05

Chapter 4: A Country Store Outside Gatlinburg

Tank probably should have consulted a map when he somewhat hurriedly herded Bull into Craig's car at the Bedford motel and headed for the on-ramp to I-81 south. But he didn't. And since he didn't, he didn't realize that Asheville wasn't on I-81—or even close to it for that matter—and he was already entering Tennessee before he realized he wasn't going to Asheville that day.

It was getting late when he left the highway near Gatlinburg, Tennessee, and was trying to figure out how to double back on a road to Asheville, and night was falling. He'd gotten off on a side road, turning the wrong way at a roadside tavern and small grocery store combination, and found himself driving up into the Great Smokies past mountain cabins wedged between trees on a road that went from asphalt to gravel to dirt and got narrower and rougher the farther he drove.

He eventually just stopped at a cabin showing no lights. He knocked on the door but no one answered and he went around to the back deck, which looked out over the lights of Gatlinburg below. He found an unlocked door here and he and Bull just walked into the cabin.

He felt a little dopey after the long, confusing drive—well, dopier than he usually felt—and didn't really know why he entered the cabin or what he was looking for, but there was food in the refrigerator and he was hungry and tired. Bull looked up at him with trusting eyes, and Tank found something that Bull didn't mind eating and put out a bowl of water for the dog. After he'd eaten something himself, Tank found a bedroom and stretched out on top of the bed and was asleep in moments. He was already asleep when Bull pattered into the room, jumped up on the bed and cuddled up to the warmth of Tank's side and was soon off into a contented dreamland himself.

* * * *

"Bar? What kind of bar you lookin' for?"

Tank had driven down to the tavern at the corner where he'd made the wrong turn. When he had wakened that morning and inhaled some food and coffee he'd perked up at the unoccupied cabin out onto the deck, he saw that there was a magnificent view down into the western foothills of the Smokies. Gatlinburg was laid out below him, and he could see that it was a fairly large town.

As he sat on the deck and looked down to the town below to the sound of Bull slurping water from a bowl, Tank thought about the ride back to Asheville and how that would be backtracking now from his journey to Nashville. Gatlinburg looked like a good-sized town, and, if he remembered rightly, it was a tourist town. Maybe he didn't have to go to Asheville to get a few week's work. Maybe he could get that right down there in Gatlinburg.

"Well, sort of a men's bar—maybe they have sports bars down in the town for men only? I just need work for a couple of weeks. I'm on my way to Nashville for tryouts for the Titans."

"A football player, are you?"

"Yeah. Defensive tackle. Play for the Virginia Hornets now."

The guy behind the grocery section counter—the tavern room itself was empty and unlit this time of morning—was giving Tank the once and half over, so Tank returned the favor. The guy was older, maybe at least into his early forties, but he handled himself with confidence and looked pretty bulked up from where Tank stood. He was probably a retired Marine type, with a buzz cut and tats on his biceps. The sleeves of his T-shirt were rolled up onto his shoulders, and he had a pack of Camels lodged at the rolled material on one side. His face was a little messed up—probably from some roughhousing that got out of hand—but he wasn't downright ugly. He just looked like he could take care of business, whatever that might be.

"I played some football myself. Ain't heard of the Virginia Hornets, though. A feeder team, are they?"

"Yeah. Semipro out of Richmond. Some do go to the Redskins or the Atlanta Falcons from there. And some over to Nashville with the Titans. That's where I'm headed. The Titans' scout said I'd be a shoo-in; all I needed to do was get to the tryout week. Thought I'd stop off on the way and pick up a little cash. I've done the door and bouncing at clubs in Richmond."

"Talkin' about gay sports bars here, are we? Is that what you mean by bars for men?"

"Uh, yeah, I guess so," Tank answered, somewhat taken aback by the guy's direct reference.

"Nope, no bars like that in Gatlinburg. Afraid the closest you'd come is right here. We have guys show up here in the evenings pretty regular lookin' for that sort of thing. They don't cause no trouble, though. And what there is of that, I handle myself. Don't really need a door man or a bouncer."

"Yeah, it looks like you can manage," Tank answered, a bit disappointed. "Thanks just the same. I'll get some things then and be on my way."

The guy kept his eyes glued to Tank from behind the counter while Tank walked the three aisles of the store, picking out this and that. He'd replace everything he'd already taken at the cabin and add what he and Bull would need over the next couple of days while he thought about whether he'd try going back to Asheville for work or on toward Nashville. "It's OK, I ain't stealing nothin'," Tank ran through his mind as he shopped. He wasn't a thief. And he'd leave the cabin in as good a shape as he found it too. This was something he was learning from this trip—a sense of personal responsibility.

When he brought the groceries over to the counter, what the guy then said showed that it wasn't suspicion that drove him to keep Tank under scrutiny. "I don't have anything you can do at the tavern, but there's some wood out back that needs choppin' if you're just looking for some temporary work for a few bucks. It would help keep you in shape for the football tryouts too."

"Uh, yeah. I guess I could do that," Tank answered, and then because he didn't want the guy to think he was ungrateful for the offer or that he felt the work would be beneath him, "Yeah, that'd be great. I wouldn't have to work out on top of everything then."

"Come back around this afternoon and you can get started. Twenty dollars an hour is best I can do—and then only if you chop steady. But I can throw in all the beer you can drink while you're doin' it and these groceries can go to seal the deal too. OK with you?"

"Yeah, yeah, that would be great."

The guy followed Tank to the door of the store. "Name's Hal, but the way. Hal Shifflet."

"I'm Tank Sullivan."

"Tank? What kinda' name is that? Your mamma give you that name?"

"Naw, but it's what I've gone by forever, I guess. The name's good enough for me."

"And I'll have to say it suits you too," Hal said, and when Tank looked back up at him from the parking area, he could see a glint in the guy's eye. A type of interest that Tank recognized well enough.

"Hey, is that a dog you've got there in the car?" Hal asked, as Tank opened the door and pushed a welcoming Bull back across the seat.

"Yeah. This here's my dog."

"A pit bull is it?"

"Yeah, I guess. I've never gotten around to askin' him."

"A real man's dog that. Say, where are you stayin'?"

"Up the road here aways. Cabin on the road."

"Well, then this afternoon then. Say, no later than three? Don't want to be choppin' wood and drinking beer in the dark."

"Nope, sure don't."

* * * *

Tank was dragging a bit when he got back to the cabin that evening. He parked Craig's car out by the road and he and Bull trudged around to the back of the cabin and in through the door from the deck. He had chopped wood before, but not for four straight hours like he'd done today. He'd gone light on the beer, because it was only the wood he wanted to chop.

He worked in a clearing behind the tavern building. Hal would come to the back door of that occasionally and watch Tank at work, stripped down to gym shorts and heavy boots to give some protection to his feet from a stray swing. Tank set Bull on a long rope farther to the back, where the dog couldn't accidentally get in the way of the swinging ax. Beyond where Bull whiled away his time happily while seeing that Tank was nearby was a ring of small cabins running in a semicircle around the clearing. Tank reasoned that this must have been a tourist court at some time, but the cabins didn't look occupied now, although only a couple of them appeared to be in falling-down condition.

It was already dark when Tank reached the cabin. He let Bull run outside while he put the groceries away and then he fixed both of them something to eat and walked gingerly off to the bathroom, where he took a long, hot shower. After he'd toweled himself off, he padded back into the bedroom naked and collapsed on the bed and was asleep almost instantaneously, not having even taken the time to turn the light off in the bedroom.

Hours later, he woke, startled, at the sound of Bull's furious barking. Sitting up on the bed, still groggy, Tank saw that Bull was at a window that looked out onto the back deck and was jumping up and down and pawing at the pane of glass and barking like the world was coming to an end.

Tank struggled to the window, but by the time he got there, no one was on the deck. He did, however, think he heard a vehicle's engine start up. Not right in front of the cabin, but down the hill a bit.

"Damn peeping Toms," he muttered, hoping that it was just that and not the owners of the cabin checking in and getting the shock of their lives, as he pulled down the blind of the window, flicked off the light, and returned to the bed. Bull jumped up on the bed and settled down beside Tank, accepting Tank's petting as a just award for having chased off the violator of his new home.

* * * *

"No need for you to go up the mountain every night if you don't want to," Hal said as he brought a cold beer out to Tank at the chopping block the next afternoon. "I got cabins right back here that nobody's using. You could just pick whatever one of those that you want and stay right here."

"I don't know if I could afford—"

"You could stay for free. No one else is askin' to pay to stay in 'em."

"Thanks, then, that would save me some drivin'."

Tank and Bull went up the mountain one last time when he'd finished chopping for the day, and Tank showered and then worked hard to return the cabin to the same condition he'd found it. He laughed when he fully realized what he was doing. "If Craig could see me now," he thought. This had been a main sticking point with Craig. If Tank had been this fastidious when they'd been together, he and Craig would have had far fewer fights.

Tank realized he missed Craig now. Having Bull for company was nice, but it wasn't like having Craig. He was getting more than a little horny too. He hadn't had any now for nearly a week. That Tim guy was real nice to fuck, but nobody did it like Craig did. He'd have to remember to call Craig after he'd gotten signed on with Titans. And maybe he'd look around to see if there was work for Craig in Nashville too. It would be nice to try to give that another go. He'd have to get Craig's car back to him anyway—unless, of course, the law caught up with him before he could and tossed his sorry ass in jail.

Tank wondered what would happen to Bull then. Maybe Craig would find his owners, although Tank didn't think that Bull would consider that as doing him any favors. Or maybe Craig could take Bull. Craig was nice that way. Very thoughtful. Tank felt a little guilty about not having seen the value of that in him before.

But no use thinking about that. Tank was going to be on the Titans squad then. He'd have the money and support to smooth any difficulties like that over if it came to that.

After he'd cleaned up and put the cabin back in order, Tank and Bull got back in the car and drove down the mountain. When he drove into the parking lot of the tavern, he saw that the place actually was hopping at night. The parking area was nearly full. A black guy getting out of a red Mustang convertible momentarily arrested Tank's attention as he was driving around the side of the tavern and back to the cabin he'd picked out. The guy moved like a fullback and was built like one. Tank wondered if there was some decent footballing going on around here; he could use some practice time before he picked up stakes and left for Nashville.

He decided that after he got his duffel and Bull settled in the cabin, maybe he'd come back to the tavern for a drink and ask the black guy with the red Mustang about the football scene around here.

The tavern was pretty full when he entered it—and he was surprised to see that it was pretty much the kind of place he had been looking for to work at temporarily. There were tables for drinking and tables for playing pool and lines for darts, and three TVs overhead were showing three different sports games going on. The room was pretty full—all men, all looking like they worked and played hard and could take care of themselves.

Hal was presiding at the bar, and he barely looked at Tank when Tank bellied up there and ordered a draft from another guy who was taking care of most of the orders from behind the bar. Hal did take the time to flash Tank a broad grin of welcome, though. He didn't do more because he was busy deep in conversation with the black dude with the red Mustang.

Tank took the beer and wandered over and watched a couple guys playing pool. They watched back, and Tank had no trouble figuring out that this, indeed, was a gay-friendly bar. One young guy looked particularly appealing to him.

He turned and split his time watching what was going on at another one of those tables and looking up at the nearest screen, which was showing a tennis match that didn't keep his interest too well. Off and on, he looked over to the bar, wanting to get the chance to talk to the black guy about football.

The last time he looked up, though, he saw that Hal and the black guy were headed toward the door to the back of the tavern. Tank smiled at the guy at the pool table he'd been attracted to, who was paying more attention to him than what he was doing with his pool cue. He was in the mood, but he wasn't sure if he was in the condition for any part of this tonight, though, still sore from trying to get used to the rhythm of the wood chopping. So, he pushed off the wall and headed to the back door in Hal and the black guy's wake.

Tank came out of the back of the tavern in time to see the two turning the corner. By the time he got to the corner himself, what he saw was two torsos descending steps down into a cellar under the tavern by way of an external staircase that had been covered by steel doors that opened out to the side. As he watched, Hal turned and pulled the doors shut over his head.

On his way back into the tavern, Tank was stopped by a hand being laid on his forearm. It was the young guy he'd been watching playing pool. He was well-tanned, with a pretty-boy face and black, curly hair. His body was lanky, but he had well-worked muscles. His jeans, plaid flannel shirt, and boots said "construction worker," but there was a softness about him and said he hadn't been engaged in that long—that he barely was out of high school. He also had a look of need about him that Tank couldn't resist and his hands were on Tank, one gripping a bicep and the other feeling up Tank's torso. So, ignoring the groaning his muscles were doing, Tank assumed, correctly, what the guy wanted took him back to the cabin with him.

They didn't make it to the bed. As soon as they'd entered the cabin and Tank had shut the door, the pretty-boy was all over him, unbuttoning his shirt and pulling it out of his jeans. He couldn't get enough of feeling up Tank's chest muscles and biceps—with his lips and tongue as well as his hands—and soon was on his knees in front of Tank, unzipping him and feeling his freed cock with his lips and tongue as well as his hands.

Both of them, minus their jeans, and just with shirts hanging open, Tank fucked the pretty-boy up against the wall, one strong hand fisting the guy's locked wrists against the wall above his head and the other one palming pretty-boy's belly, causing his buttocks to jut out toward Tank's crotch as Tank split his orbs with his cock and the pretty-boy cried out for more of the thick shaft, deeper and faster. They exploded nearly simultaneously. But virile, and in-shape—and not having had it for a couple of weeks, Tank remained hard.

Stammering his awe and appreciation, the pretty-boy was reaching down to the floor for his jeans when Tank let him know that he didn't do singles. The pretty-boy blustered the short distance to the single bed as Tank snaked an arm around his waist, scooped him up under an arm like he was a sack of potatoes, slammed his back onto the bed, and fucked him again missionary style, while the young man panted and fought for breaths between thrusts. His insides were warmed by Tank's cum. Neither had given a thought to condoms such was their need for each other when they entered the cabin. But, although pretty-boy felt Tank come, he didn't feel Tank's cock withering. Tank's cum already was leaking out of pretty-boy's ass—only proving to be extra lubricant for the next onslaught.

It wasn't that Tank was a cruel lover. He was a big teddy bear. But once he got started what little thinking he normally did went out the window. He didn't seem to have a good grasp of his strength and how outsized his equipment was—and he had the stamina to fuck for hours.

Whimpering, the pretty-boy shuffled up onto the bed on his back after both had come again, this time Tank pulling out and shooting on the young man's chest. Tank followed him up onto the bed and stretched out on top of him, taking much of his weight on his elbows and knees so that he would crush the other man. With a sigh of resignation, the pretty-boy spread his legs and raised his pelvis to enable the deep slide of the still-hard cock up inside him.

"OK, big boy. Take it all," he whimpered.

He had clearly latched on to more of a primeval, single-minded animal in this muscle man than he had thought, but the fucking was so glorious he wouldn't even think of objecting. Still, this would take care of pretty-boy's needs for some time to come. He had no idea whether he'd even be able to walk out of the cabin on his own after this. But there was no time to think of that now, as he felt Tank stiffen and let out a little groan. He grabbed Tank's bulbous butt cheeks, clutching them close to him as he felt Tank ejaculate again . . . and again.

"Oh, fuck. Shit. Yes, yes," pretty-boy murmured.

While the two of them were dozing after having satisfied the need that had been each of them, Tank was snapped into awareness again by Bull's bark. It was the same bark as he'd used the other night at the cabin and he again was jumping at a window on the bedroom wall. This time Tank heard the rustling of the bushes outside, but by the time he got to the window, nobody was there.

The next morning when Tank was doing a walk-around with Bull, he came out to the front of the tavern and saw that the red Mustang was still there. Later in the afternoon, when he was taking a break from his wood chopping, he noticed that the car was gone.

"So," he thought. "Hal got his and it was good enough that it lasted a while." Except that Hal had been in the store in the morning and was sitting out on the porch at the front and smoking a cigarette when Hal came around to see that the Mustang was gone.

Three days later, Tank asked for and got the day off, and he put Bull in Craig's car and set off down the mountain to explore Gatlinburg. He figured there must be a park there where both he and Bull could exercise. The wood chopping had been fine for his chest and arm muscles—and not that bad for his legs in a certain way. But he felt he needed more leg work that only distance jogging could give him.