The back corner of the locker room looks like the rest of the room, identical grey MDF lockers, same narrow wooden benches bolted to the floor, pervasive bluish white light everywhere. The ventilation system gives off a ubiquitous, low hum. A man is sitting on the bench in front of an open locker, dressed in street pants and shoes, drying his hair with a white towel. His gym clothes, damp with sweat, are piled next to him on the bench. His shirt still hangs on a hook in the locker.
The locker room door squeaks as it pivots open then again when it shuts as another man enters. He’s wearing an oversized tshirt with the sleaves cut off. It hangs down and covers much of his basketball shorts which come down almost to his knees. He walks over two isles and all the way to the back, stopping next to the first man who doesn’t see him initially because his towel is in his face. So he stands there, head bent over.
“Oh, hey, I didn’t see you,” he says when he pulls his towel down and looks up.
“Um….” His eyes keep darting to the floor.
“Is this you here?” He gestures to the locker one over from his, the only one with a lock on it. “That’s how it always turns out, huh? All this room and the only two people end up right next to each other.”
“Yeah,” he’s still not making steady eye contact, “but I can come back.”
“No man, that’s OK. Let me move my stuff.” He puts his towel on the other side of the bench and reaches around to grab his gym clothes but as he moves them his towel starts to slide to the floor and as he tries to reach for it everything tumbles out of his hands. “Fuck!”
“I’m so sorry!” He’s finally looked him straight in the face. “I, I,” speaking rapidly, “I didn’t mean, I…”.
“No worries, no worries.” He cuts him off, turns his head to face him. “I’ve gotta wash it anyway. It all stinks like a dead horse.” He grins.
“It can’t be that bad really.” Then he smiles slightly in return and as he does the rest of his body relaxes a little. “Maybe more like a dead muskrat.” He holds his gaze, tentatively.
“Muskrat!? Where’d you come up with ‘muskrat’? Do you even know what a muskrat is?” He’s shifting his whole body on the bench to face him more, ignoring his clothes on the floor.
“I don’t know. It sounds like it smells, you know, musky. But less than a horse, not as horsey, much smaller, at least when they’re dead, not as horsey I mean, I mean smelly, like your clothes, I mean not your clothes, I mean.” He stops abruptly. His eyes settle back on the floor.
For a moment, maybe a beat and a half, the only sound in the room is the woosh of the HVAC system. The silence that isn’t silent.
But he lifts his gaze from the floor slowly as though he were concentrating on his form. “Um, so, good workout?”
“Yeah man, thanks! Legs and a little cardio today. How about you? I saw you doing some curls.”
“Yeah, I was doing that.” He swallows deliberately and lowers his voice slightly. “You saw me?”
“It’d be hard to miss you this late on a Friday night, there’s almost no one else here. We might be the last two.”
“For sure.”
“How long you been lifting?”
“I got here like an hour ago.”
“No Gracie, I mean like, when did you start getting into it?”
“Oh,” he hesitates as if thinking, then: “I did a little in college with a friend, mostly sort of goofing around, but after I graduated I decided to get more serious.”
“That last spring?”
He says nothing but nods.
“Hey, no judgment, we all gotta start somewhere. Besides, look at you” – and here he stands up from the bench, leans in just a little, and reaches over to lightly touch his upper arm – “you got some guns.”
Their faces are much closer now, their eyes too, their colors evident even in the grey fluorescent light. “You think?”
“Well, I didn’t say you were swole, don’t get ahead of yourself. But you’ve got some definition.” He’s running his finger up toward the shoulder. “Up here too, I think.”
“Uh huh.” He keeps looking at the face of the man.
“Lemme see. Take your shirt off.”
“My shirt?”
“Yeah, take your shirt off and show me what you’ve got going on with your shoulders.”
“I….”
“I mean, you’re about to take it off to change anyway.”
“Um, not really.”
“What do you mean, ‘not really’? You shower in your clothes?” He’s moved his hand away from his shoulder and is gesturing toward the showers.
“I don’t really shower here. I was just getting my backpack out of the locker. To go home. I shower there.”
“Ah,” he says slowly, as much to himself as to anyone else, “I see.” Then his eyes refocus. “You want some advice? Shower here. Change in the locker room.” Then with emphasis: “Get serious!”
“It’s just I….”
He cuts him off. “Never mind. I don’t care. That’s not the important thing. The important thing is your progress. Show me. Take off the shirt.” He pauses, waits, then raises his eyebrows and shrugs his shoulders as if baffled. “The shirt, off.”
In response, he moves his jaw, but not to speak, just side to side a little bit. He squints slightly too. Then he reaches up each hand to the back of the neck hem, gabs it, and slips the loose shirt up over his head. He holds it tightly in his right hand as a bites his lower lip. His stare has become intense.
“OK,” he speaks slowly, looking up and down, “that counts as some progress.” He takes half a step closer, reaches down, and tugs the shirt from his hand. Then he lets it drop to the floor. Neither looks away from the other’s eyes. “You’ve got a nice body. I can tell you’ve put in some work. Biceps, like I said.” He reaches up and uses his finger to trace the outline of his appraisal. “Triceps here.” Now two fingers outlining. “You work these, yeah?”
He breathes in deliberately. “Uh huh.”
“Nice.” His fingers linger. “Not bad for a guy starting out.” He moves his fingers slowly up, zig-zagging, grazing as much skin as possible. “Delts and traps, good.” His hand is now against the neck. “You look really good.”
“Uh huh.” He inclines his head slightly toward the touch on his neck. “I guess so.”
“You guess so?” He’s now speaking more slowly, in something like a raspy whisper. “What do you mean, you guess so?” He says this with a smile and a relaxed face, not confrontationally but almost in wonder. “You don’t see how beautiful you are?” He’s now put his whole palm against his neck, cupping it.
“No,” he says slowly, “I mean yes,” he hesitates, “I mean, I just mean,” he pauses, “I don’t really know which all those muscles are.”
He pulls back, not taking in details like the color of the eyes or the curve of the neck, but the whole face. “You don’t know what delts are?”
“Sorta.” His faces scrunches up a little, then: “Not really I guess.”
“You’re lifting weights and you don’t have an even basic understanding of anatomy?”
“Science wasn’t really my thing in school, you know?” His voice sounds less defensive than pleading.
“Hmm,” he says, some tension returning to his face . “Let me guess. Art major? Or maybe theater?”
“Guilty of the second.”
“And did you perform, or work behind the scenes?” His hand is resting on the shoulder, but his thumb is brushing back and forth.
“Both, but mostly performing.”
“So you’re an extrovert?” He grins.
“No, not that, not at all.”
“Really, cause I’ve known theater types and it seems like they’re always on, always performing. Extroverts.”
“Not all of us. I’m pretty shy actually. But it’s different when I have a script.” Then he adds with a touch of urgency: “But I’m working on it.”
“OK…, I get the shy part, but how are you working on it?”
“That’s why I’m here. I’m trying to change my body, make it better! I want a better body!”
“Better?”
“Better. Bigger!”
“You realize that bigger isn’t necessarily better?”
“What do you mean? Look at you, you’re like ripped all over!” Now it was his turn to pull back for an overall assessment. “You’re perfect. You must’ve been doing this for years.”
“A while, but my point is that bigger, or more ripped, or swole, or whatever isn’t objectively ‘better’. It’s subjective. It depends on what you want.”
“I want that. That’s what I want! I want your body.” He stopped suddenly. His eyes moved left and right. “I mean, I don’t want it, I want to have it, no!, I mean, for myself, no!, I mean….”
“Let me stop you there.” He says this assertively, meanwhile his resting hand closes to clasp his neck. Then he tilts his head slightly forward and says, more quietly again: “I think we both know what you want.”
There’s a moment of stillness, as each eyes the other, two men, both shirtless, one gripping the other just below the ear. Each waits.
“So,” he finally says, “I was assessing your progress.”
“Yes,” he says quietly.
“Shall we continue?”
After a pause and as quietly as before: “Yes.”
“Turn around.” He says this in a plain voice, not like an order, more like a description of the world. He takes his hand from the neck, puts both hands on the other’s shoulders, and turns him around slowly to face the lockers. “Hands up.”
“Huh?”
“Hands up,” and he uses his own to move the other’s arms up, hands on the locker doors. He uses his weight to push and they both lean into the lockers.
He now conducts an evaluation, touching and rubbing and prodding him from his neck to his shoulders to his back to his flanks. Then he positions both his hands there, on his hips just above his shorts. As he presses them in he says, “This all looks good.”
“Thank you?” His face is only inches from the locker door and he’s closed his eyes now. His breathing has slowed, intensified, seems intentional.
He leans his body in and whispers in his ear: “What are you doing to work on your core?” He’s wrapped his hands around his midsection, massaging his abs with his fingers.
“What?” He says this as though disoriented, as though he’d just woken up.
“Your core. How do you work it?”
“Um, I do like situps.”
“What?” he practically barks in response. “Situps! Situps ain’t worth shit!”
“Crunches, I mean, crunches, that’s what I mean.”
“Still shit.” He pulls back and with one hand cups the other’s jaw and turns his head gently partly back toward his. “Squats! Dead lifts! Planks! Those are what you should be doing. Are you doing those?”
“No, I….”
“No!? What do you mean, no?”
“I, I don’t know how.” He’s getting a look of incredulity. “I’m afraid of fucking up my back.” Still, more disbelief. “I, I, I need a trainer.” Then, as if inspired: “You could be my trainer!”
“No shit you need a trainer.” He softens his tone. “That’s the smartest thing you’ve said. But I can’t be your trainer.”
“Why not? You practically look like a god, you clearly know what you’re doing.”
“For one thing, I don’t know what I’m doing, not enough to train you. I’m not certified. I believe in expertise, and you need an expert. For another, I already have a job, a good one, and it pays a lot better than a trainer.” He leans further in, their bodies now adjoining, chest to back. “Even better than training you, if you can believe it.” He gets no response. He smiles a little, as if to himself. “And for another, no gym is going to be happy about some half-assed amateur secretly freelancing in their facilities.” He’s slid his hands around from the flanks to the front, below the navel just above his shorts.
“But I think we were conducting an evaluation, weren’t we? Should we continue?”
“Hmm.”
He feels his way around the zone just above the shorts. “Sometime I should tell you about the inguinal ligament, but,” he adds quickly, “not now.” He caresses his abdomen, in response he shivers.
“I need to remove your shorts.”
“Hmm.”
“’Hmm’ isn’t good enough. I want something more affirmative.”
“Huh?”
“Why don’t you ask me to take off your shorts?”
“OK,” he breathes, “yeah.”
“No,” he growls slowly into his ear, “say it. Use your words.” When there’s no response he snarls: “Beg.”
Another lull as neither moves, neither speaks. The ventilation hums, they breathe. In and out, together.
“Please take off my shorts.” He says this plainly with no hint of reservation or theatricality. “Please.”
He releases his grip and steps back. Crouching down he grabs the waistband on each side and in a single motion slides the basketball shorts down, past his ass, his knees, down to his ankles. He steps out of the loose shorts easily.
“So, a jock strap!” He puts his palms on each side of his butt. “That’s a bit of a statement. But for who?”
“You can take it off too.” There’s no hesitation.
“Take it off? Are you sure.”
“Yes.” Then: “Please.”
He digs his fingers under the waistband which is much tighter than the shorts. The backs of his fingers feel the body’s heat. When he starts to pull there’s more resistance, more friction, it slides less freely, more slowly. It gets caught on his dick in the front. He yanks it free. As he slips it down his legs it rolls over on itself, tangles, resists. It’s harder to step out of than the baggy shorts, it catches on his shoes but finally comes loose. He throws the raveled jock on the floor.
“Naked.” He’s running his hands up and down his legs. “That’s better.” He clutches his calves, his thighs, his ass. “How’s this feel, being appraised, being naked?”
“I’ve got my shoes on.”
“Yes… and that makes all the difference, doesn’t it? But I’m going to be brutally honest anyway, shoes or not. You gotta do squats, you gotta do deadlifts. Your legs and butt” – here he put his hands on the parts of the body he was naming – “are way undeveloped. You’ve got potential, but you’re not working these, are you?”
“Sometimes.” He sounds defensive. “But I’m figuring it out.” He’s still facing the lockers with his hands high above his head, naked and his head slightly bowed, but he says this with a note of defiance, as if eye to eye, directly. “I thought maybe you might help me.”
“Are you not enjoying this? We can stop.”
“No! It’s just….” When his voice trails off this time, he doesn’t speak again. He stands there, frozen. Another silence, a long one.
“OK, here’s what I think.” He’s stood up and he leans in, their bodies fully in contact now, spits on his hand and reaches around to grab his dick. He jolts at the touch. It was already hard and he begins to stroke it gently. “You want a different body, bigger maybe, different. Yeah?”
He’s closed his eyes again and is pushing himself back into the body behind him. “Yeah, that.” He’s whispering, like it’s a secret.
“You look at me and maybe you want to be me or maybe you want me to fuck you or maybe you want to fuck me, or maybe it’s not about fucking at all, maybe it’s like muscle worship or bondage or I don’t know what – I don’t know.” As he keeps stroking he’s moved his other hand down into his butt crack, eliciting a gasp then a sigh. “Here’s the main thing: I don’t think you know either. Not yet. You can’t articulate your desires because you’re not sure who you are.”
As if he wasn’t listening: “Oh fuck, I’m getting close.” His body begins to tension up, like a spring.
“Already? Well then let’s slow down a minute because I’m not done.” He pulls his hand away from his ass and relaxes his grip on his dick. “How long you been out?”
“What? I…”. Again no words.
“Yeah, I thought so.” He keeps up his massage, but slowly. “Here’s the thing: I’m not a trainer and I’m not a mentor. Sorry. But,” he puts two fingers of his free hand over his mouth, “don’t talk, I might be able to help. Monday you’re going to call the gym and make an appointment with JJ, he’s a trainer. He’s good, really good. He’ll not only help you get where you want, he’ll help you figure out where that is.” He’s still carefully stroking his dick.
“JJ – Oh god! – OK – Oh! – But I don’t know if I can – fuck! – afford – fuck! oh fuck! – a trainer.”
“Tell him you know me. He’ll give you a good rate.” He leans in, pressing his body, and puts his lips next to his ear. “Speaking of rate,” he’s almost hissing, “I think we could increase this one.” He’s pumping faster now, breathing loudly into his ear, gnarling and stroking, gnarling and stroking, gnarling and stroking in step.
As he tensions up, he pants and he blathers – ‘fucks’ and ‘ahs’ and ‘gods’ – really just excuses to exhale, ejected from his mouth like spit. Then he stops, his words stop, his breathing stops, his body goes rigid, there’s only his orgasm, his orgasm and the time it stretches through, the time and the silence.
He gasps. He gasps like someone who’d been underwater too long or been revived from death, then he gasps again and opens his mouth as if to speak but reverts to panting.
He lets go of his dick. “OK.” He backs away slightly. He notices the sweat on his neck, his back, small beads and rivulets. “You OK?”
Still panting he nods. He’s slumped towards the lockers, supported by his arms which he’s brought down to the level of his head. He gulps some more air. But soon he starts to breathe purposefully, deep breaths, in and out, in slowly – pause – and out slowly – pause – consciously extending the duration each time. Opening his eyes and focusing them he sees the floor and on it his shirt. It’s wet. “Fuck,” he says not moving and closing his eyes again. He starts to laugh. “I got jizz all over my shirt. That is gonna look super weird on the bus.”
“I’ve got an idea, though,” he says as a reaches down to pick up the shirt. “I’m going to keep it.”
“What are you talking about?” He turns to face him and sees that he’s already put on his own shirt. “You gonna take my nasty shirt?”
“Yeah.”
“What, like, a trophy?”
“A trophy? Are you imagining Jeffrey Dahmer just got you off! No, not a trophy, a keepsake.”
“A keepsake?”
“A memento. To remind me of you, of this, when I want to… recall it.”
“Yeah, but what am I supposed to wear? That’s my only shirt. They won’t let me on the bus.”
“Sure they will.”
“Not without a shirt. I’m pretty sure there’s a sign about it.” He looks over at the other’s bag, which he’s moved out of the locker and onto the bench. He’s put all his gym clothes in it. “You must have an extra shirt.” He smiles and says with a theatrical sweetness: “You could lend it to me.”
“I could,” he says bluntly as he stuffs the wet shirt into the top of his bag. “But I think I’ll give you something better instead.”
“What?” he says slowly.
“When you get on the bus, without a shirt, you’re going to smile at the driver, look them right in the eye, and say hello – hold on, I’m not done” and here he holds up his hand, “and if they complain you’ll keep looking straight at them, smile even more, and say, thanks for reminding me. And you’ll walk to the back of the bus.”
“That’s it? I thought you were give me something, like a ride home or something.”
“A ride, no. Besides, I’ve given you something much better.”
“What have you given me? All you’ve done is take my shirt.”
“I’ve given you a script.”
He pulls back a little and squints his eyes at him just a little. “A script,” he says very deliberately.
“Here, we’ll practice. Put your shorts back on, we’ll make it a dress rehearsal.” He looks around for his jock. “No just the shorts. Commando. It’s actually better for the character.”
“I can’t get on a public bus like that.” He’s slipping on the shorts.
“Maybe you can’t, but he can, the character can.” He puts his hands on his shoulders, straightening him up, so they’re face to face. “OK, I’m the bus driver and you’re…. We should give the character a name.”
“Dirk.”
“Dirk? So you’re going for like a white guy, pornstar vibe,” he rolls his eyes, “whatever. OK, you’re… Dirk.” He steps back. “I’m the driver. Go.”
He closes his eyes and breathes in. He opens his eyes, resting a second as he relaxes his face. Then: “Hey!” He draws out the word and extends his arms palms up. He’s making an exaggerated smile.
“Sir, you’re going to have to put on a shirt before you get on the bus.”
“Oh yeah, I got it in my bag here, don’t worry, I’ll take care of it.” He winks, quite obviously.
“OK, no, stop, no. You played that like a player.”
“What’s wrong with that?” He takes half a step back and puts his left hand on his hip. “I’m projecting confidence.”
“No. First off, you lied. You don’t have a shirt in your backpack. Honesty is the basis of confidence, not faking it. When you fake it you disrespect the other person and they can tell. This Dirk’s gonna get his shirtless ass thrown off that bus.”
“But I’m acting, of course I’m faking.”
“You’re acting, but Dirk’s not. Dirk’s confidence comes naturally, unconsciously, from his core. You need to find that.”
“And where do I find that?”
“Start here, start with your body.” He speaks slower and puts his right hand up on his cheek. “Dirk has a beautiful face,” he pauses, tilts his head, “like yours” – when this is said about him he drops his gaze – “or maybe I should say, Dirk understands that lots of other people think he’s beautiful.” Now he moves both hands down to his bare chest. “Same with his body. People are enraptured by the beauty of his body. Maybe it’s not the body Dirk most desires – in others or in himself – maybe, against all evidence, impossibly, he doesn’t even think of himself as beautiful” – then he leans in a whispers in his ear, “even though that’s objectively wrong.” And with emphasis: “Ob-jec-tive-ly.” He pulls back. “But Dirk doesn’t allow himself to be limited by his own imagination. He understands that his beauty is a treasure, not because it gives power to him but because it gives joy and pleasure to others.”
“I’m not sure I can play Dirk. He sounds more like you.”
“No, my friend, you have been perfectly cast. You are Dirk.” He’s still got his hands on his chest. They’re looking straight at each other. Time passes in silence. “You’ve got this.” More silence. “OK?” He nods back. Quietly: “Go.”
“Good evening.” His face is relaxed. When he smiles, a thin strip of his teeth is visible. “How are you?”
“I’m good. I’m sorry but you’ll have to put on a shirt, sir.”
He stops for a second, turns his body, lowers his head slightly while still keeping eye contact. “Of course.” The gap in his smile widens just a little. “Thanks for reminding me.”
They stop, hold the silence. “Great. You’ve got Dirk.”
“You think that will work?”
“Absolutely.” He’s picking up his bag.
“What, are you leaving?”
“Gym’s closing.” He throws the bag over his shoulder. “Besides,” he raises his eyebrows, “my work here is done.”
“But I…,” then he lowers his voice, “don’t even know your name.”
“My name?” He puts a foot up on the bench, grins with great exaggeration. “Dirk.”
“Very funny. But really.”
“Why’s my name matter?”
“But I…. How will I tell JJ who sent me?”
“Oh, don’t worry, JJ will know exactly who you are.”
“That sounds kinda embarrassing.”
“Embarrassing! No, it’s more like an honor. Or maybe” he steps back, “not an honor, exactly, maybe more like… stewardship.” He puts his hand on the other’s shoulder, squeezes, turns and walks out.
