Vagabond Heart

A Total-E-Bound Publication

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Vagabond Heart

ISBN #978-0-85715-335-7

©Copyright A.J. Llewellyn

Cover Art by April Martinez ©Copyright November 2010

Edited by Delaney Sullivan

Total-E-Bound Publishing

This is a work of fiction. All characters, places and events are from the author’s imagination and should not be confused with fact. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, events or places is purely coincidental.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any material form, whether by printing, photocopying, scanning or otherwise without the written permission of the publisher, Total-E-Bound Publishing.

Applications should be addressed in the first instance, in writing, to Total-E-Bound Publishing. Unauthorised or restricted acts in relation to this publication may result in civil proceedings and/or criminal prosecution.

The author and illustrator have asserted their respective rights under the Copyright Designs and Patents Acts 1988 (as amended) to be identified as the author of this book and illustrator of the artwork.

Published in 2010 by Total-E-Bound Publishing, Think Tank, Ruston Way, Lincoln, LN6 7FL, United Kingdom.

Warning: This book contains sexually explicit content which is only suitable for mature readers. This story has been rated Total-e-burning.

Pearl Harbor

VAGABOND HEART

A.J. Llewellyn

Author’s Note

Although this is a work of fiction, it is based on fact. The two-hundred women who serviced thousands of US service men passing in an out of Honolulu during and after World War II, remain a fascinating subject for historical study. Though it seems impossible now, details here such as their cloistered, police-controlled existence and the demeaning, very strict rules imposed upon them as described here, are all true.

Inspired by the History Channel’s documentary Sex In World War II: The Pacific Front, I researched this story and created the character of Tinder McCartney, a gay male prostitute. There is no historical evidence of anyone like Tinder working in Hawaii during this time period, but I am certain there had to have been at least one man servicing the constant stream of men who streamed into the islands.

Though he is fictional, the details of daily life in Honolulu in the months leading up to the bombing of Pearl Harbor are as close to accurate as possible.

My thanks go to the wonderful staff of the Honolulu Historical Society and to my professors at the University of Hawaii (Manoa) for making so many invaluable archives available to me, for free. They indulged my many questions, sought to help me with names, dates, times and a good deal of Aloha.

The Hawaiian Journal of History, which proved to be a wondrous source of information, led me to the discovery of Richard Greer’s excellent essay, Dousing Honolulu’s Red Lights and, Mr. Ted Chernin. His report, My Experiences in the Honolulu Chinatown Red-Light District, fueled my imagination.

I created Tinder McCartney as an homage to the two-hundred women who, when Pearl Harbor was bombed, gave up their beds for injured servicemen and worked side by side with hospital nurses to heal them. Both before and after the attack, these women were heroic.

It is with profound respect and love that I dedicate Vagabond Heart to the memory of these women and to Ted Chernin who never stopped loving his own special, Honolulu harlot, Bobbie.

Mr. Chernin left this life shortly after we began corresponding.

It is my hope that he and Bobbie found one another again in Heaven.

- A.J. Llewellyn

Dedication

Dedicated to the 900 US war heroes who remain trapped in the wreckage of the USS Arizona, an established War Grave in Pearl Harbor.

Trademarks Acknowledgement

The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of the following wordmarks mentioned in this work of fiction:

Three Little Fishes: Glenn Miller

Dole: Dole Food Company, Inc.

Life: Time, Inc.

Delahaye: Terry Cook

Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy: Andrew Sisters

Quote from Samuel M. Clemens (Mark Twain), Paradise of the Pacific, April 1910

Chapter One

Honolulu, Hawaii. Monday, July 7, 1941

He looked so nervous. He licked his lips, his glance shifting from me to the sparse furnishings and back again. I knew he wanted me. He’d been waiting for hours. Now he was here, it was as if he felt too big when the room was so small. He kept his shoulders stooped when there was no need. My cubicle was half of a divided room, the other half partitioned by thin wood and curtains. Outside, I could hear the noises made by the rowdy men still waiting in line, competing with the hucksters of Chinatown trying to hawk everything from jewellery to photos with hula girls.

Curfew was coming.

The sense of urgency gave an edge to the restless laughter. The smell of charbroiled pork wafted up to us from the Chinese café opposite my room on River Street. I stepped towards Howard, his heated gaze stayed on me.

I was nervous too. I could feel his tension, but also his excitement. I heard the radio go on from somewhere downstairs. Glenn Miller performed Three Little Fishes.

It’s all right, Howard, I said, drawing down the blind a little more. You’re with me now.

He jumped when I said his name. I’d only been trying to relax him. I was pleased at least that it appeared to be his real name. The darkened room hid a lot of things, except the strong smell of disinfectant. I’d tried to disguise it with waterlilies I’d picked after my morning swim at the Natatorium. All I could smell now was pork. There was nothing I could do about that. He put his glass down on the small chest of drawers beside the bed. I was worried it would leave a ring mark, but was more worried about him. His cock looked hard in his pants. I didn’t want him to leave unsatisfied.

Howard licked his lips again.

I ran my hand down the front of his white duck pants. I was relieved he had such a nice big one.

As I got to my knees, I looked up at him. Oh, Howard, this is such a surprise.

He grinned then, giving me his full attention. It didn’t take long to liberate him from his pants. His cock leaked as I lightly ran my thumb over the tip. I squeezed. Outside, I could hear new music…from the saloon across the street. When the bar music kicked up, it meant it was time for the four-drink dose of Island Gin. The lethal, imitation brew was handed out to US servicemen every hour as they stood in line. It kept them buzzed, kept them spending, kept them in line.

There were lines for food, lines for booze, lines for sex…

Howard jumped when I leant closer to his thighs and went to work. He didn’t smell clean, but I didn’t care. I had three minutes and this boy was read to pop. I fondled his balls, licked his shaft and he gasped when I smothered that huge cock head with my whole mouth.

Oh God! he yelled.

Somebody from the cubicle next door also used the Lord’s name in vain. I milked Howard for all he was worth. His knees trembled and I released him, swallowing his load.

Thank you, Terry, he said, a tear in his eye. You’re a nice man.

I held him back until the man from the cubicle next door shuffled down the stairs and out to Hotel Street.

Milaina, the housekeeper, knocked softly at my door. She made herself scarce as we approached. I let Howard out.

I’ll be back, he said. Next pay day. You’ll see, Terry. He mouthed thank you again.

I handed him his glass. Not that he needed his horrible gin, he was pretty liquored up still, but damn it, he’d paid for it.

I didn’t respond in case anyone was listening. By the time he reached the bottom of the stairs, the guys still waiting to come up were none the wiser that Howard, the Marine, had just spent his three bucks on a male whore.

And for me, my first trick ever wasn’t bad. It wasn’t bad at all.

* * * *

I had three clients that first day. Not bad, but hardly great when the eight women also working the rooms of the Midway Hotel serviced a hundred men a day each. Milaina said that once news got around that a man was in town servicing the ‘deviants’ as she liked to call them, I’d be busy, just as the only black female prostitute had become the most popular prostitute on Hotel Street.

We had chosen my working name of Terry together. We picked it because it was a unisex name, which Milaina felt was important. I was the only male whore operating under the legal watch of the US Military and the Honolulu Police, and she felt we still needed to be discreet. I might not make as much as the girls would, but being a man and being a white one at that, I had some privileges the female whores didn’t. I was able to walk around the neighbourhood without fear of being arrested. The women were under virtual house arrest from ten-thirty p.m. until seven a.m., when the lines would start forming for them again.

Rifling through my clothes back in my own room downstairs, I chose a working-man’s outfit. Pants and a long shirt. I could have been one of the guys working in the cannery. I slipped out the back way, the staff exit. Milaina knew I wouldn’t be out late and she knew I wouldn’t come back drunk or stoned. Not only was it illegal for whores to get drunk or stoned, but I didn’t want to start spending my hard-earned money my first day on the job.

The evening air was cool down by the river. I paused a moment to stare at the battleships lining the harbour. It was a constant sight. They’d pull in, empty their freedom-crazed men for a few days and pull out. Then the next ship would take its place.

I glanced up the end of the street. The Bronx Rooms was one of the biggest brothels. It was still taking in men, even though they weren’t supposed to at this hour. Guys roamed the streets, some pausing to buy watches, souvenirs, or to try their luck hitting Hitler between the eyes with a slingshot—eight shots for ten cents—at the penny arcade in Tin Can Alley right opposite my rooms.

The Midway was an active brothel, the second biggest on River Street. The brothel district here in the heart of Chinatown was where the servicemen headed the second their feet touched dry land. River Street, which overlooked the often smelly Nu’uanu River, had businesses only on one side, which made it a little quieter, but during the day, shoeshine boys, lei sellers and hucksters hawking everything from popcorn to imaginary rendezvous with hula girls, lined the riverfront.

I walked uptown a few blocks, nodding to a couple of guys coming out of Miller’s Tattoo Parlor on Hotel Street. They both nursed gigantic pads of gauze on their upper arms. They looked young. I wondered which tattoos they’d picked. Across the street, I saw a couple of handsome black servicemen coming out of the Two Jacks saloon. I regretted that I’d never get a chance to service them, even if they were homosexual. Segregation had been forced on the islands ever since the war started.

Locals of foreign extraction were now banned from patronising prostitutes to accommodate the two-hundred-and fifty thousand servicemen streaming into the islands each month. To keep the peace, the local police who controlled the whore business, had declared black servicemen off limits. It was a shame. I liked men of colour and was more attracted to them than men of my own race.

My lover, Lauro, was a tattoo artist at Miller’s. There were thirty-three tattoo artists in eight parlours along Hotel Street, all of whom were Filipinos. Each one did between three and five hundred tattoos a day. Sex, tattoos and that horrible, imitation rum went hand in hand in Chinatown.

Though the prostitutes were now officially off-limits for the day, there was still another half hour