The first time I saw him I wasn't particularly interested, although I liked his eyes, deep brown and intelligent. A few curls of red hair escaped the sideways baseball cap, and his freckles were adorable. It was the first time meeting my neighbors since I moved into my house in this quiet suburb. They were loading up the minivan to take their son to his second year of college. He stood awkwardly between his parents as they introduced themselves, adjusting that baseball cap while we chatted. Behind them, the minivan was packed with luggage and a guitar case.
"Elliot," he said when it was his turn, reaching to shake my hand with a shy smile.
I prefer my guys skinny like me, and this guy looked like had a lot of meat under that leather jacket. Besides, I'd just finished my MBA, one I went back to college to earn after five years out in the working world, so I must be ten years older than him. I remember when I was twenty: any guy over 25 was an old man, so even if Elliot was gay nothing would happen with me.
Fall, winter, and spring flew by with my new job keeping me busy, often traveling to job sites around the state. The neighbors invited me to dinner parties with their many friends, and I learned that they all like their booze. The wife even drunkenly tried to set me up with her niece, a school teacher, and I had to delicately let both of them know that I was gay. I didn't want the teacher thinking she was unattractive. The next dinner party they invited their token gay friend, a guy with greying hair and beer gut. He and I had a good laugh about them trying to set us up. I wasn't his type because he preferred bears like himself, and he already had a boyfriend.
One warm day I heard talking and shouted instructions from in my neighbors' back yard. I looked down from my office window on the second floor and saw that the college guy must be home for the summer. He and his dad were opening the cover on their pool.
"No, Elliot, we have to be in sync," called the dad as they reeled in the pool cover.
What the hell happened over the winter at his college? Elliot had gotten hot! I remembered his parents bragging last month about how much weight he'd lost after he joined the swim team. Even though he was only chosen as an alternate and never competed, they were proud that he'd relentlessly trained for the team. Now in shorts and a shirt, he was slim and firm, his red hair thick and curling.
I popped a boner, but I let reality help it melt. He was twenty, maybe twenty-one. His dad handed him a beer after they finished, and they sat in lawn chairs, kicking them back to recline and raise their feet to relax, a father and son catching up after a semester of college.
The back bedroom on the second floor of my house seemed like a good place for my computer and my home office because I could look out over the green of my back lawn, the high cedar hedges hiding the houses at the back and on my right, but there was only a waist high chain link fence to Elliot's yard, and I found myself distracted from work many times over the next two weeks as summer took hold. Did Elliot ever wear a shirt? Whether he was mowing the lawn, skimming the pool, or weeding the flower garden, he was always in the skimpiest of shorts and running shoes and nothing else. His chest, like mine, was flat and smooth. He must've used a lot of sunblock, because his pale, freckled skin didn't turn red, even after an hour outside.
Pool time really interrupted my work. His speedo bathing suit left almost nothing to my imagination. Not that I could tell the size of his package, but it certainly wasn't small, the bulge significant. I struggled not to be the creepy guy watching him do laps--so beautiful in form and figure. I forced myself to turn the computer I use for CAD design away from the window on those days when I worked from home. Wiring diagrams don't get done while I'm at the window drooling.
Just before July 4th weekend, Elliot's parents let me know they were going away for a couple of weeks, and Elliot would have the house to himself. They were flying to Paris to see Elliot's older sister, who was on some post-grad exchange thing for a year. They didn't tell me to supervise Elliot, but I sensed that I was the guy who should call the police if a massive, drunken kegger broke out.
There was a party on Saturday night, lots of shouting and laughter, definitely alcohol. Skinny dipping also happened, lithe bodies with cute bums and bouncing breasts as they dived, cannon-balled and splashed. Some were big beautiful men and women too. Typical college kids. Since there was less than a dozen of them, I saw no need to call the police. I tried to stay away from the window and not stare like the creepy neighbor, but I did see Elliot's junk as he stood on the end of the diving board, his arms outstretched as he prepared, and it was a nice flopping penis as he leapt into the air. Again, I reminded myself about the ten-year age gap and the fact that he probably wasn't gay. My guess is he got laid that night to one of those hot women, and as I drifted off to sleep, I struggled not to picture that cute bum going up and down in the act.
The big shock came two nights later when splashing in the pool caught my attention because it wasn't accompanied by shouts and laughter. I looked up from scrubbing my frying pan and out the kitchen window, and sure enough a pale figure swam laps. Naked. His bare bum flexed his legs. I drew in my breath and my cock rose rapidly in my shorts. I watched longer than I needed to, and he stopped and climbed the stairs out of the shallow end, shaking out his curls. His chest, and then his stomach were exposed with each step. When his cock emerged, it oddly made me think of a periscope, first the cut head, then the shaft, finally the balls. He was very hard! It pointed almost straight up toward his belly button.
I knew I should look away. With the kitchen light silhouetting me, he'd know I could see him, but he didn't run into his house. Instead, he sat in a lounge chair by the pool, leaning back to relax and raise his feet. He took a hold of his shaft! Shit! He was going to masturbate! Had he forgotten their pool lights were on, their patio lights? He was only a couple of car lengths from me, and his pale figure stood out from the black lawn chair like a ghost in a dark room.
I turned away quickly, hoping he didn't catch me watching, and I hurried into the living room to turn on the big screen. It's rude to watch a guy taking care of business even though I craved him. I definitely would be masturbating to that image tonight! My fantasies are my own.
Catching him skinny dip once is an accident. Twice is lucky. Four times and more is a pattern. It was usually around 9pm, just after dark, but it also happened in broad daylight a couple of times over the rest of the week, that pale bum flexing as he kicked through his laps. He always climbed out of the water dripping and hard, and not rushing to cover it with a towel. Was he purposely showing off? Was he an exhibitionist? He was also out in the backyard a lot scantily clad while doing gardening chores, even mowing the lawn wearing only his speedo and running shoes.
Did he want to hook up? He was a cock tease if he caught me watching given that his parents probably told him I was out of the closet gay. I didn't catch him masturbating again, but he was a constant distraction from my computer. I had to work late a couple of nights to meet a Friday deadline.
My weekend plans crashed when my college friend-with-benefits, Caleb, texted that he and his boyfriend Liam wouldn't be able to come up and stay with me after all. I had been so looking forward to entertaining them in my basement with our favourite toys, another reason I was hard so often all week.
The grass needed cutting, and Saturday was bright and beautiful--hot, but not too hot. I plugged in the mower and started my lines, but even this simple task was interrupted by Elliot coming out of his house in his skimpiest speedo swim suit. Awesome for racing, but leaving absolutely nothing to the imagination. He gave a pleasant wave and a friendly smile before he lay face down on a flatten lounge. Sunbathing with that freckled, pale skin? I kept my opinion to myself and spent the next hour trying not to look over at his bubble butt as I mowed my way to the end of my long yard.
As I wrapped the electrical cord, I heard him curse.
