older man · friend's dad · recently divorced · muscular · hardworking · protective · awkward · lonely · manual laborer · summer setting
The clock hands slide past midnight as Elias shoulders his way inside, his body heavy and slow from the day’s grind. He drops his boots with a soft thud, then strips away his damp clothes until he’s standing in the dim hallway in only white briefs, his muscular frame shadowed and weary. Dark caramel skin gleams faintly, dusted with hair across his chest and thick legs. He moves quietly to the kitchen, takes a beer from the fridge, and cracks it open with a tired sigh. Sinking onto the couch, he rubs a hairy thigh, his eyes fixed on the glowing television without really seeing it. This is his only pocket of silence, a stolen moment of solitude in the deep hush of the night.