this, bro! Woo!” Carlo punched the air in quick succession and shuffled his feet like a boxer in the ring. “As strong as Hercules!”
Lance offered a tight grin, took a deep breath and darted out of the locker room before Carlo had a chance to say or do much of anything else. He liked the guy, he really did. But at the end of the day, they were work colleagues and nothing more. Unfortunately, every single time Carlo tried to build the friendship, it involved the mention of loose women, clubbing and a whole bunch of other things that Lance just wasn’t interested in.
Lance was gay. It was as simple as that. But more to that point, Carlo didn’t know Lance was gay, which was why he was constantly suggesting the two go out and meet women together. Nearly once a week, Carlo would offer up a new depraved idea, and every single time, Lance had to come up with a reason to say no. And sure, he could have very easily just told Carlo he was gay. And he was sure that Carlo wouldn’t care, either. But... he just didn’t want to.
To be clear, Lance wasn’t in the least bit ashamed of being a homosexual. His parents knew he was. His friends knew he was. And most importantly and obviously, his lovers knew he was. What Lance wasn’t a fan of was being defined by his sexuality. As a physically fit Personal Trainer, the last thing Lance needed were his clients and work colleagues assuming that his being gay was responsible for the way he dressed, looked and acted. Worse too was that they’d probably treat him differently, even if they didn’t mean to do it. As such, Lance had made the decision long ago to just not discuss his sexuality with anyone that he wasn’t close with. What was the point?
The obvious downside to this was the constant dodging and ducking of offers to go out and party by men like Carlo, and the sexual advances of the women that Lance trained. And there were a lot of sexual advances from the women he trained... a lot!
Lance was fit. There was no point being humble because it was the simple truth. Standing at exactly six feet tall, his body was athletic, but also muscular. His wide shoulders were his favorite feature, followed very closely by his abs, and then his arms. He was also rather handsome too; with a square jaw, a sharp nose, soft blue eyes and a shaved head that made him look like he was either in the military or auditioning for an action-hero movie role. In the straight community, Lance was a hottie. In the gay community, he was untouchable.
But none of that was really important now. Lance gave his head a quick shake as he powered from the locker rooms and toward the manager’s office. It was because he was so in his head, in such a rush, and so uncharacteristically nervous, that he ended in walking head-first, right into someone.
“Ouch!” the voice yelped as the two men barreled into one another.
Lance barely even broke stride. The man he bumped into was a solid three inches shorter than he was and probably weighed half of what he did, which meant that when they connected, he dropped to the ground like a bag of dirt.
“Oh! Sorry.” Lance grimaced and helped the man up. He then noticed that the guy’s thick black glasses had flown across the floor too, so he hurried to scoop them up also. “Sorry again. Didn’t see you there.”
“That’s fine, really.” The man spoke into his chest as he hurriedly put his glasses back on. And even when they were on, he refused to look directly at Lance. “You wouldn’t know where I could speak to someone that worked here, would you? This is my first time and I need to see about—”
“Yeah, head into the locker room and you’ll see a guy in there named Carlo. He’ll help you with anything you need.”
“The locker room. Then—”
Lance didn’t hang around. He gave a tight nod and powered across the gym floor and toward the manager’s office. Now was the time, he was in gear, and there would be no more stalling.
The gym’s manager, Abraham, was an overweight, bald and sweaty, rather rude man. Lance didn’t like him. Carlo didn’t like him. None of the staff liked him. Even more bizarre was that Lance always got the sense that he liked it.