UNCLE OTTO

by
Zsolt Alapi

“Fee-lix, Fee-lix,” he yelled over his shoulder, bent low over the handlebars of the bicycle peddling hard, “you SUCK….I’m gonna beat you again. I’m better and faster than you, Felix.”

The two boys, wearing only their swimming trunks, were racing down the last, long hill before the house and the gravel driveway, their hard young bodies nut brown from the summer’s sun, straining, their hair flattened by the wind. Stephen was ahead by about 7 bicycle lengths and turned hard into the gravel drive, skidding and almost falling as he came to a stop by the porch, spraying small stones and dirt, where the man was sitting, watching them, smoking.

Uncle Otto, as his cousin Felix called him, was a big man. He sat in an old wicker chair wearing only shorts because of the heat, the dark hair that covered his chest, back, and arms matted with sweat. He got up and walked toward Stephen and stood close to him on the drive. Stephen could smell the sour odour of tobacco and beer.

“So, you beat him again. You’re stronger and bigger than him, I can see that. You have muscles that have grown since the last time I saw you. And you’re taller now, getting close to six feet, though you do need some meat on those bones. How old are you now?”

“Almost thirteen,” Stephen answered, and made to move away from him, but Uncle Otto reached out and pinched his biceps hard, and then ran his rough fingers over Stephen’s bare shoulders, tracing a bead of sweat that had gathered just below his neck.

“Yup, you’re a fine boy alright…like your cousin there…..Hey, Felix, so you finally made it home after all, eh?”

Felix came to join them panting, out of breath from the exertion of their race, and smiled at Otto.

“He beats me every time, but I don’t really care.”

He was shorter than Stephen, and smaller boned. He had long fingers, artist’s hands, someone had once said, and it was true, for Felix was good at painting and knew all about colours and how to match clothes and all those other things Stephen was never good at nor cared about.

“Come on upstairs, and I’ll get you two something to drink,” Uncle Otto said. He opened the door to his flat, mounted the stairs, swaying a bit as he did so, Stephen noticed.

There were four garden chairs and a table on the large upstairs balcony that overlooked the back yard. Two tall oaks seemed to join together, their branches almost embracing, providing welcome shade from the hot sun, and hiding the balcony behind a screen of foliage. Uncle Otto came out with some lemonade for the boys, and then went back into his flat, reappearing with a fresh bottle of beer and what looked like a shoe box.

He slumped down in the chair between the two boys and lit a cigarette, his legs spread out wide, almost touching the boys’ bare legs. Stephen felt the heat from his body and could almost feel the coarse, dark hairs from Uncle Otto’s legs touching his own flesh. He felt the goose bumps begin to grow on his own skin and moved his legs away, squeezing them together into his groin.

Just then, Uncle Otto reached over to get the shoe box, and as he did so, he knocked over his beer onto the table so that some of it spilled and dribbled down onto Stephen’s lap.

“Shit,” Uncle Otto growled. He took a napkin and started dabbing up the spilled beer on the table. “Sorry.” Then, he took the wet napkin and reached over and started dabbing Stephen’s groin, laughing.

“Good thing you have swimming trunks on,” he said, as he left off.

Stephen didn’t know what to say, but turned red with embarrassment.

After wiping up the spilled beer Uncle Otto said to Felix:

“Reach over there and hand me that box, will you?”

Felix did so, and gave it to him.

“Now open it. Show your cousin what’s inside.”

Felix pushed his chair closer to Stephen’s and opened the box. It contained many pictures, some of them black and white, some of them in colour. But these were pictures like Stephen had never seen before. In the first one, there was a naked man holding a woman upside down in the air. The man had a big thing in front of him, and the woman had her mouth wrapped around it, her hand grabbing, clutching it. The man had his face buried between the woman’s legs. Stephen could see the black patch of hair near his mouth. With his other hand, he was holding an electric cord attached to a large lamp. He held the plug near the woman’s cheeks. It looked like he was going to put it in.

“She’s got her mouth on his dick, and he’s putting something into her hole,” Stephen thought. Even thinking these words embarrassed him, and his face flushed again. He wanted to look away, but couldn’t keep his eyes averted.

Meanwhile, Felix kept turning over one picture after another, giggling.

“You like that?” Uncle Otto said. He put his arm around Felix’s thin shoulders and patted his head. “How does that make you feel?” His voice had become gruff, and he seemed to be wheezing.

Then, he reached down into Felix’s lap and grabbed the bulge that was thrusting up through the Spandex material.

“It’s hard….I can feel it. How about yours?”

Uncle Otto almost staggered as he bent over Stephen and put his hand roughly onto his groin. Stephen felt his testicles contract high into his body. He wanted to get away.

“No, nothing yet. Do you want to see some more? I have other pictures and lots of magazines.”

“I’ve got to go downstairs,” Stephen stammered. “I have to use the bathroom. Come on Felix. We have to go now. Come on…..now!”

Slowly Felix got up and followed Stephen, who was far ahead of him, downstairs.

Uncle Otto watched them, his figure half hidden behind the canopy of trees.

*

“That was Uncle Otto on the phone,” Felix said. “He said he’s going to come down this evening after supper to check up on us. My mom and dad asked him to.”

Stephen remembered that when his Uncle Laci and Aunt Erzsi were going out the door, Erzsi had said to them:

“Remember, if you boys need anything, call Uncle Otto from upstairs. The number is by the phone on a “post-it” note. There’s casserole in the ‘fridge for supper and we left some money for a pizza on Sunday. We’ll be back late Sunday night. Don’t wait up for us. Be good.”

And now they were away, and he and Felix were alone. With Uncle Otto.

“Felix, I don’t want him to come down tonight,” Stephen blurted out. “Why is he coming down? To show us more picture? He touched you, Fee….and me too….he touched us THERE….”

“Oh, don’t worry about Uncle Otto,” Felix answered. “He’s nice. Mom and Dad went away before, and he looked after me. We had fun together. He even took me to a movie and bought me a present after.”

“I don’t want him to come. He’s gonna kill us.”

“Don’t be stupid. He’s nice, I said. He won’t hurt you.”

“Yes he will. I heard what men like him do to boys. They bugger them and then they bury them…..What’s bugger anyway?”

“It’s what you got in your nose…..you’re full of it.” Felix laughed.

Stephen laughed too, despite himself. He liked Felix, though Felix was a bit odd at times. He remembered the painting he had done of Venus, copied from a book of mythology that Felix had shown him. She was naked, with big breasts and a round, full rear. Stephen thought she was beautiful. When he had looked at Felix’s drawing, Stephen had felt feelings like he had never had before. Felix had seen him blush, and had shown him other pictures, of other naked women, and also of men.

The two boys ate the leftover casserole in silence watching TV. Stephen looked at the time, and his heart began to beat faster. He finally got up the courage to speak.

“Do we have to let him in, Fee? I’m scared. What if he tries to do something to you or me?”

“Will you relax? Nothing’s going to happen, I tell you. He comes down, has a drink or two. All he does is watch.”

“Watch what?”

“Nothing. You’ll see.” Felix was silent for a long time.

“He even gave me money, you know.”

“Money? For what.”

“You know…to watch.”

But Stephen didn’t know. Each minute drove him further into imagining what would happen. He even began to look at each lamp in the living room, wondering how it would feel to have a cord pushed into that part of you. At that thought, he felt his sphincter contract and the heat rise in his face.

Felix left the room and was gone for a long time. Stephen, meanwhile, walked over to the door to make sure it was locked. He put on the extra chain at the bottom. Then, he went into Uncle Laci’s study where there were a few loose weights and exercise devices. He saw one that was two long, round sticks joined by spring attachments. You had to stand on the bottom stick and push the top one as high as you could over your head. He had seen Uncle Laci do this many times in the morning as he puffed and swore, sweating. Stephen picked up the exercise device and saw that he could detach the springs from the couplings. After he did so, he had two long sticks, about three and a half feet each with sharp metal hook ‘n eyes jutting out each end. He picked up one of the sticks and swung it loosely in his hands, and then he walked back into the living room holding both in his hand.

Felix was there sitting on the sofa in his bathrobe. He had started up the large fan because of the heat, and he turned around to face Stephen. Stephen looked at him and saw that there was something very different about his cousin. It was Felix’s eyes and mouth, he realized. His eyes were darker, and seemed to stand out more in his face. Also, his lips were a bright red, and Stephen was shocked to realize that Felix had put on his mother’s lipstick.

“What did you do to yourself?”

But Felix only laughed and started singing a silly song that was a combination of Magyar and German, something about Venus and her “cici and po po”. And then Felix got on all fours and wiggled his bottom in the direction of the fan. With his other hand, he had loosened the belt of his bathrobe so that it fell open. The fan blew hot air and lifted the robe, lifting it so that Stephen could see Felix’s behind and his penis jutting out, swaying with the two sacks. Felix had hair down there, he noticed, as he tried to look away, afraid of his cousin for the first time.

“Look at me….I’m beautiful….don’t you think I’m beautiful, Stevie?” Felix was laughing and swaying his bottom to imaginary music.

And just then, the doorbell rang, three sharp rings. Felix ran to the door, holding his bathrobe together, laughing.

“Don’t open it, Fee,” Stephen said. He wanted to yell at his cousin.

But Felix removed the chains and slid back the lock to admit the man, smiling at him.

Uncle Otto had changed into another pair of shorts and a bright Hawaiian shirt. He looked cleaner, like he had had a shower, and he smelled of a strong cologne that seemed to pervade the room. Trembling, Stephen noticed that some dark tufts of hair were exposed between the top button of his shirt and his neck. His hair was slicked back and parted in the middle, and he carried a large bottle of De Kuyper’s gin in his hand.

Uncle Otto seemed nervous and drunk. He walked into the kitchen, and returned with three glasses and a bottle of 7-Up. He set everything down and poured three drinks.

“Here, boys, drink up. I think you’ll like it.” He passed the glass to Felix first, then to Stephen. As Stephen clutched the long highball glass, the heat from his hand created a splotch of condensation on it, and he put the glass down on the coffee table without drinking.

“Come on, drink up. Look, Felix has already finished half of his. Tell him how good it is, Felix.”

“Yeah, try it. No one will know.”

“Come on, kid, I don’t want to have to ask you twice.”

Stephen raised the glass to his lips with trembling fingers and drank a deep gulp. Instantly, he started to gag and cough, the bitter liquor burning his throat despite the sweetness of the soda.

Uncle Otto and Felix both laughed at him, and Stephen turned an even brighter red.

“Guess you really are new at this,” Uncle Otto laughed. “Not like your cousin here.” He squeezed one of Felix’s thighs and then went to sit next to Stephen on the sofa.

“Say, Stephen…what does a handsome boy like you do for fun? Do you have a girlfriend yet? No? Well, what about you and Felix? Do you sometimes take a bath together? Sleep in the same bed when the parents are away? Do you rub against each other during the night?”

He sounded hoarse, and he lit a cigarette with a trembling hand, placing the other on Stephen’s knee. Stephen jumped up and ran into the bathroom, locking the door behind him. Once inside, he curled up into a ball and started rocking back and forth on the cool tiles. He sat there for a long time staring at the white tiles of the shower stall.

Finally, he got up and put his ear to the door, but everything was quite. Stephen unlocked the door softly and crept out toward the living room, flattening himself against the wall.

When, he stuck his head around the corner, he saw the man on his knees holding Felix. Felix was naked, and the man’s hands were violently squeezing Felix’s backside as he buried his face into Felix’s stomach.

Stephen turned away, and as he did so, he saw the two sticks he had brought from Uncle Laci’s room leaning against an armchair. He grabbed one of the sticks tightly in his two fists and walked as quietly as he could toward the boy and the kneeling man before him. Stephen raised the stick and brought it down with all of his strength. He heard a load groan, and the man toppled over, releasing Felix, who looked at Stephen in terror.

“Run, Felix, run….” Stephen said, and he raised the stick again and brought it down on the man’s head, just as he was trying to raise himself from the carpet. He heard a sharp crack and saw the trail of blood begin from the man’s temple and drop onto the ground. Felix didn’t run, but only stood before him, naked, the red on his lips smeared, his eyes big, holding his half-erect penis in one hand.

And then Stephen was crying and running as fast as he could out the door to the garage where they had parked the bicycles earlier in the day.

Once on the bicycle, Stephen began to peddle furiously up the hill where they would always go to race with his cousin. There were no cars on the road, and everyone in the neighbourhood seemed to have turned in for the evening, eating supper or watching television behind their curtains and blinds.

Stephen felt the evening air, cool, on his sweating body. Somehow, he thought of the end of summer and of autumn around the corner and when he would be back home from his vacation.

Peddling faster and faster up to the top of the hill, Stephen turned around frantically and began his descent, bent low over the handlebars, no longer having to peddle as the bicycle gathered speed. For a moment, he felt as if he were flying, free, racing against no one this time, with nothing to think about but speed, the wind, and the coming of night.

© Zsolt Alapi
Reproduced with permission