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Back in early 2010, designer Calvin Klein and his young lover, Nick Gruber, embarked on a two-year relationship. The affair marked the first time that Klein went public with a male lover.
Their romance soured when Gruber was busted for assault and cocaine possession in April 2012, and the 23-year-old was ushered off to a posh Arizona rehab facility. After his release, Gruber settled in LA, where he found a new, wealthy boyfriend and announced that he was writing a book about his time with the intensely private fashion icon.
In October 2012, Page Six Magazine was invited to Southern California to photograph him and reveal some of the juicier aspects of the tell-all. The story appeared in the December issue of the glossy magazine.
Then, in February, Gruber announced that he had second thoughts about pursuing the sordid book project, telling TMZ, “I’m a nice person, not a mean person.” Since making that statement, the troubled Gruber has returned to the Big Apple, and last week he denied there was ever such a book in the works.
“That was false information. I never said that I was gonna write a book. I never would do something like that or hurt someone that I love,” Gruber told Gawker’s Michael Musto.
Despite his denial of the existence of such a manuscript, The New York Post has obtained a copy of Gruber’s book proposal, titled “Obsession: My Life With Calvin Klein,” co-written by journalist Lisa Arcella.
When asked for comment about the book proposal, Matt Rich, Gruber’s p.r. representative, responded: “A previous advisor, whom [Gruber] no longer speaks with, wrote up a proposal without [Gruber’s] permission or consent and circulated it. Those weren’t his words.”
Calvin Klein spokesman Paul Wilmot declined to comment.
Here’s what’s alleged in the book proposal’s contents.
Nick Gruber grew up a world away from Calvin Klein’s chic jet-set lifestyle. He would meet his father for the first time as a teenager, but until then he was shuffled between various foster families in Florida while his mother served prison time. At age 15, Gruber was sent to live in the small resort town of McCall, Idaho, with his father, a former Hells Angel. Gruber never questioned this transient, grifter existence until he met fashion icon Calvin Klein.
After vandalizing vacation homes in McCall, he returned to California, where his mother was living. Gruber, then just barely 18, was at the welfare office picking up his mother’s food stamps when “an overweight and unattractive man” approached him in an encounter that would soon change the course of the poor, wayward teen’s life.
Despite Gruber’s recent statement to Gawker that he was “never once in [his] life” an escort, the proposal says the man insisted Gruber could forge a career as a model.
“Later of course I found out that this is a typical, cliché come-on line to get you into the escort business,” the proposal says. Gruber had no interest in having sex with men, but he soon learned he was every gay man’s fantasy, which he would parlay into his alter ego — and some nice pocket change.
“Some gay men love the idea of seducing a straight guy, and that, I would come to discover was a big part of my appeal.”
Gruber told his mother the truth about his new job, but she was “unphased.”
Through the various men he met through the sex trade, he got into porn, using the alias “Aaron Skyline.” While Gruber was seducing gay men with his straight-man fantasy, he was seduced by the greenbacks he got in return.
By the time he graduated high school in 2009, Gruber had acted in both straight and gay porn movies, making as much as $3,500 in two weeks.
He had also enlisted in the Army, but he continued to moonlight as his gay alter ego in porn. By January 2010, he was stationed at Fort Riley, Kan., when he met now-deceased porn producer Vaughn Kinsley, who was “well known for supplying hot young boys to the rich and famous in Los Angeles.”
Kinsley, according to the proposal, promised to find him a “sugar daddy,” and later informed him that Calvin Klein had seen a photo of Gruber in nothing but a green jacket and was taken with him. Klein’s name, synonymous with a global fashion empire, meant nothing to the teenager.
“For my part, I really had no idea who [Klein] was. Although I guess I didn’t realize it at the time, I grew up pretty poor. I wasn’t wearing designer labels unless they could be found on the racks of Wal-Mart and even then I was hardly paying attention to the name inside my underwear.”
The Bronx-born fashion designer was drawn to Gruber because he looked like a younger version of himself. According to the proposal, the escort and the fashion icon embarked on a sexting relationship. In March 2010, Klein sent a private G4 plane — complete with a cream and beige interior and cashmere blankets — to whisk the 19-year-old from Kansas to New York.
Once he touched down in the Hamptons, a limo was waiting to usher Gruber to the home of Klein’s ex-wife, Kelly.
There, Klein greeted Gruber at the door wearing a short-sleeve shirt and sweatpants.
“Hi, I’m Calvin, come on in.”
Klein took him on a tour of the home before showing him the guest house, which was filled with lit candles and a roaring fire.
According to the proposal, the pair had an epic lovemaking session.
“Not to sound arrogant, but I really think Calvin first started to fall in love with me that night,” the proposal says.
Though the pair stayed in different beds the evening of their first encounter, everything was about to change for both the wealthy arbiter of taste and the unsophisticated Army boy.
The next morning, Klein took Gruber to the Ralph Lauren store, where he bought him a black pea coat. He then introduced his new plaything to his artist friend Eric Freeman.
“I later found out that this was a big deal for Calvin. He had never introduced a guy to any of his friends before,” the proposal says. “Right from the very start Calvin was treating me as if I were his boyfriend. He was happy to show me off in public and I felt like a boyfriend too. It was a new feeling for me! I knew my life was about to change forever.”
It would. But first, Gruber needed to get out of the Army, a move which Klein encouraged. The proposal says he was discharged under the “Don’t ask, don’t tell” policy. Klein then rented a $9,000-a-month apartment for his new beau on Greenwich Street, but moved him into his $20 million triplex penthouse on Perry Street. The Greenwich Street pad was there purely for their trysts.
Gruber’s metamorphosis became a pet project for Klein, who proceeded to make him over in his likeness.
“In a scene straight out of Pygmalion, Calvin goes to work transforming his love interest. Nick gets new clothes, a new hairstyle and teeth. There were meetings with a steroid doctor to help him keep his lean and pumped look. His skin was resurfaced and he even gets speech therapy to upgrade his speaking style,” according to the proposal.
The couple embarked on a European vacation, where the besotted Klein “pressures” Gruber to profess his love for his older boyfriend. (And showed his penchant for public sex — the proposal claims the pair made love in a famous French church.)
Gruber eventually acquiesced, offering Klein a marriage proposal, which the twice-married mogul accepted. However, their engagement bliss was short-lived. Upon their return to the Big Apple, Klein tightened his hold on Gruber, which greatly strained the relationship, already compromised by a nearly 50-year age difference.
Feeling stifled, Gruber rebelled by commandeering Klein’s Bentley to Florida, where he began an affair with a woman. Desperate to hold onto Gruber, Klein landed him a modeling agent and a job at a restaurant.
In January 2011, he threw Gruber a star-studded 21st birthday party at NYC’s Indochine, attended by fashion luminaries such as Anna Wintour, Donna Karan, Vera Wang, plus Alec Baldwin.
Despite this public affirmation of their union, mutual doubts poisoned the relationship. A romantic trip to Rio de Janeiro for New Year’s Eve was ruined when the party boy, then 22, wanted to partake in Rio’s legendary nightlife, while the 70-year-old wanted to stay in. The trip was cut short and the pair headed back to New York.
According to the proposal, Gruber camped out in the Greenwich Street apartment, seeing his older suitor on weekends. When Klein stopped giving Gruber his $10,000-a-month allowance, the one-time escort said he returned to turning tricks to support his louche lifestyle and partying ways, which included bedding a mogul’s daughter and another’s (female) personal assistant.
As Gruber’s life spiraled out of control, Klein informed him he would no longer foot the bill for his luxurious West Village digs. The debauchery continued until April 2012, when the admitted cocaine abuser was busted for assaulting a friend who Gruber claims grabbed his crotch. In the proposal, this chapter of his life is referred to as “Rock Bottom.”
He agreed to enter the Meadows, a posh Arizona rehab center, and Klein, once again, was his generous benefactor. But Gruber soon realized that nothing in life is free.
When Klein flew out to visit during “Family Week,” he took Gruber to a local motel for a sexual encounter while on a four-hour pass.
“I really thought he was there because he cared about me and wanted to help me,” the proposal says. “But then he checked me out of the center essentially for a booty call, and I thought that was all he really cared about.”
After completing rehab, Gruber moved to a sober living facility. He didn’t stay for long: Klein, the proposal claims, had the staff keep tabs on him.
This discovery prompted Gruber to move to LA, where he met entrepreneur John Luciano, whom he began dating.
“Nick has more of Calvin’s secrets than the NSA,” Luciano tells The Post.
Luciano says that Gruber was motivated by anger to write the book proposal: “Calvin took back everything he ever gave him, and Nick was pissed,” says Luciano.
Luciano and Gruber appeared together in the December issue of Page Six Magazine at a luxurious, oceanfront home in Orange County, Calif. But by late May, Page Six was reporting that Gruber had briefly reconciled with Klein during a Mexican getaway, though he remained good friends with Luciano.
Still, Luciano now questions why Gruber would recently deny the book proposal’s existence.
“The refreshing part of Nick is that he was very open about who he was and not ashamed,” says Luciano. “To me that was one of the best parts of Nick. I don’t know who is advising him. They are trying to turn a cook at Applebee’s into a top chef at Per Se.”
kfleming@nypost.com
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