Chapter Six
Life was easy on the loading dock because we were having fun. Very few things bothered Frankie, Rocky, or me. I almost felt guilty collecting my paychecks. Well, not really, haha!
Then, an unexpected, near disaster happened late in the fourth week of work. Frankie and I were horsing around, as usual, and he slipped backward over the edge of the loading dock. It's eight feet down to the blacktop parking lot, but he caught himself with his elbows clutching onto the six-by-six-inch wood bumper board attached to the face of the dock. I started to mock his clumsiness but stopped when I saw how pale his face had gotten. Big drops of perspiration ran down from his forehead as he let out a low groan, "Ohhhhh, fuck.."
I went right over, "What'd ya hurt, Frankie?" He shook his head slightly, and I waited till he could speak. He said, "It feels like a splinter is inside my left thigh. It's pinning me against the loading dock, so I can't just drop to the parking lot. Hurts like hell." I was scared and ran over to get the ladder we used to get down off the loading platform. I put it down next to Frankie, then I jumped down to the parking lot to climb a few rungs and pull his leg over to help support himself on the ladder instead of just elbows holding him up. Frankie said, "Oh, that's better. Thanks, Oliver."
He was still stuck against that board, so I reached between Frankie and the old wood bumper to feel where the sliver of wood connects Frankie to the dock." I'll have to break that thing off right where it goes through your shorts." "Just do it, man," he said strained. I had a razor box cutter in my back pocket, which I used to cut through the splinter against the face of the wood bumper. Frankie moved his hips away from the dock and sighed. There was a drop of blood the size of a dime on the front of his shorts.
Free from the dock, I could help Frankie inch his arm over to the ladder above where I stood. His right foot was already on the rung, so next was his right hand, left foot, and finally, left hand. He grunted with each movement and awkwardly went up the ladder using his right foot and his arms only, dragging his left leg. He grunted and groaned with each rung. His face didn't look too good; it was very pale, and his eyes looked dull.
I helped him inside the truck bed and onto one of the cardboard boxes up against the side of the truck bed so he would have a backrest. He held his left leg out. "I'll go for help, Frankie." He grabbed my arm and held me back, and grunted out, "No, Oliver, it feels like the splinter is near my balls, and I don't want that old bitch in the infirmary getting a hold of my nuts because I might never get them back. Get the first aid kit from the cafe and then turn on the truck bed's overhead light so you can see to pull the splinter out."
Then he let his head roll back against the side of the truck and closed his eyes, gritting his teeth. I ran and did what he wanted. When I got back Frankie was trying to pull his cargo shorts down, but he was in pain whenever he tried to exert pressure on his leg. The sweat was pouring down his very pale face, and he wasn't making any wise cracks, which was rare for Frankie. I helped get his shorts down; then he pulled his jockey underwear down. Lifting his butt off the box while he did it, which caused a grimace and a long groan that ended with "God damn it. Fuck!!"
He sat on the cardboard box bare-assed as I swallowed hard, and my dick twitched. Frankie felt along the inside of his left thigh near his balls to feel where the splinter had entered. Biting my upper lip, I stared at his bright red pubes that began just below his creamy-colored belly. A naturally neat, compact pube patch of soft, curly, vibrantly red pubic hair. Right below the beautiful pubes was a long, cream-colored uncut penis noticeably larger than mine. It was as perfect as a drawing medical book's drawing of a penis. No bumps or veins or imperfections, just creamy-smooth perfect skin covering a large penis.
Balls to match: a drawing of the perfect set of balls, one hanging slightly lower than the other. Not a single red pubic hair on the creamy scrotum skin. I tried to memorize it all in case I never saw it again. Oh my God, I wanted to suck on that cock and lick those balls in the worse way.
"I can feel it here, Oliver; it's wicked tender."
"Huh? What, Frankie?"
"Can you see the splinter, Oliver?" I looked where his finger was rubbing, but the big splinter was right at the juncture of the thigh and the belly or groin area. I don't know what to call that area. I told him, and he said, "Well, get the scissors and cut the pubes. Help me out here, Oliver. The fucking thing is digging into me with every move I make."
I got the scissors in my right hand and held that perfect penis of his away from the scissors with my left hand as I knelt in front, looking up at Frankie, gripping my shoulders tightly. The pain hadn't gotten to his dick yet because, surprisingly, it firmed up noticeably as soon as I closed my hand on it. I involuntarily stroked it as I gently laid the scissors' open blades on his lower belly. Then, checking to be sure only pubic hair was between the blades, I closed them, cutting the pubic hairs off close to his skin and causing a cascade of soft red pubes to slide lazily down his thigh and blow around in the warm breeze that flowed inside the open end of the truck bed. I stared at the red hairs as they floated around, and I thought, pretty.
It was fascinating, and, in almost a trance, I closed the scissors over and over on his pubes, cutting much more of his pubic hair than I had to. Still, I just kept cutting and cutting them until most of his pubes were gone, and all around us floated fluffy, red pubic hairs blown by the warm breezes. A lot landed on my sneakers, my legs, and Frankie's shorts, which were lying at his feet. I stared dumbly at them as spit rolled out the side of my mouth because I'd forgotten to swallow.
He asks again, "Can you see the splinter, Oliver?"
"Huh? What is it, Frankie? You've always had something hurting. Oh yeah, the splinter, yeah, I see it now. It looks like it was about five inches long."
Looking closer, I mutter, "The skin around it was sore-looking, red, and shiny. I should have taken you to a hospital's emergency room, but you were emphatic that I should not do that."
I got big tweezers from the first aid kit, brushed over his shorn pubic patch with the back of my fingers pushing away random pubic hair clippings, and then I got his penis in my left hand again to keep it away from the tweezers and, without thinking, stroked it again.
"Don't do that, Oliver." "What? Oh, yeah, sorry," I mumbled, thinking his pubic stubble was still soft. I rubbed all around his shorn pubic area in a kind of massage, my boner throbbing and dripping. In my hand, Frankie's cock was firm but not a boner. Frankie, sounding sarcastic, mumbled, "That feels nice and all that, Oliver, but when you get a second, please pull that fucking splinter out. It's killing me, and it feels like digging in deeper."
I shook my head and got my senses back. Frankie was talking low, and it was obvious he was in pain. I concentrated on gripping the splinter with the tweezers, but my first attempts failed because the splinter was embedded beneath the skin. It was about three skin layers deep along most of its five inches, but not stabbing directly into his thigh, so I cut a little of the skin at the splinter's entrance point with the box-cutter. Frankie let out a long hissing sound between his teeth.
Now, I could get a good hold on the sliver of wood, and I pulled it out in one motion. Frankie screamed, "FuuuucK!" and a trickle of blood followed the five-inch-long splinter out of the opening. It left behind some dirt or dust, something gray. I squeezed Bastine Spray from the first aid kit into the tunnel the splinter had made, hoping it would disinfect the cut. Frankie squealed out, "Ouch, God damn, Oliver, that stings."
Frankie breathed fast and hard for a minute and then calmed down. My hand was shaking, but I went back to rubbing his pretty red pubic stubble until Frankie put his hand on mine and gently said, "It's okay now, Oliver. I'm feeling a little better; you're the best, thank you, but you don't have to do that now." He squeezed my shoulder, rubbed through my hair, and muttered, "Help me get my pants on."
I looked at his cock and wanted to put it in my mouth. Alexander's long, thin, brown boner tasted so good, and I knew Frankie's creamy white one would taste good, too. If he asked me to, I would suck him off till he forgot about the pain from the splinter. He didn't ask, though, so I reluctantly let go of his cock and helped him cover his perfect package with first his jockey underwear, and then I pulled his cargo shorts up for him. I brushed the front of his crotch and, afterward, his ass getting the loose pubic hair clippings off his shorts. Then he leaned on me as we went into the cafe for cokes and a cigarette.
I squeezed his body against mine, again thinking I was in love. Smoking his cigarette, Frankie's hands were shaky. I wanted to hold his hand in both of mine, but I knew better. It's amazing what a five-inch splinter can do, the trauma it can cause. I convinced Frankie to lie down for a while, and he finally did, falling asleep about two minutes later. He didn't want to go home early.
Rocky came down eventually, and I told him about the splinter. He said that later, when Frankie was feeling fine again, this would be a funny story, but right now, it was scary. He called somebody in maintenance, and before the day was over, a heavy plastic cover was placed over the splintery bumper board to prevent further splinter accidents. Rocky made Frankie go home early, so I missed our afternoon make-out.
We were back on schedule the next day; Frankie was definitely his old self. He ragged on me something terrible about the job I'd done cutting his pubes. I got a boner thinking about it. We'd just finished a great three-minute make-out, and with the weekend coming up, I was determined to finally find a way to get together with Frankie on Saturday. I discussed the possibilities with him, and we were being playful about it until he finally got serious and said, "Shit, Oliver. The truth is, I'd love to have you visit this weekend, but Darleen takes up my every waking moment on weekends. I can't breathe without her there counting each breath. Love can be a pain in the ass at times."
Darleen?
"Ah, who's Darleen?" I asked, hoping it was one of Frankie's bullshit put-ons, but it wasn't. Frankie tells me that Darleen and he have been girlfriend/boyfriend since eighth grade. Darleen's mother insisted they couldn't get engaged until the end of their college sophomore year, at the
earliest, and that they couldn't get married until they both graduated from college. And that is their plan.
With a question in the way I say it, I said, "Married?"
Frankie laughed, saying, "Here, Oliver, look at this." He handed me his phone. It was in an album with ten pictures. The first was a fairly recent one of Frankie, looking just the same as he looks now, standing next to a taller guy wearing an Army uniform. The Army guy was holding his hat, so I could see he had the same red hair as Frankie. "That's my brother Ray. He's in Iraq now."
I looked at the picture, frowned, and looked over at Frankie. I saw how cute Frankie was and then looked back at the picture and saw that his brother was geeky-looking. They both had red hair, wore eyeglasses, and were thin, but Ray looked like a dork. Ichabod Crane, maybe, with a big Adam's apple. Nothing in his facial features worked well together at all, and, to make matters worse, Ray had freckles and freckles on top of his freckles. Frankie looked so puzzled that I frowned. I guess he was used to looking at his brother.
The next picture is Frankie looking like he was seven years old. He had his arm around a girl six inches taller than him. She did not look like she was seven years old. Seventeen is more like it. Frankie and the girl had on matching Middle School sweaters, his small and hers, large. I guess this was their eighth-grade picture. Someone had drawn a heart on the image and wrote "F LOVES D" inside the heart. Darleen wasn't even as good-looking as Ray. I wondered if this was one of Frankie's jokes.
In each succeeding picture, Frankie and the girl look older. Frankie said proudly, "We took a picture each new year on the first day of school. Cool, huh?" I shrugged and continued looking at the pictures. In the last one, Frankie looked just like Frankie looks now except he didn't have the 'fade' haircut, just the long brush cut that he'd had in all the pictures since the Middle School one. His girlfriend was still taller than Frankie, but he had caught up some. Darleen appeared to be maybe two inches taller in the last picture, but unfortunately, she'd filled out some more, so that Middle School sweater would need to be XXL if she wanted to fit in it now. She's a big girl with a square-shaped body. Frankie's arm couldn't reach around her back at the waist. They both had big smiles on their face, though. Darleen had a short page boy hairstyle and, there is no other way to put this, a large, fleshy nose. I wanted to cry. Poor Frankie.
Frankie saw the concern on my face and squeezed my shoulder, saying enthusiastically, "Don't be sad, Oliver. You can still be my boyfriend!"
Wha, huh?
To be continued...
