EXCERPT: Simple Men

Simple Men is essentially the story of Foster Lewis - the new chaplain of Verona College -and the school's football coach, Chip. Yet the side story of college ball players Brad & Jason has gotten quite a response from readers, some even suggesting they get their own book. This is the scene where I introduce those two troublemakers.

Football is an outside sport. Jason Jordan hated practice in the gym because it might rain. All the guys did. Nobody minded getting wet. They were ball players after all. Still, there was one good thing about practice inside: Coach Arnold wore his skin tight shorts. Any other coach would look like a caricature in those shorts, but Coach Arnold…The man could wear the hell out of those shorts! When they trained outside, the coach wore his usual sweats or pant suit. But on strength-training days, it was the shorts. They were mesh, shone off the fluorescent lights, and hugged tight around the Coach’s thick legs like a wrapped ham at Christmas.

Mmm. Ham. Jason suddenly realized he was hungry.

The team sat on the gym floor in designated rows. They had just finished with their calisthenics, the dullest part of strength training, and the Coach was going on about something. Jason really wasn’t giving it too much thought. He was caught up in Coach Arnold’s thighs. He rested back on his hands, his legs spread out, his mouth salivating at naughty fantasies. He was sure he wasn’t the only one. The coach had a bulge in his shorts that couldn’t be ignored.

Beside him sat his best friend, Brad Park. Brad was a bit of a troublemaker. In fact, they both were, but Brad looked the part more. He had a goofy grin and carried with him an air of mischief. Jason was a slyer sort of troublemaker. It was his looks that let him get away with most things – the sweet eyes, the mop head of hair – whereas Brad’s eyes were dangerously close to wide-eyed shiftiness and his hair was shorn. The two had been best friends since starting college, having connected immediately over B-movies and country music. They were not the most popular guys at school, but they were well-liked enough. Coach Arnold seemed to like them anyway, and that’s what mattered. You get in good with the coach and you’re set. Brad’s dad and half dozen brothers had told him this.

Brad had dated a few different girls, but none seemed willing to take his shtick for long. He wasn’t surprised by this, or even particularly hurt when a relationship ended. At the end of a lousy date, he still got to go back to his dorm where his best bud, Jason, was waiting, most likely with a copy of some dark, twisted movie filled with bad special effects and a freshly opened box of Chips Ahoy!

Jason was the type of guy who was invited to all the formals. He cleaned up very well. Yet he was never too interested in anything more than that. He had plenty of girl friends, but no girlfriends. He’d not had a girlfriend his entire time in school, though Brad knew he had been involved with a girl at least once before college. None of that mattered, though. When Jason and Brad were alone in their room, they had a blast watching the movies and pigging out on junk food. (Enjoy it, they were told. Your metabolism betrays you as you get older. And that’s just the first thing.)

They wrestled some…Well, a lot. They were, after all, on the wrestling team when football wasn’t in season. But some of the guys in the house – especially those in the floor below them – found their late night pinnings quite annoying.

Jason’s mind had shifted to one of these late night matches as the coach spoke. It was no longer the coach who was making his mouth water as he sat on the gym floor, but Brad. The coach was only a momentary salivation; Brad had been filling Jason’s thoughts for about a year now. By the feel of Brad’s pecker last night as they rubbed against one another in a spontaneous match – frotting, he had heard it was called – Brad felt the same. Nothing was said the next morning, though. Jason was a man of few words anyway. Why waste them on embarrassed utterings.

Jason heard Brad snicker. He leaned over Jason’s shoulder and pointed at his happy crotch. “Dude!” he said. “Watch the boner.”

Sure enough, Jason’s dick stood at alert, stretching his own mesh shorts. He owned the moment, shrugging with a smile. “Jealous?”

“Shit! I got that beat and you know it.” He reached to his own shorts as if he were going to pull the thing out. Jason loved that cocky grin. Brad was a bulldog, but he was a bulldog with a tender heart. He didn’t show that aspect of himself to too many people though.

“Guys!” the coach called from the front. “Something wrong? Am I bothering you?” The coach had one of those voices that could clear a stadium.

“Jason’s got a boner, Coach!” Brad blurted out.

Snickers and guffaws from the assembled players.

“Pay attention, guys,” Coach Arnold instructed the two troublemakers.

“I am, sir,” Jason said with a grin. He nodded at his penis. It was starting to subside.

Coach gave them a You two will never grow up look. “All right, everyone. Hit the showers. Remember, practice tomorrow at four on the field….as long as it doesn’t rain.”

The gym filled with the squeaking of shoe rubber and relief. Most of the guys were starving.

“You two,” he said, pointing at Jason and Brad with the rolled up coaching magazine he always seemed to have in his hand. The boys wondered if he ever actually read it. “I need to speak with you.”

“Listen, Coach,” Jason said. “I’m sorry. Sometimes I just get distracted. You know how it is. It has a life of its own. I’ll start wearing a strap if you want.”

“I don’t want to talk about your pecker, Jason. I have a favor to ask.”

“Anything, Coach,” Brad said. “What can we do you for?"