Shadowing Jem
Mac clocked out of the discount store for the last time a little after two o’clock. He had hours before the start of his first training shift on the floor, but he knew he’d get to The Gym early. He was way too keyed up not to.
Plus, Jem was working a double today. Again. Mac detoured through Taco Bell and grabbed both of them lunch before heading over. It was a little frivolous to spend ahead of his paycheck, but the car had a full tank of gas and it seemed more important to find a way to thank Jem than to hoard his pennies.
He settled the food in the kitchen and sent a text. Mac wasn’t used to casually texting anyone, but Jem really didn’t allow for formality. Within twelve hours of moving in, Jem was gifting him sheets and towels; within two days Jem had picked him up a guitar stand from a thrift store.
“I have no furniture.”
“Correction: now you have a guitar stand.”
“No one’s ever bought me a guitar stand before.”
And Jem had kissed his cheek before spinning away and calling, “I’ll expect to hear you play one of these days, roomie!”
It made Mac a little uncomfortable, but Jem didn’t allow for that, either.
A few minutes later the outer door opened and Mac started spreading out their meals.
“Ugh! Seriously, I can’t take it. Tell me it’s at least five.”
“Sorry. It’s not quite three.”
“I’m going to die of boredom.”
“You can’t. Then who will train me?”
Jem’s eyes lit. “In the dismal drudgery of working a normal job, I almost forgot! You’re mine tonight, all mine. And you bought me lunch. Trying to butter me up, Mac?”
“Stop flirting.”
“You haven’t even seen me flirt yet. Just wait.” Jem pulled his share of tacos toward him. “How did you do it? How did you work at that store without murdering anyone?”
Mac shrugged. “It’s what you do. What’d you do before this?”
“You wouldn’t believe. I nude modeled for a while, which pays well but isn’t steady work. One of the guys in the class started paying me for private modeling sessions, and you can about imagine where that went.”
“Gross.”
“Well, he could have been okay, I guess, except one day I showed up and he was like, ‘Oh, don’t mind five of my closest friends. We’re all gonna sketch you tonight!’ and I decided that was not really the job for me. I also worked flipping burgers for a few weeks, making pizza, taking tickets at a movie theater, pulling espresso, and my personal favorite, changing oil.”
“You did not.”
“Oh, I did. My nails looked terrible!” But that was a throwaway line, and Mac had spent enough time with Jem now to know it. “Actually, that wouldn’t have been quite so bad, I don’t think. But the professor I’d done the modeling for came in with his car one day and complained about me—they really frown on you taking up as a pro with the artists, you know—and got me fired without cause. Nice, right?”
Mac shook his head.
“But it all worked out, because the Professor called me like three days later and here I am. Anyway, you nervous?”
“Yeah. I don’t know. Coach still thinks I can do this, so I guess I’ll try.”
“Well, you can’t screw it up as badly as I did, so at least there’s that.”
“Screw up on the floor?”
“I was terrified of women, Mac. Like I didn’t even make eye contact with women I was so afraid one of them would want me to touch her.”
“It was really that bad?”
“Put it this way: halfway into my second training shift, the Professor pulls me off the floor, drags me up to her office, drags Coach from his office, and makes me go down on her for the rest of the shift. Three hours I spent with my face all up inside the Professor, Mac! Well, Coach gave me little incentive licks to his dick every now and then, but most of the time I was trying to figure out how to breathe and perform cunnilingus simultaneously.”
“Cunnilingus.” Mac snickered.
“Shut up! It was traumatizing!”
“Was it?”
“Well, no. No, it wasn’t even that uncomfortable after the initial leap. I mean, once you’ve gone there, it’s not a thing, but that first few minutes? I thought I was going to faint.”
“Jeez, Jem.” Though that actually sounded a lot like the way he’d felt about sucking Coach’s dick the first time. “After that it was okay?”
“It was touch and go. But now? So not a problem. Now it’s kind of fun, playing with women.” Jem paused. “I take it you’ve gone down on a woman before?”
“Yeah.” Shit.
“Well, good. Because it seriously took my jaw a few days to recover and I wouldn’t wish that on anyone.” He grinned and finished his tacos. “You gonna crash in the office again?”
“Uh. I figured I’d drive back to the house. I mean, I’d pretty much be in Coach’s way, so—”
“You’d rather drive to the house and sleep on the floor, then drive all the way back here. Yeah, sure. I mean, obviously he knows you’re in the building because he’s got notifications that flash on his phone every time someone swipes their card more than an hour outside their scheduled shift, but if you want to explain to him later why you didn’t bother to even knock, sure, go for it, but wait until I’m there so I can watch.”
“He’s got notifications on his phone?”
“Yeah.”
“You know that’s kind of creepy, right?”
Jem shrugged.
“This is the first time he hasn’t been stuck with me in a week. I don’t want to—impose.”
“Please. I was a wreck the first three weeks of my training. I didn’t want to sleep unless Coach was in the room.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know,” Jem said, like he was actually thinking about it. “He made me feel like someone had my back, for the first time in my life. It was like I spent twenty-one years breathing at ten percent, and all of a sudden I could take these deep breaths and I didn’t want to be apart from him. It was fucking embarrassing. And I couldn’t stop doing it.”
Mac studied the wrappers for his tacos. “You think he wouldn’t mind?”
“If he needs you to leave, he’ll tell you. You may as well knock and see. You can always go home if you can’t use the office.”
Which sounded so normal and sane. Even though it wasn’t.
“I know that feeling,” he said, glancing up. “I know what you mean. I don’t like it, but I don’t think I’ve been able to sleep in years as well as I did on Coach’s couch last week.”
“Coach and the Professor hire two types of people: the broken ones, and the whole ones. They need the whole ones to keep everything moving, but I’m pretty sure we’re the ones people keep coming back to see. Anyway, I gotta go. He’ll probably be happy to see you, especially since he totally knows you’re here.”
“Creepy. Hey, where do they sleep? Do they live here?”
“There’s an apartment across the hall. But I’m not sure either of them really sleeps.” Jem saluted. “See you later, trainee. Thanks for lunch.”
“Sure.”
Mac took his time cleaning up. Then he showered off the discount store and pulled on the only clothes he owned that Jem considered suitable for one day of training. (“One day. And you’re on your own with Lupe about those shoes.”)
He almost backed out, but Jem would make fun of him later if he did that, so he forced himself to knock on Coach’s door.
“Come in!”
Sure, go right in. He pushed open the door and walked over to the desk, where Coach was watching him approach. Coach laughed.
“Twenty dollars. The Professor thought you’d knock, I told her you wouldn’t.”
“Is it really true you can see when we get here early?”
“It’s really true. Hey, Mac.”
“Hey, Coach. I’m not trying to interrupt or—or get in the way—”
“You done with the store?”
“Yeah.”
Coach reeled him in and looked up at him. “Good. If you want to sleep, go right ahead. Don’t disrupt the mats, okay? I’ve already got that set up for Jem later.” Coach raised an eyebrow. “You didn’t tell him, right?”
“No. I don’t even know what I would have told him, but I didn’t say anything.”
“Good. I’m so excited.” Coach kissed his forehead. “Get some sleep. And no, my office is not open for naps for everyone on staff. But for you, today, it is. All right?”
“Yeah,” Mac said, feeling both relieved and disappointed. He tried not to think about what that today meant, not that it mattered.
“Sleep.”
Mac turned away, scouting the mats, where blankets were laid out, and towels, and a huge bottle of lube. And gloves. He contemplated what all that meant as he lay down, but as usual the warmth and weird safety of Coach’s office stole over him, making everything seem less important. During a brief fantasy of leaving The Gym after his shift later, going to the house, and sleeping as long as he wanted, Mac fell asleep.
* * *
“Stop looking so cute. Mac, wake up. You’re late for work.”
Shit. He sat up, blinking. “Jem? I’m late?”
“Not that late. Come on.”
Mac cast a glance over at the mats, but another blanket had been thrown over everything.
“I know,” Jem said. “Looks like Coach is planning to have a good time later while we poor working stiffs are downstairs, trying to do a job.”
“Poor, poor working stiffs,” Coach said, not looking over. “Train our boy well, Jem.”
“Oh, you know I will. C’mon, Mac. Did Coach tell you your clothes arrived?”
“My clothes?”
Jem laughed and grabbed his arm. “Yeah, they’re down by your locker. You’ll be lucky if Lupe hasn’t already opened the box.”
Everything was still a little fuzzy. “Did you call me cute?”
“Did you think I hadn’t noticed you were cute? Please.”
He followed Jem out of the office and down the hall. Sure enough, Lupe—dressed for her shift—was tapping one golden tennis shoe against his box.
“Happy Christmas, sugar. Open up.”
“Um. Okay.” Mac slit the packing tape with his car key and started pulling out clothes. But he’d seen the order go through, and this was definitely more than he’d bought. “I don’t think this is actually mine. I mean, I got like two pairs of pants and three shirts, so—”
“Then Coach went back in and added stuff after you left,” Lupe said. She pulled out a package of underwear. “Like this, for instance. The man has good taste. But where are your shoes? That’s what I need to see.”
“Wait—what?”
“He did the same thing for me when I started here. I was wearing the worst clothes, you can’t imagine. Coach sat me down and made me look at every page in that catalogue and pick out the things I actually wanted, no matter how ridiculous.” Lupe dug out the bag with his shoes and nodded. “We’ll work on style later, but these will do.”
“I didn’t know that,” Jem said.
Lupe pointed a finger at him. “No, there aren’t pictures.”
“Hey, I wouldn’t have asked. Give me some credit.”
“Anyway, let’s get you dressed, Mac. I don’t get you until Wednesday, and this is what you’ll be wearing—” She picked out a pile of clothes (including, he blushed to see, a red jock strap). “You can wear whatever you want the rest of the week.”
“Uh, thanks, Lupe.”
“Shower. Clothes. Work.”
He rolled his eyes, bundled up a random assortment of interchangeable work clothes, and went to the showers.
Behind him, Jem said, “Was that the first time you ever wore what you wanted to wear?”
“First time I did it in public, anyway. And I still don’t know how he had the gall.”
“Coach is magic.”
Lupe snorted, but didn’t disagree.
Mac had no idea what all that meant, but the realization that he was about to start his first shift on the floor basically eliminated all other thoughts from his head.
Sex gym. Right. Holy shit.
* * *
Jem spent a surprising amount of time actually showing him how to work at a gym. They went over the machines, the common issues with the computers in the treadmills and ellipticals (“When in doubt, restart, I swear”), and the safety practices for the weights machines. He touched a little bit on the basic cleaning and maintenance that all staff was responsible for, and told him that Punky would go over it more in depth tomorrow.
As more clients started to show up, Jem switched over to client-staff best practices, starting with “don’t get territorial.”
“Clients have their favorites, we have our favorites, but you can’t let yourself start thinking like a client owes you their time. You might play with someone every day for a week, and then next week they’re on to someone else. It’s the job, okay?”
“Okay.” Mac considered it as they checked over supply cabinets. “Does that really happen? I mean, that people get attached to clients?”
“Oh, Mac. Listen, you spent last week training with Coach, right? Don’t you feel a little more attached to him than you did to whoever trained you at the store?”
It sounded rhetorical, until Jem nudged him.
“Yeah. Is that the same, though?”
“Not exactly, but it’s definitely similar. You aren’t selling these people toilet paper and frozen dinners. You’re selling them your attention, you’re selling them an experience, a connection. Maybe it’s just for five minutes, maybe it’s for an hour, it doesn’t really matter; for that amount of time you give them the part of you that only exists in The Gym. The better you are at compartmentalizing, the better you’ll be at the job.”
“Huh.” Which probably made sense, though he’d have to think about it more.
“Let’s double-check all the cabinets in the private rooms. The sooner you know exactly how they’re laid out, the better.”
The private rooms were a cross between a doctor’s office and a hotel room. They had beds, but Jem showed him that the beds could be stripped in about five seconds and transformed into massage tables. There was a sink in each room with foot-operated water, and three different bins for garbage, bodily fluid waste, and recycling.
“Wow,” he said. “This is quite the setup.”
“I know.”
“Does the day staff know about these rooms?”
“Sure. We turn them over at the end of the night so they look like rooms for private massages and make sure all the cabinets stay locked. Same with the cabinets on the floor.”
“The Gym has a secret identity,” Mac murmured, looking around, trying to see the room as a place where no one had sex. “Interesting.”
“Speaking of interesting, let’s go shop for clients.” Jem pressed a palm to his chest. “No touching for you. That orange badge is your shield. If anyone asks, you can tell them you’re still in training. You are strictly a voyeur, Mac.”
“Uh. Okay.”
Jem flashed a cheeky grin. “Hey, you could sound a little more excited about it.”
“It doesn’t—bother you? That I’m about to watch you, you know, with clients?”
“I don’t mind an audience. Does it bother you?”
Mac shook his head. “I kind of feel like it should, but it doesn’t.”
“Good. Easier that way. Let’s go.”
The first client who requested Jem’s service was nothing like Mac expected. She was short, with close-cropped blond hair and a mischievous grin.
“Oh, training. Please tell me you have time for a spanking, Jem.”
“For you, Amanda, of course I do. This is Mac. Mac, Amanda.”
They shook hands (sure, just a casual meeting, here at your local neighborhood sex gym), and Amanda grinned.
“He’s adorable.” She rubbed her hands together. “Well, when? I’m on edge, Jem. My in-laws are in town, two of the kids are sick, and I’m crawling out of my head!”
Jem reached out to thread his arm into hers. “How about now?”
“Thank god. I should really get home soon, but ugh. In-laws. Tell me you don’t have in-laws.”
“Bite your tongue!”
Amanda laughed.
Mac followed them back to a private room (one of them already had the little light lit overhead that meant it was occupied), and took up an awkward stance just inside the door.
“He’s shy,” Amanda said.
“He’s respectful. It’s very charming. Do you have requests?”
“Just your ass, Jem. You’re the best, you know. You’re my absolute fave.”
“Aw. Don’t try to tempt me over to the dark side, Amanda. I’m onto you! Mac, come closer. Sit here.”
He sat at the edge of the bed, which they’d left as a bed, and almost choked when Jem dropped his pants and bent over next to him.
“Oh my god, your ass. Gimme, gimme, gimme.” Amanda rubbed and kneaded Jem’s ass like it was the purest pleasure of life. “You sure you don’t want to marry me, Jem? I would so make it good for you. And you could totally have boys on the side.”
“Your husband would not be pleased.”
“He’d have to get another wife, though I guarantee there’s no woman in this place with an ass as firm and luscious as yours.” She grinned at Mac. “Tell the truth: Jem’s ass is amazing, isn’t it?”
Jem giggled. “Don’t put my trainee on the spot, it’s rude.”
Amanda’s hands framed Jem’s butt like a picture. “I mean, look at it. Look at it. Ugh. I love this ass.” A second later she pulled back and smack. “Yes, mm.”
The first time, Mac jumped. When she kept going, he pretended to be fascinated by the laces of his new shoes. Then she really got going and he snuck a look at Jem’s face, but Jem put his head down and pushed back, presenting his ass even more for Amanda to spank.
“Oh, babe, you are fucking incredible.” She rubbed up against him and reached around. “I love how you stay so hard for my hand, Jem. Most of them can’t do it, even the straight guys. You have a gift.”
“I do like your hand. Is that it? Don’t tell me your arm’s tired already.”
She laughed and slapped the side of his ass, still rubbing against him. “So insatiable. I’m good.” She stepped back and rubbed him harder, and shit, oh shit, his ass was pink. Mac was pretty sure he could see handprints, but maybe he was making that up.
One final slap, and Amanda pulled Jem’s pants back into place, gently tucking him in. When he straightened up and turned, she kissed his cheek.
“Thanks, Jem.”
“Thank you. I’m all tingly now.”
She waved at Mac. “I’ll see you around, rookie.”
Mac couldn’t actually form words, but he did manage to wave back as Jem led him from the room. He was relieved when they retreated to the locker room, where Jem sat him down on a bench and took up the facing spot in front of him.
“She spanked you.”
“Yep.”
“She didn’t even get off.”
“Well, she probably got off after we left. Amanda’s private.”
“She got off on spanking you?”
Jem grinned. “You really are adorable. Is that the most extreme thing you’ve ever heard of?”
“No. No, but—I mean—I guess I thought—” He shook his head. “I thought, you know, she’d want you to have sex with her after.”
“I think she just really likes spanking. And her hubby’s super dominant, so he doesn’t go in for her spanking him. You don’t have to look for him, by the way; he goes strictly for the ladies.”
Mac’s jaw dropped. “Wait, her husband comes here? To The Gym?”
“Sure. They have a couples membership. I didn’t see him downstairs, though. He’s probably at home with his parents, can you imagine? I bet she’s texting him right now to tell him she’s getting off without him. Most of the time I think they get a babysitter so they can come here on date night.”
“Whoa, that’s—” What was it? Freaky and bizarre and totally insane.
“Cool, right? I hope if I ever settle down it’s with a guy who thinks The Gym is a really good date.”
Mac shook his head. “I did not think of this as the kind of place married people would go for fun.”
“Why not? Married people invented it. Anyway, you good?”
“Yeah. Yeah, but—did you actually like that?”
“I don’t mind spanking.” Beat. “Okay, fine, I actually enjoy being spanked.”
“Is that why you could, uh, you know. Stay hard?”
“I learned almost everything I know about spanking from Coach. Seriously, I’m pretty sure there’s some kind of pavlovian thing where someone tells me to drop trou and bend over and my dick gets real excited. It’s all about the conditioning.”
Too much information. Or, possibly, not enough.
“You might get a level three someday, young grasshopper,” Jem intoned. “And you, too, will experience the joy of spanking.” His voice switched back to normal. “Until then, if someone asks you for something you aren’t trained to do, you tell them you’re so sorry, but you’re not allowed to do that yet. Easy peasy. Most people will know you’re new, and they won’t even ask, but if they do.”
“Okay. All right.” Mac hesitated. “I’m not sure I could stay hard being spanked like that.”
“It definitely helps to find it super sexy. But you know, you get better at staying hard with practice, I swear, just like anything else.”
“Right, yeah, just like anything else.”
Jem winked and stood up. “Come along, trainee. Let’s see who else needs our service tonight.”
“Your service, you mean.”
“Oh no. No, there are people who won’t even approach me when I’m training. The people who do definitely get off on you watching.”
“Wait—really?”
“Silly boy. Come on.”
So he was already part of this, even if he wasn’t allowed to touch or be touched. Mac couldn’t decide if he thought that was cool or strange.
* * *
Jem was clearly a lot of people’s fave. He blew a big muscle man right there on the floor, while the muscle man flexed in front of the mirror. He also assisted a woman who was having trouble changing her weights out while she felt him up through his clothes and he pretended not to notice.
“It’s a fantasy,” he explained in a low tone as they walked away (the lady now lifting weights like nothing was up). “Like a fantasy where you’re in the gym and you think your trainer’s hot, only here you can actually act on that without being a sleaze.”
“Right,” Mac said.
Jem tossed a grin back at him and started the rounds again, introducing him to more people, nudging him to actually make eye contact. It was hard to know where to look because sex could be happening anywhere. Despite Jem’s assurances that performances on the floor were meant to be seen, Mac still didn’t really feel comfortable looking.
The clients fell somewhere on the polite to rowdy spectrum, but all of them seemed to want Mac to feel welcome, which was a surprise. Along the way, he met by name staff he’d only seen around up in the kitchen, all of whom shook his hand and seemed genuinely happy he was there, maybe because that was one of the rules, maybe because they just liked having new people around. He couldn’t tell which.
The first half of the shift flew, right up until the last client before lunch, who grabbed Jem by the hair and said, “Aren’t you gonna introduce me to the new guy?”
“Hey, Gary! Gary, this is Mac. Mac, Gary.”
The guy didn’t let go of Jem’s hair. “Good to meet you.”
“You too,” Mac lied, watching Jem carefully.
“Is this your way of requesting my service, Gary? Use your words, now.”
Gary growled instead and shoved Jem toward the hallway. “Get us a room.”
“Sure thing, stud.”
“Can the garbage, Jem.”
“As you wish.” When Jem turned away he kept the smile on his face, but for the first time all night, Mac didn’t see it in his eyes.
They grabbed a room without a light on over the door, and Jem let his fingers trail across Mac’s arm for the second it took Gary to follow them in. Mac wasn’t sure how to take that, but he stood just inside the door and waited, stomach already churning.
“Knees,” Gary said, pointing to the spot in front of his shoes.
Jem sank down obediently and looked up; from the side, it was hard to tell what his expression was, but it definitely wasn’t the easy confidence Mac had seen him show with other clients.
“Open up.”
The second Jem opened his mouth, Gary grabbed his ears and jammed his face against the front of Gary’s pants.
“Make it wet. Get it in there. Don’t be shy in front of your little friend.”
Mac’s entire body went rigid. He’d known Jem exactly a week and he wasn’t prepared to feel this attached—or protective—but it took everything in his power to stand still while this total douchebag talked shit at Jem’s face.
“That’s right, make it nice and wet. You hungry for it, boy? You want it in your hole?” The hands at Jem’s ears pulled harder and Mac told himself that if he saw blood, fuck all of it, he was going in.
“No, please—” Jem mumbled.
Gary laughed. “That’s right. You know just what I want to hear. Keep talking.”
Jem kept talking, putting up enough struggle to clearly get Gary off, begging to be let go of. It was intense and disturbing, even though Gary never actually pulled down his pants. He made Jem blow him right through the fabric, and when the guy finally came, almost suffocating Jem against his body, Mac’s relief was more than a little tinged with disgust.
“Cocksucker,” Gary said, tossing Jem’s face away. “Look at the mess you made.” With that he walked out, with the front of his pants slobbery and gross.
Jem knelt there for a long moment before turning a tired smile on Mac. “So that was not my best work.”
“What the fuck, Jem?”
“It’s better than what he used to do, because the Professor told him if he skull-fucked another one of her staff he’d be out. He thinks I’m the one who complained, so he gets a little shitty.”
“A little shitty? Jem—”
“No, that’s on me. I should be able to just play the role required, but he gets to me. He preyed on nervous straight boys for a while, and it was pretty messed up.” He ran his hands through his hair and stood up to splash water on his face. “Lunch, Mac.”
“Jem, come on, you gotta tell Coach. There’s no way—”
Jem pressed a hand to his chest. “Do not tell Coach. I don’t need him saving me from the job, and this is the job. Plus, Gary talks more shit now, but before—before was worse. One more complaint and they’ll end his membership, which could make a lot of problems for us. You can’t tell Coach, Mac.”
“But—”
“No. I need to learn how to accept, even when I dislike the client.” Jem shook his head and massaged his jaw.
That wasn’t what it was, and both of them knew it, but Mac was way too new to put into words what had disturbed him so much about that guy. Not that it mattered. Jem extracted a promise not to tell Coach (while Mac did the mental version of crossing his fingers, already trying to figure out how to get around it), and they went up to the locker room for lunch.
Jem caught a quick shower first, though. Mac wondered what his expression would do once he was alone for a minute, if he could finally lose that horrible forced smile.
* * *
Halfway through lunch, Jem got a text message that made him raise his eyebrows and glance across the table. The staff took their lunches in three shifts, so only about a third of them were in the kitchen, but Mac wasn’t shocked when Jem didn’t explain it.
They were cleaning up their trash when Jem said, “We have an unplanned appointment.”
“Okay.”
“Do you know about this?”
Mac mustered what he hoped was a neutral expression and said, “Know about what?”
“Uh huh. Come on, trainee.”
When there was a lull in the traffic in and out of the locker room, the two of them walked down the hall to Coach’s office. Jem knocked and opened the door without waiting for a reply. He immediately crossed his arms and stood there, staring at Coach’s profile.
“What’re you up to?”
“I’m not up to anything.”
“Coach.”
“Jem.”
“You’re up to no good.”
Without turning, Coach said, “I’m gonna need you to clock out.”
Mac had no idea why that appeared to make Jem’s day, but his grin was unfeigned and delighted.
“Ohhhh, please, please. Right now?”
“Right now.” Coach finally glanced over at them, as if he’d barely noticed their entry. “I require your service.”
Jem sighed, still smiling, and crossed the room toward him. “You have no idea how much I need this tonight.”
“Something up?”
“Nothing. Just tired.”
Liar.
Coach pushed the keyboard across and Jem did something that apparently clocked him out. He pushed the keyboard back and leaned in to kiss Coach soundly.
“Thank you,” Jem murmured, almost too quietly for Mac to hear.
“Do you require my service, Jem?”
“I really, really do. What’re we doing?”
“Oh, you know. Anything.”
“Anything-anything or—”
“Anything-anything,” Coach confirmed. “Why’s your trainee standing against the door like we scare him?”
“He does that. Mac, c’mere. Let’s decide what we’ll do to Coach tonight.”
Mac blushed against his will at the images that brought up, but neither of them mentioned it. He stood to the side of their embrace, with Coach still sitting in his chair.
“I’m ready for anything,” Coach said, looking up. “Just in case you wondered.”
Jem kissed him again, lingering there for a long moment with his eyes closed. “Please, Coach.”
“Of course. I had some ideas, but they’re only ideas. Go look.”
Jem pulled away to look at the mat, and the supplies left there. In his absence Coach turned to Mac, small smile turning up the corners of his lips.
“Hey, Mac.”
“Hey, Coach. Why’d you have Jem clock out?”
“So he can do anything he wants, instead of just what we allow for our employees.”
A whoop attracted both of their attention.
“I take it that’s a yes?” Coach asked.
“To everything. Come over here. I don’t want to waste a second. Coach, we’re only halfway through the shift.”
“I blocked off the rest. It’s okay, the Professor and Lupe are aware you’re not on the floor.”
“I’m freaking out. Can I get the toys?”
“Get whatever you need.” Coach locked down his computer and stood up. After the slightest hesitation, he pulled Mac into a hug. “How’s training?”
“Don’t ask him that! I’m not at work anymore, stop talking about work!”
Coach’s eyes narrowed. For a second Mac thought he was going to call Jem out, but he only said, “We can check in tomorrow. I’ll be down to do some of the maintenance gloss-over with Punky.”
“Cool.”
Jem shot him a look, which he ignored. “I’m ready to begin service now, Coach.”
“I can’t wait. Mac, this isn’t exactly training, but it will serve a similar purpose.”
“Plus, Mac hasn’t seen much today because he’s been staring at his shoes.”
“Have you?” Coach asked, leading him to the mats.
“It’s hard to know where to look.”
“Oh, I know. But Jem and I want you to watch, all right? We’re gonna show off a little, aren’t we, Jem?”
“You think you can take this guy, Coach?” Jem waved a huge black thing around that vaguely resembled a Christmas tree, with a smallish triangular section at the top graduating to larger and larger sections at the bottom.
“Mm, let’s find out.” Coach pulled his shirt off and as hard as Mac tried not to look, he couldn’t help it. What had Jem said? Maybe he now had a pavlovian response to Coach’s chest.
Jem giggled and stepped up beside him. “He’s a hot beast, right? You want to play, too, Mac? We can definitely make room.”
“What’re you gonna do with that thing?”
“Nothing to you, silly. I’m gonna shove as much of it as I can in Coach’s ass.”
Mac opened his mouth, but nothing came out.
“He’s not going to kill me, I promise.” Coach grinned. “Thanks for not giving him a heads up, by the way.”
“I knew! I knew you knew!” Jem brandished the black thing at him. “We gotta stick together, roomie. Don’t take Coach’s side against me!”
“It seemed like it was probably gonna be your side,” Mac said. “Anyway, um, can you not wave that freaky thing at me?”
“It’s a dildo. Maybe we’ll find you a small one so you can play along.”
“Uh, no thanks.”
Jem waved the dildo like a scolding finger. “Are you afraid of anal play, mister?”
“Um.”
“Don’t let this be like me and cunnilingus, okay? Because we could totally play with your ass for three hours, but it’s so much easier if you just relax and let things happen.”
“Oh, did you tell Mac about that?”
“That and my totally codependent streak where I was your shadow, like a freak.”
Coach hooked Jem by the neck and pulled him in for a kiss. “It was a period of adjustment and transition.”
“It was a period of me not being able to function outside of this room, Coach.”
“You functioned just fine. The point of this room was to give you a place where you didn’t have to.” He reached down and tugged Jem’s shirt over his head, getting snagged briefly on the dildo.
“You can feel free to pretend I wasn’t psycho-obsessed with you if it makes you feel better, Coach, but we both know I totally was.”
“C’mere.”
And shit, watching the two of them kiss was hot, even though Mac didn’t know why. Partly it was Coach, but partly it was also Jem, who’d been nothing but good to him from day one, who looked out for everyone and dismissed himself. Watching Coach’s hands on Jem’s back was hotter than any porno Mac had ever seen, and nothing had even happened yet.
Jem dropped the dildo and turned his attention to pushing Coach’s pants down his legs, as far as he could without breaking the kiss. For a strange moment, Mac almost helped. He could actually see himself move over to the other side and finish undressing Coach.
He clenched his fists to make himself stand still.
Coach’s hands slid under Jem’s pants, squeezing his ass, and Jem hissed.
“Mm,” Coach murmured. “What’s all this?”
“Amanda. You want to finish the job?”
“You know I do. Come here, dirty boy.” Coach kicked out of his pants and shucked Jem’s, then pulled him down to the blankets-covered mats. “Let’s see what we’ve got.”
Mac’s fingernails were digging into his palms. Naked. Jem naked, over Coach’s lap, with Coach inspecting his still-pink skin. Mac couldn’t help the way his breaths were coming in shallowly, or the way his heart was pounding.
Then Coach’s hand came down and Jem jolted. The smack was a hell of a lot louder than it had been when Amanda spanked him.
“Nice,” Coach murmured, rubbing the mark he’d just made. “What do you say?”
“Thank you, Coach.” Jem’s voice had dropped two registers.
“You’re welcome.” Coach gave him more, until Jem was writhing and panting.
Mac was inescapably hard watching them. He didn’t want to think about why or what that meant, but he really couldn’t pretend it was anything other than what it was: watching Coach spank Jem made him harder than anything had all night.
“Sit, Mac,” Coach said. “You don’t have to join in, but you’ll be more comfortable if you’re sitting.”
“You sure you don’t want to join in?” Jem asked. He stretched, groaning. “Oh, that was so good. Thanks, Coach. Amanda had some kind of time issue so it was only a tease earlier.”
“You need me to spank this ass, you only have to ask.”
“Ha. That’d be every day. You shouldn’t make promises like that.” Jem flipped and stretched again, and shit, there was Jem’s hard dick, right there, like it was nothing, like he didn’t even notice he was naked right now. “Aw, Mac’s still all dressed.”
“Mac is not the one who needs your service right now. Focus.”
Jem smiled. “Seriously, though. Sit with us. Watch me try to fist Coach, it’ll be amazing. But remember, no fisting at work. This is for fun.”
“Uh, yeah. I think we’re pretty safe on that front.”
“That’s because you don’t know what you’re missing. Coach, how did you know I needed this tonight?”
“I didn’t. Does this look like a charity case to you? I knew I needed this and I figured you’d be good enough to give it to me.” Coach leaned over for a kiss. “Pure self-interest.”
“Uh huh. Turn over.”
Coach flipped over and Mac used the movement in the room to take a seat at the edge of the mats. He still wasn’t really prepared for the way Jem’s hands looked so totally at home on Coach’s ass.
Did Coach have a nice ass? It wasn’t as, like, frame-worthy as Jem’s, maybe, but Mac was pretty sure that based on any objective scale, Coach had a nice ass. Which reminded him of Jem saying he was cute as if that was obvious, as if everyone looking at Mac just knew he was cute.
Could he ask about that? Could he ask how you knew something like that? Since Jem just seemed to be having a good time playing with Coach’s cheeks, Mac figured he could ask. Even if it was a stupid question, Jem was the kind of guy who wouldn’t mind.
“Hey, Jem? How do you know someone’s cute?”
“Huh. I don’t know. It’s not like it’s objective. I think it’s just a thing where you kind of know, when you look at someone. Like you, you have this whole Justin Bieber I used to be sweet and innocent, but now I’m a hardened bad boy vibe, which is kind of hot.”
“And you haven’t even seen the rest of his tattoos,” Coach mumbled.
“Tattoos?” Jem turned and gestured. “Off. Let me see. I mean, the thorny vine’s pretty good. And that heart is amazing, but you’ll have to get a different cut of shirt so it doesn’t chop right down the middle of it. Off, Mac.”
Mac pulled off his shirt.
“Tornado, nice.” Jem pressed fingertips to his blood drops. “Does the three have meaning?”
“Lucky number, I guess,” Mac said, because he couldn’t explain that for years he’d thought that eventually he’d grow up bigger and stronger than Joseph, that eventually he’d outgrow the three years between their ages. It was the kind of childish conviction that never truly wore off, no matter how old he got. Someday I will be big enough to beat him back.
“Behold me bringing the mood down.” Jem kissed him lightly. “Sorry, Mac. Anyway, I don’t really know what makes someone cute, but whatever it is, you’ve got it. Right, Coach?”
He looked at Coach because that’s what you do in a conversation where one person asks the other a question. Coach was looking back at him like he could see all the layers of Mac’s deceptions and none of it mattered.
“I agree with Jem,” was all he said.
“Anyway, back to playing.” Jem’s fingers tapped his blood drops three times before he moved away. “Coach, you really blocked off half a shift for this?”
“I already did quarterly tax returns last week so I could block off an entire shift for cuddling. The Professor barely blinked when I said I was having you clock out for a few hours.”
“Aw, cuddling.” Jem leaned over Coach’s back and kissed his neck. “You know, having a boyfriend sounds exhausting. I would so go for having a cuddle buddy, though.”
“Make Mac cuddle with you. He needs the practice.”
“Coach! Don’t be rude.”
Mac shrank back a little and tried not to be obvious about it.
“Anytime you want to cuddle, Mac, you find me. Mm, Coach, I want to taste you so badly right now it’s killing me.”
“You are a master of delayed gratification.”
Jem laughed. “I really am. It’s gross.”
Mac had assumed “taste” referred to a blowjob. It wasn’t until Jem peeled Coach’s cheeks apart and rubbed his face against them that he began to get the hint.
Shit, rimming Coach. Whoa. Even more whoa was how much Jem clearly got off on it. He had his face crammed up against Coach’s ass, tongue out, sometimes moving back and forth, sometimes just diving in like it was all he could do to control himself.
And Coach grunted and pushed back at him, like give me more.
Mac had never been rimmed, and he’d sure as hell never rimmed anyone else. He’d never wanted to. But right now, watching Jem and Coach—
Stop. Just fucking stop. This is a temporary solution. It’s not your fucking life, so stop.
Except if Jem and Coach, who genuinely seemed to like him, were really just temporary, where did that leave him for the rest of his life? With people who pitied him, like Annabel? Or people who depended on him because they didn’t have a choice, like Mom?
Or people who fucked him because they thought he was cute and he happened to be standing there, but never saw him again, like everyone he’d ever had sex with?
Mac bit down hard on his tongue when Jem licked a final swipe up Coach’s crack and knelt up.
“I could do that for days.”
“Who’s stopping you?” Coach grumbled.
“I have goals, Coach. A very valued client of mine set up a whole fisting scene, and it’s my duty to him to see it through.”
“I forgot how much I like your tongue.”
Jem slapped Coach’s ass. “Troublemaker.” He reached for the lube and squirted it on Coach’s crack, running his hand up and down until it was coated. “Coach. So hot.” He started working lube into Coach’s ass and Mac looked away, trying to get his breathing to calm down.
He’d had his fingers in Coach’s ass like that. Coach had had his fingers in Mac’s ass like that. Shit. There was no universe where he could pretend this wasn’t turning him on. He could barely pretend he wasn’t wishing he was the one with the fingers in his ass.
“Oh, someone’s been cramming for tonight. Let’s see what else you can take, Coach.”
Jem lubed up a long, not-thick-as-judged-by-the-Christmas-tree-thing dildo and began working it into Coach’s ass while Coach pushed back, trying to take more. The thing was long, though, and he only took about half before Jem started fucking him with it, long strokes in and out, his left hand smoothing over Coach’s lower back.
“Look at what you take for me, Coach. So good. We’re gonna see how many parts of the big one you can take now.”
“I want your hand,” Coach muttered.
“You’ll get it when I say you can have it, mister,” Jem said, and winked at Mac.
So…Jem was kind of in charge in his not-serving-clients life. That wasn’t a huge shock when Mac thought about it, but he’d maybe kind of assumed Jem would be more of a bottom than that.
Not so much.
The tip of the big black dildo went in quickly enough, but even lubed to dripping, the second section took longer. When Coach tried to force himself back for more, Jem gave him a smart smack to the thigh.
“Stop it. I’m playing here.” In and out, in and out, forcing Coach’s ass to open up for the flared parts again and again, making him groan. “Is it good, Coach?”
“More, you sadistic little—”
Smack.
“You were saying?”
Coach laughed harshly into his arms. “Yeah, Jem. It’s good. Keep it up.”
But instead of keeping it up, Jem pulled the toy out and set it aside, then reached for another one, as long as the first, but thicker.
Mac couldn’t stop staring at it as Jem lubed it up.
“Don’t drool, Mac.”
“Uh…”
Jem smirked and positioned it at Coach’s hole. “Aw, look at the little gape. Coach, you’re a hot hole, you know that?”
“I’m an empty hole. Do something, would you?”
“So impatient.”
Mac flushed, recalling his own impatience, and the burn/tear of forcing himself down on Coach’s dick.
“Stop trying to control everything, you.” Jem worked the dildo in slowly, but deliberately, playing with it, moving it so Coach would feel it everywhere.
Stop trying to control everything. Shit. Right. So Coach had let Mac control something, and he’d fucked himself up. He watched a little more carefully, storing their words and actions away to piece together later.
“Ohhh, that’s deep.” Coach’s back curved and the dildo sank another inch. He exhaled a long breath.
“Yeah, sit with that, okay?” Jem let go of the dildo, and somehow Coach’s body didn’t immediately push it out. “Good boy. Hold it for me.” He reached around and Coach gasped. “That’s a good boy. You like feeling full, don’t you, Coach?”
“Uhhhhhggghhh.”
One hand still clearly working Coach’s dick, Jem used the other to fuck him with the dildo, encouraging him with the kinds of words Mac wouldn’t have dreamed of anyone ever using with a guy like Coach. Words like “baby” and “honey.” And the weirdest part was that Coach almost seemed to purr.
The thicker dildo was replaced by the black dildo again, and this time both of them worked at it. Coach took the first three sections and Jem added more lube before working in the fourth.
“You know what would help? Another hand. Mac, give Coach’s balls some love while we do this, okay? This part burns like hell if you don’t have something to counteract it.”
“Jem—” Coach said, raising his head.
Mac was already moving. “Yeah, okay.” Because this was something he could do, and also, now that he had a reference for “burns like hell,” he thought he’d definitely want to help, if he could. “But if it hurts, why do it?”
“Because it also feels good. And it’s hot. And it’s a little like scaling a mountain—pain in the ass all the way up, but once you’ve reached the top, you feel like a superhero.”
“Because it’s an intense act of connection,” Coach added.
“Softy,” Jem said, caressing his leg.
Mac lubed a hand and knelt alongside Coach, reaching under his body blindly while Jem worked the dildo in little thrusts. Coach trembled when Mac started playing with his nuts, little shudders running from his shoulders down his back.
“Good, that’s it. Looser now. Aw, Coach. You’re so fucking hot like this.”
He got the fourth part of the dildo in and left it still while Mac tried to come up with inventive new things to do to a guy’s sac. Was he supposed to stay away from Coach’s dick? He stroked an experimental finger up over his taint, which made him shiver all over again, and then back more, to his ass, which was gripping the dildo.
“Ohhhh, man. Oh god.” Coach sucked in a breath.
“Mac, you’re a natural. Look at you. Give him a few good pumps while I pull this out, then we’ll see what I can do with my hand, okay?”
Watching Jem work his hand slowly into Coach’s ass—right here, next to him, close enough to see exactly how much care Jem was taking, and exactly how much Coach was responding—Mac had felt less turned on while actually having sex with other people. Right now? He thought steam might come out his ears. And that’s when Coach started moaning.
“Eager beaver,” Jem said. “You’re doing so good. Look at you taking four fingers like it’s nothing. Come on, baby, give it all over.” He expertly turned his hand, twisting, withdrawing, re-entering, stretching Coach a little more each time, never letting up with the words until they were a comforting stream of nonsense in Mac’s ears because all he could hear was Coach’s little breathy moans. You wouldn’t think a guy like Coach could moan like this, like his voice was his breath, like his body could use both to express need without language, but even if he could, you definitely wouldn’t think he would, not like this, not with Mac here. Maybe Jem—Coach clearly loved and trusted Jem—but not with a random guy he’d only known a week.
Mac knew, with certainty, that he’d never shown this level of abandon, or trust, with anyone in his entire life.
Coach’s moans turned into light “hah” sounds as Jem pressed his thumb inside, then deeper groans as he began to slide in and out, fucking Coach, fucking his hole, which somehow just kept taking it. Seeing an asshole open like this was so incongruent with every mental image Mac had of assholes that it was hard to reconcile.
“Oh, honey, look at you. Look at you taking my arm.” Jem pressed a kiss to Coach’s spine. “You’re the sexiest human alive, Coach. Take more. Take it deeper.”
Coach took it deeper, though not elbow-deep. Still, it was all so fucking intense, and when Jem nudged Mac again, he wished the angle was different so he could suck Coach off instead of give him a hand job. This was so fucking for real. It deserved a mouth, not a hand.
Though Coach didn’t seem to mind his hand.
“Do it, baby, come all over Mac. You want to come all over Mac, Coach, don’t you? Do it. Let him lift you up. Let us fuck you, Coach, come on—”
Coach’s orgasm was unlike any Mac had ever seen. It didn’t hit him in waves. It seemed to shatter across him like a plate glass window, all at once. He shook and shook and shook, moans turning into some cross between laughing and weeping.
“Jem. God.”
“I know. I’m a legend.”
“You’re literally a god. I’ve decided. All will bow down at the temple of Jem.”
“Hush. Hold still. No, Mac, stay there. Just keep your hands on him for a minute while I pull out.”
Pulling out and all related cleaning activities were especially messy, considering the lube used in this production, but Jem took care of it efficiently while Mac pressed his hand to Coach’s heaving stomach, afraid to move. This probably wasn’t what Jem had meant, but it’s where his hand fell, and where it stayed.
When the last toy was washed and laid out to dry on a towel, and the only things left to pick up were the blankets they were still using, Jem lay down again, on Coach’s other side, and guided him to the mats. (Mac, with masked regret, removed his hand.)
“Here I thought you were being altruistic, giving me a scene out of the goodness of your heart.”
“I told you I wasn’t. Pure self-interest.”
“Liar,” Jem said, kissing him. “Thanks, Coach. I needed that.”
“Me too. I’m gonna be sore as hell tomorrow.”
“I hope you’ve got aloe.”
“You should come in early tomorrow and apply it for me.”
Jem pretended to think about it. “I don’t know if you can trust me around your ass. I see it, I might have to dive in again.”
“I trust you. Thanks, kid.”
“Way to make it wrong, Coach.”
Coach offered a sleepy smile. “I’m so blissed-out on endorphins right now. It’s amazing. Every day should end like this.”
“Say the word, Coach. Hey, we have another half an hour of Mac’s training shift, if you want me to bring him back down to the floor.”
“How can you possibly think about going back down to the floor right now? No. Go home or stay here, do not go back down to the floor.”
Jem looked down at him, expression all fondness and love. “Lazy bum.”
“Cuddle with the lazy bum, for god’s sake.”
“Well, I suppose I’m off the clock.”
“Cuddling is a totally regulated activity here at The Gym,” Coach mumbled, holding out his arms.
Obviously now was the time Mac should leave. Except he was still on the clock, and Jem was his trainer, so he probably shouldn’t go back to the floor. Huh.
He started to move away, and both of them sent him puzzled looks. Coach’s cleared first.
“You. Relax. You don’t have to cuddle, but you have to stay here and bask in the afterglow.”
“Or,” Jem said, “I can blow you. You seem to have developed an area of discomfort there, Mac.”
Shit. Mac swallowed and tensed up.
“Mac doesn’t like blowjobs?” Jem murmured.
“Mac is here to have sex and get paid. But he considers you a friend, which complicates the blowjob.”
“I can just leave,” he said, realizing that he sounded petulant but unable to help it.
“God, why? Don’t leave. I mean, you don’t have to let me blow you either, obviously, but don’t leave.”
He didn’t want to leave. That was the confusing thing. He wanted to stay. Not for a blowjob, or a cuddle. He wanted to just…be here. With them.
Coach eyed him and patted the mat where he’d been sitting. “Thank you for bearing witness tonight.”
“Bearing witness?” Mac asked. He made his decision and sat back down.
“Sometimes the most important person in the room is the one who witnesses, who observes, who is present without being involved. Sometimes that role is the one that holds the room.”
“And that was me?”
“Not tonight. But it could have been. And it may be tomorrow. You are not merely watching, Mac. You are participating through your presence. And I appreciate it.”
“Sure. Anytime. I mean—uh—”
“Anytime, yeah, for me, too.” Jem stretched, still enclosed in one of Coach’s arms. “Oh god. Coach. Your ass.”
Coach laughed. “Your fist.”
“Really, though.”
They stayed a little longer than a half hour, and Mac realized, eventually, that they stayed mostly for Coach. Coach, who regained his usual humor and confidence as they chatted—and as he cuddled with Jem—but for a brief time after being fisted, Coach was different. Maybe a little darker, a little more exposed. His laughter had an edge to it. His eyes, unguarded, had a sharp quality that Mac both hungered for and wanted desperately to avoid.
He kissed both of them lightly as he saw them out, and thanked them again. Jem put an arm through Mac’s on the way to the parking lot, squeezing only once.
“Times like these I so want to be his shadow again. I love him a stupid amount. Like sometimes I think I want him to give me away at my wedding someday, if I have one, and I don’t really want one.”
“It’s just that he’s so…real,” Mac said after a minute. “He looks at me and—” He didn’t know. He didn’t know what it was, or how to say it.
“I know. He’s magic, I’m just saying.”
He’d thought it silly the first time he’d heard Jem say it to Lupe, but Mac didn’t exactly argue the point either.