Saloon Doors

Adult book stores don't have the same front presentation to the street that other stores have. They don't have the wares in the window. Not really.

Instead they have words - in neon, and in code. "Adult books" means more than those words may indicate. Giant 2-color sales offers painted on plywood on the front, covering the window.

Perhaps at one point the shop was a clothing store, with windows to see in.

The front door isn't open to the street. There's a partition blocking a straight view in, and you have to zig-zag to get in. And then...you're in.

The place isn't dark, but it isn't well-lit. The aisles aren't cramped but they're not spacious either. There's just enough room to roam around and browse, without bumping into or upsetting anyone else in the store.

The merchandise is organized by category. The three-way gangbang DVDs are on their own shelf. The interracial anal fucking ones are in a spot of their own.

Magazines are lined up neatly, and in plastic half the time. They're cleaner, dare I say it, virginal. Invariably there's a hallway in the back in which single-occupant booths show scenes from porn films on a video screen. It's usually marked by swinging saloon doors. It's the separator between the mere browsers and the ones who are here to jerk off.

The booths have a video monitor, built into the wall, and the deck is at the front. Men stand calmly, politely, and patiently in the hallway, not making eye contact. They peruse the card at the front of the hall, figuring out which girl, which angle, which position is going to get them hardest and orgasming the quickest. They wait for their booth to be free.

The fellow before them comes out and quietly lets the door close behind him. He's had his cock out in there, and either jerked off onto the floor, or into a paper towel, or even into his own underpants. Quietly he finishes and lets the next guy go in. And they do, looking to side-step any sticky puddles that may make them slip.

No one makes eye contact, and no one gives anyone any lip. Everyone is here for the same reason, to be stimulated beyond what the normal world out there can give them. No one here is giving anyone any trips. No one notes or bats an eye when you pick up "Cum-Drinking Whores with Dicks Up Their Assholes." It's not sick, it's not out of the ordinary. Of course, you're merely curious.

The smell of fecund humid sweat fills the air. The only sounds are the muffled treble-y moans from the playback machines. Even when you come up to buy something, there is no real talking. You hand it to the clerk. And the money. "I want it" does not need to be said.

He nods, you nod, he hands you the bag. If you accidentally bump someone, you back off. No shoving, or pushing in this testosterone-heavy environment. Because all the masculine male energy has been externalized, onto the material surrounding, the men are docile.

Practically emasculated. I don't think a fist fight ever breaks out in an adult bookstore.

The places are harder to leave than to enter into. First, to exit the realm of open positive polysexuality is to allow a slight death of reality intrude. And besides, someone might see you exit the den of sin.

These "bookstores" were special temples hidden and prevalent on the city landscape. The internet has closed them about all down, and changed this democratic and social environment.