Chapter Nine

Time for a Wet T-Shirt Competition!

Rafe

He took me to a gay sex shop.

"I just think we should celebrate!" Nev insisted as he pushed open the unmarked door in the basement to the secret part of the store for non-humans. "Forget the Big Dick Dan stuff—we need to mark your coming out and newfound love of dudes. I'll help you pick something, bro."

I looked around as we entered the room, not sure whether to be scared or intrigued. It was very dark and moody, with the occasional red strobe light and thumping music that I could feel in my bones. Floating white shelves seemed to glow in the low lighting, all of them displaying a range of sex toys for non-humans. Tentacle dildos the length of my thigh. Butt plugs the width of my fucking head. Anal beads with goddamn spikes on them.

There was an entire range of products that promoted its use of incubus pheromones: lube, massage oil, poppers, fake cum refills for ejaculating dildos. The far wall showcased the shop's range of blow-up sex dolls for different species: fae, werewolves, orcs, and hybrids like fauns and centaurs. I snorted when I saw the ghoul one, with its sickly grey skin, dark fingernails and shadowed eyes.

"So." Nev clapped his hands with enthusiasm, looking around. "What are we thinking?"

" We ?" I snorted. " I'm not thinking anything. I don't need a new sex toy."

"It doesn't have to be a toy." Nev grabbed my wrist and dragged me over to a display of leather accessories. "What about a thong? Or a harness or something?"

"I'm not into the leather stuff," I said quickly. "Or thongs. I've never worn a thong in my life, Neville."

"Me neither, but I bet you'd look great!" he said chirpily, holding up a minuscule scrap of shiny green fabric. "This would go with your eyes!"

"I am not buying a thong because it matches my eyes, Nev," I said blankly, taking the underwear from him and putting it back. "Seriously, man, I don't want anything. And I really can't be late for work."

"You won't be!" He huffed in exasperation. "We have loads of time, dude. Let's at least look around. Embrace the queerness, bro."

"I will," I said defensively. "I totally will. But I only realised I was queer, like, three days ago. Give me a chance."

"I'm too impatient." He pouted, then perked up and reached for a paddle covered in silver studs. "Ooh, this is pretty."

"I don't want a paddle," I said. Nev pouted again and set it down, then went to reach for a whip. "I don't want a whip either. Or handcuffs," I added when he diverted his attention to those.

"No problem, bro," he said, not deterred by my unwilling demeanour. "We'll keep looking."

I glanced helplessly at the time on my phone. "Nev…"

"Oh my god. No way. This is perfect. "

I looked up as he strode over to a display of what looked like Halloween-themed toys. There was a vibrating witch's broom, fake fae wings covered in a subtle, shimmery dick pattern, butt plugs with werewolf tails attached and…

Oh my god.

No. No no no.

"No," I blurted when Neville turned to face me with a delighted grin on his face, brandishing the pumpkin head with a cock sleeve for a mouth. "No way. No fucking way, Neville."

"But it's a…" He peered down at the packaging. "Headless Horseman-themed masturbatory aid. It's perfect! Ooh, and it has two sleeves. One in the mouth, one in the neck hole—"

You could fuck its neck hole ?

"No," I repeated, emphatically shaking my head. "Nope. Put it down. We're leaving."

"Let me buy it for you!"

I blanched. "No. I do not want a headless horseman pumpkin head sex toy."

Nev grunted, spinning it in his hands. "But it's not like it's—"

"No."

"It could help you come to terms with—"

"No."

"It's on sale!" He gasped and pointed at a yellow sticker. "Half off! That's a steal, Rafe."

"Nev." I scrubbed a hand down my face and looked around, feeling self-conscious when I realised we were the only customers in here. The fae behind the counter—who I was pretty sure I'd seen leaving Ewen's place in the past—was smacking his gum and watching us with a bored expression. I cringed. "Can we please go? It's way too fucking early to even be in a sex shop. It's, like, ten a.m. And I need to go home and get ready for work."

"Are you sure you don't want it?" To my mortification, Neville held the pumpkin head sex toy in front of his own face and lowered his voice to a slow southern drawl. "You could pretend it's a certain cowboy neighbour of yours."

"I'm leaving." My face on fire, I turned for the door, and promptly smashed my forehead into one of the floating shelves, causing several werewolf-themed dildos with big knots to bounce off my face and fall to the floor. "Ow! Fuck!"

"Oh shit." Nev hurriedly put down the pumpkin head. I could hear him trying not to laugh as he asked, "You okay?"

"Oh my gosh, hon, are you alright?" The fae from behind the counter was hurrying over, and fresh heat rushed to my face as he placed a delicate hand on my shoulder and peered at me. My forehead smarted under my palm.

"I'm fine." I gave the fae a tight, embarrassed smile. "Uh, sorry about the—"

"Oh, don't even worry." He waved a hand and gave me a sweet smile back, and my face grew even hotter when I realised, yep, I'd definitely seen him leaving Ewen's place in the past.

And now I was letting myself realise just how pretty he was. Which wasn't helping, to be honest.

"Did it break the skin?" he asked in concern as Nev watched us in silence, amusement dancing in his eyes as he sank his teeth into his lower lip to stop himself from laughing. I knew the expression well. Bastard.

"Uh, no." I reluctantly removed my hand so the fae could see my forehead—god, I hoped there wouldn't be a lump—and cleared my throat. "Let me grab those. Sorry."

I'm going to kill you, Nev , I thought viciously as I bent to pick up several knotted dildos before the fae could tell me not to worry again. My head swam from the throbbing in my forehead, and I reflexively leaned my weight on one hand as I knelt.

Unfortunately, there was a dildo in that hand. A dildo with a suction cup base. A well-made one, it appeared, because it seemingly fused to the floor and became a permanent fixture.

"Oh shit. Oops." I tugged. It didn't move. Neville and the fae watched in silence as I tugged again, trying to break the seal, but instead my sweaty hand just slid up the length of the werewolf dick and flew off the tapered tip. A bleat of nervous laughter burst from me. "Wow, that's, uh… that's got great suction!"

Fuck, why the fuck did I just say that? Cringing, growing increasingly flustered, I tried to yank the dildo off the floor and once again only succeeded in sliding my fist along its length.

"You can just leave it, hon," the fae said in a sympathetic voice as he and my best friend watched me jerk off a werewolf dildo suctioned to the floor of a sex shop at 10 a.m. on a Friday morning.

"'Kay!" I replied in a strangled voice, trying to sound blasé about it when inside I was dying.

I was out of breath for some reason when I stood back up, and my legs were shaking a bit.

"Did you want the pumpkin head?" the fae asked with an encouraging smile.

"No." So much blood rushed to my face that I thought I was going to pass out, the bump on my forehead throbbing angrily. "No, thank you. I'm just—We're going to go now."

And I was never going to show my face in here again.

—

"He absolutely knows you've seen him, and he absolutely wants you to keep watching," Neville declared as I pulled into my driveway.

I'd just finished confessing all my sins to him—yes, including the mattress-humping—and while I was relieved that he wasn't calling me a pervert and putting an end to our fifteen-year friendship, I was pretty sure his response wasn't actually the greatest one.

"Um, I think assuming that is probably super problematic, right?" I asked doubtfully. "We don't know that he knows, and we definitely don't know that he, uh, likes me watching."

"But you told him!" Nev insisted, unbuckling his seatbelt as I killed the engine. My belly clenched when I saw Ewen's truck in his own driveway. "You told him to close his blinds that first night. You made it really obvious you'd seen him. And you said he responded by saying ‘maybe' and sucking on his beer bottle like it was a dick. His own dick."

Heat prickled in my cheeks. "That might've just been me imagining things."

"I think he's putting on a show for you," Nev said with a resolute nod before opening his car door. "Which is hot as fuck, bro."

I let out a strangled groan and shoved my way out of the car. "No, it's humiliating."

Was Ewen throwing me a bone because he thought I was some sad, repressed voyeur who sat by my window every night like a horny little ghoul, salivating over my professional wrestler neighbour's big dick and muscular body and cocksucking skills?

I sighed miserably as I grabbed my shopping bag from the back seat. That was, in fact, pretty accurate. Fuck.

"You know what you should do?" Nev gave me a bright smile as he bounded around the car to join me. "Give him a show back! Jerk off in front of your window later."

I inhaled too fast and ended up choking on my own spit. "Are you kidding me?"

"If we'd bought the pumpkin head, you could've stood at your window fucking it for him. Oh man, I bet that would drive him wild."

I could not think of anything more acutely humiliating. And deranged. Perverted. My best friend was as deranged and perverted as I was, but he seemed to embrace it.

"Neville," I began through clenched teeth as we walked up my driveway, "I am not fucking a pumpkin head in front of my window for my neighbour to watch."

Nev sniffed. "Seems a bit selfish not to, if you ask me."

"I wasn't asking you."

He huffed, tapping his foot impatiently as I unlocked my front door. "If I, as your oldest friend, can't give you unsolicited advice, then who can?"

"I'd be fine with no one ever giving me unsolicited advice," I deadpanned, letting him into the house and following. "Okay, put these away for me while I go get changed, then I'll drop you off on the way to work."

Nev took the grocery bag I held out and immediately peered inside, no doubt to steal one of the bags of chips I'd bought. "'Kay."

He wandered into the kitchen as I made my way upstairs, and I rolled my eyes when I heard him trying to very quietly open a chip bag. There was a faint crinkle followed by the sound of crunching.

I couldn't stop myself from glancing out the hallway window when I passed it, but it looked like Ewen's living room was empty. I'd developed a Pavlovian response to the view though, and my dick was half-hard as I got undressed to put on a suit for work.

I'd just finished buttoning my shirt when I heard a loud gasp from downstairs, followed by Nev barking, "Rafe!"

I jumped and went still for a second, then strode to my bedroom door with a frown. "Yeah?" I yelled back.

"Rafe!" he called again.

I huffed. "Yes?"

"Rafe!" Nev appeared at the bottom of the stairs and tripped twice in his haste to run up them, spilling tortilla chips from the bag in his hand. "Rafe! Rafe!"

"What?" I asked impatiently, wondering what the fuck was wrong.

Instead of answering, he grabbed my wrist and dragged me down the hallway to the spare bedroom at the back of the house. I tensed and glanced down at myself. I was only in a shirt and my boxer briefs.

"Neville, I have to get ready for work—"

"Shut your face! This is important."

Almost growling in irritation, I glared at the back of my friend's head as he pulled me toward the window. "Neville, for fuck's…"

My voice trailed off pathetically when I saw the reason for his dramatic outburst.

I stared at my neighbour as he straightened in the yard below, holding a piece of fencing. The top third of his long blond hair was tied back in a little bun to keep it away from his face, and the only thing on his upper half was a tiny cropped tank top with ragged hems. "SUN'S OUT, GUNS OUT," it said across his chest, and it was so short that it barely covered his nipples. The line of dark blond hair trailing from his navel to the waistband of his equally minuscule shorts glinted in the sun, and his abs were just ridiculous. Like, people didn't really look like that, did they? It was absurd. No one actually had abs like that.

My mouth dried out as I watched him lean over to grab another bit of fencing. I could see that he'd snapped the ruined panel into smaller pieces, and now he was collecting them all.

He was actually fixing my fence.

In the smallest items of clothing I'd ever seen.

There were gardening gloves on his hands, which for some reason made his bare forearms look even more tan and ropey and muscular. Neville and I stood and watched in silence as he paused, wiped the sweat off his forehead, then tucked the pieces of fence panel under his arm and vanished up the side access of his own yard, no doubt to dump them in his truck for disposal.

Even once he was out of sight, it still took a few more seconds for my brain to come back online. I cleared my throat and nervously tugged my shirt tails over my groin. For no particular reason. "Okay, so he's finally fixing my fence. Great—"

Neville interrupted me with a gasp, grabbing my arm. "He's coming back."

I lunged forward and practically pressed my nose to the glass. Ewen reappeared from his own yard, this time carrying a brand new fence panel.

But I wasn't looking at that.

Emblazoned over his ass on those tiny shorts were, similar to his tiny top, the words, "SUN'S OUT, BUNS OUT."

And his buns were certainly… out. My tongue felt thick as I allowed my gaze to trace over the crease of his ass cheeks, which appeared with every step he took.

"I would genuinely pay to watch this," Neville said. "This is top one percent content." From the corner of my eye, I saw him slowly lift a tortilla chip to his mouth and crunch down as he stared.

"I mean, really…" My voice was hoarse. Parched. I wet my dry lips. "Who wears… that? To fix a fence? He… he's going to get a splinter."

"Do you think he's that tanned all over?" Neville asked, completely ignoring my question.

I know he is .

"Fuck me, look at those—" Neville wiggled a hand toward his side. "—the side muscle bits. The wings. They're huge ."

"Lats," I croaked, staring at them too. They were huge. So were his biceps. And his delts.

All of him was.

I knew for a fact.

Ewen crossed the boundary into my yard and propped the new panel up against the fence. Then he turned toward my house, gloved hands on his hips.

And looked up.

"Fuck!" Nev squeaked as we both ducked out of sight in sync. My heart was racing as we crouched, unmoving, under the window in silence for long seconds. Then Neville looked at me and whispered, "I'm going to look."

My hand shot out to grip his arm. "No!" I hissed. "He'll see you."

"I have to, bro." Nev shook his head, stuffing three chips in his mouth. "I can't not look. It's like staring at a solar eclipse. A muscular, skimpily dressed solar eclipse. You know you shouldn't look directly at it, but… you're stupid and you do it anyway."

I swallowed as Neville peeked his head up to peer into the yard. A second later, he relaxed and said, "Okay, he's not looking this way."

I couldn't stop myself from stretching up a little so I could peek too. Ewen was striding back into his yard, vanishing briefly from sight before he reappeared holding a bottle of water. My mouth grew even drier when he stripped off one of his gloves with his teeth, then shoved it into the waistband of his tiny shorts before opening the bottle to drink.

His Adam's apple bobbed as he tipped his head back to gulp down water. Nev started shovelling chips into his mouth faster and faster as he stared, transfixed, just like me.

Then Ewen pulled the bottle away with a sigh, before lifting it and tipping some water over his face.

Neville made a choked sound from beside me.

" Hnngh ." The involuntary noise that left my mouth wasn't much better, and I tried to mask it by clearing my throat. "Well, that's—"

I could've sworn a tiny smirk appeared on Ewen's face, a second before he upended the bottle again, this time pouring the rest of the water over the front of his shirt.

Turning it translucent.

"Fuck me sideways," Neville croaked.

"Alright, okay, well that's…" I shook my head and let out a rough bark of near-hysterical laughter. My face was on fire. My dick was throbbing and already leaking, the tip sticking uncomfortably to my boxer briefs. "That's ridiculous ," I finally managed, my voice humiliatingly hoarse. "No one actually does that. Does he think he's in a nineties rom com or something?"

"Let the man live his life the way he wants, Rafe," Neville said with surprising vehemence.

"But this—That doesn't happen in real life." I felt too hot and flushed as I stared down at my neighbour. His nipples had hardened from the cool water, and his tiny wet T-shirt clung to them obscenely. I could see his chest hair matted beneath the translucent fabric.

"Rafe." Neville finally turned from the window to face me. He dropped the chip bag and clamped his hands on my shoulders.

I hurriedly cupped both hands over my junk so my best friend wouldn't be subjected to the sight of my raging boner. There was no point even pretending that I wasn't ridiculously hard.

"That did just happen in real life," he told me, impassioned. "This is your life. Your life is becoming a nineties rom com. Embrace it."

"How am I meant to do that?" I asked, staring at him dazedly.

"Fall in love with the blond-haired, blue-eyed guy next door."

" Ha! " The incredulous bark burst from me reflexively, and far too loud. I clamped my hands over my mouth and cast a fearful glance at the window.

Neville pouted. "Why is that funny?"

"Because one, I'm a ghoul," I pointed out. "Those nineties rom coms are never about literal ghouls, Neville. And two, it's Dan fucking Ewen. He's made my life miserable for three years. He's a dick!" My best friend's eyes lit up, and he parted his lips to speak, but I got there before he could. "Do not say anything about his dick."

Neville huffed and rolled his eyes, picking his chip packet back up to peer inside. "You need to get better at this being-horny-for-guys thing."

I don't actually think I'm having any issues with that, I thought as I bit my lip and resisted the intense urge to peer back down into the yard. Just for one more look.

I was going to have my change my underwear before I finished getting dressed. I'd leaked an embarrassing amount of pre-cum just from, once again, spying on my neighbour like a pervy little gremlin.

Embarrassment heated my cheeks, and I began awkwardly waddling toward the door, keeping low to the ground so I wouldn't be spotted through the window. "We need to get going so I'm not late."

And I needed to stop being a creep. I needed to stop watching Ewen. I needed to stop thinking about him. I didn't even like him. It was ridiculous.

Fucking Dullahan Dan and his stupid wrestling outfit and tiny shorts and big muscles. He was so annoying. He was the worst.

I was done. Done paying attention to him. Done thinking about him. I had better things to do.

—

I found myself detouring on the way to work after dropping Neville off at his place. Driving back down a familiar street. Ducking my head and keeping my gaze lowered as I hurried through a familiar door.

My face burned when I stepped into the store and saw that the werewolf dildo was still suction-cupped to the floor. Someone had placed little Wet Floor signs around it so no poor unsuspecting customers tripped on the big knotted dick wobbling in time with the music's heavy bass.

"Oh, hi!" a familiar voice said as I slunk up to the counter and placed an object on it. "How's your head feeling?"

Fuck. I'd been hoping he'd forgotten about me. It wasn't like I was all that memorable.

Usually, anyway. When I wasn't jerking off werewolf dildos in the middle of sex shops.

"Fine," I mumbled, resisting the urge to reach up and touch the sore spot on my forehead. At least it hadn't swelled up.

The friendly fae shop worker gave me a sweet smile, then rang up my purchase. I took the plain black carrier bag with an awkward smile—more of a pained grimace—and turned to leave as quickly as possible.

"Enjoy the pumpkin head!" he called after me.