See, what happened was...Tom, Jeb and I were out in the barn with Juan--Steve's hired-hand--at a time when lifting weights was kind of new. And before I go any further let's get the messy background shit out of the way...
Steve's like a dad without being my dad, cuz I don't even know who my real dad is. And my mom? She's long gone after, first, dumping my actual dad, then having Steve become part of our life and then dumping him and running off. I never hear from her--even when I turned 18 last month. I haven't heard anything from her since '58. Nothing. And now it's 1959, and still not a peep.
What makes it all even crazier is how she decided to send me to this strict Christian school run by some Mormons instead of just the regular old elementary school everyone in town goes to--she's not even Mormon herself, and neither is Steve for that matter. I'm going to graduate soon, so there's no point switching schools now.
But anyway, Tom and Jeb go there with me, cuz their folks are super-sized Mormons--like crazy strict--and even tho we're all 18, we can tell others our age in town know way more about life than we do. They just stare at us whenever we walk by the movie theater--stare, cuz of how we're dressed and how we always walk by, cuz they know we go to that school and aren't supposed to go to the movies.
Now that all that crap is out of the way, I'll just say that being farm kids, we couldn't afford any of those Joe Weider barbells we saw advertised in the back of magazines at the drug store. So Steve suggested we go ask Juan to help us cuz Juan had made his own set.
"I dunno, Steve--Jeez. Can't you ask him for us?"
I watched him rub his solid, unshaven jaw.
"He don't talk to me much, is all," I added, hoping I didn't have to talk to Juan directly.
"That's because you don't talk to him, Todd." He pawed his open-collared, lumberjack shirt, me watching his hairy pecs roll around underneath. "Just take Tom and Jeb with you and ask him. No big deal--he'll be pleased."
Pleased? I never saw Juan pleased in my whole life.
I took one last, lingering look at the body I hoped I'd one day have--at how the bulk of his lumber-shirted shoulders and chest V-ed down his torso into his full-crotched jeans.
"You gonna stand there gawkin' all day, or go ask him?" he sipped his mug of coffee.
Not having a mom or brothers and sisters was fine by me--Steve was more than enough of a stand-in dad to love and admire. I was so lucky that when my mom left us, he wanted me to still stay with him. Only seventeen years older than my 18, he looked hunkier than Rock Hudson and the Marlboro man put together. Just being near him did things to me and my buddies we didn't understand--intense, heart-racing, lump-in-our-throat feelings.
I mean, you gotta understand right off the bat that being farm boys in 1959 Utah meant that we knew absolutely zip about what made us feel that way--we only knew that we did.
And Juan? Juan, if anything made us go mute in total awe. Half Latino and half African-American, Juan was dark-skinned, six-foot-two, maybe 240 lbs, with biceps and chest and shoulders his faded work shirts simply couldn't seem to contain. So we were way spooked over having to interrupt his workout and stammer out our hope that he could help us develop our teen bodies before it was too late.
"No problem," he'd said, wiping his brow. I was so relieved Steve had been right, and Juan didn't mind us asking him. "--but you're going t'have to make your own weights. Mine'll kill you kids."
That's when the fierce-looking giant showed us how to choose different-sized tin cans and mix cement, and make our very own barbells using leftover pipe. He did this with a toleratin' smile in the heat-sheltered coolness of the barn.
"Put 'em outside in th' sun now to set--there's nothing more you can do until they're dry n' solid."
"This one looks ready now, Juan. It's been over an hour."
He gazed at me as if looking right through me. "Cement don't dry in an hour, ok? Now put 'em outside an' go off swimmin' or something."
Jeb quickly began doing as he was told, but Tom and I stood there staring at Juan's button-popping pecs.
"C-can we watch you?" Tom's eyes were darting all over Juan's body. "You know--get some pointers?" He gave out a breathy laugh, tryin' to act natural and not so worshipful.
Juan put his hands on his hips, framing his 30" waist, sizing us up. By then Jeb was back, wondering what was going on.
"You three really want 'some pointers', or just want'a stare at my body?" The smallest of smiles played over Juan's wide, full lips.
We looked at each other, Tom suddenly breaking into an impish grin. "A little'a each!"
Jeb punched him, a resounding smack on his muscled, t-shirted shoulder.
"Hey! Just tellin' th' truth!"
Juan silently began undoing his shirt, watching us go catatonic as his chest came into view.
"Who sent you's over here?"
"My 'Poppa Steve'. He said you'd 'be pleased'."
Truth be told, n' like I said before, I'd never seen Juan 'pleased' in my life. He kind of smiled to himself, though, hearing that. "Oh, 'Poppa Steve' sent you, huh? Well, 'Poppa Steve' ain't gonna be too pleased that I'm way behind in m' chores..."
When that old, torn work shirt fell open, so did our mouths. We saw the carved valley between his gigantic pecs--the undulating ripples of his velvet-skinned abs--and stared at the way even his bellybutton looked muscular, the deep hole stretched open, a stream of black hair going down his brown, muscle-stretched lower belly.
An' below that? Below that was a massive bulge mounding-out his jeans.
"Oh, man!" Tom whispered as Juan pulled his shirt clean off, flexing his pecs--making each one jump and dance--his nipples sitting smack in the center of each slab, poking out like two rivets.
"Like that, do you?" He smiled grimly, then raised his right arm and flexed his bicep into a gargantuan, three-tiered boulder.
"Jeezums!" Jeb stared.
"Sh-i-i-t!," Tom murmured, daring to swear in front of Juan. "I'll do anythin' to have arms like that!"
I just memorized every mountain and valley--the way his deep armpits sheltered a sexy pocket of black manhair--the way his triceps punched out--how his deltoids striated.
"So now," Juan relaxed his pose, "let's see what you three got."
"U-us?" Jeb stammered, his angelic, freckled, pug-nosed face turning pink.
"You want us to....?" I looked down at myself.
"If your so-called 'Poppa Steve' wants me t' train you, then I gotta see what I'm workin' with, don't I?"
"Hell--I'll show you," Tom said, "--I ain't shy."
Of the three of us, dark-haired Tom was the most built. All of us had bodies more developed than most teens our age, just because we lived on farms and did physical labor. The 'townies' called us 'hicks'--but knew better than to say it to our faces.
Tom began pulling off his t-shirt, Jeb and I following suit.
"Well now, whadda'ya' know," Juan looked down from his towering height, arms folded.
"What?" Tom pushed his chest forward, his well-developed pecs on display. "So, tell us--how do we look?" He even raised his right arm and made a muscle.
A full-fledged grin transformed Juan's rugged, big-boned face. He looked more Latino than African-American, except for his sexy full lips and short, almost-shaved kinky hair. "Not bad--not bad at all. Hell, how old're you three?"
"Jeb's not eighteen yet, but both me and Todd is," Tom went into a double-biceps pose. "--you'll be eighteen soon, tho', huh, Jeb?" Tom examined his own muscles adoringly.
"It was my birthday two weeks ago, Tom. Thanks a lot for not remembering." Jeb's eyes kept darting over Juan's naked torso.
"I was skinny as a rail at your age--except down here...." Juan suddenly cupped his bulging jeans. "...got tired of being teased--wanted a body to go along with what I got born with, I guess." We stared at how he just left his hand right there--right smack over top of his mounded-out fly.
We fell silent, Jeb blushing like a tomato--me staring 'tween Juan's legs--Tom not only staring, but absently feeling up his own crotch.
The silence went on a long time, the only sound the barn swallows chattering as they sailed in and out of the overhead loft.
"Oh, I see--you're eighteen, but you don't even talk about how other guys are hung?"
"How they's what?" Tom squinted up at Juan.
A look of surprise crossed Juan's smooth and cheek-boned face. "Christ," he swore, us raising our eyebrows at it. "Those Mormons sure know how to mess with your heads. How we're hung--what we got goin' on...", he took both hands down and used his first fingers and thumbs to circle his huge mound, "...here."
"Lordy. Heck, no," Tom's eyes ran from Juan's face to his half-melon pecs--down his endless abs--to stay fixed on Juan's mounded fly. "--but I sure wish we could!"
Tom kept pulling at his crotch. "M' Daddy tells me it's th' 'devil's playground'--keeps tellin' me to take cold showers, whatever th' heck that's supposed to do!"
Juan actually laughed then--a low, deep chuckle. "He means he can see you're horny, boy--but he's too religious to use the word!"
"Some of the guys say that word in the swimming pool change room," Jeb piped up, his brow furrowing, eagerness in his voice. "--but I don't know what it means."
"They don't either," Tom scoffed.
"Neither do you, O'Rourke! None a' us does," I felt my heart pounding--the same feeling I get whenever Poppa Steve gives me a little hug goodnight.
"Seriously? Eighteen, and you don't know what 'horny' is??" Juan's large eyes grew larger as he smiled and shook his head in disbelief.
