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Once I’m confident that I’m alone, I open the app again to take a closer look at the request.

My mouth waters at what this sub is asking for. It’s hot, and making this video is absolutely going to leave us both satisfied.

There’s just one teensy issue. Fortunately, I’m a problem solver, and this is a problem I know exactly how to take care of. I click ‘Accept’ and start walking across the parking lot, away from the motel and away from my room.

It’s almost midnight, and outside of the few dim streetlights and the distant red and green neon sign of The Hatch a few blocks away, Silver Street feels like a ghost town. It’s complete with a smattering of boarded-up buildings like the movie theatre I still remember going to as a kid to watch scary movies, which is oddly fitting given its current state. Although that’s not what has me concerned. It’s the one flickering floodlight illuminating the storage lot next to the garage that has me realizing I might have a bigger problem—I need something from my van, and Sly must have parked it inside the garage. Part of me feels a sense of comfort knowing that he’s keeping it safe and secure inside. The other part is annoyed because this sub specifically requested Octavius.

Two weeks ago, when I realized I was being dropped off at Second Place Auto, I frantically rushed to grab my weighted blanket, some clean clothes, and whatever else I thought I’d need and toss it all into my duffel bag as fast as I could to limit my interaction with Sly.

I’m not a size queen, but Octavius isn’t exactly a small boy, and he wasn’t high on the list to get into the lifeboat that night. So now, I need to rescue my favorite coworker and clock in.

Thankfully, I’ve snuck into this garage so many times, so I know exactly how to get in. As teenagers, Sly and I would sneak in when we wanted a place we could get away from the rest of his family. Normally, that meant using the couch in the garage’s office as our make out spot. Other times, it’s where we escaped to stay up late and talk about our dreams for the future.

Either way, the window we would sneak in through was never locked because it was impossible to open if you didn’t know exactly how to jimmy it just the right way. This time, I realize it’s a little bit harder to climb up without Sly helping me like he used to. Maybe some harmless mischief tonight, on top of my plans for later, will finally help burn off all this restless energy.

I struggle through the opening, dragging myself over the brick windowsill, realizing that I’m not as flexible as I once was. I make it into the garage’s office, which still looks like it did ten years ago. I flip on one of the lights in the garage. As I expected, my van is parked in the bay all the way at the end, next to Sly’s car. If I close my eyes, I can still picture Sly when his dad handed him the keys. I try to ignore all the nostalgic feelings that mental image brings me. Seeing that car now, next to my van, is somehow so bittersweet, but cosmically fitting. Sly has devoted his life to helping his family business in our hometown, while I’m the attachment-free nomad that I was always meant to be. Our choice in vehicles couldn’t embody that more.

Walking past his car, I unlock the door to my van with the physical key so the horn doesn’t chirp. The door quietly slides open after I press the button for the automatic opener, and I climb inside.

Standing inside my van for the first time in two weeks feels a little surreal. It may not seem like a long time apart, but suddenly the inside feels very small and cramped, compared to the motel suite. As cramped as it may be, it still feels like coming home—because it is. That’s why it takes me no time at all to find exactly what I came for. I rummage through the cabinets and grab a couple more things since I’m already here, and hop out, pressing the button again for the automatic door to close. As I turn around, I’m met with a wall of resistance when I face-plant into an immovable object that was definitely not there a few minutes ago.

“What the fuck?” I blurt out, except it’s muffled by whatever my face is buried in. I nearly jump out of my skin when I step back and look up to realize that I didn’t bump into a what, but a who.

Squealing, my hands fly up in surprise, sending my bag up in the air. My moment of panic starts to subside, realizing it’s not a crazed serial killer or lunatic, but my ex-boyfriend and love of my life, looking at me with an amused grin.

That relief is short-lived. I watch on in horror as Octavius flies out of his bag and through the air.

In the dimly lit garage, his little rows of suction cups glow, and a very small part of me wants to laugh because I’m right—he looks so cool. The rest of me is caught in a tug-of-war between mortification and panic at the realization that Sly just caught me sneaking into the shop to grab my dildo, which is now about to land on the hood of his freshly washed car.

He follows my eyes as the toy does exactly that—with a dull thud, the suction cup base lands squarely on the hood—making the glowing tentacle sit perfectly upright.

Sly tilts his head and looks at it.

“Huh,” he huffs, eyeing the wobbling tentacle. “Really stuck the landing there, Octavius.”

I want to shrink away or crawl into my van. This was supposed to be a simple in-and-out extraction mission, not⁠—

Octavius.

Am I hearing things, or did he just say that out loud? There’s no way he knows my favorite coworker’s name. He can’t know.

“Octavius?” I let out a nervous laugh and try to play this off. “Good one. I see what you did there. Did you just come up with that yourself?”

He shakes his head and turns toward me, folding his arms over his broad chest. Between his black T-shirt and yet another pair of sweats, he looks like he just rolled out of bed. “Do you want to tell me what you and Octavius are doing here in the middle of the night, Black Sheep Bunni?”

Fuck. No. No, no, no.

That one name confirms it—he knows. It feels like the air has been sucked out of my lungs. His eyes stay focused on me.

He steps toward me, and I turn away from him, leaning against his car. I can’t look him in the eye. I don’t know how he knows about this.

Outside of Grace, no one in my life knows that this is how I make a living. I’ve never been ashamed of what I do or the career I’ve built, but that doesn’t mean I want everyone to know about it either. From a personal safety and security standpoint, to not wanting to feel like I’m being judged, to simply not wanting to have to explain my choices, I maintain that separation of my personal and professional lives.

Even with my back to him, I feel his eyes on me. I don’t know if he thinks this is funny, or maybe he thinks less of me, but the sense of panic I’m feeling tells me something even worse. As much as I don’t want it to be the case, his opinion still clearly matters to me, and I hate that.

“So, what is this?” I ask, throwing my hands up in exasperation. “Did you come down here to give me shit for what I do because you know my secret? Or are you here to tell me you’re glad you broke up with me because you would never have approved? Because spoiler alert, Sly—just like that kiss at the bar, your opinion doesn’t matter because I still hate you for dumping me when I needed you to be there for me.”

The way those words flowed right out of me almost startles me more than Sly did by finding me down here. I don’t know if I’ve ever consciously thought of those particular sentiments, but clearly, they were lurking under the surface if they came so easily.