Evil Is a Man

AUTHOR'S NOTE:

The feedback I got was pretty split about whether folks wanted Jake to take Maxim back or not. Here is Jake's decision.

If you like what you're reading, let me know: SellarDhor@gmail.com. And let me know where you want the story to go and who you want Jake to end up with. And if you have any ideas for the future, let me know, I might include them.

APRIL 4th

"Maxim, I've spent all these hours thinking by myself and I've come to my answer."

We were alone in the bedroom, both of us fully dressed. He looked extremely anxious, and that made me feel bad. I didn't have to ask to know that he hadn't slept at all the night before. I grabbed his hand to try and calm him down. It was hot with sweat and pulsing with his racing heartbeat.

"The truth is, you were right. In spite of your lies, you've made me extremely happy, and made me love you."

As I talked, his disposition changed from anxious to happy, his eyes watering with sentiment and a smile on his lips.

"And I love the possible life that you represent for me. Now that your father, Edmund, and Zhora are out of the picture, staying here permanently seems like a dream. This city is absolutely gorgeous, I would never tire of its beauty. And I love this mansion. You've made me feel like it's home. I love Mrs. Ford and your sister. Staying with you here would be the obvious, easy choice."

"Yes, yes, your words make me so happy. I'll never hurt you again, I swear." He moved in to kiss me.

I pulled back. "That would be the easy choice to make, but what I've come to realize is that I just can't forgive you. I have to leave you. I'm sorry."

His face went white. "No!"

"Yes, I'm sorry."

"No, you're just playing some joke on me. Please tell me you're kidding."

"I'm not, Maxim. I can't forgive you. I can't move on in our relationship. So, I've got to move on outside of it instead."

"No, you can't do this. You're just still angry. The wounds are still raw. You need time. Stay two weeks. We can do two weeks just like last night. At the end of two weeks, your anger will just be a faded memory and you'll be willing to forgive me, I know it."

"That's not the problem, Maxim. I know myself too well. No amount of time will ever change my mind or let me forgive you. I'm not going to change, ever. You see, the lies made me fall out of love with you. I'm sorry."

"You're wrong."

"No, I'm not wrong!" It was the first time I snapped at him. "You're in denial, but you need to accept this. I'm leaving right now, I've packed all my things and I'm going. There's nothing up for debate here."

And then he started to really, really cry. "You can't leave me, you can't!" He knelt down at my feet and put his arms around my legs, begging me. "No one will ever love you like I love you. It's just not possible! I'll give you everything I have if you stay, and if that's not enough, I'll spend every second of my life getting more to give to you."

"I know you would do that for me, but I'm sorry, Maxim."

His wet eyes soaked my pants as he sobbed and sobbed, pleading with me. "If you leave me, I'll never recover! Never get over it!"

I pulled him off the ground and hugged him, starting to get choked up myself. "Maxim, I never meant to cause you this pain. If I knew what kind of pain I would ultimately cause you, I would go back and undo the entire relationship. The pain will go away eventually, I promise."

"No it won't, my solnyshko, it never will!"

"It will, and you will move on and forget about me."

"You are so wrong. You are the sun, don't you see? How could I move on without you? What kind of life in the dark would that be?"

"I'm not the sun, and you will move on."

"I can't go on living a life without you in it."

"That better be allegory, Maxim."

"It's not. If you leave me, I might just end it all."

"Maxim, you can't blackmail me into staying with you like that. If you're feeling suicidal, then you should get professional help. Think of your responsibility to your people. You need to be here."

He started to change from incredibly distraught to angry. "You are ruining my life!"

"You'll forget about me sooner than you think, I promise. You'll find someone else."

"No, you're wrong. I have legally signed myself to you, you know that."

"I never asked you to do that, you knew I thought it was idiotic. I'm sure you'll find a way to romance someone in secret, without being caught."

"I never will break that vow, Jake. I never want to touch anyone else again, ever."

"You feel that now, but forever is a long time. You'll change your mind eventually. Now, I'm sorry, but I have to go."

"If you refuse to stay as my boyfriend, at least take me with you as your friend."

I was about to say yes.

"You'll never survive out there without me," he said.

And that made me change my mind. Suddenly I was determined to make it without his help. "No," I said. "I need to do this without you."

I picked up my packed bag and headed for the bedroom door.

"Goodbye."

Before I could leave, he rushed over and blocked the door. "I won't let you just walk out of my life cavalierly."

"You can't stop me from going."

"You can't leave until I remind you exactly what you're giving up."

He surprised me by kissing me suddenly, pouring all of his passion and resolve into that kiss.

"Don't you feel my love?"

"I do feel it, but that's not going to change my mind. Don't make this harder for either of us than it already is, Maxim. I'm leaving."

"No, I won't accept that, no."

He knocked my bag down and took me in his arms.

"Maxim, please stop, please let me go."

His tears got all over my cheek. "Not until I make you understand just how much I love you."

He carried me onto the bed and set me down. He started to take off his tie.

"Maxim, please!"

"You need to stop talking right now and just listen."

"Maxim, you can't--"

"I told you to stop talking!" He forced his tie into my mouth, gagging me, and tied it behind my head.

He climbed on top of me, pinning me down on my back. I tried to push him away with my hands.

"Don't do that, don't fight me. Don't make this harder than it needs to be."

He pulled my shirt off and used it to tie my wrists together behind me. And then he pulled my shoes off, and yanked my pants and underwear off as well, until I was naked. He used the pants to tie my ankles together.

Still leaning on me, he started to rip off his clothes. Unlike my clothes, which he maintained, he ripped apart his suit, ruining it totally.

"I know if you could speak, you'd be chastising me now about ruining another one of my suits. If you think I can survive without your caring comments in my life, you're wrong."

He blew a bit of fire out of his mouth, and suddenly, he was the flame-covered version of himself that had made love to me two days ago.

"You're the only lover who would ever be kind enough to let me share this, my true self, with you and not even bat an eye. Even better, you completely embraced it, embraced me. I'll never share this side of me again with anyone, ever. It belongs to you. I belong to you."

He started to lick my naked body with his flame-covered tongue, sending shivers into my body wherever he touched me.

"I'm going to make you feel my love."

He was already completely hard, and he drove himself against my unit, kissing it with its fire. His fiery tongue invaded my ear, and his hands explored my chest. I couldn't help but start to get hard.

"Oh yes, I can feel you responding to me. You want this, you want me. I know you'll never want me as much as I want you, I always knew that and accepted it. Touching your body to me is like visiting Heaven. I knew it could never mean that much to you, but you still liked what I have to offer, still wanted me back, and that will always be enough for me, because I love you. And you will feel my love, oh yes, and once you do, you will never be able to leave it."

His fiery legs entwined mine, pulling me against him as he thrust over and over against me. Goodness, how much I wanted to give in and tell him everything would be fine.

I shook my head, moaning my dissent.

"What? Can't you feel how much I love you?"

I nodded.

"But you still don't care, is that what you're telling me?"

I nodded.

He got up off me, his expression turning to fury. "I give you my heart, and look now, you've shredded it! You have no regard for me at all, no regard!"

As he fumed at me, the fire around his skin started to form a flame dragon, which quickly filled up all the free space in the bedroom.

"I could just burn you for what you've done to me, burn you to cinders!"

The dragon came swooping towards me, but I held my ground. And it disappeared just before it hit me. Once again, the only fire in the room was the layer covering his skin.

"No, you know that's an empty threat. I could never, ever hurt you."

I held up my tied up legs as if to ask him to let me go.

"I may not be able to hurt you, but I also can't let you walk out of here."

I sat up and tried to roll off the bed, but he jumped on me and prevented me from leaving, pinning himself on top of me.

"Listen, my solnyshko. You're not thinking clearly right now. I'm going to hold you here by force for a couple weeks, and you'll still choose to stay with me, I know you will."

I shook my head. My gag was loose enough for me to get out, "Not ever!"

He tightened my gag again. "Well then, if you'll never be capable of doing the right thing, I'm going to hold onto you forever."

I tried to wiggle, shake, and kick, but he wrestled his naked, flaming body into my own, pinning my legs down and making them useless.

"I'm going to hold you like this forever. You know that's not an empty threat, I will never let you out of my arms. I'll feed you and bathe you without ever letting go of you. And there will come a time when you finally give in to me and just let me take care of your every need."

None of this talk had gotten him the least bit soft, he was grinding his firmness into me as he continued to wrestle me.

"Because, let's face it, you're just not smart enough to make decisions for yourself. Every time you do so, you end up hurt or nearly killed or at least in dire danger. That's just not acceptable. I'm going to hold you like this for your own good, your own safety. Because letting you free is letting you walk into certain death, and what kind of man would I be to let that happen to you? I love you too much for that."

I tried again to use my legs to knee him. While he wrestled them down, I moved my tied wrists behind my head and managed to untie my gag.

"Maxim, you can't do this. You've lost yourself to your emotions. You would never hold an innocent person against their will. That's a move from your father's playbook, not yours. You're above this, Maxim."

"You're right, I have no right to keep you. I hope I didn't hurt you."

"You didn't."

He got off me and untied me. "Let me help you with your clothes."

I wanted to tell him I could do it myself, but he was determined to make things right with me. He put my clothes on carefully and neatly.

"You're wearing the suit I got you," he said. He started to cry even more. "Please forget my momentary lapse in character."

"I will, I know how hard it is for you to keep your emotions contained. It's something I can relate to."

"You could always understand me so well" He picked up my bag and put it on my back.

"I don't want you to try and find me, Maxim."

"I won't. But if you change your mind and decide to forgive me, or if you even just ever want to talk to me about anything, you call me up. If need be, I will cross worlds to get to you. My love will never burn out."

"Thanks," I said, even though I was more determined than ever not to ask for his help.

"Goodbye, my solnyshko."

As I left, I could just see the naked, fiery man drop to his knees and start to sob.

I said my goodbyes to Mrs. Ford on my way out and started to walk down the street.

"Hey, wait!" I turned around to see a woman in a black, period dress behind me, a backpack on as well. Helina.

"What are you doing?"

"What does it look like I'm doing? In case my backpack and flats aren't clue enough, I'm coming with you."

"Why?"

"Because if my best friend can't forgive my brother for screwing up their relationship, then neither can I. If you two are splitting up, I'd rather you have custody of me than him."

"That's nice of you, but I'm not really sure how I'll get by. I have no way to provide for you."

"There's this thing called irony, which you must have never heard of if you thought I was serious about my custody line. No, I do not expect you to take care of me or provide for me in any way. I'm older than you, after all. You just behave exactly as you would have without me there. If ever you go someplace I'm not comfortable following, I won't. Easy as that."

"Tell me why the hell we came to this dump again? It smells like the sweatiest man ever just stuck his never-washed jockstrap over my head." Helina plugged her nose as we walked into Alik's Gym.

"Because, Alik Grishan is the only one who can help us get out of the Carstvo. And he's not answering his phone, so I'm hoping to find him here."

Alik Khorkov, the unattractive, shady owner of the gym, was sitting at the desk. He looked at me briefly, and then his eyes went over to Helina.

"Well, look at this fine lady. Only one reason beauties ever come to this place. I'll be your pimp, woman, and all I'll ask in return is to get as much of the product as I can take. How about it, you ready to be impaled by me?"

"That truly sounds marvelous," said Helina. "But, as a plan B, how about I impale you while you beg me to spare your life for insulting me?" She opened her mouth and showed her sizable fangs.

"Whoa, sorry, ma'am, I never, ever seen an Aristocrat in here before. Please don't hurt me."

"We're looking for Alik Grishan," I said. "Is he here?"

"Nope, his hands are too banged up to box, so he's occupied, uh, in other ways."

"Where is he? We need to find him."

"He's staying at Madame Mathilde's Cabaret downtown."

He scribbled down the address for us, and we left.

It was night by the time we found Madame Mathilde's Cabaret, which was in a part of town I had never been in before. Though the architecture in that neighborhood was just like the rest of the city, the people walking the streets all looked working class circa turn of the century, the men having Alik's simple, cheap suits, and the women in dowdy, plain dresses.

"I know you are charging at the door," I said to the bouncer at the door. "But we are strapped for money and aren't here to see the show, just to find Alik Grishan."

"Oh sure, go ahead on in and find Alik. That is, after you both pay me."

Helina pulled out a large stack of bills from her pocket. "It's on me."

"Where did you get all that money?"

"I was smart enough to pocket it before we left the mansion. I'm not sure how far it will get us, but it's a start."

"Well, thank you."

We stepped inside the theater mid-performance. The place had a much more modest décor than all the other entertainment venues I had seen in the city, but was quite large. The stage at the far end was designed to be the center of attention, but the floor was a standing room only kind of place, except for some bar tables around the outside. There was a very large bar at the back of the stage which everyone was ordering drinks from, and as a result, most of the show-watchers were drinking. The crowd was similarly working class as the outside had been, only these folks were all adults and mostly men.

On stage there were a small number of musicians, much smaller than the orchestras I has seen elsewhere. They were playing a boisterous, heavily piano-driven music-hall song. It was the first time I had seen an example of working class music that would fit the era.

Also fitting the era, there were six dancers in dresses on stage, and they seemed to be dressed and dancing like dancers would have in the Folies Bergere in Paris, decked out in dresses, feathers, beads, and makeup. All of the ten were fit and talented dancers, but not all of them were genetically attractive. Clearly talent alone was enough to get you hired, which seemed commendable. The men on the floor were cheering and whistling at the dancers as if they were stripping.

"Have you been here before, Helina?" I asked.

"Oh, god no, I would never."

"You do have major holes in your memory," I joked. "For all you know you were employed as a dancer here."

"If so, I'd say that's my first real argument for holding onto my amnesia."

"Since prostitution and on stage nudity is outlawed here, this is a bawdy of a show as these people can pay for."

"I can't believe that my money is supporting this sort of activity," she said.

I noticed a lot of the revelers were shouting things in Russian. "What are they saying?"

"They are using the most brash bits of Russian that I've ever heard. I dare not translate it. Apparently, this club is a magnet for completely classless."

"Fitting that we would find Alik here," I said.

We found Alik sitting at one of the bar-tables on the outside of the room, trying with moderate success to drink from a glass bottle of beer with his two hands still bandaged. We sat down with him at his table.

"Oh, of course, what else would Alik Grishan be doing with his recovery time but ogle scantily clad dancers and get wasted on beer?" I asked Helina, loud enough for him to hear me.

"Once again, you are a complete moron, Jake Groves," he said. "Even though I can't box, there's always work for me to do, and that's what I'm doing now. And this isn't beer, it's root beer, and they are giving it to me on the house. I never drink on the clock."

"What sort of employment do you have in a place like this?" asked Helina.

"I find it a threat to my livelihood to be discussing these matters with anyone related to the Tsar."

"It's okay, you can tell her, she's cool," I said. "We're here to discuss illegal matters with you in any case, hoping we can buy your services."

"A couple times a year, the performers, who all live above the theater, pay me to stay with them and serve them sexually. They docked my normal fee because I can't use my hands, but there is a lot I can still do with my lips and tongue, such as--"

"You can stop there, Alik," I said.

"Yes, quite right. I can use my imagination, thank you," said Helina.

"You say you need to hire my illegal services? For both of you?"

"That's right," I said.

"This is the perfect time because the performers won't need me until they are done with their shows, late tonight. We can go back up to my room here and for a reduction of my normal fee, I'll fuck both of you. Did you want me one at a time or together? Because the charges will be different, I'm afraid."

"How come you misinterpret every single word out of my mouth as a solicitation to buy your sex?" I asked. "I'm never going to buy your sex!"

"Well, don't speak for Helina," he said.

"Oh no, I give him full permission to speak for me in all matters concerning personal sex solicitation."

"Mistakenly thinking everyone around you is paying you for sex must be some sort of severe psychological complex I never got to in school. I bet the performers here probably hired you to do something completely legal and you've deluded yourself into thinking they want to sleep with you."

"In all the times they've hired me before, they've hit me up for sex more times than I could possibly count on all my fingers, toes, and other larger pieces of mine. And by other pieces of mine, I'm talking about my--"

"Please stop there, we believe you!"

"This one is just all sorts of charming, isn't he?" asked Helina. "I can see why these performers love him already."

"Does that mean you're changing your mind about hiring me to fuck you?"

"As you have yet to learn, irony is this girl's best friend."

"In the likely case you're still thinking she wants to pay for sex, take that as a hard no," I said. "We need you to get us safely into Russia proper, out of the Carstvo, and then into China. I have a passport, but Helina has nothing. Can you help us?"

"I know all the right people on the black market to help you, but it's going to take a couple days to process."

A price was negotiated, and I handed over my passport to him.

"Before I agree to part with my soft-earned cash, as the treasurer of this operation, I know we won't have enough money for room and board for a couple days until the contraband is complete. I'm going to have to insist that you provide room and board to us during all the time we are waiting as a part of our payment." I saw the hidden brilliance of her plan: making Alik provide room and board would make him work to make sure we were taken care of as quickly as possible.

He narrowed his eyes. "I'll let you sleep where I sleep and eat what I eat. I'm not going to provide some high class Aristocracy room and board to you."

"That's fine, I'm used to some pretty lousy living conditions," she said, obviously referencing her past in captivity.

"And only if one of you agrees to help me take care of myself as long as these bandages are still on. I've had some real trouble getting by on my own. I'm not asking for anything ridiculous, just help with all the daily parts of living and working that I can't do myself I only just got here, but I hired one of Alik Khorkov's prostitutes whose business has gone flat ever since she turned seventy to help be my nurse at home when I need it, and I was going to pay her to be here with me too. I can hold off on that if one of you helps me out."

"I can do that," I said. "I've already been your nurse under worse conditions. I hate sick people, but injured people are fine with me, especially ones that aren't bleeding anywhere. That's fine."

"Agreed," said Helina, handing over a huge chunk of her money.

"Excellent. You make yourselves at home. I'm going to run off right now and get this started for you."

He left the table and walked over to the bartender before leaving the theater. Soon, we had someone taking our dinner and drink orders on the house.

As we were eating very simple sandwiches for dinner, I noted, "This seems a world away from anything I ever ate with Maxim. Which is both sad and somehow refreshing."

A seventh performer came out, clearly too obese to ever be a dancer, decked out in red dress. I noticed as soon as she came to the front of the stage and opened her mouth that she was a singer, and as soon as she started to sing I realized she was a man. Her voice was much too deep to be a woman's, though her singing was lovely. I heard men around us murmuring that this was the lady who owned the place, Madame Mathilde herself. The words to the song were somewhere between a drinking song and a jokingly sexual one.

"Well, looks like this is an equal opportunity place of employment," said Helina. "You could get a job here as a singer just as easily as I could."

"Too bad my singing voice is horrendous."

"But you're a talented athlete, so you could be one of these dancers."

"I think I have the wrong parts for these hollering men," I said.

"I don't think so. Two of these dancers are men."

"No they are not, I don't believe you."

"Call it the curse of having telescopic vision, but I've suffered all the evidence I need to prove my theory without a doubt every time they kick up their legs. Absolutely nothing is being tucked away, and if you were in the front of the theater, you would have no doubt."

"You are kidding me! They have to wear underwear by law!"

"They are legally in compliance by just the thinnest dangling group of threads."

"So that's why these people are so excited!"

As we waited, my cell started ringing. As soon as I saw it was Maxim, I refused to answer it. A couple hours later, he had left several voice messages. He told me he noticed I had taken Helina with me, and that made our safety even more important than ever. He was begging me to tell him where we were so he could join us. He told me his special power made him the most powerful Petrov Blood vampire, and we would need him to survive our enemies, that he was the one who knew all about the vampire worlds, and therefore he was the only one who could help us make safe decisions. I refused to talk to him, so I just texted him letting him know it wasn't going to happen. I tried not to miss him.

A couple hours later, when the performance was still ongoing with the dancers taking only half hour breaks at most, Alik returned and told us everything was moving along as he planned with our travel plans. Since it was late and I'd been yawning for some time, I asked Alik to show us to our beds.

"Yes, this is the best time to sleep," he agreed.

Alik led us backstage and then upstairs into the living quarters. Everything was decorated in a very frilly, feminine way. There was a common kitchen and sitting area, but the rest of the place was all bedrooms. Each performer had their own room, and from the ones that had open doors, I could see that they served as dressing rooms too, with costume and makeup supplies bursting at every seam.

"The three of us are splitting two rooms and two beds," said Alik. "One of you can take the single bed room, and the other can share my queen."

"Why don't you take the single and I'll share the queen with Jake?"

He shook his head and opened one of the doors. "Because this isn't a proper bedroom at all, they've just got a tiny cot in here." It looked like they had filled one of the spare bedrooms with storage. Only a thin cot was on the ground, with a bathroom in the back. "I tried to sleep on that thing but nearly broke it, I'm way too big."

"Well, it's no one's fault but your own that you have freakishly big, roided out muscles," I said.

"Maybe so, but that's not going to make me fit on that thing, I've tried. Honestly, there's not enough cloth on that cot to make a big enough jock strap for me, let alone hold my whole body."

"I'll agree to sleep there, but only if you swear to me that you didn't actually try the jockstrap thing literally with that cot," said Helina.

After he did, Helina took her things in there and said goodnight. Alik lead me into his room, which had a queen, a bathroom with a shower, and looked like some other performer had used to live there. I put my things down.

"If you're going to share a bed with me, I do have one rule. No sex. If you must fondle me in my sleep, you'd better keep your touching to a minimum. If I wake up with my cum all over me, I'll make you pay for it."

"I am not going to force you to have sex with me in the night, my goodness!"

After I got ready for bed and changed into my sleeping shorts, Alik looked at me and frowned. "Look at how bony you are now. You've lost at least fifteen pounds since I first met you. Have you been malnourished or something?"

I looked into the room's large mirror and realized he was right. "Must have been because Maxim wouldn't let me do anything on my own, he wanted to do it all for me. He basically treated me like I was an infant."

"You mean he put you in diapers and gave you a bottle? Some of my clients ask for that sort of stuff, which I always refuse."

"No, nothing that freaky! He didn't have a baby fetish, he just wanted me to expend as few calories as possible and instead he would do everything. And we were often too caught up in our sex life to eat. He wouldn't even let me read in bed when I was around him. I asked him to read too, but he was so insistent on sharing our pleasures that he would take my book and read it out loud to me instead, telling me to rest my eyes."

"I can help you get your muscle back, but you'll need to eat more frequently, like I do, and start lifting again. You can do that at Alik's gyn."

"Thanks, I will. I don't like to look scrawny."

Alik pointed to his bandages and said he needed me to get him ready for bed. I helped take off and put away his clothes until he was just down to his boxers. He wanted me to brush and floss his teeth for him in the bathroom, which I did.

He sniffed his armpit and made a face. "I can't go to bed stinky. I need you to help me in the shower."

I couldn't argue with his cleanliness, so I got him naked and put him in the shower. While he held his hand up so as not to get the bandages wet, I soaped his body down, washing each of those overly massive muscles carefully, noticing again how hairless his body was except for his head, pits, and blonde pubes.

When I got to his well-hung, uncut dick, hanging flaccid from his blonde bush, I washed him carefully under his foreskin, noting that his equipment was one of the most attractive parts of him.

"You're losing it. Three seconds ago that cleaning my cock officially turned into fondling. Get your mind off my dick before I make you pay for the experience."

"I was just cleaning you, sheesh!"

Alik wanted me to shave his face in the shower, which I did, and then I dried him off.

"What should I get for you to sleep in? Do you have pajamas?"

"I'll sleep naked."

"Do you really have to?"

"No, but I get up to piss a lot during the night. Do you really want me to wake you up every time to pull my dick out?"

"No, I guess not."

"There is something I need before bed, though." He gestured towards something on the desk that I realized was a syringe.

"You want me to inject you with steroids?"

"That's right."

"No, I refuse! Not only is the idea physically repulsive to me, it's morally wrong as well. I'm not going to help you permanently destroy your body in the name of cheating!"

"Like it or not, this is a part of my normal routine, what you said you'd help me with. If you can't do this, I'll hire someone who can, and you can just leave."

"Alright, please don't kick us out this late at night, we'd have nowhere to go besides back to Maxim."

"If you want to stay, you'll inject me."

"Fine, I'll do it."

He laid on the bed face-down. "Just inject me in the ass. And no jokes, please. This is the only time I'll ever let anyone poke me in the behind, believe me."

I grabbed the syringe and approached him. I hated needles so much, I felt like I was going to faint. I looked away to avoid this, knowing that his muscled butt was so large, I really couldn't miss my target without trying to. I held my breath and knocked the needle down, made contact with flesh, and pushed the liquid through the syringe, then pulled it out.

"Oh goodness, that was repulsive! Good thing I'll never have to do it again."

"Wait, on the counter in another bottle I need you to inject me with as well."

"What, what is it this time?!"

"Human Growth Hormone."

"Alik, you are a disgusting beast."

But I went to the counter, put the second liquid in the syringe, and injected him in the butt again, looking away again in order to keep from fainting.

I said my prayers while Alik took a piss (thankfully on his own), and I got into bed, ready for sleep. It wasn't nearly as comfortable as Maxim's bed, but it would do. I tried not think about how much more I mixed sleeping with Maxim's body than I did missing out on the nice mattress.

Alik turned off the light and jumped into bed beside me. And even though I was all the way on my side of the bed facing away from him on my side, he was so heavy he pulled his side of the bed so far down that I found myself rolling down towards him. I landed right on top of his body, face down.

"What is going on?" he asked. "What was my one rule? No sex in the bed! And yet, here you are all over me! I refuse to have sex with you without payment!"

"It was purely accidental, I assure you! If you weren't so roided out, we wouldn't even be having this conversation. There's nothing I can do to keep myself on my side of the bed, so if you don't want me touching you, you'll just have to sleep on the floor."

He didn't argue with me further, and we both fell asleep.

A telephone ring woke me up a bit later. And then Alik's insistence that I need to answer it. I hopped to the ground, turned on the light, and answered the old-fashioned phone, putting the earpiece to my ear and mouthpiece to my mouth. "Hello? Okay, I'll tell him." I hung up the phone. "Alik, you are needed by the woman in room three."

"Got it." He got out of bed and headed out the door.

"Aren't you going to put clothes on?"

"No, she likes me naked."

Just when I was drifting off to sleep, he returned. He was no less naked but entirely hard.

"I need you to help me brush my teeth again."

"Oh, why is that?"

"Because I've just been sucking pussy. That's how she likes me to get her off."

"Eew, gross! If that had been me, I would be swishing rubbing alcohol right now."

"At least she didn't care about me coming, that was really a plus." I started to brush his teeth, and he spit some pubes into the sink. "Sorry, she was really hairy."

"So sick!"

We jumped back in bed. A bit later, the phone rang again. I got up to answer it, a lot more leisurely this time. "Alik, you are needed in room four."

He got out of bed and looked down at himself. "Fuck, I've got a raging boner still."

"Is that a bad thing, given the circumstances?"

"This dancer likes me to show up flaccid so she can play and stretch out my long dick for a while before I get hard and she jerks me. Can you pour cold water on me in the shower?"

"Sure."

I did as he asked until he was flaccid. He walked out again naked, and was back again not too long later. He was no longer flaccid, his hard dick was sticking up.

"That woman is so strange. She doesn't ever want me to pleasure her or touch her at all. She gets off completely on touching my dick."

I looked closely, and realized he had seed all over his dick, stomach, and chest. He was still leaking more out.

"Can you wash me off here?"

"If I have to."

He pushed me into the shower and I washed all the semen off his smooth pecs, stomach, and uncut dick. Soon, we were back in bed.

The phone rang not more than an hour later. "Hello? Alik, you're wanted in one of the male dancer's rooms, room seven."

He jumped out of bed. "This one likes to be fucked. The condoms and lube are in the drawer."

"You seriously want me to help you put a condom on? That's gross!"

"Don't you want me to be protected? We're not all immune to diseases like you."

"Yes, I suppose." I walked over, opened a condom, and looked at him. "Wait, shouldn't you be hard? Otherwise, won't it just slip off?"

"Sometimes I need to stroke myself to get going. Since you are my hands today, you'll need to do that."

I rolled my eyes. "Fine, but if you try to get me suck you to get you going, I'm refusing. I know there is no way you're flexible enough to suck yourself in these situations."

"I would never ask you to give me oral for free when that's something others pay to do."

I grabbed his soft unit, and almost as soon as I started to stroke it, it turned hard. I rolled on the condom and lubed it up, and he left.

When he came back, he had a smile all over his face. "Are you smiling because the sex was hot?"

"No, don't be stupid. I'm smiling because he blew his load almost as soon as I was inside him, and didn't bother to check whether I did too. Which means I'm still ready to go."

"Well, another woman called in room six. Three times while you were gone, in fact, she is extremely demanding."

"Oh, I remember her. I need to get over there to fuck her as soon as I can. Get this condom off me."

"I'm not touching a used condom with my bare hands!"

"You are such a prude. I have gloves in my bag."

Only when the latex gloves were on me did I take the condom off and dispose of it.

"How do I smell? Do I stink like sweat to you?"

I sniffed. "You smell clean, don't worry."

"That is exactly what I'm worried about. The dancer I'm about to visit likes me hot and sweaty, like she's interrupted a workout. Help me get revved up."

He started to jog in place, and he mocked boxed as well, even though his hands were bandaged. He pulled out real gloves for me to wear, and we both ran around swinging at each other, though both of us were pulling our punches. He reminded me not to hit him in the head, as he was still recovering from that concussion. We boxed until he was dripping with sweat.

He sniffed himself. "Rank, just as she likes, perfect. Now, get another condom on me."

I put one on him, lubed it up, and he went on his way.

It didn't take long for him to come back. "I need this condom off." I donned my gloves and removed the liquid-filled rubber. "And the rest of the dancers don't like me sweaty, so you'll need to give me another shower."

I took him in the bathroom and gave him a much quicker scrub down than before, and we both went back to bed.

An hour later, the phone rang again, and I picked it up. It was one of the other male dancers. "Alik, room two."

"This is an easy one. He doesn't like to touch me, he just likes to look at me and have me jerk him off."

"Okay, off you go."

"Wait, he wants me to be dressed in my boxing gear. Has a boxing fetish."

I helped him dress in his boxing shorts, shoes, and gloves. He wasn't wearing underwear.

"This still isn't good enough. I'm not hard, and he needs me hard. Can you please just stroke me some until I get there?"

"I guess."

This time, it took a lot of stroking before he finally started to stiffen. I was surprised he was able to do it at all after orgasming twice already that night. With his erection poking against the shorts, he walked out of the room. He came back in the same state a while later.

"The dancer in room five wants your company."

He had me take off the boxing gear and put on a new condom before he left. And when he came back, he had a smile on his dopey face. "That's it, that's all of them. Let's get some real sleep now."

I took off his condom, and he wanted to wash off one more time before bed, which was fine with me. And then we got into bed and shut our eyes.

Almost immediately, the phone rang again. "Who could that be?" I answered it, and recognized the voice. "Alik, you are needed in room one right now by Madame Mathilde herself." I hung up the phone.

"You have to be shitting me," he said.

"I'm totally serious."

"But she almost never asks for me!" He jumped out of bed, alarmed. "I'm already not attracted to her, she's just too obese for me. And couple that with the fact that I've come three times already, and that means the chances I'll be able to get myself hard when I'm already in there, well, it's not gonna happen. I need to be hard when I go in there, though, `cause if not, she's gonna not be pleased. So, get stroking."

I grabbed his soft unit with both hands and started to play with him.

"This just isn't happening."

"No, I am not going to blow you!"

"I would never ask you to blow me! Even that wouldn't matter, the thing is completely dead. If you don't want to get me fired, you'll do what I always do to myself in this situation."

He pulled out another syringe and vial. "How are steroids going to help you now?"

"Not steroids. Alprostadil. I use this stuff whenever I need to get a boner, and all the normal means have been exhausted. Just inject it into the side of my dick."

"No, that's disgusting! I cannot do that, mixing needles with someone's privates! Can't you just take some Viagra or something orally?"

"It's too late for that now, I didn't plan on being summoned by her. This is the only solution, and you have to do it to me, or we'll be booted out of here."

"Okay, okay, I can do this. It's just like last time."

I filled the syringe with liquid, walked over and bent down until I was looking at his penis. There would be no looking away this time, I realized. I couldn't afford to miss.

"Here it comes."

I took a deep breath and stabbed the needle into the side of his penis successfully.

"Hey, I did it!"

But that's when I saw a drop of blood leak out of the hole I had created. I felt deeply, deeply disturbed.

I fainted before I could manage to inject the liquid into him.

APRIL 5th

"You do not understand the magnitude of your fuck up!" yelled Alik. "I only got paid for half of one day's payment from them thanks to you!"

Alik, Helina, and I were moving down the street in the pale morning pre-dawn, shivering in cold. "I said a million times, I'm sorry."

"You haven't said it a single time in a tone of voice that is the least bit apologetic, but whatever. Since you blew my employment, you'll both need to be paying me in order to stay at my place and eat my food."

"We don't have any extra money!" said Helina.

"Well then, you'll need to earn money. Get jobs of your own. I know that must seem like an alien concept to you high class people, that you may not even know the meaning of the word. But in these parts of town, everyone works. I could get you prostitution jobs that would pay huge sums, if you'd like me to pull some strings."

"Absolutely not."

"Not a chance."

"Well then, you'll need to find some legit work on your own." He looked at me. "Your pocket is buzzing again."

I looked at my phone. "It's Maxim calling again. He's been calling all night, trying to get us to come back."

"You should damn well take him up on that. You don't know how good you had it, living in a palace with all of these servants at your beck and call. Never having to lift a finger or work, having all your needs or wishes paid for. And all you had to do is let him fuck you."

"No, he screwed up," I said.

"What did he do? Try to kill you? Because outside of that, I really can't see how an offense he made could ever be so bad that it would lead you to get by on your own."

"He lied to me."

"Oh, he cheated on you? Is this what this is about?"

"No, he lied about me not being able to get addicted so he could get me to take recreational drugs with him, and he always treated me like I couldn't take care of myself."

"Oh yeah, those are serious, unforgivable crimes, no wonder you left. It all makes perfect sense to me. You are such a fool. Do you know how many times one of my tricks treats me like shit in the course of the session? You know what happens when they come back begging for more? I always go back, just as long as they got the green to give me. What else matters?"

"The difference between you and him is that you are a prostitute who will do anything for money and he is a good person who follows his heart," said Helina.

"Don't even start me on you," said Alik. "Unlike him, you didn't even have to let anyone fuck you in order to get all that reward and you still were stupid enough to walk out. You should turn around right now, both of you, and go back to him. Save me the pain of having to put you up in my place. I absolutely hate houseguests."

"We promise not to disrupt the testosterone-drenched vibes of your bachelor pad," said Helina. "I won't even complain about the tricks you bring home or whine if you walk around naked."

"Fine. But I'm only agreeing to this because you sad fucks don't have any other place to go."

As we headed towards Alik's neighborhood, more and more people filled the sidewalks and streets, looking like they were headed towards work.

One of the young women who looked to be headed off to work herself stopped when she saw Alik, smiled, and snuck up behind him. She jumped onto his back and covered his eyes with her hands. "Guess who?"

"Who else in the world would climb my body like toddler when everyone around us rightfully behaves like adults?"

"You never want to have any fun anymore," she said, getting down off him. "Shall I greet you like a grown woman? Hello, Mr. Grishan." She kissed him on the lips.

"Much better."

"Who are your new friends?" She smiled at us.

"These two will be staying with us for a while."

"I'm Jake Groves," I said, shaking her hand.

"You're a real cutie."

"Thanks."

"And I'm Helina." She wisely left her last name out.

The woman shook her hand. "You are beautiful!"

"Thanks."

"I'm Nadeen Grishan."

I cleared my throat. "Oh my, you're Alik's, uh--"

"Yup, sure am," she said, smiling. "Do you see what I have to put up with?"

She was pretty, it was true, but in a scrawny way that was completely different from Helina's striking, adult beauty. She was petite, had messy brown hair, and her body was skinny and flat-chested, making her look much younger than her actual age, which was probably like my age or a bit older. There was something frail and slight about her appearance that made me feel protective about her. How could a man as large and brutish as Alik, with his large endowment, ever have sex with someone like her without breaking her? It made me annoyed at him that he would even pursue such a person. I knew from firsthand experience having sex with him that he wasn't the least bit gentle.

"Do you know about his odd sort of employment?" I asked.

"Oh yes, all too well, I'm afraid."

"And you're okay with it?"

"Absolutely not," she said. "I complain about it every chance I get. But I don't have much say in it, do I? He makes his own choices in spite of what I say. At least I've gotten him to assure me he uses the proper protection, and is as safe as he can be each and every time."

"That's true, he is really good about protection."

"Oh good," she said. "I just have to take his word for it. I've asked so many times to go and watch him at work, but he won't ever let me. So it's good to hear it from your lips."

"I want to hear more about how you first learned about this," I said.

Alik stepped forward. "I told her I was going into boxing, and that's the end of it." He gave me a look.

"Yes," she said.

"Oh, right, boxing," I said. "Of course. And I don't know him well enough, but outside of boxing, does Alik do anything else for employment?"

Alik shook his head at me without Nadeen being able to see him, and his face went red.

"He works fencing training jobs sometimes, he tells me," says Nadeen. "Sometimes, like last night, those jobs take him out of town for a night or two."

"Right, that's all I do," said Alik.

"Well, it was nice meeting you, Mrs. Grishan," I said.

"You mean, Ms. Grishan."

"I do? Aren't you Alik's wife?"

"Eew, no! That is so gross! I'm his sister!"

I was alarmed. Aside from both being white and both looking like they were from Russian descent, like this whole city was, these two looked absolutely nothing alike. And suddenly, Alik at least partially improved in my judgment as I knew he wasn't sleeping with anyone so frail looking. And he wasn't involved with anyone while secretly carrying on as a prostitute. "I'm sorry."

"Why does everyone think we are married just because we live with each other and I give him a greeting kiss on the mouth? We don't share a bed or anything! We haven't even seen each other naked. He was too much older than me to ever have been put in the same bath as kids by our parents. Did you think this too?" she asked Helina.

"No, I knew from the way you were looking at each other that you were brother and sister right from the moment you approached us," she said, obviously thinking of her and Maxim.

"Anyway, since you're here, these two need jobs for a couple days. Anything they could do at your work?"

"There's no official positions open, but if you go to this address and tell Mr. Nazorov that I sent you, he should be able to find you something." She scribbled down the address on a piece of paper. "And I also put our home address too on there." She gave me her house key. "If you do choose to work there, I'll see you this afternoon. I've got a doctor's appointment at the hospital this morning."

Helina and I thanked her.

"I'll tag along to the hospital to see if I can get these bandages removed early," said Alik.

The two of them left.

The address led us to a major factory within walking distance of us. "Can this be right?" I asked Helina. "Would the wealthiest Proletariat's sister be working in a factory?"

"She's probably in management there."

There was a huge crowd of uniformed workers waiting to get in the front doors, and Helina and I stood out among them. They were scrawny, with hard lines in their faces and bad teeth. They smelled awful, and were carrying on with the thickest Russian accents I had ever heard, often switching between English and Russian mid-sentence. What I could understand was terribly foul humor, highly inappropriate jokes coming from both the men and the women.

"These people are totally foul," Helina whispered to me, and I agreed.

When we got inside the building, it became clear that this was a textile mill. An older man in a business suit appeared on a platform above us, and the crowds calmed down immediately at the sight of him. He picked us out of the crowds right away.

"And who might you two be?" he asked.

"We're looking for work, are you Mr. Nazarov?"

"Yes."

"Nadeen Grishan told us you might be able to find temporary employment for us."

"She did, did she? Come up here and let's have a look at you."

We climbed up to his level, and he shook both of our hands as we introduced ourselves, Helina again only gong by her first name.

"Well, Helina and Jake, both of you look younger than most of the workers here, and you're dressed far nicer than they are. Are you sure you belong here?"

"We're sure," I said. "We need work to pay for our room and board. We don't have any money."

He nodded, and I got a good look at him. Going from the neck down, I would have thought he was a much younger man. He was tall, stood straight up, and stoutly built, solid. But looking at his face told me his true age: he probably was in his early sixties. His gray hair was balding, and he had age spots on his forehead.

"Both of you look very young. You know it's illegal for me to hire minors."

"I'm actually much, much older than I look. You don't have to worry with me." Helina uncrossed her arms for the first time since we had gotten inside, and I saw Mr. Nazarov's eyes moving to her large breasts, checking them out quickly and moving his eyes away politely.

"I believe you," he said, seemingly deciding that she wasn't as young as he first took her for. Then he looked at me. "But you?"

"Jake's the one who is barely legal, but he is," said Helina.

"I can't just take your word for it. I'll need ID."

I had given Alik my passport and driver's license, so I fished out the only photo ID I had and handed it to him.

"Ah yes, just barely legal, but legal you are, Jake. And what luck, you're Bourgeoisie, just like me!" He handed my Bourgeoisie License back to me. "I've been looking for some Bourgeoisie person to serve as my personal assistant. How's your handwriting?"

"Impeccable!" I said honestly.

"Would you like the position? It pays much more than any other job here."

"What about Helina?" I asked. "Are there two assistant openings?"

"No, just one, but I can hire her on as a factory worker."

"That doesn't seem right," I said. "She's not exactly going to fit in with any of the other workers here."

"It's okay, I can do factory work for a couple days. It's not going to kill me."

Mr. Nazarov took all of our things and put them in a locker. Then he handed Helina a factory uniform. "You'll need to change into this and report to the foreman."

"You want me to change? Right here, in front of you?" She started to pull at her dress-strap.

"No, no! Not out here! This factory is listed as a public place of employment, and its nudity is therefore illegal. There's a dressing room downstairs."

She thanked him and went back downstairs, and Mr. Nazarov led me up a couple flights of stairs. "I actually live in a apartment here, and that's where I'll primarily need your help."

His apartment turned out to be a comfortable, cozy spot, much nicer than the rest of the factory was, and I complimented him. He sat me on a desk and had me transcribe business memos using paper and a fountain pen.

While I worked, he kept me chatting, and he seemed like a really nice old man the more we talked.

He looked over at my work. "You weren't embellishing about that penmanship. Almost as nice as my granddaughter's. My grandson's penmanship is terrible, but other than that, you remind me a lot of him. Both of them. They are about the same age as you, and I love them so much."

"If they take at all after their grandfather, they must be great kids," I said.

"They are splendid. In fact, both of them served in the job you're doing now for me before they had to leave town for their higher schooling. That's why I'm so glad to have you. Are you close to your grandfathers?"

I shook my head. "I wish. My grandfathers all died before I ever knew them. As a kid, I always wished I had a kindly old man to look after me."

"Well, it's never too late to fulfill wishes. You are such a great kid, Jake. I want you to be my honorary grandson while you are here. My grandchildren stay here in the spare bed while they are working for me, and you are welcome to have as much of my food as you want."

"That's really nice, Mr. Nazarov!"

"Please call me Grandpa Nazarov."

"Albright, Grandpa Nazarov. But what about my friend Helina?"

"Oh, are you two an item?"

"Oh no, no, no. Just friends. We're both single, and I'd never be interested in her."

"So, you wouldn't be sharing a bed. Well, we'll find a place for her too, a room downstairs."

"Thanks!" I wiped sweat off my brow. "Grandpa Nazarov, did you turn on the heat or something?"

"No, but that's a sign that the factory floor is working. The machines downstairs both heat up this room and make it humid, and there is nothing I can do. Once they shut down for the day, it will go back to normal, I promise you."

"Well, I'm sure I can suffer through it."

"Everyone up here just strips down to their underwear to keep cool. Feel free to do the same. I can put your clothes in my closet, where it's cool and dry, to make sure they don't get ruined."

I did not want to ruin my suit. "But isn't undressing in the factory prohibited?"

"Actually, because I live here and obviously cannot get by without being nude from time to time, I got them to legally declare just this apartment inside the factory as a private residence, where those work rules do not apply. Go ahead."

I stripped down to my briefs and folded my clothes, handing them to him.

"You don't mind if I follow suit, do you, Grandson?"

"What did you do when your biological grandson was your assistant?"

"I stripped down to my underwear, as did he."

"Well then, I don't mind at all."

He stripped down to his boxers, taking both of our sets of clothes to his closet. When he came back, I looked him over.

"Wow, Grandpa Nazarov, you're really built for a..."

"For an old man?" he asked.

"Well, yeah. You've got way more muscles than I do." Even though he was nowhere near as muscular as a vampire, he looked fitter than I ever guessed someone his age could.

"Thanks."

"I want to look like you do when I'm your age." Then I remembered how ridiculous that statement was considering I didn't age.

"You don't even have as much muscle as me and you're in your prime. You've got a huge ways to go if you want to look like me when you get older. You're built just like my grandkids, all bones. Those two hate so many kinds of foods that they never sit down to eat properly and never exercise. They've grown up with plenty, but still look like they are malnourished. You've got the same sort of look, I could tell even through your clothes."

"It's true, I do look really skinny. Any tips for looking like you, Grandpa?"

"You need to eat more."

"What else? How do you keep your skin so taut?"

"Here, come into the bathroom and I'll show you what I use."

I followed him there, and as soon as I had, he poured a clear liquid from a bottle all over me.

"Rub this all over! It's a mixture of oils. I put it on me once a day." He poured it all over himself and started to rub it in.

As I did the same, I realized the oil wasn't really rubbing in at all. Perhaps it was the humidity, but all I did by rubbing my hands in it was make it worse. And my briefs were totally soaked with the stuff too. At this rate I would need to take a shower before getting dressed. At least it smelled good.

"Here, Grandson. I'll show you what I do for exercise, why I have this body."

He led me into room that had been fashioned into a rough gym. The back of the room was set up with wrestling mats on the floor. But oddly enough, he showed me a rope.

"Mom taught me this as a kid, called it hog tying. You see, she was a country bumbkin' farm girl from the Logan Blood who had been sold into slavery when she came of age, but she managed to escape here."

"Wow, she must have been something," I said.

"She was strong willed, but she never could adjust to the Petrov Blood city life. She was constantly ridiculous here. When Kirrll instituted the Decency Codes, My dad and I picked them up easily, but she could not subdue her old ways. She ended up being executed by him for it."

"My gosh, I'm so sorry."

"It's okay. At the time I was completely mortified by her. I designed myself after my father completely, but there was one thing she taught me that I held onto. Her hog tying game. And I've taught it to my son and grandchildren too. I do it every chance I get. When I don't have a partner, I practice on a stuffed animal pig my granddaughter got me. But you're here today. Will you play with me? Just like my real grandson would?"

"Sure Grandpa Nazarov, if you teach me what to do."

"Each of us has three pieces of rope. The goal is to tie the other person's hand together and also his legs. And then to pin the other person on their back for ten seconds. No eye-poking, kicking, punching, or slapping allowed."

"Sort of like wrestling, but with a cowboy slant."

"Exactly." He grabbed a bottle of oil and poured it all over the mat. "I put this on to make things more interesting." And then he handed me my ropes. "Ready?"

"Yes."

"Go!"

He started towards me, but I evaded him. I realized that I was faster than him, so I kept out of his reach while I fashioned my rope into a throwing loop.

Then I threw it at him, encircling his body and locking his arms together.

"You're surprisingly good with a rope!" he said.

"I've had practice."

"You've got my arms, but you'll need to get my legs too."

I used my end of the rope to pull him towards me so I could try to tie his legs together. Closing the space between us turned out to be a mistake, as he slid his legs towards me, sweeping me off my feet. That floor turned out to be a lot more slippery than expected. He used his legs to put my upper body in a scissor grip while his arms pushed against the ropes, getting them free.

The match devolved into a strict wrestling match as both of us forgot the ropes and tussled for control. He was amazingly strong for an old guy, but I still was close. I was trying to be gentle with him, I didn't want to hurt him.

He pinned me on my back, and I knew that if that had been a normal wrestling match, it would be over. Instead, he tied my hands together in front of me and then tied their rope to the waistband of my underwear.

I could feel him start to tie my feet, so I squirmed around onto my front, where he couldn't pin me. While he wrestled both my legs, trying to get them under his control, I moved them around and quickly as I could, keeping them out of his grasp. It took both his arms and his legs to finally get the upper hand enough to tie them together, and then tying them to my underwear.

I had nothing else to try but to pull and pull my limbs apart, trying to break the ropes. When I felt a snap, I got excited only to realize I had only managed to rip my briefs off. Well, at least that gave my limbs more room to move.

"Whoa, you're taking off your underwear? Didn't think you'd do that. Well, I can follow suit."

Next thing I knew, I saw the man's boxers hit the ground. He then used my surprise to flip me over onto my back, trying to pin me. In the process, I could see his large, uncut dick dangling, thankfully as flaccid as I was.

Just as he started to count, I used all of my strength of flip back onto my front. He jumped onto my back, trying to make me flip, but I held firm, wrestling him away.

As we grappled, it felt to me like there was something very firm poking me in the back. I wondered if he had gotten hard. I supposed with all the skin contact, and with our bodies covered in oil, it was probably only inevitable given we were naked. Even though I wasn't the least bit hard.

And then I drew a sharp breath in surprise as I felt his dickhead slide into my hole. "Whoa, ouch! Hey Grandpa, you just accidentally slipped inside me!"

"That wasn't accidental. I just couldn't resist your sweet little hole, Grandson. Of course, rape is unfortunately illegal in Petrov Blood, so if you want me to stop, all you have to do is say `no.'"

I opened my mouth to say no, but as soon as I did, he pulled a rope into my mouth, gagging me. I shook my head, but he wasn't looking.

"If you don't say no, any other movements are just part of the game."

I tried to struggle against him, but with the ropes holding me down, I had no shot at taking control. All I could do was try to slowly gnaw my way through the rope in my mouth.

He stuck himself all the way inside me. "Oooh, how does that feel to have Grandpa's dick inside you, boy? Jake, you have to understand. How much I long to do this with my own grandchildren, and even though they are of age, incest is illegal here so I'd get arrested. But I can do whatever I want to you, yes I can. I know it hurts to have Grandpa's huge dick screwing you like this, but soon, the pain will go and you'll be begging for me to go harder."

I finally, finally, bit through the rope and spit it out. "NO! No, no, no, no! Get off me!"

He stopped thrusting. "But, Grandson, I know if you let me keep going you'll get used to it. This could be the start of a wonderful relationship."

"No, get off!"

"Fuck you, fuck you!" he snapped, but he had to pull out. "You've ruined it all!"

"Untie me now!"

He was forced to do as I asked.

"This was sexual harassment!"

"Bosses are permitted to make sexual advances at their employees and have sex with them. Only if the employee turns down sex, and then gets fired because of it, can sexual harassment be filed. I am not going to fire you."

"I refuse to work for a pervert like you. I quit."

"If you quit, I have connections in this town. You'll never work in this city again."

"I don't care!"

I washed off the oil in his shower quickly, put my suit back on, and left that apartment. I found Helina arguing with the foreman.

"This woman needs to use the bathroom. Can't you see she's pregnant?"

"It's not my fault the slut got knocked up," said the foreman, a porky guy. "We don't do bathroom breaks here. She can wait for lunch like everyone else."

"You are such a jerk!"

"Helina, come on, we're leaving."

"Thank goodness, the conditions in that factory are horrendous! I was about ready to kill someone, maybe two or three someones!" She changed back into her dress, we grabbed our bags, and we left.

I told Helina exactly what happened with Nazarov.

"That man could have raped you and gotten away with it. He should be killed for it!"

"I know we were supposed to bring in money today and until we are ready to leave the city, but if that man really does make it impossible for us to work anywhere else, I refuse to go back there. Alik will just have to understand. He's so rich, it's not really like he's losing anything."

She agreed, and we headed to the home address Nadeen wrote for us.

"This can't be the right side of town, can it?" asked Helina as we walked towards the address. Even though there was nothing unpleasant about the exterior structures there, we seemed to be entering a bit of a slum. Every alley was absolutely filled with street people living out of boxes.

We found the listed apartment building and went inside. Instead of inviting hallways, the interiors were completely torn apart and filthy. People were just lying around in the halls and stairways.

"Can they really live in this building? Did she write down the wrong address?" asked Helina.

"Maybe they live in the penthouse, and land is so cheap here, they can afford to have like several floors to themselves in an amazingly swank apartment."

We got to their floor and apartment number, we almost expected the key not to work on the front door, but it did. We stepped inside, and instead of a swanky, spacious apartment, we found a tiny, worn- down tenement that didn't even have a window. There a tiny room that had a minimal kitchenette and card table, and the rest belonged to two tiny bedrooms with two double beds and two bathrooms. Though the place was worn down, at least it seemed like it was being cleaned.

We found Nadeen lying on one of the beds.

"Nadeen, question for you," I said. "Why is this place such a, well..."

"A shithole?"

"Not how I was going to put it, but yes."

"Listen, I can tell by your two nice suits that you're not Proletariat. This is actually an above average dwelling for Proletariat in the Carstvo. The whole place has an extreme division of wealth. It's all in the hands of Bourgeoisie and Aristocrats, meaning us working class people get what's left, and that's not much."

"That's terrible!" I said.

"But Alik should be getting a Bourgeoisie equivalent salary from his boxing," said Helina.

"He does, but that's my fault," said Nadeen. "You see, I've got kidney failure. Three times a week, like this morning, I have to go for dialysis. Alik, as noble as he is, uses every spare cent he has to pay for those treatments. But his money is just barely keeping the medical expenses at bay, so my factory job pays for this place."

"I'm so sorry," said Helina.

"You aren't given healthcare?" I asked.

"I was as a kid. This place takes care of minors really well, feeding them, housing them if necessary, schooling them, and providing medical. But as soon as we turn eighteen, we're all on our own. That was seven years ago for me, and since then, Alik and I have had to spend every second working in order to get by. We don't have anyone else to help us at all."

"Oh my goodness," I said, not able to process it all.

She started to cry. "I hate myself for what I've turned my brother into. He never wanted to be a boxer, never wanted any of the life he has, but he had to do it to help me. You don't know how many times I beg him to just let me die, that I'm not worthy of his gifts, but he won't ever listen."

I started to cry too and put my arm around her. "You're a very special person who deserves a life," I said. "He knows that."

"But he's not even biologically related to me, he was adopted. And yet, he still gives me everything he has."

"My opinions of Alik are improving by the second," Helina said.

"I can't afford to stay here and cry, I have to be at work and clock in. I feel much stronger than I did a couple hours ago. I have to get to the factory."

She excused us so she could change into her uniform. While we were alone, I said to Helina, "I need to go back and take my job back. I can't not be gainfully employed, no matter how awful the job is, not when her health in on the line."

"I agree completely."

When Nadeen came out of the room, I told her we were going with her, and she thanked us hugely for chipping in.

"I had a bit of an altercation with that jerk Nazarov, I'm afraid," I said was we walked down the street.

"Already?" she asked. "Wow. It took him two weeks of bliss as his personal assistant, with him asking me to call him Grandpa, until he pulled out his penis and told me that Grandpa had a sweet lolly for me to suck on. I haven't been in his apartment since, just working in the factory. If he's already harassed you, he's moving much quicker than ever. Somehow, that pervert is only getting more pervier as he gets older."

"But the factory work I was exposed to was nearly as bad. The supervisors act like slave drivers, there are no safety measures in place, no benefits, and if the workers do the slightest thing wrong, they'll fire them, and they'll starve out in the streets. I never knew such wickedness could exist in this city, and it makes me want to burn the whole place down. And that's coming from someone who has a fear of fire."

"It absolutely atrocious to work there. Please, don't tell Alik about how bad it is. When he asked me to connect you two to jobs there, I wanted to warn you how bad it was, but with him beside me, I had to keep my mouth shut. If he knew, he would try to get me to quit. But if I quit, Nazarov would make sure I never could find work anywhere else in the city."

When we returned to the factory, Nazarov came and talked to us, thankfully dressed in his suit again. "Helina and I want our jobs back."

"Fine. Helina, put your suit back on."

She nodded and went to get dressed.

"Jake, you can come back to my apartment and continue helping me there. It's my personal place where my nudity is permitted. I may not be able to touch you now without your permission, but I can touch myself all that I want."

"No, I want my position transferred to the factory floor, like Nadeen did."

"Fine, you shadow her and do as she does. Nadeen, you just got yourself a new partner."

He handed me a uniform and I got changed. Nadeen and I spent the first few hours working with Helina manning the mill machines that were turning cotton into thread. Soon enough, I was as horrified as Helina by the way the workers were treated by their superiors.

"All these supervisors need to qualify for the Logan slave pens would be to add to rape and violence to their repertoire of cruelty," I said. "To think, when we came in here, both of us snubbed our noses at them."

"If you're wondering why so many of these people smell," said Nadeen, "it's because many of them can't afford their own running water. They have to pay for public showers, and that's a luxury they can rarely afford. Alik and I are lucky in that department."

"Why are so many of them so crass and vulgar?" asked Helina.

"These people have had their spirits destroyed," said Nadeen. "Most of them aren't right in the head anymore. They're rough language is the only means of expressing themselves that makes sense considering how awful their lives are."

When these people had worked hard for seven hours straight without a break, lunch was announced. I expected them to give us an hour off, but instead, these people only got fifteen minutes off. There wasn't any food served in the building, so everyone had brought their lunches, and Nadeen gave us both sandwiches.

"Nadeen, why is everyone carrying their lunches into the bathroom?" I asked. "That seems so unsanitary."

"That's the only way these people have time to eat and use the bathroom. They have to do both at the same time. Otherwise, it's another seven hours before they are off, no break."

We spent the first half of our second shift working alongside Helina and the other laborers until Nazarov came down and announced that we were both needed in the dye tanks, tossing me something. Nadeen pulled me into the changing rooms.

"He makes me do the worst job in here each day as his way to get revenge on my rejection of him. It seems you have to pay that price too."

"What do we have to do?"

"Stand in the dye tanks and pull all the stuck cloth out of the machinery. Regular clothes cannot be worn for this, so he's gone and provided us with wonderful outfits he expects us to wear. That's what he gave you."

I went into my stall, took off all my clothes, and put on what he gave me, a ridiculously small, ridiculously tight pair of briefs that showed off everything.

Nadeen came out wearing the same briefs, only she had a skimpy bra to wear as well. "This is just enough covering to not count as nudity, and there's a work reason for requiring it, so he can get away with it."

At least the dye tanks were in a remote part of the factory where no one else could see as we stepped into the waist deep, hot liquid.

"Isn't this going to dye us blue?" I asked.

"He allows us showers after this to get it out."

Nazarov wandered down and sat down at a working desk oddly placed right by the tanks.

"Don't think I don't know why he had his desk moved to overlook the tanks. He pretends to be working, but I know he's just watching me as my underwear gets soaked, leaving me practically naked. And now, he has you to look at too."

As we pulled cotton out of the tank and tossed them out, I noticed him looking at us whenever he could. By the time we were on the third tank, his behavior and disposition changed as he watched us.

"What is he doing now? Why is he breathing like that?"

"Oh, this happens every time. He just pulled his dick out of his pants and is beating off watching us."

"Disgusting! He can't do that!"

"No he can't, but since his desk is blocking his crotch from our sight, and if anyone comes, he can put it away before he is seen, he's never been caught. I just try not to look at him and ignore him."

While Nadeen was an expert at ignoring Nazarov, I was not so good. I noticed the disgusting man jerk off clearly all the way to orgasm, making all sorts of noises, and then cleaning himself up and putting it away finally. Only then did he stop watching us and leave.

When we finished, we showered, and she taught me how to scrub my skin until it was raw to get the dye out. We then rejoined the other workers until our day was finally over.

After getting us dinner back at her place, I asked Nadeen where Alik was.

"He got his bandages off early at the hospital today, so what does he run off to go do against the doctor's wishes? You guessed it, boxing practice."

I got to Alik's Gym just in time that night, getting there just before Alik Khorkov left for the night. He told me Alik was practicing inside on his own, and I convinced him to let me in before he locked the door and left.

I found Alik in the back dressed in his boxing shorts and gloves. He was pounding away at a hanging punching bag.

"You shouldn't be boxing so soon after your injury!" I snapped.

He noticed I was there for the first time and rolled his eyes. "What are you doing here?"

"I came to keep you from boxing."

"Why does it seem like, for the past weeks, every time I move, there you are, causing m pain? You're like a bad case of herpes that won't go away."

"Normally, given that you just compared me to an STD, I'd get into another argument with you, but I'm not here to fight. Just to make you stop."

"I'm not going to stop. I need the practice. You can't make me do anything I don't want to do."

I stepped in between him and the punching bag, covering it with my body.

"Get away from there or I'll hit you."

"No. You're not going to hit me."

"We'll see about that. Last chance to move."

"No."

He moved towards me, swinging hard, and I flinched.

But he only punched the space of the bag to the left and right of my body, ending up right against me. I pulled his arms down and made him stop.

He was so angry with me, he pushed his body against me.

I kissed him on the mouth, completely disarming him.

"What was that for?" he asked me, shocked. "Oh, did you change your mind about paying me for some fun? Is that why you came here?"

"No, I'm never going to pay you for sex!" I hadn't wanted to yell at him, but he just made me do it. "I kissed you because I wanted to kiss you."

He looked confused. "Because you wanted me to take pity on your lack of money and give you a freebie? I'd like to, really, but I just can't."

"I'm not interested in you sexually. I'm interested in you romantically."

His jaw dropped. "Romantically? Are you out of your mind? You despise me, remember? The only interest you could possibly have in me is sexually."

"Nadeen told us everything, Alik."

He looked shocked, angry. "She did? I told her not to say anything."

"Well, she told us anyway, and I'm glad she did."

"This is why I didn't want you two staying with me. Neither of you was ever supposed to know."

"How much have you been keeping from her?"

"So much, and you'd better not say anything."

"You have to tell me what I'm not supposed to tell her if you expect me to agree to that!"

"The prostitution, of course. She knows nothing about it."

"What else?"

"The injections I've been taking. She has no idea I've been juicing. And she doesn't know that I've cheated in my boxing matches, or that I get paid extra sometimes to fight bare-fisted."

"Are you sure you should be keeping all that from her?"

"Yes, completely. You've known her, what, a whole day now? I've known her her whole life. She's suicidal as it is. I never know when she's going to try to kill herself to try to save me from her. If she knew the truth about the horrors I've turned to, she'll go over the edge. So you'd better not say anything! It's not your place to bud into this! These are our lives. It has nothing to do with you!

"I'm not going to say anything. For once, we agree on something. Helina knows not to say anything either."

"Good, that's what I need to hear. Now, I don't want you, either of you, to bring up any of this again. Just forget you ever heard it. Both of you are about to leave the city for good in a couple days, so none of this matters."

"I can't just forget, Alik. Who else knows about this?"

"No one."

"You've gotten through all these years without confiding in anyone?"

"That's right."

"I want you to open up to me. Share with me the pain you're feeling. I want you to trust me as your friend."

"I don't have friends. I have my sister, and I have clients. I don't know how to open up. Please just leave me here and let me box."

"No, I'm not leaving."

"Fine, I'm done anyways. I have to get ready to see another client tonight."

"You're not going to avoid me that easily." I reached over and put my arms around his naked upper body, holding on.

"What are you doing now?"

"It's called a hug. It's something friends give each other."

"This is ridiculous. Please let go."

"Not until you give into me and open up."

"I don't have time for this, I have to get ready."

"You're not losing me that easily."

"Fine. You do what you want."

I walked towards the locker room, and I held onto him, walking backwards. Once we were both in the locker room, he sat down and started to take off his shoes.

I sat on his lap. "I'm not letting you go."

"Listen, you need to understand something. There's nothing inside me capable of being your friend anymore."

"What happened to the Alik Grishan that was there before Nadeen's hospital expenses started?"

"He's dead and gone. I had to kill him in order to create this false version of Alik Grishan, the gruff boxer whore."

"There's still a little bit left of that old Alik when you talk to your sister."

"Out of necessity to keep her hopes up. Other than that, there's nothing left. Nothing left to befriend anyone."

"I don't believe that, and I'm not going to let you go."

"I need to shower now!"

"I don't care."

He stood up again, and I stood with him, still hugging him. He pulled off his shorts, leaving him naked, but I still held on.

He walked into the shower, still with me holding on. He grabbed the faucet. "I'm going to turn the water on now. If you don't leave, you'll ruin your nice suit."

"I don't care."

Just before he turned on the shower, he said, "Ah, hell. You are such a dick."

He lifted me, carried me out of the shower, set me down, and started to take my clothes off himself. Once he had stripped me naked, he tried to shake me off and go back into the shower, but I grabbed him again in a hug and kept on him.

He turned on the water and got us both wet. He grabbed the soap and lathered his back and butt up, rinsing that side off.

"I need you to back off now. You're keeping me from soaping my front, and I can't go to my client not fully clean."

"All you have to do is let me in and I'll let you go. I told you that."

"Fine, I can wait you out."

I held on as he stopped soaping and just stood there in the water. We waited and we waited.

Just when I started to wonder if my technique was hopeless, I saw some change in his face. "You're crying!"

"No I'm not. It's just the water."

"It's not. I'm positive! You can't hide it from me."

He spun around to keep me from seeing him. "You're wrong."

I kept on him, not letting him escape, staring at his face. "You can't hide this from me! You're crying!"

He ended up collapsing to the shower floor, sitting with his back against the wall and covering his face with his hands.

I didn't let him get him away. I sat down and hugged him, pulling his hands down. "Let me in!"

"Fine, fine, Jesus Christ, you're relentless!"

"That's right!"

"What do you want to know?"

"Why did you go into boxing?"

"To make money."

"Do you like the sport?"

"I detest it. Always have. I don't really like any sports, honestly."

"What did you want to be then? I mean, I wanted to be an Engineer in school."

"I wanted to be a chef in school. A fancy one, and I had a real talent too. But it's not like my sister's illness took that away from me. This whole Blood did. The system always kills out the dreams of the Proletariat kids. Because it provides us such excellent public schooling. I was such a bright pupil. So was my sister, who was always incredible at math and dreamed of being a mathematician. But only the rich can afford to send their children to school."

"If you two were so talented, weren't their scholarships, financial aid, or students loans?"

"None of those things. No, if you can't pay for the schooling up front, which is a small fortune, you aren't going anywhere but in the factories."

"You couldn't still prove your skill as a chef without your higher education?"

"Nope. All chef positions require chef school degrees as minimum entry, and those require a bachelor's degree. I could have gotten a job as a fry cook in some crappy diner with no possibility of advancement and poor pay, but who would choose that?"

"So you got into boxing?"

"As soon as I realized that my sister was sick, three years before she became an adult, I knew it was going to fall on me. You see, our parents had died when we were kids."

"I'm so sorry. How?"

"My mom died in a factory accident."

"That's awful! And your family didn't get any workers comp money or life insurance?"

"None of that exists for my class. We got nothing. My dad, in his drunken grief, ended up breaking a silly dress code Decency Code in the street and got killed for it."

"I hate Kirrill even more than before!"

"Thanks. But the state took care of us as minors quite well. We were allowed to stay together, and me, being four years older, started being sort of a father figure to her. I matured real quick. I only had one year after I turned eighteen where I worked in the factory like a normal person in the Proletariat. When my sister got sick, I knew what had to be done. I found I had a talent for boxing, and I was tall enough for it and big boned, though like everyone else, I was skinny at the time due to malnourishment. You see, the only Proletariat people who escape the hell are the ones who are talented athletes. Either you box or you dance at Madame Mathilde's Cabaret, and I was no good at dancing, so that only left boxing as a possibility. I threw myself into it and the work paid off, even though I still much prefer factory work to boxing. As soon as I started to make some extra money, I invested it in food, both for my sister to help her get healthier, but also for me to get bigger, put on some much needed muscle."

"When did the juicing come in?"

"When I realized that I was good enough to be a pro, but just not good enough to be a champion. I needed that juice to get me to that level."

"Even though you could be ruining your body?"

"I'm concerned about her health. Not my own. I don't do anything that could risk me not being able to bring an income, unless it pays well enough to risk it, like it did when you and Maxim asked me to help you kill Kirrill. In fact, if I had succeeded, Maxim would have paid me enough money to pay for her whole medical future, but I failed. But juicing will just have long term consequences."

"Don't you feel bad about cheating?"

"Of course I do. If there were no stakes, I would never cheat. But each time, I have to ask myself, what's worse, cheating on some stupid boxing match or letting my sister die? There's absolutely no hesitation."

"I understand. And the prostitution?"

"I hate it even worse than the boxing, but I had to resort to it to keep up with the expenses. It got easier to do as I went forward, but I still can't get through a session without shutting it off."

"Emotionally?"

Yes. But you want to know the worst part of it all is?"

"What?"

"It's that I've had to make all these sacrifices, we both have, and I still am not any closer to saving my sister's life. I'm just keeping us both afloat." He really started to sob, and I hugged him even harder.

"In her eyes as well as in mine, you are already a hero."

"I don't want to be a hero. I'm not doing this for recognition or gratitude. I just want to her to be healthy."

"Well, you're getting it anyway."

I moved in and kissed him, that's how moved I was.

"You're kissing me again."

"Yes."

"Why are you kissing me?"

"Because now that I see what a good person you really are, I'm incredibly attracted to you In spite of you being you."

"That's touching. And the young Alik Grishan would have kissed you right back. But now, I can't kiss you. I can't ever belong to you or anyone else, because I can't even belong to myself. The only thing I can ever belong to is the cause."

"I understand that. I'm not trying to get in the way of you helping your sister. But I don't see why we can't be intimate still in spite of that in your time off. Unless you're not attracted to me."

"I'm attracted to you physically, Jake. I told you that from the first day I met you. And I've fallen for your heart the moment Maxim told me you saved all those slaves in the Territory."

"He did?"

"Almost as soon as we met, yes."

"That wasn't me alone but a group effort."

"Still, it shows me we have the same sorts of hearts."

"Then I'm kissing you again," I said. "This time, try to kiss me back."

I kissed him again, and once again, he just sat there passively. Just when I was about to break away, deflated, something changed in him.

He put his hands behind my head and pulled me close as he responded to me. His lips opened and his tongue licked at me, not too roughly, but with sweet sultriness. I was smiling as I kissed him back, delighted.

"Oh my god! I just realized something!"

"What?" I asked.

"I must have kissed lips a million times since I took on this boxer persona. But that was the first time in all those years that I really kissed at all. The first time that I kissed someone without being paid to, without kissing as I thought they expected me to kiss. That was the first kiss I did for no one but me!"

"And did you enjoy it as much as I did?"

"Enjoyed it more than I ever knew I could. Can I do it again?"

"You can. You can do anything you want with me, Alik, as long as you are following what your heart is telling you."

"My heart is telling me to do this."

He kissed me that time, and it was just as passionate as the last. As our tongues intertwined, he pulled my body against him. We were still sitting under the flow of the warm water, and I realized his dick had gotten hard as he pulled me against his body. In an instant, mine was too.

He seemed to like that, as he turned me over in the spray of the water so I was on my back and he was on top of me, never breaking the kiss. I let him take me where he wanted without interfering. He started to thrust his huge hardness against my dick in the water as he pulled me closer and closer against his body with his arms, almost like he wanted our bodies to merge into one.

He stopped suddenly, getting off me. "I'm sorry. I got carried away."

"Don't apologize, I loved it."

"Well, as drawn to you as I am, I can't be intimate with you. I have to save my sex for my clients."

"Ugh, I know, I know."

"And right now, I have a client in twenty minutes. I'll be late if I don't rush."

"I'll help you," I said. "I caused you to be late, so it's the least I can do."

I grabbed the soap and stated to lather up his front. I wanted to go slow and enjoy it, but knew I would have to hurry through it so I didn't let myself make it into a sexual thing for me.

I helped him dress too, including getting that big unit, still hard, into his trousers.

"I'd kiss you goodbye, but if I did, I'd never be able to leave you. But I assume you are sharing a bed with me?"

"Of course I will."

"Don't wait up!"

I woke up that night in Alik's double bed as I heard the bedroom door open. He hadn't realized I was awake, probably his eyes not adjusting in the dark, and I watched something I found very amusing and sweet. He was trying to not wake me up as he got ready for bed, tiptoeing around the room very slowly. But a combination of factors kept making him cause unexpected noises: the room being so tiny with every free space taken with something, his huge size, and his general clumsiness. Each time he banged against something accidentally or knocked something over, he swore angrily (but quietly) at himself. After he undressed, he thankfully went into the bathroom and got ready for bed.

When he came to join me, I had drifted off again. "I've been hard at work keeping your bed warm for you," I said to him as he pulled the covers up.

"Damn, I was trying so hard not to wake you!"

"Which was very sweet of you and earns you this." I kissed him, and once again, I felt that wonderful kiss back, filled with passion. Both our hands searched each other's bodies. In an instant all my notions of sleep evaporated as my dick woke up, pressing against his warm skin.

I grabbed onto his dick, and unlike mine, it was totally flaccid. I broke the kiss. "How many clients did you sleep with tonight?"

"Do you really want to know?"

"I'm afraid so."

"Three."

"You got off three times tonight?"

"Yes."

"Which means this guy," I said, grabbing his flaccid dick, "is all petered out for the night."

"I'm afraid so. Jake, you need to face the facts. Sure, you've forced me into opening up to you, and it feels amazing to have you to listen, to have you to confide in. But you'd be better off just being friends with me. Not take our friendship to a romantic level. `Cause you know I couldn't ever be your boyfriend. You got the Tsar himself, a much more handsome man than me, trying to win you back, totally in love with you. I mean, think about the kind of life you had with him compared to this." He pointed to the shabby, cramped, windowless room. "I mean, come on! Not to mention Maxim won't age, just like you, and I'm already twenty-nine. I'm not living the kind of life here that will make me age slowly."

"I'm not asking you to be my boyfriend, Alik. My boyfriends come with monogamy."

"I can't ever offer monogamy. And even if you had been willing to have an open relationship, I still wouldn't let you call me a boyfriend. Because I couldn't ever give myself to you the way I want to, the way you deserve to be treated."

"So, we're not going to be boyfriends," I said. "I understand that. I still think we should enjoy each other in a romantic context instead of merely just being friends."

"Feel this dick," he said. He grabbed my hand and forced it on his unit. "Flaccid, useless, impotent. That's all I can give you. How can you be happy with just the measly leftovers?"

"Under normal circumstances, I'd want you all to myself. But we're not under normal circumstances, so I accept what I can get. It's not fun thinking about you being with others, but the truth is, I know that's not you. It's like someone else's mind takes over your body during those evening hours, and then leaves. Because it's not like you're choosing to be with those people out of lust."

"No, never."

"Anyway, I think your flaccid penis is one beautiful piece of art." I leaned down and kissed the big, uncut thing. "I'm happy with it just the way it is."

He laughed. "Well, if we are going to be romantic, I'll only allow myself this if you promise that I won't be holding you back. If you meet someone new or if you decide to go back to Maxim, I want you to leave me without hesitation. Promise!"

"Alright, I promise. What is your schedule tomorrow?"

"I have to be up early for boxing lessons I'm giving at the gym."

"You'd better not be receiving end of any hits! You remember what the doctor said about your head condition."

"No, they'll not be boxing me, I promise. Those will take me through the night, and then it's more sex clients."

"I know you always work so hard you never get a full night's sleep, and tonight it's already so late, so I won't keep you up any longer."

"Thanks, I am exhausted." He kissed me sweetly. "You know, this is so weird."

"What?"

"In all those years I've been sleeping with clients, none of them has ever asked me to share a bed with them and sleep over. Last night with you was the first time I had to share a bed since I was a kid, and it wasn't under romantic conditions. Now that we have gotten so close, should I hold you while I sleep?"

"What do you want to do?"

"I want to hold you. Is that okay?"

"Sure, especially considering how small this bed is."

With me on my back, he rolled on top of me, holding me underneath him. "Wow, this feels really, surprisingly right."

I was so pleased how much he enjoyed that position that I tried to last, but that only worked for half a minute. "Alik, I can't breathe. You're crushing me."

"I am? Sorry." He rolled off of me.

I gasped for breath. "Alik, you are a giant compared to me. I'm sorry, I just couldn't manage."

"Like I said, I have no experience with this. And look at you. Somehow you've only gotten scrawnier since last night."

"Long factory shifts don't exactly encourage muscle growth, I'm afraid."

"No, they don't. Let's find a sleeping position that won't end up in your premature death by smothering."

I put him on his back and then I laid my body on top of his. Unlike the reverse, in which someone walking in might never see a trace of me under his mass, his body was so big it was almost like I was lying on my own bed. "How this?"

He put his arms around me. "This will do quite well."