The Road to Amazing (16 page)

"Everyone's nervous," Kevin went on.
"They're all sort of down on their luck, and they all need a break,
so they're jockeying against each other, trying to undercut each
other's confidence. Maybe there's an evil producer too, playing
them off each other. One by one, they each go out onto the set of
the talk show, and the comedian watches them on the monitor — and
oh, hey, the only time we ever see the talk show host is on that
monitor, we don't ever see him in real life."

"I like it!" I said. "And there aren't
any windows, so the green room is totally claustrophobic. And
there's no cellphone coverage either, and maybe he even gets lost
on the way to the bathroom. The longer the comedian waits, the more
trapped he feels, and the more he comes to realize how important it
is that he does well — that this really is his last shot at
success. So he's really, really desperate. Finally, the comedian's
time comes, and he goes out onto the set, and he's completely
nervous, but he ends up killing it! We finally see the host for
real at last, and he even invites the comedian over to the chair by
his desk."

I looked over at Vernie for her
initial reaction.

She thought for a second, then said,
"It's not terrible. As long as there isn't a final twist at the end
where he's really been in hell all along, and the talk show host is
Satan, and he has to keep repeating the same night over and over
for all eternity."

I stared at Vernie, because that was
almost exactly what I'd just been thinking.

"What?" she said. "Am I
right?"

"No!" I said. But then I blushed and
said, "I'd been thinking the talk show host was really, like, St.
Peter, and the studio audience has been judging him to see if he
deserves to go to heaven. And maybe the comedian walks out a
glowing door at the end."

She smiled an all-knowing little
smile. I felt stupid, but it didn't matter because the whole point
of my screenplay idea had been to get the weekend back on track,
and it seemed to have worked.

"Well, you're right," I said. "It's
more interesting if it's metaphorical. We create our own heaven and
hell — that kind of thing?"

Before Vernie could answer, Nate said,
"You should write about this weekend."

I clutched a drumstick.

"You know?" he said. "A bunch of
people in a house for a weekend wedding, and how things keep coming
up? Will they or won't they get married?"

Kevin stood up to start clearing the
dishes.

Really?
I wanted to say to Nate. What the hell was
with
him? He was
supposed to be Kevin's best friend! Was he really this
clueless?

Frankly, now I was annoyed. I loved my
friends, but this was my wedding weekend. I was starting to think
Kevin had a point about everything going wrong.

"Let's all move into the front room,"
Gunnar said, and everyone else immediately agreed with him,
including Vernie.

You know how you can sometimes sense
when people are secretly eyeing each other — when everyone else
knows something you don't? That's what was happening
now.

What in the world?
I thought.

It was funny. All through dinner, I'd
felt like the only one who had a handle on all the things that were
really going on — all the subtext. Suddenly it seemed like everyone
there knew something I didn't.

Everyone except Kevin. He didn't seem
to be in on this either. We exchanged curious glances. After all
the pointless drama of earlier, I was extremely wary about what
might be going on.

We all cleared the dishes (except for
Nate, who had very conveniently disappeared), then gathered in the
front room.

Gunnar hit a switch, knocking out the
lights. Meanwhile, Min set this Bluetooth speaker on the coffee
table, and punched a couple buttons on her phone. The speaker
exploded with both music and this rainbow of shifting
lights.

"What's going on?" I said.

"What do you
think
?" Gunnar said.
"It's your bachelor party!"

Our what?
I thought. Between the lights and the music, it
really did suddenly feel like a party, even though there were only
seven people in the room. It also helped that, except for Kevin,
they were all grooving out to the music — even Vernie (surprisingly
good).

"What did you guys plan?" Kevin said,
but he was smiling when he said it. So much for our friends ruining
our wedding weekend.

Nate appeared at last, from out of the
hallway. He was wearing his green doctor scrubs, and he was dancing
too.

No, not just
dancing,
I thought.

Nate, Kevin's annoying straight best
friend, was doing a strip tease.

CHAPTER NINE

This was crazy! A bachelor party with
Nate doing a striptease? But the music blared, and the lights
flashed, and somehow Vernie and Ruby had already arranged two of
the padded dining room chairs in the middle of the front room, and
Min and Gunnar were pushing me and Kevin down onto them.

Then Nate took charge. He wasn't
dancing, exactly — it was more of that straight-boy strut that
isn't graceful, and it definitely isn't polished, but it's
confident and cocky.

He stopped right in front of us,
striking a sexy pose, then, in time with the music, he yanked open
the front of his doctor scrubs, baring his chest and
shoulders.

His pecs bulged, and the hair on his
chest — dark blond — was surprisingly well-trimmed, especially for
a straight guy. Did he manscape or had he only shaved for this
little show of his? Had he rehearsed it? Exactly when had he agreed
to do this striptease anyway? Our friends could have been planning
this bachelor party for weeks. Needless to say, they were all
laughing and totally cheering him on.

I also wondered:
Exactly how far is this "joke" striptease going
to go?

Kevin leaned over, closer to me, and
said, "I had nothing to do with this, I swear!"

"Oh, I believe you," I said, laughing.
"'Cause you know I'd totally dump you if you did!"

But here's the strange thing: neither
of us looked at each other when we said this. We couldn't take our
eyes off of Nate.

Remember when I met Nate, and at first
I thought he was really hot? Then he said those annoying things,
and I told you I didn't think he was hot anymore?

That might have been
another little lie. I never really stopped thinking Nate was hot. I
just thought he was kind of a jerk
in
addition to
being hot.

Nate kept strutting around. He was
camping it up, not taking the striptease seriously, but that didn't
necessarily make things any less sexy. If anything, it might have
made it even sexier, because I could sort of pretend it was all a
joke even as I was watching his every little move.

Then, once again in time with the
music, he tore the top of his scrubs completely off, throwing the
whole thing to one side. He was shirtless now, revealing toned arms
and a lean torso that tapered down toward the shapeless, crumpled
paper-like material that made up the bottom half of his scrubs (but
not so shapeless and crumpled that I couldn't make out the bulge of
his ass).

Suddenly I was face to face with
Nate's abs. The ridges and muscles reminded me of a kaleidoscope —
everything twitching and shifting in sync. Nate was a doctor now —
in residency, I think. Weren't they supposed to be so incredibly
busy? If so, how could he possibly have time to body-sculpt his abs
like this? Somehow I hated and loved those abs at exactly the same
time. They even sparkled with this little sheen of
sweat.

"Oh, God, my
eyes
!" Kevin said.
"Nate, you were my
roommate
!"

He ignored Kevin and kept
strutting and/or dancing. Nate had
definitely
rehearsed this thing, at
least a little.

On one hand, I agreed with Kevin: this
was incredibly awkward. It was Kevin's best friend, and I had a
very strict personal policy where I made a point not to lust after
friends, or friends-of-friends, even when they were very
hot.

On the other hand, Nate had an amazing
body, lean and tan and toned. I may have briefly noted his body
before, in that wetsuit especially. Now I was seeing more of him
than I'd ever imagined I would, short of walking in on him in the
shower.

Nate kept dancing, closer and closer,
smiling seductively, but also doing that thing strippers do where
they pretend they're ignoring you, even as they have to be aware
that you're watching their every little movement. I noticed for the
first time that he was barefoot, and somehow his feet were sexy
too.

Outside the rain kept falling, heavier
now, and I could hear it trickling down windows and splashing out
in the yard, even over the music. That made me realize how Nate's
striptease had made me start to sweat (not surprisingly), so it
sort of seemed like the perspiration was coordinated with the water
sounds, like it was trickling down my body.

Nate stopped, standing tall with his
feet solidly planted, still wearing only the bottom of his doctor
scrubs. He finally met my gaze, then Kevin's — greeting us both
with this sly grin and half-nod.

Then, in one sudden flurry of
movement, he bent over, yanking down the bottoms of his loose
scrubs. He stepped out of them as effortlessly as if he was wading
in a pond, then he simply tossed them to one side.

I literally held my breath, not
certain what I would see next. I mean, it wasn't like he'd really
be naked, right?

He stood upright again, and I saw he
was wearing a green Speedo. (Most American guys didn't wear Speedos
for bathing suits, but I guess they were still pretty common in
Australia, so it made sense that Nate would have one.)

He wasn't naked, but the Speedo, well,
let's just say it didn't leave a lot to the imagination. It also
looked surprisingly, um, full.

"Right
on
!" Gunnar shouted, and Ruby, Min,
Otto, and Vernie all whooped it up. Min and Gunnar clearly knew
about Nate's striptease in advance, but he had to be taking it a
lot more seriously than they expected. Somewhere along the way it
had gone from campy fun to outright sexual.

Nate sauntered closer, not really
dancing now, but languid, seductive. Was he going to give us a lap
dances or what?

"I can't look," Kevin said, covering
his eyes, and Nate laughed (and even his laugh was somehow
Australian).

Nate straddled me. His bulging crotch
was right below eye level, which was absolutely ridiculous. I could
see the ridges and bulges of exactly what was packed in his Speedo,
the position it was all in and everything.

I can actually feel the
heat of his crotch,
I thought.

Legs wide, he lowered
himself down farther. He definitely
was
going to give us lap
dances!

I was laughing — this was, after all,
still a big joke. Or was it? That line was rapidly being
blurred.

Outside, the rain still splashed,
harder now, and my whole body was slick with
perspiration.

Nate's ass pressed down against my lap
— specifically against my crotch. I'd never had a lap dance before,
especially one from a guy, and suddenly I was understanding what
all the fuss was about. Needless to say, he'd long since given me a
boner — basically, I had a railroad spike in the front of my pants.
I mean, the only thing coming between my dick and Nate's ass was a
couple of layers of clothing.

Nate kept grinding himself against my
crotch, even as he started running his fingers through my hair.
Every now and then, he lifted himself upright, and I felt the bulge
of his Speedo graze against my stomach. There was even less
material between him and me there. It was almost sensory
overload!

The rain was still splashing outside,
and I heard a sudden gush, like a clog had broken somewhere, maybe
in the rain dispersal system, and all the water had rushed out, but
in my mind, it sounded like something much naughtier.

Remember a couple of pages ago when I
said I had a strict personal policy where I didn't lust after
friends or friends-of-friends? You knew that was another lie,
right?

I was nervous. The whole
idea of this being a joke was now shot completely to hell. Nate
absolutely had to know that he'd given me a boner — he had
to
feel
it. If I
didn't know any better, I'd say he was specifically aiming for it.
But it still didn't quite compute. How the hell did a straight guy
know how to give a lap dance to another guy anyway? And
why
would a straight guy
give a lap dance to a gay guy, even at the gay guy's bachelor
party? I'd been a teenager at a time when having a straight guy
knowing you thought he was hot was a really bad thing.