I met my best friend John in high school, when we were both on the ski team. Amazingly, we'd kept in touch through college, even though our universities were almost on opposite sides of the country. He was the best man at my wedding; his brother was his best man, but I was still happy to be there as one of the groomsmen.
Our wives and kids get along great; we often vacation together in the summer, renting a big house on the water where we'll all play games and stay up until the wee hours of the morning. While we don't live close to each other, we manage to stay in touch over the years, and our families feel like one big close knit community.
We both had been looking forward to our "guys skiing weekend" for months. It had actually been years since he and I had done anything with just us two, without our wives and kids.
Unfortunately, flight delays due to weather, and making multiple wrong turns in the rental car, meant we arrived at the resort much later than we had planned.
As a result, instead of the adjoining rooms that we had booked, there was only one room left in the whole hotel.
The girl behind the desk apologized profusely, and assured us that two rooms would be open the next night, but was steadfast that with it being high season there were no other openings.
"Does it at least have two queen beds?" I asked.
"No, sorry, it's a king. This particular room doesn't have a rollout either," she said.
"What do you think?" I asked John.
John sighed, "Let's just take it; I'm too tired to try and find a different place. We've known each other long enough that it's not any big deal to me. Besides, we used to have to bunk together on the ski team way back when. You OK with it?"
"Yeah, it's not ideal, but we can make do. We'll take it." I replied to the clerk.
Wrestling our luggage and skis down the long hallway, we finally found our room. Like we had expected, nothing fancy (we were there for the skiing, not the room); a table, chairs, TV on the dresser, hangers on a rod, and the bathroom. At least there was enough room for all our stuff.
"Why don't you shower first, John?" I suggested.
"Sounds good," he said, and headed off to the bathroom with his shower gear.
After calling my wife to let her know we had made it there safely (and telling her about the fiasco with the delays and the single room), I lay down on the bed while I waited. At least the bed was nice and comfortable, and in fact I feel asleep.
John woke me when he lightly tapped me on the shoulder saying "your turn." I was a little surprised to see that he was naked, but thinking back to our high school days that was par for the course with John. He thought nothing of walking around with nothing on following a shower with the team, and this was much like that.
"Don't forget to put on clean underwear. We didn't sleep naked in the past, and we aren't starting now," I teased him.
Sleepily he said, "Oh, right, will do."
I gathered my stuff and stumbled into the bathroom. I was glad to see there were several unused towels, so at least I wouldn't have to try and dry myself with John's soggy towel.
The hot water felt great on my tense shoulders and back. So good that I started to get a chubby, and I toyed with the idea of taking myself in hand to release some tension. But exhaustion won, so I reluctantly shut off the water, dried off, and brushed my teeth.
Remembering John's unintended nudity I put on my clean underwear in the bathroom and headed back to the bedroom area.
John was already sound asleep on one side of the bed, so I slipped under the covers on the other side and turned off the bedside light.
