-1-

 

It was 4:30 PM.

Too early for Haley to be back from work.

Which told Luce his husband would either be in a good mood or ready to start a fight.

The front door clicks open and Luce pauses the cryptography lecture he’d been watching on Nova’s iPad. Business at Fallwater had been slow. Unless something crashed he didn’t have much to do except send out the hosting bills at the end of the month.

They’d gotten a massive influx of visitors to the Fallwater site during their brief moment of internet notoriety a month ago. His bandwith bill had nearly tripled but none of the traffic had transferred into clients. He’d  only lost clients because they were afraid their information was going to be exposed. A few others, like Grant Figueroa from the medical fetish directory, had ended their contract because of what had been described to him as "drama with Maverick".

Haley drops his messenger bag on the living room floor and stands in front of his armchair. “I don’t have a job anymore.”

His face breaks.

“Fucking bastards,” Luce growls. “We’re getting a lawyer. They can’t just fire you when you didn’t do anything.”

“I quit,” he admits quietly.

“Lex—”

“I had to. Natalie just lied—"

“Who is Natalie ?”

Haley frowns impatiently and Luce knows he’s forgotten someone he should know but his short term memory was getting worse.

“She’s my director of nursing,” Haley fills him in. “She called me in her office and said the state suspended my license and she was so fucking sympathetic about it.  She said she’d find a place for me.

But then, at lunch, I looked at the official suspension record and Natalie had submitted all the evidence. She and some asshole on the hospital board compiled all my minor mistakes from the last decade to make the complaint. Little stuff like when I had late paper work or asked doctors for pharmaceutical samples—it’s shit everyone does. Then they added in the neglect and child abuse accusations.

They just wanted me out because some of the donors and hospital board members didn’t like that I used to do porn. I went to confront her and she said I was being insubordinate…. and maybe I was. Do you remember she’s 15 years younger than me ?....I was just so pissed.

I'm  good at my job,  I trained half the fucking head nurses in that shithole of a  hospital system and I just… I said fuck it and quit…I got escorted out by security and everything.”

“You don't need that job.” Luce discards the iPad. “I can find a regular job or sell Fallwater and go back on disability… hell, I’ll take money from the girls—”

“I don’t want fucking handouts, Luce. I’ve worked for everything I needed since I was 14—”

“Even more of a reason why you deserve a break—”

“What the fuck is wrong with you ?,” he snaps. “I am not sitting around here all day doing nothing—”

“Fine. Let's find a lawyer and challenge the suspension—”

“I can’t challenge it. It’s already happened—”

“Well what the hell do you want, Lex ?” He says it louder than he means but he was tired of being yelled at for every little thing. “I don’t understand what you want.”

“Happy Cow Creamery.” Haley sniffs and brushes away a frustrated tear.

This makes Luce pause. “What ?”

“It’s an ice cream shop in Summerlin. It’s my favorite and expensive so I’ve always gone alone. Right now I want an ice cream sundae with my boys. That will make me happy right now. Do you think you can handle that ?”

He says the last part with a tinge of annoyance. Luce didn’t feel like making an unplanned trip  but he knew enough to know he didn’t have a choice.

“Ma went out.” His mother often walked out saying she’d be back and he never asked for details. “Nova’s at his Shakespeare thing until six.”

Haley scoffs, pulling his scrubs shirt and undershirt off in one  disdainful tug and letting them drop to the floor.  “He has one line. I think they’ll be fine if he misses one rehearsal. I need to hug my son.”

***

“I’m going to fucking kill your son!” Haley declares and slams the door of the minivan. Luce knew it was a bad sign when Haley had walked out of the Paradise Youth Theatre without Nova.

“What now?”

“His drama director looked at me like I was crazy and told me Nova only has rehearsal twice a week not three times a week.”

“He's probably with that Matthews’ kid—”

“Brixton is Hamlet. I saw him in there… He said he didn’t know where Nova was, apparently they aren’t ‘hanging out’ as much anymore so I guess they broke up…which good for him. Nova was going to ruin that poor boy’s life.”

“They were dating ?”

Luce never understood the dating rules they way Nova explained them. He always referred to Brixton as a friend and whenever they went anywhere other people were always invited.

As Haley calls Nova’s phone, Luce takes out his own phone to look at the app that told him where everyone else was. He expects to see Nova’s blue dot in Reno visiting Holland but it’s not.

“He’s at the mall,” Luce supplies.

“Which one?”

“The one in Prizm.”

“That little…He’s not at that mall, that mall sucks. He’s at the California border.”

“Why would he go there ?”

“Let’s think Luce, what can you buy legally  in California, that you can’t buy here ? Why is everyone fucking with me today!”

With little regard for the traffic, Haley pulls the minivan out of the parallel space and merges on to the highway.“I bet he’s with  Holland, she’s his only friend who can drive. Text them both that we know where they are and Nova has an hour to get his ass back to the condo and say goodbye his bedroom door.”

Luce uses his stylus and it takes him 30 minutes to send the message. Nova responds within five seconds.

It’s not what you think. Holland surprised me and we’re helping her younger cousin pick out a prom dress. Coming home now.Sorry.

Luce reads the text aloud but Haley seems disinterred as he pulls into the parking lot of an upscale grocery store. Luce never came this far out into the suburbs but he knew the area enough to know there wasn’t an ice cream shop nearby.

“Where are we ?”

“I just need to grab something.”

Haley  hops out of the van, leaving the keys in the ignition and shuddering air blowing. A creeping feeling of anxiety and hollowness creeps over Luce as he watches all of the people coming in and out of the grocery store. Their therapist told him he should takes steps to work on his social anxiety. 

He disagreed.  He had what he needed and it didn't include bing in public spaces that made him physically uncomfortable.

He does a double take at mixed age group sitting under an umbrella at an outdoor table. His former aide, Imogen, is sitting at the edge of the table in a taupe apron with the grocery store’s modernist logo on the front. Her brown curls pulled into a sensible low ponytail.

It couldn’t have been a coincidence.

Luce pushes his seat back as far as it would go, clumsily throws his body into the backseat and maneuvers into his wheelchair.  He pulls out the retractable cane from the wheelchair side pocket and uses the tip to press  the button on the dashboard that lets the ramp down so he could roll out.

Imogen’s eyes widen and then light up as he makes a direct line toward her.

“Luce ?” Her face breaks into a grin and quickly sweeps the area to confirm he was alone before hugging him. He doesn’t return the hug but let’s her do it.

He hadn’t always been attracted to her, but she’d grown on him. She was playful and good at small talk like Haley. She’d pushed him to try new things. He’d never describe it as love but it felt like a friendship. Like they’d respected each other.

But the way she’d talked about him online told him differently. It had hurt but he still wanted to believe the best in her.

“You never took that stuff down like you said you would,” Luce says. “Alex got his nursing license suspended…he lost his job today.”

Her hands fly to her mouth. “Oh, no. I’m sorry…God, I don’t know what to say.”

“He drove here. I think he’s looking—”

“He what?”

“There you are,” Haley spits walking towards them, a quiet rage underneath his words. “Are you happy, Imogen ? I can’t be a nurse anymore. I lost my license. Is that what you wanted?”

She takes a step away from Luce and looks to her co-workers having lunch at the table. “I don’t know what to say but I’m at work right now so--

“Oh, is fucking with people’s job bad now?” Haley retorts loudly and steps close to her. She backs up and hits the store's brick wall. “You lying fucking bitch. How much did you make off telling people I abuse my kid and husband ? Get your phone. Show me your bank account. Show me  how much you made off ruining my life.”

Her gaze shifts to Luce for help and Haley latches on to the gesture.

“Don’t look at him,” he snaps. “What the fuck did you want ? Did you want my husband ? What ? What? I have to know because this better have not all been because of how good he ate your pussy.”  

A tear falls from her face. She shudders and steps back. “All I did—”

“Don’t. I let you get away with so much. You fucking bitch. You’re a fucking bitch—”

Luce wraps an arm around Haley’s midsection to lead him away as people start crowding them. He’d never seen him this angry and it looked like it was going to get ugly. After a few steps Haley stops resisting but waves a middle finger in her direction and stomps back to the van.

“Are you proud of that ?,” Luce asks once they are out of the parking lot. 

Haley shakes his head. His hands still vibrating with rage. “She just gets away with this. Nobody cares anymore.”

“Fuck her. Let’s just get the ice cream, go home, get drunk. I’ll eat your pussy.”

Haley glares at him unamused. “I don’t want to get shitfaced.” He hits the steering wheel. “Fuck!…maybe Nova had the right idea. I want to smoke.”

“Okay.” Luce could do that too.

“I just lost my job, we're not buying weed.”

“You don’t have to buy it.”

He turns to Luce. “I told you to get rid of that shit.”

“You told me to get it out of the condo,” Luce points out opening the glove box and removing the false bottom.

***

-2-

Luce had always been under the impression Haley had never so much as smoked a cigarette. But he takes to rolling and smoking his first blunt almost too well.

They’d parked in the back of at a run down truck stop just outside of the California border, popped the trunk of the minivan and sat side by side in the trunk. He’d wordlessly split the first blunt with Luce, despite his usual insistence smoking could trigger another stroke.

Haley was half way through his second blunt when Luce realized it was time to call in a favor.

The favor appears as a hand smack  to the side of the car. “Hey, how much ?”

They both startle to see a well styled Maverick with a shit eating grin plastered on his face.

“$100 for mouth, $250 to fuck,” Haley responds easily and for some reason it makes Luce grin.

“Well, shit,” Maverick smirks. He takes the butt of the joint Haley offers him and takes one inhale before stomping it out on the asphalt.

“If you want me to be your whore I won’t be a cheap one.”

“Or a sober one ?”

“I’m fine,” Haley protests. “I can drive. Luce is just being…annoying.”

Maverick leans against the car and inclines his head towards the black SUV his roommate, Violet, had driven him here in. “Ready?”

“Did you bring me food ?,” Haley asks getting up on his knees. He’d been hungry since they’d finished the first joint but he didn’t want to go inside the truck stop.

“One salad.” Maverick lifts an arm to present a brown paper bag.

Haley balks and tosses him the minivan keys. “Are you trying to trigger my eating disorder?”

“Trust me, babe you’ll love this. Chinese chicken salad, extra chicken, extra ginger.”

Haley shrugs,  takes the bag and slinks back through the van’s trunk on his hands and knees to sit in passenger seat. The volume on the radio goes up and Britney Spears floods louder from the van’s speakers.

Maverick gives Luce a facial expression he can’t decode.

“Uh, he okay ?”

“He will be. Can we go to your place so he can air out a little ?”

“Sure,” Maverick inclines his head. “They always have cops at the border, I mean I doubt they’ll stop a minivan but---”

“I figured.” Luce had begrudgingly thrown the rest of his supply into one of the garbage cans. He had a prescription for cannabis pills that could hold him over until he could buy again.

Maverick enthusiastically takes the wheel of the minivan and they make it back across the border without a single glance from the police. Haley insists they play old episodes of Maverick’s podcast and he teases him about it as they drive.

Luce had never been to Maverick’s house. He’d spent his whole life in cities and there was something tranquil about the quiet desert town. The calming exterior didn’t prepare him for the chaos crammed inside. Maverick and Violet have to make a path for his wheelchair by tossing aside small mountains of shoes and Amazon boxes.

Violet offers him a Diet Coke he turns down but Haley takes it gleefully.“I should be fine to drive in an hour,” he says, clicking open the can and downing it

“So… what ?,” Maverick asks sitting at a kitchen table covered in open cereal boxes. “You were just going to beat that girl’s ass ?”

“I don’t want to talk about it. Wouldn’t want to bad talk Luce’s girlfriend.” Haley rolls his eyes. His flippancy stung Luce.

“I’m pissed at her too—”

“You fucking defended her, you pulled me away—"

“Because you were two seconds away from an assault charge and never getting your nursing license back.”

“Who do you think I am ? I was not going to hit her. I’m upset not stupid.” Haley say but he doesn’t sound confident. He pulls on Maverick’s hand and puts a coy finger to his mouth. “I need to lie down.”

Maverick gives Luce an apologetic look before letting Haley lead him up the stairs of his own house.

Luce turns to Violet who was absently wiping down the cluttered counter. He knew she was in her early thirties and worked a part-time remote job as well as her work with Maverick. She wasn’t his type, but likely fit the look of what most straight men wanted in a submissive.

 “I have to go film some stuff,” she says quietly. “But you can…”

 “Can you help me up the stairs ?”

 She nods and he instructs her on how to break down and fold the wheelchair so she can carry it upstairs. He was out of practice moving up stairs, the movement is pained and awkward.

Violet points to Maverick’s open door with a silent incline of her head before skipping back downstairs.

Luce finds Maverick and Haley fully clothed and tangled together on top of an unmade bed covered in mismatched blankets and  doe-eyed stuffed cartoon characters.

Haley was sobbing quietly into Maverick’s chest, Maverick’s hand ran absently through Haley’s ponytail as he placed soft kisses on his forehead. It was similar to what Luce had seen Haley do every time Nova got upset over some small injustice.

He’d often been oblivious to Haley’s unspoken emotional needs. It was the only thing he'd taken and wanted to work on  from their multiple, mind numbing attempts at couple’s therapy over the years. He'd been too busy trying to fix it like it was  a piece of code when what Haley needed was for him to comfort him.

His husband had  been shunned by the professional community he’d helped build and lost the career he’d worked so hard for. Luce remembered the endless days when Haley filmed at Virtue during the day, attended school in the evening and worked brothels at night. 

And he'd still found time for them as a couple.

Luce cautiously wheels to the bed and, thanks to the height of Maverick’s bed, is able to shift himself from the chair to the bed. The mattress was surprisingly firm. He sets a hand on Haley’s back.

“I love you,” Luce says, moving his palm in what he hopes are relaxing circles, “And no matter what, we’ll be okay.”

Haley doesn’t turn to look at him, he just  presses closer to Maverick. Luce glances over to see Haley’s lips were now moving against Maverick’s in a slow rhythm. It was a more heated and languid kiss than the usual quick pecks he’d witness them share.

Luce used to envy how easily Maverick and Haley flirted.  The first few years Haley was his, he’d created a one-sided nonexistent rivalry with Maverick. That baggage had disappeared decades ago. Maverick was the only person he trusted to dominate Haley the way Haley craved. But in all those sessions he’d never watched Maverick.

Now he focuses on his full lips, teasing grin and how his muscles strained as he forcibly held Haley at his hip to keep him close. It was subtly authoritative and sexy.

Maverick’s thick lashed brown eyes flick briefly up to Luce before going back to Haley. His voice pitches low. “Show me how you kiss hubby."

Haley turns to face Luce. His expression dreamlike--partially from the weed and partially from the control Maverick was now exerting over both of them. He loops his arms around Luce and bring him close as their lips connect.

Luce had never smelled another man on his husband. Maverick’s aftershave mixed with the blue indica kush and Haley’s sweet almond face cream overwhelms him. He attempts to gentle the kiss but Haley bites his lip and lets out a soft moan that sends all his blood rushing downwards.

Between Nova’s nightmares and his defective brain they’d barely had sex. His depression told him he didn't deserve to feel pleasure. 

“I’m going to fuck you.” The words fall from his mouth. Knowing his hand won’t fit down Haley’s tight jeans he cups his ass to bring their bodies close and grinds against his erection. “Take these off.”

Haley winces. “I haven’t had electrolysis in like--”

“I don’t care.”

Haley runs his hands through his now loose hair, tossing it back before pulling himself away. “I just need 10 minutes…I want to freshen up.”

“I don’t care,” Luce repeats but Haley ignores him. He stands, his clothing askew and walks on unsteady legs out the door.

Maverick  crawls over to the side of the bed Luce was occupying and he stiffens in shock when Maverick leans over his body like he was going to hug him. But Maverick just reaches across Luce’s body to pick up a handful of loose condoms from the nightstand drawer.

He sets them on the bed and starts sorting. “I’m not sure where this is going but…just in case. I think we’re the same size,” Maverick pulls a gold foil packet out and holds it like it was a paper football.

“I don’t think so.”

Maverick narrows his eyes. “Are you seriously going to act like you haven’t seen my dick ? I gave Haley a free membership to all my channels.”

“I don't watch it. You look at the camera and talk too much…I don’t understand that.”

Maverick sighs.

“There are literally thousands of hot guys on the internet. You have to connect with your audience so they pick your shit. Like, imagine if you had a favorite porn star, someone you really liked. Not only do you see them naked all the time, you also get to talk to them and control what they do.”

“I don’t have to imagine that.”

Maverick pinches his face in annoyance and makes a fake gagging noise. He tucks his hand into the waistband of his pants. “How about this. I’ll show you mine, you show me yours ?”

Luce nods.

Maverick chuckles to himself and tugs down his jeans and thong to reveal neatly waxed dark pubic hair and a heavily veined dick so perfectly shaped and thick it finally made sense to Luce why Maverick was still in porn. Luce felt a base need to touch it, or put it in his mouth or do something to see what Maverick looked like when he was hard.

“Show me yours?,” Maverick smiles. He slides down in the bed and rests his chin on his hands in anticipation.

 In that moment Luce would have killed for the body he’d had at Maverick’s age. He'd gotten back into decent shape with regular rehab visits but his body has been changed by his accident.

“You know that I—I…have a lot of scars…my body is different—and I don’t always stay hard, I usually take a pill—"

“Honey, 90% of my in-person clients are your age…I’ve seen it all,” Maverick says congenially. “Show me. I want to see. May I ?”

Luce felt a strong desire to wilt and surrender under Maverick’s warm gaze.

He nods and Maverick unzips his tacksuit jacket and rucks up his undershirt revealing shiny surgical scars and the feeding tube taped to his side. He relieves Luce of his jogging pants and boxers next.

Now that he was fully naked the muscle mass missing on his paralyzed side was stark.

Mavericks drags a black-painted fingertip around his manhood. Luce wanted him to be impressed by his size but Maverick seems almost bored as he plays with his half erection.

 “You always want a favor from me to make your boy happy, but you never really talked to me,” Maverick teases.  Luce doesn’t realize his mouth is hanging open until Maverick kisses him and his tongue ring’s bulbous head drags across the roof of his mouth. “You like to switch, right ? Will you be my sub for a little while ? Say ‘Yes, Maverick’”

Luce held on to his last bit of resistance for as long as he could.

“Yes, Maverick.”

Maverick grins approvingly.

“I know you want to fuck, Lex—I like that little name you call him so I’m stealing it—and I’ll let you get this beautiful dick in your beautiful boy. But we’re going to play first, okay ?”

“Yes, Maverick.”

Maverick’s capable hands travel up and down his body, Luce’s mind nearly goes blank just following the sensation.

“Good. Look at how hard your pretty cock gets when you say that, er, I guess I should say look at how hard my pretty cock gets. This is my cock until I decide you can have it back. Now, you have to talk to me, Luce Grace. I play music when I play with handsome subs. Tell me all about your five favorite albums and I’ll tell you if I’ll allow any of them.”

Luce thought about the last time he’d gone to a music store to buy a record.

“Permanent Record by A—”

“Aerosmith ? Uh-uh, baby. I wants something this decade.”

Luce is silent. He wasn’t even sure if young people knew what a record was these days. He'd lost a lot of his interests after the accident. “I haven’t bought an album since my accident.”

“What was the last one you bought then ? I know you know.”

He thought about it. “Future Sex Love Sound.”

“Justin, huh ?,” Maverick place a few drops of lube on his hands and starts pumping. Luce tries to keep his mind focused on following Maverick’s next question and not how good his hands felt. “Were you an NSYNC fan ?” He hated talking about himself to people other than Haley. Of all the things he had to put up with in his life, this made him uncomfortable.

“Jean and I took...Twyla to a concert…Twyla and…and um, Charlotte.”

His voice breaks on her name. He hadn’t said it yet.

“Oh, shit, babe,” Maverick says softly removing his hands. “I’m sorry. Shit, we need a safe word—”

“No. I’ll tell you. It’s fine. I just need a minute.”

“Yeah, if you’re good.”

Luce nods and Maverick gives him a closed mouth peck on the lips, he pulls away just as the tip of Luce’s tongue attempts to touch his mouth. Maverick brushes his lips on his cheek and then briefly presses their lips back together. It was a game to him; teasing kisses that made Luce desperate to finally capture his mouth in his.

The bedroom door shuts behind them and Luce turns to see Haley standing at the door. He gives them a curious look.

“What were you two talking about ?,” Haley mouth is turned up in a curious smile as he crawls across the bed to look at them.

Luce doesn’t answer right away and Maverick answers swiftly. “Just who gets to fuck your ass and who gets to fuck your mouth.”

***

-3-

The sound of Maverick cursing pulls Haley from the best sleep of his life. His  body was deliciously sore and for some reason he was wearing a piece of delicate millennial pink lingerie that felt expensive. 

He squints at the time on the cable box underneath Maverick's giant television.

7:18 PM

“Oh fuck!” He sits up quickly and his right arm is wrenched painfully backward. It was cuffed to the headboard with a metal D-ring. “Get this fucking off me, I have to go home!”

“Lex, wait,” Luce warns. He turns sharply to see Luce next to him in Maverick's bed. He was shirtless and had Maverick’s sticker covered laptop in his lap.  “I told Ma we used the MGM voucher from the honeymoon. She’ll look after Nova tonight. You can go back to sleep.”

Maverick, who smelled freshly showered and had changed into leather pants and a dark blue corseted vest that shrunk his waist to practically nothing, climbs on to the bed and unhooks the D-ring.

“Who’s clothes am I wearing ?” Haley grimaces. The lingerie was sexy but touched some very intimate places.

“It’s from a company that wanted to sponsor the girls,” Maverick explains. He sits on the edge of the bed. “Don’t tell Rox you can fit into a sample size because she will kill you. I thought it would look good on you… Luce said we shouldn’t stop having fun just because you passed out.”

Haley body tingled with the memories of how they'd spend the past hour. It has started with  impact play and light bondage. Then he'd been on all fours with Luce behind him and Maverick in his mouth. They'd edged him for over an hour and when he finally came, the orgasms, weed and Tylenol he'd taken earlier knocked him out. 

Haley runs a hand over his eyes and turns to Luce who had abandoned the laptop to press close to him, making the bruises on his body throb. Haley welcomes the touch and rests his head on Luce's chest. “I guess we should use that  hotel voucher for real. I’m sure they have a room open.”

“I was just telling Luce you can spend the night here,” Maverick shrugs. “I can sleep with Rox or in the filming room.”

“Oh no we couldn’t—” Haley starts.

“Look, we all know good and well part of the reason you lost your job is because of your association with me.” Maverick leans casually against Luce’s other shoulder. “It’s the literal least I can do.”

“You have all that back up medication and shit in the van,” Luce reminds him. “I’ll have everything I need.”

Maverick grins and Luce turns to  brushes his lips over his. Suddenly Haley knows why Luce, who never liked to go anywhere, was just fine spending the night with Maverick. They’d managed to have more sex in two hours in Maverick’s room than they’d had all year.

Haley picks up an oversized plush Pokémon that had likely witnessed some very new things,  and hugs it to himself as Maverick swings his legs over Luce's lap and they start making out. He shakes his head. “This is too soon.”

Luce turns to him and Maverick presses their cheeks together. “What?”

“This… seeing you two in a room together,” he explains and self-consciously fluffs out the Pokemon's ears. “I don't know...In my head I thought I’d retire in 12 years, take my pension, buy us a two bedroom bungalow in Florida and Maverick would come with us so we could be that scandalous house in the senior community that the neighbors whisper about.”

Maverick pulls his tongue out of Luce’s mouth long enough to interject. “Uh, maybe they think I’m your hot young renter?”

“The second bedroom is for Sara,” Haley explains. He was a little punch drunk from the afterglow but he had thought about their future after attending a retirement seminar last year.  “She'd have to live with us at that age.  Nova would be living in some big city following his dreams but he’d come down to spend the whole summer with us. Then he’d go away until another holiday.”

“If Nova had a job he wouldn’t get the whole summer off,” Luce says.

“Yes, he would. He’d have to. Don’t poke holes in this.”

“Hey, I’m in,” Maverick grins. “If I’m still single and retire when you retire, I’ll happily be your hot young third…ooh, I can be Luce’s sugar baby.”

“Do I get a say in any of this ?,” Luce asks. “Just because I want to fuck him doesn’t mean I want to wake up to him  everyday.”

“I don't see why your opinion matters,” Haley says and then his playful smile drops. “Besides, at this point when  I actually retire you’ll be too old and senile to have an opinion on anything.”

“Look, I don’t need the competition or anything,” Maverick hedges. He swings his legs off the bed. “But, you could probably make some serious money doing porn again right now.  I could manage you for a percentage off the top.”

“Fuck, no, my career is over,” Haley responds quickly and Maverick giggles. “I’m never doing anything on the internet ever again. I am done with porn—”

“Could have fooled me with the way you handled two dicks--”

Haley launches the Pokémon and few more stuffed animals in his direction for good measure but Maverick only laughs.

“Alright, loves well that was fun but… I have a live show I'm already late for,” Maverick sighs, fixing his hair in the mirror. “I’ll be back in an hour. We can talk about dinner.”

“You know you can’t talk about this on your live, right ?” Haley adds and Maverick put his hands up defensively.

“I got it. Lesson learned. Believe me.”

Maverick closes the door behind him and Haley sighs into Luce’s bare chest. Luce sets aside Maverick’s laptop, that was now running security updates, and lets his hands roam Haley’s body, squeezing and cupping his barely covered ass before slipping two fingers inside him.

“I love you,” Luce murmurs, dipping down to kiss him.

Haley sighs. “We can’t just have kinky sex every time we’re in a rough patch....it doesn’t make everything...magically better.” Despite his words he lets his hips rock against Luce's fingers.

“Didn’t one of those therapists say something about lack of intimacy ? You’ve been distant.”

“I was not,” Haley argues but he knows it’s not completely true. “I was just tired and stressed by that stupid social media stuff. I was afraid the worst was going to happen and—”

“Now it has,” Luce finishes. “That thing you said about Florida....We could move to Florida now…if you want—”

Haley balks, unsure if he is trying to make a joke. “Yeah, baby, let’s move to fucking Florida.”

“I looked up some stuff about your license while I was updating Maverick’s computer…your license is only suspended in Nevada, right ? You could get one from another state and be a nurse again.”

“I could,” Haley sighs. “Besides you’d be uncomfortable in a new place.”

“I’m uncomfortable with a lot of things….but I’d do it for you. Move. You said your job was important to you.”

“I don’t know. I--ah,” he sighs at the sudden pressure when Luce finding his prostate. “I think…we’ll be fine for a while. I’ll swallow my stupid pride and ask the girls for some help if it comes to it. I can't imagine what the pharmacu bill is going to be without insurance...I won’t let Nova starve or go without his meds—”

“Nobody is going without meds. We have options. You know that.”

“When you grow up the way I did that fear doesn’t leave you—”

“I won’t let that happen.”

For some reason that breaks Haley and the tears he’d throught he was done with come back. Luce makes a few failed attempts a kissing them away before their lips find each others. Haley bites nearly through the skin of his lip when he comes quietly into the lingerie's panties.

Luce pulls away suddenly. “What about New York ?”

“What ?” His must still be cloudy from the orgasm.

“What if you got a New York nursing license. It’s a walking license so you could use it in other states.”

A small creased formed between Haley’s eyebrows. “Am I still high or something?  I can't just move to New York.”

“We would all go.”

“And leave your family ?”

“Twyla and Colette are already in New York. Ma likes it on the East Coast, she’s only back here because of me...Mai's living in Japan and Atsumi’s moving to LA with El the minute she graduates in May which means Jean and Minnow are going to start traveling again. Everyone is gone. maybe it’s time we left too.”

“I did love that  trip to New York Pride…we had so much fun. Well, up until the end,” Haley recalls wistfully.

“Maybe Twyla and Colette will let us rent their duplex until we figure our shit out.”

Some of the panic coiled in Haley’s stomach releases. It had been years since he had a new start and a part of him wandered if he had one more left in him. Only this one wouldn't be alone. That made it all feel less scary. “Are you being serious ?”

Luce nods. “We’d make good money selling the condo building to one of those asshole developers. Pay off some of my medical debt,  restart Nova’s college fund and get that house in the suburbs you always wanted.”

The idea of selling the condo to become another generic mixed use space didn’t sit well with Haley but everything else made him excited. “You don’t know this but…I do look really good in a peacoat.”

---

A/N

Next chapter is the last one !