Reginald Thickman is a professor of industrial arts, a welder, a sculptor and assistant coach at GHU.
Descriptions
Mr. Thickman taught certain blue-collar skills like welding but mainly focused on Foreman Qualifications Engineering — which was apparently a degree program intended for factory foremen. Avery had never heard of it before because it was mainly taken by athletes who needed an easy A and a simple degree.
He was there in a heavy black apron, a helmet, filthy jeans and little else — no shirt beneath the apron. The helmet, with built-in goggles, was to protect himself from the sparks flying from his welding torch. They illuminated the caliginous workshop like a spotlight aimed at his sweat-gleaming cabled shoulders.
From The Basketball Coach
Professor Reginald Thickman — as the sign on the door said, not Coach Thickman — had incredible arms. He was a black man with very dark skin and big fleshy arms. He had a thick barrel chest too.
He had a dense mustache that was well-trimmed and a layer of unkempt beard hairs beneath that.
Thickman took a deep breath and rolled his eyes. He was used to bossing around big tough guys, both his students and his players. When he wore this nasty shirt that showed off his arms and he told his “boys” what to do, they jumped to it. They knew he meant business. Professor Thickman did not play around.
From The Basketball Coach
The apartment smelled like a bachelor — specifically, it smelled like a black bachelor, which Avery found alluring. There were scents of coconut butter and sweat and medicinal lotion and sweat-soaked underwear and takeout steak-and-cheese subs without the bun and farty drawers and wrinkled clothes that lived in a hamper and Febreze and unwashed bedsheets that stank of armpits. It was an alluring smell, even if it also made Avery wrinkle his nose.
Thickman lived in a sad little apartment with a living room dominated by a bench press. The first time Avery had come over, Thickman had covered the weights up with a sheet because Avery had called him out on it when they first met, but he had stopped doing so eventually. The bench press was even a little moist today, like Thickman had been using it recently and his backsweat still clung to it. Thickman was shirtless when he opened the door.
From The Basketball Coach