Yeah I know, this all sounds like I'm saying I was a cocky asshole and shit. But I wasn't. I'm still not. I'm a pretty shy guy, laid back, and funny too, or so people tell me. You know, sensitive. It's just a fact that I'm hot, and I allow myself to enjoy it (actually, I thank God for it and can't imagine living any other way. How the fuck do you faggoty-assed insurance salesmen get laid -??).

Years later, when Jeff was analyzing why he liked me - he loved to do that, right out loud in front of me, it was cute as hell - he said it was as if, somehow, this sensitive, queer, laid back, stoner artistic guy he loved to cuddle up with, just happened to end up with more moose-juice in my veins than a fuckin' rhino. Every now and again, the rhino just bursts out, saying and doing things that I would NEVER think to say! I've learned to control it somewhat, but when I was in college, you never could tell when I'd switch from sweet, cute shy boy to raging muscle junkie.

By junior year, all my old kid friends, the smart kids I used to hang out with, from my freshman hallway and my art classes and stuff, they all started asking me like "Wow, Mike! What's happened to you?"

"Nothing. I'm just the same…only now I've got muscles," I'd answer, almost always following this with a chest flex, or a long, calf-exploding tiptoe stretch to the sky. Or they'd say, "Why don't you hand with us anymore, why do you always go hang with those scary frat-boy muscle jocks?" To which I'd whip back my t-shirt sleeve to the middle of the shoulder, practically ripping the sleeve open, and pop a nice flex for the gasping kids. "Because, dudes, I AM one of those scary muscle jocks!" I still kept up my grades and painted, and took pictures with my camera, but for my social life, all I wanted to do was hang around these stupid brain-dead jocks. God, what the hell was I thinking. Compared with my old friends, the jocks were totally dumb and superficial, and sometimes downright mean. But I fuckin' LOVED being one of them just the same. Story of my life.

Don't worry, I didn't let 'em forget I was queer for their bods. How could they, after the -- shall we say, obvious? -- way I announced my queerness to them that day on the porch of Sigma Omicron Pi?

"Muscle Faggot" the jocks started calling me, with apparent intent to humiliate me. But I didn't give a shit. I'd be all "Sir, yes SIR, I'm your faggot sir…you stupid beerhead muff-diving jock!" and I'd put the guy in a headlock, and we'd all laugh. They dug me, I'm tellin' you. We'd go out every weekend to the beach, our elite group of the best-looking, most built guys. I tried to be nice to my old friends, the smart kids and the drama fags and what-not, but most of them had stopped talking to me anyway. That was fine with me. They were all scrawny as hell, or worse, they were flabby, pimply, just plain butt-ugly. I knew I just wasn't like them, and I knew I never would be, ever again. •