Neil had no idea if this was all part of the change, or if this was an experience Bradley would have had before this all. The way things were was affecting just how much seemed normal, and how much was decidedly not. But what Neil could tell for sure was that the story that Bradley had told? That story about one of his clients suddenly breaking through a plateau, becoming well and truly "hot", it resonated with Neil. It made him realize exactly how much he aligned with it...and it was also just as well turning him on. He felt his sweat starting to trickle down his forehead. He looked to the side at a conflicted but still eager Max. Obviously eager to get back out on the workout floor and continue hitting some cardio at the end of his workout or some post-exhaustion workout plan.
The blond newly minted adonis could tell that it seemed like spending time in here had had an effect on them both. The brawny and muscular Max had now developed signs of growing toward the bodybuilder ideal - still fat and chubby at the edges, but with a lot more muscle to go with it, and his physique seemed more honed. More deliberately trained.
And Neil...fuck. Neil had never been a muscular guy before that week - right? - but now that Neil could get a good look at himself he was mystified by what he saw. He was really, truly looking like an amateur bodybuilder. Just shy of his first competition, ripped six pack abs, a powerful pectoral shelf, swollen, strong shoulders and pronounced trapezius muscles. A wide flaring back and lats, a tight and trim waist, and glutes, together with complimenting quads and thighs, that almost made Neil question how heterosexual he ever truly was...
If it was not for the fact he had observed all this happen in the first place. He could tell when these strange shifts in perception were due to happen, and when he noticed and saw them, it seemed they retreated from his mind. As if leaving to try and push their way in at some later date. When Neil was not going to be quite as diligent about the continuity of his week.
Max spoke up, "I'm gonna go keep hitting my workout. You good to go on, Neil?"
"I think..." Neil spoke, his voice heavy and his mouth seeming weighed down by saliva, "I'm gonna ask Brad for some further help with some of my poses. I think my side chest game was a little weak."
"Sure thing, man," Max seemed to be at least somewhat bemused and yet also not entirely aware of what was going on. "I'll see you around."
With that, Max left to go hit his workout, leaving Bradley and Neil alone together. Brad seemed to pick up on the fact there was an interminable homoerotic tension in the air, and so awkwardly chuckled, "Your uh, your side chest sure seemed fine when I saw you guys posing earlier..." He bit his lip, "Unless you wanted to talk to me about...something else."
An awkward silence. Neil looked at his half-hard cock resting in his shorts. He gripped his hands by his side. He knew before today he was as straight a guy as there had been. He knew something was doing this. Something was somehow involved making him feel this sense of curiosity. But at the same time there was an inexorable tug toward such actions. A thing he could hardly deny. A desire he could not quell, that was every bit as strong as time went on as his desire for women.
A desire he could not quite articulate yet, but he knew it heavily featured men - men particularly like Bradley. "I..." Neil started. He gulped, "I was feeling...so weird. So stirred in a certain way by that story you told."
Bradley crossed his arms, "Which one?"
"You know the one." Neil said quickly.
"You'll have to be more specific." Bradley was definitely back in his element now. With the two of them alone, and having a basic idea what Neil was on about, he was clearly in his element as a flirt. "Come on man, you'll have to say it."
"Do I...?" Neil shook his head, and blushed, looking up at the ceiling, mounted with just as many mirrors as the walls, giving the perfect image of the muscular male athlete - flush and confused about his desires, but feeling them all the same, "I want---I want to do something with you, man." Neil managed.
"And I don't blame you," Bradley subtly flexed as he leaned back, "I mean, look at me. The guys and the gals want a piece of this. Of course they do. We put in so much hard work for our bodies, right, Neil? It's natural that people pick up on that. You can just tell I put in all this effort." Brad flexed his arms, and Neil was once again left swooning. He knew what he wanted. He just didn't entirely know or get what that might entail.
He could articulate his sexual needs, but he knew so little about them by this point that he was not sure what to do with Bradley if the two even went forward with this. "So...can we? Can we like, fuck? Can we fool around somewhere? Maybe even in he---"
"Not in here, man," Bradley shook his head, arms across in front of his broad chest, "Too many people come in and around here. We have some pretty strict policies about sexual relations on the gym premises, due to a now former trainer who made use of the private training facilities for activities that were...not entirely professional."
"Ah." Neil nodded, though the mental image if anything turned him on even further.
And he could see, looking at Bradley, that even though he maintained such a profile of the professional trainer, he was just as well feeling pretty excited about the prospect of fooling around with an amateur bodybuilder. Not many guys around here to fool around with had the kind of bodily form that might approach Bradley's own. Neil's wasn't so close, but it was closer than most. The fact the trainer was nursing his own hard on was making Neil feel like just working off the tension in the locker room.
"So where can we---?" Neil trailed off, not saying what exactly they would be doing. Presumably there were just as many ways to have sex with a man as there were ways to have sex with a woman.
"At my place," Bradley said with a confident smile. Neil was a little surprised that Bradley was offering up his house and home for their little liaison, but then, maybe it was better that way. The younger bodybuilder saw fewer chances for any unwelcome intrusions that way. Bradley then continued, "Meet me after my current shift in about an hour. My car's a Honda Accord, out in the back, near the last tree before the road leading up to the college."
Neil remembered seeing that car and wondering whose it was. Now he knew that the sleek, sexy car belonged to a strong, masculine and sexy man. Fantasies ran through Neil's head of a threesome between him, Bradley and Sandra in the back of the car. Of them fumbling and erotically fooling around---
"Now before you get yourself too worked up," Bradley said with a chuckle as he saw how Neil was getting - the combination of an increasingly obvious erection and that much sweat was hard to ignore, "Keep yourself under control before we head on up to my place. It's downtown, a quaint old country home, refurbished about five years ago by yours truly."
Sounds nice, Neil thought. He cleared his head and nodded, "Yeah, alright, I'll be around and I'll uh, I'll be out there in an hour." With that, Neil went out and got on a cardio machine next to Max, who was plugging away trying to deal with his remaining fat and chisel that body into rock solid shape.
"I'll be out in an hour. I'll make sure and be back tonight at the dorm." With that, Neil went ahead, turned up the cardio, and joined Max on the treadmill.
Max for his part looked at the doors to the posing room, saw Bradley leaving with a confident smile, and wondered what they talked about in there. He could tell that something about Neil seemed different. He seemed resolved in doing something. Max just shrugged and went on with his workout. He figured if he worried too much about Neil, he wouldn't get in his best workout! After all, fixating on what other people were doing was a surefire way to lose track of your gains.
Even when it might be wise though to pay heed to what was going on.
----------------
Almost an hour later, Neil was cleaning up after his cardio, having showered and washed off his odors from sweating it up on the treadmill. Muscles glistening with sweat and his hair slicked back, Neil left the gym shortly ahead of Max and started heading off toward that car. Which he saw was the only one still parked over there. He could feel himself getting a bit more nervous. Wondering if Bradley would have been waiting, or if he just got out there himself...
And he was somewhat relieved that he didn't keep his friend waiting when he saw Bradley leaving through the back of the gym and walking out toward the car. Bradley chuckled when he saw that Neil was waiting awkwardly there. Like a deer in the headlights. "Wow, you really don't waste any time, do you? Well, let's get this rolling."
Bradley unlocked the car and got in the driver side door, before unlocking the passenger side door, "Your ride awaits, Mr. Boone."
Neil got in shortly after Bradley did, eagerly awaiting as he did to see how this would go. Fantasies of these sorts of once-forbidden affairs swirling through his head in an almost fetishistic light. Neil had only ever had fantasies prior of romance with and sexual involvement in women. But now he was going to experiment in his curiosity with men. And for that, Neil had absolutely no idea how these things tended to go. He'd seen gay couples on the silver screen before, but he had never exactly thought about the mechanisms of the act on their part. He had no idea how they did it, what went on, so on.
"Bradley...what're we gonna..." Neil asked.
------------------
Max Walmann was on his way out as well, having just finished changing clothes in the locker room following a shower. As he was drying off his hair he heard a voice - with a different, unique sound completely unique from how he ever heard it before. "Hey, are you Max Walmann, Neil Boone's buddy?"