Tales From the Gym

by Roland Graeme

  Avery laughed. “I’m sorry to disappoint you, Guy, but he’s very discreet. Otherwise, there wouldn’t be any mystery, would there?”

  “Have you ever had sex with him?”

  “You’re very inquisitive, Guy.”

  “You fucker. You get me all hot and bothered, watching your dirty website, and you won’t even throw me a crumb. Some friend you are.”

  “You and I are friends, Guy. The website is business.”

  “Something tells me you probably manage to combine the two, often enough.”

  Avery’s lips curved in an enigmatic smile. “Sometimes,” he acknowledged. “I’m only human.”

  “Let’s stop dancing around and get right to the point. If I agreed to perform on your website—how much would you pay me?”

  Avery took a pad and pencil, and wrote some figures down. He pushed the pad across the desk to Guy.

  “It’s a sliding scale, as you can see,” he said, matter-of-factly. He used the pencil as a pointer, indicating each of the figures in turn. “This much for just posing in the nude. This much for jacking off—to orgasm, of course. This much for getting into a little body worship with another guy—you know, looking, touching, licking, no actual sex between the two of you. This much for having sex on camera with another guy. And this much, which includes a little bonus, as you can see, for having sex with two or more guys at once.”

  “Cash?” Guy asked.

  “Cash in the hand, at the end of the show.”

  “I’ll do it.”

  “Which?”

  “All of it. Whatever you want.”

  “I thought you’d need a lot more persuading than that.”

  “I want to do it.”

  “You’ll have to sign a contract, with a release form,” Avery said. “And give me proof that you’re over the age of consent.”

  “I figured as much. I brought my birth certificate and passport along with me.”

  “Good. I’ll make a copy of them for my records.”

  “You’re all business, aren’t you?”

  “This is business, Guy,” Avery reminded him. “I’m doing this to make money. Which doesn’t mean we can’t have ourselves some fun. But putting out a decent product comes first.”

  “I understand.”

  “There’s something else you’re going to have to understand. Attitudes have changed, and nobody with any brains is likely to be surprised by the fact that such things as gay bodybuilders exist. But having it known that you’ve done porn work can still hurt you, when it comes to product endorsements and such.”

  “I’m out,” Guy said. “I don’t care about that.”

  Avery explained that no one on the website used his real name. They’d have to come up with a pseudonym for Guy. They brainstormed, and decided that one way to protect Guy’s identity would be to change not only his name, but his ethnicity. He would be billed not as a French-Canadian, but as an Italian-American.

  “You’re dark, so it’s plausible,” Avery said.

  Avery wrote down Guy, then crossed it out and changed it to Guido. That much was easy. He then began to play around with Guy’s surname, writing down Tremblay and, under it, tremble. He had an inspiration, and came up with the Italian word tremare, meaning to tremble. From here, it was only a step to terramoto, the Italian word for earthquake. Finally, he wrote Guido Terratrema. “La terra trema,” Avery explained, literally meant “the earth shakes.”

  “I didn’t know you were so fluent in Italian,” Guy said.

  “I had a Sicilian bodybuilder for a lover once. He was short, but he was big where it counted. And talk about having a strong sex drive! He taught me how to talk dirty in Italian. Anyway, here’s what I’ve come up with. We can call you Guido Terratrema, and bill you as The Italian Earthquake,” Avery said, triumphantly.

  Guy groaned. “It sounds like a professional wrestler!”

  “Close enough. Can you live with it, for the time being? Most of the time, we’ll just refer to you as Guido, after all.”

  “I guess so.”

  Subtlety, Avery pointed out, would be wasted in this line of work. You went for the jugular—or rather, for the penis.

  Avery inputted the information onto a contract template stored on his computer, printed out two copies, and had Guy sign them. He also made photocopies of Guy’s documents, for his records.

  “When can I start?” Guy wanted to now.

  “Eager, are you? Maybe next weekend. We’ve been scheduling our live shows on Friday nights, lately. We catch the crowd that either doesn’t go out, or goes out later. Hey, you don’t suffer from any racial prejudices, do you?”

  “None whatsoever.”

  “Do you like black guys?”

  “You mean sexually? Sure. The bigger and the blacker, the better.”

  “That sounds promising. Have you ever been oreo’d?”

  “Oreo’d? What the hell does that mean?”

  “I’m surprised you haven’t heard the expression before. It’s when a white guy ends up as the middle of a fuck sandwich, between two black guys. Although admittedly, once all three of them get going, it doesn’t matter too much who sticks what up whom where, technically.”

  “I guess I get the general idea. Sounds like it could be hot.”

  “Then I don’t see any need to mince words. How’d you like to make your debut on the website fucking around with two huge black dudes?”

  “And get paid for it? I’d probably think I’d died and gone to heaven,” Guy joked. “I assume you have two specific huge black dudes in mind? Anybody I know?”

  “I don’t think so. I mean, they belong to the gym, but because of their work schedules they almost always come in and work out first thing in the morning. So you’ve probably never run into them. Here, let me show you.” Avery rifled through the mess on his desk top, and finally extracted a manila folder from a stack of them and opened it. “Here you go. Take a look.”

  Guy studied the half-dozen eight by ten glossy photos that Avery handed him. Three of them were of a hulking ebony muscle god with a brutally handsome face and a head that was completely shaven, to match his hairless body. In one of the photos he wore hot pink posing trunks, but in the other two he was nude. The butt shot revealed a pair of perfectly hemispherical, gravity-defying buttocks. The full frontal pose was even more striking, because the viewer’s attention was inevitably drawn to an uncut cock which, even though it was flaccid at the moment, epitomized the word hung.

  “Jesus,” Guy muttered. “Does that thing get as big as it looks when it’s hard?”

  “Let’s just say it’s one of the website’s biggest attractions. Like what you see?”

  “I like the cock. The guy it’s attached to looks kind of scary.”

  “He’s a heavy duty motherfucker. He and his buddy like to throw around some of that Down Low gangsta attitude. But it’s mostly a pose. I know how to handle them. Anyway, take a look at the boyfriend.”

  Guy examined the other three photos. These showed a slightly younger and slightly less intimidating caramel-skinned bodybuilder, with a male-model face and the kind of elaborate dreadlock hairstyle cascading down the back of his neck which looked as though it would be extremely high maintenance. He, too, wore posing trunks, pale blue in his case, in the first picture, but he posed naked in the others, in which he was showing off a butt and a dick only marginally less formidable than his buddy’s.

  “The first brother is Deacon, but everybody calls him Deke,” Avery said. “And the other one is Antwan. Antwan is Deacon’s boy.”

  “His boy? Meaning what, exactly?”

  “He’s Deke’s submissive little bitch. Does everything his daddy Deke tells him to.”

  “Interesting.”

  “You sure you can handle them?” Avery asked.

  “Listen, buster. The man I can’t handle hasn’t been born yet, and for your information, that includes your buddies Tico and Misterioso
—and you,” Guy boasted. “Bring ‘em on. The bigger, the blacker, and the butcher the better, as far as I’m concerned. Before I’m finished with the two of them, that stud Deke will be my bitch.”

  Avery looked dubious. “We’ll see.”

  Avery gave Guy an address to report to on Friday night. Guy was sworn to secrecy. He was not to divulge the location, or what went on there, to anybody.

  “Not even Petr?” Guy asked.

  “Especially not Petr. Having a training partner can be worse than being married, sometimes. It’s hard to keep any secrets from him.”

  “I’m surprised you haven’t tried to recruit Petr, too.”

  “Don’t think it hasn’t crossed my mind. But I still don’t know him very well. So let’s leave Petr out of it for the time being.”

  “Whatever you say, Avery. You’re the boss.”

  “I’ll see you on Friday night, then. By the way—you’d also better douche, and I mean thoroughly, before you show up,” Avery advised Guy. “We’re going to want your ass hole empty and squeaky clean, and ready for action. Otherwise, you don’t need to bring along anything special in the way of equipment. On your first time at bat, we’ll keep it simple, no sex toys or special gear. Oh, but make sure to bring a padlock—preferably one that can’t be picked too easily!—because we have lockers there for you men to put your clothes in.”

  Between that interview with Avery and Friday night, Guy put in some extra heavy workouts. He wanted to look his best for the camera. Petr complimented him on his dedication. Guy was tempted to confide in his training partner, but thought better of it. He wasn’t sure how Petr might react to the revelation that Guy was planning to perform in a live sex show.

  On Friday evening, Guy hit the shower in his apartment’s bathroom and cleaned himself out thoroughly with a shower shot attachment, a long narrow nozzle attached to the shower head, before he got dressed to report to duty.

  The address Avery had given him was indeed a warehouse, located downtown. At this time of night on a Friday the street was quiet. Guy parked his car and found the doorway, which was marked only by a street number. He pressed a button labeled Deliveries and heard a bell clang inside the building, good and loud. After a long pause a strapping young number in tight jeans, T-shirt, and a baseball cap opened the door a crack. He looked out warily onto the silent, deserted street, and also gave Guy the once-over.

  “Yeah?” he asked Guy, looking at him suspiciously. “What do you want?”

  “Avery Jones sent me.”

  The youth consulted a piece of paper attached to a clipboard. “Oh, he did, did he? What’s your name?”

  “Guy Tremblay.”

  The doorkeeper consulted his list, then shook his head. “Don’t see it.”

  “How about Guido Terratrema?”

  “He’s on here. Why didn’t you say so?”

  “Sorry.”

  “Come on in. You must be the fresh meat, huh?”

  “I guess so.”

  “Mr. Jones always seems to go for the big boys, like you. No lightweights need apply.”

  Guy entered the warehouse and found himself in the midst of a hubbub of activity. About a dozen men were milling about. He recognized some of them from the gym, and when he exchanged greetings with them, he felt a bit embarrassed. It might be more difficult to preserve his anonymity in this new line of work than he’d thought.

  Avery approached him, looking as briskly businesslike as always.

  “Guy! Glad you could make it.”

  “Did you think I wouldn’t?”

  “It was a possibility. Sometimes when I sign up a new guy, he does have second thoughts and doesn’t show up. Then I put another guy on in his place and I tear up his contract. I try not to take it personally or hold a grudge. This isn’t for everyone.”

  “I’m not so sure it’s for me,” Guy admitted. “I think I’m coming down with a case of stage fright.”

  “That’s only natural. Don’t sweat it. You’ll do fine. Come on, I’ll show you around.”

  Avery pointed out to Guy a row of lockers, and near it, an enclosed space that had been made into a bathroom, complete with toilet and shower. Nearby was the expanse of white-painted wall, with the wrestling mat set on the floor in front of it, which Guy recognized as the place where Misterioso and Tico had gotten it on together.

  “And over here’s our pride and joy,” Avery said. “The Box, where the magic takes place.”

  “The Box?”

  “That’s what we call our main set, the one we use most of the time. Sometimes we do shoot in other parts of the warehouse, just for the sake of variety. But in The Box we can control everything, especially the lighting, and get creative with the camera angles.”

  Guy soon realized why the set was nicknamed The Box. It was an impressive piece of carpentry. What looked like a good-sized cubicle, without a ceiling, set out in the center of the warehouse floor, in fact consisted of four free-standing walls mounted on castors, so they could be slid apart at will. Each wall segment was unfinished raw wood on one side, but was quite nicely finished with thin wood veneer paneling on the other. When the four walls were fitted together, the result was a convincing approximation of a room. Any one of the walls could be moved aside to allow the camera to film the interior. As a further refinement, two of the areas of paneling in each wall were in fact windows, which could be slid open, also to permit the camera to peek through.

  An array of overhead lamps, all of them adjustable, was aimed at the interior of The Box and bathed it in a strong light that killed any shadows. Parked just outside The Box was a tall steel industrial stepladder, mounted on lockable wheels. Attached to it was a microphone on a boom, suspended high over the center of the cubicle.

  Most of the space inside the set was taken up by a large, low platform bed. The mattress was protected by the kind of heavy black rubber fitted sheet favored by hardcore BDSM enthusiasts. On top of this, however, was a crisply laundered heavy cotton fitted sheet in a vibrant shade of pale blue. Two pillows, with matching pale blue pillowcases, were positioned at the head of the bed. On the floor to one side was a small, low table, on which were displayed a large box of condoms and a tall plastic pump bottle of a silicone-based lubricant.

  “All the comforts of home, I see,” Guy joked. “I’ve been in some motel rooms that were a lot less inviting.”

  Nearby was an enclosed freestanding booth, also constructed of rough wood, but with glass windows. This housed the computer equipment, including some impressively large monitors. The area around the booth and The Box was a bit of an obstacle course, crisscrossed with electrical cables on the floor. A large wheeled rack held some pieces of electrical equipment, including another large video monitor.

  Avery introduced Guy to “Webmaster Paul, our computer wiz,” who manned the booth and was in charge of sending the show out over the Internet.

  Paul laughed. “Computer geek, is more like it,” he said. “But proud of it.” He was an amiable young man, and Guy recognized his voice at once. He was the show’s unseen host and commentator.

  Guy next met Orlando, the cameraman. He was another member of the gym, with whom Guy already had a nodding acquaintance. He was a well-built Hispanic number, whose tight-fitting T-shirt bared his arms and revealed some of his many tattoos. He had to be well-muscled, Guy thought, in order to lift the camera up onto his shoulder and hold it there comfortably for any length of time. The camera was a large, very professional-looking piece of equipment, and it looked quite heavy.

  “There are only two house rules here,” Avery remarked, when he noticed Guy inspecting the camera. “Nobody’s allowed inside the booth once we go live except Paul and me. And nobody, not even me, is allowed to touch Orlando’s camera.”

  “That’s because even though it’s insured it does cost a small fortune,” Orlando explained, apologetically. “So if, God forbid, anybody does damage it, I want that person to be me—so I can kick
my own ass and curse myself out. Well—there is a third rule, maybe. Try not to get any cum on the lens, unless we’ve agreed you’re going to shoot there beforehand. We do that occasionally, to give the viewers a thrill. But if you do it by accident, don’t worry about it. I can always just wipe it off.”

  Avery drew Guy aside. “Come on. I’ll introduce you to your costars.”

  Deke and Antwan were nearby. Both men were naked except for gym shoes and gym shorts, red shorts in Deke’s case, white in Antwan’s, and they were doing pushups to pump up their muscles. Their dark-skinned bodies glistened with sweat. They interrupted their exercising when Avery introduced Guy to them, taking care to call Guy “Guido,” which sounded strange to Guy’s ears.

  “Guido’s the new man I told you about,” Avery said.

  Deke looked Guy up and down, then nodded with satisfaction.

  “Um,” he grunted. “The new white meat is choice!”

  Guy felt an obligation to make conversation. “Ah, my name isn’t really Guido,” he admitted, for lack of anything more pertinent to say. “That’s just the name Avery came up with for me.”

  Deke nodded. “Name’s aren’t so important. You can call yourself Napoleon Bonaparte if you want to, as far as I’m concerned, so long as you fuck as good as you look.”

  “I’ll do my best,” Guy said. He was beginning to feel just a bit intimidated by the black man.

  “You got any preferences?” Deke asked. “You know, when it comes to what you want to do? Once we get your ass inside The Box, there’s no holding back. We expect you to give it up to us, and put on a good show.”

  “I’m into all the basics. Oral, anal, rimming. I do them all, and either way. Active or passive.”

  “Good for you. My boy Antwan wants to get fucked tonight. By two dicks at once, if possible. How’d you like to help me DP him?”

  “I’ve never double penetrated anybody,” Guy confessed. “It might be a little too ambitious, for my very first time here on the show. I wouldn’t want to bite off more than I can chew.”