“Sure,” he said. “Let’s get it over with.”
Chapter One
Fabian Salahhatedhockey.
Clearly there was some sort of game happening today because the subway train was packed with people wearing blue Toronto Guardians jerseys. Fabian wished he could sit down; he didn’t like standing in the middle of these people, being judged by their boring, ignorant brains. There was at least one dull jock who was openly sneering at Fabian in disgust.
Fabian kept his eyes down and resisted the urge to sneer right back at the man.
Three more stops and you’re home, he told himself.
A little girl in a pink version of the Guardians jersey—because obviously you can’t let your daughter wear something that isn’t bubblegum pink—smiled up at him. He forced himself to smile back.
It wasn’t her fault he was in a bad mood. It wasn’t her fault that he hated hockey and the people who loved it, or that her parents were far too concerned with aggressively gendering their child. She was just enjoying an afternoon out with her parents, cheering on the hometown boys.
Fabian was sure the team was packed with heroic, upstanding young men. Certainly not a bunch of homophobic alpha assholes who would be celebrating their win by doing very gross alpha things tonight. Fabian had met exactly one hockey player in his entire life of being forced to meet hockey players who wasn’t a complete nightmare.
“Is that a guitar?” the little girl in the pink jersey asked him.
Fabian blinked. “It’s a violin,” he said, as warmly as he could manage.
“Is it yours?”
“Yes.”
“Do you know how to play it?”
Fabian smiled. “Yes I do. I think I was about your age when I started learning. Do you play any instruments?”
She shook her head, but then said, “I like to sing and dance.”
“Me too.”
The girl’s mother pulled her closer on their joined seats, and whispered something in her ear that was probably benign, like “Leave the nice man alone” or “Don’t talk to strangers,” but Fabian couldn’t help but imagine it was more like “Don’t talk to men who are wearing eyeliner and nail polish.”
The girl stopped talking to him, but she watched him intently all the way to Wellesley Station, where Fabian finally removed himself from the hoard of hockey fans.
As he made his way down Church Street, Fabian felt the lingering tension from the subway ride leave his body. He had better things to think about than stupid jocks. For one thing, he had finally broken things off—for good this time—with Claude last night. Claude had been the latest in a long line of self-obsessed snobs that Fabian had, for whatever reason, invited into his bed. He wouldn’t call what they’d had a relationship; he’d just kept running into Claude at various events and they would inevitably end up fucking. But Fabian wasdonewith that shit.
He was in a good place now. He had some very promising shows booked, had almost finished his new album, and he’d recorded an in-studio interview and performance for CBC Radio last week. Hisparentshad even listened to it, so he had definitely made it big. If things kept up he would be able to quit his part-time job, become super rich and famous, move to a private island, and never see a hockey jersey ever again.
Ryan was pretty sure he had an ugly dick.
The guy jacking off on Ryan’s laptop screen right now had a great-looking dick. It was long and straight and not too thick. It was all smooth and cut, with perfectly hairless balls. The shaft jutted proudly out of a tidy patch of dark curls.
Ryan’s dick was thick and red, and the hair that surrounded it was even more red. He tried to keep on top of grooming the area, but his pubic hair was as unruly as the hair that covered his head and face. His balls seemed too large and kind of saggy. His dick poked out of a lumpy sleeve of foreskin. The head was fat and dark, and a very prominent vein wrapped around his shaft.
And, unlike the dude in the video he was watching, Ryan took forever to come. He had always been a little slow at sex, but getting off had taken a lot of extra effort the past year or so. He knew it was at least partially the fault of his anxiety meds.
Ryan closed his eyes, blocking out the image of Mr. Perfect Dick, but not the man’s happy moans. Ryan took a slow breath—in and out—then looked down at his dick.
“All right, buddy. We can do this. No pressure, just whenever you’re ready. But let’s try to get there this time, okay?”
He went easy on it, stroking himself with loose fingers and a lot of lube. Sex these days, even with himself, required a lot of patience. For this reason, he rarely dragged anyone else into the ordeal.
The guy on the screen was having a lovely time, swearing and gasping and promising a huge load very soon. “Show off,” Ryan muttered. He started scrolling through the recommended videos that were listed under this one because he knew he was going to need another.
He wasn’t even sure what he was looking for. He liked jerk-off videos because he could kind of pretend he was sharing an experience with someone. He could pretend he was the one making the beautiful man on his computer screen moan with pleasure.
