Part 2 is here.

18+ Only. Mature Themes.

Boundaries Breached

It’s like the room was holding its breath. Air thick as fog, fluorescent lights buzzing like judgment, the room itself had a pulse. I could feel him breathing. Logan’s hand was still on my leg, his fingers warm and filled with intention. His eyes searched mine; something passed between us that had nothing to do with logic or training.

For a second neither of us moved. The notes on my desk blurred, the sound of rain softened until it felt like it was happening somewhere far away. He was close enough that I could see the small scar near his jaw, the one from the bike crash he’d told me about. Close enough to smell soap and that faint trace of coffee on his breath.

Then he leaned forward, the world tilting as the kiss landed like a shock.

A collision that made every nerve stand to attention. His lips were soft, moist and warm enough that I held my breath.

It lasted five seconds. Long enough to shatter my concentration and long enough to change everything.

I pulled away first, sucking in a breath like I’d been holding it forever, suddenly gasping.

Logan crouched there beside me, looking every bit as shocked as I felt. Then his hand shot off my leg like it had burned him; he jumped backwards, collided with his chair and fell back onto it. He turned to his desk, sat down, the blood rushing to his face.

“Fuck!” That was all he said.

He looked as freaked out as I felt.
What just happened? Why did he kiss me?

I stood, wanting to run; where, I didn’t know, but the room suddenly felt too small for the two of us. As I walked to the door, he faced forward, staring at his laptop monitor, which had gone idle, the FBI logo reminding us both that we were always under surveillance.

Logan’s chest rose and fell fast. His eyes were wide, the color of deep water after a storm. I faced the door again but couldn’t move, couldn’t think. Only the sound of rain and the low hum of the vents filled the room.

He stared forward, frozen, muttering, “I shouldn’t have done that.”
The chair squeaked as he shifted, grabbing a pen that wasn’t needed, flipping pages on his notebook like he was trying to ground himself, but his hand trembled slightly.

I swallowed hard, still tasting him. “What was that about?”
He didn’t look up. “I don’t know.”
“Why did we do that?” I wasn’t asking him; I was asking us, the room, our bodies.
He gave a short laugh, dry, almost bitter. “I don’t know.”
“It’s not logical.”
He exhaled, turned to look at me like I’d said something odd. “Not everything is logical, Josh. Not everything has to make sense.”

The silence after those words felt sharp enough to cut.

“You can punch me if you want,” he said finally.
I laughed, shaky but real. “That’s not how friendship works.”

That made him glance at me. His face softened, some of the panic fading. “You’re not mad?”
“No,” I said. “I’m… confused. But not mad.”

He rubbed a hand through his blond hair, making a mess of it as he stared at the floor. “I don’t want this to get weird.”

“It’s already weird.” I smiled a little. “But I think we’ll be fine. We survived cafeteria lasagna, remember?”

That pulled a real laugh out of him. He nodded, the tension slowly uncoiling. “Right. We forget it. Go back to being us.”

“Us,” I said. “The FBI’s prettiest pair.”

“Don’t start,” he said, but he was smiling now.

But I couldn’t move.

This wasn’t Logan’s fault. I felt it in my body, and my cock twitched at his touch, when my heart hammered after he kissed me.

I didn’t kiss boys. That wasn’t what I did, and as far as I knew, it wasn’t what Logan did.

“Have you ever…”

He turned, eyes wide, but in them I could see fear. Fear of what I’d say, maybe. And shame, like he’d acted on impulse and was already fighting to lock it away.
“Have I ever what?”

In him I saw the little boy, clear as day, doing the right thing like I had, like pleasing everyone, getting good grades, a doctorate so his parents could brag. A boy who’d grown up and bottled up that fear, hiding behind logic and reason.
And for five seconds, I got a glimpse of something else.

“…have you ever kissed another, you know, guy?”

He looked down, put his face in his hands as though to hide something.

Eventually, as the lights hummed, the vents whispered and the rain outside drummed its fingers on the window, he whispered, “Yes.”

I sat back down, hands in my lap, trying not to judge.
“Tell me. Tell me what happened.”
“Why?” He looked up, eyes red-tinged, like he was about to break down.
“I’m not judging you. I promise. We’ve become close, friends. I like you a lot, and I thought I understood everything. But now I don’t, and I want to. So please, tell me.”

He nodded, shook his head, but kept it down for the longest time.
Then he told me a story that moved me.

He sucked in a breath, face still flushed, eyes trying to hide behind their lenses. “When I was in high school, my friend Matt and I were doing homework, and the same thing happened. He kissed me, except it was a bit longer.”
I nodded, swallowing whatever had just appeared in my throat. “Okay,” I said, trying not to sound judgmental.

He cleared his throat. “Mom came in, she dropped the sandwiches she’d brought us. The look on her face, disappointment, disgust. That’s all I remember. Matt left, and after that we weren’t really close anymore. But my mom, she never said anything. Didn’t tell Dad, didn’t tell anyone, didn’t even talk to me about it. Not really, not in a way that said anything.”

I let out a breath I didn’t know I was holding.
We sat, the revelation heavy between us, the room feeling very small.

“I’m sorry,” was all he said.

I stood and walked to him, reached out. He looked up, searching my face as if trying to understand my motive.
I smiled. “Give me a hug.”

He did. He stood, and we embraced. I wrapped my arms around him and squeezed to reassure him. For a few moments he was stiff, holding back, but then he relaxed, and the hug was warm.

The best hug I’d had in a long time.

“I like you a lot. I’m not offended. But I’m worried.”

With my face against his neck, feeling his breath and the press of his body against mine, I felt something much more than I wanted to feel.
I wanted to comfort him, but I had to pull away. You can only comfort when you’re in a safe space. I wasn’t.

I pulled back from the hug and wanted to say something. But as we stood in that moment, faces close, bodies still touching, everything changed. That was the problem. His lips, his body; they’d felt too good. I’d been watching him for weeks, every movement, the way he slept, the way he looked naked in the shower.

Our eyes locked. We stayed locked in an embrace already beyond the point of return. I stared at his lips, then back at his eyes.

Then I did exactly what he’d done to me. I leaned in and pressed my lips against his.

The rush hit like before, intense, blood surging, skin burning.
He kissed me back. For a second our eyes were open and we both got a glimpse deep inside each other.
We kissed, but this time I opened my mouth, and I felt my tongue touch his. Our lips became one. Everything else disappeared. For a while, it was just Logan and me, alone to judge ourselves.

I felt his cock, pressed against mine, already throbbing.
His hands slipped behind my head, gently stroking the back of my neck and shoulders as his tongue probed my mouth.
Instinctively, I pushed my crotch into his so we could feel them together.
For a few minutes, we stood in that embrace, kissing, connected in a way that felt both impossible and inevitable.

I pulled away gently, opening my eyes and looking into his.
Whatever tension there had been was gone.
“Wow,” was all he managed to say.
I smiled and stepped back.
“Shall we get some food?”
He laughed, shook his head, then stared at his laptop as if it had answers.

When he eventually looked back at me, there was something new in his eyes. I couldn’t work out what it was.
“So, what does this mean?”
I shrugged. “I guess we’re dating now. It’s official.”
He laughed, and I joined him.
“I don’t know what it means. We kissed, apparently we both like kissing each other. But right now, I want to get some food and not think about it.”

As if to reassure him, I leaned in and gave him another kiss, just a short one.
He nodded, looking a lot lighter than moments earlier.

We threw on clothes for general indoor relaxation. Yes, even off-duty, FBI training dictates what you wear, and we went to the cafeteria.

A few others were there, laughing and joking the way you only see on a Sunday.
Mara, a red-haired, green-eyed tall woman, was in the middle of a joke. As we approached, we got the tail end of it. Others laughed, some shook their heads, and we could tell it was a dirty one.

We’d gotten to know each other well and sat comfortably among the group after getting some food. It seemed everyone else had already eaten.
Nadia, who shared a room with Mara and seemed as close to her as Logan and I had gotten, smiled, then added a comment to Mara’s story, which brought out fresh bursts of laughter. She was tidy, black hair tied back into a severe ponytail, brown eyes gently watching everything as though she was ready to make a joke out of it.

“What did we miss?” Logan asked, looking more relaxed than I’d seen him all day as he shoveled rice and vegetables into his mouth.

“Mara’s being naughty again,” Alanah said, without a smile, but in a way we’d all gotten used to. She didn’t smile, she barely laughed, but she wasn’t harmful in a way that derailed conversation.

Mara leaned over and pinched Alanah’s shoulder. “You don’t laugh, but inside you wish you were as funny as me.”

Everyone did laugh at that, because it was true.
She was a starer, often scrutinizing you until you had to lift your collar and look away.

When Connor started telling us a joke, filled with sarcasm and boundless energy, all eyes were on him, except for Alanah’s. She watched me closely, as though studying me. Then she scanned Logan, looking for something. As Connor landed his joke, others laughed, and Alanah’s eyes shifted back to me.

The tiniest shift at the corners of her mouth told me she’d seen something; something she appeared satisfied with. She flicked to Logan, back to me, raised her eyebrows very subtly, then looked down.

I don’t know why that bothered me, but I felt exposed. I kept my focus on eating my dinner and Connor.

“I tried flirting with the med-tech this week. She said she only dates guys with emotional intelligence,” Connor said. “So I told her, perfect, I’m emotionally available… for about thirty seconds.”

He flexed and winked at Priya, who rolled her eyes hard enough to count as cardio.
Everyone laughed, even Logan and me.
Except for Alanah, of course, who continued to watch everyone like she was taking notes.

Diego stood and announced he was going to play Foosball. Others jumped up and followed him, but Logan and I stayed with Mara, Nadia, Grant and Alanah.
As soon as the others were gone, Alanah couldn’t help herself. “What have you pretty boys been up to?”
The way her eyebrow raised and the tone she used forced the others to look at her, then back at us, as if she was highlighting something.
“Studying. What you should be doing,” Logan said, quick off the bat.
I laughed. “Aren’t we getting tested tomorrow? I want to keep ahead.”
“You guys do everything together?” Mara asked, but not in a threatening way.
I shrugged, not sure how to answer that.
Logan said, “As much as you and Nadia do everything together, I guess.”
Nadia laughed and fist-bumped Logan, and they laughed.

We put our plates away and joined the others for some gaming that night. It turned out most of us were very competitive, with Alanah and Connor putting a lot more energy and effort into winning, which, of course, meant they won.

An hour before lights out, we said goodnight and went to get ready for a big week ahead.
When we got into the room and prepared for the bathroom, there was no awkwardness at all. I think Logan felt as relieved as I did, like we’d resolved something.

But when we got into the bathroom and stripped to get into the shower, Logan said in a quiet voice, “Now you can watch me shower openly, like I know you’ve been dying to.”
I laughed, but realized the comment opened another door.

As I got under the hot spray, I looked across the bathroom and saw Logan watching me, a small smile on his face, facing me.

And his cock was hard.

I smiled, feeling uncomfortable for the first time, starting to wonder what we were doing, and how far this would go.
In my mind, naively, I thought the kiss had settled something, like we’d got it out of the way and now could get on with our lives. But as I watched him shower, watching me, I realized how stupid that was.

I turned my shower off and stepped out.
Logan had just started soaping himself, but his eyebrows went up as I walked slowly toward him.
The bathroom door wasn’t locked, so I quickly locked it. I didn’t say anything, but stepped into his shower, realizing my cock had also gone hard and that something had to be done about it. I was operating more on instinct than anything else.

There was no need to say anything, because as soon as I stepped in and moved closer to him, he opened his arms and I stepped into a warm hug and a kiss.
A few moments later, with the hot water spraying behind Logan and my hands on his back, I said, “I don’t know how far I want to go with this.”

He nodded. “Me too. We can just jerk off.”

We kissed again, but this time our cocks were free of any clothes and the feel of his against mine made it hard to breathe, especially as we were kissing.
That kiss became more intense as both of us pushed into each other, gyrating our cocks together.
Logan, far more brazen than I’d ever been, reached between us and grabbed our cocks.

The feel of his hand on my cock, his chest hairs brushing mine, was enough to make me want to nut. But I wanted to wait for him, no matter how much I needed to just release.

“That feels too good,” I said out loud, more to myself than for Logan.
“Mmmhmmm,” he said, eyes closed, kissing me while one hand stroked us together and the other rubbed my back.

I reached down to touch his hand because there was something I finally admitted I’d been dying to do.
Touch Logan’s cock.

His hand slipped to our balls, pushing them together, while mine took over, gripping us both as I explored him.
“You have foreskin,” I whispered, surprised.
He smiled, as though proud. “Yeah, and you don’t.”

For some reason, we both found that amusing and laughed, then kissed again.
The surprising part was that I had a bigger cock, not by much. Mine was thicker, and around eight inches, whereas Logan’s was around seven and not as thick. He was hairier than me too.

Under that hot water, I jerked us both, enjoying feeling his cock against mine as we kissed in a way I’d only ever kissed my girlfriend.
“I’m close,” he whispered, barely audible under the spray of the water.
“Yeah, me too.”

We continued to kiss as I felt us both throb in my hand, enjoying the way his hands stroked our balls while I worked on our shafts.
Our lips locked as we very quietly ejaculated, breathing heavily, deeply and as quietly as we could.
Even with the hot water, I could feel the even hotter jizz from both our cocks shoot up between us.

As the last of it shot out, I moved to his neck, kissing him there, letting the hot water wash us away.
Logan kissed my neck, and we hugged in a way that spoke volumes.

Tired, I stepped back and watched him, naked, his cock slowly softening.
He grinned. “That feels better, a relief actually,” he said in a whisper I barely heard.
I nodded. “Hurry the fuck up, I’m cold.”
He laughed and grabbed the soap, and began to soap me.

I let him.
He appeared to be studying my body as he soaped me, working down from my navel to my cock and balls.
“You’re bigger than me and thicker.”
I grinned. “Thanks, I think.”

We took turns soaping each other, casting each other glances that didn’t need words, then finished and went to brush our teeth.

Minutes later, we got into our respective beds and I realized that for the first time, I’d gotten in bed with just my cock, something that Logan had been ribbing me about since we’d gotten to Quantico.
I lay there, my mind racing with thoughts as I heard Logan’s soft breath over in his bed.

“I really liked that,” Logan said in the darkness and quiet of the room.
“Me too,” I said, turning to my side so I could see him in the faint light from the lights outside the window.

A few minutes later, I could tell he still wasn’t asleep, so I got up and walked over to his bed.
He turned. “What are you doing?”
“Move over,” was all I said.
He watched me for a second, but then shifted over, so I got into bed with him.

We hugged, facing each other, and I kissed him again.
“Good night,” he said, a whisper on freshly clean breath.
“Don’t get used to this,” I said.

We laughed like kids with a secret, but his hands around me and mine around him said everything.

Want more? Check out Substack for the rest of this series.

Part 1 is here. This story has definitely gone down the SCI-FI road 😄
Warning: 18+ Only

Field Training

Day one and a storm had just begun, lashing at windows, pelting on the roof, banging on doors like an angry neighbor. But inside it was calm, warm and relatively quiet.

We stood, looking around, pacing, but neither of us could see where the group were.

“He definitely said here and 7am?”

I nodded. “Definitely.”

We walked toward our rooms, both confused, still looking back along the hall trying to work out what was going on.

Then things went from strange to worse. I opened the door, and held it wide for Logan, who was right behind me.

“You know what this means?” I heard him say.

I turned to look, waiting for the punchline I already knew was inevitable.

Something in the way he stared at me, the way his eyes were saying something I couldn’t work out, his smile, a little crooked, and his posture, a bit off for Logan.

“What?” I swallowed, feeling uncomfortable with him for the first time since we’d met.

He stepped forward, and I stepped back, studying his eyes, a race against time to interpret the expression, but I just couldn’t.

I stepped back again but hit the wall, his smile widened as he stepped forward.

His face was inches from mine as he said, “check mate.”

Just as he spoke those words, I finally interpreted the look in his eyes.

Lust.

He stepped in and kissed me, pushing his body against mine. I tried to push him away, but found my arms were stuck, I couldn’t move them. Or maybe, it was because I didn’t want to.

I felt his body against mine, and I even felt his hardness pushing against mine.

My body wouldn’t move, no matter how much I willed it. Then, my tongue met his, while my brain screamed for it to stop. But I couldn’t.

Then my own cock hardened.

Every fiber in my body screamed, every part of me overheating while my mind kept screaming, no no no!

Logan pulled my pants down, and instead of stopping him, I kicked them off.

He held me tight, wouldn’t let me go, as I struggled with him. Somewhere an alarm sounded, in the distance, but it echoed.

“Josh! Josh!”

The voice sounded different, far away at first, then above me, the tone changing, the depth of it shifting.

I opened my eyes.

Logan was standing above me, in his underpants, bare-chested with sleep still in his eyes.

“Josh!? Are you okay? You were having a bad dream.”

I sat up, arms behind me to support me up. “What? What time is it?”

“Six thirty.”

“Are you okay?” Logan’s croaky voice asked, an alarm going off somewhere outside.

“Um… yeah,” I said, swinging my legs over the side of the bed and putting my face in my hands.

I looked down, a wet patch where my hard cock strained against my pants.

My pajama pants, they were off somehow and at the end of the bed. I must have wriggled out of them in my dream.

When I looked over, Logan was smiling, looking at my cock and the wet patch.

“Man, that must have been some dream.”

I threw my hands down to my crotch and kept my head down, looking over to where my sweats were.

“Formation in thirty minutes,” a voice barked from the corridor. “If you’re not ready you’ll be running laps until sunrise.”

He rubbed his face. “Who schedules exercise before the sun’s even had coffee?”

I was still half in the dream, the kind where I wasn’t yet a government pawn and Logan had pinned me to the wall. My hair felt like a bird’s nest, my mouth tasted like glue, and I hadn’t even sorted clothes. Logan appeared more awake.

“Crap, we need to shower, get food.”

He stood, stared at me. “Josh, move.”

“You can go first. I’ll figure out what to wear.”

“Do we have time? There’s two showers. Efficiency, remember?”

That word made it sound like a group project instead of a shared bathroom. I followed him in, towel over my shoulder.

The bathroom light was brutal. The tiles were cold underfoot. We both froze, remembering the double showers. Logan raised an eyebrow.

“You thought it was weird,” he said, peeling his shirt off. “Turns out it is efficient.”

I laughed. “You just want to see if I actually shower.”

He grinned and turned the water on full blast and I recalled the dream, so vivid and hard to shake, making it even weirder to be in the bathroom naked across from Logan.

Steam rolled across the room. He pulled his briefs down and stepped under the spray, head tipped back, muscles moving like they had a plan. I threw my clothes off, faced the wall, tried not to think about anything I shouldn’t.

The water hit me like a slap. I heard Logan curse. “They trying to wake us up with pressure washers?”

“The spray is insane,” I called back.

When I turned, I caught him through the steam. He was watching me, grin lazy, eyes glinting.

“You’re watching me again.”

“I’m not.”

“You are.”

His grin didn’t move.

We finished fast, racing to dry off. Both of us laughing at nothing, or maybe it was nerves.

“Forgot to set an alarm,” I said.

“Same. Rookie move.”

We sprinted back to the room, pulling on whatever was clean. Logan looked annoyingly put together. I looked like I’d been mugged by laundry.

Through the slats in the blinds, the sky looked washed out, a type of gray that was still clinging to the night towering over the rain. Somewhere out there a helicopter passed low, and a few birds hadn’t yet figured out they were living on a military base.

“Let’s go before someone decides pretty boys get double laps.”

I ran fingers through my hair. “We have nine minutes to eat.”

Two recruits were already in the hall, half ready and curious. Someone muttered, “The pretty boys are running late.”

“That’s going to get irritating fast,” Logan said as we bolted toward the mess.

We hit the mess hall with seven minutes left. The air smelled like eggs, bleach, and nerves. A woman in a hairnet waved us through before we could ask if we were allowed. Logan grabbed a plate like a man who’d already mapped the buffet. I stuck to scrambled eggs and coffee, because I was still half inside that dream and the caffeine might bully reality back into place.

Other new recruits were scattered at the tables finishing breakfast, looking prepared and ready. Alanah sat upright, reading from a printout and eating like she’d been training for it. Connor demolished the rest of his breakfast like it was an opponent. Grant wiped his fork with a napkin before each bite. Priya stirred her oatmeal without tasting it, eyes on her phone.

Two of them were just getting up and putting plates away. Mara Klein, comms analysis, all sarcasm and caffeine. And Theo Park, Legal and Compliance, posture too perfect for someone his age.

Logan caught my eye over his plate. “This feels like high school detention with slightly better lighting.”

“More carbs,” I said.

“More rules.”

“Rules you’re already planning to break.”

He grinned. “Not before we know who’s grading.”

Five minutes later, Benning’s voice rolled through the hall like thunder. “Formation in two minutes. If you’re late, I’ll make you explain why to the asphalt.”

Chairs scraped. Plates hit trays. Logan and I fell into step, the others close behind. The morning air had gone from cool to threatening. We filed into the courtyard, ten of us facing Benning and Dr Keller.

Benning’s gaze swept over us like a scanner. “This is where the next twenty weeks start to matter. You will learn to work as a unit. You will hate it before you appreciate it. Consider this your last easy morning.”

He moved down the line, naming specialties. Alanah, behavioral science. Connor, tactical. Grant, medical. Priya, forensics. Mara, comms. Diego, surveillance. Nadia, cryptography. Theo, legal. Logan, cyber operations. Josh, behavioral cybernetics.

He paused at me. “Behavioral cybernetics. Sounds like something I need a translator for.”

I tried to smile. “Predicting network behavior through human patterns, sir.”

“Useful, if it works.” He turned to Logan. “You the recon guy?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Good. Make sure your pretty boy roomie eats more than coffee. You’ll need him conscious.”

There were sniggers.

Keller stepped forward, calm and precise. “Over the next weeks you’ll rotate through four divisions; academic, tactical, field, and cyber. Each test will build on the last. Fail one, and you’ll retake it. Fail twice, and we’ll send you home. By Week Three, you’ll operate as an integrated Red Cell. That means your mistakes will cost each other points, not just you. Learn each other’s strengths now.”

Benning checked his watch. “Gear issue in five. Move.”

The ten of us followed him across the courtyard to a building that smelled like detergent and new fabric. Inside, tables were stacked with folded gray sweats, PT shirts, boots, and duffel bags. The clerk at the desk didn’t look up. “Strip to your shorts. Line up and don’t make me repeat it.”

Grant was already down to his boxers, arms out like he was auditioning for surgery. Connor followed, laughing. Logan gave me a look that said we’re really doing this and peeled off his shirt like confidence had a body.

I joined the queue, trying not to make eye contact with anyone or anything. Nadia raised one unimpressed eyebrow. Alanah stood near the wall, arms folded, studying everyone like a psychologist dissecting a pack of lab rats.

The clerk moved fast, measuring chests, waists, inseams, muttering numbers.

We were handed duffels that weighed more than logic. Inside were folded uniforms, shoes, socks, and a thin binder labeled Training Protocols and Standards.

Benning led us back to our dorms and gave us five minutes to change into training gear.

We reassembled in minutes, each of us turning into near copies: gray sweats, black trainers, FBI across the chest. When we stepped outside again, the sky had turned a lighter shade of gray, rain threatening but not yet brave enough.

Benning stood waiting. “Inspection.”

He moved along the line, eyes scanning our uniforms, boots, posture. “You’re government property now. Act like it.”

That is how the first day started.

The first month was a blur of activity and it was hectic and exhausting. From physical training, to sitting in classrooms and everything in between. Logan and I were stuck together and were treated as a unit. This wasn’t just because we were both cyber, but because we’d bonded like good friends from the first introduction.

In any team exercise where we were required to buddy up, nobody looked at either Logan and I. We were a given.

As much as there was sarcasm, insults and cutting remarks, the camaraderie was evident and by week four, we’d become a very close knit group. Even though there was a strict no alcohol policy, we’d spent many nights observing each other, listening, talking and playing games, sitting in classrooms, watching each other’s performance in physical activities.

I even found myself matching Logan on our run speed and endurance.

We did this every day, with half of Sunday off to do our washing, unwind and catch up on homework, of which there was plenty. Logan and I had gotten used to seeing each other naked; we were never self-conscious. We stripped, sometimes chatted naked, usually in a hurry between classes, and dressed. It had become so routine that I’d even gotten into the habit of sleeping in my underpants just like Logan did.

It was on this Sunday, four weeks in when Logan and I sat at our desks studying that something big happened.

At this point, I knew more about Logan than I had about anyone in my life. We’d slept in the same room, showered, ate, trained, learned and bantered next to each other every day for a month. I knew when he snored and why, which thankfully wasn’t often, he always woke up with a hard-on, and often peed once in the night.

“I can identify the packet headers, verify the checksum, and trace the attack vector across three proxies, but apparently that doesn’t count as ‘authentication’ in a courtroom. Why does a judge need a chain of custody statement when I can literally recreate the breach from raw data?”

I didn’t look up. We were both bare-chested, which is how we studied most of the time. A habit because we changed outfits all too often as it is. “Because courts run on trust, not code. They don’t care that you can rebuild the data. They care who touched it between the keyboard and the evidence locker. Rule 901 isn’t about proof, it’s about people not lying.”

I could feel him watching me when he said, “that’s ridiculous.”

“So is gravity, but we still have to live with it.”

Logan grinned, leaned back in his chair and stretched. “I can’t read another thing. I want to play. Maybe shoot some pool, or fussball. What do you think?”

I paused to look at him, the late afternoon light hit just right, shifting his eyes from deep ocean to the color of a summer pool, and for a second I forgot what he’d asked.

Something tightened in my chest before I even knew why. It wasn’t new; it was just louder, harder to ignore. A feeling I’d had many times that I’d suppressed, to be analyzed at a future date.

Logan tilted his head, the grin softening. “What? Why are you staring at me like that?”

I blinked, but my brain stayed stuck on the shape of his mouth, the curve of his jaw, the way his muscles moved in his biceps when he flicked his pen and the way his chest jutted out when he needed to move to the next thing. My pulse kicked, stupid and obvious.

“Nothing,” I said, because I didn’t even know why myself.

His chair creaked as he leaned forward, elbows on his knees, eyes still on me. The grin came back, smaller this time, curious instead of cocky.

“Tell me.”

I tried to look away, but that would be too obvious. I had to remind myself that Logan knew me as well as I knew him.

My breath was caught in my chest and for a few agonizing seconds, I couldn’t find words, which made it even worse.

He stood, the gold FBI logo catching the light on shorts that did a terrible job of hiding his cock, one I’d seen a hundred times and still couldn’t ignore, then crossed to my desk and crouched beside me.

“What gives?”

I turned to my laptop and my notes, feeling the heat building up and flushing my neck and my face.

“Er… nothing. I just… I don’t know. Maybe I was just… distracted.”

But no matter what, I couldn’t look at him.

Logan kneeled next to me, and put his hand on my thigh, which felt exceptionally heavy, and warm.

The urge to jump up and run, to where I didn’t know, but to simply get away, was strong.

The silence turned awkward, for the first time since we’d met.

“Josh, what’s up? Tell me,” I could feel his eyes boring into me.

But the minute he’d put his hand on my leg, I felt it.

I stirred. It was something I just couldn’t control. The blood thrummed in my ears, my body responded.

My cock responded.

All at once, something I’d been ignoring for weeks suddenly surfaced at the worst possible moment.

Then Logan saw it, and I heard him suck in a breath and hold it.

But he didn’t move away, or run. He kept his hand on my leg, watching me, watching my cock betray me while I stared at my laptop awkwardly.

Then I did look, trying to hide the fear in my eyes, to think quickly on how I could explain this sudden awkwardness and the physical reaction.

I opened my mouth to tell him I was exhausted, overloaded and hungry, but instead I stared.

That’s when I noticed the change in Logan’s face and in particular, his eyes. The blue had gone deep again, but the way they softened, the subtle shift in the way our eyes connected, like suddenly our eyes were communicating what our words refused to.

His hand moved across my thigh and grabbed my shaft, and gripped it.

Logan’s eyes stayed on mine the whole time.

“Logan…” I began, not sure what I intended to say. But then my hand instinctively moved to his, and I gripped it, and held it there.

A surge went through me. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d jerked off and released pressure. I’d been too afraid to, because I knew what I’d think about. Logan in the shower, Logan in bed in his underpants.

Logan stared at my bulge while his hand gripped it, but then I looked down and realized he was hard too. The way he crouched, it pushed out like a big tent.

I smiled. “Oh.”

He half-smiled, with a nervous twitch, like the corners of his mouth were as confused as I was.

Whatever had happened, the moment to break through that veil of pretence had arrived. It hit me all at once that we couldn’t go back now. Not now we’d had this moment.

Logan’s hand stayed on my thigh, solid and alive. He froze, eyes flicking up as the weight of what he was doing hit him. For a second he looked like he might pull away.

I caught his wrist before he did, not to stop him, but to steady the air between us.

“Josh,” he said quietly.

“I know.”

Silence pressed around us. I could hear the hum of the old vent, the scrape of my chair when I shifted closer. The tension between us changed shape, less about rules now, more about honesty.

As if responding to something I was thinking, but didn’t say, he said, “me too.”

His face moved towards me, and I leaned in, our eyes connecting, talking in a language neither of us could decipher, no matter how much we studied.

I felt his breath as he moved closer, even as I studied his lips, so pink and so full, and then our lips touched.

There's more on my Substack here. Thanks for reading.

Warning: 18+ Only

My parents were already proud of me. I’d topped my class, chasing the doctorate I’d wanted since high school.

Then in my first year working as a research scientist in the university’s cybersecurity lab, some guys in a chopper kidnapped me.

Okay, maybe kidnapping isn’t exactly true, but the real story sounded kinda dull.

It was late spring, a little warm and maybe even sticky, and of course I was running late again. I grabbed a sandwich on my way, jogged across campus, and slid into my chair pretending I’d been there all along.

Professor Aldricht burst in, unkempt gray-streaked beard bristling, eyes wild, finger already pointed at me.

“Joshua Sunderland! Thank you for dropping by!”

The room froze except for a few muffled giggles. Probably more at him using my full name than his temper.

I sank lower in my seat, nodding like I cared while my brain scrambled for another half-believable excuse.

My inbox pinged. The others were already roasting him.

Then one message nearly killed me.

Attached image: Aldricht as Gandalf yelling YOU SHALL NOT CLOCK IN AFTER NINE!
Caption: Real-time footage from the lab.

I lost it. Tried to hide a grin, failed miserably.

“Amusing, is it? Do I amuse you?”

It was like being back in high school all over again. I looked down, wiped the smile, praying for an interruption.

The door slammed open at the perfect moment.

Four men in suits filled the doorway.

“Mr. Sunderland?”

My stomach dropped. FBI badges.

I simply stared.

Two older agents walked over, stone-faced and in intimidating gray suits. They told me to come with them while my work colleagues’ mouths gaped. Before I knew it, they were steering me through some hidden stairwell, two flights up, straight onto the roof.

Rotor noise hit first. A chopper waited there, with another agent standing by, looking impatient.

The one at the door leaned close so I could hear him over the blades.
“Mr. Sunderland, Special Agent Cotchin. You’ll be briefed at the destination.”

I already knew asking what that destination was would be a waste of my time.

And just like that, the craziest day of my life kicked off.

The ride to the location I wasn’t allowed to know about was in complete silence. I watched the men, all in their thirties or forties, expressionless and sour-faced. I got the impression I’d done something very wrong.

The week before, I’d published a paper that caused a bit of a stir. I’d even been interviewed by a large paper about the content. I tried to think what I could have done to get myself into this level of trouble as we flew through thick clouds toward an unknown destination, my heart pounding and my mind reeling, trying to recount every incident of my life that could have led me here.

We arrived at a secret facility that smelled suspiciously of new monitors and military-grade coffee. Turns out we’d landed in Virginia.

Inside, I met a woman who looked more like a librarian than a special agent, who introduced herself as Dr. Marian Keller, with Assistant Director Halvorsen at her side. I was still flanked by Cotchin.

“Mr. Sunderland,” Dr. Keller began. Her voice was softer than I expected, the kind that could calm a bear mid-rampage. She leaned forward slightly. “We brought you here because your paper just became a national headache.”

She slid a printout toward me. “Behavioral Fingerprinting of Autonomous Reconnaissance Networks Using Non-Deterministic Heuristics.” I’d written it to sound clever, not dangerous. But apparently I’d nailed both.

She explained that someone had used my research to mask an AI-driven breach hitting multiple federal agencies. Nobody could trace the source, but my model could predict how it moved. It was the only thing catching the patterns in real time.

That conversation blindsided me, and I went from prime suspect number one to the key witness in an investigation.

The sum of that insane day? I was being asked to apply to the FBI. And when I say “asked,” I mean told.

I was given a week to pack my things. The University of Maryland had already been notified. I said my farewells to family, friends, and colleagues. The girlfriend and I had split weeks earlier, so that was one problem conveniently solved.

A week later, I found myself at Quantico, Virginia, beginning training to become an FBI agent. My parents were prouder than I could have imagined, but I had never once, in my life considered this career path.

And that’s how I met Logan Everett, my roommate.

No sooner had I been shown my dorm, given a time for pick-up and a finger pointing down the corridor to the bathrooms, I found myself walking in and seeing this tall, blonde, muscular guy bent over, who looked as confused and rattled as I did.

“Hi,” I said, stepping into what felt like his space. He was bent over the bed unpacking his suitcase. My first view of Logan was his ass, and my first thought was, why the hell am I noticing his ass?

He turned when the door hit the wall, immediately friendly. Deep blue eyes that twinkled like he was always looking for trouble, tousled hair that was either naturally perfect or took effort to look that effortless.

“Hey. I’m Logan. You’re rooming here?”

I nodded. “I think so. Pretty much got given a clue and the rest is up for interpretation.”

He had a great smile, and was quick to laugh. “Yeah, same here. Got in about an hour ago. No clue where to get food, the bathroom, or any useful information.”

We shook hands. His grip was warm and firm, a grip that belonged to a guy comfortable in his own body.

“Someone’s coming at six,” I said. “That’s all they told me. Oh, and the bathroom’s down the hall.”

Both single beds were on opposite walls, each with a desk, a brand-new laptop, and neatly stacked supplies like pens, pads, and cups. I dropped my case on the bed, not in any rush to unpack, and watched Logan.

He faced the door. “We don’t even have a key. You think anyone around here locks up?”

I shrugged. “Pretty sure the locking isn’t our job.”

He smirked. “So if my stuff disappears, who do I complain to? The President?”

I looked past him to the window. “See that dome by the stairwell? Axis Q-series. Four-meg sensor, IR-cut filter, wide enough to catch the whole corridor. There’s another over the entrance with an L-mount. You can tell by the red reflection in the lens.”

He followed my gaze, eyes narrowing. “You clocked all that walking in?”

“Can’t help it,” I said. “I remember things.”

He nodded, reappraising me. “Then you already saw the Hikvision PTZ near the north corner. Covers both exits. 30x optical zoom.”

I hadn’t, actually. We’d come in from the opposite direction, and I’d been too focused on my reality shift for any thorough investigation. “Good to know.”

“Interesting,” he said, studying me with that same amused expression.

We appraised each other, two strangers dissecting a room like forensic twins, then he laughed softly and the tension broke.

“Come on, genius,” he said. “Let’s see what else is watching us.”

I’m not exactly a nerd, and I know I don’t look like one. I don’t usually make friends easily. Most of my friends came from sports or school, but I found myself instantly warming to Logan, fell in step alongside him like he’d always been there.

“So, I assume you’re cyber too?” I asked as we wandered the halls, noticing the way his shirt fit tight across his chest, the top buttons undone just enough to show a hint of hair.

He nodded. “Yeah. Military side of cyber. Transferred here, today’s my first day too. Doing special ops and recon, but they flew me in last week for the interview and gave me the whole ‘either join, or join’ speech.”

I laughed. “What is with that? I swear if I hadn’t accepted, I’d have found my career quietly erased.”

He laughed too. It was a good laugh, easy, like someone who laughed a lot. When he turned to me, there was that look again, the one people give when they’re trying to work out what a guy like me is doing behind a computer instead of on a field.

“Pretty much. Surprised they even gave me a week to quit my life and move. Kinda neat you’re here though. I was dreading this, but having a roomie like you makes it better,” he said.

Logan led the way down the corridor, and we turned a corner into what looked like a small cafeteria. It smelled like grilled food and floor polish, with steam rising from the bain-maries and the hum of vending and soda machines.

“This can’t be real,” I said, walking past trays of lasagna, salad, and food I couldn’t identify.

Beyond that, a games room with pool tables, foosball, table tennis, even consoles and couches.

A guy and a girl were locked in an Xbox battle while two others smacked a ping-pong ball like their lives depended on it.

I turned to say something to Logan, but he was already at the counter talking to a large man in a white hairnet.

“What can I get you?” the man said.

“Where are the prices?” Logan asked.

The man smiled, clearly used to that question. “You just arrived, huh? No prices here. Take what you want. You overeat, you’ll throw it up. That’s your only warning.”

Logan whistled, a sound that somehow matched him. I caught myself watching the way his lips curved as he did it.

He stared at the trays for a while, then asked, “What time do people usually eat?”

The man shrugged. “Whenever you want. Open from five a.m. to ten p.m.”

I scanned the food and finally decided on a stroganoff.

“I’ll have the lasagna and salad,” Logan said, grabbing a tray when the man pointed him to it. Logan handed me one and took another for himself.

“I never want to leave this place,” I said. “Man, they’ve got Xbox, PlayStation, board games, pool. Like, seriously?”

We ate too much, drank too much soda, and ended up slouched in the dining chairs staring at the games room like it was paradise.

“Where you from?” Logan asked between mouthfuls.

“Maryland,” I said, spearing a few fries. “You?”

“Portland.”

When Logan studied something, his eyes darkened and his brow dropped slightly. As I spoke, he appeared to be reading me.

“What do you do for fun?” he asked. “Girlfriend? Sports? Gamer?”

I chewed and nodded toward his plate. “You always eat that fast?”

He grinned and nodded again, mouth full.

I smiled. “Not anymore, she’s history. Gamer, I guess, yeah. RPGs, DnD, tennis when it’s warm.”

I was starting to get him. Logan was predictable, in a way that made him trustworthy.

“Me too,” he said, rattling off a bunch of games I’d either played or heard of.

“You’re super cool,” he said finally, grinning. “This’ll be a fun few months.”

I nodded, but there was that flicker in his eyes again. That extra second of looking before he glanced away.

At six sharp, we met Supervisory Special Agent Benning, a man built like someone who could crush concrete with a handshake.

Along with the four we’d seen in the games room, there were four others, making our team ten in total. Everyone looked mid to late twenties, sharp but clearly a little disoriented, like we’d all been drafted in a hurry.

Benning had the look of someone carved from order itself. Broad shoulders, sleeves rolled to the forearms, salt-and-pepper hair cropped with military precision. He carried himself like a man who’d never needed to shout to get obedience.

“Evening, everyone,” he said, calm but commanding. “You’ve all been cleared for the Special Agent Basic Training Program. You’ll spend the next twenty weeks learning how to be useful and not get yourselves or anyone else killed.”

He didn’t smile much, but then, nobody else did either.

We followed him through a long corridor lined with glass-walled classrooms. Inside, whiteboards were covered in scribbles, and projectors hummed quietly, ready for the next morning’s lectures.

“That’s your academic wing,” Benning said. “Law, ethics, interrogation, digital forensics, and paperwork. Lots of paperwork. You’ll start there at 0700.”

We crossed an open-air walkway that smelled faintly of pine and gun oil. Off to the right, a cluster of floodlit buildings caught my eye.

“That’s Hogan’s Alley,” he said. “Our fake town. You’ll learn evidence collection, tactical movement, and how to tell an innocent bystander from someone planning fuck you up.”

A few nervous laughs.

He pointed toward another block in the distance. “Firearms and tactical training center. You’ll qualify with sidearms before the end of next week. If you’ve never fired a weapon before, congratulations, you won’t leave until you’re a skilled marksman.”

We looped back toward the dorms. Benning stopped at a glass door with a keypad entry. “That’s your cyber operations wing. You two pretty boys,” he said, looking at Logan and me, “will spend time there once the basics are out of the way. It’s quieter, colder, and a lot more fun if you like puzzles that fight back.”

A few of them laughed, and I threw Logan a glance. I had a sinking feeling that we’d just been labeled and it would stick.

We got an introduction to a few other areas, some of which we’d already discovered. We also got the lowdown on the Mess and the same caution we’d received from the server. He checked his watch. “Curfew’s 2200. Lights out at 2230. Don’t make me regret being civil. Welcome to Quantico.”

And just like that, he was gone.

The ten of us stood in the corridor, blinking under fluorescent light, half in awe, half wondering if we’d just joined something we couldn’t quit.

We drifted back toward the games room, a little too wired to sleep.

That’s where I met Alanah Chan, sharp-faced, quietly intense, and the type of person who only said things once. She was tight-lipped about her specialty, which somehow made everyone more curious.

The others were all interesting in their own ways, and it didn’t take long before we realized most of us had been drafted within the same two-week window.

“What do you pretty boys do?” a rugged, slightly stocky guy by the name of Connor asked us.

Our introductions were off to a great start, with banter, sarcasm and conversation that could only come from a group of highly intellectual people.

Games started up. Pool table, foosball, table tennis. Someone turned on music. For a moment, it felt like college again, except we all knew this wasn’t going to be that kind of campus.

When an alarm sounded, everyone froze.

Except Alanah, who calmly pointed at the clock. “Curfew,” she said, standing, almost looking bored. “Good night.”

And with that, she walked off.

Within minutes, the rest of us followed.

“I really like her,” Logan said as we headed down the hall.

“Yeah, me too. She strikes me as the type who knows what’s going on, even when she doesn’t.”

Logan glanced at me, hand on the door, eyes squinting a little like he was trying to read between the lines.

“Nicely put,” he said, and pushed the door open.

I finally pulled out a few things from my case and shoved them into the cupboard, promising myself I’d sort it later. Logan was hanging everything with military precision, shirts lined up, jeans folded, shoes tucked neatly under the bed. Even his bathroom bag sat perfectly centered on the blanket.

“You coming to brush your teeth?” he asked behind me.

“Uh huh,” I said, finding my toiletries buried under a tangle of cables and socks.

The bathroom was bigger than I expected, with two sinks, two showers on opposite walls, and one toilet cubicle.

I ran a finger along the counter. “Why would anyone want to shower with someone else on the other side?”

Logan rinsed his mouth, then looked at me through the mirror. “I’m sure Alanah would say it’s efficient.”

We both laughed.

“I’m just glad there aren’t two toilets,” Logan said as we left the bathroom and went back to our room.

I found my sleeping shorts, a pair of gray sweats with cutoffs, and my Snoopy tee that had long since faded into a blur of color.

“That’s cute,” Logan said.

I turned and lifted my covers, then looked back to see what he had on, so I could tease him.

Logan was in briefs.

I spun to face away again. “Oh, you sleep in jocks.”

He chuckled, a little nervous. “I thought that was normal.”

I shrugged. “Might be. I’ve just never been a big fan of normal.”

“I can put something else on if it makes you uncomfortable?”

I turned and tried not to look at his bulge. “Nah, not at all. Was just surprised.”

As I slid into bed, I watched him pull his sheets back. It was hard not to notice how fit he was. The briefs clung perfectly, outlining a body that came from discipline and hours in the gym. His legs were strong, lightly hairy, and the muscles in his back moved like they knew exactly what they were doing.

The room light was off, but the floodlight outside poured through the blinds, just enough to see shape and movement. Logan bent forward, checking something on his ankle, and the fabric of his underwear tightened across him like it was painted on.

Then I saw it.

He was looking back at me from between his legs. Grinning.

I froze, eyes jumping to the ceiling.

“Don’t be embarrassed,” Logan said quietly. “Kind of flattering.”

My face burned. I could hear my own heartbeat in my ears, and for the first time in a long time, I didn’t know what the hell to say.

“Night,” he said.

I heard him slip into bed, the mattress quietly adjusting to his body.

“Night.”

Thoughts raced through my head, about what had just happened. Why I was even noticing details about his body and his smile? Something that I would never have noticed before. There was also the excitement of becoming an FBI agent, so I simply couldn’t sleep for a while.

But eventually, as I heard the soft sound of Logan’s breathing, I did sleep, picturing him lying in his bed in his jocks.

Want more? Join the community on Substack. Part 2 is here.

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All characters are over 18. None of the characters depicted resemble anyone I've seen cruising. Not even that blonde guy that one time.

After I Railed a Straight Guy in the Park

Streetlights blinked on along the road just as the sun disappeared. Darkness settled over the town, and with no sound anywhere around us, the cold feeling creeping up and down my back intensified.

“Kent,” he said, his voice a lot less confident than it had been.

I turned to him and looked further down the road. Lights glowed in houses and shopfronts all along it, but there wasn't a single person anywhere.

“Huh?” I said, turning back to him. “That where you’re from?”

He smiled, a very likeable smile given the circumstances. “No, my name’s Kent.”

“Oh, shit, sorry!” I said, my palm immediately going to my forehead. “Gregory.”

Our hands met like I hadn't spent a few minutes with my cock inside him less than half an hour earlier.

“Fancy checking out down there?” I asked Kent, pointing down the road.

Every building looked deserted. We walked along the footpath like two men treading actual eggshells. Like any step might go through and we’d find ourselves plummeting directly to hell.

The betting shop, the cafe, the Indian restaurant, the sandwich shop, the vape store. All looked like they should be open, but were closed.

“What the bleeding hell is going on?” Kent said, the words coming from him as strange as the circumstances we found ourselves in.

I shrugged, walking alongside him, looking to the houses on the left, and then to the businesses to our right.

Kent turned to me, his eyes wide, then he stepped toward the restaurant. From the sidewalk I could see lights on inside. I followed Kent to the door and I watched as he tried to open it.

The door opened. He shot me another look, like every step of his decisions needed my approval.

I followed him inside, the door clanging behind me, echoing loudly.

I sniffed. “Why doesn’t it smell like an Indian?”

Kent shook his head. I could almost see the hairs on his neck stand up.

We walked through to the back.

Lights were on, an extractor fan above the hotplates was on, fresh food was on all the counters, fish, vegetables, meat.

Kent leaned back against the large refrigerator, staring at the empty kitchen.

“Gregory?”

I looked around the kitchen for a while, even stepping to the center, before turning back to Kent.

I simply shrugged. I didn’t trust my voice.

As though he had a plan and hadn’t decided to share it with me yet, he pushed away from the fridge, grabbed my shoulder in a friendly way, then moved back out of the kitchen. We also realized plates were set on many tables, napkins, cutlery.

They’d certainly prepared to open.

The betting shop doors were open, and inside, we found poker machines still on, lights behind counters lit, but not a single person.

All of the doors we tried were unlocked, and inside, we found life in inanimate objects, but no people.

Then we saw the police station. I felt that spark in my chest as Kent picked up speed. We walked to it much faster, both breathing a little heavier when we reached it.

At the door, Kent paused, watched me, his eyes betraying any confidence I thought I’d witnessed, then he exhaled, and opened the door.

This was a typical station, perfect for a town of this size, small.

There was nobody inside the station.

We walked backward. Outside the station, we stood under a streetlamp.

“You were in Brighton, you said. What time did you leave there?”

I tried to think.

“I don’t remember,” I said, thinking back. “I went to Brighton, I had a meeting, and then I left.”

“What details do you remember?” Kent asked me.

I shook my head again. “Just that I got the train, and there was nobody on it.”

I followed him as we crossed the road, walked directly down the path of one of the houses.

Kent opened the door, and strode straight in like he owned the place.

“Hello? Hello!” he yelled.

I moved past him into the kitchen, noticing lights were on, places were set for dinner. Someone had been in the middle of making stew.

Kent moved quickly, racing up the stairs, stomping around, calling out. I didn’t bother to follow him, having an inkling that he’d find what we’d found downstairs.

He didn’t say anything when he walked down the stairs, but his eyes did. As we headed toward the front door, I saw a family picture. A man in a shirt and tie, a woman in a light-blue dress, two kids, a boy and a girl, all smiling at the camera.

There was something wrong with that picture, but I couldn’t really see what it was until I walked away from it.

Their smiles were identical.

I brushed it off.

Outside, we walked toward the station again, at a loss of options.

“I have an idea,” I said, eyeing the cars out front. I walked back into the house, straight to the living room, scouting around, feeling Kent’s eyes on me as I searched it.

I found what I wanted in the kitchen. Keys.

Outside, I clicked the unlock button, and a Kia Sportage blinked. We both ran to it.

I got in, feeling sudden relief, with Kent jumping in next to me. Even as he pulled his seatbelt on, I had a dreaded feeling. When I put the keys in the ignition, my fears were confirmed.

Not even a sound. No ignition trying to start. The car was completely dead.

I got out, leaving Kent sitting in the passenger seat looking confused.

In the house next door the keys were on the coffee table.

That was a Ford Fiesta.

The ignition also didn’t turn.

“Fuck!” I said, slamming the car door, leaving the keys in the ignition.

Kent had gotten out of the Kia and stood between the two cars, a rising panic on his face.

For nearly an hour, Kent tried two cars, and I tried one more, we went into nearly all the houses and stores along that road, and encountered exactly the same thing in all of them.

Back toward the station, shoulders down, both of us kicking the tarmac as we walked along the road, I tried to suppress that darkness that began to rise from the base of my neck.

On the corner, I moved away from Kent and opened the pub doors. It smelled like a pub, spilled beer, stale something, but it was devoid of people.

I went to the kitchen and wasn’t surprised to discover the same thing. Someone had been preparing food, but nothing had actually been cooked yet.

I went behind the bar, grabbed a pint glass, and exhaled, then tried to pour myself a Guinness.

My eyes lit up when the Guinness flowed. I didn’t bother to let it sit, I immediately took a sip.

I threw my head back, and exhaled.

“What?” I heard Kent ask me from the other side of the counter.

I turned to him, putting the pint glass back under the tap, and resuming the pour.

“Sir, we are fully open. All drinks are on the house. What will you have?”

Kent grinned as far as he could given the circumstances, scanning the various labels on each of the taps.

“I'll have a Peroni thanks sir,” he said, both hands on the table, looking around at the empty bar.

Moments later, they sat opposite one another at a booth by the door, looking around, drinking faster than normal.

“This is fucking crazy. Is someone having a laugh?” I said.

Kent didn’t say anything, he kept his eyes on the pint glass, fingers occasionally tracing lines through the condensation.

“Kent, where exactly was your viewing?”

Kent looked up finally, like he’d been deep in thought.

“What?”

“The viewing. You went to look at a house. Where was that?”

He opened his mouth, then closed it, his eyes narrowing. He watched me, eyes widening. “Why can’t I remember?”

He looked at his pint, then back at me, then to the window, then down again.

“I… I don’t… how can I not remember?”

I stared. “You don’t remember where the viewing was?”

He rubbed his forehead, then turned to the window.

Even now, with an entire town apparently missing, I found myself watching him. The pub lighting was kinder than the streetlights outside. It softened everything. The lines around his eyes, the stubble along his jaw, and even the frown sitting permanently on his face tonight.

If I'd passed him in a supermarket I'd have looked twice.

Then probably a third time.

The strange thing was that I could picture his face perfectly, yet I couldn't remember a single detail about the meeting I'd supposedly attended in Brighton.

“How long have you been married?” I asked, scanning the pub again, the empty tables, the quiet games area, nobody behind the bar making occasional, distracting sounds putting glasses away.

Kent didn’t answer, so I turned back to him.

He stared.

“I don’t know. I can’t remember!” he said, though I knew the aggression wasn’t aimed at me.

I did it the only way I know how. “Do you even have a wife?” I joked, raising my pint and laughing.

But that didn’t calm him. He leaned back, watching me, jaw slack, eyes still very wide.

“I remember having one, I just can’t remember her.”

Those words stuck with me for a few minutes.

We finished our drinks a lot quicker than we would have had we paid for them, but I felt no better. In fact, as Kent’s anxiety continued to bubble up, I found it increasingly more difficult to calm myself.

Kent pushed the empty pint glass away, linked his fingers together, then started twisting them against each other.

I watched him, then reached out and grabbed his hands, forcing him to stop.

“Kent,” I said, keeping my voice low. Just the sound of my own even voice calmed me.

He kept his gaze down at his hands, tried to fight my hand and keep doing it.

I squeezed my hand, brought my other one over and kept his hands down. My voice was a little firmer this time. “Kent.”

He froze, then his hands went flat on the table. I kept mine on top.

“Kent, we can’t unravel, alright? I need you pragmatic. Listen, what do you do for a living?”

Kent paused, and for a minute I thought he was going to tell me he couldn’t remember.

“Operations Manager for a construction company.”

“Good, that’s a start. And you said you work in London.”

“Yeah. London.”

I nodded, almost feeling a sense of normality returning.

“What about you?”

I did have to think for a moment. “Trainer. HR systems,” I said, scratching the back of my neck for no reason.

“Partnered?” he asked me, touching his empty pint.

I shook my head. “Nah, recently separated.” And still getting therapy over it.

I got up. “My round again,” I said, taking the empty glasses for reasons I didn’t understand, and heading to the bar.

“Maybe we should remain clear-headed,” I heard him say, but I was already moving around the bar to pour us both another round of drinks.

I watched Kent play with his phone while I waited for the Guinness to settle. I pulled my phone out, which still had the SOS at the top.

When I brought the drinks back, I sat opposite him again, then pushed his Peroni to him.

“Anything?” I asked him, picking up my Guinness, and tapping his glass.

He didn’t respond, but looked out of the window.

“This makes no fucking sense. Where the fuck is everyone?”

I took a big drink of my Guinness, starting to feel the calming effects.

“Bet you’re missing your wife. I’m sure she’s okay,” I said, studying him again.

Kent stared at his phone as if he was reading something, but he didn’t say anything for a long time, nor did he touch his pint.

Eventually, he looked up, finally grabbing his drink and sipping it.

When he spoke, it was in a low voice, almost a whisper, like he was making a revelation.

“I’m not. I’m trying to think about my wife, picture her, feel something… but I’m not.”

I stared, a cold tingle dropping down my spine.

We drank that second pint mostly in silence, occasionally one of us would repeat the obvious, our frustration, the same question, or simply just to hear each other speak.

Kent drained the rest of his second Peroni fast, then got up and went to the bathroom.

He came back, a look on his face that worried me even more.

“What?”

He simply shook his head. “I need to be outside. I don’t know why.”

I drained the rest of mine, then went out with him, the pub doors closing behind us echoing on the street.

“Can you hear that?”

I strained to listen, but I heard nothing.

I shook my head.

“That’s the problem. Nothing at all. No birds, no wind, no anything.”

I had that sound in my ears like after I’d been in a loud club all night. Afterward, when everything is quiet compared to the loud music.

We walked to the middle of the road, looking around us, where we’d started earlier.

“Let’s go back to the park and fuck again,” I said, partly joking, but also because at least in the park we weren’t acutely aware of how fucked up this whole situation was.

He laughed. “Why? We could just fuck here.”

I laughed, and nodded, looking around.

I unbuckled, dropped my pants and my briefs, turning in a circle. “Hello!” I yelled, my voice echoing off buildings. “Public indecency over here, got my cock out!”

Kent’s face screwed up, like he was concerned, but his eyes were drawn to my cock.

I felt my cock harden, even while my whole body screamed for me to put my clothes back on, like suddenly people would reappear, and I’d be caught with my pants down.

Kent stood with his hands on his hips, looking past me, then back to my cock, then to the pub where we’d just sat, then back to my cock, then back across the footbridge to the park, then back to my cock.

If I’d seen this in a photograph, I would call it perfect. Everything was exactly right, lights on in houses, cars parked neatly outside houses on streets, businesses looked open, and the streetlights had all come on right when they should.

“You’re right. We could just do it right here. Keep fucking until someone comes along,” I said, not even sure if I was joking anymore.

“You’re standing in the middle of the road with your dick out, and nobody’s come running out,” he said, unbuckling.

As he unbuckled, his gaze drifted to the pub we'd just left. Warm lights glowed behind the windows. Empty.

I followed his gaze, hearing him unzip, looking toward the sandwich shop, the betting shop, the police station, the houses we’d entered without permission, and the useless cars still parked where we’d left them.

A dog should have barked, someone should be shouting, a curtain should have twitched.

The only thing twitching was my cock when the suited man next to me dropped his pants, and I saw his cock, and his ass as he continued turning in a circle.

He turned to me, looking ridiculous with his pants around his ankles, eyes flicking past me one more time, as if expecting something to change at any moment.

“You know what?”

I shook my head. “What?”

"If nobody's appeared by now," he said, shaking his head, "I don't think they're about to."

We both laughed, and I realized it was because the alternative would have driven us back to the pub, except this time we wouldn’t stop at two pints.

I shuffled forward a step toward Kent, and he shuffled toward me, his cock hardening as I reached him.

I dropped to a crouch, grabbing his cock, enjoying the feel of something real in my hand.

It throbbed, leaked precum, and was hot to touch.

It was even hotter when I put it in my mouth.

I waited, but there were no shouts, no sudden alarms from anywhere as I sucked Kent’s cock in the middle of the street.

On the corner, past his waist, I saw a stop sign.

No, I thought, I won’t stop.

Even that stop sign felt wrong somehow. But I couldn’t work out what exactly.

His cock tasted great, a bit of precum, clean, like he’d just come out of a shower. It throbbed as I sucked it to the base, feeling his balls on my chin, his hands going to my head and fingers gently massaging my scalp as if he wanted me to know he was enjoying it.

Then his hands gently pushed my head away, then pulled me up.

I came up, thinking he was going to turn around, or drop to suck me, but instead, his face moved to mine, and our eyes locked.

Then Kent kissed me. His lips were so soft, warm, fleshy, pressing into mine tentatively, as if waiting for permission.

My arms reached around him, and I kissed him harder, my tongue pushing through his lips to find his, which was eager for mine.

The kiss became passionate, like all of our fears were in it, transformed into need, and the other might hold the answers. His body pushed into mine, the heat of our cocks pressing into the other’s hips, arms moving around each other to grip, massage, make sure there were no gaps between us.

Even while we kissed, I was still aware of the wrongness of it all, not of us half-naked in the street, but the lack of sound.

Kent pulled away, but his eyes stayed on me, studying my face, then he turned, spitting into his fingers.

I spat in mine, put it on my cock, and rested a hand on his lower back, ready to guide myself into him.

He was still a little relaxed from our fuck in the park, so pushing it in wasn’t the issue. But balance was.

Standing in the street without something to lean on was the issue.

As I drove my cock into him, he nearly stumbled forward, we both shuffled, a laugh escaped him, then we stabilized and resumed.

“He’s fucking me over here!” Kent shouted.

I laughed, but still looked around, waiting for someone to shout or something.

Given we’d already gotten far more intimate with the kiss, I leaned into his neck and licked, then sucked the side of his neck. He threw his head back, his hand reaching to grab my head and hold it there, while my hips pushed my cock into him repeatedly.

Both of us breathing loudly, fucking, the sound of skin slapping on skin echoing even louder than our breath.

We fucked for a while, listening out for sounds. Slowly at first, then I built momentum, my fingers reaching up his chest and playing with his chest hairs, tweaking his nipples, then moving down to grab a handful of flesh from his stomach.

He moaned, groaned, exhaled, and did that whispering thing again which I didn’t catch.

Then he blew his load without warning.

I heard it hit the tarmac. I moved my hand to his cock, my hand going over his as he continued to jerk himself off, feeling the stickiness coming off him.

I let myself go, suddenly feeling it explode into him.

He whispered something again, and I kept going, kept sliding my cock into him, enjoying how much more relaxed his ass muscles were by the end.

We weren’t in a hurry, so we stayed on the street, my hands moving up to hug him, as if I was afraid he might run off and leave me alone with my pants down.

“We should find some food,” he said.

I laughed. “Typical man, shoot, then start talking about food.”

He laughed. “Yeah, sorry.”

I pulled out, laughing. “Don’t be. I was thinking the same thing as I blew my load into you, gee, I could do with a burger right about now.”

We pulled our pants up laughing, still looking around us like we expected something to change.

“You’re quite the character,” he said, shaking his head.

“Yeah, ex-wife calls me a barrel of laughs. So, I hear this pub does a pint and a burger tonight for under a tenner.”

We entered the pub laughing, then walked around the bar to head out back to the kitchen.

Kent went to the large refrigerator, while I scouted the counter, and the shelving, to evaluate our options.

I thought about sizzling burgers and my stomach rumbled.

A large lettuce was on the counter, along with some tomatoes, and some pickles. Kent handed me some buns from the cabinet, so I grabbed some as he went off to find burgers.

I held the burger buns in my hands, something about them felt wrong. They were a bit heavy, and the texture was all wrong. I studied them, digging my finger in, but I couldn’t.

“What the fuck?” I said, lifting up the bun to my nose.

No smell.

“What?”

I licked one of the buns.

No taste.

“What’s wrong?”

I turned to him, holding out the burger bun. “Try that, tell me I’m going crazy.”

Kent took it from me, and I picked up the lettuce.

The lettuce was too heavy. I took a sniff, then put it on the chopping board and grabbed the knife.

“What the fuck is this?” I heard Kent say, just as I put the knife on the lettuce, and began to cut into it.

Let me just say it was more like I had to saw through it.

Bits of what looked like lettuce came off it as I sawed through it, like I was going through wood.

I picked up the bits, and played with them between my fingers.

This was plastic.

“Okay, we’ve officially gone batshit crazy. Either all this food is plastic, or we’re fucking crazy,” I said, dropping the knife and stepping away from the counter, moving my back to the shelving.

Whatever pretense we’d had that this would be okay, that we would get through it, all vanished the minute he confirmed what I’d just discovered.

Kent held the burger bun out, his face looking horrified.

“This is fucking plastic.”

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I love these warm evenings, when the sun’s just dropped, things cool just enough, shadows begin to form, and I’m not in a hurry to be somewhere.

I mean, I’ve got somewhere to be, I just don’t need to rush.

The station was pretty dead, across the road the park was empty, which makes sense, given I’m out in the middle of nowhere. Somewhere between Brighton and London, I looked across the platform and was a bit surprised I didn’t see anyone.

Nor was I pissed off I missed the train. I checked the board again, an hour and forty minutes before the next train to London.

I sighed, shook my head, but then forced myself to laugh it off.

I could get a pint. There’s a pub that looks decent across the road. I could take my sneakers off and go walk through the park. The thought of my toes sinking into the dry grass was appealing.

As I deliberated, a man rushed in, suited, looking panicked, running toward the overhead sign. He slowed, then stopped, carrying his backpack, out of breath.

“Fuck!” he just about shouted, shaking his head, face screwing up and his cheeks turning rosy.

I turned away, half-smiling, covering my mouth just in case.

He walked away from me, then back to the sign as if by checking it again, the train times might change in his favor. He cursed, though quieter this time.

As I finally made my decision, I headed toward the exit, quite a few feet away from him.

But as I neared the exit, looking across the road, wondering where the fuck everyone had gone in this bum-fuck-nowhere town, I scanned him one more time.

Our eyes locked for a second.

“You okay?” I said, giving him a small nod, then puffing my lips, letting him know I felt his pain.

“Yeah. No, not really. Can’t believe I missed it,” he said, dark eyes studying me. “An hour and forty minutes. That’s fucked!”

I nodded, slowing, then turning to half-face toward him. “Yeah, nothing we can do about it though. Figure I’d grab a pint. Might as well. Might even squeeze in three.”

For just a flicker of a moment, his eyebrows raised, then he clenched his jaw and tried to smile. The only good thing that came out of that was the dimples.

Proper cute. Definitely a northerner too. From his accent, I was guessing Leeds. Somewhere in Yorkshire anyway.

I stopped then. We wouldn’t see each other again, so why did it matter?

I’d just had therapy the day before, her words repeated in my head like she was still in there. “Seize opportunities,” or “Put your confidence first,” and other shit that sounded practical, but was difficult in practice.

“It was either that, or a quick scout around the park. Nice evening for a cruise, really,” I said, my toes curling, that spike going down my neck because I wasn’t sure if I’d pushed it.

“Cruising?” he said, nearly stepping back, scanning me from head to toe again.

I simply nodded. “Yeah, why not? An hour and some is plenty of time,” then I shrugged, and headed out.

Even as I rounded the corner, I could feel him staring back at me, like I’d just said the unthinkable.

But fuck it, right? If he knew what I’d meant, he’d be into it. If he didn’t, then he’d have no idea. 

I walked up the ramp past the station, headed over the small bridge, then down into the park on the other side. Up there, looking around me, it was like a ghost town.

“Where the fuck is everyone?” I asked myself, stepping off the off-ramp, and finally entering the park.

It was warm, especially in the park, even if the sun hadn’t dipped enough to cool anything properly. I made my way along a worn path in the grass, contemplating taking my shoes off.

I cast my eyes back over to the station, the platform on the other side, but the cute guy had gone. What was he? Probably around forty. Guaranteed he’d decided to cab the rest of the way.

As I walked, I carried the same relaxed, calm, not-giving-a-fuck energy still around me, though as I scouted ahead, I knew two things.

This was clearly not a cruising park, and two, nobody was cruising anyway. Hell, nobody was even in the park.

Shame, the first clump of bushes proved to be the ideal spot for a bit of rumple in the bushes. I entered the shaded, shrouded, cool spot, marveling how serene, private, and quiet it was. 

I breathed in, the air was perfect. I stretched my arms out, exhaled, slowly inhaled. 

My therapist’s words filtered through my head again. “Be in the moment.”

A path led away from that incredible spot, but the woods where it went were thicker, following the trainline fence. I was about to start walking that way, when I heard a twig snap, and the air felt different.

I turned. He walked in, backpack over his shoulder, watching me, then looking around, as if he’d entered a store, and hadn’t quite decided what he was going to buy.

I nodded. “Hey,” wishing I hadn’t. That’s not how these things worked.

He nodded back, but didn’t say anything, still scouting around, taking in what I’d just been watching. 

He stopped near a tree, looking back toward the station. Where he stopped was even more secluded, slightly deeper in the shadows.

Fuck. Is he actually cruising? He must be. He didn’t just walk over that bridge, walk right by that pub on the corner, see the cafe down the road, probably even the chip shop, and then come here after I suggested cruising.

I looked around again, which was pointless. I could see for miles, and there’d been nobody anywhere.

He slowly walked to a tree, stood facing it, like there was a sign there giving him instructions. Then, casually turned to face me, his hands in front of him, like he was peeing or something. 

I stayed back, not quite sure what was happening, but liking the way he looked from behind too, fit, a bit muscular, and judging by the bag, he was one of those guys who went at lunchtime.

Trying to be cautious, though feeling my legs tremble, something in my chest shuddering as I tentatively walked around, I got more of a view of him. 

His cock was out, but if he was peeing, he hadn’t started yet. It was so quiet, I would definitely have heard it. 

I slowed, stood a few feet away, staring beyond the trees in front of us and beyond, out into the actual park. From the corner of my eyes, I saw him angle himself.

I turned, and got a better look at all of him. He looked a lot less pissed off than he’d been on the platform. His face was more relaxed. His eyes watched me, not as dark as I'd first thought, maybe navy blue. Button nose. Stubble catching the early evening sun slipping through the trees.

His cock was dangling, and hardening. That much was obvious. 

Mine twitched, so my hands went to it, still not convinced this was actually happening, even though he was turned toward me, cock out, watching me. My hands fumbled for my zipper, thought I’d bring it out anyway, pretend I needed to coincidentally take a piss right here, a few feet from him.

By the time I’d navigated my cock out of my underwear, and pulled it out, any uncertainty about his intentions disappeared.

His cock was rock-hard, angling himself toward me more, so I could see all of it. Balls were out of the zipper too, dangling there, a bit hairy.

I stepped forward, feeling mine catch up, begin to throb in my hand.

Then he stepped toward me, looking around, slightly frowning, probably also wondering why it was so quiet.

The quiet was perfect. I checked him out again, this time a couple of feet away, the only sound was my breathing, and probably my heartbeat.

We finally stood facing each other, I reached out then and slowly put my hands under his shaft, and then gripped it. He closed his eyes, exhaled, like this was exactly what he’d needed. When he opened his eyes again, his hand came out to mine, slightly cooler than I expected, but felt good when he gripped my cock, and then squeezed it. Then both hands came out, one cupping my balls, gently squeezing then, the other moving up and down my cock, slowly jerking me off.

The handsome guy turned his head behind him, then looked behind me, which made me turn to check. By the time I turned back, he was already dropping to his knees, mouth open, facing my cock, studying it.

Then he put it in his mouth, and I inhaled, and held it.

Damn that felt good.

His mouth was hot, compared to his hands, his tongue immediately licked under it, then his mouth tightened on it, and I moved my hands to his shoulders, resting them there. 

Fuck. 

He sucked my cock, while I closed my eyes, turned my face up, feeling every part of my body alight with it.

And he did it for a while. I got close, then he’d slow down, like he could tell, his hand would jerk me slowly, while his tongue licked around the head, then disappeared under again, then he’d swallow it all again.

I unbuttoned, deciding to pull my jeans down, let it all out, and give him full access.

He paused, then stood, unbuckling his belt, his button, dropping his pants, revealing his white Calvin Klein underpants, then dropping those too. 

I was about to crouch down, and give him what I thought he was preparing for, watching that cock, the foreskin bunched up around the tip. 

Then he spat in his fingers, stepped to the tree, leaned against it with one hand, while putting spit up his butt.

This guy’s ass had definitely been in the gym for a long time. Round, pale, and only lightly hairy, like somebody had built it in a laboratory specifically to test my self-control.

My chest pounded, and I even felt a little bit of sweat form around my temples as I shuffled forward, made difficult because my jeans had just dropped around my ankles.

I moved up behind him, pushing my cock to touch his ass, press it into his butt crack, while I spat in my hand, lubed my cock, then pushed it into that delicious butt.

He braced himself, spreading his legs, bending over slightly to give me better access.

“Go slow, will ya?” he said, the accent thicker this time, masculine, deep voice, probably someone who requested things only once in the workplace.

I couldn't stop looking at him.

The shirt looked expensive, and his hair had that annoyingly effortless look people paid barbers good money to achieve.

Everything about him suggested somebody with a calendar full of meetings and an inbox full of problems.

Then again, most of those people weren't usually standing half-naked in a park waiting for a stranger to rail them.

Even when I put my hand on his waist, and felt how tight it was, while my cock pushed into that crack, finding its way to his hole, as if that space alone wasn’t enough to make me wanna nut.

I found it though, first time, the tip of my cock pushing into him, while I felt him tense a little, before leaning forward a little more, relaxing.

Probably not enough spit to rail this guy here, right beside a tree, in a space I’d only moments earlier decided was the ideal place to fuck someone on the downlow. But seconds later, my cock slid into him. I had to pause, wait, just in case he screamed, backed out, changed his mind, maybe even run back to the station, opting to wait for the train patiently instead.

But all I heard was his controlled breathing, maybe he whispered something I didn’t catch out of those full lips, and then my cock slid all the way inside him.

My hips pressed into his back, my balls gently knocking his as I began thrusting into him, each time waiting for him to tell me to slow down, and each time being surprised as he closed his eyes, bowed his head further, and let me rail him.

That’s when I started pounding him, realizing that’s what he wanted, pushing it in deep, feeling it hit his prostate. Each time I felt like I was close, I'd slow down, pull out slightly, then push it in again, concentrating on making this last. 

After all, we both had plenty of time.

I heard him whisper again, this time I thought I heard him say, “please.” I didn’t say anything, so I bucked myself into him repeatedly, watching as his body shook. He put both hands against the tree, his body almost parallel with the ground, while I grabbed both sides of his waist and fucked him harder.

He grunted then, or maybe it was a growl, too low to tell what it was, but somehow it made it harder not to cum.

I tried slowing down, but then a hand came out to grab me, push me back into a faster momentum. I knew I wouldn’t last much longer, and we still had plenty of time.

That whisper again. “Harder,” I think he said.

I fucked him again, then again, then so hard that the slapping of flesh echoed around us. Somewhere a bird flapped and flew off.

“Eugh,” he grunted, and I felt his ass tighten, then I looked around, and realized he was blowing his load all under the tree.

That was all I needed to let myself go.

“Fuck!” I grunted, feeling myself unload into him, my breath wheezing in my chest as my balls slapped against his.

I kept fucking him, not quite sure when he’d stopped blowing his load, even after I’d long finished.

Then I did stop, and slowly let it slip out of him.

“Damn,” I said, hands going behind my head as I relaxed for a moment, catching my breath, realizing I’d built up a sweat.

The hot guy stood, pulling his clothes up, and slowly getting himself together, while he slowly turned to me.

This is the point they normally run. In cruising, once the deed is done, it’s an awkward smile, nod, then flee.

But he didn’t. He stood, buckling up, then mimicking me and stretching.

“Thanks, that was a good way to pass the time,” his eyes watched me, like they were laughing too.

I smiled. “Yeah, figured if we had such a long time, might as well…”

I got my jeans up, then we both pulled our phones out to check the time.

We still had over an hour. I started wondering if he’d be up for a round two.

“Fucking shit towns. No reception.”

“You need data?” I said, unlocking my phone and checking it. I had plenty of reception walking into the park.

The top of my phone simply read SOS.

“That’s odd! Never seen that before,” I said, lifting my phone up, as if an extra couple of feet would make a difference.

“Yours say SOS too?”

I nodded.

“What network you with?” he asked me, restarting his phone.
“Vodafone, you?”

“Orange.”

"That's not a network problem," he said, turning to look back behind us.

"What?"

"If one phone loses signal, sure. Two? Different networks?" He shook his head. "Something's wrong."

I exhaled, then turned to head back to the station, with the guy right behind me, keeping my phone out, and checking the reception as we walked.

Even as we crossed the footbridge back to the other side, my phone still showed that strange SOS, so I turned my phone off, and restarted it.

I turned back, and slowed, so he could walk alongside me. “Where are you from?”

“Live in London, just had a viewing near here.”

“Looking to buy?” I asked him, wondering if he was about to tell me to mind my own business.

Back on the other side, we walked along the path, back toward the station.

“Yeah, we’re looking at something in this area. Close to the station, but with plenty of space.”

“You and the husband?” I asked him, relying on my therapist’s advice about being more forward.

He smirked, turned to me, like what I’d said was funny.

“Wife.”

“Oh,” I said, turning to him. 

“Assume you’re not open,” I asked him, rounded the corner and entering the station again.

He shook his head, moving ahead of me to the platform train times. He turned once, eyes looking down. “Like to keep it.. Downlow.”

I nodded. 

He reached the readout, but it was dead.

“What the actual?” he said, looking up and down the tracks.

I stepped back, then looked out to the road.

“Don’t you think it’s weird?” I listened around me, and realized we hadn’t heard a single sound.

He stared, like I’d said something shocking, but I could tell he was listening too.

“No sound.”

I nodded. I walked backward, then onto the road, looking up toward the pub.

“Might just check in the pub, see if something’s happened.”

“Good idea,” he said, moving to walk with me, which surprised me.

I guessed he figured standing around in a station all by yourself wasn’t that exciting.

The pub was just past a hardware store, which was closed, and a laundromat, also closed. 

Something felt off, and I couldn’t shake it.

"You do this often?" I said, smirking at him.

He laughed. "God no."

"Could've fooled me."

"Mate, an hour ago I was looking at property with my wife on a zoom call."

We reached the pub, and both stopped outside.

Closed.

No sign, no lights on, no apologies.

We both turned to each other.

“What the fuck is going on? How can the only pub in this town be closed?”

We both instinctively walked around the side, and there was nobody along there, no sign of life inside the pub, and nobody on the street.

I looked down back along the road, then back to the station.

“When was the last time you saw anyone?” I asked him.

He shrugged. “When I left the viewing. Agent got in his car, drove off. Come to think of it…” he scratched his head. Then turned to look back at the pub. “This was closed earlier. Just realized. Never thought much of it.”

I nodded. “I think when I got the train here, and stopped, I was the only one on the carriage, which I thought was odd, given it’s peak time.”

We both stood in the middle of the town, a new feeling erupting inside me that had nothing to do with the guy I stood next to. As the realization dawned on us that something strange was happening, we both moved closer, our shoulders pressed together, as we looked out in every direction, both of us speechless.

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Smart ass.

Swans around like he’s a model, complete with that stupid slow walk, always some girl hanging off his arm, laughing at his stupid jokes, usually blonde girls. I call them the gigglers.
Hear them sometimes, laughing in his apartment, then a while later, the headboard banging against the wall, the same wall where my bed is. Sevan from down the hall commented on it once. Saw him in the lift, bleary eyed, nodded weakly instead of saying hello, then cast his eyes in the direction of 4B.

Fuck that guy and his revolving carousel of big tits and tiny brains.

I got back from the gym, stood in front of the mirror and raised my biceps, curled them, puffed my chest out.
Progress. Minor progress.

I got my shake, added double the amount of recommended protein powder, then added honey. Because why the fuck not.

The laughing started early, then the clinking of glasses, more giggling, forced laughter, then silence. 

I grabbed my noise canceling headphones and slipped them on, flicked the television on and put my feet up on the coffee table.

Even through my headphones, I heard a shout, then what sounded like someone yelling. No, a scream, loud, shrill. I threw them off and leaned forward.

My apartment was silent, and so was his. Then raised voices. I heard a voice, probably female, scream something, then moments later, the door slammed.

I sat back and smiled.

I slipped the headphones on again, but then heard a loud knock.

Thought it might be Sevan, nice enough guy, a bit lonely apparently, often borrowing something. My vacuum, mop, sometimes my extension cable.

But when I opened the door, 4B stood there, looking ruffled. A scratch across that too perfect face, eyes wide, face flushed, angry even, and he looked exhausted.

I had to suppress a smile.

“Hey,” he said, leaning against my doorway, muscles bulging from where he probably slapped her.

“Hello,” I said, searching his face for a clue as to why he was at my door.

“Sorry to bother you, I…” he cut off, turning to his other hand, limp by his side. 

Then I saw it, blood, a lot of it. Dripping onto the polished wooden boards. It looked swollen, a little bruised, maybe even fractured the way it hung limply by his side.

I forgot everything else, and quickly reached out to his arm to inspect it. “Holy fuck!” I said, my voice echoing down the corridor.

4B shook his head, though he winced when that made his arm move. “It’s not as bad as it looks, just need some ice, but I… erm, didn’t have any…”

I nodded, gently grabbing his arm and leaning in. He was right, the gash was small. 

“Can you lift it?”

He shrugged, then used his other hand to lift up his arm. I held his wrist on one side, helping support it. He winced again, but he was able to bend it, then slowly move it up and down. It wasn’t a lot, but just enough.

“It’s not broken, come in,” I said, holding the door open, then going to my fridge to get the ice pack from the freezer.

I grabbed some antiseptic cream, a bandage, then got him to my dining table. I shoved him into a chair, and got to work cleaning up his wound.

“Thank you so much for this, I’m sorry to barge in like this,” he said.

I shook my head, then paused while he gritted his teeth. He nodded, so I continued cleaning the wound. It was small, not deep, and had already mostly stopped bleeding. I put a bandage on it, then inspected the bruise.

“That bruise looks like it’s gonna hurt a bit,” I said, picking up the ice pack, and holding it up. “This is gonna hurt a bit.”

He nodded, so I put the ice pack against the bruise, and watched the way his body stiffened. I’d never been this up close to him before, except for that awkward time in the lift, him texting probably another blonde, and me staring impatiently at the illuminated numbers.
I’d found a cloth and used it as padding, then got some gauze and used it to wrap it around his arm. He sucked in breath, then stared at me. For a jerk, he had incredibly handsome deep blue eyes.

“You need some pain relief,” I said, moving back to my kitchen and going to my first aid kit.

“No, please… it’s fine, I had a couple of drinks. That will do,” he said.

I turned to him. “It’s not my business, but you need to call the police. That’s a pretty big deal,” I moved back to the table, and took a seat opposite him.

He half-smirked. “Nah, thanks. I can’t… I mean, kinda my fault,” he laughed then, but the laugh didn’t reach his eyes. I got the sense he was holding back.

I folded my arms and sat back. Even slouched in one of my dining chairs he somehow looked too large for the apartment, one knee jutting awkwardly beneath the table.

When he didn’t say anything, I said, “in what way?”

4B looked down, then to his right to my television, which was off, and then back to me. “I mean… it was stupid. We just…”

I didn’t say anything, but was surprised to see him not so confident.

I leaned forward then, hands on the table, a little too curious not to ask. “You just what?”
He scrubbed a hand over his face and stared at the ice pack wrapped around his arm.
"Ah man," he said. "You know how it is with girls. They can change their mind in, like, a minute."
The mahogany dining table was cool, and I pressed my hands on it, staring at them for a moment, then looking up at him. “Actually, no I don’t.”

His gaze lingered on me about a second longer than necessary. Then one corner of his mouth twitched, and his hand went to gently massage his injured arm.

“Oh, sorry…” he began, scanning me up and down as if reassessing me.

I had to fight the urge to reach out and squeeze his bruised arm.

“Sorry why?” I said, refolding my arms.

Up close, the cracks showed. His nose had been broken at some point, a small ridge running across the bridge, and fine lines sat at the corners of his eyes. One canine overlapped the next slightly.
Noticing these details should have made him less attractive.
But it didn’t.
Still, I figured he still had the look to pull the neverending list of blondes, even with all the flaws.

He shook his head. “Can I tell you something? No judgment?”

I nodded, unfolding my arms and placing my hands back on the table. “Sure, we’re neighbors, aren’t we?”

Something loosened around his eyes. The tension he'd carried into my apartment seemed to drain out of him for a second. “That’s true.” He proceeded to lift his left hand, then hold it out. “I’m Russell,” he said.

I only hesitated for a moment, then reached out with my right hand and shook his hand. “Nice to meet you officially, I’m Karl.”

“You German?” he asked me, studying me again.

“Yeah, well… my parents were. How about you?”
The skin around his eyes creased, and for the first time since I'd laid eyes on him, I didn't hate him.
“I’m not German,” he said. 

A laugh escaped me before I could stop it.

“I’m French American, or rather, my parents are. My mom’s French, and my dad’s American.”

“I won’t hold that against you,” I said. This time we both laughed.

“Ouch.”

“How long have you been in Toronto?” he asked me, scanning my apartment, “hey, nice apartment. You decorate this yourself?”

“Four years, and thanks, yes, I did.”

He nodded, pursing his lips in appreciation, looking around. “Nice.”

“So,” I said, my fingers tracing lines on the table, “kinda got me curious now. What the fuck did you do to her?”

He laughed, and I smiled.

He shook his head again, looked down, his right hand going to hide his mouth for a moment. When he pulled it away, he didn’t look straight back at me, but he spoke quietly. 

“She said she was into something specific, when we talked online. Then, when I tried it…”

I gripped the table, and tried not to laugh. “...she gave you what for?”

He laughed. “Gave me what for?” His eyes landed on mine again. “Haven't heard that in years.”
I waited again. He looked great, but lousy communicator.

“So, what was the thing she said she wanted, but then realized she didn’t?” I asked, trying not to look too eager for the answer.

It took Russell 4B a while to respond, his face contorting through a range of emotions. He lifted his left arm, and bent it slightly. 

“Wow, that ice is really doing the trick.”

I reached out and touched the ice pack. It was still cold.

“It should, just reduces swelling,” I said.

“You a doctor or something?”

I nodded. “Or something.”

He laughed. 

“Are you a movie star? Model?” I asked, then wished I hadn’t.

The grin was much wider this time, and he cocked his head slightly when his eyes landed on my lips.

“Marketing,” he said, staring.

“Oh. Sorry,” I said.

He shook his head, played a little with the bandage, then looked back at me. “She wanted a specific fantasy.”
He rubbed his jaw. “The sort where safe words are supposed to matter.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah.”
I put my hand over my mouth to hide the grin, and looked down. It took me a moment to compose myself.

“Specific fantasy?” This time I didn’t bother to hide the laugh. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to…”

The sound of his laugh again caught me off guard. It was lower than I'd expected, maybe even a little rough around the edges. It filled the apartment for a second and made it feel smaller. 

“I’d laugh too, Karl. If my neighbor, who I’d never really spoken to, came to my door with a busted up arm… yeah, I’d laugh a lot.”

“I guess if I ever end up having a guy beat me up, and come to your door for stitching up, you can laugh at me.”

His eyes did that thing again, like somehow he was reading me through my eyes.

“So… role play huh? Something rough? Doesn’t sound so bad to me,” I said, then nearly smacked my face into my palm.

He grinned, then angled his head again, mouth slightly open, watching me. “You like rough?”

I felt myself flush, and tilted my head down, one hand subtly sliding under the table to readjust my tight pants.

I shrugged, then turned to him. He still watched me, like he was waiting for an answer.

“I guess. Yeah, sometimes. Depends on the guy. Mild to wild, and all that,” I said, my fingers loosening my collar, which was already pretty loose.

“Mild to wild,” he repeated, eyes flicking between my lips and my eyes, then my shoulders. He added, “you work out.”

I looked at my shoulders as if I needed to check, then scrunched my face and closed my eyes, and dropped my head into my hands.

Even as I tried to hide my face, I could hear his laugh.

“Don’t worry about it, Karl, I do it too! Especially when girls comment on my big cock, I look down.”

I spat when I laughed this time. “What!?”

His shoulders rolled as he laughed, then he winced, and looked up, mouthing, “ow!” before turning to me, still grinning.

“Did you just tell your gay neighbor, who just admitted he likes it wild sometimes, that you’ve got a big dick?”
He tilted his head.
"Karl, that’s the part you latched on to?" And he looked entirely pleased with himself.
His eyebrows rose, and he leaned back, hand going behind his head, watching me. Then his gaze dropped briefly to my mouth before returning to my eyes.

I didn’t know what to say. I kept thinking about his cock. Then my eyes dropped, for just a second. But he caught it, then grinned, and laughed.
For a second he just stood there looking at me. 
I should have said something. Changed the subject, offered him another ice pack, asked about the girl. Anything. Instead I sat there like an idiot while my brain catalogued every detail of his forearms and wondered what the rest of him looked like under that shirt. 
Russell surprised me when he pushed himself away from the table, and stood. 
The apartment suddenly felt very quiet.
I became aware of every stupid thing I'd said in the last ten minutes. I even thought I’d upset him and he was leaving, but then he began fumbling with his button and his zipper.
“Wait!” I began, holding my hand out, but realizing I didn’t want him to stop, “you don’t have to show me…”

Even one-handed, he managed to pull his zipper out, reach into his underpants and pull out his cock.

I stared.

That’s when I understood the neverending stream of girls.

“Fuck me,” I said, studying every bit of it. A vein ran along one side, he had a lot of foreskin, and his balls were massive.

He grinned, watching me, clearly proud of his tool.

“If that’s soft, I can’t imagine how big it gets hard,” I said, realizing what I was suggesting.

Russell’s eyes narrowed slightly, then he looked to his arm, still hanging by his side. “Well, for that, I might need some help.”

I swallowed, or at least tried to. I shot up, went to the fridge and grabbed two bottles of water, then returned and placed one in front of him.
We both stared at the bottle, and I smiled, then shook my head. I picked up his bottle and unscrewed the lid, then put it on the table in front of him.

He stood at the table, reaching over for the water, his eyes never leaving mine, his cock hanging out of his zipper. 

It looked slightly larger, though that could have been my imagination.

We both drank water, and I felt my pulse race. Then we both looked down and stared at his cock.

He smiled.

Damn it.

His eyes slightly narrowed, and then he licked his lips.

“So, just how rough do you like it?”

I swallowed again, but kept staring at his cock.

“Pretty rough,” I said, my voice much, much thinner than normal.

He nodded. “I would never have guessed that… you know, you like… Um, guys.”

I finally looked up and our eyes connected. “I wouldn’t have guessed with you.”

He smirked then. “Oh, I don’t. Only once. But seeing as she fled, and you’re here…”

I stared. “Oh, you mean now? But… what about your…”

We both looked at the bandaged arm, then he shrugged, turned back to me and said, “I don’t need that for it.”

I smiled, or coughed, it was a bit hard to tell.

When he inclined his head down, with a cheeky grin, I understood why they queued up at his door.

I stepped forward, and dropped to my knees, coming face to face with it. At first I handled it like a precious relic, then my hands roamed around his smooth balls, the length of his cock, very milky smooth, that vein appearing to throb as it grew in my hand.

I pushed the foreskin back, revealing a light-pink head, the hole beckoning me to taste it.

By the time I opened my mouth and began to suck on it, it had thickened and my fingers were no longer touching. It was a lot thicker than I thought.

Then he shoved me backward, the back of my head hitting the table, and his one good hand holding the back of my head.

“You want to know why she fled?”

I couldn’t speak with my mouth full, but I did want to know.

I garbled an affirmative.

“I meant rough, and she meant wild.”
I tried to swallow, couldn't, and made a sound I'd never made in my life.
As he held my head exactly where he wanted it, I stopped wondering about the girls. I started wondering about me.
How rough?
I found out moments later.

My hair isn't that long, just long enough for Russell to grab hold of it. He yanked me upright and my eyes watered immediately, pain shooting down my neck and through my body.

The smile that came then as he brought my face to his changed, but only slightly. He still looked pleased. He just didn't look playful anymore.

His hand went down to my buttons and, just as nimbly as he'd handled his own, had my pants around my ankles just as quickly, turning me, with a hand pressing into my upper back, shoving me down onto the table.

“Your safe word’s German.”
Oh. He's paying attention.
I couldn’t laugh because my face was pressed down into the table, but I wasn’t sure if I wanted to laugh.

“Pretty boy ass,” he said, loudly spitting into his hand.

I wanted to suggest lube, but pressed my lips together instead.

He wasn’t kidding. 

My body had an immediate, unambiguous opinion about the situation, and it was not positive. It burned, and I screamed.

“There you are.”

I think I bit my tongue because I could taste the bitterness, but I reached across the wooden table and gripped the end hard.

I could tell he wasn’t even a quarter of the way in, and he kept pushing, not even giving me time to adjust.

I stayed silent, while my body begged him to slow down.

His hand pressed down into my back, crushing my chest to the table. I struggled to suck in breath, and held it in me when I did, trying to force myself to loosen up for him.

“Shhhh,” he said again, his jeans dropping to his ankles and his knees pushing into the back of mine.

I surprised myself by loosening up, and he took that opportunity to push it all the way in.

I gripped the table, bit my lip, my eyes squeezed shut.

“Fuck,” I whispered.

“Still haven't used your safeword.”

I garbled something.

He thrust into me, the table pushing away from me slightly, the legs scraping the tiled floor loudly.

I felt myself fully open up, feeling his muscular thighs slap into the back of my legs, and even his balls, smacking mine with a loud sound that echoed around us.

Then the table groaned forward an inch. Then another. Just as it inched to the wall, I moved my fingers away from the edge and simply splayed them flat on the table.

The table then hit the wall three times before I stopped counting. Same wall my bed is on. I wondered if Sevan could hear it. Then I stopped wondering about Sevan as 4B pounded me so hard, the table rattled.

I could feel his cock throbbing as it hit my prostate, then I felt myself build. 

Before I could say anything, I heard him grunt, a low growl, then his hand came off my back and he grabbed my ass and slowed down.

“Damn,” he said, even as I felt him flood me.

It was hot. It rushed inside me, just as I exploded under my table.

I gasped, trying to catch my breath as the last of my jizz squirted somewhere below me.

Russell pulled out, and I heard him exhale loudly. 

“Fuck me, German. Next time the bitch runs away, I’ll come knocking on your door.”

I wanted to smile, but instead I exhaled, unable to move.

Smart ass.

-------------

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Chapter 1 - Night Shift in the Cell - Fox Emerson

Donuts

The humidity was so thick I could taste copper in the air. The AC rattled like a box of nails, humming a dying tune but did nothing to shift the smell of floor wax and stale Maxwell House.

Outside, the sky looked bruised, holding onto a storm that refused to break.

I wished it would just fucking rain and cool things down even a fraction.

I leaned back in my chair, the leather sticking to my uniform shirt. It was 1:04 AM and I was fucking done. I stood again, just to air the back of my sweaty clothes. Sweat had soaked the front of my shirt. The AC hadn’t done a decent job since before the dinosaurs.

I threw the tennis ball across the room. It hit the corkboard, dropped, clipped the ceiling tile. Nine times out of ten, it landed on my desk. I’d been on nights long enough to work out the angles.

In the distance, I heard a car, which was unusual at this hour in my town. Past the real estate office on the square and the general store, headlights flickered through the dark. A moment later it rounded the bend and headed straight toward me. I recognized the patrol car immediately.

I jumped up, grabbed my hat and set it on my head, then snatched the keys and headed for the door.

Mac’s cruiser skidded to a halt. He opened the door looking pissed.

“What happened? Thought you were going home?” I asked him.

“Hey, almost made it home before I caught this genius spinning tires and doing donuts at Grange’s garage.”

I looked into the car and sure enough, there was someone in the back. I leaned in and got what the shadows gave me. Dark blond, blue eyes, a face that had no business looking that composed in the back of a cop car at one in the morning. Young, but not in the way that makes you feel old, in the way that makes you pay attention. He had that clean look about him you don't see at this hour. A nose that was rounded and small, and lips that were used to smiling. He looked amused, or even inconvenienced as he stared for an extra second before looking away.

“Grange’s?” I said. “That place hasn’t had business in years.” I followed Mac to the back of the car as he opened the side door.

Mac shrugged. “Yeah. Thinks he’s Fast and Furious.”

I leaned in slightly, trying to get a better look at the young guy. “Doesn’t look like he was racing anyone.”

“Out you come, ya idiot. Get in there. Let’s see if a night on that bench doesn’t slap you across the face like yo mamma shoulda.”

He came out, hands cuffed behind him, sliding out feet first. Even cuffed, he moved like he wasn't. Slow and measured, like it was his decision to. Broad shoulders, narrow waist, built like a guy who didn’t have to work for it, and he was far too relaxed for a guy in handcuffs.

Most of them came in loud, swearing under their breath or asking for a phone before the cuffs were even off. He didn’t do any of that. Didn’t act like someone who was apparently doing donuts at one in the morning.

Mac grabbed the guy by his arm a little too rough, but the young guy didn’t react. He simply followed Mac into the station.

I followed both, went inside and watched as Mac manhandled the guy into the first cell, then closed the door.

“Turn around,” he demanded, in a tone I rarely heard.

The guy turned, pushing his hands back. Mac uncuffed him.

Mac turned to me, exhaling. “Not really in the mood to do the paperwork.”

“I’ll do it,” I said, looking back at the guy who just stood there expressionless. “I’ve got nothing else to do.”

“Bet your ball throwing’s readying you for the Olympics,” Mac chuckled.

“Yeah, when throwing tennis balls at a corkboard gets me a gold, I’ll be happy. So, give me the specs and I’ll write it up. You can go through it tomorrow and submit it when it’s ready.”

Mac headed to the door, then paused, looked back at me and winked. “You’re a champ, thanks, I owe ya.”

“Before you go. Question. What exactly do you plan with him?”

Mac flashed a quick smile, then walked over and in a quiet voice said, “not planning anything. He doesn’t strike me as a problem. Just figured he’s better off here until he cools off.”

I nodded and watched Mac turn and head out.

As I walked back to my desk, I studied the young guy. He stood and watched me back, that perpetual expressionless face.

I moved to the cell, hands in my pockets and faced him. “Donuts huh?”

He shrugged. “I turned the wheel a few times.”

“At one in the morning?”

He stared. “It was quiet.” As if that was an answer.

I recognized him, but was also struck by his body language. The way his hands rested comfortably on his knees, or how he moved slowly, purposefully.

“I know you. Your parents are the… Carlisles, right? You went off to college. Wes? No… that’s not it. Owen? Owen Carlisle.”

The tiniest corners of his mouth lifted, but it was so brief it might have been a shadow.

“So, you’re a detective,” he said sarcastically, turning to sit and then lean back against the wall.

His parents were good people. And he was too well dressed to be in that cell. He was dressed in nice jeans, a white tee and dark sneakers.

It occurred to me he probably hadn’t had any water, and the heat in that cell was no joke. I grabbed a cup from the dispenser, poured the lukewarm water into it and handed it to him.

He stood, came to the door and took the cup, then surprised me by thanking me.

“You’re welcome,” I said, moving back to my desk. My quiet had been invaded. Facing the wall, I picked up the tennis ball and rolled it between my hands instead of throwing it for a while.

A while later, I looked at the time. Just after one-forty am. I threw my head back and exhaled.

“Can I have another one?”

I swiveled away from the desk and moved around to the front of the cell. Owen held out the cup.

“Oh, sure,” I said, taking the cup and going back for a refill.

He leaned against the bars when I returned with the refilled cup. “Sorry it’s warm. Nothing works properly in this station.”

He stared, but accepted the cup. He downed it all in one gulp. I reached out for the cup, but he shook his head. “I’m good, thanks.”

For a second, we stood facing each other, only the bars between us. He was closer than I expected. Close enough that I could see the faint line of sweat at his collarbone, the way his shirt clung to his chest, the definition there. I forced myself to look down.

“So, um… you finished college early, right? Came back? What happened, if you don’t mind me asking.”

He shrugged, turned and moved to sit down. “Wasn’t my thing.”

I shook my head. “Not your thing? Getting an education? So what, coming home to hang with your parents gonna be more your thing?”

He stared at the wall opposite him.

“What were you studying anyway?”

Owen didn’t turn to me, he watched the wall, hands in his lap politely. “Physics.”

It nearly made me take a step back.

“Too hard?”

He turned to me, but didn’t say anything.

“You miss it?”

He replied, but expressionless. “The theory, not the people.”

“The people the problem?”

His mouth shifted slightly, not a smile exactly. Something subtler than that. “The people are always the problem.”

“Physics,” I said. “And you’re out there spinning circles in an empty lot.”

Owen didn't answer right away. He leaned back, legs apart, like he owned the place. The jeans pulled across his thighs when he sat like that. The bars did nothing to make him look smaller as he rolled the cup between his hands. I looked away, confronted by why I found him so intriguing.

“It’s flat,” he said finally.

“The lot is flat? Flat lots are everywhere, in daylight too.”

He smirked, like he knew something funny but he wasn’t about to share it.

“At one in the morning?” I could go back to my desk, but talking to this enigma was far more interesting than throwing a ball at the wall. I grabbed the ball and threw it.

He caught the ball with one hand. The slap echoed.

“Less variables,” he said, tossing the ball toward the floor. It struck the concrete, clipped the wall, came back up into his hand without him shifting his feet.

I sighed, leaned against the cell. “You plan things often?”

He grinned, then turned to me, and gave me a small nod. He threw the ball again. It did the same thing. The slap of the ball in his hand echoed in the cell.

“I don’t like surprises,” Owen said.

Behind me, the air conditioning unit hiccupped, but didn’t stop. For a breath, I held mine.

Owen glanced up at it briefly. “That fan’s about to give up,” he said. “Sounds like bad bearings.”

I looked back at the unit, then at him. “You a mechanic now too?”

He shrugged. “No. Just listened to enough machines dying.”

I nodded. “So, I’m curious why you left college. Too many surprises?”

The smirk vanished. “Oh, college was full of surprises.”

“Bad ones?” I asked, hoping I’d get better responses.

“Predictable ones. Except one. Doesn’t matter now.”

I scratched my chin and looked up, feeling a line of sweat pour down the center of my back. “You don’t strike me as someone who loses control of a car for fun.”

He stopped, turned to me and his eyebrows went flat. “I didn’t.”

He scanned me, apparently noticing the sweat patches which stood out on my standard police issue shirt.

Owen threw the ball again.

I sighed, and went back to my desk, but he spoke before I reached it.

“I didn’t lose control," Owen said. The ball slapped into his palm, but he didn't throw it again. He stood up, walking to the bars with an easy confidence that made the small cell suddenly feel too small for him.

"One of the few lots around here with basalt in the asphalt." He looked at me, and for the first time, his eyes weren't just blue, they were sharp. Analytical. "I wasn’t just doing donuts, Grant. I was testing a stability system I’ve been building."

I blinked. None of that sounded like something a drunk kid doing donuts would say. The "cop" part of my brain was trying to keep up, but the "man" part was stuck on the way he said my name. "Stability system?"

“Electronic Stability Control is designed for the lowest common denominator,” he said.

I stared at him.

“The idiots who panic when they hydroplane. It cuts power, brakes for you, treats you like a child.”

I wondered if he was talking nonsense or if any of this was true, and shrugged.

“The car assumes I’m an idiot, Grant. The factory settings are for people who panic. I just wanted to see if I could make it do exactly what I told it to, right up to the point where the rubber gives up. It’s the only thing in my life that actually follows a formula.”

He leaned his forehead against the iron bar, looking at me through the gap. The boyishness was gone.

"Early morning the temperature’s stable, the air’s dense, and there’s no traffic. I wasn't 'spinning circles.' I kept hitting the same entry angle at forty-two, over and over, just watching when the tires started letting go.”

He paused, his voice dropping into that gravelly rasp that made the humidity in the room feel twice as heavy.

“I did twelve perfect rotations before Mac saw the smoke. I didn't 'lose control.' I found the edge. And then I stayed there because it’s the only place that doesn’t feel predictable.”

I didn’t realize he’d picked up the tennis ball again. He let it roll out of his hand. It bounced, then thudded and rolled across the floor and stayed there. He went back to sitting purposefully, with his hands on his knees.

"But I guess Mac just saw a punk in a fast car." Owen's gaze dropped to my belt, then slowly traveled back up to my eyes. "What do you see, Grant?"

I walked back, staring. The Owen who’d come in handcuffs was gone, in his place was someone I’d misjudged.

“Did you try and explain that to Mac?”

He shrugged. “You know he’s not someone who’s going to listen to anyone. He had the face of someone who’d already decided my fate.”

I walked up to the bars and put my hands on them. Suddenly, I felt like the one on the inside.

I watched him a long moment, then glanced at the thermostat that hadn’t worked since Reagan was in office. I looked at the keys, then at the camera that hadn’t recorded a frame in three years. Mac was already home with a beer, and the paperwork was just a stack of lies anyway. I knew his mom, I knew his grades. He wasn't a runner; he was just a kid whose world was spinning faster than his tires.

“You’re not going anywhere,” I said.

He didn’t answer as I unlocked the door.

“Come and sit out here, the air conditioning's useless, but a lot better than that cell.”

I moved to my desk, sat on the chair and hoped I hadn’t just made a mistake.

Moments later, Owen came around the corner and moved to the desk. On the opposite side was an old chair, soft cloth, better than the leather that was supposed to show superiority.

He sat opposite and put the ball on the table.

I picked it up, on instinct, I threw it past his head and watched how he shifted sideways, but didn’t panic or show fear. I’d timed it right, it flew past his head, bounced off the cork, hit the ground, back up and then toward my hand. I had to move my hand a few inches. The slap was loud.

Owen stared at the ball, then me. He nodded, then the corners of his mouth went up again, and he seemed to view me differently.

“So, what’s your story? How come you get the midnight shift?”

I got up, went to the water dispenser and got myself some water, then poured one for Owen in a fresh cup. I handed Owen his water, and sat back down, taking a big sip.

Owen nodded his head. “Thank you,” and drank half the water.

I drank all of mine, then put the plastic cup on the desk into a stack of several others.

“My turn. Simple as that.”

Owen nodded, leaning back in the chair.

“Want me to drive you back to your car?” I asked him.

His eyes widened. “Yeah, that would be great. But won’t Mac get upset?”

I shrugged, stood and grabbed my hat. “He’s in at nine. I’ll tell him you left just before. We know where you live, not like you’re gonna skip town.” I turned to stare, just to make sure he understood that wasn’t a question.

He nodded. “Thank you, I appreciate it.”

I locked up and drove Owen a couple of miles out to the Grange Garage.

A silver Lexus GS 350, an older model, sat alone in the dark.

“That’s an impressive car.”

Next to me, apparently enjoying the AC, Owen’s expression didn’t change. “Dad’s car. He’s left, so mom said I could use it.”

I drove up to the car and parked alongside it. “Left?”

We sat in the silence, only the hum of the engine and the air conditioning.

“Yeah, a few months ago. Some woman called Ethel, over in Donny Brook.”

I turned to him. “Sorry, that sucks.”

Owen looked out to the car, then down, avoiding eye contact.

“Yeah. You know what that’s like, don’t ya?”

I swallowed and looked ahead into the night.

“Well, thank you again. You know where to find me, if Mac needs to arrest me again.”

Just before he turned, he put his hand on my thigh, just above the knee, and squeezed it.

The touch was brief, but long enough to make me forget how to breathe.

Then he got out.

As he moved to his car, I watched him from behind. A very fit young guy, and a surprise. His hand print was still fresh on my leg. I put my hand where his had been, watching his ass as he unlocked the Lexus, and got in.

I waited a few seconds for him to start the car, then watched him head out. Just as I was about to drive off, he suddenly spun the tires, threw the car into high gear and shot across the lot. In seconds, he reached an incredible speed, then slammed the brakes on, turned the steering and rotated the car. He barely completed the turn, steadied, then slowed the car and drove past me. Just as he was about to pass me, he rolled the window down, his blue eyes cutting through the night between us. He saluted me, and then drove off, leaving a trail of smoke behind him.

I began to laugh. A low, nervous sound that echoed in the empty car.

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Leandro: Confessions of the Other Man

My name is Leandro, and this is unfortunately a tragic but true story. I’ve agreed for Fox to write this on my behalf, on the condition that names are changed, for the innocent and not-so-innocent. Which means my name isn’t really Leandro.

At twenty-one, I was straight, or at least that’s what I told myself. All my friends were straight, my life was straight, my gym was straight, my girlfriend was straight, my roommate was straight, my entire college felt aggressively straight. Straight like cheap cologne in locker rooms and beer sweating through red plastic cups on Friday nights.

The guy I sucked? He was straight too.

My army of friends believed in a version of me I’d curated since I was six. My roommate Sylva was part of our group, part of my college and a big part of my life. She trusted me, loved me, respected me and believed in me. We’d been living together for nearly two years.

When I met Julia, I did feel something for her. I’d had a string of women I’d dated, sometimes cheating on one to swing to the next. My buddies judged me, but laughed, because I was an insatiable straight man who simply couldn’t get enough. Sylva liked Julia, and it wasn’t surprising when they became friends.

The sex with Julia was good, adequate, perfunctory. Like you fall into after a party with the lights off and the door locked, careful not to think too much about why you’re doing it.

My life was moving toward a decent job, a house with a white picket fence, a woman who’d give me children and probably a dog called Spot. Spot would probably bark at mailmen while I mowed a lawn I didn’t really want.

Cheating was part of my vocabulary. In a strange way, it shielded my other yearning, the one that tried to rear its head but quieted whenever I found another woman.

Then, late one night, after far too much drinking, I saw an ad for a sex site. As soon as I saw it, I knew what the site was about. All the cocks, all the asses, all the bodies that had hair and no breasts.

Alone, I secretly joined this site with a name that was as fake as my life.

When JockDad34 messaged my blank profile, I was immediately taken by his chest, his arms, the hairy chest and the delicious cock. Oh, that cock.

I told JockDad34 what I told myself, that I was straight, I had no intention of hooking up with a man but had simply been curious.

“Me too, buddy. I’m discreet, just here to chat,” he texted me that night.

“Just wanted to see what the site was about,” I lied, zooming in on his cock.

“Can I see more of you?” he asked me, sending me a different angle of the same cock. Then another of his perfectly shaped, hairy ass.

I sent him expiring pics, freshly taken.

“Well, I wasn’t planning on meeting anyone, but given we’re both straight, I mean… if you wanted to …we could…” he responded.

“I’m not sure I could, where abouts are you exactly?” I asked, far too curious for my own health.

Was it too much coincidence that this hot daddy was just around the corner?

“There’s a hotel between us,” he suggested, “I’ve been wondering what their rooms are like.”

That hotel was even closer to me. I could walk there in less than three minutes. That is, if by some strange circumstance, I did in fact go and meet him.

“Not that I’m going to meet you, but if we were to meet, what would we do?” I asked, punching out the words on my phone, the blue light washing over my face, while I kept glancing over my shoulder at an empty room that suddenly didn’t feel empty.

“We can just touch each other’s cocks. You seem to like my ass, you can touch it. That’s all, and see what else happens,” he wrote. Minutes later, he told me he’d booked the hotel, that he’d go there and wait for me. No pressure.

Thirty minutes after he’d arrived at the hotel, he messaged me to remind me that it was okay if I didn’t go. And also to let me know that I could walk in past reception, go straight to the lifts and up to his floor.

I could already see the hallway in my head, muted carpet, low lighting, the faint hum of air conditioning and the anonymous smell of lavender cleaner that clings to places like that.

Twenty minutes after that, I followed his instruction, and found myself outside room 422, my hand hovering, but not quite ready to knock. I could hear my pulse in my ears, feel it in my fingertips, as if my body already knew what I was about to do.

But I did knock.

When JockDad34 opened the door, I saw his face for the first time and sucked in a breath. My knees went weak, my heart paused and my sensibilities went on vacation. He was very handsome, a light dusting of grays in his light beard, muscular and fit, with green eyes that made me forget why I’d promised myself I wouldn’t turn up.

I stood inside his room, the alcohol having numbed my sensibilities, but already beginning to wear off. To make things worse, he was as nervous as I felt. We stood, both of us shifting from one leg to the other, looking at points around the room, then at each other, and then at the door.

I might have even eyed the window at one point.

“Do you want a drink? My name’s Richard, by the way,” he told me.

“Leandro,” told him, “and yes, please,” I added quickly.

Minutes later, with an overpriced beer in one hand, I sipped it like it could give me courage as we sat on the bed, hardly talking.

“You’ve never done anything with a guy?” he asked me.

I nodded, sure I’d already told him that. “And you?”

He shook his head, then said, “nope, not since I was eight. But that was just experimentation.”

I nodded. “Me too. When I was seven, but doesn’t count.”

My eyes shot to the window when he touched my leg. His hand rested on my thigh, just lightly, but it felt heavy. It felt like the kind of hand that could get under my clothes, and linger on my skin.

“Your cock is hard,” he said, his eyes focused on my bulge. I looked down, and realized he was right. I also knew it had been like that since I’d entered the room. His hand was still on my thigh, but the other one moved to his own bulge in his jeans. I could see the shape of it. He stifled it, light hairs on the back of his hand flexing as he pushed down on it.

“Do you want to see mine?” he asked me, keeping his gaze down at his own erection.

My mouth was still dry, even after downing that beer. But I nodded, and watched as he leaned back slightly and undid his top button. He was slow, his hands slightly shaking as he brought the zipper down.

My heart beat too fast, my own cock screaming to be let out as I watched his fingers dig into the elastic of his undies and pull away. I saw that first glimpse of the tip of it, which had caused a little wet patch on his white underpants. He breathed, held it a second, then pulled them down.

I stared at the cock I’d seen pictures of, heart hammering in my chest, thrumming in my ears and competing with the room’s air conditioning as his hands gripped it, and precum glistened.

For a while, we both stared as he slowly jerked his cock next to me. Occasionally, he’d look over to my bulge as if willing it to perform the same magic.

He threw his T-shirt off in a motion that was smooth.

I didn’t need to be asked, and it was getting uncomfortable anyway. My hands moved without guidance and released the button on my own jeans, then pulled the zipper down. I remember thinking I couldn’t even remember what underwear I’d put on.

Richard licked his lips while I struggled with my tight jeans. I had to shift forward, half stand so that I could pull them down slightly, but not too much. Just enough that we both saw my underpants were light green and that I too had that little wet patch.

My hands slipped under the waistband and seconds later, did what I’ve never shown another man.

My rock hard cock.

He licked his lips again, jerking his cock. “Nice cock, even better in the flesh.”

“You too,” my voice stammered, “it’s big.”

For a while, we sat alone in that hotel room, inches apart while we stroked ourselves. He broke the silence, “can I touch it?”

I was afraid that if he touched it, I’d shoot my load, but my cock throbbed when he asked me, so naturally, I nodded that he could.

He turned to me slightly, giving me a greater view of his cock and the front of his body. His pecs were very defined, and the muscles in his arms rippled as he slid off the bed and turned, crouching in front of me. I was terrified of what he was about to do, while I willed him to do it.

His hand reached out, but before he touched it, his eyes looked up and they appeared to ask a question. As if we’d made a silent agreement, his hand reached out and his fingers went where no man had ever.

I closed my eyes as the warm fingers and palm wrapped around my cock. I opened them when they began exploring my cock, stroking it, moving to the tip and caressing the precum. More leaked as his other hand reached out and slid under my balls, and cupped them.

I spread my legs as wide as my jeans would allow, struggling to prevent my mind from interjecting.

He stroked me, often looking up at me to see my reaction. My eyes were either closed, or watching what he did to me. Or they were looking down to his own cock, a light string of precum stretching down.

“Do you want to touch mine?” he asked me.

I nodded, while swallowing, wishing I had more beer.

He stood, and pulled his jeans and underpants down further to his knees. His thighs were hairy, and solid, I wanted to touch them first. I licked my dry lips, reached out and put my hand on his thighs. They were so hot, and so firm. I moved them to his inner thigh, under his balls, noticing how clean and shaved they were compared to the rest of his body.

With both hands I reached his cock and balls, and felt them. I could feel his cock throb as my fingers gripped it gently. I mimicked him by thumbing the precum, stroking his shaft and his balls.

“God,” he whispered, “that feels so good.”

I gulped, and slid off the bed. I was too curious not to, I wanted to see it up close. I wanted to smell it. On my knees, I moved to his cock and jerked him slowly, smelling the freshness of his balls, the heat radiating from him and the way it pulsed, like it had its own heartbeat.

“I don’t mind if you want to taste it,” he said, then added, “never had a guy do that.”

I wanted to shake my head and tell him I wouldn’t, but then moved my lips toward it anyway. I didn’t realize I was going to until I reached it, and then his moved forward, willing me to try it.

I did. I opened my mouth and let my tongue taste his precum. It swirled around my mouth, on my tongue. It was bitter, but sweet, and very him. The head of his cock slipped into my mouth, and I wrapped my mouth around it, experiencing the taste, the heat, and the way it throbbed in my mouth for the first time. He moaned, and his hands gently began caressing my ears, begging me to continue.

I’d come this far, so I let more of his shaft enter my mouth, while his hands reached around my head and persuaded me to take more of it. Moments later, emboldened by the privacy of the room, I let all of it slide across my tongue. When I felt the tip of his cock hit the back of my throat, I knew I’d gone too far.

But instead of pulling away, I began to suck it, enjoying the thickness of it, the way it radiated warmth in my mouth, and the taste of it.

“Fuck!” he groaned, as I tasted that thickness between his masculine, hairy legs.

He pulled away, and pushed my head back. Richard looked up and closed his eyes. For a few seconds, I wondered what had happened, but then realized.

When he looked back at me, I saw relief.

“Close,” he said.

I sat back on the bed, and wondered what that meant.

Richard dropped to his knees again, and took my cock in both his hands and asked me, “shall I?”

My eyes told him that he could.

As soon as I felt his breath on my cock, I threw my head back and fell back onto the bed. By the time his mouth opened and took the tip of my cock in, I was already trembling.

Then he sucked my cock, and I gripped the sheets, lifting my head to watch Richard as he sucked my cock. He took all of it in his mouth, green eyes studying me while he sucked it. For someone who’d never done it before, he was very good. No, he was the best.

This was the best blowjob I’d ever gotten by a mile.

I could feel his saliva drip to my balls, and his hands using it as lube to stroke them. I had to fight myself so I wouldn’t cum too soon.

He paused, as if sensing this, and then asked me, in that low voice, “do you want to try fucking me?”

If his mouth was that hot, then his ass surely would be even hotter.

“Have you ever fucked a butt?” he asked me.

I nodded. “My girlfriend. She doesn’t like it.”

He stood, watched me while he pulled his jeans and underpants off. Richard stood at the foot of the bed in white socks. A body that caused me to leak even more. His hands pulled my jeans and underpants off, and then he forced me to sit up and pulled my T-shirt off.

Naked, he pushed me back and crawled onto the bed, watching me, moving toward my naked body and then his lips reached mine.

Richard’s lips touched mine just as his body pressed down onto my body.

His cock throbbed next to him. I could feel the hairs in his chest gently rubbing into my chest as his hands reached behind me and caressed me.

We kissed. I lost all sense of time. It was just the two of us on that bed in the hotel, and nobody would ever know. My hands reached behind his head and caressed his neck, the back of his shoulders as he pressed his body into mine. I wrapped my legs around his butt and felt the firmness of it.

His tongue was incredible as it danced with mine, like we’d been rehearsing it. His light beard scratching at my chin as our cocks throbbed together.

“Fuck,” I paused, wanting to push him away. “I’m close,” I whispered, but it was too late.

Instead of stopping, or pulling away, he pressed in harder, and fucked our cocks with his body. I felt my cum explode between us as my legs gripped his butt and controlled it.

“Ooooh!” he groaned, and I realized he was blowing his load too.

I felt both of our loads between us, hot, sticky and wet as he continued to rub his body into mine.

“Fuck!” he said into my neck, as cum dripped down the side of my body. His lips licked and kissed my neck as the last of it oozed out of us.

Richard slid to my side, but he kept his arm on my chest as he struggled to catch his breath. I lay alongside him, catching my breath too, with my mind racing about what we’d done.

I had to go. I needed to get out. Shame set in. I’d just cheated on my girlfriend with a man.

I got up.

“Sorry, I have to go. I have to… erm, go somewhere… I just remembered.”

His hand grabbed me before I could launch myself off the bed.

“Wait, before you run off. Take my number. I really like you and we might want to do it again.”

I nodded, having no intention of doing that. But he got off the bed, and waited until I put my jeans on, then stuck his hand out. “Take my number, I’m deleting my profile on that site.”

Something in me understood that future me would regret leaving without it, so I did. I let him put his number into my phone.

As I was about to leave, I thanked him. He stood, probably feeling what I felt, but appearing to handle it better.

When I got home, I was still alone and was able to shower and get back into bed without having to talk to Sylva, my roommate.

The next day, I did what I’d always done when something didn’t fit the story I told about myself. I pretended it hadn’t happened.

That worked well, until a week later. During that week, I’d fucked Julia twice, and both times felt flat, maybe even boring. Like watching a small black and white TV, after owning a huge flat screen color TV.

Friday after college, I was home alone again and had gotten sick of thinking about Richard. I had his number, which I’d debated deleting a number of times.

“Hey,” I texted him, “Leandro here.”

Minutes later, he replied. “Hey, nice to hear from you. I’ve been thinking about you. Jerked off many times.”

“Me too. But, please don’t be open about stuff on here. Anyone might see it, and it would be better.”

“Yeah, that makes sense. I need to be discreet too.”

I didn’t ask him why, but we talked briefly about meeting up again soon.

That weekend, Sylva and I were at the apartment. “What time are we meeting with the others?” Sylva asked me.

“Not sure, Robbie said he’d message a location,” I said, jumping into the shower.

Minutes later, Sylva said, “there’s a message on your phone.”

I was already half-drunk, too arrogant and careless to think about it. “Can you please read it? I’ll try and be quick,” I called from the shower.

Ten minutes later, I was dressed and ready to go. “Where are we meeting?” I asked Sylva.

“Robbie hasn’t messaged yet.”

“Who messaged then?” I asked her, reaching for my phone.

She didn’t say anything for a few moments, then said, “not sure. I didn’t check.”

I had a quick look and saw that someone other than our core group of friends had messaged, but ignored it because it wasn’t important there and then.

That night we went out and were soon joined by Julia and the others. It was a really fun night.

The next day, a gloomy overcast sky outside threatened to drown San Francisco, as I lay hungover on the couch. Sylva had been mostly in her bedroom, but eventually she joined me.

She sat on the end of the sofa, looking slightly less tragic than I felt.

“Are you okay?” I asked her, sensing something coming from her that felt wrong.

“I need to tell you that I read your messages yesterday, Leandro. And I need to talk to you about it.”

“What messages?” I asked her, vaguely recalling something about it, while picking up my phone. I scrolled down, past all the coordination effort messages from the night before, and saw the message from Richard.

I opened the chat and realized he hadn’t just sent messages. Thinking I was reading them and trying to entice me, he’d also sent pics of his cock and his ass. The last message read, “you didn’t fuck my ass, but I’ve been wanting you to.”

My jaw dropped and I sat up, eyes bulging, avoiding Sylva’s stare.

“Yeah,” she said, in a quiet voice. “I didn’t want to say anything last night. Because I respect you, and also because I like Julia, and she’s a good friend, I’m giving you a week to tell her. Or I will.”

Sylva went out, leaving me to stew in my mess.

Fuck.

It took me days to gather the courage to organize a dinner with Julia. We met at a fast-food joint I knew she frequented and liked.

She sat opposite me, her eyes full of hope that the months we’d been dating meant we were getting serious.

“I have to tell you something, and you’re not going to like it,” I began, watching her eyes widen and her mouth open.

“What do you mean?” she asked, searching my eyes.

I felt the words tighten in my throat. There was no easy way to do this.

“I cheated, I’m sorry. I feel fucked.”

She stared. For a while, she didn’t say anything, then cycled through different emotions. “You’re fucking with me,” to, “was it that Ho who kept flirting with you last week?” and back to, “you’re lying.”

In the end, I knew she wouldn’t believe me without proof. I pulled out my phone and opened the conversation with Richard.

“It was with a guy, and it only happened one time.”

She still refused to believe me, so I handed her the phone.

Slowly, her hand reached across the table for my phone. I gave it to her.

For minutes she sat and stared, at the messages and the pictures Richard had sent. Eyes narrowing, mind reeling, nose twitching.

Then, after what felt like an eternity, she finally looked up. “You slept with a man?”

I nodded, and swallowed. “Yeah, a week ago.”

She was fast. Her fury was sudden. I ducked just as her face went crimson and she launched the phone at my head with everything she had.

The sound of the phone smashing against the wall was so loud that the entire restaurant stopped to watch.

She stood, and she screamed. Words I never registered. She said something, many things. I did hear, the f word, and gay cheating, and then lying, but they were surrounded by many other words and her fury. Her hair appeared wild as she shoved the chair, screamed one more time and then ran out of the restaurant.

I shrank in the seat, my phone in pieces next to me, looking around me at dozens of accusatory faces.

I wanted to kill Richard.

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Ch.1 - The Hole in the Door - Fox Emerson

The Virgin

Perth, Western Australia – 1963

Bruce walked in, threw his keys on the corner counter, and discarded his cement-covered boots in the general direction of the shoe-rack by the door. Dried sweat had streaked dust down the sides of his face, and his thinning black hair was speckled with dust.

“Oh for God’s sake, Brucey!” a woman’s voice called, as she banged the wooden spoon on the side of the pot and set it down, before walking over to place the boots neatly into the cheap wooden rack, picking up the keys and putting them on the hook.

“How was your day, love?” his voice was gruff; deep and coarse. He opened the fridge and took a beer out. He pulled the tab, took a long drink, then wiped his mouth with the dirty, navy-blue shirt sleeve. Seconds later, he moved into the adjoining lounge area and sat in his recliner and grabbed the remote, not once putting the beer down. As he sat down, he farted loudly.

“It was fine, come on, Bruce! We paid a lot of money for that lounge! Go change into something clean! You’ll get dirt and dust all over the lounge!” Vera Smith said, in contrasting, high-pitched tones.

“Jesus, woman! Will you give me a break?! I’ve just walked in the fucking door! At least wait five fucking minutes before you start shouting that trap of yours off!” he spat back, but put the beer down and got up. He stormed through the kitchen and left via the hallway.

In the narrow hall, he nearly collided with Brad.

The boy wore flared blue jeans and a rose-coloured, tie-dyed top with a loose collar. An old camera hung around his neck.

“Jesus fucking Christ, Bradley! What on Earth are you wearing? You look like a fucking pansy for fuck’s sake.” As he walked down the hallway and entered the master bedroom, he yelled, “Vera, we’ve raised a fucking poof. Why are you letting him wear that shit?” The voice was harder to hear from the kitchen as he moved away to the bedroom, “…Thank fuck none of the guys are around; I’d be fucking humiliated.”

When Brad entered the kitchen, his mother appraised the boy, then smirked and shook her head. “Hello young man, how was school?” she asked, as Brad went in and gave her a kiss on the cheek, then put an arm around her. The camera strap buckle caught in her chestnut, frizzy hair.

“Ow!” she said, and a hand flew up to disentangle it.

“Sorry Mum!” he quickly fumbled and released the hair.

She patted her hair down and massaged her scalp. “Look, your father doesn’t like your t-shirt. What do you think if we put that hippie top away for a while, and go shopping for your 18^(th) birthday and get you a new one?” She focused on stirring the pot, and bent to adjust the temperature on the stove for another pan, which was filled with boiling water.

“I’m sorry about your hair,” he said again, watching her.

Russet coloured eyes regarded him, and they matched his eye colour. “Honey, it’s ok.” Then after turning back to the task of cooking, she said, “About that top.”

Brad folded his arms and watched her, looking down at his simple, tie-dyed t-shirt and shrugged.

“I like it Mum. It’s in fashion now. Dad’s old and out of touch. Also, it makes a statement.”

She strained to hear him; his voice was so soft and low. “Come on, Bradley, you know he’s funny about stuff like that,” she wiped the tomato-soaked spoon on the side of her brightly coloured house-dress. It was already stained and marked in a number of places.

“I mean…” stirring something again, she was distracted while Brad waited behind her. He lifted the camera and on impulse, took a picture of her. She didn’t notice. He moved away and tucked both hands into his jeans’ pockets as he leaned against the kitchen table.

She turned to him once more, a weathered face with no make-up and lines that she’d once said were made by each of her children’s births. “For your birthday last week, how about we go shopping together? Less pink and rose-coloured ones, and I’m thinking more… boy colours – like blue or green.”

“I can’t wait to finish school, get a job and move out. Then I can wear what I want!”

She fixed her eyes on him, no longer distracted, then her eyes were downcast, and she nodded, with a frozen smile on her face.

Brad bit his lip, and reached out to say something, but before he could respond, Bruce walked into the kitchen. He was wearing tight football shorts and an even tighter t-shirt with a faded design of some long-forgotten musician.

“What he needs for his fucking birthday is new clothes that make him look like a fucking man! I’ll take him shopping, don’t you worry about that! I’ll pop by the boxing studio on the way and get Mick to sort him out. Promise ya by the time we get out, he’ll look and act more like a man.” As he turned and walked into the lounge room and picked up his beer, he yelled, “And get that fucking stupid toy off your neck. You look like a square!”

Brad’s face darkened and even as his mother cast him a warning, he shot back, “You mean I’ll come out thirty kilos heavier and wearing hideous clothes that didn’t even fit me when I first bought them?”

Bruce flew into the kitchen – his eyes bulging, cheeks a crimson red, and saliva seemed to drip from his bared teeth. As Bruce’s face appeared centimetres from Brad’s, his hands were balled into fists, and the right one was held up as if it were a cobra snake waiting to strike. The muscles in his arms suddenly appeared twice the size, straining against the tight fabric as though ready to burst through.

“You fucking say that to my face, you goddamn faggot!” he spat, looking every bit like a tiger about to pounce on his prey.

Brad was a much leaner, shorter version of his father, with an athletic frame that cowered under the imposing man. Shoulders shrank, his face angled down, and he looked at the floor, winced and braced himself, ready for the fists that usually followed.

But Vera slid in and shoved Brad roughly out of the way. Brad whipped the camera off and placed it on a small side table, turned to face his dad, gaining some courage because of his mother. He ground his teeth while his gaze went from his mother to his father.

“Bruce! What are you going to do? Hit our son again? And then what? The door knocks and neighbours ask if everything’s okay? Then?” she yelled back, “Neighbours are always watching, Bruce.”

Bruce looked less calmed and shouted back, “Is that a threat? It would be my pleasure! They can take the rotten pansy away and we can walk around with our heads held high, no longer worried that our neighbours are thinking that we have two fucking daughters.”

The screaming match escalated, and Brad slowly backed away, both thankful and fearful that his mother stood in his place, but also ready to jump in if it was needed.

But Bruce punched Vera, hard – on the shoulder and she wailed, a pitiful, woeful sound. The force sent her into a full spin, and she spun across the room, lost her balance and nearly fell. But she stopped herself from falling and fled the kitchen to the outside yard. Bruce stomped past the stove and knocked the pasta sauce off it, which redecorated the kitchen floor and walls. Brad caught some of the hot sauce on his face and along one arm, and quickly pulled off the offending rose-coloured shirt to stop the wet sauce from burning through to his skin.

Bruce walked towards Brad, punched him in the gut and yelled, “You should have taken that fucking thing off earlier,” and stormed off, but pulled the shirt out of Brad’s hand and stretched it as he went. He picked up his beer and took a big swig, turned the volume up on the news, as he threw the stretched and destroyed t-shirt into the corner.

“The discussions continue on whether Australia will actually move from the pound to a decimal currency,” the presenter’s voice on the television boomed.

Brad picked up his camera and went out to the courtyard, but his mother had disappeared. He assumed she’d probably gone to vent at the neighbour’s house, as she usually did. Before walking back into the main house, he caught a snippet of his father on the recliner. Beer in one hand while the other one twitched around the remote, belly overhanging his shorts while he sat alone. Brad lifted the camera, and he snapped a shot.

The T.V. was so loud that his father didn’t notice.

His older brother walked in and cast Brad a look that was somewhere between annoyance and pity, though Brad could not determine which. In silence, they both automatically joined in the task of cleaning the kitchen.

Thirty minutes later, when their older sister, Mindy arrived home from work, with frizzy, messy chestnut hair like her mother’s, she made no comment as to the mood in the house, which was obviously tense, and told everyone she was getting takeaway. She sighed a lot and rubbed the dark circles around her eyes absent-mindedly, but talked incessantly.

Nobody said anything when Vera eventually returned just in time for pizza. They sat around the table while Mindy lightened the mood with her talk of work, and how the supermarket, which had recently promoted her to shift supervisor, liked her so much that they’d alluded to the fact that there’d be a supervisory role coming up soon. If Mindy behaved, she’d be first in line.

Bruce scoffed absent-mindedly, an eye on the news from the T.V. in the adjoining lounge area, and the other one on a fresh new beer as he said, “I’m sure they’re just saying that, so you’ll work harder.”

Vera shot Mindy a look that Brad interpreted as one of assurance and caution, and to ignore their father. Mindy didn’t react to either Bruce or Vera, as usual.

“Anyway, I’m doing extra shifts this weekend to help out because next week the current supervisor is away on holiday and I want to prove I can work harder when needed,” she continued indifferently.

“You should work hard anyway,” Bruce said gruffly.

“I’m sure they’re as proud of you as I am, honey,” Vera said in a soothing tone and a voice that did more to calm and reassure Brad, who watched her in silence.

“I’m going surfing this weekend with Rob next door,” Aaron said, not looking at anyone in particular. His voice contrasted to Brad’s and was halfway as gruff as his father’s. He turned to Brad and asked, “Want to come, Bro?” and pushed long strands of dark hair away from his forehead and behind his ears, which made them appear like curtains.

Bruce interjected with, “After you’ve mowed the lawns and done your chores.”

Vera flashed Bruce a glare, but nodded to Aaron and held up a finger to her lips when Bruce turned to look at the T.V.

Brad looked about to say something, but Vera cautioned him with a nod, so he didn’t. Her hair was a mess, and Brad stared at it. He leant over and patted one side down. She regarded him with a smile, turned to kiss his hand, and patted her hair down subconsciously.

“I’ll get a cut soon,” was all she said, but when she looked at Brad, she added, “You’re overdue, honey.”

Brad shook his head, and brushed his straight, nearly shoulder length hair, with his hand. He pulled a thick bunch down over the scar above his right eye.

Vera leaned in to touch the scar, with eyes that brimmed with love, but he shook his head and inched away to hide it.

“You and that skateboard!” was all she said on the matter.

He rolled his eyes. “Mum, there are far more important things going on in the world than my appearance!”

They’d eaten later than normal, and helped clear the table and put the empty pizza boxes in a pile by the door. Vera whispered a thanks to Aaron and Brad for cleaning up and Mindy for getting pizza.

Aaron whispered that he’d licked the wooden spoon clean and that it tasted delicious. Vera hugged him, tears springing in her eyes.

“You kids are the best thing that ever happened to me,” she whispered.

When all was cleaned, Vera asked Brad if he’d take the rubbish down to the local shops and dump it in their bins, given theirs was already full and it was nowhere near bin day.

“Sure Mum. Need anything from the shops while I’m there?” Brad asked her.

Brad put on trainers and a plain tee and took the bags for a walk.

“Want me to come?” his older brother asked, but Brad shook his head and left before his brother could insist.

The evening was pleasant, with a light breeze whispering exciting murmurs about the impending summer. He stepped out, and looked up at the window next door. It appeared cold and the room beyond it was empty.

Ashley. He sighed wistfully.

The several-minute walk past single-story houses that were generically ordinary was entertaining enough if you were a young teenager with a creative mind. Brad studied the worn houses that stood in sharp contrast to those that had been meticulously maintained. Most of the houses belonged to residents that either didn’t care, or would profess a lack of time. While a smaller portion looked like they had been chosen carefully and with pride. There were gardens that fit the environment, with kangaroo paw and ferns adorning them, while palms, bougainvillea and bottlebrushes graced others. All the neighbourhoods were filled with trees and bushes, but some were tidy, and others were not.

Brad walked along them and studied them all with keen interest. As he passed a house with a large spider’s web that looked perfect, like something from an atlas, he lifted his ever-present camera and snapped a picture of it. The spider stopped suddenly as Brad snapped his picture. Brad smiled and brought the camera down. “Are you posing for me, little spider?”

Three streets away, a large park that ran on either side of Gosnells Railway Station split the cheap houses from the more expensive ones. Brad deliberately walked around the park so he could walk past the more expensive houses, where some of the wealthier kids from his school lived. Some of the double-story homes were much better presented, with gardens and lawns that were either professionally maintained or meticulously cared for by a home enthusiast. Brad studied them all with keen interest and wondered about the families inside each one.

He watched as Sally Preston came out of her front door and casually walked out to the car that waited for her. She saw Brad but didn’t seem to recognise him. Brad had his hand up, ready to wave enthusiastically, but quickly dropped it when he realised she didn’t register him. He watched Sally get into the car, which Brad assumed belonged to her older boyfriend, a guy called Josh Anderson.

Josh Anderson was the older brother of Ronald Anderson and had a lasting reputation from their local high school. He’d graduated two years earlier and was still remembered as the guy who set the Principal’s chair on fire and somehow gotten away with it. Maybe it had something to do with his father being on the school council in addition to being a donor of the school’s athletics equipment. Or perhaps it was because his Dad was a well-known lawyer, renowned for his aggressive bullying tactics.

Josh had also allegedly banged all the hottest girls, while managing to graduate with A’s. He had still somehow gracefully exited school unscathed and the envy of many.

He also drove a brand new 1963 Ford Falcon that his father had bought him.

Because of Josh’s cool status, Ronald was untouchable and seemed content enough to saunter along in his brother’s footsteps, but it had made him even more of a formidable big bully.

Amanda Golders lived next door to Sally, but both girls were enemies in high school, largely because of Josh, though Brad remembered a time back in grade seven, when they’d all been best friends.

There had been seven of them that had been firm friends until the first semester of high school, when it all disintegrated – for reasons that Brad still didn’t understand.

He watched the house with a look of longing, but kicked some stones and looked the other way as he passed them.

It seemed that in primary school, friendships were about trust, mutual interests and having fun, but in high school they were simply about reputation and image, and hanging out with someone because they complimented you.

Brad had once heard Sally tell Josh that she liked standing next to Amanda because, ‘Next to her, I’m ravishing.’

Brad walked along the edge of the park and thereby doubled his walking distance. As he neared the local shopping area, he saw the carpark was only a quarter full.

That’s where the local BI-LO, a discount supermarket his mother continued to rave about, stood. The bright orange sign was brand new and it was so bright and so big that it seemed like a gigantic beacon. You could see it from halfway across the park. He dumped the bags in the bin alongside BI-LO and walked in a different direction and much more direct route towards his home.

Behind that same shopping centre, on the other side of the train station, was a block of toilets. It wasn’t fully dark yet, so no lights were on, but the door was open and unlocked.

Like a kid, Brad grabbed his crotch through his shorts, and realised he needed to go.

He walked in and immediately saw a urinal straight ahead, but movement to his left caught his eye. In the second it took for him to cross into the toilet and move to the urinal, he distinctly saw a man jump back from the door of the toilet and quickly turn away as though hiding something. But it was fairly dark and difficult to make out too much detail. Then Brad was at the urinal and the view to the cubicles was blocked.

Puzzled, but happy to relieve himself, he stood, unzipped and let it flow. The toilet didn’t smell particularly bad, but smelled a little bit of paint. Though his eyes were immediately drawn to the graffiti on the wall facing the urinal, which was centred around the area right next to where he was peeing. Brad wondered who took the time to write all these messages, and why they bothered to do it if it clearly took more time than peeing. A large circle alerted him to a small peep-hole, with an arrow which had been drawn in black marker. The arrow simply pointed to the small hole, so naturally, his eyes focused on it.

Brad shook his foreskin vigorously, and tucked it into his underpants. Before zipping it up and putting it away, he bent and looked into the peep-hole.

A movement from within shifted, and something shiny was immediately visible. While it was hard to see from the low light, he realised the shiny object blinked.

It was an eye.

Brad flew backwards so fast he nearly lost his balance.

It was really quiet in the toilet block. But he heard another kind of movement; a sort of shifting, like someone was creeping slowly around with bones cracking.

Having finished doing what he needed to, he turned to leave, but curiosity got the better of him, and he paused. Brad was pretty sure the guy he’d seen before waiting for a toilet hadn’t left. He was sure he would have heard him leave. Brad leaned against the last cubicle wall, away from the peep-hole and peered around the corner.

The man was still there, and he was leaning forward into the door. He was looking forward as though peeking through, though he was angled strangely. His pelvis was pushed up to the door and he was staring up above the door. Brad was careful not to make any noise, but his face flushed. The man must have sensed being watched because he suddenly looked about to glance his way, so Brad quickly ducked his head back and hid.

A few seconds later, he carefully craned his head around and saw the man once more pressed up against the door and paying no particular attention to anything else.

The man’s jeans were undone.

There were three stalls, and from that angle, he couldn’t see what the state was of the other two doors, but Brad realised if the man saw him, he might get really cross, so he played it safe and stayed hidden away.

He heard sucking sounds.

Someone inside was sucking the man’s dick.

And the man looked ecstatic. He moaned and quickly turned to where Brad was standing, so Brad quickly moved back, hoping he hadn’t been spotted.

Another moan. Sucking sounds. Then more moans. They were soft; carefully controlled, but they were unmistakeable sounds of pleasure and sucking.

They played cat and mouse for a while, while the man received a blowjob and Brad’s dick pushed against his jeans so hard that he thought it would burst through.

He was able to get a good look at the guy. Good looking – not a model, like what he saw in those magazines selling cigarettes or coats or shoes, but maybe someone that lots of girls wanted to date. In the darkly lit toilet, his hair looked dark, and he might have been in his late twenties, or even thirties. Small nose, a beard and moustache, which a lot of men had, and he looked fit.

He hid one last time when the guy looked up.

Brad dared to cast his eyes around one more time and saw the man was zipping up, the expression on his face was difficult to read in the low light, but his body language was easy to interpret; shame, embarrassment and the overall demeanour of someone who’s been naughty.

But he also looked relieved.

Brad moved back to the urinal, realising the man would know he’d been there all along. He stood at the urinal and pulled his dick out and felt trapped.

His dick was stiff.

He heard the man walk behind him. When he turned, the man’s shadow could be seen walking out the front door.

A toilet seat moved, and a toilet flushed. Then a door creaked open, and someone came out and washed their hands. Brad glanced behind him and saw a man, perhaps in his mid-forties, washing his hands and staring at Brad. He was quite good looking; fit, perhaps a physical education teacher or a runner; slightly balding and fine lines around his eyes. But those eyes were piercing blue; they held Brad’s gaze for a second, and it was enough. The electricity that flowed between them was palpable. His dick stirred just by looking into the man’s eyes.

The man smiled, reflecting Brad’s own attraction. It was a cheeky smile and one that conveyed a shared understanding. It was one of those looks that suggested the man knew something that Brad didn’t. Brad turned and faced the urinal, too afraid of the confrontation.

A few seconds later, he turned to see the man was still shaking his hands and smiling at Brad.

Once, in primary school, they’d had a relief teacher who smiled like that a lot. It was like he’d known things that nobody ever could. Brad had never seen the man anything but happy.

This man shook his hands to dry them, still smiling, and looked behind him, and walked back to the cubicle, while turning to watch Brad. He nodded his head as though he meant for Brad to follow him.

The man whose eye he’d seen, suddenly flushed and exited the toilet in a hurry, without even washing his hands. Brad stood transfixed, not sure what to do. His legs began to tremble in a way that alerted him to danger.

He zipped up and turned, heading towards the door. He intended to rush out of the toilet block, and out and beyond, to the safety of his known world. But when he looked to the right, he saw the outward-facing door was locked and there was a hole in it.

Nobody else was around, and the toilet appeared eerily still.

A finger popped out and wiggled around to get his attention. It was so silly he wanted to laugh.

He moved the camera strap around so that the camera was behind him, and took a step forward.

The finger disappeared, but the hole remained.

He imagined that the hole was growing, but he knew it was a trick of the light.

Brad took another step forward, almost mesmerised by the hole and what it apparently offered.

The hole beckoned.

He took another step.

The hole was two feet away, and it waited patiently.

Beyond the hole, he knew who waited. And he knew what was coming, but he didn’t know how or what to expect. He was afraid, but more importantly, he was drawn in.

His brain told him to flee but his dick demanded he continue.

One foot away from the hole and he could just make out some movement through that dark place. He was tempted to bend down and look but decided against it. He shuffled half a foot forward and felt fear like he’d never felt before.

He knew who was in there. There was no real mystery.

When a rush of blood went to his head, he became a little lightheaded and an urge to flee surfaced. He thought about his dad and his mother and an anger welled up. His father, lifting a fist at his mother, and his mother upset.

He pushed those thoughts away.

The finger wiggled as though it knew his doubts and he clenched his fists and released them while forcing himself to relax once more. As though it was aware of his intimidation and it wanted him to know that it meant only to give him pleasure, that little finger wiggled again, and it poked in and out of the hole. The motion seemed obvious, but he still stared at it as though it was absurd.

In a way it was absurd. It surely wasn’t normal.

He slowly unzipped his fly with trembling hands.

Glancing at the door, keenly listening for anyone coming inside the toilet block, he inched forward half a centimetre.

He undid the button at the top of his jeans.

At eye level, there was more graffiti. ‘Feeeeeels Gooooood.’ Written in black marker pen. He stared at the lettering. It was written by someone with neat handwriting. Brad’s writing was so similar in fact that he could have written it himself.

Nobody was beyond the main door. Outside, all was quiet but nevertheless, he strained harder than ever to hear anything at all.

He pulled his hand into his underpants and pulled his rock-hard dick out.

It was throbbing and happy to be released.

Brad didn’t think he’d ever felt his dick so hard. Nor had he ever been so terrified and thrilled.

As though excited by what Brad exposed, the finger beckoned again.

He moved an inch closer and still considered leaving. Thoughts of his dad. Sally Preston ignoring him.

He thought about Josh. The way he walked in those tight jeans. His handsome face that everyone wanted to kiss.

His dick throbbed and the finger grew impatient.

There was a wrongness in the quiet toilet that somehow made the experience more dangerous.

And exciting.

He could get caught.

But the hole waited, and his dick was so close to it. He saw the mouth waiting just beyond that hole. The tongue protruded. No longer patient and wanting him to know that the time was now.

There was no way he could undiscover this hole and walk away. It would taunt him, and he knew it.

He moved that tiny bit so much so that somehow he leaned an extra centimetre forward – just enough, for the tongue to protrude and make contact with the tip of his cock.

It licked the end and in that lick, there was a promise; enter now and the reward will be great.

Slowly, as though entering a warm bath, he slipped it into the hole.

‘Feeeeeels Gooooood.’ He read that again as he slipped his throbbing dick into the hot mouth.

The mouth swallowed it immediately, and his entire body shuddered. A thrill that he’d never experienced and could probably never describe, overtook him.

Tremors of pleasure became shakes.

‘Feeeeeels Gooooood.’

His dick, deep inside the anonymous man’s mouth, was impossible to describe. It was a lot like not realising you needed to pee desperately and being able to relieve yourself, except the pleasure was much more intense and ecstatic.

He pushed his pelvis into the door, much like he’d seen the man do earlier and angled his face so he could listen out for anyone coming, but he also did it so he could get every bit of him into that wonderful mouth that knew exactly how to suck a dick.

The mouth sucked beautifully. His dick was immersed so deep into the man’s throat that he nearly came in that first few seconds. The urge was already there. But he couldn’t nut so quickly. There was no way he would ejaculate as quickly as that. Still, he suppressed the desire to right away.

The mouth was experienced in such matters however, and it sucked well, and it was also careful. The warm mouth wrapped itself tightly around his dick. It knew what it was doing. Sucking, pausing to lick the tip and tongue around the foreskin and the mouth was on the tip and then it sucked from the head and went as far as it could go. It went from swallowing the whole lot to licking the tip, with a light stroke and a warm, soft hand, hot breath and another deep suck. Each time the mouth swallowed his cock, he nearly came, and each time he nearly came, the mouth stopped and left him on the edge.

The graffiti. By now, he’d read it over a dozen times. It was an odd thing to read, given he experienced what the writer had written. ‘Feeeeeels Gooooood.’

He wanted to write something right next to it. But what would he write? And with what?

Brad listened out for anyone who might disturb them but also knew then he couldn’t hold it any longer. The vibrations in his body, coupled with the fear; the urgency, the wrongness of it all, the hotness of not knowing who the man on the other side was, doing things to him that had never been done before like that.

He felt the ejaculation begin. There was no stopping it now.

The man must have sensed it, because the mouth tightened, and that made Brad explode.

It was nothing like peeing when you were busting to go. It was nothing like a thousand desserts. It was nothing like the wank he’d had when he’d found those hot magazines that time in his dad’s hidden cupboard.

Nothing was quite like ejaculating into someone’s mouth, anonymously through a hole in a door.

Yes. It did feel good. He thought that as he came. It felt more than just good.

Convulsing against the door in a strange after-sex position, he was immediately spent.

But as soon as he came, he pulled away from the door and tucked his fast-softening penis away and made for the door, only hitting the tap as an after-thought, and flying his hands under the water, before he rushed out into the night.

With his head bowed, he exited the toilet block and picked up speed. He began to run, this time he didn’t detour past the rich houses, he went the most direct route home and was there within two minutes. As soon as he entered, he went to the bathroom and took a shower.

His sister’s loofa was on the shower and he picked it up and inspected it, poured a lot of soap onto it and used it on his dick, then around his pelvis, and his legs and eventually up his body and eventually onto his face. He scrubbed too hard and felt the sting, but undeterred, he continued. A knock at the door accompanied a muffled voice, but he ignored it.

Eventually, he turned the shower off when the water turned cold and got out of the shower and dried himself.

Minutes later, in bed, he picked up a book and tried to distract himself with the novel he’d started the night before. But try as he might, he did not register any of the words. His eyes inevitably left the book and illuminated a part of his mind that had been awakened.

He’d discovered an incredible awakening.

He didn’t want to, but his mind began to recall the experience and his hand went to his erect dick. When he blew under his sheets seconds later, it was with the thought process that he should never go back to that toilet again.

Never. Ever.

But he knew that he was lying to himself. The pleasure he’d experienced in that toilet was incredible and addictive.

When Aaron opened the door and got into his own bed across the room a little while later, Brad was wide awake with his eyes closed.

“Are you awake Bro?” Aaron asked.

Brad opened his mouth, but then closed it. Across the room, he saw the silhouette of his brother, his small, pointed nose and the outline of his medium-length hair in the dim moonlight. Aaron got into bed and sat facing Brad, but when Brad didn’t respond, he lay down.

Within minutes, he started snoring.

This was chapter 1. The rest of the story is available on Amazon here.