Working at the Club
Hey there amigos! Here is chapter 9, the ink freshly dried of course. As all great things must come to an end, so must all the mediocre things, including my story. So in a couple of chapters, alas, it shall be no more but a few bytes gathering dust on the proverbial digital shelves of Nifty. A lot of you have asked me if I have any other stories to which my answer is no. Since I have some sort of following here with this story I would like to shamelessy promote my next story. Look for "Gallerie Nacht" in the encounters section. It will be a short, quick one, probably, but it might prove to be some okay reading. Okay, boys, keep those keyboards clean.
Chapter 9
I kissed him with a passion and a desire not at all different than from when I kissed Ryan, but it wasn't the same either. It was a different sort of kiss that felt less, well, I guess lusty.
My initial enthusiasm and desire pushed Adam way back on the bed at the outset. But Adam kissed my back. Our bodies righted themselves and the kiss became mutual. Adam moved his hand up my body, brushed across my cheek and then paused there, awkwardly. And as suddenly as the kiss started, it ended. His hand came down to my chest abruptly, and pushed me away.
"Steve, what is this? What are you doing?"
I opened my eyes and looked into his. They seemed hurt, confused. I bowed my head and sat back in my original position on the bed. My head dropped in frustration.
"Steve?"
"What?" I was still choking on my tears and the misery I felt from Ryan.
"What were you doing?"
"What do you think?"
"Well, I think you were kissing me."
"So," I responded snidely.
"Did you mean it?"
"What do you mean?" I asked.
"I mean, why did you kiss me?"
"I don't know." I paused.. Why was he all weirded out? It pissed me off how he had to analyze everything. What can I say? I kissed him because he was there. Spontaneity shouldn't require an explanation. I then added with spite, "Because you were there."
Adam paused. He seemed to search for the right words and started to say something and then stopped. Then he started again, "I don't think that's fair. To me. I mean, I understand your situation, the stuff you're going through. But what signals are you trying to send me?"
"Adam, it's just a kiss," I said trying to play it off. "What do I have to explain?"
Adam snickered. "Do you like me now, too?" I opened my mouth to say something, but I wasn't sure what would come out so I closed it again suddenly. This was starting to get awkward pretty quickly. Adam didn't wait too much longer for me to make up my mind and he added "or am I maybe the just the next available piece of ass after Ryan." I furiously looked up at Adam, and saw that he meant what he had said, and he was even as mad as I was at that moment. I got up off the bed and started pacing around the room.
"How can you say that? I'm not like that... at all!" I couldn't hide the anger in my voice. "How dare you! Where do you come off acting like that?"
"Me?" Adam questioned. "Me!? I'm the one who should be upset. I'm trying to help you sort things out with Ryan, who you obviously like a lot, and then you go and treat me like plan B in case shit doesn't work out with Ryan."
"Plan B!" I retorted. "Shit, you'd be lucky to make plan Z!"
Adam stared at me, and his mouth dropped open. The anger melted out of his face and his eyes and was replaced with a blank and bleak look. He shook his head, "Could you please leave," he said softly. "I'm going to bed, now." I ran my hand through my hair and contemplated the last few minutes. I was upset, over something totally unrelated to Adam, and I had just taken everything out on him. How could I have let things get so out of control? I walked out of his room without another word.
I went and flopped down on my bed. I realized that I did like Adam, too. Of course I did. Why else would I had gotten defensive and tried to play the kiss off like something that didn't matter. The truth was I was as sick of Ryan and all his shit as much as I was still in love with him. Maybe what I saw in Adam was someone who could return the love I so desperately wanted to give. Damn, and now I had really fouled up things good. I fell asleep in my clothes, exhausted, and frustrated.
I woke up at four in the morning and couldn't fall back asleep. The events of the previous night kept replaying themselves in my head. Finally, after tossing and turning in bed I threw back the covers and got dressed. I went downstairs and poured myself a glass of water. I heard footsteps above and could tell they came from Adam's room. I listened as he padded across the floor to use the bathroom, and then retreated back to his room. I went upstairs to his door and raised my hand to knock.
I paused, and as hard as I tried, I couldn't bring myself to knock. I was taken over by a dread of what I would say. How could I explain my actions and my feelings towards him? Because in truth, I was treating him like a plan B. I went back downstairs and walked out the front door to get some fresh air. It was just shy of five o'clock and the night sky was a dark blue-gray and seemed to shudder as it tried to fight off the advancing sun and the dawn of a new day. I watched as two Robins hopped around the front yard in search of worms.
I remembered reading somewhere that the Robin was the official state bird of Connecticut. I chuckled softly to myself. What an ugly, uninteresting bird to adopt I thought. I watched the Robins' tirade and watched as one triumphantly pulled up a worm and turned to fly back to her nest. I thought to myself that no matter what we humans tended to believe, our problems didn't amount to a hill of a beans in the scheme of things. All around me, Nature was blooming, living, and dyeing in the milky white dawn, oblivious to mine or anyone else's problems. I walked off the porch and proceeded to walk down the hill. I walked around my neighborhood for twenty minutes, and didn't see a soul on so early a Sunday morning. By the time I returned home the sun had fully risen and washed away the last remnants of night.
I showered and ate breakfast. My mom came down at 6:15 dressed in her nurse's uniform.
"Honey, what time did you wake up this morning?" she asked as she hurriedly poured herself a cup of coffee.
"4. Why?"
"Well I heard you moving about. Is something wrong?"
"No, of course not." No matter what, I never could talk to my parents about stuff that was troubling me. My other brothers could, but I just couldn't open up to them. I lied and assured her that everything was fine, and she left for work shortly thereafter. Fifteen minutes later, just as I was getting ready to head out the door and get myself to work, I heard footsteps on the stairs and looked up to see Adam walking into the kitchen.
"Hey," he said, giving me a weak smile.
"Hey," I softly said, my face turning red as I struggled to come up with an apology, an explanation, anything to put my conscience at ease. "Listen," I started but he interrupted me.
"No, its all right Steve. You don't have to apologize, its my fault too." I shut my mouth and continued to watch him, wondering where he was going with this and how it could possibly be his fault as well. "Well," he continued, " I guess I wasn't really that upset when you kissed me. I think I have been sending you signals and well... I just should have played less of a role between you and Ryan. I know you like him a lot, well, I was just kind of hoping you might like me too. But it's cool. I shouldn't interfere." I started to shake my head and begin to say something but he raised his hand to stop me and continued.
"It's cool. I know you said some mean things and I said some mean things about you as well. I'm sorry." He paused.
"I'm really sorry, too. I didn't mean anything I said," I assured him.
"Regardless, lets put it behind us. We should be friends, and even if you did like me at all, its probably... its just probably better that we keep things platonic between us."
I nodded my head. I felt really uncomfortable and awkward around him. As if sensing my emotions, he spoke up again. "I'm moving out today, its probably better. I still hope you'll look me up sometime."
"Sure I will." He handed me a piece of paper with his address written down on it.
"You've probably got to get to work, don't you?" he asked. I glanced up at the clock and nodded. I grabbed a jacket (the mornings were damp and cold) and my keys and was about to head out the door.
"Well, I'll see you later," I said to Adam.
"Thank you so much for putting me up, Steve. You're a great friend and I'm sorry we had this argument."
"You're welcome." I said. We stared at each other for several seconds, then quickly I embraced him in a hug and squeezed him tight. "I promise I'll come and see you."
Adam nodded. His eyes were getting a little misty, as were mine. I turned around uncomfortably and hurriedly headed out to my car.
The morning passed pretty ordinarily. Brad and I had no trouble and by 8:30 we were napping in a wooded area just off the 13th green. I love this job! I tried not to think too much about the escapade with Adam. Every time it popped in my mind I just gritted my teeth and fretted about how our living arrangement had ended. I couldn't help but wonder what would have been between Adam and I if I hadn't met Ryan. Well, coulda-beens are something you can't fret about and you've got to let go of them at some point. However, there was an aching, dull pain in my heart when I thought of all the fun times I had with Adam. Having it all end like it had was pretty miserable.
Brad sensed something was bothering me and tried to get me to open up. I kept assuring him that everything was fine. Neither Adam nor Ryan were working today. Which was surprising because it was a real busy day down at the pool. When Brad and I went down later in the day to get our lunch I probed the manager.
"You guys seem a little short-staffed today."
"Yeah, I know. Ryan didn't come in today. His ass is in trouble when I see him."
Yeah, he's got a lot to fear from you, you dweeb, I thought to myself. You all know I couldn't stand the kid. That perplexed me. Ryan was a playboy and not adverse to playing hooky, but it still didn't make sense. A quick thought popped into my head that maybe he was upset about something, maybe me, but I quickly pushed it to the back of my mind. I couldn't afford to let him get to me anymore. I felt it was time to move on.
Around 3pm just as we were heading back out towards to redo the course, Miguel caught up to us.
"Hey, drinkboys. Que pasa?"
"Nada," I called back to him. "You wanna go cruise for some ladies with us?"
Miguel glanced at his watch. "Yah, why the fuck not. Les' go!"
"What do you mean 'cruise for ladies'?" Brad asked, thoroughly confused. I jumped out of the cart we were in and grabbed an extra one by the loading dock.
"Go up and check on the front, Miguel and I will go check on the back. Meet us in the woods," I said grabbing some supplies from the back of his cart and transferring them to ours. Miguel climbed in and I climbed in beside him.
"Hey, baby, let me drive," he said.
"No way, I've seen the way you drive."
"Ah, you no fun!" he protested. I really wanted to talk to Miguel and get his advice. So we made our way to the back 9. People were teeing off by the station so I had to wait for them to finish before I could make any moves. After the fourth golfer teed off I quickly restocked the drinks, and replaced the snacks and fruit that had been eaten. Then I grabbed a a twelve pack of beer from the cart and a towel. I dumped the beers into the cooler and pushed the way down so they'd get under the ice and cool down. As my hand came up I used the towel and stealthily swiped three cold Buds. I covered them with the towel and hopped back onto the cart, no one the wiser.
We drove off into the woods and cracked open a cold one each. "Listen to this shit, Miguel," I started. After I had told him about Ryan, I introduced him to the whole Adam issue and lied, saying Adam was some guy I knew from school. I didn't want Miguel thinking I had the hots only for snackshed boys!
After he had listened, he took a long swig of the beer, and wiped the perspiration from his forehead. He chuckled a bit and looked at me, "Why you wanna know what I think?"
"Well, all the shit I listened to with you and your girl, I figure you owe me."
"Ah, sheeeit. What I mean is it sounds like you already made up your mind."
"How so?" I asked, the bottle of beer pausing against my lips.
"Ryan is shit. He's no good," he said shaking his head. "He was fun for a little sucky-sucky, but now you all banged out, no?"
I laughed. "I guess."
"If he called and apologized would you take him back."
"Yes," I said. "Well, probably."
Miguel laughed out loud. "Ha! You're like one of them battered wives who always takes their loser husband back! You know what you gotta do?"
"What?"
"Go for Adam. He likes you, man. He said so!"
I shook my head and my face twisted in pain. "Yeah, but that's all f'd up now. I couldn't go for him without making it seem as if the only reason I want him is because things didn't work with Ryan."
"Yeah, but is that why you would go for him?"
"No. Of course not."
"Then you know in your heart it ain't true baby. Adam will know too." I mulled over that for a few moments. The more I thought about Adam, the more it hurt me to think what I had said, and how I had acted. "If you go back to this Ryan fool, you're the stupidest gringo I know, man," Miguel finished.
We heard the whirl of Brad's cart as he motored off the trail and into the shady clearing of the woods in which we were sitting. The conversation between us ended. After we had finished our beers, we went back to the clubhouse and dropped off Miguel. The rest of the day passed without incident and Ryan never did show up at work.
When I got home, the first thing I noticed were a dozen red roses sitting on the table. Then I saw a note next to them. It read:
Steven - These came for you today. Who is R? Anyway, we went out to dinner and then a movie with the Giraldi's. Be back later. There's frozen pizza in the freezer. Love, Mom
I looked closer at the roses and saw a note on them. This note read:
I can't begin to apologize for the way I've been acting. Please call me. I need to talk.
Love,
R.
I cringed thinking of the explanation I would have to give to my parents about this. But it suddenly brightened my whole night. I couldn't believe he had sent me flowers. I was so unlike him that it made me giggle. I found myself smiling broadly and couldn't believe my luck. Perhaps there was hope for this boy after all . I found myself reaching for the phone but stopped myself before I could dial his number. Miguel's advice came roaring to the front of my mind. I decided to let things sit another day. If anything, I'd leave Ryan sweating so he could have some idea of what he had put me through. I decided that made the most sense. But I would call him back the next day. I would definitely call him back.
TO BE CONTINUED...
Okay, I hope this was a more reasonable time period than my last posting. I hope I'm not cranking this story into the ground by continuing to write more. I can only say that's it just about finished and I hope it stays decent up until the end. As always, please email me if you feel the desire. I try to respond to each and every one.
h_2_t@hotmail.com