The sun was slanting in through the naked front windows and gleaming off the floor, casting a honey-colored glow to the room when Josh struggled to open his eyes.  But it wasn’t the midmorning light, nor the assault of a half-dozen cleansers still lingering in the air that brought him to consciousness.  It was septic alarm, reprising its shrill cry through the floorboards from the cellar below. He clapped his hand over his eyes. 

“Not. Fucking. Happening.” he croaked hoarsely. 

He blearily stumbled into the basement to silence the alarm, then made his way to the fridge where he had stuck the wrinkled invoice with a magnet to spare it from the previous night’s historic cleaning rampage.  He studied the thin crumply paper. There were two phone numbers on it. The first was printed at the top on the company heading, but Sean had drawn a line through it in pen and scrawled a different number underneath. Probably changed phone numbers and had an entire box of letterhead to use up, Josh reasoned as he massaged the sleep from his eyes with his thumb and index.  Sean didn’t exactly strike him as the polished professional type, but then he did haul human excrement for a living. 

He stood with his cell phone poised in his hand. It was a Saturday morning. Would anyone even answer? And if someone was available to come out, how much would a weekend call cost?  He groaned slightly as he punched the digits on the keypad and swung it to his ear.  This was a septic tank, not a dental cleaning. Waiting wasn’t an option. 

“Yo, this is Sean,” came an almost immediate answer. Josh blinked.  Was this his cell?  “Hello?” Sean repeated. 

“Hey, Sean—” he fumbled. “It’s Josh Arnette. You were just here last night? At my home? To pump my septic tank?” What the fuck was the matter with him? Were his hands actually trembling?

“Yeah, I remember.”  

There was a pause before Josh realized he was stupidly waiting for more. Like what else was the guy supposed to say?  ‘Oh, yeah—the one with all the cum?’  He shook himself. 

“Yeah, right. Well, see I woke up this morning and the alarm was going off again.”  

“Okay—I can be there in twenty.  See you then.”  

The line went dead. Josh blinked.  That was it? He hadn’t even needed to ask if someone would be able to stop by. His hand was still frozen midair in the gesture that was supposed to accompany the question he hadn’t had a chance to ask.  

He had barely downed a Red Bull and wrestled on a fresh pair of jeans and clean t-shirt before reflected washes of sunlight raking across his bedroom wall signaled movement in the driveway.  He peered through the slats of the blinds to see a spotless gray F250 glide soundlessly up to the house, chrome winking in the morning light.  

If the thought that this was not a typical septic service call had first entered Josh’s mind then, it was confirmed when he opened the front door to find Sean standing on the porch in a black polo with straining sleeves, jeans, and the hottest red Pumas he had ever seen. He swallowed hard as Sean tipped his aviators up on his neatly pulled-back mane. 

“So, still having some trouble, huh?” Sean began. His tone was neutral—not as jovial as it had been at their meeting yesterday, but Josh wasn’t really in a place to judge the level of chipperness of the shit tank guy. 

“Yeah.  So, everything was fine after you left. I had a shower—just a regular shower. And ran the dishwasher.”  Perfectly said. It took everything in him not to visibly cringe at his qualifying just what type of shower he had taken.  

If Sean noticed the statement, he didn’t register it on his face. “Well, let’s have a look at that alarm.” Josh moved aside and Sean stepped past him into the living room, a faint musky scent following behind. Christ, I doubt he smelled like that yesterday, Josh mused as he shut the door. As he led the way to the basement steps, Sean paused to survey the pristine living room, which now sported little more than the sagging sofa, 50-year-old Ethan Allen coffee table, and the stacked TVs. “You seem pretty clean.  And minimalistic.”  Said no one of Josh, ever. 

In the basement, Sean briefly examined the gray box capped with the angry red light. “Yep,” he softly murmured to himself as he unlatched the box to expose the wires and switches within. He flicked the switches down and the light extinguished. He paused, looked at Josh, who returned a curious gaze, then after a moment he returned the switches to the up position. The light stayed off. Sean’s lips quirked in a small grin. “That should do it,” he announced with a tone of finality. 

“What—that was it?” Josh demanded disbelievingly. 

Sean shrugged as he slammed the door closed on the alarm box. “Sometimes the pressure in the tank gets a little off after a cleaning and it throws the switch out of whack. Just needed a reset. I doubt it will happen again.”  

Josh furrowed his brow. “Great. But, I mean—if that’s all you thought it was, couldn’t you have just told me that on the phone? Save yourself the trip?”

Sean placed a red Puma on a battered kitchen chair and seemed to study it. “Yep. I could have,” he said without looking up.  Josh followed his gaze to his foot. It was the same one that just yesterday had been housed in a worn boot that sported the fetid remains of his cum from god only knew which ejaculation.  

“Oh,” Josh managed feebly after a moment. “Well…I appreciate your coming back out. Especially on a Saturday. What do I owe you?” he pivoted and crunched a few steps toward the stairs before he realized that Sean wasn’t following. He paused and turned back. Sean was looking at him now. 

“How about a demonstration?” he finally said.  

Josh felt his eyebrows knit with confusion. “I’m sorry?”

Sean removed his foot from the chair and slowly approached.  “At the door,” he said, drawing up to Josh and crossing his arms over his chest, “you said you had taken a—what was it? A ‘regular shower’ last night.” This close, Josh became acutely aware of the few inches Sean had on him, as well as the girth of those arms.  “Tell me, Joshua: what other kind of shower do you take, exactly?”  Though his tone was light—inquisitive—the question thudded in Josh’s chest, a ball whispering down the lane and slamming mercilessly into pins. 

This was going to be a defining moment, Josh knew. And like most defining moments, it was happening in an equally dramatic location: in the dankness of his grandmother’s basement, next to a stolen U-Haul dolly and with a cobweb tickling his ear.  So…which Josh was going to answer—the one that let everything slide down the drain, or the one he desperately wanted to be. The one with a scintilla of gumption.

He squared his shoulders and cocked his head, trying to appear relaxed. “That would be the kind of shower that clogs your crust buster, Sean.  Why do you ask?”  He had managed to keep his tone nonchalant.  Barely. 

Sean arched a brow. “Because I’ve been dying to know what you’ve got going on that you could fill a hole in your backyard with that much juice. You got four balls or something?”

Josh shrugged.  “Just a vivid imagination is all.”

“What exactly do you imagine?”

Josh was beginning to breathe heavily. “Well,” he began, taking a step back, “it always starts with a man.”  

Sean calmly removed his sunglasses from his head and folded the temples, placing them gently on a rusty chest freezer.  He looked pensive. “What else?”

Josh took another step back. “I lay at his feet.” 

Sean took a step toward Josh, a crinkle forming between his eyes as he considered this.  “Why do you to that?” 

“To—to be crushed beneath him,” Josh managed, tamping down the watery doubt that he could feel welling up now that rock hard possibility was closing in.  He had been inching his way back until his legs found the front edge of a battered futon.

Sean gave his head a half turn. “Sounds painful.” With nowhere left to go, Josh sank into the moldy sofa.  Sean put a foot up between his legs, the red suede Puma sinking into the cushion.

“It’s never painful the way I imagine it,” he confessed softly.  His jeans were tenting with an erection that was eager to test the reality. 

Sean smiled. “With the amount of cum I pumped yesterday, I imagine it’s a lot more about pleasure.”  The gleaming white sole of his sneaker squealed lightly with anticipation as he leaned in. “I’d love to see how you do it, if you wouldn’t mind.”

Josh heaved a shaky sigh as he unbuttoned his jeans.  His damp boxers pushed through like a mushroom heaving through the forest floor.  His head fell back on the futon in a musty cloud and he stared into the floor joists above as Sean brought his shoe down on him. Josh felt the toe of the Puma press just beneath the glans.  Clear drops of his excitement blossomed through the silky shorts and stuck to the shoe, connecting the two men in fragile, glassy threads. “Oh, Jesus,” he whispered. 

“It’s Sean,” Sean corrected with a lopsided grin. “Am I doing this right?”  He slid the Puma up further, the diamond patterned tread teasing the shaft through the material until his heel was flat against his balls. He squeezed them. Josh gasped as pain danced with pleasure.  Sean observed with interest. “I want to be sure I get to see a big finale.”  

“I don’t think you’ll be disappointed,” Josh groaned at the ceiling as Sean alternated between dragging his foot down and thrusting it up the underside of his cock.

“So this man—the one you imagine…does he ever do this?” Sean queried as he placed the flat of his sole against the tip of Josh’s head and pivoted his foot in small circles. The boxers twisted and slid slickly under him.  Josh writhed at the sensation. 

“Oh my god.  Not like that, he doesn’t,” he admitted, a chuckle burbling up.  He felt the shoe pause its gentle torture and the warmth of Sean’s fingertips as they slid around the loosened waistband of his jeans and underwear. With a vicious tug, Josh was exposed down to his knees. He sat up with a start and looked at Sean, so seemed to be studying him in mild fascination. 

“Only two balls,” he observed.  He smiled as his lifted his foot and placed it back on Josh’s bare cock.  “I guess that’s not the secret behind your secretions.”  Josh rolled his eyes and giggled as Sean began to slide the sole of his Puma through the pre-cum that dribbled down the shaft. Soon, the shoe was working against him harder.  Josh’s head fell back against the futon.