Chapter 17: Morning Ritual
The walk to Mateo’s apartment was a quiet negotiation of shared space. Their shoulders brushed occasionally on the narrow sidewalk, a point of contact that felt more significant than the frenzy in the office. Jamie’s body hummed with a deep, settled ache, a satisfying echo of the night’s final punctuation. The hollow feeling was gone, replaced by a fatigued fullness.
“It’s not much,” Mateo said, fumbling with his keys at a nondescript door wedged between a bodega and a laundromat. “Just a crash pad.”
He wasn’t lying. The studio was a single room dominated by a large, unmade bed and a colossal, professional-looking speaker system. Clothes were piled on a single chair, and the walls were bare except for a framed poster of a muscle car. The air was warm and carried the faint, clean scent of citrus soap underlaid by the deeper, muskier note of worn leather.
“Bathroom’s there if you need it,” Mateo said, toeing off his shoes. He went to the small kitchenette, filling a glass of water. “You want one?”
“Please.” Jamie stood just inside the door, taking it in. It was the opposite of his own carefully arranged studio. This was a space for function, not presentation. A pair of black leather shorts, still damp, were draped over the bedpost. He recognized them from the container.
Mateo handed him the water, their fingers brushing. “You can stay. If you want. I mean, it’s late. Or you can go. Either way.”
Jamie drank the water, watching Mateo over the rim of the glass. The offer was open, no pressure. It felt like a test, but a kinder one. “I’ll stay.”
Mateo nodded, a flicker of something like relief in his eyes. “Cool. I’m gonna grab a shower. You can take one after. Towels are under the sink.”
The bathroom was indeed small, the mirror still fogged from Mateo’s earlier shower. A half-empty bottle of massage oil sat on the counter. Jamie used the toilet, then washed his hands, the citrus soap sharp and bright. He looked at his reflection in the clearing mirror. His hair was a mess, his eyes were tired, but he looked… present.
When he came out, Mateo was in a pair of sweatpants, shirtless, scrolling through his phone on the bed. The sheets were dark grey. He looked up. “All yours.”
The shower was hot and good. Jamie let it pound on his shoulders, washing away the gym and the office and the lingering ghost of Kellan’s loft. He used Mateo’s soap, smelling like him, a fact that felt strangely intimate. When he emerged, steam billowing around him, he realized he had no clothes.
“Uh. Mateo?”
“Yeah?”
“I don’t… have anything to wear.”
A beat of silence. Then, “Bottom drawer. Left side. Help yourself.”
Jamie opened the drawer. It was full of soft, worn cotton. He pulled out a grey t-shirt and a pair of black boxer briefs. They were too big, the shirt hanging off one shoulder, the waistband of the briefs loose. He folded the cuffs of the shorts over once. He looked like a kid playing dress-up. He almost laughed.
He walked out, the fabric soft against his skin. Mateo looked over from where he was plugging his phone in to charge. A slow grin spread across his face. “You’re swimming in that.”
“You’re a giant,” Jamie retorted, climbing onto the bed. The mattress was firm, comfortable. He settled on his side, facing Mateo.
Mateo turned off the main light, leaving only the blue glow from a digital alarm clock. He slid under the sheets beside Jamie, his body a radiating line of heat. They lay there, not touching, in the quiet dark.
“Today was weird,” Jamie said into the stillness.
“Which part? The burrito or the part where you broke into my office?”
“Both. All of it.” Jamie shifted, wincing slightly as the movement tugged at sore muscles. “The part after the burrito was good, though.”
“Yeah.” Mateo’s voice was a low rumble. “It was.”
Silence settled again, comfortable this time. Jamie listened to Mateo’s breathing even out. His own body was exhausted, but his mind ticked over, processing the sharp pivot of the last twenty-four hours. He’d gone from being a convenient hole in a stranger’s loft to being here, in borrowed clothes, in a near-stranger’s bed, feeling more seen than he had in months. It didn’t make sense. It felt inevitable.
He must have fallen asleep, because the next thing he knew, the room was washed in the thin, grey light of pre-dawn. He was on his side, facing the wall. And he was acutely, immediately aware of a solid, heat along his back.
Mateo was pressed against him, his chest to Jamie’s spine, one heavy arm thrown over his waist. And Jamie could feel, unmistakably, the thick, insistent press of Mateo’s erection against the cleft of his ass, even through the layers of fabric.
A slow, familiar heat coiled in Jamie’s stomach. He stayed perfectly still, letting the sensation register. The soreness from the night before was still there, a deep, tender ache that seemed to pulse in time with his heartbeat. The idea of being touched there again was a mix of terror and sharp, blinding want.
Mateo stirred behind him, a deep, unconscious sound. His arm tightened, pulling Jamie closer. The pressure increased. Jamie bit his lip.
Mateo’s breathing changed. He was awake. Jamie could feel the moment he realized their position, the slight stiffening of his body. The arm around his waist didn’t move.
“Morning,” Mateo mumbled, his voice thick with sleep. His lips brushed the back of Jamie’s neck.
“Morning.” Jamie’s voice came out as a whisper.
Mateo shifted his hips, a slow, grinding roll that made Jamie gasp. “Sorry,” Mateo said, but he didn’t sound sorry. He sounded awake, and interested.
“It’s okay.”
“You’re sore,” Mateo stated, his hand sliding down from Jamie’s waist, palm splaying possessively over his lower belly.
“I am.”
Mateo kissed his shoulder blade, through the thin cotton of the borrowed shirt. “I know.”
Then, with a sudden, easy strength that still surprised Jamie, strong hands flipped him onto his stomach. The sheets were cool against his cheek. Mateo moved over him, his weight settling across Jamie’s thighs.
“What are you—” Jamie started, pushing up on his elbows.
A firm hand between his shoulder blades pressed him back down. Mateo’s voice was a low growl by his ear, warm and sleep-rough. “Breakfast first.”
Before Jamie could process the words, Mateo’s hands were on the loose waistband of the borrowed boxer briefs, tugging them down. The cool air hit his skin. Then Mateo’s hands were on him, broad and warm, spreading his cheeks apart.
Jamie buried his face in the pillow, a shudder running through him. This was different. This was possession of a different kind. It was slow. It was deliberate.
Mateo didn’t hesitate. He leaned down, and the first hot, wet swipe of his tongue made Jamie jolt, a broken sound punched from his lungs. It was an intimate, shocking violation, and it erased every thought in his head. Mateo laved over his tender, used hole with a focused, hungry patience, mapping the sensitive flesh with a thoroughness that was almost clinical in its dedication.
Jamie trembled, his fingers clutching the sheets. The soreness was still there, but Mateo’s tongue was softening it, warming it, transforming the ache into something else—a bright, sharp need. He moaned, pushing back against the pressure, wordlessly begging for more.
Mateo groaned in response, the vibration against Jamie’s skin sending a lightning bolt straight to his core. He obeyed the silent plea, his tongue pressing inside, fucking into him with shallow, relentless thrusts. It was wet and messy and profoundly obscene. Jamie could hear the slick, intimate sounds, could feel the scratch of Mateo’s stubble against his inner thighs.
“Mateo…” Jamie breathed, the name a plea and a prayer.
In answer, Mateo slid a hand under Jamie’s hip, lifting him, giving himself better access. He feasted, his mouth a hungry, demanding thing, until Jamie was shaking, reduced to a whimpering, pliant thing beneath him. The sensation built, a coiling tension entirely different from being fucked. It was tighter, brighter, more focused.
When Jamie came, it was with a shocked, silent intensity, his body seizing, spilling onto the sheets beneath him with barely a touch elsewhere. Mateo held him through it, his mouth never stopping, gentling now to soft, licking kisses as Jamie shuddered.
Finally, he pulled back. Jamie collapsed, boneless, into the mattress. He felt Mateo shift, move off the bed. He heard the bathroom door open, the sound of water running.
He returned with a warm, damp washcloth. He cleaned Jamie with the same practical tenderness as he had in the office, then flipped him over onto his back. Jamie looked up at him, bleary and spent. Mateo’s lips were swollen, his chin glistening. He looked utterly, feraly pleased with himself.
He climbed back into bed, pulling Jamie against him, skin to skin now. Jamie’s borrowed shirt was rucked up around his armpits. Mateo’s erection, still hard and insistent, pressed against Jamie’s thigh.
“You’re still…” Jamie murmured.
“I know,” Mateo said, kissing his forehead. “It’s fine. That was for you.”
The simplicity of the statement, the self-contained pleasure Mateo had taken in just doing that, shattered something final inside Jamie. He turned his face into Mateo’s neck. “You’re different, too.”
Mateo’s arms tightened around him. They lay there as the room grew brighter, the sounds of the city beginning to filter through the window. The leather shorts still hung on the bedpost, a relic from another life. The phone, silent on the charger, held a world of hollow invitations.
Here, in the tangled sheets smelling of sex and soap, Jamie felt no urge to reach for it. For the first time in a long time, the morning didn’t feel like an empty space to fill. It felt like something he was already inside of, something warm and real and quietly, terrifyingly promising.
The promise lingered in the warm, tangled sheets until Mateo’s alarm shattered it. He groaned, fumbling for his phone. “Work,” he mumbled, his voice gravel. He pressed a kiss to Jamie’s shoulder before swinging his legs out of bed.
Jamie watched him move through the dim room, the powerful lines of his back and shoulders. A part of him, small and quiet, wished he’d ask him to stay. Mateo just pulled on his gym clothes. “I’ll text you later,” he said, already mentally gone.
“Sure,” Jamie said.
The door clicked shut. The silence it left was different from Kellan’s. It wasn’t hollow. It was… waiting. Jamie lay there for a long time, the ghost of Mateo’s mouth still on his skin, a phantom brand. His body felt well-used, pleasantly sore. And yet, beneath the satisfaction, a familiar wire was humming, untouched. The deep, serrated hunger from before the office, before the burrito, had only been sedated, not slain.
He took his time getting home. The city felt too bright, too loud. His own apartment was a sterile exhibit. He showered, scrubbing away the scent of Mateo’s soap, of sex. He moisturised. He dressed in tight, black jeans and a soft grey top. He looked in the mirror. He looked perfect. He looked empty.
He picked up his phone.
The Grindr icon was a familiar siren on his screen. His thumb hovered. Mateo’s words echoed: I’m not a brick wall. This wasn’t about Mateo. This was about the noise in his own skull, a static only one kind of frequency could drown out. He tapped the icon.
The grid loaded, a mosaic of torsos and smiles and blank profiles. He ignored the “hey” and “what’s up” messages. His search was surgical. He filtered for “Top,” “Now,” and a distance radius of two miles. He needed it close, and he needed it immediate.
A profile blinked up: no face, just a torso ripped with hard muscle, shadows cutting across a defined abdomen. The bio was three words: Aggressive. Hosting. No BS.
Jamie’s breath hitched. His finger tapped the screen.
“Looking?” the message came back instantly.
“Yes. Now.” Jamie typed, his heart beginning to pound a different, darker rhythm.
“Pic?”
Jamie stood, faced his bedroom mirror, and took a picture. He angled the phone down, capturing the tight fit of his jeans, the slender line of his torso, the deliberate arch of his lower back. He sent it.
The response was a picture in return. A thick, heavy cock, uncut and intimidatingly erect, lying against a thigh. The message followed: “Can you take this?”
A cold, bright thrill shot through him. This was the weight he craved. The kind that left a mark. “Yes,” he typed.
“Address.” It wasn’t a question.
Jamie sent his location. He didn’t think about Mateo’s gentle cleanup in the office, or the careful way he’d held him afterward. He thought about the spiderweb cracks in Kellan’s wall, the sound of his own voice breaking. He needed that obliteration again. He needed to feel the world narrow to a single, brutal point.
He rearranged the pillows on his bed. He put a towel down. He waited by the window, watching the street. Every passing car made his stomach tighten.
His phone buzzed. “Outside.”
He buzzed the entrance open. He unlocked his apartment door, leaving it slightly ajar. He stood in the center of his living room, listening to the heavy footsteps ascending the stairs. They stopped outside his door.
The door pushed open. He was taller than his picture suggested, broader, with a blunt, handsome face and cold eyes. He looked Jamie up and down, his gaze impersonal, assessing. “You’re smaller in person.”
“I can handle it,” Jamie said, his voice steadier than he felt.
The man closed the door and locked it. The click was final. He didn’t touch Jamie. He just stared, a predator gauging its prey. “On the bed. On your knees. Face down.”
Jamie moved. The posture was submissive, but inside him, a fierce, dark excitement ignited. This was the script he understood. The man’s hands were on his waist, yanking the jeans and briefs down in one rough motion. There was no kiss, no tenderness, no warming touch.
He heard the tear of a foil packet, the sound of lubrication. Cold, wet pressure against his entrance. He was still tender from the night before, from the morning.
“Relax,” the man grunted, not as an encouragement, but as a command.
Jamie forced a breath out. The head pushed past the ring of muscle, a brutal, burning stretch. He cried out, his fingers clawing at the duvet.
The man didn’t stop. He shoved forward, burying himself to the hilt in one relentless, punishing thrust. The air left Jamie’s lungs in a pained gasp. It was exactly what he’d asked for. It was agony.
“Fuck,” the man breathed above him, beginning to move.
And he did. There was no rhythm, no build. It was a jackhammering, piston-driven fuck, each snap of his hips driving Jamie into the mattress. The bedframe slammed against the wall with a regular, brutal thud. Jamie’s world dissolved into pure sensation: the searing stretch, the impact, the smell of sweat and cheap cologne.
He turned his face to the side, his eyes unfocused. On his nightstand, his phone screen lit up. A notification. The preview text was visible.
Mateo: Thinking about breakfast…
The words blurred as another brutal thrust jarred his vision. A sound tore from his throat, something between a sob and a moan. The man above him growled, his pace increasing, chasing his own finish.
Jamie squeezed his eyes shut, chasing his. He focused on the pain, on the crude, mechanical friction, on the emptiness that was finally, finally being filled with a violence that felt like truth. The coil in his gut tightened, sparked.
His phone lit up again, another message, unseen.
The man’s thrusts became erratic, jagged. He grunted, a sharp, animal sound, and jammed himself as deep as he could go. Jamie felt the hot, flooding release inside him, a claiming without intimacy.
As quickly as it started, it was over. The man pulled out with a wet sound. Jamie heard him zip up. He didn’t touch Jamie again. He didn’t speak.
The door opened and closed.
Jamie lay on the towel, his body trembling, the sharp, acidic smell of sex and strangers filling his clean room. The physical ache was profound, a new layer over the old. He felt scraped raw.
His phone buzzed again on the nightstand. He didn’t move. He stared at the ceiling, waiting for the quiet to settle, for the static in his head to finally, blessedly clear.
It didn’t. It was louder than ever.
It was louder than ever. The silence in his apartment was a physical weight, and the phantom sensation of the man’s hands felt etched into his skin. His phone buzzed again on the nightstand, Mateo’s name glowing, a tiny beacon in the gloom.
Jamie didn’t reach for it. He stared at the ceiling, his breathing shallow. The sharp, animal smell of the encounter filled his pristine room, a stain on the air. His body throbbed with a deep, sick ache that felt like a judgment.
He slowly pushed himself up, wincing. The towel beneath him was damp. He balled it up, along with the fitted sheet, and shoved them into the hamper, a practiced ritual. In the bathroom, he avoided his own eyes in the mirror. The shower was scalding, needling his skin, but it couldn’t reach the cold, hollow space that had expanded inside his ribs.
He dressed in soft, loose sweatpants and a hoodie. He made tea and didn’t drink it. He sat on his clean, remade bed and watched the afternoon light crawl across the floor. His phone sat silent now. He had ignored three messages.
A dull restlessness began to pulse in time with the ache. The emptiness wasn’t satisfaction. It was a void, and it demanded to be filled. He picked up his phone, his thumb moving on its own. He opened the app.
The grid was a familiar constellation of want. He filtered, his criteria reflexive. Now. Hosting. Top. His profile was a blank space, a gray void. A message popped up, unsolicited. A torso, harder than Mateo’s, less defined than Kellan’s. The text was direct: “Hung. Can host.”
Jamie’s heart beat a thin, frantic rhythm against his sternum. His fingers were cold. He typed back, “How big?”
The response was a photo. It was obscene, grotesquely thick and long, a weapon. A follow-up message: “You can’t handle it.”
A hot wire of defiance snapped in Jamie’s chest. The soreness felt like a challenge. “Try me,” he typed. “Address.”
The cross-town bus ride was a blur of disconnected faces and street noise. He stared out the window, his forehead cool against the glass. The man’s building was a nondescript brownstone in a neighborhood that felt vaguely unsafe. The hallway smelled of mildew and stale grease.
The door opened on the first knock. He was older than his photo, his face weathered, his eyes a flat, chilly blue. He wore only gym shorts, his torso a landscape of sinewy muscle and faded tattoos. He looked Jamie up and down, a slow, appraising glance that felt like being priced.
“You’re the one,” the man stated, his voice a low rumble. It wasn’t a question. He stepped back, leaving the door open.
The apartment was dark, blinds drawn. A single floor lamp cast a sickly yellow light over a worn sofa and a large, flat-screen TV playing muted sports highlights. It was profoundly lonely.
“You sure about this, kid?” the man asked, not moving from the center of the room. His arms were crossed. “You look like a strong breeze would snap you.”
“I said try me,” Jamie repeated, his voice surprisingly steady. He kept his hood up, hiding his face. “You talk a lot for someone who’s just hosting.”
A faint, cold smile touched the man’s lips. “Alright.” He hooked his thumbs in the waistband of his shorts and pushed them down. His cock sprang free, heavy and already fully hard. It was as big as the picture promised, intimidating in its girth. “On your knees.”
Jamie obeyed, the coarse carpet biting into his skin through his sweatpants. The man stepped forward. He didn’t guide himself. He just waited. Jamie took a breath, the scent of clean sweat and cheap soap filling his nose, and leaned forward.
It was a struggle from the first second. The man was thick, almost painfully so. Jamie worked, using his hand and mouth, forcing himself to relax his jaw. The man watched the muted TV, one hand coming to rest heavily on the back of Jamie’s head. He didn’t thrust. He just let Jamie work, his silence more oppressive than any command.
When he was wet enough, the man tightened his grip in Jamie’s hair and pulled him off. “Turn around,” he grunted. “Bend over the couch.”
Jamie stood, his knees protesting. He toed off his shoes, pushed his sweatpants and briefs down to his ankles. He bent over the arm of the sofa, the coarse fabric scratching his cheek. He heard the tear of the foil packet, the slick sound of lubrication.
There was no preparation. The broad, cold head pressed against him. The man leaned over him, his body covering Jamie’s, one arm snaking around Jamie’s throat. He applied pressure, not quite cutting off his air, but claiming it.
“You wanted it hard,” the man breathed into his ear, his voice devoid of warmth. It was a statement of fact.
Then he pushed. The stretch was brutal, a searing, tearing invasion that forced a choked gasp from Jamie’s throat. The arm around his neck tightened slightly in response. He couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think, could only feel the impossible width filling him, splitting him open.
“Fuck,” Jamie managed to rasp, a sound of pure pain.
The man began to move. There was no rhythm, no technique. It was pure, punitive force. Each thrust was a short, violent slam that drove the air from Jamie’s lungs and sent a shockwave through his entire frame. The arm around his throat constricted further, the world beginning to tunnel into grey spots at the edges of his vision.
He was a thing being used, a vessel for a brutal, impersonal release. The man fucked him with a single-minded aggression, his breaths coming in sharp grunts near Jamie’s ear. The only sounds were the wet slap of skin, the creak of the sofa frame, and Jamie’s own stifled, airless whimpers.
The pressure in his head built, a dark, swirling buzz. The pain below was transforming, mutating into a sick, dizzying thrill. He was disappearing into it, the pressure on his throat and the relentless pounding below merging into a single, annihilating sensation.
“Harder,” Jamie gasped, the word barely audible.
The man obliged. His hips snapped forward with renewed ferocity, his grip on Jamie’s throat tightening to the edge of consciousness. Jamie’s vision swam, the grey spots blooming into black voids. He was nothing but a ragged breath and a ringing in his ears and the devastating, complete fullness.
The man’s rhythm broke. He shoved in deep, held there, and Jamie felt the hot, pulsing rush inside him. He came with a raw, guttural shout, his whole body shuddering against Jamie’s back. The arm around Jamie’s throat loosened, and Jamie dragged in a ragged, burning breath, coughing.
As quickly as it had begun, it was over. The man pulled out, stepping away. Jamie collapsed onto the sofa, his body trembling violently, sweat cooling on his skin. He heard the man zip up.
“Bathroom’s down the hall if you want to clean up,” the man said, his voice now completely neutral, as if commenting on the weather. He picked up the remote and turned up the volume on the TV.
Jamie pulled his clothes on with shaking hands. He didn’t look at the man again. He let himself out, the door closing softly behind him. The hallway light was blinding. He staggered to the stairwell and leaned against the wall, his legs unable to hold him.
His throat ached. His body felt profoundly violated, a ravaged landscape. He touched his neck, his fingers coming away damp with the man’s sweat. On the bus home, staring at his own ghostly reflection in the dark window, he felt the wet, hot trickle of the man’s release seeping into his sweatpants.
He didn’t feel clean. He didn’t feel used. He felt erased. The static in his head was finally, blessedly gone. In its place was a vast, silent white noise.