I sometimes wonder how I should feel, as an ostensibly straight guy, about the fact that I enjoy taking a bit of a tumble in the sack with other men from time to time.  I mean, one minute I can be fixating on a girl, finding myself falling in love, showering her with affection and all the usual standard-fare hetero kind of stuff; the next, when a favourable opportunity with a reasonable looking guy presents itself, I'm right in there with him, the two of us going at each other like a couple of horny rabbits.

I suppose I just wonder sometimes if it's normal, or whether maybe I should be feeling guilty or anxious or something about it.

Take the night I proposed to Melissa.

We had an amazing evening: I surprised her by kneeling in front of her offering her the ring; afterwards we had a quiet meal together, romantic music in the background, atmospheric lighting around the room, all that kind of stuff, and then, after chatting for a while, we went upstairs and – well, you can guess the next part.  But it was a nice evening for both of us; that's my point.

The next morning, while I was making us coffee as she slept, I got to thinking that maybe I ought to have at least a few hang-ups about my behaviour on the previous evening.  You see, even then, on that unique and apparently perfect evening for us, I'd spent half an hour during the early part of it banging the arse of some guy I'd never met before and wasn't likely to again.

As the kettle boiled I wondered if I should be feeling guilt about it; or perhaps, more specifically, if I ought to have spent the previous evening – if I really was the decent, upstanding guy I like to think I am – gnawed away by guilt at what I'd been doing just a couple of hours before I'd proposed.  Whether maybe I shouldn't have proposed that night; whether I should have left it until an evening which hadn't been sullied by one of my casual encounters with other men.

I reminded myself what I'd done; what had happened.  It hadn't seemed such a big deal at the time.

I'd rushed to the jewellers straight from surgery; almost knocked people into the road as I dashed through the streets to get there before it closed.

Fortunately I'd managed to reach the doorway just as the last of the shop assistants was locking up and I'd managed to persuade him, with a few pleading smiles and a generous dose of charm, to let me collect the ring I'd ordered.

He let me in and relocked the door behind us.  "If my boss catches me on my own in the shop with a customer, he'll kill me..."

I thanked him profusely and assured him it would take just a couple of minutes to find my order.  "The ring's paid for and everything... I just need to collect it..."

He nodded as he went to a chest of drawers behind the counter at the back of shop and started searching through them for a package bearing my name.

He was in his early twenties; tall and attractive with a deep quiet voice.  I thought I detected traces of Asian ancestry in his face, but his accent was born-and-bred Yorkshire.

His name badge read, "Will".  (And it turned out he would, too.)

I started picking up vibes – you know, like you do – when he made some joke about his ring finger while he was finding my order.  I don't even remember what the joke was exactly but it had struck me as a little odd and I'd thought, "Aye aye..."

I'd replied, wanting to stoke the fire a little and find out if my suspicions were true, "Not much happening on my ring finger at the minute..."

And he'd looked over at me, his eyes a warm chestnut brown behind his specs, and suggested, "Maybe later this evening there will be..."

"You think?"

He found the small package with my name on it and walked back over to me.

He smiled.  "Yeah... your girlfriend will have a ring to give you, won't she?"

I shook my head.  "No... this is a surprise..."  I held up my hand, deliberately wiggling my middle rather than my fourth finger.  "Looks like this will have to stay ringless for now... unless I get any other offers..."

He looked at me curiously, a quizzical smirk only barely perceptible.  It seemed like it was his turn to think, "Aye aye..."

I smiled warmly and mock-innocently at him.

He said, tentatively, "D'you like having a ring on your finger... I mean, a lot of guys don't..."

I continued smiling.  "Yeah... it's okay... from time to time..."

He tore part of the label from the package he was holding and put it in front of me on the counter.  "Okay... I've just got to get you to sign to say you received it, Dr Wallace..."

I signed the slip and said, "Please... call me Sebastian..."

I could tell that had made him smile even though I was looking down at the paper.

He took the slip from me and grabbed a file from beneath the counter to store it in.  He asked, trying to make it sound casual, "So.. Sebastian... what sort of ring would you like for your finger... if you had the choice?"

I chuckled at that.  I liked that one.

"I dunno... something with a warm feel, I guess... warm and inviting... and tight... yeah... very tight... I wouldn't want it slipping off..."

Now he chuckled and our eyes locked.  We were both trying to figure out the other's intentions.

He seemed as if he was going to say something else but then it was like he censored himself and he made do with just smiling more broadly at me.

I thought, "He's not sure how far to go with this... he thinks I'm just teasing him..."

Then he turned to pick up a carrier bag from behind him and I noticed that his black work-issue trousers clung pretty tightly to his arse.  He had very attractive, full, round cheeks.

He turned back to me and put the package into the bag.

I thought I'd throw him a line.  Let him know I wasn't just messing around.

I said, "Your boss likes his staff wearing tight trousers..."

He looked surprised at that at first but then shrugged.  I could see I'd disappointed him: he thought I was changing the conversation to mere small talk.  He just muttered, "Yeah... I dunno why... I guess they're cheap or something..."

I smiled back, more warmly.  "Not that I'm complaining... they look pretty good..."

Now he understood and grinned again.  "You think so?"

I nodded.  "Yeah... you've got the... ah... figure for it..."

He laughed.  "Yeah?"

I ventured at being a little bolder.  "Yeah... you've got the arse for them..."

He laughed more loudly.  "D'you really think so?"

I laughed back.  "Yeah... they show it off very nicely..."

He didn't say anything else.  We just kept chuckling as he passed me the bag and I made to leave.

But then he said, slowly and a little nervously, "You know... Sebastian... if you want to try on a ring like the one you said you'd like... you could come through to the back of the shop..."

I looked at him and he wasn't smiling.  He looked scared as hell.

I smiled broadly.  "Really?"

He looked really tense.  I guess he knew he was risking things turning pretty nasty if he'd misread things between us, not to mention losing his job if anyone caught us.

He nodded.  "Yeah..."

I kept smiling.  "A warm one... nice and tight...?"

He smiled a little.  "If you want it...?"

I laughed.  "'Course I do!"

We went to the backroom of the shop; a small, dingy kitchen with a kettle and a few cups, littered with boxes and surplus stock from the shop.

He stood with his back to the table and looked like he thought I was going to attack him.  Like he really thought that my motives might not be all they seemed and that I might take a swing at him.

I moved towards him and pressed my lips to his.  We kissed gently and I felt him gradually relax and then begin to enjoy it.  We put our arms around one another and our tongues started pushing more deeply into each other's mouths.

I grabbed his arse, kneading his firm round cheeks through the back of his trousers.  I felt his cock – a hard bulge at the front of them – grinding insistently against the front of mine.  My own cock strained for release, forming a thick diagonal rod reaching up to my right pocket.

He pulled back and gasped, breathlessly, "I thought you liked girls... you bought a ring for a girl..."

I shrugged.  "Yeah... but I like this too."

He looked a little confused but then smiled and shrugged back.  "Okay...!"

I took my hands away from his arse and undid the buckle of his belt, pulled the zipper down over the mound behind his fly, and then yanked his trousers down a couple of inches.

The material of his white briefs was stretched by his cock as it struggled to be freed from their confines.  I rubbed the front of them gently a couple of times, enjoying the feel of his soft yielding balls and stiff throbbing cock inside them, before pulling the front of them down to expose his glory.

He was looking at me with that startled, serious expression again.  Perhaps he thought this might be my first time with another guy; was worried that the sight of his cock would disgust me.

I smiled to reassure him and then stared at his cock, rubbing it gently in my hand.  I was about six inches long, of average thickness, and a pale brown colour.  His glans, when I exposed it as I slowly masturbated him, was a deep purple and it oozed precum in a thick, sticky dribble.

I muttered, "Nice cock."

That made him smile.  "Yeah?"

He seemed really grateful that I liked his cock: I wondered if perhaps he'd had a bad experience when he'd reached this point during a previous encounter.

I knelt down and licked the tip of it, tasting his salty precum as I swirled my tongue around its head.  He shivered, pulled away and urged me to stand up again.

He smiled apologetically.  "Sorry – it's too sensitive – I really don't like it."

I squeezed his shoulder and told him it was okay.

He tried to undo my belt but his hands were inexperienced and we both tittered as I had to take over from him.  I pulled down my fly and released my cock from my shorts.  It arched upwards, pulsating in excitement.

He laughed, "Wow!  Who's a big boy, then!"

I smiled.  I must say that it did look pretty impressive.  My cock's about eight inches long and, while it's not the thickest I've ever seen, it was quite substantially thicker than his.  Don't get me wrong – I really liked the look of his erection – but the sight of mine towering over it really turned me on.

I grabbed both our cocks and wanked them together.  It felt surprisingly good and we both began to breathe more quickly as we enjoyed the sensation.  I could feel his cock twitching, oozing precum like tears, as I gripped it in my fist alongside my larger version.  I glanced down and admired our paired cock heads, the slits in them blinking like eyes as our foreskins glided up and over them; his was smaller and purple, mine was more bulbous and almost scarlet.

Then he fell to his knees and sucked at my cock enthusiastically, almost as if it was a lollipop.  He grabbed my arse through my trousers and pushed my hips towards him, feeding furiously on my cock with his lips and tongue.

I must say that the sensation wasn't exactly pleasant.  In fact, for the first time in my life, I felt myself going a little flaccid during a blow job.

He stood up and smile apologetically again.  "Sorry – I guess 'cause I don't like them, I never really learned how to give them..."

I lied: "Hey – don't worry – they were never one of my favourite things..."

After a few seconds' silence, he asked, "So what do you like doing?"

I smiled.  "Well... right now... if you're up for it... I wanna try that ring on... the one you promised me..."

He chuckled.  "Okay... I might be able to work out what size your finger is from the feel of it..."

"Well.. actually... I was hoping you might have one that would fit my cock..."

That threw him.  He looked down at my cock with an expression almost of horror.  He stammered,  "I dunno... I never... you know..."

I squeezed his shoulder again.  "Hey – we don't have to... if it's your first time..."

"It's not that.  It's just... well... I never tried taking such a big cock up my bum, that's all..."

I smiled.  "Well, we won't do that then... don't get so worried..."

He looked a little embarrassed and smiled wanly.  "Sorry... it's just... well... I like it... but it might hurt... you know..."

"Well, if it does, I'll stop and we'll do something else..."

He thought about that for a few seconds and I asked, "So, d'you wanna try it?"

He smiled a little and then nodded.  "Okay..."

I was surprised to notice that his shock at the prospect of being fucked by me had made his cock go almost completely limp.  Another first.  This was turning out to be quite an experience.

I motioned for him to turn around and knelt down behind him.

I pulled his trousers and briefs a little further down, revealing the pale round cheeks of his arse.  His cleft was very slightly hairy and had a deliciously musky scent: my cock twitched in eager anticipation.

I licked my middle finger and pressed it into his crack, searching for his hole.  I found it – puckered and slightly moist – and gently slid my finger into him.  His ring opened easily and offered little resistance: he might have little experience of larger cocks but he was certainly no novice as far as anal sex was concerned.

I eased my finger out and he bent forwards and gasped.  I did it again – back in, and then back out – and he moaned.

I reached round to feel his cock and felt it – quite literally – hardening from soft to full size in about five seconds.

I chuckled, "You like that..."

He gasped, "Yeah... I really do..."

I began fingering him slowly at first, but soon sped up and became more forceful at his insistent grunts of encouragement.

Needing more lubrication, I pulled out and licked my middle finger again, enjoying the raunchy taste of his backside along its length.

Now I inserted two fingers, and he gasped and panted in appreciation as I roughly fingered him with them.  He bent further forwards and pushed his arse back against me; craning it towards me like he was offering it to me.

Then, needing still more lube, I pulled out again and used my tongue to wetten his anus and rectum.  That made him groan and I felt him shudder rhythmically as he began masturbating quickly and aggressively.

I was wanking too: the taste of his insides were raw and exquisite.

I pulled my face out from his arse and started fucking him with three fingers.

He opened his legs as wide as they would go and cried out, "That feels so fucking good...!"

I responded, "I wanna fuck you, Will..."

He surprised me by calling out, "Yeah... come on... do it!"

It must have taken me ten seconds to pull a condom from my wallet, tear it open and unfurl it down my cock, but it felt like about three weeks.  I was convinced he was either going to climax while I was doing it, or was going to change his mind.

But he did neither.  He kept wanking while I got myself ready, urging me to fuck him, telling me how much he wanted it.

I got up and stood behind him, and pressed my cock against his now loose and opened hole.  Again I thought he might back out, but instead he called out, "Yeah!" and pushed his arse back against me, like he wanted to eat my cock with his arsehole.

I pushed myself into him in one smooth movement and he took it.  I think he farted a couple of times but he took it.

Then I grabbed his hips and humped him roughly and frantically while he grunted in pleasure and masturbated himself so quickly that his elbow was a blur.

We were sweating like pigs, grunting and panting: each man caught up entirely in his own pleasure at that moment with little interest in the other.  I was overwhelmed by the hot tight slippery feel of his arse around my cock; by the occasional wafts my nose kept getting from it as I slammed in and out of him; by the thought that, here we were with our trousers barely down past our hips, sordidly buttfucking in the back of a shop.  Will was experiencing his own pleasures: perhaps of the sensation of my cock sliding in and out of him; or of his hand on his own cock; or by the fact that he was bending over the table he probably had tea at with his boss and workmates every day, being soundly rogered up his rear by a customer.

I guess now that I've reached this point, I can answer my own question; the question I posed to myself while I was standing waiting for the kettle to boil.  The one about whether I should feel guilty about having sex with guys when I'm supposed to be straight and in a relationship with a woman.

The fact of the matter is that I like to get intimate with another guy because with him I can do things I just wouldn't dream of doing with a woman.  Melissa, like nearly all the girls in my life before her, likes sex to be gentle and affectionate; loving and giving.  Most of the men I've had sex with like it rough and fast; passionless and base.

So I suppose – just as I supposed that morning after I'd proposed to Melissa – that there's really no reason to feel guilty.  It's simply a case of not comparing like with like.  Sex between men is so different, for me at least, from the sex I have with women, that I can enjoy both without either undermining the other.

Melissa might not see it that way, of course, but it makes perfect sense to me so why bother consulting her on it?

Will climaxed before me but was considerate enough, unlike a few of the other guys I've had sex with, to let me continue fucking him until I'd also completed.  He sprayed a fairly impressive wad of semen across the table, making a few low guttural grunts, and eased off masturbating to milk the last few dribbles out of himself.  Then, still recovering his breath, he grabbed the edge of the table with both hands and stuck his arse out towards me, urging me to use him to achieve my own orgasm.

I willingly complied, plunging my cock into his rectum in long, sweeping thrusts, while I held his hips firmly in front of me.  Now I found it was my turn to grunt as I watched my cock, thick and large, sliding rapidly in and out of his eagerly splayed buttocks; the condom slick and wet with his butt-sweat and my saliva.

I must have come within a minute of Will, but it felt like a lot longer.  I got into the state I sometimes do when I'm screwing the arse off a guy, where time seems to pass really slowly because I'm enjoying it so much.  I could feel the tell-tale tingles of my impending orgasm but, for what seemed like ages, they seemed distant and insubstantial.

However, nature had to take its inevitable course, and eventually the intense pleasure I was getting from the frantic thrustings of my cock into his tightly-clenched rear became too much to bear.  My semen rushed explosively from my balls, slamming rhythmically against the tops of Will's thighs, and filled the bulb of the condom at the tip of my engorged cock almost to bursting point.  I grabbed him round his chest, shuddering and gasping against him, as I gratefully spent myself deep inside him. 

Afterward, when I'd flushed the condom down the staff toilet and we'd wiped ourselves using the last few sheets of tissue from the roll, we hitched our trousers back up in silence and returned to the shop zipping our flies.

He'd said something about hoping Melissa would like the ring and I'd said something like "Cheers".

Then he let me out and we politely nodded our thanks and farewells.

I wondered, that next morning as I poured hot water from the kettle into our coffee cups, whether I should suggest returning to the same jewellers to choose each other's wedding rings.  It might be kind of nice to see him again; to smirk at each other over Melissa's shoulder as she oohed-and-aahed over the rings in the cabinets.  To see if we could flirt with each other so discreetly that she wouldn't notice.

But in the end I opted not to.  I figured that a one-off screw with some guy in the backroom of a shop is one thing; a repeat performance opens up a whole can of worms that I'd rather leave untouched.  I mean, after I've had sex with a guy, I like to move on from it pretty rapidly.  I don't want it to become a regular thing; I don't want words like 'affection' and (shudder) 'relationship' starting to come into play.

So we went to a different jewellers for the rings for the big day.

Even so, though – even after saying all that – I guess I still find myself hoping Will wasn't disappointed when I didn't return.  I'd hate to have upset him.

"Ring Finger" was the first story I wrote about 'myself' following an eighteen-month break between 2003 and 2004.  It's written very much in the style of "Man About The House" and shows how I'd moved on from the opportunistic, almost accidental, encounters with other men of my student days and was beginning to actively seek gay sex.

The story is fairly unremarkable except for the fact that it takes place on the day of my engagement to my future-wife Melissa.