So, this friend of mine...? Let's call him The Architect. Basically, The Architect and I have known each other for 26 years... ever since he was born. Our parents used to be friends, and while they are not anymore today for reasons unknown and irrelevant to The Architect and I, him and I still keep tight contact and are better friends now than we ever were as children.

He trusts me with his deepest thoughts and emotions... and whereas I am not completely open with him about myself and my relationship with The Fiancé for fear of alienating him, I am still closer to him than others by my ability to give him advice from a woman's point of view without there being any male-female tension or sublimial "somethings" between us.

Only a few days ago he confided to me that he is still a virgin. I wasn't exactly shocked, because I knew that he has extreme difficulties closing the deal with women, but at the same time I didn't think that his problem was this big. I don't quite understand his difficulties either, for he is a very handsome, very smart, very sophisticated, and funny man, who is more charming than most, and has no difficulties starting up and holding conversations with women wherever he goes. He is not exactly a tall man, but as if to make up for it, he has a very tight body. His pecs would put many men to shame, and he moves about and acts with just the right amount of confidence and arrogance that women find charming. Yet he never gets more than one or two dates in at best, before he's being ditched again. I have been sitting back and analyzing this for years, and whenever he asked me for advice, I was there giving him my stand on things: he is too intense, he is suffocating his dates with his gifts and his attention, he smells like desperation. It's more than that, but those are the main points I keep telling him over and over.

I know he is starving for female attention, and I know that he is very frustrated with himself for having reached every goal and every dream he has set for himself, yet not the one he is craving for most. And as life goes, the things we want but cannot have take on a huge significance for us, usually much more than they should.

What's more, the household he grew up in was and is dominated by a very strong father who couldn't be any more macho than he is. Sexist and homosexual jokes are on the daily menu, and on top of that his mother is been pestering him with questions about "when will you bring home a girlfriend" for years. The Architect has taken on a lot of his father's ways of acting, and the target demographics for his jokes are pretty much the same, which is another reason why I had been reluctant to out myself (or The Fiancé) to him until now.

Last Saturday we were invited to a pool party at his parents' place. We had a really good time, and much alcohol was consumed. As the night got really late and The Architect had drunk a few Long Island Ice Teas more than were good for him, we all went down to the basement to play some table tennis. You can probably imagine the carnage. At any rate... as The Architect lost one game due to his lacking brain-body coordination, he walked straight up to The Fiancé and leaned against him, hugging him for solace in play-desperation over the lost game. The next thing I know, he kisses him several times with tiny playful pecks on his shoulder, just where his mouth reached standing up straight. My eyes bulged a bit, and to play it over I announced a loud curse over not having had my camera when I needed it, to which The Fiancé hands me his cell phone, which has a camera built into it. And lo and behold, The Architect goes right back to embracing The Fiancé, this time planting a few tender kisses onto the curve of his neck. Of course I took the shot with the cell phone, officially as blackmailing material for when he is sober again, but I am glad that I have taken it... otherwise I wouldn't have believed it myself for it was so COMPLETELY out of character for him.

The Architect then tried to play it off with a reassuring "Oh, you don't have to feel uneasy." to The Fiancé, which made me giggle inside a bit, cause - if you only knew, my friend. The Fiancé didn't say anything either, and soon after that it was time for us to leave on our quite long ride home anyway.

This little episode made me think, though. As already mentioned in the title: the saying goes that drunks, like children, never lie. Could this be an explanation for his bad luck with women, for his inability to close the deal? Is he in reality a closet-case homo-/bisexual who is so repressed and conditioned to a certain way of life, that he cannot admit it even to himself, yet subconsciously averts any closer contact with women without knowing that he is doing it? Has his father's conditioning of what a man is supposed to be like and act like been successful enough to reduce him to a fool that makes an a$$ out of himself when he's blabberingly drunk, that only substantial amounts of alcohol free him up enough to act upon what he really wants, only to be able to blame it on the alcohol when he's sober again, not having to take on any real responsibility for his actions, and not having to further deal with it on any conscious level?

After he was done nibbling on The Fiancé's neck he briefly turned around to my gaping self, grinned, and said something to the effect of "after a few Long Island Ice Teas it just has to be a man for a change...", obviously finding himself to be very funny, maybe even provocative.

He left me not quite knowing how to proceed. He's always come to me for women-related advice, and he trusts me and my opinions. I am honest in my attempts to help him to get to lead a more fulfilled life, and I am not beyond suggesting he explore "different" ways of approaching love for himself... though I am not sure if I should. Would revealing myself and The Fiancé to him serve as a good example of homo-/bisexuality NOT being a bad thing that has to be joked about and looked down upon, or would it alienate him from The Fiancé and maybe even me, and cause him to think less of us? Would him knowing about The Fiancé being all many and masculine as he is yet still enjoying sex with men on occasion inspire him to look beyond the conditionings of his social surroundings, or would it cause him to close up even more than he already is?

Should I even mention the little incident last Saturday to him and question him about it, or should I just metaphorially brush it underneath the carpet and assume we all forget about it?

When The Fiancé and I left, The Architect hugged me and suggestively brushed up against me and held me close for a bit longer than he should have, and it felt to me as if he was making up for what he had just done to The Fiancé: to get a bit touchy-feely with a woman to acertain his role as a manly man. I didn't push him away or think much about it... he was drunk, afterall.

The last man I knew who remained a virgin until the age of 25 and never managed to close any deals with women suddenly turned up with a boyfriend. He's a full-blown gay man, and much happier than he ever was in the years before admitting to his preferences. Any advice on how to proceed with The Architect would be welcome.