Can Am Story

by Oliver Rill

  “No snogging in the cab! See you later!”

  Aaron took the room above me that opened onto the sea front. Anybody would have done the same, even though both rooms were lovely.

  I started to unpack and called Antonis. He answered from Zurich and told me to let his cleaning lady know that I was going to pick up the things that I had left at his house over winter. I laid on the bed and closed my eyes briefly.

  “Oli, wake up. We’ve only got 20 minutes!” I had fallen into a deep sleep, exhausted from the excitement and the long journey.

  “What? Shit! Did you fall asleep too?”

  “I’ve been walking along the beach, sucking in some of that sea air. It was beautiful. Come on, get a move on!”

  I drove us up to Apollonia. Each ordered a dish that was placed in the middle of the table and we all shared. Wine flowed, but the Greek music gradually got on my nerves.

  “Oli, if Aristo was gay, you’d make a pass at him, wouldn’t you? Admit it.” Debbie asked provocatively.

  “If Aristo was gay, we’d be long married and would fuck each other’s brains out three times a day. He likes chicks and that’s why I have to look elsewhere.”

  “If I was gay, I’d definitely go for Oli. He’s a class above all the others.” Aristo said looking at me with a smile of solid friendship.

  “You two should marry anyway. You’re really sweet together.” Debbie retorted with a trace of irony.

  “Debbie, believe me I have tried. But he won’t.”

  “Oh, Oli. Did you really?” Aristo asked with raised eyebrows.

  “I thought I had. Didn’t I use the right approach? Tell me, what was missing, I’ll make up for it right away.”

  “Maybe you should get down on one knee.”

  “I’m not doing that in the restaurant! They’ll all want a bite!” Everyone laughed uproariously.

  “And Aaron? Who is your favorite?”

  “There are a few cute guys here. You aren’t short of candidates.”

  “Oh come on, tell us. Who do you fancy?”

  “No one in particular.”

  “So what’s your type?” Debbie drilled.

  “Well, I don’t really have a type. He has to be a little bit athletic.”

  “A little bit?” I interjected.

  “Yeah, a little bit. What were you thinking? That gay muscle-men keep to themselves?” I guess we all did, as we all nodded wisely.

  “I like a good sense of humor. In fact, I insist on it. If he’s intellectual too, then that’s really sexy.”

  “A comic book worm!” I said, amused at the image.

  “I don’t want a geek! I’m not into the weird and wonderful. Well, not unless I’m very drunk. It has been known.” Laughed Aaron.

  “I think Aaron’s type are few and far between. I guess that goes for all of us, with the exception of Debbie and Rachel, of course.”

  “I don’t really care. I’ll take anything that comes my way.” Aristo entered the conversation. “And Oli is waiting for his white knight in shining armor, or even a shining black Porsche, to relieve his loneliness.”

  “Riding isn’t the sport it once was and it’s really difficult to find a gallant knight out there anymore anyway.” I explained. Aristo leant over to Rachel and said in a stage whisper that all could hear:

  “Oli’s problem, Rachel, is that he is too demanding. The poor guy has to look like a model, he has to be intelligent, he has to be as faithful as a retriever and as independent as a cat. He must never need attention himself, but has to devote all his time and energy into looking after Oli.”

  “You forgot to mention that he has to be dynamite in bed. Jeez! Am I really that complicated?”

  “Actually, you’re quite easy to deal with Oli. You just insist on the best of everything.”

  “Oh leave me alone. Fill my glass up. That’s what I want right now.”

  The next day, Stavros would pick up Debbie and Rachel in the helicopter. The wind had picked up and I asked myself if that was a good idea in this wind. Aristo had stayed with family for the night and Aaron and I were alone in this house that was once the well-known watering hole ‘Facebar’.

  It hit me as I stood on the terrace gazing at the harbor very early the next morning and filled my lungs with the sea air. The absolute quiet on one side then the roar of the waves on the other. The sun warming my face and a light breeze gently stroking my skin. I was relaxed, in the here and now. I had found my place in life. Before the house had been a project: getting it; rebuilding it; furnishing it; and storing the accessories of life. Now it was my home, my safe haven, where I wanted to be. I had a deeper connection to this place than any other house, even though it was the simplest of all of them.

  Aaron broke into my thoughts.

  “I want to go to Faros this morning.” He looked down at me from above. He still had his PJs on: shorts and a loose white T-shirt.

  “Shall we go out for breakfast? We don’t have anything in.”

  “Have a look and see what Gavin has brought in.”

  “I’ll shower. I’m going to put my swimming things straight in the bag now, but let’s go to Fassolou, it’s near Faro, and I’m sure you’ll prefer the beach.”

  “You didn’t show me that one! I want to see it. And I am going to drive today!”

  We drove around the quay, parked the car and went into Pipi’s Café and ordered breakfast.

  “Isn’t it great sitting here in the mornings looking out at the bay? I’ll never get enough of this view.” I said and sighed as I looked across the beach to my long awaited house. I had wanted that building since the first day I had set foot on the island and now finally my dream had come true.

  “I can see why you like it so much.”

  “But you’re missing a proper gym, aren’t you?”

  “The machines here are crap, but the guys are fun to train with.”

  “The guy that opened it, is supposed to be a very good-looking, well-built guy. Did you know that he died in a motor bike accident?”

  “Yeah, they told me. His brother took over the gym, didn’t he?”

  “You’re doing well with all gossip from the island! But if you really want to keep your ear to the ground, have a word with Maria from the Boutique. What she doesn’t know isn’t worth knowing!”

  “That’s good to know.”

  Aaron drove us to Fassolou, dressed in his swimming shorts, ready for the beach. I had to keep averting my eyes as they strayed to his well-formed legs. The massive curve of his thighs seemed to spread further as they rested on the seat. I was tempted to reach over and squeeze them, but stopped myself in time.

  The beach was deserted apart from us. We had driven up a stony hill and found a roughly hewn out parking lot behind it. The beach lapped at the barren hills, with one or two large trees offering the only shade on the fine sand. From here you could see Chrissopigi, a monastery built into the stone and a popular Sifnos tourist destination. The tourists were older in this area of the island, families with children tended to favor the beach near Faros. I didn’t know why there was this trend, just that this beach was quieter.

  We didn’t hang around, but ran at full pelt into the temperate sea. The beach fell gently into the sea, so that you didn’t plunge immediately into the water, but could gradually get your body wet avoiding the shock of the water and enjoying the anticipation. Or, you could simply run straight in as we did and dive under the surface at the earliest opportunity.

  “We’ve got another 11 days!” Aaron called out in joy.

  “Hey, it’s our first day here and you’re already counting down the days?”

  “Just so that I keep hold of reality and don’t get a shock when we have to return to the … what do you call it? … The plastic world.”

  I threw my head back and laughed. “You’ve really caught the bug, haven’t you? Sifnos is magic. Everyone that comes here falls in love with it. Anyone who doesn’t, doesn’t have a soul!”

  “And anyone
who hears you, will think you need to be locked up!” He said ducking me. “Cool off! You’re getting a touch too much sun, I think.”

  I gasped just in time before my ears were filled with underwater sounds and salt water clouded my eyes. The pressure of his hand on my head let up quickly, but I veered away as I came up again, in case he caught me again in his iron grip, even though it was all play-acting.

  We flopped down on the fine sand under a tree. It was too dangerous to sit directly in the sun and I would get a tan from day to day living anyway.

  “Oli, can I ask you something?”

  “On this occasion I will make an exception as it’s you. I normally require an application form filled out in triplicate.”

  Aaron laughed. “I just wondered how you do it. I mean you and Matt; and Aristo; and Daniel, you’re all friends but they’re also your employees. Do you know what I mean?”

  “Not really.”

  “Well you have to say things and do things that are difficult between friends, like, erm, I don’t know, something that you don’t like that they’re doing. You have to reprimand them.”

  “Yeah, I do have to and I do. You’re asking if I can come down hard on them, when I need to, aren’t you?”

  “Exactly. Isn’t it hard to do that?”

  “No. Look, for one thing they are much more interested because they aren’t working for any old company, in any old job. They are a part of it. They are motivated to make sure that everything runs smoothly.”

  “Because they don’t want to disappoint you.”

  “That too. But much more because they feel they belong, it’s a peer pressure type thing. We all sit around the pool together and everyone knows that he’s given his best that we all earn the fruits of our labor and we can all be proud of each other. It’s more that sort of thing.”

  “Okay, well imagine that Matt got up to something a bit dubious, or really fucked up. What would you do then?”

  “Then I’d go to Matt, tell him he fucked up and we would try to sort the problem out together.”

  “And if it was something that couldn’t be rectified from one day to the other? Would you still sit beside the pool with him, or would you be too angry?”

  “Did you get out of the wrong side of bed this morning or what’s up with you? No of course Matt can swim naked in my pool and I’ll drink a beer with him in the evenings after work. Everyone makes mistakes. If I was going to get annoyed, I’d be annoyed with the problem rather than with Matt. They are two separate things.”

  “And now. Here. Are we in work or not?”

  “Now with us it’s more complicated. And easier. You are paid by the company for your time, but I also use you shamelessly! I use you privately about 90 percent of the time, I guess. Don’t you think?”

  “There’s no difference between the private you and the work you, as far as I can see. You’re always the same. Just when you have a press conference or visit Boeing, or the bank. Otherwise you’re the same when you sit at the pool as when you’re at the office or on the beach.”

  “Does that look unprofessional to you?”

  “Not at all, just the opposite. You’re always so confident, so easy and laid back, as if you can do anything you turn your hand to and you never have any worries.”

  “I do have a few worries occasionally, but I can’t complain. I have to talk to Aristo soon about staffing. We don't have enough people at the moment, but neither do we have enough space for the teams that we’ve got. That is his problem, but the buck stops with me. Also, we have a few battles going on with the big providers on some flight routes and there are opportunities that we’re missing out on because Boeing won’t get their fingers out of their asses. Then of course there’s the banks. We have to get our financing for the fleet from somewhere. So yes, business is good and everything is running smoothly, but it’s not as easy as it looks.”

  “Wow! That’s what I mean. You can’t see that all that is going on under the surface with you. Don’t you ever worry that it will all turn tits up?”

  “Na. It’ll all work in the end.”

  “Impressive. I’d be in totally over my head and wouldn’t know up from down.”

  “For now, you’ve just got to drive me about, Aaron. Then you’ve got to make sure I don’t get mixed up in some silly scandal. And then, you have to go back into the water with me. Come on! Interview’s over.”

  In the meantime, a couple of tourists had walked down onto the beach and Aaron, I looked at him with new eyes, but he still looked more like the Incredible Hulk than any man I have ever known before. Just in a healthy, sexy skin and not the horrible green one. His thick muscles shone more than usual and I had to make a conscious effort not to stare. It was a new feeling, I’d always found his physique a little too much.

  “You know what, Aaron? It’s bad. Whenever I eat breakfast I am famished by lunch time and today is no exception.”

  “If Gavin doesn’t cook, you don’t eat properly. That’s not good either, you’re thin enough already.”

  “That’s not true. I still have a tummy.”

  “Yeah, sure. You have a screw loose. Come on, let’s go eat.”

  We set off in the direction of Kamares. Me working hard to not look at those massive thighs resting on the driver’s seat. Suddenly Aaron threw a right and came to a halt in the middle of nowhere.

  “What’s up?” I asked.

  “Go on. Grab hold of them” He said.

  Of course I didn’t. So he took my hand and stroked his leg up and down and then his very hard cock.

  “You’ve been looking at me all day. That’s what you wanted, isn’t it?”

  Surprise robbed me of my tongue. He pulled his pants down a little, put his hand on the back of my head and I bent over him.

  It wasn’t until we were on the road to Kamares that I found my tongue again. There it was in my mouth, I just had to trust it to say something.

  “I’m really hungry.”

  “I could see that.” He smiled. “We’ll go eat and then I’ll look after you.”

  “You mean …”

  “I do.”

  We ate more or less in silence, each of us pondering the impact of what had just happened. I was embarrassed and confused and there again, I wasn’t sure that it was appropriate to start something with him.

  “Come on, let’s pay up and go. I’ve got something planned for you.” He winked.

  We went into my bedroom. I was so charged and horny that I just ignored the warning that my brain was urgently sending.

  “You’re really not bad in the sack. Has the cat got your tongue now?” he asked. He sat, half lying naked on the bed.

  “I’m, well I’ve been taken by surprise, I suppose.”

  “You, taken by surprise?” He parroted. “You’ve been thinking about it all day.”

  “Well your antenna certainly works fine. Yes, I have. And it’s all the island’s fault. I’m always horny when I’m here.”

  “Yeah, right. It’s all the island’s fault.”

  “Haven’t you every thought about it before now?” I wanted to know.

  “Do you remember when you had that sunburn? I really wanted to just push it in and take you without saying anything at all.”

  “Aaron! But that was on Sifnos too.”

  “Whatever. Come on, you know you’re hot.”

  “I know that I have a pretty face. Other than that, well, humpf! Can I say something to you without you getting upset?”

  “Go on then.”

  “It’s a great feeling to actually touch you. You feel so firm and hard and I always wanted to have sex with a muscle man. But it’s like you said. It’s a cliché.”

  “What’s to get upset about in that? You feel good too, when you wrap yourself around me. You’re a fantastic kisser! The best ever for me.”

  “Ah. Thank you.”

  “And now? Have you ticked another one off your bucket list? What’s still missing? The black guy?”

 
; “I’ve already had the black guy. But I haven’t ticked you off yet. I think we still have a way to go.”

  “What, aren’t I muscle-mannish enough?”

  “Yes of course you are, but I have to do it again to make sure. You can’t make such an important decision based on one experience.”

  “I’m glad you said that, because I want to know if you kiss as nicely in the mornings as you do in the evenings.”

  “In the morning? Mmm. Wednesdays are always hard for me. Just a moment. I’ve gotta take that call.”

  It was Aristo. He wanted to know if he could take the guest room. He had had a row with his dad and didn’t want to stay there a moment longer than he had to. I agreed, of course and he said he’d be there in about half an hour.

  “Aaron, we’ve got a visitor in around 30 minutes. Aristo. He’s going to take the other room.”

  “Maybe I should put my pants on, what do you think?”

  “I think … maybe you could leave it a couple more minutes.”

  “Come here!” We cuddled for a while until I thought it would be prudent to get dressed.

  “I’m going to take the scooter and go to the gym. You’ve probably got stuff you want to talk about.”

  “That’s nice of you. I think Aristo wants to vent a little.”

  Aristo arrived and I opened a bottle of wine. It always helps when someone’s venting. However, this time, he was completely cool, not upset at all. In fact, it was hard to see there was anything wrong.

  “He still treats me like a little kid. He has to understand that I’m not a kid anymore. That’s why I had to leave.”

  “But you’re ok?”

  “If it’s not ok to stay here, I can go to a hotel. It’s no problem. My boss pays well.”

  “Your boss will slap your behind if you’re not careful! I love having you here.”

  “Ok cool. Then I’ll stay. I met Aaron on the way here. He’s going to the gym, isn’t he?”

  “Yes, he’s going to teach the guys on Sifnos how to bend iron.” I said, mentally picturing the scene in my bedroom a half hour ago. How I covered his body with wet kisses.