and waits for me to answer his non-question.
I “zip” my mouth closed.
“The first thing you’re going to do is locate your next target. Keep your eyes on him until he looks at you, and then what you’re gonna do is look away like he’s caught you staring, and then look back. If he’s still looking over when you look back, you’re in. Smile, look away very briefly, and then look back. Got it?”
“Um . . .” What the fuck?
“Like this, okay? Pretend I’m a handsome stranger, and you want to fuck me.”
Shouldn’t be hard. “Okay.”
Lando jogs over to a high table a few metres away. It’s waist height on him, but there are no bar stools. A group of people hang around the other edge and are intrigued by Lando’s arrival, but he blanks them.
I stare at him, but a second later he comes running back. “No, no. I’ll be you, and you’re a random hottie, and I’ll show you how to do it.”
He runs back, and I look away, count in my head for a few seconds and look at him. He does exactly what he said he would, averts his eyes, then glances back and smiles coyly, and holy fuck, is it effective.
How?
How is that possible?
“Now you try!” he yells, ignoring the baffled looks from the group next to him.
I do what he says.
“Nice, okay.” He’s back beside me. “Could use a little more practice to make it seem a bit more natural, but it’s definitely getting there. You can always bite your thumbnail like this.” He demos the thumbnail chewing, and he’s right. I want to fuck him more. Whoops.
“So, that was step two. Step three is the clincher, okay? And it’s another nonverbal cue. What you do when you have the guy’s full attention is you lock the fuck in. Make him feel like there’s only you and him and everyoneelse is nothing but a meaningless blur in the background. Then you let your gaze sweep all the way down his body, right down to his shoes, back up again, and then you do this kind of half-smile, half-lip-bite thing. Honestly, it’sneverfailed me.” Lando puts so much emphasis on the word “never” that I instantly believe him.
