In a way, I'd always taken refuge inside of my head. It was my 'safe place' to go, and I retreated there almost unconsciously and with alarming regularity. Considering what Sam and I had just talked about, I was feeling a bit uncomfortable, if not actually even worried. I was still shy and private by nature and - let's face it - not at all uninhibited. I had a good sense of humor actually, but generally I chose to show a more serious, studious side to the world-at-large - we all 'wear our masks'. There was also a real truth in what I had told Sam, too - that I'd never really learned how to just play or 'let my hair down' with any regularly. There was always something more important to be done - work. Sam had unwittingly just called my bluff and asked me to 'let go'. I knew that all he was really saying to me was, "I want to play. Please just come play with me. Be your whole self, not just parts of it." Ah, from the mouth of babes, as they say - and what a total babe this man of muscle was! It wasn't a leap to assume that Sam was at least hoping this included my being sexually 'playful' as well. So all I had to do was to be more open, spontaneous, uninhibited and even perhaps wild. Yikes! What had I agreed to? For me, this was scary stuff. So not surprisingly at all, in the next few moments I retreated into my mind - far away from all of this - and started conjuring up a multitude of disjointed, unconnected thoughts and impressions. I was escaping more from myself than I was from Sam. Thoughts raced through my head in no apparent or related order.

First, it occurred to me that I was aroused- just the very motion associated with stepping-down drew my attention briefly to that unmistakable 'beefiness' in my pant leg. Moreover, I'd also been more-or-less continually aroused since I'd first met Sam the man. A real man. Was that minutes, hours or even a day ago? I seemed to have no sense of time. I'd resigned myself to the fact that I'd have a semi-perpetual hard-on whenever I was around this man - as well as beside, behind, in front of, over or under him as well. (I had no way of knowing it at this time, but in retrospect, that's proven to have been an uncannily accurate psychic prediction.)

Then I thought of the ways in which Sam was already becoming a growing collection of paradoxes and dichotomies to me, even in the short time since we'd met.

For example, on one hand, his mere physical presence would awe or humble anyone. Even with his clothes on, Sam would probably awe regardless. A professional linebacker would be immediately demoralized by his overall body mass. The size of him just intimidates, shocks and stuns. And with his clothes off, Sam's body would just humble any observer. The beauty in his type of physical development is classical. It intoxicates. The incredibly masculine shapes of perfectly-realized muscular giants, all built to symmetrical perfection, communicate very strong primal messages subliminally. Those messages are about his power and sexual potency. Combined with all of his other "100% all man" attributes, Sam would sit at the apex of the 'Alpha Male' pyramid - the ultimate manifestation of masculinity in this world. Well, in my world anyway.

Then I thought that Sam doesn't get out all that much, basing my observation on a few things that he'd told me previously. I doubted that many men had ever seen Sam's fully-exposed physique. My impression was that he actually kept to himself quite a bit. I suspected that, if given the opportunity to look at him buck-naked for more than a few seconds, he'd make any woman's panties wet as well as put a big bulge in any man's shorts. His kind of attractiveness is raw - even animalistic. Some physical beauty transcends even gender-orientation. All I knew is that he just plain made me sweat. Sam's physical looks were unquestionably 100% 'handsome He-man'- stud material here of the very first order.

Zap - I was off into another completely unrelated thought. This one concerned, of all things, the back of Sam's head and specifically his dark hair, and then - oddly - his haircut as well, which wasn't something I'd usually pay any particular attention to. I found myself thinking that it was a good haircut, too - overall, just a great look for Sam. His hair looked silky and had a satiny sheen. The length was medium-short; long enough to be able to run fingers through it, but short enough probably to just brush, although I guessed that Sam combed it. I also noticed the wisps, swirls and rings of hair all over the back of his head that suggested his hair would be naturally quite wavy - maybe even curly if it was any longer. But at it's current length, it was naturally neat and only hinted at a possible wilder unruliness. Damn! Even this man's hair looked sexy to me.

Wham - I found myself thinking next about Sam's personality. He had some very remarkable, even somewhat unusual, qualities. These characteristics seemed to both repel and yet attract me simultaneously, not unlike the physical man himself; a paradox that I'd eventually learn to just accept. If not almost 'simple' acting at some times, Sam was certainly 'basic' acting all the time. What you saw was what you got - and it was, in fact, all that was probably there. Sam was open, incredibly straight-forward, honest and sincere, but to such a degree that it frankly had startled me at least several times already. All combined, he reminded me of a child - a young boy, in fact. I truly believed that the man was incapable of lying or deceit of any kind. In fact, I don't think he even knew how to. Sam also had a certain naivete that was hard to pinpoint, but it was there nevertheless. Yet I'd also heard him say things to me that hinted of a certain kind of latent wisdom. Some of these deeper insights greatly surprised me. At this very moment though, I wasn't particularly thrilled with some of his insights however, at least as they applied directly to me. In the very short time that we'd spent together, I'd already seen several suggestions of a generous and giving nature in him. The total trust he's exhibited - and especially with me so far - was powerfully endearing.

Bang - another odd thought suddenly popped into my head. Actually, it was more of a strong feeling. It was obvious that Sam was extremely happy to be fulfilling my 'special birthday request' by lifting for me. Maybe he was even genuinely excited by this opportunity to really show off his big muscles; however, I just had the strong feeling suddenly that he was really not a real show-off at all, by nature. I not sure exactly what those signals were that I'd picked up from him - but somehow I sensed that at least his ego was probably normal-sized, even if his body was anything but. That thought - this hunch of mine - surprised me. I didn't think that this characteristic was typical of men with such physiques. My hunch nevertheless was that Sam was just not 'into himself' in that way at all. He seemed to have a kind of humility about him - maybe even a wee bit of shyness mixed in - that may not have been obvious to me, at least so far, because of his rather affable, outgoing nature.

So to me, it logically followed that Sam might be doing this solely because I had expressed an interest in something that he also enjoyed very much. I had finally managed to say it aloud to him - admittedly with a real struggle - that I really liked his 'muscles'. It struck me now that this dynamic between us was exactly like two boys excitedly discovering that they have a real common interest in baseball cards, and Sam just wanted very much to show me 'his collection'.

"You like Yoggie Barra cards? Hey, I've got a big set of Yoggie's! You wan'na see 'em?"

"Wow! You've got a REAL Mickey Mantle slugger? I've been looking for that one forever! Say- maybe we can even trade! I'll give you all my Yoggie's for just your one big slugger!"

So Sam wasn't doing this to merely show off his clearly far-superior physique, in any flaunting sense anyway. He was going to do this only to please that boy that lives inside of me - and then excite and arouse the man in me, too. That could be measured of course by the deflection of the needle on the 'ol dick-ometer. And the truth was that I really was both man and boy simultaneously. For that matter, so was Sam.

As for those male aspects of our personalities - it popped into my head that there probably was a sort of crazy, but nevertheless very real, sexual feedback loop going on between the two of us. I already had some awareness of this hard to define special energy. Together, we created 'sparks'. Pleasure given would beget even more pleasure received. But as for those 'boys' in us, Sam WAS really doing this just for me. All these behaviors now suddenly seemed to me to be about bonding - and Sam was just doing whatever he could to feed and nurture a stronger bond between us. Sam's primary motivation was to please me however he could do that- so that I WOULD JUST LIKE HIM.

Then I thought about what I'd felt when I was looking into Sam's face upstairs, especially into those eyes of his. I realized that what I'd been seeing was that 'little boy' inside of him - the little boy who trusted completely, celebrated every aspect of life unquestioningly, and above all else, just wanted a trustworthy friend to play with.

A really big lump formed in my throat suddenly. I felt all mushy and gushy. Something went 'ping' deep inside of me, as if I was just beginning to see Sam through a brand new pair of glasses.

All of these crazy, disjointed thoughts flooded me all at once. Some of them at least seemed like fairly profound revelations, too. When taken all together as a whole, it felt to me like an epiphany of sorts - especially considering I was just (barely) a 19 year old kid. This was a powerful, humbling, and a certainly also very unsettling sudden awareness for me. In retrospect, I believe that this experience was my heart fully-opening - if but momentarily - to another human being - probably for the very first time in my life, in fact.

Next I began to mull over this list of all of Sam's positive attributes - an already long and quite impressive list at that. All summed, Sam seemed to be just one really very decent and kind human being. I thought, "What's not to genuinely like here?" Damn. Nothing I could think of at all certainly. So the guy just also happened to be the most heavily-muscled stallion I've ever seen, which also included television, movies and magazines, too. "So what's not to genuinely LOVE here, Pete?" Damn, nothing I could think of either. That scared me. I decided to stick with 'I liked him'. That I could handle.

Suddenly Sam spoke, abruptly snapping me back from of all these far-away thoughts. I didn't quite catch what he'd said though. It might have been, "Watch your step, Pete." That was probably the gist of it, I thought. My brain suddenly cleared and I was zapped back into the real world again. I was still following Sam down the stairs, right where I'd been before I'd taken this mental vacation. In fact I'd probably taken only a very few more steps during that whole time my mind had been wandering off. It felt as if I'd been gone for a very long time strangely, but in actuality the elapsed time had probably been only mere seconds.

My eyes focused on Sam's back as he walked down the stairs in front of me. I realized that it was really the ONLY thing that I could see, reminding me again of just how massive that this dude really is. With his body framed by a confined space in the stairwell, his massiveness was now semi-quantifiable. Although Sam wasn't ducking, his head nevertheless only cleared the ceiling by an inch or two at the most. I saw his hair brush it lightly a few times. I also realized I couldn't see around him; in fact all I could see in front of me was a wall of dark-green material - the back of Sam's sweats. The incredible width of his upper back was graphically demonstrated when the outsides of his shoulders and upper arms alternately brushed the side walls with each step he took. If Sam was even a few inches wider, he'd have plugged that stairwell like a cork in a bottle. This was the same impression that I'd had when Sam climbed into his truck cab back at that bar. The man is just one truly huge dude! I thought more about his size now, but in a different way than I had before.

After all, Sam's body was so far beyond any expected 'norm' that I suppose it would automatically attract immediate attention anywhere. I couldn't imagine Sam going out in public without drawing an involuntary glance from literally every person he happened to encounter - and 100% of the time, too - be that a man, woman or child. That's probably just human nature. And to not be hypocritical about this, God only knows I couldn't keep my eyes off of him either. So to say he was a 'very big dude' - or even a 'monster' - still doesn't quite capture the real visual, social and psychological impact that Sam must constantly make on other people.

I began to contemplate what everyday life situations must be like for the big lug. I pictured him doing his grocery shopping. I could see Sam turning down an isle pushing his shopping cart, and all the shoppers suddenly snapping their carriages around almost in unison and clearing that isle - fleeing in the opposite direction. Strangely, I also just sensed that is exactly what happens to Sam, and probably more-or-less routinely. I suddenly remembered that was exactly my own involuntary reaction when I first turned around on that bar stool to check out who owned that big hand on my shoulder. I'd have hit the ceiling had Sam not suppressed my 'launch' in mid-flight with his hand - and also held me down on that stool for quite awhile thereafter too! He's scary big.

I wondered how many people actually really knew this guy at all, or would ever voluntarily initiate a conversation with him. Well thankfully, Sam's a good talker and seems to be outgoing enough - but still that thought bothered me. How many people took the time to actually see anything else about him other than his massive body? How many had ever even noticed just what a handsome face Sam really had? I mean, his was a face 'to just die for', at least to me - not to mention Sam's heart-melting pair of real clear 'baby blues'. They're almost eerily-pale, in fact. His eyes have an unusual coloration and a special softness and sparkle to them... and they're just kind-looking, like there's a good soul in there. My suspicions were sadly - probably not all that many. •