DISCLAIMER: This is just a story. If it did happen, I don't know about it. There are real places mentioned in the story but that's all that's real about it. If you aren't allowed to read stories like this where you live - you should move.
This story is dedicated to three people who mean the world to me, each for different reasons and you each know what those reasons are: MIKEY, DAWN and BOB (In Illinois)
Copyright (c) 2004 by RimPig. All rights reserved. Permission is granted to Nifty Archives, to archive and display this work. All other uses are expressly forbidden unless explicit arrangement has been made with the author. This copyright applies to all chapters and pages of this work. It may not be reproduced, posted, stored electronically, or archived, except for personal, non-public use, without the express written permission of the author.
THE GUY ACROSS THE HALL Part One By RimPig 2004
I was 18 when I got married. I didn't want to. I'd pretty well floated through high school. Being a jock, a member of the football team and the wrestling squad made life really easy in the small school, White Mountains Regional High, that I went to. I made some good friends who all left town for college as soon as they graduated. Me, I wasn't interested in college. I preferred to work with my hands and loved cars so I ended up at Gallen Regional Vocational Center learning to become a mechanic. It was in the middle of that training when it happened.
I could understand them wanting to leave. The only real 'business' in the town was tourism - for the skiing and for sight-seeing. Carroll was the home to the Mount Washington Hotel which was the town's biggest employer. The town's only real claims to fame are that the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank were started at a conference in the Mount Washington Hotel in 1944 and the Mount Washington Cog Railway which has been climbing to the top of Mount Washington since July 3, 1869. That is, unless you also want to count that the top of Mount Washington is the sight of the world's worst weather - literally! Hurricane force winds occur at the summit on average every third day and the world's highest wind speed ever recorded - 231 mph - was recorded at the summit. The weather on Mount Washington has accounted for the deaths of over 100 people - not exactly what you'd call 'paradise'.
My ex-wife had been my girlfriend in high school. Not that I really wanted one but she'd done most of the chasing after me. I mean, I thought girls were okay and I liked sex and all but there just seemed to be something missing in all of it. I guess we were stupid because she got pregnant. This made my parents somewhat disappointed in me and her parents furious. Seems they wanted there 'little princess' to marry somebody with more ambition than a 'grease monkey'. I'd known they didn't want her dating me and, frankly, if she'd broken up with me I don't think I would have been that broken up about it. I think mostly she held onto me because it pissed off her parents.
Because Carroll one of the smallest towns in Coos County, the population only 689, her parents didn't want to have a wedding there so we ran off and got married in front of a Justice of the Peace in Bethlehem which was down in Grafton County, came back the same day and moved into an apartment that my parents had helped me rent and her parents had helped furnish. I noticed it was pretty cheap furniture - almost as if her parents figured we wouldn't last that long so there was no use in buying anything of good quality or that would last.
The only thing good about the whole situation was that six months into the pregnancy, after we'd already gotten married, she lost the baby. I say good only because I just couldn't see bringing a child into what turned out to be a completely loveless marriage. I remember I'd talked to my Dad when the whole thing happened with her getting pregnant to begin with.
"Son, you don't have to marry this girl if you don't love her." Dad had said to me.
"But, Dad, she going to have my baby. I can't just walk away from a kid of mine. Could you?" I asked.
"I'm not saying just walk away. I'm just saying there's other ways of being a father." Dad insisted.
"Not and be any good at it." I groused.
"Look, son, I'm only thinking about your happiness here. Ending up married to someone you don't love is the worst kind of hell on earth." Dad informed me.
"We get along okay. Maybe I'll learn to love her." I mumbled.
"Love ain't something you 'learn', son. It's something that grows. But it's got to have a start. I just don't see that here. A baby ain't no way to start a relationship." Dad said.
"No, Dad. It will be all right. The relationship will work. I'll make it work." I said, full of teenaged bravado and stupidity.
Those words came back to haunt me many times over the next three years that we lived together. The relationship never grew. I never fell in love with her nor she with me, really. Most guys think that marriage is for sex. Well, let me clue you! I don't think we had sex 10 times in those three years. She would fuck my brains out when we were dating but after we married and after she lost the baby, she lost all interest - either in sex or me or both, I was never sure. The one thing I was sure of was that I was miserably unhappy and didn't know what to do about it. Then Dad stepped in.
He dropped by the garage I was working at one day right at quitting time. He asked me to go have a beer with him. Since my wife was working second shift at a plant outside of town that made plastic containers, I was just going home to an empty apartment anyway. She and I were spending almost no time together over the last six months because they supposedly changed her from first shift to second shift but I wasn't all that sure that the change had been forced on her. I got the feeling she requested it so that she could more easily avoid spending any time with me.
Dad and I drove to a local tavern where we grabbed a couple of drafts and Dad led me to a table in the back corner where we would have privacy. I could see that Dad had something he wanted to talk to me about and I figured it might be about my marriage but I was still totally floored by the first words out of his mouth.
"Son, your Mom and I have decided that we should hire an attorney and get you a divorce." Dad said.
I sat there in shock, just looking at him with my mouth hanging open.
"I know this is a bit forward of us but, son, we just can't stand to see you so miserable any more!" Dad said, looking me right in the eyes when he said it, daring me to tell him different.
I couldn't of course. He was right. I was miserably unhappy. I had been ever since I'd gotten married. It was a wretched situation that I didn't see ever getting any better. Though I couldn't admit it at the time, I was more grateful to my parents than words could ever express for what they were willing to do.
"Now, Tommy, you're over 21. You're an adult and if you want to tell me to butt the fuck out of your life, I will. But we love you son and watching you is tearing your Mom and me apart." Dad said and I could see the truth in his words by the pain in his eyes.
"Dad, I could never say that to you! You're the best Dad a guy could ever hope for. I should have listened to you when this whole thing started. You were absolutely right. I had no business getting married to someone I didn't love. And what you said about a marriage without love being the worst kind of hell...well, Dad...I've been there, done that and bought the t-shirt now." I said, hanging my head.
"Son, we all make mistakes. You did what you did out of the best of intentions and a sense of honor. There was a baby involved and, I have to tell you, though I knew it was a huge mistake, I had a great deal of respect for you, son, for standing up the way you did and taking responsibility for what happened. However, that's all changed. There is no baby and before there is one, you Mom and I just feel that now is the time to end this before it goes on any further." Dad said.
"Ain't much chance of there ever being another baby, Dad." I said quietly.
Dad looked at me sympathetically.
"Yeah. I kinda figured that, son. It don't take a whole lot to make a man happy and usually when he's as miserable as you are all the time it's because he ain't getting his ashes hauled the way he ought to." Dad said.
I know I blushed at this, because I could feel my face heat up. It had been a long time since Dad and me had 'The Talk' when I was about 13 and he caught me jacking off one night, and we really hadn't talked much about sex since then. Actually, like most guys, Dad and I didn't do a whole lot of talking. We would always spend time together, though. Dad loved to fish and so we'd go out to a lake nearby and go out in Dad's small boat. We never caught much but that wasn't the reason we went. The fishing just kind of gave us an excuse to be together, drink a few beers and talk. I'm not exactly sure why guys always feel they need an excuse to be together like that but they evidently do.
"So we've got an appointment set up for Friday afternoon at 3:00 o'clock. Can you take off from work?" Dad asked.
"Yeah. That won't be no problem. Marty, my boss, he's a good guy. He's said a few things to me about seein' me so miserable, too. I don't think this will come as any surprise to him. There's just one thing, Dad. I don't want to move back home. No offense, but I want to live on my own." I said.
"I understand completely, Tommy. No offense but I hadn't counted on you movin' back home. Your Mom and me have gotten used to being alone since you got married and we like it that way, if you get my drift." Dad grinned at me with a twinkle in his eye.
I blushed again! There's just some things that kids - even adult kids - find difficult knowing about their parents! Even if you know intellectually that at some point in time your parents had to have had sex because you exist - still, it isn't something that's real comfortable thinking about!
"Yeah. I get it, Dad!" I said ruefully. "It's just that well...I don't really have enough money to get a place of my own. We don't have a lot put away and I'm gonna have to give her half of it."
"Don't worry about it, son. Your mom and me didn't do much in the way of gifts when you two got married. I guess maybe it's because we saw this day comin'. We can well afford to rent you an apartment. You just look around and find something you like." Dad said.
The next afternoon, after work, I did exactly that. I'd bought a newspaper at lunch and started looking thought the 'Apartments for Rent' ads. I'd already told Marty, my boss, about what was going on. He just smiled at me and told me to take all the time I needed until this thing was over. He told me that he'd gone through the same thing when he was my age and he knew what it was like.
By the time Friday had rolled around and it was time to meet my parents at the lawyer's office, I'd found a place that I wanted to rent. It was in an old but very well cared for building downtown over a small grocery store. The building was three stories and only had four apartments, all of them one bedroom units - two on the second floor and two on the third floor. This apartment was one of the two on the second floor which meant in the evening, after the grocery closed, I didn't have anybody under me. Not that I was gonna do any break-dancing or anything, but I just didn't like havin' to worry about somebody downstairs bein' disturbed.
We met with the lawyer that Dad had chosen. It turned out to be a young guy - not much older than me. He was the son of one of Dad's poker buddies. He'd only been practicing law for a couple of years but this was not a very complicated divorce. In fact, it hardly seemed worth having a lawyer at all. We had no children and there were no 'marital assets' to speak of. My wife and I each had cars but they were both over five years old. Our bank account was barely over five figures and the only other asset was the furniture her parents had bought which I'd just a soon give to her anyway.
Because it was a 'community property' state, marital assets were basically just divided down the middle and there was no such thing a alimony. The state also had what was called 'no-fault' divorce, so all that had to be stated was that the parties no longer wished to be married and that was about it. The attorney told us it would take about six months, unless my wife contested the divorce - which was highly unlikely. The lawyer said he would serve her with papers on Monday.
After leaving the attorney's office Mom, Dad and I headed over to the apartment that I wanted to rent. They were both impressed by how clean and well maintained the building was and at the size of the apartment. For a one bedroom, it was larger than the two bedroom I shared with my wife now and the rent was much more reasonable. My wife had demanded that we move into this 'young adult' complex which had a lot of amenities - most of which I never used, nor did she - and cost a great deal per month. The new apartment would run me less than half of what the one I presently shared cost. The landlord was the guy who owned the grocery downstairs so after he showed us the apartment, my Dad wrote out a check to him for first, last and security. I told Dad I'd pay him back, but he insisted that, like the attorney, this was something that he and Mom wanted to do for me.
All that was left was to tell my wife that I was filing for divorce. When she finally got home that night, she was surprised to see me up waiting for her. I rarely did that anymore. She looked at me funny and asked why I was up. I told her that we needed to talk. She seemed somewhat disconcerted and also somewhat wary and defensive at this announcement. We sat in the kitchen and I just flat out told her that I'd seen an attorney that day and that I wanted a divorce, that the papers would be filed on Monday and that I was moving out the next day. I told her I was quite willing to split the bank account with her and she could have all the furniture that her parents had bought.
She sat there looking somewhat dumbfounded - like this all came as some kind of surprise. Finally she just shook her head and began laughing. I asked her what was funny.
"I already have an appointment with an attorney on Monday. I was going to file for divorce. I had intended on telling you tomorrow. I guess we both know what a mistake this has all been." she said.
"Yeah. It has been. I don't know if it was yours or mine or both and, frankly, I don't care. I just want out." I said.
"I plan on moving back in with Mommy and Daddy." she said, so I really don't need the furniture. "If you're moving to your own place, you probably will, so you're welcome to it. It will at least save you some money." she said.
I thought for a second about that and decided she was not only right, but she apparently was trying to make some kind of generous gesture now that she knew that I wouldn't fight her on a divorce and I was just as eager as she was to end this farce we called a marriage.
"Okay, I said, but the law says we're supposed to split everything and there ain't nothin' really to split." I said.
"It's okay. My car's newer and better than yours - that should even things out." she said.
"I guess I'll sleep out here on the couch, tonight." I said.
"Why? There's no reason for that. I think we can trust ourselves enough to sleep next to each other one more night." she said.
Knowing how little had gone on in our bed other than sleep - especially for the last year - I supposed she was right. We went to bed and in the morning, she was gone when I woke up. There was a note on the kitchen table telling me that she'd went to see her parents to give them the news of the divorce and that she was looking at moving out that afternoon or as soon as she could get her father to come and get her things. I decided to stay in the apartment one more night and called some of the guys at work to come and help me move on Sunday.
Deciding I didn't want to be around when my soon-to-be-ex-wife came back with her parents to get her things, I went over to the apartment and decided to look around it and decide where I was going to put the furniture. I drove over to the apartment, walked up the stairs to the second floor and I no more put my key in the door than the door opposite mine opened.
There in the doorway stood a big guy! Now, I'm no slouch at about six foot but this guy had me by three or four inches and with shoulders a mile wide and a chest and upper arms showing in his 'wife-beater' that said he either did very physical labor or he very seriously worked out. His hair was black and his eyes a crystalline blue. I could tell that he was about my age - maybe a couple of years older. He was wearing an old pair of gym shorts along with the wife-beater and was barefoot.
"You the new guy?" he asked.
"Yeah! My name's Tommy. Tommy Driscoll." I said.
"Pete." he said, sticking out his hand "Pete Blackstone."
His hand shake was firm without being over powering. It was clear that this young stud had nothing to prove. I noticed, immediately, however, that he wasn't from around Carroll - or anywhere in New England for that matter. He didn't have the distinctive 'twang' of the New England accent.
Now a lot of New Englanders have a strong resistance to 'outsiders' but I wasn't that way. I welcomed anybody that would move to Carroll. After all, it was a pretty small town and, to my mind, it need some new blood in it! I just couldn't place his accent because basically, he didn't have one. At least, not to my ears.
"So how come you're moving here? You just getting out of school?" he asked.
"No, just out of a marriage." I answered.
"Oh, fuck! I'm sorry." he said. "Me and my big feet that always seem to end up in my big mouth!"
"Nah! Don't worry about it. I ain't broken up about it. It was a mistake from the beginning. I should have known it wouldn't work. I was too young and too stubborn to listen." I said. "You ain't married, I take it?"
"God, no! And don't want to be - ever!" Pete laughed.
"Smart man!" I laughed. "Well, it ain't gonna happen to me again - ever!"
"So when you movin' in?" Pete asked.
"Tomorrow. I got some friends movin' my stuff." I said.
"Say, why don't you come on in. I got some coffee just brewed. That is if you ain't busy."
"Nah! Ain't got a thing in the world to do." I said, realizing that it was true.
Besides, there was something about Pete that I just instantly liked. I don't know what it was. I mean, it wasn't his looks or nothin' - not that he wasn't quite a stud! He was just about what women called 'drop-dead gorgeous'. I mean, even as a guy, I could see that! But there was just something there - something so nice - that I just wanted to get to know him. Somehow I had the feeling that we were going to become really good friends.
God knows, I could use a friend about now. I'd lost all my friends when they moved away to college and then to jobs in the big cities. Small town life wasn't what they wanted. I don't know why, but I didn't have the same hankering to go chasing after money and living in smog-blanketed cities surrounded by millions of strangers. I'd grown up in this small town and it's where I wanted to stay. Close to my family, close to my roots. But it was lonely with nobody to really talk to. There was always the guys at work and sometimes I had gone out with them to get a beer after work but nothing seemed to 'click' with any of them. I don't know why.
But now with Pete, that was a whole different story. Something seemed to 'click' almost from the moment I met him. When he ushered me into his apartment, I was amazed at the place. It was a mirror image of the one that I'd just rented but configuration was where all similarities stopped. The living room was furnished with a long couch and what looked like two, deep comfortable chairs all upholstered in leather of a deep, rich reddish brown. The three leather clad pieces were grouped around a large coffee table in dark wood facing a wall on which hung a huge plasma screen and what looked like enough electronic sound equipment to outfit a good-sized Best Buy! A huge rack of CD's and DVD's also occupied space against the wall. I could see the pieces of what looked like (and which were) a very good home theatre sound system. The walls were stark white and the only color in the room came from two large modern paintings on the other walls adding slashes of color from deepest red to shocking blue. The floors had been stripped to their hard wood and polished to a high gloss with no rugs covering them to hide the beauty of the wood.
At the other end of the long room, rather than a dining room table, the entire dining area had been turned into a home office with a huge computer desk and what looked to be a rather extensive and powerful computer system. The one outstanding thing about these apartments were the kitchens. They were large by apartment standards - big enough to eat in with lots of cabinets for storage and fairly modern appliances. However, Pete's kitchen was very different from mine in that his cabinets were all dark wood and leaded glass so that the contents could be seen behind the small panes of glass and the counter-tops were all a deep red granite - as was the sink.
He motioned me over to a good-sized kitchen table of dark wood that looked like it was an antique (it was - over 150 years old, I found out later) and brought over two cobalt blue mugs filled with what turned out to be some of the richest, most flavorful coffee I'd ever had. There was a cut-glass sugar bowl on the table and Pete pulled from the refrigerator a matching cut-glass pitcher filled with cream. Adding both to my coffee and looking around the kitchen, I couldn't help but be impressed by my surroundings.
"This is really quite a place you've got here! Either you or the landlord has been doing some upgrading!" I said.
"Well, I guess you could say we both have. The landlord is a particular friend of mine." Pete smiled.
"You mean the guy who runs the grocery downstairs?" I asked.
"Oh, no. He's not the owner of the building. He simply manages the apartments for the owner." Pete said.
"Oh!" I said. "Well, I wonder if I'll get to meet the owner?" I asked.
"I would expect you will, in due time." Pete answered.
"So I guess that's why your place looks like this, huh?" I asked.
"Well...you might say that. Eventually the landlord wants to redo all of the apartments this way but before he could do your's, you rented it." Pete said. "But maybe, if you don't mind putting up with the mess, it could get upgraded while you're living there."
"Sure! I don't mind, especially not if it would end up looking like this!" I enthused.
"Well, I'll have to see what I can do about that." Pete grinned. "So, you're getting divorced?"
"Yeah. The marriage was really a mistake. I didn't love her but she got pregnant. I stuck it out for three years, but finally my Dad offered me a way out. He and Mom are paying for the divorce." I said.
"Really? That's quite unusual." Pete said.
"Well, Dad said they'd never given me a wedding present." I grinned. "I guess a divorce was the best present they could give me. That, and this apartment."
"They rented the apartment for you?" he asked.
"Yeah. I wanted out and we didn't have the money for that. I can pay the rent but Mom and Dad did the first, last and security so that I could move quickly." I explained.
"I understand. Did you ask them to do all this?" he asked.
"No. Dad came to me. They saw how miserable I was and wanted to do something to change it." I smiled.
"Well, it seems to have worked. You don't seem miserable to me." Pete smiled back.
"No, ever since we saw the lawyer and rented this place, it's been like a thousand pound weight was lifted off my shoulders." I said.
"Well, it looks like you could almost hold that much. You must work out with all those muscles." he grinned.
I was shocked at first. I didn't think of myself as muscular - especially not looking at him. And that was part of the shock. I found myself looking at him - a lot. I couldn't seem to tear my eyes away from his muscular body. I'd never had this happen with another guy before and I couldn't understand why it was happening to me. I found myself blushing hard - whether from what he said about my body or from the embarrassment of not being able to tear my eyes away from his form.
"No. I don't. I guess it's from work. Throwing around engines and transmissions will keep you pretty well toned. And I do still run every morning. I do about three miles a day to stay in shape." I admitted.
"It definitely shows." he said, eying me.
"How about you! I'd say you must work out pretty regular." I said.
"Well, I have to!" he smiled. "It's one of my professions."
"One of your professions? How many do you have?" I asked.
"Actually, I have two. I'm a male model and I also am a writer. But sitting in front of a computer for hours at a time doesn't do much for your body so I have to work out to stay looking good enough to do the modeling gig." he said.
Well, that certainly made sense considering how handsome he was! In fact, I don't think I'd ever seen such a good looking male in my entire life! And the fact that I noticed that bothered me as well! What the fuck was wrong with me?
"So you don't model around here, do you?" I asked.
"No, I moved here about five years ago. I wanted to live somewhere small and quiet - away from the big city where I'd been raised." he smiled.
"Where was that?" I asked.
"You mean you can't tell? Most people say that my accent gives me away!" he laughed.
"No, I can't say that I can. I really can't hear any accent."
"That's because I've had enough speech courses to basically train it out of me! I was born and raised in New York City. That's where I still do some modeling - that and in California. Sometimes, I've been on shoots in Europe but mostly I only accept assignments in the United States now. Unless the money is just too enticing." he said.
"Fuck! That must be fun! Traveling all over the place!" I said.
"Yeah, you would think it would be, but it's not. It's a very lonely life. The only people you spend time with are other models and, I don't like to seem elitist, but models - by and large - are about the most egotistical and boring people on earth. All they seem to be concerned about are themselves and their looks. I didn't seek out a career in modeling. I just kind of fell into it so I've never been that hung up on how I look." he said.
"What do you mean, fell into it?" I asked.
"Well, I was walking down the street one day in Manhattan and there was a photo-shoot going on. The photographer spotted me and got his assistant to give him my name, address and phone number. The next thing I knew, he was contacting me and offering me $250 and hour to do a layout for a men's fashion magazine. That's how I got started. It was money I just couldn't pass up." he said.
"You make $250 per hour just for standing around getting your picture taken?!" I exclaimed.
"Well, it's a little more work than that, but basically, that's it. Only I now make over $1,000 per hour." he said.
"Fuck! $1,000 per hour! That's incredible!" I said.
"Don't be too impressed. It won't last. I'll soon be too old to get that kind of money. And I've been considering retiring anyway. Since I moved here and my writing career has begun to take off, I've been less and less inclined to having to travel to New York or LA. So, what about you? What is it you do?" he asked.
"I'm just a mechanic. I work on cars." I said.
"Hey! That's a really important profession! Shit! I can't do anything nearly that practical. Engines and such are a complete mystery to me. Whenever I take my car into the shop, I'm sure that they're ripping me off because I have no idea what the fuck they're doing!" he laughed.
"Well, you don't have to worry about that anymore. You need your car fixed, you just let me know. I'd be glad to do it for you." I said.
"Oh, I couldn't impose on you that way!" he said.
"Why not? It's just the neighborly thing to do." I said.
He looked at me for a moment like he couldn't figure out what I was talking about. Then he smiled.
"Yes, the neighborly thing to do. You have to understand, I wasn't raised here like I guess you were." he said.
"Yeah, I was. I love this little town. Never wanted to live anywhere else." I said.
"You see, in New York, where I was raised, the 'neighborly thing to do' was often to rip off your neighbor. Not exactly the same kind of ideas there as here. That's one of the reasons I moved here. I wanted out of that rat-race, the dog-eat-dog world. But I find it's been hard here as well, making friends. People here seem to have a distrust - a standoffishness - where strangers are concerned.
"Well, there is that. This is New England, after all. But it ain't just because you're a newcomer. I don't have any friends either. I had friends when I was in high school, but they all took off for college after graduation and none of them ever wanted to come back and live here. Can't say as I blame them, really. There ain't much here in the way of what you might call a 'career'." I explained.
"You're the first guy I've felt comfortable talking to." Pete said, giving me a shy smile.
"Same here! I don't think I've ever felt this comfortable with somebody when I first meet them. I hope that we're going to be friends." I said eagerly.
I was afraid that I'd said it a little too eagerly! I didn't know what the fuck was up with me. It was like I really wanted Pete to like me more than anything else in the fucking world! I'd never felt that way about anybody before! But he just gave me this really bright fucking smile!
"Yeah. I'd really like that, too." he said and his voice showed just as much eagerness as mine! "So, now that's settled, have you had breakfast yet?"
"Nah. I was gonna go over to the caf^Â and have some in a little while." I said.
"Well, there's no reason to do that. I was just about to cook breakfast when I heard you. It's just as easy to make it for two." he said, smiling.
Wanting to spend more time with him - for reasons I couldn't explain even to myself - I looked at him and smiled.
"Yeah! I'd like that - if it's not any trouble." I said.
"No trouble at all!" he smiled.
He got up and went over to the refrigerator and started pulling stuff out. Before I knew it, I could smell the wonderful smell of bacon cooking and onions and green pepper as well. In not a lot of time, Pete was laying out a full breakfast of western omelets, home fries, bacon and toast. There looked like there was enough to feed an army but between the two of us, we devoured it all.
"Damn! That was good!" I grinned at him, finishing off the last of my home fries.
"Thank you! It's always nice to cook for an appreciative and hungry audience!" he laughed. "And now that I've fueled up, I feel like working out. Why don't you join me?"
"Uhh...well...I don't have anything with me to work out in." I said. "I should probably just get out of your way and let you get to it."
"Nonsense! I've got stuff that will fit you easily." he said.
"Where do you work out anyway?" I asked.
"Come on. Let me get you some thing to change into and I'll show you." he said.
He led me into his bedroom. If I thought the rest of the apartment was impressive, it was nothing compared to this! The central feature of the room was the bed. King-sized with a dark wooden canopy and long, heavy velvet drapes in deep burgundy gathered at the four dark wooden posts carved in intricate details at the corners. The bed was covered in what looked like (and I later found out was) a black leather cover. At the foot of the massive bed, was what looked like a massive carved wooden chest which looked ancient. Indeed, I later found out it was from a Spanish Galleon and was from the 1600's. There was another plasma screen television on the wall opposite the bed and I could see speakers suspended from the ceiling in all four corners of the room. The floors were again highly polished wood but there were small rugs which looked like old Arab prayer rugs on both sides of the bed.
The headboard of the bed itself was a bookcase and filled with books. Above it was a mirrored wall and when Pete hit the light-switch by the door, not only did lamps on dark wooden night stands on each side of the bed go on but spotlights from up inside the canopy illuminated the bed as well. I could also see small halogen reading lights on swing arms sitting on top of the bookcase headboard. On the other two walls, rather than paintings or artwork, there was displayed a collection of swords, the likes of which I'd never seen before. Swords of every shape and size! There must have been at least a hundred of them between the two walls. My eyes were particularly drawn to a large, curved sword which I knew from reading and movies was more than likely Japanese in origin. I walked over to take a closer look at it.
"You have a good eye." Pete said, coming up behind me. "That is the prize of my collection. A true Japanese Katana sword dated to around 1535. The sword of a Samurai in service to Ashikaga Yoshiteru who was the 13th Ashikaga Shogun who reigned from 1546 to 1565."
"This is really amazing! How did you get interested in swords?" I asked.
Pete laughed.
"The usual way, I guess. I studied fencing when I was in high school and college. Got to be quite good at it but not enough to enter the Olympics." he said.
I was quickly deciding that there were so many sides to this very attractive man - so many sides that it would probably take years to learn them all!
"So let me get you something to change into." he said, walking over to a tall chest of drawers against one wall that I hadn't noticed. It, too, was of the same dark wood as the night stands and bed.
He pulled out a pair of gym shorts, a clean jock and a sweatshirt with the sleeves cut off so that there was only about a two or three inch sleeve.
"You can change in the bathroom over there if you're shy." Pete said.
Even though there was no belligerence to it and it was said gently, this sounded like a type of challenge. A challenge that I couldn't quite understand. I just knew somehow that I was just supposed to change right there and so I did.
"That's okay. We're both boys." I joked as I quickly stripped out of my t-shirt and blue jeans and donned the jock, gym shorts and sweatshirt.
I noticed that Pete's eyes never left my body as I did so - as if he wanted to see me naked. I just figured that this was just my mind playing tricks on me. That couldn't be the case!
Once I changed, Pete led the way out of the bedroom and then out of the apartment. I followed him downstairs and then down to the basement. The first room we came to was a small laundry with a coin-operated washer and a coin-operated dryer. There was a concrete-block wall which made the room very small. I wondered at this because, if this were a full basement, the room beyond the metal door set in the middle of the wall had to be huge.
Pete pulled a key from his pocket and opened the metal door and reached inside to turn on the lights. The ceiling lit with rows of fluorescent lights show the room to be, indeed, huge! Huge and filled with work out equipment. More than I'd ever seen before. More, in fact, then there was in the gym at White Mountains Regional High!
"Holy shit!" I exclaimed looking around.
Pete just grinned at me.
"My little home gym." he said.
"Some fucking home gym! You could train for the fucking Olympics in here!" I said.
"Well, perhaps. It would depend on what sport." Pete laughed. "Come on, let me show you the rest of it."
"The 'rest' of it?!" I exclaimed.
Pete didn't say anything, just led the way to another door in a back wall past all of the equipment and free-weights. He opened the door, turned on more lights and we stepped into what would be termed a 'wet' area. There was a huge shower with four heads coming out of the walls, two on each side. Next to this, was a glass door which was fogged with condensation.
"Steam room." Pete said, pointing to the glass door.
Next to this was a small wooden door which Pete pulled open to reveal a small sauna, basically big enough for two and finally a large hot tub. Pete reached over to the side of the hot tub, threw a switch and the water began to churn and bubble.
"There's also bathroom facilities here." Pete said pointing out a urinal and toilet along with a sink and mirror.
All in all, in a compact area, was everything you would think to find in a good health club.
"This is incredible! Don't tell me, your good friend the landlord built this for you?" I asked, wonder in my voice.
"Well, you might say that. Look, Tommy, if we're going to be friends, there's something I need to tell you. I'm the landlord. I own the building. I bought it when I moved here to provide not only a home for me but some income. I let the grocer, Tony, handle the rentals and act as my agent for a reduction of his rent and I don't tell the tenants that I'm the owner. That way, they don't bother me with problems. If their sink overflows, I want Tony to call a plumber. I don't want to have to deal with it because there's not a whole lot I could do other than that. I don't know anything about plumbing or electrical, for that matter." Pete admitted.
"Well, that at least makes sense! For a minute there, I was thinking that the landlord must be a very wealthy woman and you were her kept 'boy-toy'!" I grinned.
Pete almost collapsed, he was laughing so hard at this. I didn't think it was all that funny but it must have struck him that way.
"No, no way, guy!" Pete said when he'd finally calmed down. "So, how about we work out?"
The End of Part One of THE GUY ACROSS THE HALL
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