Bottom (Oberon Modern Plays) Read online

  Yep, I’ve got no idea what I’m talking about. I can’t even taste the food. It’s gone all thick and furry. Like I’m chewing on a sock.

  But he laughs. And his cheeks pinch in the corners which is cute, and I quickly forget that he was late.

  Scene 5

  WILLY dives out of the Date onto the floor and speaks whilst in a press-up position looking spannered at the ceiling. We snap into the Backstory.

  I lost my virginity on Ketamin by the way, which is a horse tranquillizer. The guy asked me if I wanted to take some K and I said ‘OK’ – K… I don’t remember it much at all. I just remember seeing two different images of the ceiling as if my brain couldn’t wire my eyes properly.

  Scene 6

  WILLY jumps back to the Date.

  This is our third date – but I’m still fucking nervous – this is probably the most nervous I’ve ever been. It’s up there with seeing Beyoncé in concert for the first time, and waiting for my mum to pick me up from the police station when I was caught stealing hair gel from Superdrug.

  He is a Bottom. I can tell. It’s like we have silently agreed that he is waiting for me to make the first move. I need to top his bottom, which is something I’ve never done before.

  I am normally the gracious, welcoming, pillow-biting Bottom and I’m fucking nervous because all I keep thinking about trying to push into his wagon wheel and it’s making me very sweaty.

  Message ping. WILLY leaps out of Date with another anxiety move.

  Lucy?

  LUCY:

  No

  Scene 7

  Present Day.

  This third date happened last night. If it’s 7:20 now, that was 23 hours, 20 mins ago.

  I haven’t slept a wink. My mate Bella says you always look you best when you haven’t slept. She kept pulling all-nighters when she started going out with her boyfriend. Kind of like rough and ready. A bit stale…but fizzy. It worked for her, so…

  I guesstimated when he would be home and texted him after one hour and twenty-five minutes. This way he will be able to give me full attention. No distractions.

  I said –

  WILLY gets the phone from LUCY.

  I said, ‘Thanks for last night.’

  Maybe I should have asked him a question? Should I have put a kiss? There’s nothing for him to respond to. ‘Thanks for last night. Full stop.’

  I know he’s read because the double tick on WhatsApp has gone blue…so…

  WILLY gives the phone back to LUCY.

  Thanks Lucy.

  Scene 8

  Backstory.

  I came to the Land of the Gays to find love, which meant I had to ‘go out’ to look for it. Which was expensive. So I found work part-time. Part-time in four different jobs. I’m a teaching assistant, a call centre operator, a theatre usher, and – my main job – a waiter in a burger restaurant.

  He grabs a pink mic and mic stand and works the room. We hear the buzz of a restaurant.

  My job at the restaurant starts off quite fun. I love looking after all the customers and serving the drinks. Clearing the tables. They don’t put me on taking orders for the first few weeks, but I don’t mind as I quite like clearing the tables.

  One of the managers has these plasticky cheeks and a nosey nose. She sits in her office every shift, and I have to bring up her staff meal which she orders around every two hours.

  He sits down with the mic stand in the front row of the audience, facing the other side. This is the Restaurant. It is tight and claustrophobic.

  When I first started, when I was bringing up her meal, she said:

  ‘Ooh Willy – I was really happy when you interviewed for Belinda’s Bangin’ Burgerz. I love gay boys. I’m such a fag hag!’

  She leant in closer to me. I could smell her.

  ‘Ooh I bet you can’t wait to get your hands on our meat!’

  She smelled sweet and synthetic, like she’d rubbed a car air freshener under her armpits.

  ‘So then, tell me Willy, are you a Top or a Bottom?’

  Beat.

  I said, ‘Um…’

  ‘Ah – obviously a Bottom then.’ She winked and sank her brown teeth into a quarter pounder.

  Scene 9

  Mannequin.

  WILLY considers himself.

  Am I a Top or a Bottom?

  He inspects the mannequin.

  He can’t decide.

  He starts to pull down the pants, to look at the bottom –

  WILLY:

  No.

  He pulls up the pants with a snap.

  Scene 10

  Backstory. WILLY sits on the edge of the mannequin block.

  I get home after that shift and I open my laptop.

  Google Chrome

  Gaytube

  Blowjobs

  Anal

  Bareback

  WILLY checks in.

  Self-esteem?

  Great.

  Love for Beyoncé?

  Also great.

  Quest for Love?

  Currently unsuccessful.

  Maybe I should stop wanking and get on Tinder.

  Scene 11

  WILLY goes to his bucket of props and pulls out a pink ukulele.

  …and it’s not a fringe show unless you’ve learnt three chords on the ukulele…

  WILLY goes and sits in the audience.

  Top or Bottom?

  I went on Tinder and I matched with Brian

  He looked quite hunky with a Hawaiian – shirt

  I thought he looked really handsome

  He said ‘Hello Willy how you are you?’

  I said ‘I’m fine thanks, what are you up to tonight?

  To-night?’

  He said ‘Top or Bottom?’

  TOP or BOTTOM?

  TOP or BOTTOM?

  I went on Tinder and I matched with John-o

  He looked handsome with a mono-brow

  Which I thought I could handle

  He said ‘Hello Willy you look saucy’

  I said ‘Hello John-o ooh I do quite like condiments…what’s your favourite?’

  He took a second to respond

  He said ‘Top or Bottom?’

  TOP or BOTTOM?

  TOP or BOTTOM?

  Text message ping.

  …Lucy who is that please?

  LUCY:

  Er it’s your flatmate, he says that the kitch–

  WILLY:

  OK – don’t worry – it’s fine.

  WILLY continues to sing.

  I went on Tinder matched with Susan –

  But she wasn’t my type

  But she’s here tonight…say hello Susan

  WILLY picks someone in the audience to be Susan. Gets them to wave.

  Hello Susan!

  I went on Tinder and I matched with Alec

  He had a nice smile and a phallic – cactus in his profile picture

  I said ‘Hello Alec how’s your cactus?’

  He said ‘Hello Willy do you like my prick?’

  I said ‘Yeah it looks lovely…’

  He said ‘Top or Bottom?’

  TOP or BOTTOM?

  TOP or BOTTOM?

  Before you make friction

  You gotta make a decision

  Before you make friction

  What’s your position?

  Top? Or Bottom?

  Scene 12

  Sex Facts.

  WILLY strides up and down the stage, like a know-it-all professor giving a lecture.

  In general we can say there are two categories for bum sex.

  WILLY goes to his bucket and gets out a pink top hat and a pink beret.

  Top –

  He puts the top hat on someone.

  – and Bottom.

  He puts the beret on someone on the opposite side.

  In sex the Top is the penetrator and the Bottom is the penetrated. The fucker and the fucked.

  Now I am not an expert, but I think biology gives heterosexual relationships
a clue as to who is going to be the Top and who is going to be the Bottom. BUT with Queer relationships that kind of goes out the window. But we still try and stick to these binary rules…because Humans like rules.

  Nowadays people are clear on their Tinder or Grindr profiles what they are looking for, by either stating it in their ‘about me’ section, or asking ‘Top or Bottom?’ very early on in the conversation. So that you can match with the right position.

  And to identify with this can be as normal as saying…‘I am wearing tiger print socks.’

  WILLY chooses a few audience members and says an obvious fact about them. ‘I am wearing a fabulous knitted jumper’ etc.

  So – once we define our position, the rules are set, and we can play the game of sex.

  Thanks, Lucy.

  LUCY plays ‘You Sexy Thing (I Believe In Miracles)’ by Hot Chocolate. WILLY dances as if doing a Soul Train. He is shit at it.

  In the 70s, queer men who didn’t have the internet and had to meet people in real life used hankies as a down-low code to indicate their sexual preference.

  WILLY pulls out a purple hanky and a leopard print hanky from his pockets.

  If you put the hanky out your left back pocket you were a Top, and out the right you were a Bottom. And different colours suggested that you were into different things – if you had a purple hanky you liked piercings –

  He gives the purple hanky to someone.

  – or leopard print if you liked tattoos –

  He gives the leopard print hanky to someone.

  He pulls out a yellow hanky.

  – or yellow if you liked piss.

  Susan.

  He gives the yellow hanky to Susan.

  Thanks Lucy.

  Music stops.

  But there is a problem – what happens if I fancy someone who is the same position as me? How do I get past that? Have I missed the love of my life because we’ve both put down the same thing?

  WILLY moves to the Date.

  Before I met this guy I’d been a Bottom. I didn’t know what it felt like to be a Top because I’d never even tried it. And I didn’t know if you could change yourself once you’ve labelled yourself.

  Scene 13

  Date.

  He looks at me straight in the eyes when we speak which is kind of freaky so I keep playing with the peas on my plate with my fork. Mashing them up to make mushy peas.

  I’m gripping my fork quite tightly and it slips out my hand and lands on the floor behind me. I bend down to pick it up, but I realise I’m showing him my bum – I don’t want to give him the wrong impression so I turn around quickly to show him my crotch.

  I wonder what he’s thinking.

  Probably how amazing the sex is going to be when I finally top him.

  Or, ‘what the fuck is this guy doing he is obviously a Bottom I need to leave.’ Please don’t leave.

  I worry that he might think I am a Bottom because of what I’m wearing. Or because of how I sound. Or because I’m not very strong.

  I try and give off the ‘Top vibe.’ Controlled, strong and heavy. I plant my legs and puff out my chest. I square out my shoulders and I put a smile on my face which says, ‘Hey – I’m a Top.’

  Mannequin music plonks in. WILLY is distracted.

  He puts up his hand to stop it.

  Shut up.

  Back to Date.

  I’m a Top.

  Scene 14

  Backstory.

  WILLY starts to melt out of the scene and into the crowd bottom-first. ‘Dreamer’ by Livin’ Joy supports it. He goes through the centre row of the audience as moving through a busy club.

  I was at Uni in Manchester when I came out – when I say ‘came out’ I mean drunkenly fell into some guy’s face in a club in front of my friends. I started this weird non-sexual relationship with a guy. He took me by the hand and dragged me around Canal Street – the ‘gay village’ – showing me the clubs, pubs and bars and telling me about gay culture.

  He pointed at the muscley ‘straight-acting’ guys and said they were the Tops, and pointed at the camp, skinny, flamboyant twinks and said they were the Bottoms.

  I doubted that was true and wondered how he knew that. Like how would you know?

  But I was naïve. This was my first dipping into ‘queer culture.’ And I soon learnt that this part of queer culture was the loudest, whitest, and the G-A-Y-est.

  WILLY picks up the phone from LUCY and checks it. No messages. He gives it back, picks up the ukulele and heads to the other side of the audience.

  Do You Like Wearing Pink

  Do you like wearing make-up and do you like wearing pink?

  You’re a Bottom!

  Do you like going to the pub and having a pint?

  You’re a Top!

  WILLY asks the audience.

  Do you like Sex And The City and Angel Delight?

  If the answer is yes, then:

  You’re a Bottom!

  WILLY makes some questions up on the spot. It is silly and has nothing to do with anything. ‘Do you like going swimming in the middle of winter with carrots up your nose’ etc. He quizzes them, judging them, moves through them and shouts over to the other side.

  Do you prefer Beyoncé or Rihanna?

  He keeps asking until someone says Beyoncé.

  What’s your favourite Beyoncé song?

  He isn’t happy with their answer. He asks around until he hears a song he likes. He teases people. He calls his favourite suggestion a Top, and everyone else who suggested a song a Bottom.

  WILLY stands in front of his posters and looks to Beyoncé.

  Beyoncé.

  I like you, but I also like pints.

  I’ve never seen Sex And The City, but I love the colour pink.

  Am I a Top or a Bottom?

  BEYONCÉ:

  I think a star is born a star. I think…I know me…I was born to do what I do. It’s just too natural. There’s certain things that I know no one taught me. No one can teach you. It’s just…you are.

  Scene 15

  Date.

  I clear the plates and ask if he wants a taste of my dessert.

  Our dessert.

  THE dessert.

  The fucking spotted dick I bought from Sainsbury’s yesterday because it was reduced. 50p for two dicks.

  He says yes.

  I guess I had this idea that he would say yes to the spotted dick, and that would be the signal to rip each other’s clothes off and roll around the kitchen floor.

  But this doesn’t happen.

  Instead I do a nervous laugh –

  ‘Hahaha’

  – and accidentally inhale as the spoon goes into my mouth. Some of it goes down the wrong hole and I make a stupid joke –

  ‘Ooh I’m choking on spotted dick.’

  Why the fuck did I say that. Why the fuck have I given him spotted dick – does this mean he’ll think I’ve got syphilis? I wonder if I should tell him that I’m clean and that I’ve recently been tested…

  We finish the dick and he offers to do the washing up.

  ‘Yes actually that would be quite nice as I am tired and very nervous and that was a big effort.’

  But I say no

  ‘No’

  and leave it for the morning.

  Scene 16

  Sex Facts.

  Generic shopping channel music/lift music plays. It has a samba beat. WILLY is the know-it-all professor again. He step-ball-changes throughout.

  When bottoming there are a few things I do to prepare my body.

  Unless I want to shit everywhere, I use a douche.

  WILLY goes into the bucket and pulls out a pink douche and jar of chocolate spread.

  You fill this up with water, you stick it up your bum, and it washes the shit away. Not everybody uses this. Not everybody wants to, not everybody needs to and not everybody has to. And some people just hope for the best. Don’t they Susan.

  WILLY nods at Susan and puts the douche down nex
t to the mannequin.

  I also watch what I eat. No curries or anything spicy. You don’t want any nasty surprises.

  There is a rhythmic pause in the music. WILLY has been trying to time the speech to so that it lands with the next line.

  You have to time it right.

  So, if you want to douche and do all that, you have to pre-arrange. Or at least prepare for the possibility.

  Thanks Lucy.

  Music cuts.

  They don’t show this bit in porn. In real life you can’t ever be spontaneous. It isn’t attractive.

  ‘Oh…hi yeah…sexy time – hang on let me go clean the shit out of my arse.’

  It doesn’t work.

  Backstory creeps in. No longer know-it-all professor.

  It’s quite stressful. You have to plan really far ahead for a one night stand with a stranger you haven’t even met yet.