***

It hadn’t worked at all, Otis thought grimly as he walked back home. The restaurant wasn’t very far from his apartment building, and he liked the exercise, regardless of the weather. He had tried to think less of Hudson, but quite the opposite had happened. It hadn’t helped that Jackie hadn’t been there tonight, as usual, to serve as a distraction. It baffled Otis to the extreme that so much of his mental space was inhabited by his neighbor. Maybe it was all because he had unfinished business with the man. In life, one needed to have guts; he had read that exact thing somewhere, but he didn’t recall where. And this type of situation required guts.

He would knock on his neighbor’s door tonight. He would apologize again for the spying, and then he would offer payment for the dating advice he needed. Was Hudson expensive? As someone who had just come into a little bit of money, Otis thought it right to provide himself with a little extravagance. Of course, there was the matter of not exactly knowing his neighbor’s rates when it came to that kind of thing, but maybe they could work something out, like business partners. Yeah, that sounded about right.

And, before he lost all his courage, he decided to do it right now. As grandma used to say, no moment like the present, and there was also that nice quote she used about the present being a gift. That was a gift Otis was planning on putting to good use tonight.

He decided to take the stairs instead of the elevator, and by the time he reached the landing on the fifth floor, he was already breathless. However, the restless energy that had propelled him into action was now a bit subdued, so that he could control his thought-mouth coordination when talking to Hudson.

He paced the landing a few times, determined to get his breathing under control before doing what he was there for. Once he decided he no longer sounded like he had run a marathon, he stepped in front of 505 and knocked. There was a chance that Hudson wasn’t home, and that would be a tad disappointing, especially since he worried that his newfound courage might deprecate before he got the chance to try again.

He was still lost in thought when the door opened in front of him. Hudson was there, right in front of him, and the way he looked rendered Otis speechless. He wasn’t wearing a shirt and that left his chest bare. The beautifully shaped pectorals made Otis’s mouth go dry and, to escape them, he moved his eyes lower, over the well-defined abdomen, only to have them come to rest on two symmetrical tattoos engraved over the external oblique muscles. They represented some sort of gun, the barrels pointing at the V the lower abs were making at a slanted angle. Otis felt a new kind of terror flaring inside his mind. He couldn’t tear his eyes away. They were glued there, while his mind was supplementing the details that were still hidden to the naked eye by low-cut blue jeans, hanging over sexy hips.

“You have more tattoos,” he whispered.

Hudson sighed, like it pained him even to talk to Otis. “Are you here for an inventory of my tattoos? And my eyes are up here.”

Otis finally managed to unglue his eyes from the sight of those gun tattoos and looked Hudson in the face. “Do you need an inventory of your tattoos? I wouldn’t mind.”

Hudson laughed and crossed his arms, leaning against the door jamb. “Why are you here, Otis?”

“Right.” Otis reached into his pocket and took out the tip money he had collected over the last few days. “As you can see, I have come into a little bit of money. Now, I can pay.”

Hudson blinked once and then frowned, although the corners of his lips curled upward, a clear sign that he couldn’t be mad. “For what?”

“Dating advice.”

***

Hudson had been killing time before the opening of The Bouncing Bunny, and the last thing he’d been expecting was to see his nosy neighbor at his door. And now, Otis was there, handing him a few neatly folded bills with both hands and leaning forward, like a Japanese businessman offering his card. This wasn’t a good time. In one hour, he’d be out the door, heading over to a shady venue that probably exploited youths who didn’t have anywhere to go or were unable to fend for themselves, young men who sold their bodies like they were nothing. And now, he had this young man standing there, so unlike all the men that had visited his apartment over the last few days.

It wasn’t a good idea to have Otis over. No, not a good idea at all. However, some of the weariness that had been growing in him since he had taken over the case seemed to lift the moment his eyes met that singular amazing blue eye. Without thinking twice, he moved out of the door and gestured for Otis to follow. “Come on in, then.”

Otis moved past him and Hudson closed the door behind them, not before looking – force of habit – up and down the corridor for any sign of suspicious strangers.

“So, what do you want to know?” he asked.

Otis sat gingerly on the sofa, but only after Hudson insisted. “About dating. I can pay.” He was still holding out the neatly folded bills.

“Put that back in your pocket. I’m not charging for this. But, first of all, let me get this clear. What makes you think I could give you dating advice?”

“You date a lot,” Otis pointed out, as if it were some obvious fact that Hudson wasn’t aware of.

He actually dated very little. Ever since making detective, he hadn’t paid much attention to dating anyone. Hooking up, yeah, he did that, but getting involved with someone? That hadn’t been in the cards for a long time.

“What exactly makes you think that?” Hudson was standing, but at a fair distance, so as not to startle the strange, beautiful creature sitting on his sofa. However, it appeared that even so his mere presence was tangling up Otis’s speech. The words coming out of the pretty mouth that made him think that a term like Cupid’s bow was aptly applied were a stuttered mess.

It didn’t take a genius to realize that Otis was ogling him. He was trying not to, but the way he bit his bottom lip, turning his eyes away only to move them back was so endearing that Hudson felt something akin to a wave of pleasant sensations moving through his chest.

“You are comfortable with other men,” Otis finally explained.

“And you’re not?” Hudson asked and moved closer, drawn to the pretty man in front of him.

Otis shook his head slowly, while his only visible eye remained glued to Hudson.

Hudson smiled and put one hand on Otis’s head, running his fingers through the silky hair, marveling at the strange contrast between the dark roots and the rest of it. Otis stared at him, his lips parted, moist and inviting. What would it take to have him? Hudson wondered. What would it take to scare him off, as he should?

The fascinating blue eye blinked slowly, so slowly that it seemed unnatural. Hudson felt enthralled beyond reasonable thought. He tipped Otis’s chin, caressing it and then leaned over. He closed his eyes as he brushed his lips against the soft mouth waiting for him. There was no resistance, just a sort of startled passivity. Hudson waited against himself to be pushed away, but, when nothing happened, he moved his tongue to taste the pretty lips properly. A small soft moan escaped Otis’s mouth, and Hudson took it as an invitation. He cupped the blond head with one hand to help himself into that maddening kiss.

Otis tasted amazing. Hudson wanted more—

He almost stumbled and fell on his ass when he was pushed away. Otis rushed out of the room and then the front door opened and slammed shut, while hurried steps faded away.

He looked around, a bit startled and confused. What on earth was he doing, flirting with his neighbor? Then, he winced as he felt the not-so-familiar-lately straining in his pants. He grabbed his crotch and groaned. “Are you fucking kidding me?” he asked, his words bouncing back to him in the empty apartment.

For days, he had looked at attractive men in all kinds of sexy outfits and getups, or wearing nothing at all, and his dick had remained as limp as if it served no particular purpose but hanging around like an old wino at a seedy bar. And now? It was up and about only from a mostly innocent kiss.

Hudson increased the grip on his erection until the itch went away. He had work to do; getting hard over his pretty neighbor was not part of it.

***

Otis clenched his hand into a fist over his chest. His heart was hammering. He was sweating so much that his shirt clung to his back, and his cheeks were burning in shame. What had just happened? Why? His brain struggled within the confines of his skull, searching for a way out. Was that what a real kiss felt like? And people weren’t instantly dying or combusting from them? How was it possible?

Without actually doing any thinking, he began undressing, decided that he needed a cold shower. His entire body was burning. He stepped under the spray and gasped when he felt the water on his skin. The shock alone helped him focus a little. He put both hands on the wall and stayed there.

Hudson, his neighbor – what was his last name? – had just kissed him. Otis touched his lips briefly. There was nothing left there, but Otis couldn’t shake off the overwhelming sensations washing over him, not entirely. He let his forehead rest on the cool tile wall and took deep breaths.

His very handsome, very sexy neighbor, had kissed him. Did he kiss all the men coming into his apartment? What kind of work did he do, again? Otis squeezed his eyes shut, but it wasn’t helping. His imagination worked in unbecoming ways. Otis pressed between his legs; his neighbor made him have sex thoughts, strange thoughts that involved him spread naked on the man’s sofa, wearing nothing except for maybe one of those leashes on the wall. Hudson would bring a hand to caress his back slowly until he reached lower.

That was just as far as he could go. Otis was only dimly aware of his breathing growing ragged, harsher, as the tension in his body gave in. The cold water carried everything away, even the signs of that shameful release. He shuddered, his eyes still close. Hudson should never know that he had been thinking of him like that. It was wrong; Otis knew it, and yet, he couldn’t bring himself to feel bad about it. His body trembled for a while, first from the slowly fading eddies of pleasure, and then from how cold he felt.

He turned off the water and walked back into the room, using a towel to dry his hair and rub it against his skin. He needed to be careful about not catching cold, especially now that he had just gotten a promotion at work.

That had been a kiss, he thought, as he lay on the bed, his arms spread out to his sides, his eyes on the ceiling. “Grandma, someone kissed me today,” he whispered, as his cheeks began to burn. Of course, he wouldn’t tell her about what that kiss did to him, but he could tell her something else. “It was like nothing I’ve ever felt in my life. It was amazing.”

***