I saved his number as "Duke Peers" at first, but then he excitedly showed me that he'd saved mine as "My Cat" with an emoji of a cat with heart-eyes next to it. "Oh, right," I whispered, changing his to "My Owner" and putting a peach emoji either side of it for good measure.

When he looked over my shoulder and saw that, his eyes closed slightly and he looked dangerously aroused, so I almost regretted it.

We sat on one of the benches in the park and I avoided sitting on his lap by just putting my legs over his thighs. He stroked my knee.

Duke was making anxious glances between me and his phone while he lit up another cigarette. "What now?" I asked, hoping he wasn't going to do something stupid like ask for my social media accounts.

"I want to set a picture for your contact…" he looked at me sheepishly. "But I can't decide between a picture of just you or one of us together…"

"Give me your phone," I requested, holding my hand out. I had half a mind to lob the phone as far away as I could, or smash it on the ground, but I held back.

I got the front camera open and pointed it at me, then I snaked an arm around Duke's shoulders to pluck the cigarette out of his lips from behind. When he turned to look at me, confused, I pushed the back of his head toward me and kissed him while taking the photo.

He completely froze up after that. I put his phone back into his pocket, since he wasn’t moving. I think his brain just stopped functioning for a while.

“You dead?” I asked, lightly slapping his cheek. That brought him back to consciousness, but he was suddenly way too animated. He latched onto me and we started making out. I was swept up so much, it was all I could do to not drop his cigarette. It had gone out by the time we stopped.

I could feel something hard poking my legs, and it wasn’t just his intense thigh muscles. “Calm down,” I warned. “We’re outside.” He kissed the space below my ear.

“Have you ever done anything dirty outside?” he whispered, his voice all low and husky. I had to think about his question for quite a while, since my sexual history is vast and varied.

“Uh… yeah, a few times. But I’m not doing that with you.” I could feel him nodding against my neck.

“Yeah, I understand: I wouldn’t want anyone else seeing us, either. It’d be best if we were alone together, right?” I was speechless. I had several fantasies about punching him in the face, but he would have liked that too much and gotten even more riled up, so I restrained myself.

He was quiet for several minutes. “This is my first ever date,” he confided, like it was something embarrassing. 

“Oh?”

“Have you been on dates before?”

“I guess so.”

“What did you do?”

“Well…” I had to drag up memories that I hadn’t thought about in years. “I dated a guy that really liked this one band, so he took me to all of their concerts. It didn’t end well.”

“Why not?”

“I hooked up with one of the band members. Actually, I think we had a threesome with him. He wasn’t very good-looking without the stage lights.” Duke was attentively listening, but his lower lip was quivering like it wanted to pout. “And I had another boyfriend that took me to a few football games. I’m pretty sure I sucked him off in the bathroom. It was kinda gross.”

I had no problem discussing my sexual history, but I was wearily aware that giving too much careless detail would reveal me as being trans. I did decide that it wasn’t a problem if he happened to find out, but I certainly didn’t want to tell him otherwise.

“So your dates usually do get sexual?” There was something hopeful in his voice.

“This one won’t,” I said firmly. He beamed at me.

“Because I’m special?” There was a catch in his voice. I rolled my eyes and went limp when he squeezed me into a tight hug.

"You're certainly something."

We walked around a bit more, and stopped to look at a water fountain. "I almost drowned in one of these, once," I told him, dipping a few fingers into the cold water. He looked concerned. "I was drunk," I explained, suddenly aware that he might have thought it was on purpose. "April fished me out."

"You two seem to get along well," he mused. I gave him a quizzical look.

"Where? How?"

"Well, all the friendly insults make it look like you're having fun," he explained defensively. I gave a half-troubled sigh.

"It's not exactly fun, but it's better than how she used to be with me. After the whole killing myself debacle, she was walking on eggshells and acting all nice. It pissed me off. So I started teasing her until she teased back and now we're like this." I sighed again. "People being too considerate of me is weird. I don't like it."

Duke started patting my head after that and looked thoughtful, but didn't say anything.

When Frank came to pick us up, Duke asked if I was hungry. "Probably," I answered, though I'm sure I was still fairly full from the pie.

"Let's go to Reggie's. Have you ever been?" Duke asked me once we were in the car.

"Is that the bar?" He nodded. "I've walked past it a few times, but never gone in." I didn't like drinking in bars. Also, Reggie's was in the really shady back-alley part of the city. It was almost impossible to walk by it accidentally, since it was so out-of-the-way, but a guy I used to sleep with lived on that street. 

In all honesty, every part of this city is kinda shady, but before meeting Duke in that shop, I'd never had direct contact with the crime stuff.

"Have you been recently, Frank?" Duke asked.

"Not since you slept with the owner, no."

Duke glanced at me but I didn't react. "It was a long time ago," he said with a stiff laugh, putting a hand on my shoulder.

"It was last month," Frank informed me.

"Mark!" Duke snapped. "It was just sex, I don't have any feelings for him," he assured.

"I didn't ask," I said bluntly, since I didn't care. He looked like a dog with its tail between its legs.

"I thought the new bartender would be more your type," Frank said.

As it turned out, the new bartender in question was my type as well. His name is Maverick Cadwell, and he's adorable. He's a fairly femme guy, wears dangly earrings and bright clothes, always smiling and easy to talk to. He's taller than me, but not by too much, and even though his usually baggy clothes tend to hide it, he's toned as all hell.

I've actually known Maverick for many years, since he went to my school, though he's five years younger so we didn't overlap long. That, and he used to date my sister (before he came out as gay).

Considering all that, when I saw him behind the bar I wondered how I should react, but I didn't have a lot of time to think about it since the second our eyes met he bolted the bar and ran over to me.

"Soot!" he shouted joyously, scooping me up into a hug and swinging me around with such reckless delight that my legs hit Duke and knocked over a chair. I still have bruises. 

Duke yanked me out of Maverick's arms and held me up out of reach. I felt like a ragdoll or a prop. Most of the other patrons were looking at us.

"Maverick, you need to be careful indoors," I scolded.

"Ah, sorry, you're right," he apologised with a laugh.

"Well, it's okay if you understand."

Duke was glaring hard, his frown line deepening and twitching aggressively.

"You look so different!" Maverick told me excitedly. "Your hair looks great!" I'm fairly sure my hair had grown out a lot since I'd last seen him, and it definitely didn't look great because I never do anything with it.

"I see you still have a bowl-cut," I noted.

"Sure do!" He bent down to pick up the chair that fell over. "How's Merritt?"

"The same as usual, probably." I lightly tapped Duke’s arm. “Hey, put me down.”

“How do you know each other?” he asked me in an angry whisper.

"I'll tell you when you put me down," I bargained. He begrudgingly obliged, but held my hand tighter than necessary. "He used to date one of my sisters," I explained. "It's good to see you again. Did you get taller?"

"Yeah!" Maverick beamed, like a ray of sunshine. "But I keep meeting more tall people, so it doesn't feel like it!" he pouted, then craned his neck dramatically to look up at Duke. "And now I'm meeting another one! Hi! Wait, actually, we met before, right?"

Duke looked unhappily at Maverick's outstretched hand and didn't shake it. Instead, he pointedly just put both his hands over mine. "Yes. Briefly," he grumbled.

I elbowed him for being rude. "Maverick, could I get a triple of whatever will make me forget today the quickest?" I asked wearily.

"Coming right up! And for your gentleman companion?"

“The lunch of the day,” Duke answered, still grouchy. “Aren’t you going to eat?” he asked me when Maverick hurried off to get our orders.

“I’ll just eat yours when you aren’t looking,” I joked dryly.

“Really? Okay! That’s even better than having me feed you.” He shook excitedly.

“God’s truth… This guy is hard to discourage,” I thought. 

We sat in a corner of the bar, as far away from the other patrons as possible. It was fairly packed for a weekday at noon, but I didn’t go to bars enough to immediately think that might be strange.

“It’s a good thing you didn’t ask for a specific drink,” Duke told me. “This place removes all the labels on their alcohol and writes their own, so you don’t always know what you get,” he laughed. “It’s pretty fun!” 

He went on to tell me some of the other odd things they did at the bar, like having a rhyming day where all staff and patrons have to speak in rhymes, and anyone who messes up pays double all night. Turns out the clientele were all in the "same line of work" as Duke, but there was a "no shop talk" rule in place so that information wouldn't spread. It was also a neutral zone, meaning people from different criminal organisations could be in close proximity without bloodshed.

"Well then why did you ask if I'd been here before?" I asked, since I'm certain I didn't give off criminal vibes.

"... Good point," he said with an embarrassed chuckle, probably feeling dumb.

I looked around, thinking that if I wasn't with Duke then I'd probably be scared shitless being there, since everyone seemed like they could beat me into a pulpy Soot Smoothie with one hand.

"Is this the sort of place you like?" I asked, thinking that, at least visually, he blended right in. He smiled.

"Yeah," he said warmly.

Maverick came over with our orders then. Apparently "whatever will make me forget today the quickest" was a dry gin.

I mean, unfortunately, and evidently, I do remember that day, but whatever.

"I totally forgot you live in the city, or I would've asked you to hang out!" Maverick said apologetically, perching on the edge of the table. He's a chatty guy, so he went on, "I moved here nearly two months ago for university. Oh, I live upstairs, cause my uncle is the owner here, so you can visit me anytime you want! I usually just work evenings, but my classes were cancelled today so I'm doing a lunch shift."

I took note of the fact that this meant Duke had slept with Maverick's uncle. Small world?

"You're in university now? God, I feel old. What're you studying?"

"Fashion design!" He struck a cutsie pose.

I could see Duke getting gradually angrier, probably because I wasn't paying enough attention to him, so I put my hand on his thigh under the table. He tensed up.

"Is there a girl called Emma Cunterblast in your class?" I asked, and started to stroke Duke's leg softly. He made a quiet gasp.

"Yeah! You know Emma?"

"No, but I know her girlfriend."

"Oh! That reminds me! I actually have a boyfriend now," he said with such a sweetly innocent smile. "And get this: his driver is Tong! Do you remember Tong? From school?"

I snickered. "Oh, god, do I remember Tong. He was great. He beat me up one time and then cried afterwards," I said, feeling a little nostalgic.

Tong, AKA Long-John Tong, AKA Johnathan Longhaul, used to sell me weed in highschool. He also tried to beat me up one time because he heard I was dating his older brother. We reconciled after that since he started sobbing, and I talked him through some of his homophobia to the point that he actually became a total ally. I heard that he even got the school to start an LGBT club and have pride flags put up.

Maverick looked quite shocked to hear that. He went on to tell me that another kid from school was living in the city as well.

"Was he your Goth friend?" I asked, my memory doing its best but starting to struggle with the names.

"Yeah! Manny's working around here now as well! Oh, speaking of work, how's the tablet I gave you?" Maverick had a thing for bartering, and I got my current drawing tablet from him in exchange for some design work for a campaign someone he knew was doing.

We chatted a little more, but I eventually told him he should get back to working.

Duke ate his food fairly quickly and excused himself to the bathroom. I had been rubbing him under the table quite a lot so he probably needed to go get that under control.

I decided to go for a smoke, and told Maverick to let my companion know if he came back first, because I am considerate. Well, once I left the bar I did put serious thought into just walking home, so I'm not all that considerate I guess, but I didn't. Not entirely by choice, though.

I'd nearly finished my cigarette, having smoked it a bit quicker than usual because the people on the street all seemed sketchy. I assumed that must be the usual clientele, so when a few walked closer to me I just stepped aside to allow them into the bar.

Turns out they weren't looking for a drink: they were looking for me. One of them gave me a swift punch in the gut, knocking all the wind and smoke out of me. I fell over the outstretched arm of another man, and was dragged off before I could even react.