Each sentence was another punch in the jaw. I was being pummeled, thrown back into the ring corner and being worked over mercilessly. I heard myself laugh as I struggled to keep control of myself. No one at St. Bernard had ever seen me cry, no matter how cruel they'd been.
But their cruelty had never hurt this much.
He was not going to see me cry. He was never going to know how much this hurt.
“Well, I didn't think that, Chad, so you don't have anything to worry about,” I heard myself say. “I can't think why you had that impression in the first place.” I watched his face as it relaxed into relief.
I wanted to punch him in the face. I wanted to kick him in the balls and stomp on him as he writhed on the floor in agony.
“Well, I wasn't sure, so I wanted to be clear.” He mock-wiped his forehead. “Whew. I'm so sorry, Jordy. I didn't want to seem mean or anything. I'm glad I was wrong, and now we've got that awkwardness out of the way. I really am glad we're friends, Jordy.”
And I want to see you die in excruciating pain.
“Me too.” I forced a smile on my face. “You have no idea how happy I am we're friends.” I had to get out of there. I was close to losing it completely, and he was never going to see me cry. As long as there was breath in my body, Chad York would never see me cry. “Well, I'mâI'm going back to the party.”
“I'll be there in a sec.” He gave me a hug, a weird one where he leaned forward and barely touched me. He gave me a cool peck on the cheek and patted me on the back again.
Somehow I walked out of the room and shut the door behind me before my breath started coming in gasps. I couldn't catch my breath, and my eyes began watering as I held on to the wall for support. I had to get out of there. I wanted to get to my car and just drive. I wanted to get as far away from Polk as I possibly could. I wanted to forget I'd ever come here, that this whole thing had been a huge mistakeâ
“Jordy?”
It was Roger.
“Leave me alone, Roger,” I said, my voice shaking as I struggled to control the sobs. I would not cry in front of him. “I want to go home.”
“You're in no condition to drive,” he replied. “Come on into my room and tell me what's wrong.” He peered at me in the dim light of the hallway. “It's Chad, isn't it?”
I nodded, and he put his arm around me, leading me down the hall to his room. He unlocked the door and pushed me inside. He shut the door behind us and I sat down on the bed. I started sobbing, and the story came pouring out of me. “I am
repulsive
to him. I am fat and ugly and gross.” I wiped at my face. “I don't know what I was thinking. I must have been crazy to think someone like him would want me.”
“There's nothing wrong with you, Jordy,” Roger said softly as he rolled a joint. “You have to get that out of your head. Chad's the one with the problem.”
“No, he was right.” I forced a weak smile on my face. “Look at me. Who in their right mind would want me?”
“You need to stop beating yourself up about this.” He lit the joint. “Trust me, I know.”
“And I've been so shitty to you.” I buried my face in my hands. “I wish I was dead.” I waved the joint away. “How could I have been so stupid?”
“I tried to warn you,” he said simply. “But I've never wished I'd been wrong more in my life.”
His words, his kindness, made me cry even harder. “He needs to pay for treating people like this,” I blubbered. “He can't get away with this.”
“Forget about him,” Roger said, sitting down next to me and putting his arm around me. “You're worth a hundred of him.”
I put my head down on his shoulder. “He needs to pay.”
Roger kissed me.
I kissed him back.
He pushed me gently back down on the bed and unbuttoned my shirt. He started kissing my chest, my stomach, and then undid my pants. I put my hands behind my head.
Stop him, don't let him do this, you aren't interested in him.
But I didn't stop him, because it felt good. He put his mouth on my cock, and I closed my eyes. His mouth felt incredible on my cock. He started swirling his tongue around the head, and I started moaning. But even through the pleasure, no matter how good it felt as he sucked my cock, I couldn't get Chad's face out of my head.
You need to make him pay for this humiliation.
And as I came, my entire body going rigid with the incredible feeling of my first orgasm induced by someone else, the answer came to me.
Yes, I would make Chad pay. If the only thing wrong with me was my body, well, I could
fix
that. This ugly duckling would turn himself into a swan. And I would make Chad want me.
And as Roger fell asleep in my arms, a smile crossed my face.
No one will ever make me feel like this again. Ever. And I'll make Chad want me. I'll work on my body and make myself physically beautiful. And when he wants me, finally, I'll have my chance.
I would make him pay.
Interregnum
“S
o, the very next day I went to work.” Jordy smiled a little sadly. “I was very determined. Once I make up my mind, there's no stopping me.”
“So, you're telling me you weren't attractive,” Palladino replied dubiously. “No offense, but I find that a little hard to believe.” As soon as the words came out, he regretted them.
Slow down there, cowboy, you're letting the fact he's good looking affect your professional judgment.
But they were true. Sitting there looking at the handsome young man, it wasn't possible to believe he had ever been unattractive. The face was so handsome, for example. You don't change your face through diet and exercise.
Without saying another word, Jordy got out of his chair and walked over to the scroll-top writing desk pushed up against a far wall. He started rummaging around in the top drawer, moving aside papers and envelopes and a roll of stamps. Palladino couldn't stop staring at his ass inside the tight shorts. The shirt had crept up again, exposing the two dimples just above the curve. It was an exceptional ass, and Palladino considered himself to be a connoisseur of the male ass. He pictured what it must look like naked. He imagined it was white and smooth, the untanned skin contrasting with the deeply tanned torso and legs above and below.
I knew I was gay when I saw an amazing ass,
he remembered.
It was in high school, at Polk West. He'd been a freshman and gone out for the freshman football team. He hadn't wanted to, but his father had played football in high school and so had his older brothers. There wasn't any real pressure put on him, it was just expected. And on the first day of practice, bruised and exhausted, he'd stripped down to shower. He'd carried his towel over his shoulder, and when he reached the communal shower area he'd stopped dead in his tracks. Right in front of him, another player was standing with his head under the stream of water coming out of the showerhead. His broad tanned back rippled with muscle, and it tapered down to the biggest, hardest, roundest ass he'd ever seen. He just stood there for a moment, gawking at it, before someone flicked him with a towel and startled him out of his frozen state. He got under his own shower but kept stealing glances over at Jim Delevan's extraordinary ass. He wondered what it would feel like to put his dick in there, or what it would taste like. And later that night, at home, he jacked off remembering Jim Delevan's magnificent ass, with the hot water cascading down over it.
For the next four years, his crush on Jim Delevan never abated. He took every opportunity he had to stare at Jim's naked body in the locker room. Whenever he ran into Jim in the halls, he couldn't help but watch that mighty ass encased in jeans. He never had the nerve to talk to Jim, but he fantasized about him every night before he went to sleep, using Vaseline on his cock as he stroked himself and dreamed about what it would be like to be Jim's boyfriend.
Jim got a football scholarship to San Diego State, and Joe never saw him again.
But this kid's ass rivaled Jim's, and that was saying something.
Jordy found what he was looking for and shut the drawer, standing up and walking back across the room. “Here,” he said, holding out a photograph. “This is what I used to look like.”
Startled out of his reverie, Palladino took the picture and stared at it. “This is you?”
“From a car wash we did as pledges to raise money to buy the class gift.” Jordy stood there, his arms crossed and his legs spread, his left eyebrow slightly raised as he waited for Joe to look at the picture and agree with him.
Palladino struggled to keep from smiling as he looked at the picture. Granted, Jordy now had an absolutely amazing body, but he was hardly the fat, unattractive loser he'd been describing. “Jordy, there was nothing wrong with you.” He looked up and met his eyes.
Joe wasn't lying. The picture was actually quite adorable. Jordy was soaking wet, because someone out of the picture had trained a hose on him. The water glistened as it soaked him. He was wearing a white T-shirt that clung to his body, and his soaked jeans shorts were sliding off his hips. Sure, he wasn't in as good physical condition then as he was now, but he wasn't disgusting to look at.
“Are you
blind?”
Jordy's eyes widened, his lip curled in scorn. “Look at those spaghetti thin arms! Can't you see the belly and the saggy boobs?” He shook his head, curls bouncing. “It was no wonder no one wanted me then.”
“What I see is a really cute young man,” Palladino said, putting the picture down on the coffee table, “who had absolutely no reason to be down on himself.”
“That's nice of you to say,” Jordy replied. “But it isn't true.”
Joe shrugged. “Just because you don't see it doesn't mean it isn't there for others to see.” He smiled to himself. Someone had told him that once, a long time ago, back when he was Jordy's age. “We are all our own worst critics, Jordy. Sometimes we need to give ourselves a bit of a break, you know?”
Jordy's mouth opened, but no sound came out. After a moment, he said, “Well, that's very sweet of you to say, Detective, but I wouldn't have wanted me, either. I can't blame Chad for not wanting meâbut I did then.” His smile was brittle. “Besides, if you don't find yourself attractive, how can anyone else?” He shrugged. “And I was used to people looking right through me whenever I went to Fusions. I'm not making that up, Detective.” He shook his head again. “There was this one guyâI really thought he was cute. Chad introduced me to him three times. I was so repulsive he forgot about me every time. Each Wednesday it was like meeting him for the first time. You know how soul-destroying that is? And if I wasn't with Chad, the guy wouldn't even say hello.” He made a face. “And Chad found me repulsive. He'd told me so. It was the only reason we couldn't be together. So, I needed to change. I made up my mind.” His face tightened. “No one was ever going to make me feel like that again, Detective. No one was ever going to make me feel like a worthless loser ever again.”
Joe stared at the pretty young man.
It's what's inside that matters,
was what he wanted to say, but he didn't. It might be true, but it wasn't always. Hadn't he himself complained regularly about the shallowness of the gay community, how muscles and bodies and handsome faces were the only currency that mattered, while personality and intelligence ran a far second? Didn't he go to the gym himself regularly, to keep his own body fit and trim? It would be hypocritical to argue about the value of inner beauty with this kid. It wasn't his inner beauty that had drawn Sean to him, after all. Sean thought he was a hot daddy. But deep pockets had proven more desirable to Sean than a hot body.
“This was all, what, six months ago?” Joe glanced down at the picture again. The boy in the picture was adorable, with his big smile and water dripping off of him. But the physical transformation was extraordinary. Sure, his face wasn't quite as fleshed out as it had beenâthere were no dimples in that face, or visible cheekbones, but it was quite obviously the same person. The warm eyes, the shape of the jaw, and the full lips hadn't changed. “That's pretty amazing.” The arms in the picture were not “spaghetti arms” by any stretch of the imagination, but they weren't tanned or developed, either. He glanced back at Jordy.
“Thank you.” Jordy inclined his head slightly. “But like I said, the morning after Hell Night I went to work. I came back here and cleaned myself up, and I took a good, long look at myself in a full-length mirror. Naked. Clothes can hide flaws, but nudity is the great equalizer.” He laughed. “I took notes on all of my physical flaws and started doing research. I joined a gym and hired a trainer. Two hours a day, five days a week. I hired a nutritionist, and she designed a bodybuilding diet for me, designed to build muscle and burn fat. And I kept doing researchâsupplements, workout programs.” He smiled faintly. “When I put my mind to something, I can become a bit obsessed. I wanted to know about the latest developments in muscle-building technology, whether it was exercise programs or supplements. I read everything I could, and of course my trainer was the best that money could buy here in Polk.” He laughed. “While everyone else was studying for finals I was working on myself. Finals were just a slight distraction for me.”
“You didn't have to study?”
“Of course not.” He gave Joe a strange look. “I had so many points in some of my classes I didn't even need to take the final to get an A. I knew my coursework inside and out. I just reviewed everything an hour or so before the tests, and I knew I could ace them. And I did. I made the dean's list that semesterâand I will again this semester.” He shrugged. “This isn't a hard school, Detective. Anyway, I also had the five-week Christmas break to get myself into shape. So I had almost two full months before the next semester started to transform myself into a new person.”
“You didn't go home for Christmas?” Joe knew he was letting the interview get off track and was glad his partner wasn't with him. Grace Rivera was a great partner, and the two of them got along well. Grace was a “just the facts” kind of detective, though, while Joe veered more along the “let the subject talk” school. Joe theorized it was a better methodologyâyou got a lot more insight about people by letting them talk, letting their prejudices and weaknesses come out in conversation. That way you could get a better sense of how trustworthy they were. And Jordy's story was captivating him.
It's not just because he's beautiful,
he told himself again as he waited for Jordy to answer.
This is a deeply damaged young man.
“My parents wanted me to join them in Africa, but I told them I wanted to stay here and get a jump on next semester.” Jordy shrugged. “It's not like we ever had a traditional Christmas with lights and a tree and all that, anyway. Mom and Dad are always somewhere exotic. They were bummed, but they were cool with it. I knew they would be, and I didn't mind being alone at Christmas.”
“Really?” Joe couldn't imagine not spending Christmas with his family. He also couldn't imagine his parents being okay with him skipping out on the holidays, for that matter.
“There were times when I was at St. Bernard when I couldn't get to where they were. It's not a big deal. It's just another day, really. But two weeks in Africa would have fucked up my schedule, and I couldn't afford to lose that time. My life became highly regimented. Up every morning at six, eat breakfast, head to the gym for two hours with my trainer, then another hour of cardio, and then a post-workout snack, high in protein. I stuck to my eating programâfive small meals a day, low in fat and carbs, high in protein. And what was really strange was that after that first weekâwhich was hell, I might add, I've never been so exhausted in my lifeâI started loving working out.” He got a faraway look in his eyes. “My off days from the gymâI felt like I wasn't myself on those days. I also started getting a weekly massage to keep my muscles loose and ready for more work. Even now, it's my favorite part of the day, you know. I love going into the gym, putting on the headphones, just going deep inside myself and pushing myself really hard. You work out, don't you?”
“Yes.” Joe nodded. He knew exactly what Jordy was talking about. He cleared his throat. “And where was Chad during all this?”
“Chad went home for the break. Most of the brothers were gone, and I didn't go anywhere near the house. I wanted my return to the house to be dramatic. I wanted to walk in and have everyone's jaw drop. And after a couple of weeks I started to see changes. My pants were getting looser. I was starting to see bigger muscles, more definition, even my abs were starting to showâand that convinced me to work even harder, to stay focused. Chad was going to see me and he was going to want me. But I couldn't wait.” He cracked a smile. “I wanted to see how peopleâgay guysâwould react to the new me. So, I decided to give my body a test run.”
“What did you do?” Joe asked, but he suspected he knew the answer.
“I went to Fusions on New Year's Eve, to see how people would react to me.” He smiled again. “I bought a new outfit. Boy, was I nervous! I had my hair styled and had the highlights put in.” He ran a finger through his curls. “I'd gotten contact lenses, too.” He inhaled deeply. “And so, the new Jordy strolled into Fusions that night.”
“And?”
“It was like I owned the place.” Jordy's eyes softened as he remembered. “I walked into the bar and couldn't believe it. Hot guys who'd looked right through me all the other times I'd been there were checking me out. It was crowded. I walked up to the bar. Usually Chad got drinks for us because it took forever for the bartender to wait on me. As soon as I stood at the bar, the bartender was right there. I couldn't believe it. He actually
flirted
with me. And while he was making my drink, another hot guy came up to me and started hitting on me. It was
incredible,
and I knew I was doing the right thing, had made the right decision. The whole night was amazing. That first drink was the only one I paid for all night long. I went out on the dance floor and took off my shirt. Guys kept checking me out, touching me, kissing me, dancing with me. I had
power
for the first time in my life, and it was awesome.” He shook his head. “I got picked up for the first time. I think his name was Matt, I don't remember. But he was gorgeous, and we went back to his place. All he could do was tell me how beautiful I was. I fucked him senseless. He had a great ass.” Jordy shot a glance at Joe. “I'm sorry, does that bother you?”