Sweat and Gay Desire Under the Empty Gym Showers

That Friday I left work with a single idea in my head: wreck my legs. I got to Olympus a little after 9:30, when the gym starts to empty out and only the people who really train are left. I’m thirty-nine, and I’ve spent half my life lifting iron and swimming, so my body responds like a sharpened tool. That night I needed it more than ever.

I did heavy squats, Romanian deadlifts, leg press, hip thrusts until the veins in my quads were standing out under my skin. I finished lying on the bench, gasping, my sweat-soaked T-shirt plastered to my chest and sweat running down the tattoo on my arm. I looked at myself in the mirror across from me: wet braids stuck to my back, legs shaking, my shorts outlining something that adrenaline had already started to wake up.

Then I saw him come in.

His name was Adrián, though I learned that later. Younger than me, maybe thirty-one, tall, with that V-shaped back only years of swimming build. He was wearing a white tank top so soaked it showed his nipples, and black shorts that left nothing to the imagination. He set himself up on the bench beside mine, loaded the bar with almost twice what I’d been using, and started pulling it like the weight was made of cardboard.

Every time he lowered it, the fabric tightened over his ass. Every time he came up, the muscles in his back opened like wings. I watched him in the mirror longer than I should have, and he caught me. He didn’t look away. He gave the faintest smile, set the bar down, and said:

—I’ve been watching you tear this gym apart for weeks. But today you’ve got something different going on.

—Bad week —I said—. I needed to get it out somehow.

I stood up, as if it were the most natural thing in the world, and got behind him under the excuse of correcting his form. I put my hands on his hips. I felt the heat of his skin through the fabric, and I also felt, unmistakably, his ass pressing back against me.

—Open your knees wider —I told him, and my voice came out rougher than I meant it to.

He pushed back, slowly, a fraction of an inch, just enough for neither of us to be able to pretend it had been an accident. He turned, looked me in the eye for a long second, and dropped his voice to a whisper.

—The downstairs showers are empty at this hour.

No more was needed.

***

We went down to the lower-floor locker room two minutes apart, just in case anyone was still around. There was no one. The lights were dimmed, the air heavy with sauna steam, the floor of the communal showers wet and gleaming under the lights. Eight shower heads, dark tiles, a long stone bench in the center. A place made for one thing, which that night was going to be used for the exact opposite.

We stripped without ceremony. When he took his shorts down, I understood why he walked with that kind of confidence. He was thick, straight, hard already, pointing upward. Mine responded instantly, as if it had spent the whole night waiting for that order.

We turned on a stream of hot water and stepped under it together. We held each other’s gaze for two more seconds, the last scraps of sanity, and then we threw ourselves at one another. The first kiss was a fight: tongues, teeth, beards scraping, hands searching for purchase in the other man’s wet back. His fingers traced my tattoo; mine moved over his perfect lats.

Someone had left a bottle of gel on a ledge. We used it to soap each other up, and suddenly there were four hands sliding over muscles, over hips, over necks. I took his cock with both hands and worked it slowly, feeling every vein under my fingers, while he growled against my ear.

—Fuck —he said—. I knew you had to be hiding something like this.

I dropped to my knees on the wet floor, water running down my back, and took him in my mouth. First my tongue circling the tip, tasting the water and the salt of his sweat. Then deeper, opening my throat, going in and out, saliva mixing with the spray falling over us. Adrián grabbed my braids with both hands, as if they were reins, and set the rhythm himself, slow but deep, his abs knocking against my forehead.

—Just like that —he murmured—. All the way down. No rush.

I wasn’t in a rush. I could have stayed like that for quite a while, but he had other plans.

***

He lifted me by the hair gently and turned me against the wall. The tiles were cold and I was burning. He spread my ass cheeks, fingered me open slowly but without mercy, one finger, then two, stretching me while I pushed back for more. When he felt I was ready, he pressed the tip against me and entered centimeter by centimeter, giving me time to adjust, until I felt him all the way inside, pressed tight to me, both of us breathing like animals.

He started moving slowly and built the pace however he wanted. He held me by the hips with one hand and by the braids with the other, pulling me back so he could arch me more, every thrust long and full. Hot water poured over us, splashing onto the floor, mixing with sweat. I scraped at the tiles, finding nowhere to hold on, my knees shaking, my cock bouncing against my stomach untouched by anyone.

—Look at me —he said, and forced me to turn my head so I could see him over my shoulder.

Then he turned me around. He pressed my back to the wall, lifted one leg until my ankle rested on his shoulder, and entered me again, this time looking straight at my face. His chest knocked against mine, his free hand wrapped around my throat without really squeezing, just enough for me to know who was in charge. Every stroke hit all the way in. When I moaned too loudly, he shut me up with a kiss and bit my lip.

***

We moved to the stone bench in the center. He sat down with his legs open, water running over his chest, and made me sit on top of him, facing away. He lowered me slowly, letting me control every inch, until I was fully seated. Then I started moving, up and down, my hands dug into his thighs hard as the bench stone. He pushed up each time I came down, perfectly in sync, his fingers marking my waist, my own cock slapping my stomach with every motion.

The sound of our breathing and the water filled the empty showers. At some point I stopped thinking about whether anyone might come down. I didn’t care. All that existed was that wall of steam, that body under mine, and the heat rising from deep inside me.

Then he laid me out on the floor, face up, under the stream pouring straight over our faces. He spread my legs, stood between them, and entered me again, first slowly, savoring every inch, then faster and faster. His abs brushed mine, his hands went back to my braids to arch my back against the floor. Water ran down his back and splashed my face, and all I could see was his silhouette outlined against the lights, moving over me.

—I’m not going to last much longer —I told him, and it was true.

—Neither am I —he answered—. But we’re finishing this the way I want.

***

He put me back on my knees, water running down my back. He stood in front of me, stroking his cock with his hand, shining with water, and he came with a groan that echoed off the tiles. The streams hit my face, my parted mouth, my chest. I swallowed as much as I could; the rest slid over my body mixed with the hot water.

I barely had time to get up. I grabbed myself, still hard, and came over his torso, splashing his abs and chest, the same chest that had been pinning me to the floor minutes earlier. We both stood still for a second, gasping, looking at each other as if we’d just come out of a fight we’d both won.

We stayed under the water for a long while, without talking. He hugged me from behind, his body still pressed to mine, our breathing gradually slowing. We turned off the tap, dried off with the towels we’d left on the bench, and got dressed without many words, the kind that are left over after something like that.

In the parking lot, already dressed, he held out his phone so I could type in his number.

—Next Saturday we do it again —he said—. But at my place. No people who might come down.

I went out into the street with my legs still shaking, though no longer from squats. The cold night air hit my face and pulled a smile from me that I couldn’t hold back. I saved his number, pulled up my jacket collar, and walked toward my car thinking that whatever that was, it had only just begun.