It was a warm summer night in the year 2000 (August, I think–maybe September). I was working nights as a police dispatcher, and my schedule was all out of whack. 6pm to 6am was my regular shift, so my nights off were often quiet, sometimes lonely, and occasionally weird. This is one of those stories. Now, 24-Hour Fitness was the perfect gym for my schedule, and 3am was my go-to workout time. And although the 24-Fitness Sport in Santa Monica, CA is certainly the busiest gym I’ve ever seen, it was normally as empty as the streets at 3am. On this particular night, however, I wasn’t alone.

I turned up, signed in, threw my bag in a locker, stretched the quads a bit, and hopped on the treadmill. And that’s when I saw him… In all his pale glory, the man himself, Vinnie Barbarino (a.k.a. John Travolta). My first two thoughts: Oh my God, that’s John Travolta! Followed by, Why the fuck is he so pale? I swear the dude was practically transparent. He looked sickly. But he was being led around by a personal trainer, so I figured he was on the mend.

Well, the novelty of seeing John Travolta in public wore off quickly (I do live in L.A., after all), so I just went to finish my workout, ignoring him. I had about 8-10 lifts on this particular day, so I finished my usual circuit around the gym. (Now I want to preface this next part by saying that at this time I was in the best shape of my life. I may be a fat bastard now, but not back then; I was training for the police academy, and I was ripped.) Well, as I complete my workout, I notice that John Travolta is following me around the gym. I mean, every time I use a machine, John Travolta uses it next. There must be 200 pieces of equipment in the room, but every time I finish with a machine, John Travolta and his trainer use it next. Not once. Not twice. But over and over and over again. It was really weird. I mean, I had to imagine that the personal trainer was directing the workout, and not John himself, so why the correlation? I just imagined that since I was doing common lifts, my workout was probably similar to the one prescribed by the trainer. But somewhere in the back of my mind, I started to feel like I was being cruised. So this goes on for about 45 minutes, and then I hit the treadmill to run a few more miles. John Travolta and his trainer disappear. I figured that was that.

EDIT3: Story continued… The gym was quiet again. I finished my run and then headed toward the showers. Now, the gym floor was empty, and the locker room was empty, so I figured that, except for employees, there was no one around. John Travolta must have finished his work out and went home, right? No….

At this gym, directly across from the showers is the sauna room. And at the front of the sauna is a huge glass window, and it looks directly out into the shower room. Well, when I round the corner from the hallway into the showers, I look back over my shoulder, and I can see John Travolta in the sauna room leaning up against the glass window. It’s a large room, and he’s in the only spot that has a direct view of the locker room hallway and the showers. He is sprawled out, laying across the bench and his towel is loosely draped over his body.

Okaaaaay, I think. I head to my usual spot (last shower on the right), and immediately John Travolta leaves the sauna, sans towel, and starts showering as well. The thing is, he’s showering, but he’s also staring right at me. And he has half an erection. (I’ll save you the suspense, it was fucking enormous! Like a horse.) I’m thinking, is this really happening? Is John Travolta half-wanking at me?? Well, to make a long story short I started to get pretty uncomfortable, so I grabbed my towel and walked out. As I passed him, he turned to face me, holding his cock. I just ignored him and walked away, laughing to myself.

I told my roommate at the time; he laughed at the story, but he was a little skeptical on the details. Then I swear to God, not one week later, my roommate elbows me in the checkout-line at the market: “Look!” It’s a National Enquirer. The cover story? “John Travolta hit on me in the shower!”

Well, there you have it. It could all be made up, but even if it is there are still two photographs of John Travolta hanging out in gyms in the middle of the night and introducing himself to people. As Justin Jones – the original selfie taker – said, I think we all understand what was happening, when it was happening.