The house sat vacant after they died. It was right across the street from the campus and everyone told me that I should rent it out, but it would only take one Friday night college kegger to destroy the delicate woodwork and ruin the hardwood floors that my uncle had kept immaculately polished.

I didn’t move there until after my divorce; my ex-wife got our house and it was all I could do to keep her from getting her greedy little hands on this one too. “You should rent out the extra bedroom,” a buddy said. “You could probably get three or four hundred bucks a month, and what the Hell, you could even rent to a young chick and take part of it out in trade.”

“Yeah, right,” I replied disdainfully, as if the idea of paying a college girl for sex was beneath me.

‘Room to rent. Close to campus. Includes meals.’ I posted the flyer on the housing section of the message board outside the student union, including only my phone number. I rejected about a third of the callers immediately; Too female or too old. I asked the others to come around and take a look before giving them the price, and rejected most as being too big, too hairy, too Asian, or too Black. “It’s eight hundred a month,” I told them cheerfully, showing them the cot I’d set up in the dirty garage.

“Uh, no thanks,” was their typical reply. Eight hundred dollars a month was preposterous, particularly for a concrete floored unheated hovel. They could live anywhere they wanted for less than that.

The rest were young and cute and small enough, so I showed them the extra bedroom in the house and informed them that the rent would be two hundred a month, and then told them what else was required of them. “You fucking pervert! What do you think I am, anyway”? One of them even took a swing at me.

Finally, two weeks after classes had started, a young man called, desperate to find lodging. “Come on over,” I told him, “I’ll show you the room.” It was hard to believe the kid at the door was actually a college freshman. Barely a hundred and ten pounds, not much over five and a half feet tall, and no discernable beard to darken his smooth cheeks. The only indication that he’d breached adolescence was the hairiness of his legs and the deepness of his voice. “Here’s your room,” I said, showing him the bedroom. “It has cable, and I have a router in the office so your laptop should work anywhere in the house. There’s an extra TV that we can move in here, if you want. We’ll have to share the bath, but it’s right across the hall. I cook supper most every night so you can share that, too. I’m no gourmet chef but I’ve never gotten any complaints. I don’t usually cook breakfast but I’ll make sure that there’s always milk in the fridge and cold cereal around. You’ll have to fend for yourself for lunch.”

“How much is it?” He asked again. That had been his first question, but I’d insisted on showing him around first. He was obviously desperate to find a place he could afford. His clothes were dirty and rumpled, and he’d admitted that he’d been camping out here and there for the last couple of weeks.

“A hundred and fifty a month,” I answered, “and you can use the washer and dryer anytime you want. Oh, and I’m a barber, so I’ll also cut your hair too, if you want.”

He reached up and swept his hair up out of his eyes, acknowledging the fact that he needed a trim. “Is that all?” He asked, incredulous that the room was so cheap. It should be at least double that.

“There’s just one other thing,” I said, and then told him what else I required. This is where I usually lose them, but he just stood there for a few minutes thinking it over or considering his options.

“Why do you want to shave my, uh, nutsack?” He finally asked.

“Because I don’t like hair in my mouth,” I answered. “Not all your pubes, just your balls, and maybe a little around the base of your cock.”

He pondered my answer for a full minute, his face growing red as he figured out how I could get his scrotal hair in my mouth. “Just once?” He finally asked.

“Every month. It’s part of the rent.”

“And I don’t have to, you know, do you?”

“Nope. All you have to do is lie back and enjoy yourself,” I reassured him. “You can have all the girl friends you want, too.” I had a pretty good idea that his budget didn’t allow much dating. “All I ask is that you let me know if you need to jack off. Maybe I can help with that too.”

A two-minute pause this time, then he asked, “When can I move in?”

His university ID and driver’s license pictures both matched his description. His name was Trevor Williams, he was eighteen, and he was from a small town out on the coast. He gave me a collection of fives and tens and singles, dropped off his book bag, then left to collect the rest of his belongings from wherever he had them stashed.

“How about a quick trim after you shower?” I asked when he had returned. He smelled like he needed a bath, and a haircut definitely was in order.

“Okay,” he conceded, and headed for the bathroom while I put a drop cloth on the floor and set up one of the kitchen chairs.

“I’ll just shorten it up a bit,” I said, when he was seated. I then took the extra clippers and barber scissors that I keep at home and neatened him up a little. I finished off by shaving his neck. First an application of hot lather, then I took out the leather strop and honed the straight razor, then carefully shaved his neck. I didn’t bother with his face; the peach fuzz wasn’t long enough to shave. “That feel better?” I asked, handing him a hand mirror.

“Yeah. Thanks a lot. I guess I needed that.”

Saturday is the busiest day at the barbershop and I always open an hour early, and he was still sacked out when I left. When I got home he was sitting on the living room couch working on his homework. His toiletries were neatly arranged on one side of the bathroom vanity and the basin, mirror, and tub had all been scrubbed. He had also washed and put away his breakfast dishes and had cleaned the countertops and swept the floor. He had apparently been well trained. I grabbed a beer from the fridge and offered him one too, knowing full well that he was underage. He hesitated, and then accepted. “How about some spaghetti for supper?” I suggested.

“Okay, I’ll help.” As we worked in the kitchen he told me that he was functionally an orphan and although he’d received a full scholarship and had worked on a fishing boat all summer money was still really tight, and that he really appreciated my generosity, and that it was the first good night’s sleep he’d gotten since he came to town.

“Now, how about I collect the rest of the rent?” I asked, after we had eaten and washed the dishes. He didn’t say anything, but let me lead him to my bedroom where I had laid a couple of clean towels on the edge of the bed. He was decidedly nervous about stripping down in front of me, so I left the room while he undressed and returned with my shaving mug, razor, and a pan of hot water.

He was skinny, almost to point of being emaciated, each of his ribs clearly visible on his hairless torso. His balls were large and well defined in his low handing scrotum, and a teenage-slender four-inch long circumcised penis drooped in a soft arc from his groin. His thighs and calves were adolescent-hairy, as was his crotch, but only the slightest trace of a treasure trail extended towards his navel. “Just sit of the edge of the bed,” I instructed, “spread your legs and lay back and relax.” I put some hot water into the mug and sloshed it around with the shaving brush, then carefully daubed the foamy lather onto his scrotum. “Hold your dick back, please,” I asked, then opened the straight razor.

“No!” He cried, clamping both hands protectively around his tools.

“It’s okay,” I reassured him. I shave people every day and I’ve never cut anyone yet. Here, let me show you.” I unzipped my fly and pulled my balls out of my pants, then encircled them with my thumb and forefinger, daubed some lather on, and expertly drew the razor along the bottom of my scrotum. “See? I know what I’m doing. Besides that, it’s all about trust. I’m giving you a key to my house and allowing you to use all of the facilities because I trust you not to tear things up or rip me off. You need to trust me to do this one little thing, which I happen to be very good at. So, are we going to trust each other or not?” I hoped that the implication was clear: Put out or get out.

He thought it over for a minute before resigning himself to his fate and flopping back on the bed, one arm over his face as if trying to avoid witnessing his castration. Despite the heat in the room his balls were tucked tight up against his groin, seeking protection inside his abdomen. “Relax,” I said, grabbing a flap of his scrotal skin and gently tugging downward. It was difficult shaving him with his balls tucked up, but I was careful and two minutes later his bag was as hairless as that of a newborn infant. After that I knelt between his legs and collected the rest of the rent due me.

We didn’t talk about it afterwards; it was just a fact of life or another common bodily function, like wiping your ass or jacking off. A guy might brag in the locker room or factory lunch room that he’d gotten his tubes cleaned out last night, but no straight guy is secure enough to admit that it had been a guy that blew him and that he’d enjoyed the hell out of the experience.

Although he may have still felt guilty about it, the next month he was more relaxed and his balls sagged down without apprehension, and by the time the third month rolled around he was so eager that there was no need for him to hold his cock up out of my way. “Uh, it would be okay by me if you, uh, wanted to do it tonight,” he said two weeks later.

I lowered his rent another fifty dollars in light of his contribution, but I also told him that was as low as I could go. The teenager ate like a, well, teenager and the hundred dollars a month didn’t even cover his month’s groceries.

We continued that way for the rest of the school year, me servicing him twice a month. “I won’t be staying here next year,” Trevor said almost apologetically late in May. He went on to explain that his dotty old aunt had finally figured out that he wasn’t ten years old anymore and no longer slept in Batman pajamas. The old broad finally got it through her thick head that her sister’s youngest son was now in college, and she’d been horrified to learn that he was staying in the house of a total stranger instead of a fraternity where he belonged, and she agreed to cough up some money to help him out.

That was okay; although he had finally shed his inhibitions about having his balls shaved and getting blown by a guy, it was time for him to move on. Also, he had changed during the school year. He would never be a large person, but the usually dreaded Freshman Fifteen looked great on him and his once gaunt body was now more in proportion. He had also matured. His pubes were thicker and coarser, and his treasure trail had widened and darkened and was now creeping across his lower belly, and his peach fuzz had turned into a real beard that demanded periodic shaving.

“Would you teach me to use a razor,” he asked one evening.

“Sure,” I answered. Most guys shave with an electric razor or use throwaway plastic shavers nowadays, so the maintenance and use of a straight razor has become somewhat of a dying art and I was eager to pass the rather esoteric skill along. I presented him with a pair of new Solingen razors from my shop supplies and a new strop that I’d been saving for a few years, and also a mug and shaving brush. “You can use the canned shaving crème, if you want,” I told the boy, “but traditionally you use a mug and brush with a straight razor.” He already knew from watching me how to add water to the mug and stir up and apply the lather. “Alternate the razors and from day to day, and always strop them before use.” I showed him how to anchor one end of the strop to a wall hook, pull it taut, and set the edge of the razor. “Here. You try it,” I said.

He practiced for a few minutes before getting it right while I hunted up some kid’s party balloons that I keep around. “Here’s how we learned it in barber college,” I said, inflating a balloon part way, just until it was filled out enough to hold its shape. I then worked up the lather and daubed some onto the balloon, then carefully scraped it off with the razor. “Hold it just like this,” I instructed, “and scrape, don’t slice.”

He immediately popped the balloon, and I inflated another, this leaving it a little softer. He made part of another stroke before popping it. “Keep practicing,” I told him, “That’s the only way to learn.” I watched him for a while and corrected some of his mistakes and within an hour he could do about half of the balloon without it popping. It had taken me several days to get that far. By the end of the week he could shave the balloon without popping it, so I inflated them more, making them firmer and more fragile, and within a few days he had mastered the technique and applied what he had learned to shaving his face. He did okay too, and only nicked himself a couple of times.

I waived the hundred dollars for June because he would be leaving after the first week, but he eagerly paid the last installment of his rent. “How about I shave you?” He asked afterwards, lying naked on my bed. “Or don’t you trust me?”

Let a boy whom I had systematically abused for nine months take a straight razor in one hand and my balls in another? I didn’t see any problem with that, and it was okay if he wanted to blow me too. He stropped the razor while I stripped down and spread my legs so that he could brush on the lather. I don’t shave my balls, so the hot foam felt strange, and also, very good, and I immediately started to get hard. The alien touch of his warm hand tugging gently on my balls nearly sent me over the edge, but he was so skillful that I never even felt the razor glide from the base of my cock down the sides of my scrotum. His finishing touch was the bottom of my bag, and as he encircled it with his thumb and forefinger and gently drew the razor across the tight skin I lost it, and with a sudden lurch I blew my wad out onto my belly.

“Hold still!” He cautioned, at the same time that I felt a small sting as he nicked me with the razor. “Sorry,” he said, wiping the blood from the cut with the end of a towel.

“It doesn’t look too bad,” I said examining the wound with the hand mirror. Actually it did look bad; it bled profusely and was obviously deeper than just a nick, and I should have gone to the emergency room and had the wound treated. Sure. I could just see their reaction when I told them that I had cut myself shaving my balls. So instead, I daubed on some disinfectant and taped the edges of the cut shut. Trevor apologized profusely, but it was my fault and not his. Common sense dictates that a guy being shaved needs to hold still, and I hadn’t.

I put a good bandage on the wound and went to work the next day and the cut quickly healed up. Trevor finished his finals and arranged for a ride back home where he would spend the summer commercial fishing. I was sad to see him leave, but I knew I could rent the room again next fall, and who knows, the next boy might be even better.

A week after my close shave I developed a mild discomfort in my belly, and the next night I woke up in excruciating pain. Both of my nuts were swollen to double their normal size, and bright red streaks extended from my scrotum up both sides of my groin.

“Septicemia,” the doctor said, “commonly known as blood poisoning.” He immediately put me in the hospital and started an IV of powerful antibiotics, and a few days later he called in the specialists from the university hospital. I’m sure they tried their best but two weeks later, when I was finally discharged, I was a eunuch. In addition to the thin skin of my scrotum, the razor had also nicked both testicles and the bacteria had found a ready host.

I still rent the room out and I still reduce the rent for certain special boarders, but I never try to teach them how to use a straight razor.