Chase Denwitty had moved into his downtown apartment exactly one month before the world changed.
He was a single, good-looking 25-year-old guy, working a promising new job at a digital marketing firm, after two grueling years working temp spots and building up a resume. He'd snagged a killer apartment with two male roommates in a three-story apartment right on the edge of the downtown area of the city. Their names were Grady and Bryson, and they were both 27. They were single as far as Chase knew, and they worked at a law office and NPO, respectively.
They all got a long really well, and Chase was thrilled that his roommates had both turned out to be such normal dudes—a rarity in the roommate guessing game. Up until the quarantine, they hadn't really done that much hanging out. Now as the time at home stretched ever onward, they found themselves spending much more time just hanging out around the house and watching TV, or ordering pizza and playing cards while cracking open some beers.
It became a weekly tradition for someone to head down the street to the liquor store, (mask on of course), and bring back enough beer and liquor for them to get as sloshed as they wanted that night.
They were all working from home during the day, and besides going for runs, or to the grocery, or to the occasional outdoor patio for a round of drinks; they had all agreed that outside of the three of them and certain select family members, that would be it for their apartment. They were going to take the 'Quaran-Team' concept seriously. That meant they weren't going to be bringing home any hookups or new friends (or old friends for that matter). Being that Bryson had a lot of contacts in the health care field, they were privy to all the stories of what they were going through. And so they decided to wait it out together, like generally badass human beings.
Unfortunately, that is not the easiest thing to do when you're three guys with crazy big sex drives stuck in a hot summer apartment, while you slowly wait for the plague to end. Honestly...what DID horny people do during the Black Death? Write poetry or something? That's how they all felt. Like they were slowly melting from sex deprivation. They were starving to gain back the world of dating and overcrowded bars and social anything.
It was a particularly drunk Friday night as they sat around the living room coffee table, talking and channel surfing, that the topic of sex finally came up. Up until that point they hadn't really mentioned it much, but the level of buzz in the room had brought down some of their classical, hyper-masculine defenses.
"Do you guys miss fucking as much as I miss fucking?" Chase said, and they both laughed. The questioned had segwayed from a movie convo where the crazy sex scene from Monster's Ball had come up.
"Fuck YES I miss fucking!" Grady bemoaned, as he threw a card down on the table where we were playing a never-ending game of poker or rummy or whatever else. They were drinking cheap pilsners from a bucket, and Bryson had reinforced their supplies with a handle of whiskey from above the fridge.
"Hey, since we're stuck in this house withering away, do you guys just wanna get super fucked up tonight?" Bryson suggested, already grabbing tumblers for them to take shots from.
Grady and Chase quickly agreed to this plan, as they cracked open another beer with a soft rush of light carbonation. They were three bottles in at this point, and Bryson uncorked the top of the grain alcohol with a delightfully recognizable squeak of air.
"Cheers to being responsible during this very hard time, even it means we're the most desperately horny assholes we've ever been in our entire lives," Bryson eloquently offered up. He was tall and impressive in his stature. He looked like he had walked off of a Gaston casting call, with a slightly less comical chin and muscle mass. He just had that brawny, used-to-play-football type of build-still coasting off of those younger charms. Grady was the manlier of the two. He was half-Argentinian/half-Irish thanks to his parents' crazy one-night-stand love story; a combination that had led to an incredibly unique look. His green eyes and messy, short-chopped dark hair led down into a more tanned olympian frame. He had tatttoo's up and down his sides and one half-sleeve on his left side. He rowed. Who the fuck rowed? Chase had thought when he told him that. Chase had played high school baseball and still maintained his workout regimen. He was no slouch in the looks department either. During any normal time, their apartment would've been swimming with sex partners. It might've been a stereotype, but sometimes there is just nothing wrong with the stating the obvious.
They clinked their glasses with a hearty CHEERS! and swallowed down the smokey caramel liquid, as we made fun of each other's various responses to the strong alcohol.
"Apparently we're just off our game in all of the adult categories," Grady joked, and took a deep grumbly breath in as he burped after his shot.
"So how long has it been for you both?" Chase asked, as they continued their card game and kept on drinking.
"Well...let's see..." Grady thought on it, "I had that sexy bartender from Junkyard back here like, a week before the quarantine went into affect, so that would've been about...three-months-and-one-week ago." He sighed longingly after saying it out loud.
"Fuck...she's super hot, the one with the scar on her chin, right?" Chase remarked, thinking back to one of the few roommate outings he'd had with them, before the quarantine announcement in March. That particular bartender had caught all of their eyes that night ,while taking in an NBA game they'd all put money on the bar's signature big screens.
"Dude...at least you got some right before quarantine...my last hookup was when my friend Kelly came over for some casual fun, but that was like five months ago," Bryson concluded miserably.
"Yeah man, I feel that," Grady admitted.
"What about you Chase? When did you last get some before we all bunkered down for this beautiful summer?" He turned to ask, as he took a long swig of his beer.
"Seven months," they both stopped and looked up at him starkly, like empathetic veterans of the same war.
"What? Dudeeeeee, THAT long?" Grady asked.
"Yeah...I had a really bad breakup before moving in here...you guys have never heard that story but...basically I had a long-term girlfriend from college who was a little too vanilla for me and I decided it was time to try something new. But I guess it took me a while to get over the heartbreak of losing such a big part of my life and routine, ya know?" Chase felt good about finally getting to talk to actual guys about this. It soothed his soul a little, even in the midst of a drunken conversation about how long it had been since they'd had sex; and even in the middle of a depressingly boring pandemic.
"I get it, we've all been there," Grady said, and they clinked their glasses again. The boys were having a night in and, even if they weren't getting any, at least they had good camaraderie. They were proceeding towards appropriate levels of sloshed as the conversation meandered down an increasingly amusing path.
"So who was Kelly? Was that that red-haired girl with the amazing smile that you were watching a movie with like...a week before we went into lockdown?" Chase asked, fingering his card corners. He had vaguely remembered Bryson hanging out with a particularly cute girl as he got home late one night from a busy work day.
Bryson and Grady looked at each other with a secretive laugh.
"Ahhh, no. That was my friend Sara. Kelly is my longtime friend from back home...and Kelly's not a girl, he's a guy." Chase did a double-take.
"Wait...so...you hooked up with a guy?" He repeated the statement to establish its solvency.
"Yeah," Bryson said, rather simply.
"Wait..." Chase needed more information. He was very surprised by this admission. "So are you...?"
"I'm bi, if that's what you're wondering," Bryson offered up to Chase's still-shocked countenance.
"Fuck, how did I not know this? I feel like a shit roommate for totally missing that." Chase had never known a bi guy outside of friends-of-friends. He had a couple gay friends and he'd met lots of bi girls, but never a guy before. Or...he probably had and just never knew. The world was still evolving at a sluggish pace.
