The Quest (21 page)

              I arrived on base a half hour before time, I was afraid to be late. The commanding officer in charge greeted me then passed me off to a big buff guy that held a clipboard in his hands with all the details. A woman dressed in fatigues greeted me as well and welcomed me aboard. I was glad someone knew how to smile. I was beginning to think I was heading into war.

              The requests were simple, easy shots, but long hours of continual shooting. This I knew would be the case. I had been pre-warned the commander was very particular and to get the shots he wanted the exercise would have to be repeated again and again. I was okay with that. I had all the time in the world. And my view, well, let me just add, there’s nothing like watching a group of fit, handsome fatigues grunt and work hard before your very eyes. I was in candy land with all pawns at my feet following my commands. It wasn’t long, too, before their actions had them beaming with sweat and soaked to the bone. It was a nice view somewhat like the one I enjoy when I lift at the gym. So yes, I was quite pleased with my role in capturing the essence of their beautiful gleaming bods.

              Did I mention military men are just beautiful? Their bodies are conditioned finer than a machine. Their muscles are formed and carved into pure perfection and there’s no room for flaws, anywhere! I couldn’t find even one. They were all different sizes…short and tall. But each in their own right buff and strong. It was hard to pick a favorite. The women even were cut and defined, a look I had always longed for but I don’t have the discipline to do. There were only a few women in the mix and to be honest they looked just as strong and sexy as some of the men. Did I say that? Yes, and no, I’m not gay I just know how to recognize beauty when I see it. 

              But the buff one holding the clipboard, I like to call him Brutus, never cocked a smile. Not even a half crooked one. No, he just barks, blows his whistle, and stares angrily at me. I’ve seen that stare before, and no, not interested in why he stares at me like that. Better off not knowing. Besides, I don’t find him attractive at all. I like men who smile. He looked mean and rough, hard and serious, a very no-nonsense, no-fun type. I think if he tried he could have a softer look to his face. That’s if he stopped wrinkling his forehead at me. He was probably wondering what my story was. Well, he can just wonder. Like I said I wasn’t interested in Brutus despite how nice his quads looked through his fat fatigues.

              The shooting wrapped up precisely at eighteen hundred hours. The mood was pure exhaustion. There had only been a small break in the day and the guys and gals were drained. I couldn’t have imagined being in their shoes doing all the moves they had to do today. I figured it was typical so I was careful not to comment. I was sure I had a good handful of some awesome, once in a lifetime shots and was anxious to get started editing on. I shook hands with the commanding officer who showed up right at quitting time and said goodbye to the lady that accompanied me today. She was a big help pointing out what they were looking for and keeping ‘Ole Brutus in line.

              Brutus watched from afar with his arms crossed across his chest and never approached me to say goodbye. “Big Brute!
”
I whispered looking over at him. He was still staring. Why do men do that? Do they really think you can’t see them staring at you? Do they really think when their mouth is puckered, their forehead is wrinkled, and their eyes are glaring you won’t notice? “Will you stop staring at me! What are you looking at?” Geez! I shook my head walking to my car with no idea what his deal was. Maybe he recognized me, I dunno, but he was rude either way.

              When I finally settled back home, I opened the pics to see if I was right. I was. Many good shots of very beautiful men and women doing what they do best, sweating. I had a few shots of them in action belting out the words followed by their Brute leader. I put them in order according to the formations and actions they had repeated over and over. There were some really good shots. Shots that made me proud to be a photographer.

              Going over the shots, in the corner of one, I had caught a glimpse of Brutus. A true photobomb. I enlarged it so I could take a better look. It was actually a shot of him staring right at my camera, with dark eyes and a softer look than I remembered. He was actually very handsome when you looked at him in this pic. I didn’t remember him being handsome, just mean. I guess when someone’s personality isn’t nice around you it’s hard to find them attractive. You just deem them as ugly and unattractive as they behave. But seeing this picture had piqued my curiosity. Was there really a kind, decent man under all those angry fatigues? Why was I asking? The last thing I needed was another man in my life. I folded my laptop and plopped on the couch. Yeah, I don’t need another mean man to destroy me.

              I flipped channel after channel and came up with nothing. So I turned off the TV and dug through my stack of records by the wall. Dancing was always soothing to my soul; I felt the need to dance. So dance I did. I danced and danced till I was sweating all over. My socks slid smoothly over my new pristine hardwoods making it easy to twirl and twirl. When my Staying Alive album ended, I slipped Grease in its spot, then Purple Rain. When those were played out, I put on Flashdance, that’s when I really let it all go. Before it was over I had stripped down to my thong panties just so I could see the burn I was feeling on my thighs. It was exuberating! So I started the record over, not wanting the songs to end. My hair was soaked, my mascara running, my heart beat high and flying. My girls strapped tight against my chest, as not to injure them with my moves, and my energy was high. My feet were pounding the beautiful floor beneath them rattling the apartment walls. I turned up the music louder and louder drowning my soul with the sound.

              Out of the beat, I heard a bang. One right after another. Not on my door but on the wall or something coming from where I knew not. I froze and lifted the needle on my player. The record continued to spin. Then I heard it again followed by a few obscenities. Still not being able to tell where it was coming from. I deemed it harmless and resumed my dancing. Half past another body sweat and two songs down, I heard the pounding again. This time on my door. Ugh! With my old apartment, I had no worries about playing my music loud. No one around me cared. Here, I didn’t know anyone, so I had no idea who would be complaining.

              Without a second thought, I ripped open the door, sweat still dripping, heart still pounding from my dancing, paying no attention to the way I was half dressed.

              “What?” I belted when the door flew open.

              “It’s you.” He smirked under his breath.

              “What do you want?”

              “I knew I recognized you. Turn the damn music down, what are you some stripper or something?”

              “Yeah, practicing my pole dancin’ and I’m not done dancin’!” I slammed the door and smiled. Now, I know why he was staring. Yes, it was the brute that graced the field today when I shot the pictures. It was the not so nice guy that frowned and scolded everyone around me. Lucky me. He’s my neighbor. Ugh!

              I resumed my dancing through the sounds of his obscenities and pounds. The louder he yelled the louder I turned up the music, almost to the point of exploding my speakers. But I never answered my door again.

              “Keep on knocking but you can’t come in…my pole’s a little greasy but feelin’ it…yeah yeah…uh huh…uh huh…uh huh,” I sang while my feet jumped happily around.

              My soul needed the freedom required for dancing. It had been way too long since I felt that freedom. I decided to make it my new cardio routine, so every night around nine or so I would clear the living room area, and crank my record player up. One night I made it a singing lesson and played nothing but Babs, all night long. I stopped singing along to the last evergreen record around two a.m. Ole Brutus stopped cussing me around midnight. He must have found some ear plugs or joined me, who knows.

              The following morning on the way to dump a few bags of garbage I ran into him. He grunted when he saw me and I just flashed my pearly whites at him. Teach him to be mean. I don’t play nice. When you’re rude to me, I’m not gonna be rude, no I’m gonna be annoying so you need to be nice. I almost told him that too when he grunted a second time and shook his head. I guess he doesn’t know how to be nice. Poor guy. He still looked fine even though he wasn’t the friendliest person he sure was a hot ugly man! Yup…he quickly became my very hot ugly Brutus. Since I was caught up in the military project where everything is an acronym, I felt it was only my duty to assign him one.  So he was now my V.H.U.B. My H.U.B. as I called him. HUB’s for short!

              I wrapped up the picture project and sent it off. I received a letter of thanks and praises for a job well done. The article I wrote for them was quite impressive so they were asking if I’d like to work with them on future projects, articles and such. Sure, I told them. Any work was welcome and needed.

              Now I was back to being just me and my padded bank account with nothing going on. I had been off the dating sites since I met Denver, and I really didn’t have the strength to re-visit them. Sofie was still a no show in a text message but I figured she’d come around when she was ready. Radley had texted asking how I was; of course my reply was as always, “Fabulous!”

              “When you coming over?” he’d ask.

              “Not.”

              “Why not?

              “Can’t.
”
Don’t you hate those one word or one line texts? They are so impersonal.

              “Just get over here!” he replied like that would really get me to come over, not.

              “Sorry. Busy.”

              “With what?”

              “Work,” I lied. I had nothing but I wasn’t telling him that.

              “Okay.”

              I figured he’d give up but no he texted me almost every other day, same scenario. I just figured he dumped his girlfriend after the last time I saw him. Then I remembered he had no idea I moved, I never told him. The thought of that put a big smile on my face. I was really free of his ghost. Wow! Who knew it would be that simple to just move to keep from finding him at my door. He was good about popping in. I was happy no one was popping. And Brutus, I mean HUBs, I was hoping would move. Maybe move into my old apartment. Now wouldn’t that be funny if Radley showed up there one night and HUBs answered the door? Oh my! He would immediately think he was my boyfriend. And knowing HUBs, he wouldn’t be nice to Radley, Radley would probably mouth off to him, there would be a scuffle, a little swear throwing, maybe a few punches here and there and I would be sitting back with my bag of popcorn watching the show, enjoying the feature ‘HUBs and the Honey. Hoping for a part two!

              So I made it my mission to run into HUBs every chance I got, and dropped hints that he should move. I knew my apartment was still empty. I knew his was the same size, so he could just lateral over. I even stopped by the leasing office and told the agent about a guy that lives by me that gives me the creeps. She immediately knew I was talking about the hot ugly Brute, and she agreed he had that effect on her too. So she said she would try to speak to him about other options, saying him moving into my old apartment was actually a great idea and he would probably love the view of the streets of Providence from there. She said she may even find some incentive like a discounted rate or something just to make it happen.

              She said his name was Alex. He didn’t look like a Alex to me he looked like a Brutus, I told her. We laughed with her agreeing to see what she could do. I was quite pleased when I left her office and was soon back on my mission to convince the HUBs to start packing. It was a simple plan; really it was, but a long shot too. Guys don’t like to move. They hate change. This I know well by everything I had been through with the men in my life. But that evening despite the aches and pains in my legs and my cramping calves, I danced. Evil creature I was. But I had nothing else to do until the moment I decided I needed to paint. It had been a while since my last painting adventure.

              I cranked the music up really loud again in my apartment. I hung a white sheet on a wall with a few small unnoticeable nails then prepared my paint for my sheet canvas. Before I knew it, I was no longer painting with a brush I was painting with my fingers. Yes, I had converted to child-like finger painting, which led to elbow painting, and then the toe painting soon followed. I seriously had it everywhere, my clothes, my hair, my floor, my walls. At some point, a blue glob of paint hit the ceiling, not sure when, though. It didn’t matter now. It was done.

              I was dancing and singing right along with all the body painting. My clothes were removed one after another as I experimented with different body parts. So you can imagine, I used my girls (boobs), my lips, my ass, the tips of my nails swirling and twirling all the pretty colors together expressing every inch to the bone of passion my poor soul possessed within me.

              My iPod was belting Janis Joplin, the sassy sounds of Tina Turner, and an occasional man hater Cher song. When the mellow sounds of Lionel reached across the threshold of my apartment, I moved rather slow and sexy, steady and groovy then when the songs were replaced by Adele, I was back to that sass! Just like my record collection, my iPod knows me well! It threw a little of Ella and Babs in the mix, then spit a few Evanescence tunes just to crank up my solemn, depressing, ‘I’m in no mood for nonsense’ mood. My masterpiece was complete after the ever so loving Ave Maria was sung at the top of my lungs right along with Beyoncé. It was an evening I will cherish. An evening that I’m not sure I could ever re-do in such a naked fashion. It was definitely an evening of painting that released my frustration and my sensual desires; desires that were hidden in the depths of my soul longing to be rid and discarded of.