A dozen messages greet me. Faceless profiles, mostly. But definitely not dick-less.
Wowsers.
Okay.
I didn’t know it was possible for a cock to have bad angles, but it is.
Cringing, I click out of the worst photo I’ve ever seen and scan the rest of the messages from the safety of the previews.
They’re all horrible.
At least, they are tomeright now, and the lonely pessimist I’ve become lately doesn’t hold out much hope for the only DM I’m interested in. The DM that’s probably never coming.
I almost click out of my inbox before I reach the end of the unopened messages.
Cut my losses.
Delete the app.
Roll in honey and staple my nuts to a beehive.
Before yesterday, I might’ve done it.
Not the beehive thing, but the rest of it. I’ve had as many false starts with this shit as I have Christmas dinners. But that firefighter. HotCraic97. Seeing him in personandon here…it’s unlocked something in me. Not confidence—fuck no. Butsomethingthat has me scrolling to the bottom of my unread DMs and surviving the lurch in my chest at what I find there.
HotCraic97:Back atcha. Wasn’t lying when I called you a handsome fecker xx
Galen
My hot neighbour doesn’t message back right away. He stays online, though.
Typing.
Typing.
Typing.
And I’ve been there with my whole chest often enough to back off and leave him to it.
I don’t go far. I leave FlingIt open while I haul myself off my floor mattress and shuffle into the shower, embracing the power of steam to clear my grumpy lung.
I’m almost fully recovered. Gone are the days where I’d cough for a solid ten minutes before I could even stand. But yeah. This bit still sucks more from my day than I’m happy with.
Half an hour has passed by the time I come back to my phone and I’m glad to see my new friend still online and not climbing up the side of his house without a proper fecking ladder. I’m not built to watch that kind of foolery unfold.
LeLionDuBois96 isstilltyping. I take a seat on the edge of the bed and check the time. I haven’t slept late. There’s a few hours to play with before I need to cart my arse back to the station. Golden hours I’ve been known to fill with all kinds ofshenanigans, though it’s been a while. And I have other options. By now, I’m a pro at hookup sites. I get what I want and make sure everyone involved has a grand old time. I don’t need to be waiting on a newbie who’ll probably ghost me when he loses his nerve.
And yet, I don’t click out of the message thread with LeLionDuBois96. For whatever reason, I linger through my physio routine and the half-cooked home workout I lump on top. Stare at his flickering presence while I breathe through the lightheadedness I land myself with like it’s the North Star guiding me home.
Can’t say why.
Just that I do.
And eventually I get my reward in the form of actual fecking words.
LeLionDuBois96:Thanks. That’s nice to hear. Sorry. I’m really fucking shit at this x
I’m typing before I’ve loosed the breath caught in my chest.
