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Deano's Winter: A Muscle University Story


muscleaddict

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Following on from my "Muscle University" story and the "Deano's Summer" spin-off, I've written a new eight-chapter novella length follow-up. Set four/five months after the last story ended, Deano goes back to his hometown of Brighton for the first time since the summer.

 

DEANO’S WINTER (A MUSCLE UNIVERSITY STORY)

One

“Here he is. The famous Deano!”

I smile awkwardly as Shaun’s dad strides up to me with his hand outstretched. A big warm smile on his handsome, rugged face. He’s like an older rougher version of Shaun with sandy blonde hair. He’s pretty built but he’s no bodybuilder.

He shakes my hand and then grabs my shoulder.

“Bloody hell!” he says as he feels my muscle, his eyes widening. I feel a flutter of excitement and can’t help but smirk. “Shaun wasn’t kidding,” he says, slapping and squeezing my shoulder. “You’re a right little tank!”

Shaun pulls a face and rolls his eyes as he lifts his suitcase off his bed.

“Well … not little. Only cause, you know …” and then he puts a flat hand above my head to highlight the fact that I’m such a short arse.

“Fucking hell, dad!” Shaun says, with a big sigh.

“Oi! Watch your language!” 

I roll my tongue around the inside of my cheek in an attempt to hide my smile at watching Shaun’s dad embarrass him. There’s another reason why I’m smiling too. Because it reminds me so much of how my own dad talks to me. And I know for a fact if he were here right now picking up to take me back home for the Christmas holidays he’d be embarrassing the fuck out of me in front of my roommate and best mate at Muscle University.

“What time’s your train then, Deano?”

“Eleven fifteen,” I tell Shaun’s dad as I zip my suitcase up.

He looks at his watch. “Ahhh, we’ve got plenty of time.”

Shaun has asked his dad if he’ll give me a lift to the train station in Glasgow.

“Cheers for the lift by the way,” I say, feeling a little awkward.

“No worries, fella,” he says. “Bit far for your old man to come and get you, from Brighton isn’t it?”

I smile and nod, while thinking, “Thank fucking God.” Even if Shaun weren’t here, the chances are my dad would find some way to embarrass me if he were to come up here and pick me up from campus. 

And now I suddenly have an image in my head of trailing behind my dad as he storms down one of the corridors of Johnson Hall in a “Deano’s Gym” t-shirt barking at me at an unnecessary volume. “Come on. Get a bloody move on, you little shit! I haven’t got all bloody day!” Half of my fucking year watching the scene and sniggering at my expense.

I put my black North Face jacket on over my favourite black Montgomery University hoodie which somehow makes me look like even more of a tank.

“You lads ready then?” Mr Hudson says.

“Yes, dad!” he whines, pulling a face, causing me to smirk again.

As I lift my suitcase off my bed, I feel this strong sense of poignancy. Since our last lecture of the term ended yesterday I’ve felt this weird mix of nostalgia and sadness. That the term is over. And now I feel it more than ever as me, Shaun and his dad make our way out and I take my last look at our second-year Johnson Hall dorm room until the New Year.

I’m probably just being overdramatic, but I can’t help it. This has honestly been the best term I’ve had since I started at the Montgomery University of Bodybuilding & Fitness.

I don’t really know why. I think it’s a mixture of things. Being a second-year feels a bit more relaxed. It’s pretty cool knowing you’re not amongst the youngest and smallest students anymore. The lecturers seem to respect us a bit more. Even Johnny Hoxton, who I was convinced didn’t like me last year, now seems to have warmed to me a bit. I think. At least that’s the feeling I get. I guess I’ve calmed down a bit too since that first year. That’s probably helped. I’m less of a loud-mouthed twat now. I dunno. I don’t really feel the need to do any of that stuff anymore. Shout out in class. Act like a complete twat.

And in turn, I’ve found myself making some new friends and hanging out with people I didn’t last year. There’s a little group of us who have started going to the Students’ Union Bar every Saturday. Me, Shaun, Eric Mafra (still the biggest dude in the year) and Ashley Mosaku who is an absolute fucking beast. Crazy quads. A massive arse. He’s a bit of a loudmouth actually. He’s kind of taken over my role. Cocky as hell. But he’s not annoying with it. I kind of just find it funny. He actually reminds me a bit of mad cunt Tony from back home in Brighton. Kind of like if Tony was a hot jacked tank of a bodybuilder from South London. 

I’m calling Ash hot (which he definitely is) but don’t worry, I’m not secretly pining after him or anything. I have no interest in ever pining after a fellow student again. Or a bodybuilder slash personal trainer who, oooh, I dunno, happens to work at my dad’s gym or something. No more pining. No more obsessively checking Instagram profiles. No more standing at the back of Posing Practice feeling a knot in my stomach wishing I was the person Sebastian Wood was standing next to and occasionally whispering to and grinning at (I’m not even in the same Posing Practice lesson as them this year). No more lying on my bed with my arm wrapped around my back wishing it belonged to someone else. I’m done with that shit. I’m really fucking done with it.

About an hour later and I’m settling into my seat on the train. As I’m taking my jacket off, I notice two men walking through the carriage and towards me. The way they’re looking at me. Fuck. One turns his head and looks at the other (his boyfriend maybe?) and they exchange little knowing smirks.

It makes me feel a bit nervous and awkward but at the same time, I dunno, it kind of gives me a little rush too. And now they’re past me and walking into the next carriage, I’m finding that I’m suddenly smiling to myself.

I look at my reflection in the train window. I still have the same haircut I’ve had since I started university. Even though I told my dad I was thinking of changing it back in the summer after - well, after what happened, I didn’t. I think I kind of thought why should I change it? Just because - well, just because.

This black hoodie used to fit me really well, but because I’ve packed on more size since September, it’s getting a bit tight around my upper arms. I’ll probably have to buy a bigger sized one soon (which will no doubt be way too long in the arms - the perks of being a short-arsed pocket rocket bodybuilder). I wonder if I flexed hard enough the seams on the arms would rip? I smirk at that thought. If I suggested that to Shaun and Ash at the SU bar when we’d been drinking they’d probably make me do it to see if the hoodie actually did rip.

I like who I am when I’m with those lads. Even though they don’t know everything about me. Even though there’s this whole side to me they know nothing about. And might be surprised at.

I don’t really feel like I’m lying to the lads. Nor do I feel like what they see of me is an act. They just see certain parts of me. And I think I’m maybe starting to enjoy the fact that I have this secret that not many people know about. That I don’t really get to act on or indulge in much up here at Muscle University. (Save for the time I was sitting on Sebastian Wood’s bed wearing nothing but my maroon red velvet posing trunks, pumped and sweaty from flexing and posing for him.)

It feels kinda weird to be going back home. The further I get from Glasgow the more the last few months seem like a distant memory and the more I find my thoughts slipping to the last time I was home.

I don’t really think about last summer too much. It felt so far away when I was at uni. But now, these memories keep coming back. Things I try not to think about. Even though I sometimes do.

As my second train from London begins to approach Brighton, I get that familiar sense of poignancy I always do. I love the familiarity of home. The fact that nothing here changes. I know exactly what’s waiting for me here. My room will look the same as it did when I left. Josh will be the same old Josh he always is. Annoyingly carefree, occasionally hyper, even more annoyingly good looking. Dad will be the same old dad too. I don’t think he’ll ever change. I find myself smiling as I think about that.

When I look at my phone I find a text from Tony asking me if I’m still up for going out tonight. Which I most definitely am. I can just imagine what my dad will say about that.

I roll my tongue around the inside of my cheek to stop from smiling when I spot my dad’s black Land Rover outside the station. I don’t want him to think I’m, like, happy to see him or anything.

“Come on!” he barks impatiently, followed by a loud sigh as I get in the passenger seat. The train was about ten minutes late getting in.

“Nice to see you too, dad.”

“Why was it so bloody late getting in?”

I shrug. “I dunno!”

He sighs loudly again and shakes his head. I smirk and turn my head to look out of the passenger window. Same old dad. He really never does change.

I think about asking him how the gym is. But then I think better of it. As we drive towards the end of the road I see all of the Christmas decorations lit up in the streets. I’d totally forgotten about this. North Street is packed. There are people everywhere out shopping. It’s only now that I’m starting to realise just how much I’ve missed this town.

“You’re erm …” my dad pauses and clears his throat, “not seeing those twat friends of yours tomorrow are you?”

Why does he sound weird? I look at him suspiciously. 

“Why?!”

He shoots me a stern look. I’m expecting him to bark something else at me, but he doesn’t.

He turns back to face the road. “We’re going out.”

“Where?!” I say, screwing my face up.

Dad groans. “For lunch! Is that okay with you?”

I shrug. “Suppose!”

I can’t remember my dad ever taking me out to Sunday lunch before.

“With mum and Gary?”

“No.”

“What - just you, me and Josh then?”

He lets out another loud sigh. “When are you going back to uni?”

Josh’s dance music is blaring from his bedroom when I get back home.

“Do you have to have that music so bloody loud?” my dad barks as he walks into the kitchen and I’m hanging my jacket up.

I walk into the kitchen and there he is. My big brother, Joshua, looking even more annoyingly good looking as ever. He’s wearing a tight fitted grey t-shirt. His modest pecs spilling out of the V neck collar.

“Yo lil’ broski!” he says to me.

“All right?”

“Bloody hell. You look HUGE!” he says to me.

I look down. Weirdly, I feel bigger than I normally do now that I’m back home with dad and Josh. Rather than on a university campus surrounded by bulging muscle lads.

“I should bloody think so!” my dad says. 

Me and Josh exchange smirks.

“What time’s dinner?” I ask my dad, sitting down at the table.

“MY dinner’s in about an hour. I don’t know what you’re making yourself. There might be a frozen pizza in the freezer somewhere.”

I pull a face and roll my eyes.

“WHY?” my dad asks, suspiciously.

I shrug. “Going out with Tony,” I casually say.

“Fucking hell!” he groans.

Yep. There it is. I look at Josh and we smile at each other.

“Don’t you be getting into a bloody state for tomorrow!”

“Why?!”

My dad clears his throat. “Told you earlier,” he says, not looking at me, “we’re going out.”

I screw my face up. “It’s only lunch.”

Josh gives dad a look. This suspicious smirk on his face. He’s practically giddy. What the fuck is going on?

“Haven’t you told D, yet?” he asks.

Dad rolls his eyes and sits down opposite me, not making eye contact.

“Told me what?”

For some reason, my stomach clenches sharply. And I get this horrible feeling that I’m really not going to like whatever my brother’s about to say next.

“Dad’s got a girlfriend!”

***

And anyone who followed the original thread will have seen these already but I thought I'd include the below illustrations of Deano. The first was drawn by @brawnygods and the second by @Rayjacked - both incredibly talented artists who have profiles here.

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It's so nice to again be spending time with Deano as we read his continuing story.  Thanks, MA, and really looking forward to seeing how his Brighton time plays out.

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1 minute ago, DennisFLL said:

It's so nice to again be spending time with Deano as we read his continuing story.  Thanks, MA, and really looking forward to seeing how his Brighton time plays out.

Bless you, mate. I definitely felt that there was more to explore with him after the last story. Hopefully you'll like the direction this one goes in! 😊

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Ohhhhh, look what I found here.  

muscleaddict, our unmet friend, thank you.  thank you so very much.

"I’m less of a loud-mouthed twat now." - - Loved that line!!!!!!

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1 hour ago, crushme99 said:

Ohhhhh, look what I found here.  

muscleaddict, our unmet friend, thank you.  thank you so very much.

"I’m less of a loud-mouthed twat now." - - Loved that line!!!!!!

Haha! Glad you're enjoying it, mate! 😘

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Yess, glad to hear from you MA. Needless to say i am on board and ready for the ride. Deano seems in a very centered state of mind - i am curious to see how that will hold up ;)

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29 minutes ago, silverfox said:

Yess, glad to hear from you MA. Needless to say i am on board and ready for the ride. Deano seems in a very centered state of mind - i am curious to see how that will hold up ;)

Thanks, matie. Yeah - I thought it would be interesting to pick things up again with Deano in a good place! 

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