Pisces: From Behind That Locked Door (2 page)

"Fifteen minutes," Stephen announced. "Ready to move on?"

"I... you go on ahead without me."

"No, come on. We can spot each other."

"I don't really know how to do weight lifting."

"I'll show you."

What was he supposed to do? Tell Stephen no? Pass up on the opportunity to spend the next hour with him? Stephen was the only reason he was there and this was working out better than he could have ever hoped in his wildest dreams. He didn't even dare to fantasize that Stephen would invite him to work out with him. Yes, it would be embarrassing, especially when Stephen was presented with proof of just how out of shape and disgusting Jay was, but it wasn't like he ever had a chance with Stephen anyway.

"Thanks. I don't want to infringe on your time, though."

"No, don't worry about it. Come on, we'll start with one of the machines. That's easier than the free weights."

Jay smiled as much as he could and followed Stephen to the closest weight machine.

Stephen was waiting for him outside the locker room on Friday. At the reception desk. When Jay saw him standing there, he nearly turned right back around and walked out. He wasn't opposed to working out with Stephen--and spotting with the weights was a surprisingly wonderful bonus--but he did not want to
change
in front of Stephen. He didn't even want Stephen to change in front of him. Getting an eyeful of Stephen's gorgeous body would only fuel his pointless fantasies whilst reminding him of how pointless they actually were.

"Great timing," Stephen greeted. "Here."

He held out the pen to Jay so he could sign out a locker, and Jay had no choice but to accept it. "Yeah, that was pretty good timing."

"We should just walk over here together after work. I was worried I'd miss you."

Jay signed his name, picked up his locker key, and let the comment pass over him. Stephen was just being friendly. His only option was to change in the tiny bathroom stall again, so he did, and then waited a few minutes after he was done to make sure Stephen would be finished and out of the locker room.

"You feeling Wednesday's workout?" Stephen asked as Jay stiffly approached the bikes.

"Yeah, a bit."

"It'll be like that for the first few weeks, but it gets better."

Jay tried to imagine himself doing this until his muscles stopped aching and cramping. Or maybe even getting to the point that he enjoyed his regular visits to the gym. But that seemed as far beyond the realm of possibility as dating Stephen.

"That's what I'm counting on," Jay said gamely.

"So you've lived in Salt Lake for awhile, haven't you?" Stephen asked.

"My whole life."

"What's there to do around here on the weekends? I haven't really had the chance to check out the night life since I moved here."

Why are you asking me?
Jay could give him a good idea of where to start, but he was probably the least qualified person to answer. Especially since Stephen spent his entire day surrounded by people with actual lives. Most of the people who spent time at the GLBT Center went out every Friday and Saturday night.

"There are a couple good clubs in town. There are usually some good bands playing, too. The Tower has a midnight movie every weekend. They play some good horror movies in October."

"I was thinking of going out tonight. It's been that kind of week, you know?"

Jay nodded. There had been some dispute with the university over the budget. He didn't know the specifics since he was only a volunteer, but Stephen had been neck deep in it. April, the previous director, would have been going crazy by then, but Stephen had managed to keep his cool.

"Rhys goes to Pure every Friday night. You should text him."

"Is that where all the kids go?"

"I think it's all ages, yeah."

"I usually like a slightly older crowd."

"Club Edge is pretty good. Or it used to be. I haven't really gone out much since I started grad school."

"Really? You don't go just to blow off some steam?"

"I have too much work to do. I've got to grade papers tonight so I can spend all day tomorrow reading Ovid."

"When do you get a break? Sunday?"

"Nope. Got a paper to write on Sunday."

"Then it's back to the grindstone on Monday?"

"Yep."

"I don't know how you do it."

"It isn't easy," Jay admitted. "But it's supposed to be hard, or else everybody would have a Masters degree, you know?"

"You plan to get a doctorate, too?"

"If the Masters doesn't kill me."

Stephen laughed, but Jay wasn't joking. Undergrad had been a breeze, but the relentless drag of academia was starting to wear him down. He was certain he'd have an ulcer by his twenty-fifth birthday. He wished he could go out like Stephen suggested. Just grabbing a pint of beer or sitting through a movie would probably be a good idea, but there was nothing more depressing than going out for a pint alone except for buying a single movie ticket. At least studying was meant to be a solitary activity.

"I really considered graduate school. I still might go some day. But I wanted a chance to live in the real world for awhile."

"Then why did you get a job on campus?"

"This was too good of an opportunity to pass up. It's not every day that you get the chance to work somewhere great doing something that matters."

He could tell Stephen really meant that. He felt that weird fluttering in his chest that he was coming to associate with Stephen instead of what Jay felt was his inevitable heart attack.

"That's fifteen."

Jay blinked in surprised and double-checked his watch. It was actually sixteen minutes. How had the time gone by so quickly? He felt winded, but not quite like he was dying. His legs didn't feel like rubber, either.

"How did you like our set on Wednesday? Did that work for you?"

"It worked fine." As far as Jay knew. It wasn't like he had anything to compare it against. He'd felt like death when he was finished, so it'd probably been a great set.

"Okay. But if you don't like something or you want to try something else, be sure to let me know."

Jay smiled a little. "Thanks. I will."

Stephen returned his smile before setting the proper weight on Jay's machine. That smile made all the hard work worth it. It was true that every muscle in his body strenuously objected to his new workout, but what did that matter when he got Stephen to himself for three hours a week?

"Do you know Auggie Lambert?" Stephen asked while Jay worked through his ten reps of chest presses.

"Yeah. He's a senior this year. Why?"

"I was just wondering. He's in the Center a lot, isn't he?"

"He is. I have his number because we were both on the same committee last semester. Do you want it?"

"I don't think I should."

"Why not?"

"It's probably not a good idea to get involved with the students. Especially not the undergrads."

"If it's an age thing, I think he's older than you."

"It's not. Not just that. I mean, you don't think it'd be a problem?"

Jay shrugged. "I don't see why it would be. He's a really nice guy, too. And I think you're his type."

Stephen snorted. "I'm everybody's type."

It could have sounded arrogant and obnoxious, but Jay knew exactly what Stephen meant. He was like the gay ideal from head to toe. Falling in love with a guy like Stephen was completely stereotypical, and Jay did feel a vague sense of guilt for being so damned predictable.

"Well, true, but I do think you and Auggie would hit it off. He might even be going out to Edge tonight."

Stephen shrugged. "Maybe I'll go around there tonight. Why don't you?"

"Why don't I what? Go to Edge? Like I said, I'm grading tonight."

Beyond that, the only thing Jay found more unpleasant and unnatural than the gym was a club. Working out left him exhausted and sore, but still it wasn't worse than the ego-bruising, soul-crushing experience that was the gay bar. His skinny, athletic, hot friends always had a great time buying each other drinks and drunkenly hooking up after the dancing was over. There was no room in the club culture for a guy like him, and unfortunately, that was the extent of the gay culture in Utah. At least for the under-thirty set.

"And like I said, you need to give yourself a break every once in awhile."

"I will."

"When?"

"During winter break."

"That doesn't count."

"It'll have to because that's when I'll have some free time to myself."

"That's fine. I'll just find a way to coax you out. Maybe there's somebody at the Center I could use for bait?"

His face was already flushed from the workout, so Stephen probably didn't notice the way Jay blushed at his comment. "I don't even have the time to have a crush on anybody."

"You really are devoted to school."

"Believe it or not, I used to be a much bigger nerd than this. I was actually King of the Nerds in high school."

"Then it's a good thing we didn't go to the same high school. You might have had a rival for the crown."

"You were a nerd?" Jay asked skeptically, moving to spot Stephen as he benched one hundred and fifty pounds. "I find that hard to believe."

"I guess you could say I was a bit of a late bloomer. I didn't start going to the gym regularly until my junior year in college. Before that I was all pale and scrawny. I even had these big thick glasses because my mom wouldn't let me have contacts."

Stephen easily lifted the weights overhead ten times before Jay took the bar from him and replaced it on the stand. "Are you sure you weren't a jock?"

Stephen chuckled. "Yeah, I'm sure. Do you know many jocks who had a perfect GPA?"

"I don't know many jocks in general, to be honest. So if it wasn't sports, what got you working out?"

"Honestly?" Stephen adjusted himself on the bench and grinned up at Jay. "I wanted to get laid. I think that's why guys do anything."

"That sounds about right." Was Stephen on to him? Had he been too obvious with his interest? If so, it wasn't necessarily the end of the world. Stephen could just be trying to tell him
I know why you're here and that's cool but I'm more interested in guys like Auggie.
That was fair. He no doubt figured Jay deserved to know where he stood. "I guess it must have worked."

"I can't even believe how much of a difference it made. When I start feeling lazy and I want to skip a week, I just remember the dry spell that lasted until I was twenty-one. That keeps me motivated."

Jay laughed without humor. Twenty-one wasn't so bad. Jay was going to be a twenty-five year old virgin with ulcers. But weight training had worked for Stephen--who was naturally handsome and lovely and wonderful. Even so, exercising certainly couldn't
hurt
his chances of finding somebody to fuck before he died.

The sharp relief Jay felt at finally being home dissipated as soon as he opened the apartment door and saw Jeni sitting on his couch, her candy pink lips twisted in a mocking smile of welcome. "Well, there he is now."

"What are you doing here?" Jay asked, too tired to be polite.

"I heard you were working out. I had to come over here for myself to see."

"Look, I know you've probably been thinking of insults all afternoon, but I'm really not in the mood for it right now."

Jeni gasped in fake outrage. "What are you suggesting, Jay? That I don't have anything better to do except think of ways to insult you? I do have a life, you know."

"Do you? I've never seen any evidence of that."

"I'm taking Amy out to the Paper Moon tonight."

Jay's brows knitted together. "Amy? Amy!"

"What?" She hurried out of her room only half dressed, her full breasts nearly spilling out of her lacy cups. She never had any problem letting Jay see her half naked, and he couldn't figure out if she was a bit of an exhibitionist, or if he was just so entirely desexualized that it never occurred to her to be modest. "Is there a problem?"

"You're going out with Jeni?"

Amy glanced from him, to his mortal enemy, and then to him again. "Yes? Is there a problem with that?"

"What did I tell you?"

"Jay, look, I know what you said, but there's just not that many lesbians around here. I mean, I was going to end up dating her sooner or later."

"Didn't she tell you that I've been in love with her for the past two years?" Jeni asked sweetly.

"You shut up," Jay snapped. "Nobody asked you."

"I don't even know why you're so upset," Amy protested.

"I
told
you... "

"That happened years ago," Amy protested. "Plus, Jeni is sorry now. Aren't you, Jeni?"

Jay knew she wasn't. She wasn't even a little bit sorry, and she never would be. Why should she be sorry? That would be tantamount to admitting that she didn't love to make Jay the butt of her jokes. She was smirking at him again--she knew he knew what an unrepentant bitch she was.

"You two play nice. I have to finish getting dressed."

"Yeah, Jay. Place nice. Let the past stay in the past. Bygones be bygones, and all that." She patted the couch next to her. "Now, why don't you tell me all about the gym?"

Jay ignored her, hurrying to claim the bathroom before Amy decided she needed it for last second makeup emergencies.

"If you don't want to talk about the gym, we could always talk about Stephen."

Jay stopped. "Why would I want to talk about Stephen?"

"Isn't that why you're going to the gym? To make yourself pretty for him?"

Jay took a deep breath, his heart rate increasing, his legs tensing as his fight or flight instinct kicked in. He knew exactly how this conversation would go--well, it wouldn't be a conversation. It would just be an opportunity for Jeni to laugh at him for thinking, for ever thinking, that he was good enough for somebody like Stephen McNeil.

"It has nothing to do with him."

"Oh, but Amy said he's the reason you've gone three times this week. I just assumed you were trying to fuck him. Why else would you drag your ass all way to the gym?"