Chapter 21: Heat Prostation
The day dragged on in aggravating, oppressive heat. The frolic of the morning session gave way to complaint and peevishness in the afternoon. By the end of the practice there was no humor to be had. The heat had gotten into my bones, and there was no escaping it at the camp. There was not an air conditioner within miles.
The idea of eating after all those hours in the gym was unappealing. Instead, I retreated to the empty commons room, filled a glass with ice and waited for it to melt while I watched the news. My quiet time was eventually interrupted as the boys began filing in after dinner. When Corey came in, he walked over to the TV and, without asking, changed the channel to something mindlessly annoying.
"Excuse me," I said, "I was watching the news."
"Well, now you're watching Tool Time," he answered.
"Didn't your mother ever teach you to share?" I asked, peevishly.
"Shut the fuck up, faggot," he shot back.
There was instant silence in the room as all eyes turned to see how I would deal with the challenge. I was on shaky ground. On the one hand, I had been attacked without provocation and I knew that the boys would understand that. On the other, I was not one of them and Corey was. I was there to serve them and make them comfortable. Did that give him the right to treat me like shit? Even Adam had treated me well in his own twisted construct of what constituted good treatment. What did they expect of me? Fight or flight?
The answer to that seemed clear. They were straight boys. They expected me to attack back. Still, I had a further problem to weigh. To consider being called a 'faggot' to be fighting words sent the wrong message. I was a gay, and I didn't consider it to be an insult. From a political standpoint, it would be like beating someone up for yelling, "you person!" But I was QueerPowerMan, and QueerPowerMan always knew how to respond to such idiocies.
"At least," I said, venom dripping, "I don't burst into tears when I take it up the ass."
There was instant, swirling motion around me, and I honestly can't tell which happened first. Did Corey lunge at me first, or did the boys at the poker table, led by Dan but followed quickly by Doug, rise to intervene first? It must have been the latter, as otherwise how could Dan have gotten to Corey in time? As it was, he caught him just before Corey, who was barreling toward me like a linebacker, made contact. It happened so fast I had no time to react - which increased my stature, as I had not had the presence of mind to flinch. All I know is that a split second after the words were out of my mouth, while I still stood the same ground I had been standing before the exchange, there was tremendous noise in the room and Corey was being dragged away from me by Dan and Doug. Everyone was yelling - Corey that I was a faggot and that he'd kill me, many of the other boys that Corey was an asshole and should shut up.
I was completely out of my element. I had been in shouting matches before, but rarely ones that could result in physical violence - especially to me! I was immersed in a group of straight boys, each one of whom could beat the living crap out of me, and yet many of them were defending me - against one of their own. I was in Bizarro World.
The shouting and tumult continued until, one by one, voices dropped out in deference to Adam, who had shown up during the fray and was standing in the doorway leaning against the jamb, thumbs hooked characteristically into the loops of his belt. He was looking ornery, and surveyed the action in the room with curious disdain. When there at last was silence, he said, "Eric," turned, and walked out the door without waiting to see if his designee was following him. Reluctantly, the designee did.
The tension had somehow been broken. Corey had relaxed and the boys holding him had let him go, though they still blocked any potential charge at me. The immediate crisis averted, I deemed it an opportune time to beat a retreat. I told the boys I was going to try to beat the heat outside, and invited them to join me on the lawn outside the dorm. Matt alone happily accepted.
The air on the lawn was as stifling as it was in the commons room. There was not even a hint of breeze, and we lay on our backs under the weighty haze staring at where the stars should be.
"Well, that was kind of intense," I said.
"Yeah," said Matt, giggling, "but you got him good!"
"I think maybe those are the first words he's said to me all summer."
"Corey is a shithead," Matt replied.
"Yeah, but still. He's your shithead."
"How do you mean?"
"He's one of you. He's a fellow gymnast. I'm just the gofer."
"First of all, he's not one of us. He's a kid. He's not on the team. He's just here because Johnston thinks he has potential."
"Still - he has more of a claim to be on the inside than I do."
"Second of all," he said, ignoring my last statement, "You're not 'just the gofer.' The guys like you. Most of 'em, anyway. They're glad you're here.
I sure am."
"Actually," I said, I'm glad I'm here too. It's the most interesting summer work I've ever had. That's for sure!"
"And finally," he added, interrupting me, "it's just hot. It's getting to all of us. You should have seen dinner. It was ugly."
"Really? What happened?"
"Eric and Steve got into a fight."
"A fight? You mean, like a fist fight?"
"Naw. Just yelling."
"Wow."
"Yeah."
Steven? What could piss off Steven?
"It sucks out here," I said.
"Yeah."
"Maybe tomorrow night if the heat hasn't broken, I can take everyone into town to see a movie or something."
"Don't think Johnston will allow that. Not 'till Sunday, anyway."
We were silent again.
After a bit, he said, "Tell me a story."
"A story?"
"Yeah. I'm bored. Tell me a story. I like listening to your voice."
I rolled over onto my side and looked at him. He was lying on his back, his hands cupped under his head. His shirt clung to his damp torso, small rings of wetness ringing his armpits. His shirt had ridden up some revealing the two vertical ridges of his abdominal muscles, clearly visible despite the relaxed concavity of his stomach. I took the bottom hem of his shirt, raised it to his sternum and started absent-mindedly playing with his stomach.
"Okay. Once upon a time, there was a little man who decided to take a walk. So he walked up a big hill, and down into the valley on the other side." Making my hand into a little standing man by extending my index and middle fingers, I walked it laterally across the roller coaster of his stomach. "There, he found a pool. So he decided to dive in." My fingers, now near his belly button, 'dove' into its shallow depths. There was a deep resonant thud as my hand made contact after the 'dive'.
"Wow. Interesting sound," I said. I took my two fingers and began tapping his abdomen like a tom-tom. The resulting beat rang with a rich, baritone tambour. I had never quite heard such a sound.
"Like beating me?" he asked, smiling.
"Like beating you off," I replied. He laughed.
"Honestly," I said. "That's a cool sound. I don't make that sound. You swallow a drum, or something?"
He rolled over and pushed me onto my back, lifting my shirt up to my chest as I had his. He thumped my stomach a couple of times. I played a dull, muffled thud. I did him again. He played an unidentifiable, but definite note.
"Interesting," I said. "What do you think it is?"
"I got muscles," he said.
"Fuck you!" I laughed. "I got muscles."
"Well, he replied lightly, "you got the one that matters!"
"I wish I were built like you," I said, returning to feeling his abdominal muscles.
"You're built just fine."
"Not the same, though. You mind if I do a little exploring?"
"Be my guest," he said.
I began to poke lightly at his muscles, feeling the mass of them, tracing the contours lightly with my index finger. I'd been with a bunch of gym bunnies in my time, but never ones with such compacted power. There seemed to be a difference in the feel of muscles built by repetitious, mindless lifting and those built by honest, full-mobility work. They were glorious.
"You're getting me hard," he said.
"Yeah?" I let my hand leave its investigations and drew it down over his shorts, lightly outlining his growing shaft.
"What have we got here?" I asked.
"Mmmm. Wanna fuck?"
"Wanna fuck? Wanna fuck?!" I cried in mock indignation. "What kind of cheap date do you think I am?! Wanna fuck? No," I said, "I don't wanna fuck," then added, "I wanna wrastle." Knowing that surprise was my only hope, I sprang on him trying to pin his chest under mine. As his hands were under his head, I was able to gain initial advantage. I brought my hands to the sides of his ribcage, and began applying pressure to points I knew to be sensitive.
"Bet the puppy is ticklish," I said. Indeed, he was. His whole body tensed, and he fairly shrieked in surprise and as a result of my poking. Within seconds, his hands were down from under his head, and he had grabbed my wrists. I did my best to keep in contact with him, but there was no hope. He drew my hands away from his sides despite my straining to keep them there, and bucked me off him. We rose to our knees - he to pounce, me to protect myself against it. We were laughing.
"Oh, mister," he said, "you're going to pay for that!"
"Promises, promises..."
I was on his turf now, and he was delighted. In sophisticated repartee, in engrossing dialog, Matt was out of his element. But here, wrestling, using his body physically to match his strength, grace and flexibility against an opponent, he was at home.
He dove for my thighs, and before I knew what was happening I was in the air, holding onto his shoulders to keep from falling. He had me in a bear hug just below the waist, his head off to the left of my hip. As he was kneeling and I was facing him with my shoulders well over him, I got the idea that if I could only bend over and reach his ankles, I could pull them out from under him. Then I'd fall on top of him. Match to Mark!
I'm a runner, not a wrestler. I have no idea about the physics of Nelsons - full, half, or Ricky. I could not have foretold just how bad an idea that was. Bending over his shoulder had the effect of stabilizing us, and rather than allowing me to grab his ankles, it merely allowed him to stand up. Now I was slung over his shoulder five and a half feet off the ground like some Neanderthal bride who had been hit in the head with a club in preparation for carrying her back to the cave. In a move he must have been learned from countless hours studying the WWF, he howled, and threw me to the ground, landing squarely on top of me. The impact almost took my breath away.
I'm not a wrestler, but I am a student of human nature, and I knew Matt's weakness.
"Fuck!" I cried, in pain. "Ow, ow, ow, shit."
Matt was immediately off me, his face a portrait of concern.
"What?!"
"Sucker!" I lunged at him again, this time trying to repeat the move he had just done on me. I got him by the waist, and began trying to lift him up.
Matt, surprised at first, would have none of it. "Oh, you're in deep shit now!" he laughed as I struggled to move him, to no avail.
He reached down over my back, and grabbed my waist from behind as I had his from the front. His abdominals were more powerful than my legs, and in the battle to wrest control, he won. Straightening up, he held me upside-down, my legs in the air bent backward over his shoulders, my head in his lap, facing away from him. We remained there, in that unusual position, while the blood rushed to my head.
"Who's the king?" He asked calmly.
"You mean the queen?" I taunted.
He leaned back, stretching my back in a way it was not supposed to stretch, and lifted his knees a few inches of the ground. He let himself fall back to the ground with a thud, bringing me with him. The resulting jolt made me see stars.
"Ooof!"
"You give?"
"I give head, if that's what you mean!" He bounced again, a little harder this time.
"Christ! Stop that!"
"You give?" he asked again and began the stretch anew.
"Yes, okay. I give. I give!"
"Who's the king?"
"You're the king!" I laughed.
"That's better!" He deposited me safely on the ground where I remained for a few moments on hands and knees until my blood had an opportunity to return to a more normal pressure in my head.
"The king wants to fuck," his Royal Highness pronounced.
"Then fuck the king shall!" I replied while, drawing myself up, I bowed low with courtly grace.
"Cool," he said. "The king is into it."
We got up, and I led him into my room. We were drenched in sweat and dirty from rolling in the grass. It was just as hot inside, if not more so. Shirts came off, shorts followed. We stood before each other naked and proud.
"Man," I said, "Herb Ritts would make a fortune here."
"Who?"
"No one," I replied. "Doesn't matter." I stepped forward to him, bringing my lips to his. He yielded immediately, his muscular form softening as my tongue found the inside of his mouth. I embraced him, but we fairly stuck together, given the combination of heat and sweat. I broke the kiss and the embrace.
"Wait," I said, "I got an idea. Lie down on the bed. I'll be right back."
I ran to the freezer, and returned with a cup full of ice.
"Hmmm," he said. "What's that for?"
"Trust me," I said, and popped one of the cubes into my mouth. I pushed him back so that he was supine on the bed and held him there while I ran the ice cube around the inside of my mouth with my tongue. When I felt that the cube had melted enough to round its edges and my mouth was sufficiently cold, I brought it down to his crotch.
Lifting his perpetually hard dick with my hand and with the cube tucked safely between cheek and gum, I slipped my mouth over its head, careful not to dribble any of the water I had stored up. When my cold lips and tongue came into contact with his dick head, he shivered in delight.
"That's different," he said, his hands coming to my head to try to keep control in case it got too intense for him.
I bobbed on him a few times, savoring the differential in temperatures between his dick and my mouth. When I felt he was ready for it, I took a full breath, deep-throated him and manipulated the ice cube out of the pouch in my cheek into direct contact with the base of his dick.
"Wow!" His body shivered again, more from the sensation than the cold I knew, and he began to gyrate his hips to move the cube around within my mouth.
I sucked him off that way for some time, the normal calisthenics of a blowjob complicated by the added manipulations necessary to keep the cube moving where I wanted it. One hand held his dick in place, the other held the cup of ice, cooling my palm and fingers. He responded more and more vigorously to my ministrations. When I felt he was getting close, I took my free, chilled hand, and palmed his balls. He bucked a few times with the shock of the coldness, but it brought him back to the level at which I wanted to keep him.
After fifteen or so minutes and four ice cubes, my jaw began to tire. Sweat was pouring from his body, and he had been reduced to a series of incoherent moans of encouragement laced with expletives. I withdrew from him and sat up over his prone, drenched body.
"Le roi est mort," I said. "Vive la Reine!"
"Huh?" he asked, through heavily lidded eyes.
"Nothing, pup. Just babbling. You ready for that fucking now?"
"Mmm."
I got the lube from the drawer and returned to my position between his legs, raising them up to my shoulders. I squirted a good dollop of goo onto him and rubbed it in. Rather than mounting him at that point, though, I reached for another ice cube.
"Brace yourself, pup," I said, "this is going to be a little intense."
I brought the cube to just over his crack, and holding it firmly in my palm, let a few drips drop onto his pucker. It twitched in response, first drawing tightly closed, then opening up. Gently, carefully, I brought the ice to his perineum, making sure to keep it moving as I slid it forward and back. His hamstrings tensed in an involuntary effort to close himself off to me, but his knees were held apart by the position of my forearms. I increased the area covered by the ice, drawing it forward and back over his hole. When he was ready for it, I slid the cube directly over his pucker, and slipped it into his chute. He did not have enough time to react before my dick was there as well, stretching him open as it pushed, gently but insistently, past the tight ring of muscle. I popped in and, feeling my dick head hit the cube inside him, shivered myself. Making sure I didn't exceed his ability to accept me, I pressed on, driving the cube deeper into his gut, until I was fully within him.
The fuck was intense. The combination of heat and cold worked its magic on both of us. Having needed a few minutes to acclimate to the sensation, he took to it whole-heartedly. At one point, at his insistence, my dick shared the tight space in his tunnel with three cubes. I began to pound him, driving myself into him as deeply as I could manage. He encouraged me to do so in both word and deed. By the end, I was almost becoming afraid that the slapping of my thighs against his ass was so loud it could be heard from the hallway. When we came, our shouts surely could be.
Ten minutes later, after his obligatory laughing jag which, this time, devolved into hysteria - a sign I interpreted as success - we lay still on the bed, motionless except for our deep breathing. Finally, I rolled over onto my side and faced him, as I had on the lawn earlier. Without thinking, my hand went to his stomach, where it began lightly drumming to produce that lovely sound again.
"Can I ask you a question," I said lazily, still succumbing to the post-orgasmic endorphin rush.
"Sure," he said. "Anything."
"When you look at me, what do you see?"
He turned to look at me.
"No," I said. "Don't look. Just shut your eyes and tell me what you see when you think of me."
"Okay," he said, shutting his eyes again. "What I see when I look at Mark.
You're 5'10", you have medium short brown hair parted on the right. Your face is beautiful because your eyebrows are a different color than your hair - they're lighter, almost blond kind of - and because your eyes are set kind of close together. That makes them look intense. You're eyes are hazel, but they have flecks of yellow and brown and blue in them so they kind of change color depending on what you're wearing. At first I thought you were wearing different color contacts, until I figured it out. Your face is thin and angular, and when you smile, you got the cutest dimples. You've got a long neck. You're sinewy, like a long-distance runner. You got about four chest hairs but pretty smooth other than that, and you got a small mole on your back just above your waist. You got a big dick, and you sure know what to do with it. Your ass is incredible! I think you must do a lot of running or something at home. You got hair on the knuckles of your toes, like a Hobbit. It's so cute! You're really smart, and incredibly interesting, and funny and entertaining and I learn a lot when I'm around you. And you're sweet and nice and giving and kind and honest and smart and..."
"Okay, okay." I said. "That's fine. Thanks."
He turned to me, kissed me on the lips. "Don't mention it," he said.
Looking at him look at me, I realized all at once and with crushing clarity just how horribly serious a mistake I had made.