bathing – Mansploitation

Knuckle fat-lipped in the doorway, speaking only when he gotta. Knuckle liked working the door. It was liminal, and he hovered neither inside nor out but in the middle like a child hiding in scattered shadows. The sky drizzled lightly tonight, and his right shoulder got wet, but his left shoulder remained dry. He done confiscated a greaser’s switchblade. But the crowd lusted quietly tonight. He knew his scarred face scared men into submission and prevented brouhahas. As far as he was concerned, that was a good thing. Mr. Gregarian said it was a double-edged sword — no rowdiness, so no fighting, but no rowdiness, so no overdoing it on overpriced drinks either. Knuckle ain’t know if Mr. Gregarian told him that because he expected him to fix it or not, but Knuckle ain’t savvy changing how he got perceived, so he never did nothing about it. The switchblade still sat hotly in Knuckle’s pocket.
“Hey, scarface, is Caitlyn Smiles working tonight?”
“-got a pussy on his neck.”
“Sssssh, ssh, ssh, he’ll hear.”
The men all fell silent as sand before they shuffled up to the doorway where Knuckle stood, basking in the luscious leather napkin of the West Virginia night while being buffeted by the overwhelming warmth and wafts of cigarette smoke pluming out from the club’s insides. He checked IDs and sent them in. No cover charges on Sunday, only Friday and Saturday nights and some holidays, Mr. Gregarian said, because otherwise the place got too crowded and the men focused on tipping dancers instead of ordering drinks from Teddy.
Teddy has very soft fingers.
Ever since that night when Teddy jacked him off in the weight room, Knuckle thought about those fingers and returned to the weight room to see if Teddy might meet him there again and touch him with those fingers that were soft like a kitten’s tail. Those fingers had danced and teased his skin, caressing, affectionate, warm, inviting like a hot stove heaping out heat.
And that mouth was soft and warm too, and Knuckle craved it. Lips. Tongue.
Teddy said nice words. Knuckle ain’t recall them, but he remembered the tone and timbre, which resonated in his ears and remained there like resounding church bells and made his toes tingle every time he thought about them. He snuck drinks from his flask as he worked tonight. The vodka in the flask was thinly redolent of sun-baked plastic. It probably came in a plastic bottle, but he ain’t remember the bottle.
Just before midnight, Knuckle had to go in and lay hands on a black fellah who was getting garish and jagged in the mouth, cuz he done grabbed Caitlyn Smiles’s tits, and she looked at Knuckle with a ruddy face and a puckering pair of eyes and a torn bra, and she said, “You better wreck that bastard, Knuckle!”, and so Knuckle grabbed the man by the neck and dragged him into the back alley like a outside dog, and he punched him and kicked him behind the dumpster and left him there sputtering and bathing bloodwise in moonlight because tonight a full moon splashed effulgence through the clouds, and Knuckle liked that he could see so clearly, even in the alley where there ain’t no streetlight.
The black man had a gold crucifix with a ruby at the base. Knuckle took it. He gave it to Caitlyn Smiles later, and he wanted to tell her so many things that were true both inside the club and out, that the necklace was pretty like her, that Jesus would protect her, that Knuckle would protect her, that no man had the right to treat her like that or to paw her like a possessive puppy. In his mind, Knuckle thought all those things, but out loud, he croaked in a bumpy baritone, “Here. I’s givin’ this to you.” She took it and popped a tit out of her dress as though the necklace was a tip and she needed to earn it, but Knuckle ain’t even look at the naked breast. She stood there for a second with her tit out, realized Knuckle had no intention of groping it, then she screwed up her pretty face and scuttered away like she done see a ghost. She blushed. Caitlin Smiles never blushed except deliberately to seduce a man, but Knuckle made her blush by not looking at her bare tit.
Later, Knuckle saw her whispering about it to Teddy with the soft fingers and the lime-slicing knife in one hand. She said “he’s such a freak!” with a giggled-up laugh, and Teddy nodded grimly. They both took a shot of cinammon liqueur and scrupulously avoided looking in Knuckle’s direction.
But Knuckle ain’t let on that he heard. He stood in the doorway. Nobody thought he was where they were when he was in the doorway — Teddy was inside and treated Knuckle like he was outside, so Teddy and Caitlyn could share snickers about him in private, while the men approaching the door outside nervously talked about how to get past the scary-looking bouncer as though he was a statue who couldn’t hear what they said from a few feet away.
That was why Knuckle liked liminal spaces.
“Hey, Knuckle, is the shower in the back nice? Plenty of hot water?” Teddy asked a few minutes after close that night. The last of the men done skedaddle before Knuckle could tell them to leave. The dancers left in a big group because nobody wanted Knuckle to escort them one-on-one through the parking lot.
Knuckle plopped down at the bar. Teddy slid him a cheap drink, while he finished closing down and locking up the bar. Knuckle downed it in one gulp. “No,” he said.
Teddy looked at him like that hadn’t answered his question. He shrugged. “Oh. Okay. Well, I don’t wanna use all your hot water.”
“I do not shower a lot,” Knuckle said.
“Uhhhh…” Teddy stammered and blushed. “Yeah, the dancers complain about that, and… Nevermind. Knuckle, I, uh…” He thought for a long time, then broke eye contact with Knuckle. “Nevermind,” he said again. “I’m having trouble with the shower at my place. There’s this bum who keeps squatting there.” Teddy lived in a ratty old apartment building down the street, and it came with a group shower. Teddy said, “It’s fine. He’s usually passed out cold this late. It just makes the shower seem dirty, and I thought I could shower here before I leave for the night. But I know you’ve been staying here, so-“
“Let’s go,” Knuckle said. He stood up as though to leave, while Teddy was still closing down the bar.
Teddy paused. “What?”
“I will slit his throat if he does not leave,” Knuckle said. He walked to the door.
Teddy had to race after him. “Who? The hobo! Wait, Knuckle! That’s… a little extreme. Wait!” Knuckle stopped by the door and stood motionless. It took Teddy a few seconds to realize that was Knuckle waiting — he just stopped in the middle of Lipsweet like a robot whose off-switch had gotten flicked. “Wait, uh… don’t kill him. You don’t gotta kill him.”
After a pause, Knuckle said, “yes.”
“Okay, just… Talk to him sternly, maybe. Thanks for helping. Don’t kill anybody,” Teddy said. “Lemme just get the bar shut down.” He paused and said again, “Don’t kill anyone.” He raced to finish closing Lipsweet, then he and Knuckle piled into Teddy’s four-door to head to his building.
It was a square building with cardboard replacing most of the windows on the first floor. Teddy lived on the third floor though, which was the top floor. Knuckle saw a row of windows with blinds and curtains and flickering TV screens visible through them. One of those windows was Teddy’s place, the thought of which made Knuckle’s heart tumble over its beat.
Teddy followed Knuckle up the stairs to the third floor. The stairwell was a cold concrete column with spraypainted graffiti scrawled on every surface. The dancers would be shocked and exhilarated to learn Teddy had invited Knuckle to his home — it was an accident, but still, Teddy was going with Knuckle to a second location. The dancers wouldn’t even go with Knuckle into the next room.
Knuckle done took off his shirt and his wifebeater because it was a warm and humid night. His chest cooled, and the nasty burn scar on his shoulder heaved up and down with every breath. Teddy kept sneaking glances at his broad, powerful muscles. Those scars were stark in the dimly lit arteries of Teddy’s building.
Twenty apartments lined the central corridor of the third floor, and they all shared one group shower with just two showerheads. Teddy showed Knuckle to his apartment and pointed out the shower, but Knuckle went straight there, not into Teddy’s place. Teddy followed him, key in hand, into the shower.
The hobo, Bax, sprawled on his back, bugging out in a nest of rotting old clothes and scraps of cardboard. He lay in the middle of the shower area, so he ain’t gonna get wet even if both showerheads was running. That was rare though, as usually men showered alone here.
He ain’t move until Knuckle picked him up by the throat, smacked him in the face and growled. “You don’t live here! You-“
“Aaaagchk!” Bax’s eyes opened wide — he had been awake for days, on a meth binge, but he was unaware of Knuckle until he started hitting him. Knuckle slapped him again. Bax barked, “Git off me!”

When Bax peeped Knuckle’s scarred face and murderous mein, he squealed and squirmed. He clawed at Knuckle’s chest. His feet kicked the cold floor, but Knuckle brought him outta the showers and ignored his blows and cries.
Knuckle dragged him down the stairs and out into the West Virginia night. “If you come back, I will slit your throat,” Knuckle said. He tossed Bax like a sac of seed towards the road.

Then he turned around and came back inside with Teddy, who crouched by the door with wide eyes. Knuckle stood there as though waiting for another assignment.
“Thanks,” Teddy said, blushing. Bax stumbled off into the night, blood trickling from his nose. “You wanna come into my apartment? We could have a drink.”
Knuckle nodded.
They went into Teddy’s apartment. Knuckle stood there like a gravestone, while Teddy fixed them both a quick drink. Then Teddy saw him standing blankly and motioned to the couch. Knuckle sat down. He gulped his drink down in one motion. Teddy sat on the back of the couch, spreading his legs so he could rub Knuckle’s shoulders.
“Tell me about Emma,” Teddy said when he saw that tattoo again on the nape of Knuckle’s neck. His fingers hesitated before touching the burn scar on Knuckle’s neck, but Knuckle’s whole body relaxed at his touch, so he gathered Knuckle liked it or at least tolerated it. He wondered what kind of a woman would love Knuckle. Had Knuckle said she loved him? He definitely said he loved her, but had it gone the other direction? Teddy couldn’t remember.
Knuckle nodded. He waited for Teddy to pour him another drink, then he described the traveling carnival he had joined when he was a mere teenage runaway. He traveled all over the country with that carnival.
She was a glittering blonde beauty when Knuckle first saw her, swathed in bulb light from the carnival. She glid like a galleon through the crowd. She was accompanied by a boyfriend, Tom, but Knuckle ain’t clock him. The world parted like clouds around the sun, so nobody else existed, just her, serene and curving to forever, making Knuckle’s knees go weak.
The Sammy Smack-It Strength Meter dinged and belled behind him, but Knuckle couldn’t tear his eyes away from her.
“Mister! Mister! You s’posed to gimme them tickets!” said the old man who had just scored nearly top marks on the Strength Meter. Thirty tickets had been dispensed from the machine behind Knuckle, so he tore them off the roll and gave them to the wiry old man.
When Knuckle looked again for her, she was gone, lost in the crowd of Indiana appleseeds.
They were in Peoria. It took Knuckle a few minutes to remember that — all these towns looked the same to him, the same people in the same clothes, speaking the same words as they lifted the same hammer and brought it down on the same strength machine.
The one thing different here was her.
Knuckle’s eyes opened wide when he caught a glimpse of her again later. This time she was swathed in swimming darkness, just outside the well-lit carnival grounds. Children streamed past in front of Knuckle, running outta the carnival with caramel apples and sacs of Candy Annie’s home-made sweets. Knuckle pushed past them to get close enough to hear the pretty blonde lady, whose face was pursed tight, her lips bloodless, glowing when she passed under a streetlight, where she stopped to snap something harsh to that man she was with.
“You are such a asshole!” she said to him.
It was only when she said that that Knuckle finally saw she was with a man. A boyfriend. Of course a woman like her wouldn’t be single. She probably had a line of suitors trying to meet her, Knuckle thought.
He went back to the strength meter. That was it. She was gone. He might see her again before the carnival left whatever dipshit town this was, but probably not. He could have talked to her.
But he didn’t, and that was that.
The carnival shut down at ten-thirty, but Knuckle was already done by then. Nobody came by the strength meter that late. He went to the tent he lived in and sat in the lawnchair he done place out front. The sky was dappled with stars overhead, and the night was cool and calm like that woman’s eyes. But inside, Knuckle was afrenzied, with desire and with rage, and he soon got overwhelmed by the feelings coursing through him.
He stood, as the other carnies came in for the night, and he spat curse words. He formed a fist with one hand and punched his other hand in palm hard enough to hurt. He kept doing it, stalking and pacing afront his trailer.
“What’s wrong with you?” asked Pavel when he walked past. He was the horse-tamer and expert for the carnival, and he set up people — mainly little girls — with horseback rides. He always smelled like a barnyard. “There’s women here, Knuckle, don’t make ’em uncomfortable.”
Knuckle nodded. His face was grim and ruddy. He stood motionless, unsure what he could say or do that Pavel wouldn’t think made the lady carnies uncomfortable. There weren’t even any women around, most likely. The handful of female carnies were probably in their own tent by now.
“Let’s go for a bath,” Pavel said. That was where he was headed when he saw Knuckle. He always bathed first because he smelled so much like a horse. He ain’t like laying in bed in a cloud of horsehair and straw.
As he led Knuckle into the bath tent, Pavel listened to him talk about the girl he done saw. Pavel was older than Knuckle, and wiser, so he just smiled and patted Knuckle on the back.
“You’re getting this worked up over a girl you ain’t even talk to yet?” Pavel asked.
Knuckle nodded. “I guess it is kinda silly.” He blushed. His face ain’t riddled with scars then. He had a strong, straight jaw with a masculine jawline and a shaggy mane of jet hair.
Pavel filled up two wooden tubs with hot water, then he hurried to rip off his stableboy clothes. He was lean and ripped, powerfully built on his own merits, though he looked skinny next to Knuckle’s barrel-shaped body. Knuckle was slow, his eyes still dreamy and far away. By the time Knuckle was done, Pavel was already sighing and sinking into the warm water.
He leaned back in the tub and sighed. “C’mon into the water, Knuckle. Don’t get’cha hopes up about pretty nice girls. Set your sights on a carnie, most likely. Caroline Nazzir likes you.” She was a carnie, a mermaid in the Hall of Wonders, as well as a pickpocket. She done made it very clear she would sleep with any man, more or less.
But Knuckle never liked her.
His hardon jutted against his briefs when Knuckle dropped his pants. He ain’t even realize that until he took his underwear off and saw it. He covered it up with both hands, not because it would be scandalous for Pavel to see him sporting a stiffy but simply because Pavel would make of him being smitten when he did see it.
And Knuckle had to admit, he was smitten. He couldn’t stop thinking about that girl, Emma, as he climbed into the tub and sat across from Pavel. Their legs were intertwined. Since Knuckle was bigger, his legs were on the outside, pressed against the sides of the wooden tub.
“I see that, you horny dog, you sportin’ wood,” Pavel said with a baritone laugh. “You still thinkin’ about her, ain’cha?”
Knuckle nodded. He got an awkward grin on his face. “She was so pretty, Pavel…”
One of Pavel’s big knobbly feet gripped Knuckle’s dick under the water. He rubbed it up and down and laughed at the look on Knuckle’s face — Knuckle’s eyes lit up with surprise, then disgust, then a long slow melting bliss as his half-hardon turned into a full-on.
Pavel grimaced and laughed at the same time, and he put his other foot on it too. Knuckle’s dick throbbed under Pavel’s callused feet, softened by the water. Knuckle twitched.
Pavel was jacking Knuckle off with his feet for two reasons. The first was that it was funny. The second was that it would mean Knuckle ain’t gonna make Pavel use his mouth or even butt later. That was an option because Pavel owed a lot of money to this carnival, and he had to pay it by giving up the butt to any carnie who needed it. That mattered because a horny carnie was liable to start trouble in the small towns they visited.
But his plan backfired — Knuckle stood up, and, in one smooth motion, bathwater still dripping from his cock, Knuckle slipped his dick into Pavel’s mouth. Knuckle bent his knees, his eyes still upcast and dreamy, like he was moving on autopilot.
Pavel made a sourpuss puckering face, but he ain’t refuse. He been taking dick for years in this carnival, and it was better than starving to death in Poland. At least here, the food was plentiful. He slurped spit up and down Knuckle’s shaft.
A baritone grunt came from Knuckle’s mouth, and he pistoned his hips. His dick rammed into Pavel’s throat. Pavel was a tall man, so he managed to swallow almost the whole thing, until his nose was nestled in Knuckle’s pubic bush.
“Ooooohhhhmmmmm…” Knuckle moaned. He thought getting hard and blowing a nut would make him forget about that blonde woman, but it didn’t. He kept thinking about her anyway. She was too pretty to imagine himself fucking her, so he pictured her talking to him and touching his arm and giggling when he spoke — giggling with her eyes too, not just her mouth.
Sour, salty precum coated Pavel’s tongue. A moist gurgling sound came from Pavel, who patted Knuckle’s big asscheeks to signal he needed a break. Pavel spat a mouthful of prenut and wiped pubic hair off his lips.
“Gimme a sec,” Pavel said. He clutched his belly with one hand, his face tense and queasy. He held back a gag and pursed his lips shut tightly.
But Knuckle kept humping, his hips gyrating, his cock jabbing back and forth, without Knuckle paying any attention. Knuckle’s mind was fixated on her. He ain’t even notice at first that his dick moved through the air, not Pavel’s mouth. It poked Pavel in the nose when he was trying not to gag, and that caused him to retch violently.
“Uaaaaggghhhhk…!” Pavel held his stomach again and spat outta the bathtub. He intended to keep spitting until the eye-wateringly salty taste of precum vanished, but Knuckle’s dick kept poking him in the face like it was trying to find his mouth. “Gimme a sec, Knuckle-“
But his mouth opened to speak, and Knuckle — his eyes still closed — aimed his rod right for it. Pavel’s whole body buckled as Knuckle’s knob invaded his mouth, instantly filling it again with precum.
Pavel ain’t try to spit it out, though his wiry chest muscles all flexed as he held back a gag. Knuckle’s pecker pulsated like an alien beast in his mouth, and Pavel’s tongue slathered spit up and down the shaft.
Cum flowed into Pavel’s throat. Knuckle grunted again, and he pounded on his chest. Pavel winced, scrunching his eyes shut. The taste was intensely salty and powerful. He held back a gag.
Finally, Knuckle let go, and Pavel pulled off. He simultaneously gasped for air and spat jizz onto the ground outside the wooden tub. He paused for a moment. “Ecchk, your jizz tastes awful, Knuckle.” He spat again, as Knuckle sighed and wiped his dicktip off on Pavel’s cheek.
“Thanks, Pavel,” Knuckle said. His nostrils flared, and he sat back down in the spermy water of the wooden bathtub. “But I still can’t stop thinking about her.”