"You men have to learn to work as a team, so this weekend you will work"
The group arrived one by one and in some cases twos or threes. The huge house had already been rebuilt, rewired and ready except for the painting.
And that was the team's job.
Upstairs and downstairs they would paint ceilings and walls, clean windows and by Monday morning the place would be ready for the group to begin to move in.
IT was a charity place, a half way house for homeless.
"You will arrive early Saturday morning and will not leave until you're done" The coach had seaid "Manny you're in charge".
He wouldn't be there. The coach said the team needed to learn to work together on their own.
Manny arrived Friday night, so did Cal, Marshall, Reuben and Tommy. They plopped down the sleeping bags and boxes of groveries they brought.
"This is goign to take alot of time" Cal said "Manpower" Manny corrected him.
"We got to find a way to make it fun too" Reuben said.
"I know how" Manny smiled and opened his cell phone.
They surbeyed the entire house, top floor to basement. Manny sighed "Better get started" he stripped off his clothing leaving only his jock strap on "We're gonna get messy".
Cal smiled he liked getting messy and soon he too was stripped down to his jockstrap.
"You boys will get used to wearing your jocks, wear em all the time, it is the sign of the team" The coach had said that first day of summer training.
All four moved about feeling sexy, free and ready to go to work. They put cans of paint, brushes, rollers, pans in every room.
As the rest of the team arrived they round the first four already at work working the ceilings. There was no question what was going on. They stripped down and joined in.
By Saturday night all the ceilings were done and walls of the third floor.
"Fuck we did good" Manny said "Celebration tonight"
The CD player blared. The pizza circulated and the sodas poured down parched throats. Smooth young bodies made fit by age and football practice displayed pain spots base don what room they worked in. They laughed at the spots on each others bare buttocks.
They gossiped, told lies about sex and danced in groups. They were a team that worked together, danced together and that night in the darnkess made sure each member's needs and urges were satisfied.
Holind jockstraps backstraps like harnesses on a horse they felt the tight grip of each other's bodies. There was no question, no goubt, no refusals. They were a team.
The Coach arrived Monday morning. The team stood around waiting for his inspection. Each were clean of paint and sweat. Their pint spotted jockstraps w slid about over their otherwise clean bodies under their school clothes.
The bus would take them to class that morning.
The coach walked from the top floor down to the basement looking at the top corrners, the bseboard paint lines, the pile of discarded paint cans and water filled buckets with paint brushed waiting for their next use.
He congratulated the members and Manny their captain.
"Now you are a team" he said knowing all that went on during the days and nights. It had to happen.
"Men that work together and play together become a real family a real team. Now when you get out there on that field, remember who you are and more importantly who the man is in front of you, one either side of you and behind you".
There was a chuckle which the Coach ignored. It was expected.
The group chanted and yelled as they went to the bus that awaited them. Guys grabbed bags not just their own but any that seemed to need lifting. AFter all this journey would go bestter if all took it together.
Manny smiled knowing there would be parties, sleepovers, team parties on the road and that on and off the road his mats would reclaim each other again and again.
That's what teammates did.