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Kaz followed Inej into the gay bar as hesitantly as if he’d been told to enter a pit of venomous snakes.
“I’m sure we’ll find someone for you too,” Inej said cheerfully, swinging their arms.
“Nah,” he countered immediately. “I’m not looking for anyone right now. You, however,” he threw a quick glance her way. “Are going to find many someones. You’ll have your pick of the litter, I’m sure.”
Inej shrugged, flashing her ID to the bouncer. Kaz never needed to prove his age, but Inej was short and had a pleasant countenance about her that got her carded more often than not. “Maybe not,” she hedged as the bouncer indeed waved Kaz through without carding him. “I guess we’ll see,” she said cheerfully, her voice suddenly drowned out by the noises around them as they entered the bar.
Kaz stood close to her as they weaved through the crowd, careful not to get too close to anyone for very long. Not just for his sake, although that was a major factor. But because he didn’t want Inej to be at the receiving end of any wandering hands like she had been a month prior. Thankfully, she’d managed to pepper spray the man and get away, calling Kaz as soon as she’d gotten clear of the bar. He’d wanted to beat the man up the second he did an illegal U turn to get to her, but by the time he’d made it there, the perpetrator was lost in the crowd again.
If someone had done that to him, he’d never set foot in a bar again. But Inej had just opted to bring brass knuckles as well as the pepper spray.
They hugged the side walls of the room until they could get to the line of barstools in front of the bar itself.
Inej held his gloved hand to drag him through the crowd, making sure no one could get too close before continuing on their way.
When he suddenly stopped mid step, he assumed it was because Inej had stopped ahead of him.
But then she tugged on his fingers with a loud, “Come on,” before trying to continue.
He tried to keep following her, but he couldn’t. He was stuck.
Stuck on what?
He looked around his entire person, trying to figure it out.
“Wait, Inej,” he called, but she’d let go of his hand at some point and he’d lost her.
The entire reason he was here was to protect Inej, and he couldn’t very well do that when he couldn’t move more than an inch any way, could he?
He looked down again, seeing that his key lanyard — that he’d stupidly wrapped around his belt before putting it on — had caught onto someone’s long knit shirt.
Kaz sighed. “Hang on,” he muttered as the man whose shirt he’d snagged turned a little in his seat to look at the problem.
“It’s alright, darlin’,” the man said in a warm voice that sent a flood of heat down to his toes for no reason. “Here,” he offered, reaching down to help. Kaz tucked the handle of his cane into his elbow so he could use both hands.
Kaz’s hands were trying to gently tug, the man’s were trying to gently lift. Neither got either of them anywhere.
“This has never happened before,” the man gave a light, surprised chuckle as the keys refused to let go of the knit shirt. He bent down to look closer at the snag.
Suddenly, Kaz felt something catch on his shirt front. Something out of his control yanked him violently down over the bending man. He let loose a quick “What the fuck?” as he hunched over now, his chin hitting the top of his cane now.
“Fuck, sorry, I think my earring’s stuck,” the man says exasperatedly, his shoulders moving furiously under Kaz’s head.
Kaz sighed. “Would you look at that?” he said flatly, his back aching at the odd angle.
“Look at what?” the man asked immediately. “All I can see is your – admittedly attractive – legs.”
Kaz’s face decided to burn at that particular comment, but nobody could see it so he let it happen anyway. “My last fuck,” he said conversationally. “It just flew away.”
The man laughed, a wonderful sound that made Kaz’s toes tingle again. He tried to move, stopping to wince audibly. Kaz watched his dark earlobe pull a little from this awkward angle.
“I’m going to move your head a little,” Kaz says, raising his hands slowly, using his gloved hands to slowly hold the man’s head to move to the side carefully to see if he can tell where at least one of the problems is. Yep, there it was. The man’s eloquent dangle earring was caught magnificently on Kaz’s shirt button. He took the long metal pieces gently to untangle them. The man held eerily still, save a few quick breaths that rippled the fabric of Kaz’s sleeve.
He got the earring free, able to stand up straight again at the same time the man cautiously pulled away as well.
“Sorry ‘bout that,” the man offered.
“Let’s figure out the main problem now,” Kaz said firmly, eyeing where his keys were hopelessly tangled up in the gaps in the shirt.
The man looked down at where the keys were wrapped up in his own shirt hem. He sighed deeply.
Kaz tried again to untangle it, but after a minute of careful attempts to go backwards from where he thought the issue might’ve originated from, he stopped. He thought perhaps he’d just made it even worse.
“Hang on,” the man said, and Kaz stopped touching the mess as the man sank to the floor at his feet. The shirt stayed at Kaz’s hip but the man’s body fell further. He realized with a sudden rush of heat that the man had taken his shirt off.
The man stood up again. “There,” he said brightly, using nimble fingers to easily disentangle the keys now that the shirt wasn’t on his chest anymore.
Kaz tried not to focus on the wrong thing as the keys fell out of the man’s hands and smacked against Kaz’s apparently attractive legs.
The man grinned at him. “I’m Jes,” he said breezily, as if they hadn't just been attached at the hip – literally.
“Kaz,” he returned.
“Can I buy you a drink for your troubles?” he offered, his smile as dazzling at his bare chest – nope, not focusing on that.
Kaz paused, looking around for Inej, someone who was nowhere in sight. Finally, he agreed. “Sure, but let me find my friend first, she’s around here somewhere.”
Jes’ grin faltered a little. “Okay, cool,” he said in a tone that made Kaz wonder if there was something wrong with what he’d said.
Inej appeared by his side. “Where’d you run off to?” she asked, sounding a little breathless.
Kaz frowned. “I literally couldn’t move let alone run off anywhere,” he informed her, setting his cane back down on the ground to stay steady.
She just looked at him with confusion.
Jes waved at her. “Hey!” he said cheerfully. “We just got disentangled.”
Inej’s expression abruptly changed to utter surprise.
Kaz caught the look and shook his head quickly. “We weren’t making out – my keys – his shirt – oh, come on, Inej,” he groaned, seeing the wicked look on her face.
“Well, maybe you should’ve been making out,” she said pointedly.
Kaz gaped at her, speechless.
“Are you…wingwomaning for him?” Jes asked slowly.
Inej beamed. “Yep!”
Kaz rolled his eyes until Jes piped up.
“Okay, good, because it’s working,” he said with a smirk.
Kaz’s eyes widened and his jaw dropped a little again.
“I’m going to go find Nina,” Inej said as parting words, turning to leave.
“Who the fuck is Nina?” he asked, jerking back a little.
“The girl I just disentangled with,” she said with a wiggle of her dark eyebrows.
Kaz gaped at her again. “The whole time I was literally trying to get Jes’ earring off my button, you were making out with someone?” he asked incredulously.
Inej continued to beam at him. “Yep!”
She gave a quick wave of her fingers and disappeared into the swaying crowd.
“Can I buy you that drink?” Jes proposed again.
“I need a drink more right now than I ever have, so yes,” Kaz said, getting up onto the now vacant seat next to Jes at the bar with the help of his cane. Jes laughed as he redonned his shirt, an action that had Kaz staring completely helplessly at him until the bartender came over to ask him what their poison would be tonight.
“Whiskey,” he said, slapping some cash down, glad for the small distraction from Jes’ now covered chest and the last remnants of his warm chuckle.
“Watermelon margarita,” Jes said at almost the same time, withdrawing his own cash to pay.
The bartender nodded once before moving away.
Jes eyed him kindly. “Do you always wrap your lanyard like that?” he asked curiously, his gaze sweeping down to Kaz’s hips again in a way that made Kaz’s entire body erupt into tickling flames.
“No,” he admitted, fiddling with the lanyard in question. “I’ve had them stolen before – briefly – so I was trying to be better about keeping them more attached to me.” He leaned his cane against the bar under him so no one could try to steal that either. “Guess that was a shitty idea.”
“Nah,” Jes said as the bartender slid his drink to him. “Good idea, shitty execution.”
Kaz gave a little smile to that as his whiskey arrived at where his gloved hands rested on the bar table. “Alright, then,” he said, giving a shallow sip of his drink. “I’ll take it.”
“I really hate getting to know people,” Jes gave an awkward chuckle, scratching the back of his head. “I really wish we could just skip to the part where we’re friends.”
Kaz blinked before giving a little scoff. “Huh. I usually wish we could skip to the part where the other person leaves me alone.”
Jes gave him a wry smile. “Usually? But not right now?”
Kaz paused by taking another sip of his drink. “Hmm. Maybe not right now. Maybe your plan is better.”
Jes’ eyes lit up. “Really? Oh, good. So, Kaz, my good friend, what’s your type?”
Kaz tried to ignore the butterflies that spun in his gut at hearing the other man say his name like that. He wanted them to stop, first and foremost.
The butterflies didn’t care what he wanted, continuing their tornado to ravage his entire chest.
“Uh,” he said eloquently. “Well.” He paused again.
Jes’ eyebrows rose but his smile stayed. “I’ll help you. Tall, dark, mysterious?”
Kaz almost said, “Three for three,” but bit his tongue hard to keep that from slipping out. “Maybe…I don’t know. I like smart people. And I like…I like…I guess I like tall people. And…” he trailed off, trying to decide how much to say.
Jes grinned. “Tall smart people? Wow, you have quite the range,” he teased with a little laugh attached to the last word.
Kaz’s stomach flipped horribly. “I don’t know, I’ve never been asked that before, cut me some slack,” he said into his whiskey.
Jes sipped his margarita. “I’ll cut you whatever slack you want,” he agreed.
Kaz’s body didn’t know what to do with itself as they talked. So it sat there dumbly, letting his mind work overtime trying to keep up with all the little things about Jes that made it flutter back into overwhelm.
His nimble fingers that never seemed to stay still. The way his mouth stretched over his face when he smiled. His toned forearms resting on the table in front of them. His gray eyes sparkling under the overhead lights. His laugh. God, his fucking laugh.
“Like what you see?” Jes winked at him and the floor shifted beneath Kaz in a way he’d never felt before. He almost needed to gasp to keep breathing. Fuck, he’d been staring. Quick, think of a way out of this that wouldn’t embarrass himself further –
Inej appeared at his side again and Jes jumped a little at her sudden presence. “I’m going home with Nina tonight. I’ll text you later.” And with that she was gone again.
Kaz sighed to himself. “I guess I’m going home, then,” he said resignedly, grabbing his cane where it rested under the table.
“Goin’ home with anyone?” Jes asked in a tone that made Kaz sit up straighter, his nerves alight with nervous energy.
“Well, I was going home with my roommate, but she’s otherwise occupied,” he said a little sourly, staring at where Inej had just been.
“You could come home with me, if you wanted,” Jes offered, and if Kaz had thought the ground had shifted when he’d winked at him? That had been nothing compared to the way the floor completely fell out at this posed question.
Kaz stared at him for a long minute before saying, in a rather small voice, “...okay.” After all, they’d skipped the awkward part of introduction right to being friends, right? And friends slept over at each other’s houses all the time.
Right?
Jes’ gray eyes lit up again, and Kaz thought he might need to keep eliciting such a reaction from him for the rest of time. The way his own heart clenched at the sight was getting addictive. “Okay?”
“Okay,” Kaz decided. “But I have some weird boundaries.” He really needed to get this part out of the way.
Jes shrugged. “I can work with any boundary you see fit to put up,” he said easily, sipping at his half finished margarita.
Kaz slid his own almost empty glass over to the waiting bartender. “Even if that boundary is no skin to skin contact?”
Jes shrugged again, sipping his drink one more time before handing it off as well. “You can have all sorts of sex without skin to skin contact,” he said as casually as if they’d been discussing the weather.
Kaz choked nothing, but Jes’ soft smile put him at ease far faster than it probably should have. “That’s true,” he agreed, standing with the help of his cane.
Jes stood as well. They were almost the same height, but that height was still Tall, so Jes fit that preference, at least.
Jes began to leave, looking back at where Kaz followed him unsteadily.
This was one of the most impulsive things he’d done in a very long time, but he wasn’t regretting it yet. That had to be a good sign.
Jes had apparently called an Uber, because he opened the backdoor of a car that someone else drove, waving Kaz in.
Kaz hesitantly slid into the backseat, leaving plenty of room for Jes to come in as well.
Jes sat on the opposite end, leaving plenty of room between them for the moment. “So,” he said after giving the driver a rattled off address. “Did you have any other boundaries?”
The car sped up and Kaz forced himself to focus on where Jes’ eyebrows raised expectantly at him instead of on where exactly they were going. “The main one is the skin thing,” he assured Jes.
“So…can I kiss you through fabric?” Jes asked suddenly, and Kaz frowned.
“What do you mean?” he asked, trying to keep up.
“Can I put a handkerchief or something between our mouths so we can kiss?” Jes explained, staring into his soul with those gorgeous eyes.
Kaz thought about it. “We can try,” he agreed quicker than he otherwise would’ve. He needed to slow down, he needed to –
Why, though? Why should he slow down, with Jes grinning at him like that? Why should he hesitate that much, when Jes hadn't done a single untoward thing?
Kaz watched Jes’ smile widen, finding himself thinking about how he really wished he didn’t mind kissing Jes without a handkerchief because his lips looked very soft and kind and kissable.
Kaz tried to force his eyes back up to Jes’, but they kept dropping back down.
“I have plenty of handkerchiefs at home, but you’re gonna have to wait until then,” Jes purred, his never still fingers walking across the seat between them toward him.
Kaz’s face flared again and he tried to hide it by turning his head out the window.
“It’s alright, darlin’, I don’t mind a little mouth staring between friends,” Jes continued.
Kaz knew his ears had gone the way of his face, and decided that there was no hiding it anymore. He turned back to face Jes, whose eyes twinkled. “Just friends?” he found himself saying.
Jes’ eyes flashed with something else. Something that was technically warm, but also…heady. “No,” he said softly. “Not just friends.”
Kaz’s face erupted into flames.
Jes just laughed.