After the first week Adrian was back in town, everything went to shit. I’d been so good about keeping any fantasies at bay, beating them back with precision. Even the night in his suite, when he was drunk and adorable and barely hanging onto his inhibitions, I had stayed strong.

But it couldn’t last forever. I was me, after all, and being presented with the older, sexier version of my high school crush was bound to fuck me up.

My dumb ass should have known better. Adrian was wealthy, on a track to be a hotel heir, and busy as hell. He wasn’t open about his attraction to men—to himself or other people, as far as I could tell. It was easy to remember that when I was attending to his room, or when I watched as he came into the hotel with Maxine Farra, his family-approved date. And most importantly, doing anything with him could jeopardize my promotion. And I was done being held back in life from my own mistakes.

But none of this mattered when I was alone, at home, a week after visiting him in his suite.

That was when I had the first dream about him.

Everything felt just close enough to real. In the dream, we were at the hotel, and it was largely the same: the same stone and ivy, the same long corridors, the same gardens and lamps and fresh cedar smell.

But the difference was that there was no one else in the hotel but us. I was in the lobby, and Adrian had appeared nearby, taking my hand and leading me out to the back garden.

Outside, it was a crisp fall day, the leaves just beginning to change from green to gold and red, just as it was in real life. Adrian led me out to the garden, where he’d found me ten years ago, and we lay on the grass, watching the clouds pass overhead.

And when he looked at me in the dream, the cagey look in his eye was nowhere to be found. He looked at me as open as he had so long ago, with nothing holding him back, no expectations of what he should or shouldn’t be doing. When I reached out to brush my hand through his hair, he didn’t pull away or tell me that he didn’t do that sort of thing anymore—he just let me, and his hair was softer under my fingers than I’d even remembered.

“We shouldn’t,” I said softly, even as I moved closer toward him, pressing my body alongside his on the grass.

“You know we should,” was his reply. It sank into me, warming me from within like mulled wine on a cool day. Getting that from him—encouragement, instead of denial—was absolutely intoxicating.

And so I kissed him. His lips were so soft and warm against mine, and when he pulled my body over and on top of his, I knew it wasn’t just for experimentation or practice.

He wanted me. Really wanted me, in a way that he never could in real life.

And around then, even though I realized I must have been dreaming, I kept going anyway.

I wanted to have what I’d never have in reality. A version of Adrian that was open and unafraid, a version that saw me as more than just a strange old teenage memory, a little notch on his belt that he got along his way to finding a wife.

So I kissed him hard, feeling as his hand brushed along my chest, reaching down, gripping me tight against my ass. I could smell the faint scent of his expensive cologne, could feel like fine silk of his tie under my hand. He was murmuring my name against my skin and I knew that I belonged to him.

He was nothing like me, but he was mine at that moment. And as his lips wandered downward, kissing slow against my neck, it sent shivers through me, electricity pulsing down all the way to my cock, and when his hand reached down my pants and wrapped around me, I woke up.

I was lying in my own bed, it was dark, and I was harder than I’d been in recent memory. A dull light came through the small window, and I knew it must have been just before sunrise. I was hot under the sheets, and my heart was pounding.

The memory of the dream still stuck in every corner of my mind, an echo that I knew wouldn’t leave anytime soon.

It had been so real. For God’s sake, I’d noticed the same small freckle beneath his right eye that I had in real life, just a week ago, when I’d been in his suite.

I didn’t understand the dream. It’s not as if I wanted Adrian—I was well aware of my place as his employee, and his unavailability in every sense of the word.

No. The dream had clearly been some holdover from the high school days, a far-off memory imprinted with details from the past few weeks.

But… the memory of what it felt like to be on top of his body was still clear as could be. My cock ached under my sheets, and it wasn’t going away.

So I decided to forget about reality, for the moment. I closed my eyes lightly, letting myself half-slip into the dream state again, running my hand slowly down my stomach until it reached the base of my cock.

My mind did all the work for me, imagining that it was Adrian’s hand instead, that his fingers were now wrapping around the base, slowly moving until my cock was firmly in his hand.

And in my fantasy, I let myself feel wanted. It was something I didn’t feel much in general—it had been a shock long ago when Adrian had come and found me outside at the party, and it had been a shock this week when he’d invited me up to his room. It was intoxicating to imagine him stroking me like this, him wanting it just as much as me.

As I stroked myself, I let myself imagine his eyes, his lips. How had his kisses changed in the last decade? We’d both lived a whole life, since then. Would any of the quiet desperation still be there in his touch? Would he be firm and confident or yielding like he used to be?

My curiosity was growing at an alarming rate.

I wanted to learn what made him tick. Where he liked to be touched, and what made him come.

And, fuck, I wanted to come for him, too.

I moaned softly in bed, quickening my pace. And finally, I let myself picture it: the image of the two of us, naked in the bed in his suite, the bed that I made every morning for him. I pictured him sliding inside me, fucking me, confident and not hesitating for anything.

I pictured what it might feel like to be truly his, how wrong and impossible and perfect it felt, all at once.

Soon I was coming, imagining how his name might sound on my lips as he pumped inside me. I repeated his name like a mantra in my mind as I came harder than I had in months, spilling out over my hand and stomach.

It was intense, and as soon as I’d finished, a ball of emotion crashed over me, emotion that I didn’t want to deal with or think about at all. I pushed it away to the back of my mind.

That’s for future Josh to deal with.

The guilt still lingered like a haze around me as I cleaned up quickly afterward, though, filling the void created after I came.

I tried to sleep again. I didn’t have to be at work until much later—I was working the four o’clock to midnight shift tonight, and I wanted nothing more than to fall back asleep for another many hours.

But instead I lay there, watching as the light in the room turned from blue to gold, and the sun rose, blinding me as it came through the window, thinking only of Adrian.

When I got to the hotel that afternoon, I was quickly informed that Maxine Farra was visiting Adrian again this evening.

“She’ll be here in a few hours,” Mason said, urgency in his voice. We were in the housekeeping lounge. “We took care of Mr. Terrance’s room this morning, but he may need a freshen up before his date.”

I sighed as I slung my backpack into my locker. “God, Adrian really can’t make a move without everyone watching, can he?”

Mason looked up at me, slight confusion in his eyes. “He is our VIP. In a sense, he is the highest VIP we will ever host, considering he nearly owns the place.”

“Right. Of course,” I said. Mason’s intentions were innocent—he always just wanted to do the best job he could, and didn’t think about things like Adrian’s sex life in quite the same way I did, apparently.

I wished I didn’t have to know about it at all.

“Adrian has my work number,” I said. “If he needs anything, he will let me know.”

“Do go check on him beeforehand, though. Mr. Terrance—Adrian—doesn’t seem like the type to ask unless he is in dire need of something, don’t you agree?”

I paused, then finally nodded. “Yeah. I do agree.”

“Good,” Mason said. “So go check. He may need something that we don’t even know about.”

After making my start-of-shift rounds, I headed up the elevator to Adrian’s suite. It was such a routine at this point that it felt like my sole purpose at the hotel: Check in with the VIP. Make sure the VIP has what he needs. Has everything been confirmed with the VIP? One of these days I was certain that I would accidentally call Adrian “VIP” to his face instead of using his name.

I knocked on his door and when he answered, he’d clearly been getting ready for the evening. He smelled clean and fresh, and the top three buttons of his shirt were still undone.

And like a smack to the face, every memory of my dream this morning came rushing back to me. I had dreamed of that freckle on his cheek, of those honey-brown eyes, of those lips moving over my body.

“Hi, Josh,” he said, blinking. “What is it?”

I tried to shake myself out of my potent memories of this morning.

“Oh,” I said, “Mason let me know you’re having your… guest over again tonight, and wanted me to check in with you.”

“Jesus, how does Mason find out about these things?” Adrian said, shaking his head. “Um, no. I don’t think there’s anything I need at the moment.” There was a tension in his face, and I realized that he must be nervous for his date.

I nodded quickly. “Okay. Well, have fun—”

“Well, I guess I could ask you one thing,” Adrian said, waving me inside the suite. It smelled incredible inside, and I saw that he was burning a candle near the windowsill.

As soon as the door to the suite was shut, he started unbuttoning his shirt. My eyes flew wide, watching as he pulled it off, walking shirtless to his bedroom and back out again. His skin was golden, the muscles underneath firm and utterly goddamn perfect.

“Do you think that white shirt looked better, or… this one?”

He tugged a deep green shirt over his head, and I couldn’t look away as his chest and abdominal muscles flexed and moved in the process. If I didn’t know Adrian, I would have thought he was tantalizing me on purpose, but I knew it wasn’t the case. The shirt hugged his lean muscles in a way that somehow looked even better than how he had looked shirtless.

“I—uh—I like this one,” I said softly. “It’s great. Really.”

He nodded, looking in the full-length mirror at the side of the room. “I thought so too,” he said. “The white collared one looked kind of like I worked in a restaurant.” He let out a long sigh, chewing the inside of his cheek, preoccupied.

It was more than a little adorable. It was strange to get this inside look at his life, even though I was still just his employee, someone he barely knew.

It felt like he must have trusted me, in some way. And even though I’d done nothing to deserve it, I liked that.

Maybe I could have this. Maybe I could be his friend, his confidante, someone who could help him along the way. I’d never actually have Adrian in the way I wanted, but maybe this would be enough.

“Thank you so much, Josh,” Adrian said, and suddenly, he leaned in to give me a quick hug. “You’re a lifesaver,” he said, close to my ear. Fucking hell, his body felt good near mine. It was stupidly unfair.

I smiled politely at him as he leaned back. “You’ll do great,” I said, before turning to leave the suite.

Throughout the rest of the night, I tried to keep busy with mindless tasks. Plenty of guests called for extra towels and toiletries, and one guest had me come clean up a mess that his pet ferret had made. For a while, I was able to keep my mind off of Adrian and his date.

But around nine o’clock, I got a call and immediately I saw the name on the caller ID: VIP.

“Josh?” Adrian said as soon as I answered. “Listen—I’m sorry to be a bother—but is there any chance you could do me a huge favor?”

“Anything,” I said.

“Firstly, could you bring up a couple more wine glasses and some more filters for the coffee maker? I’m so sorry.”

There was a hint of desperation in his voice, like he was nervous about the night ahead of him. Perhaps nervous hope that he would hit it off with Maxine.

I switched my phone to my other ear. “Yes. I can do that,” I said.

“I’m so sorry,” he repeated.

“It’s my job, Adrian. You don’t have to apologize.”

“Well… the other request isn’t quite as simple.”

“What is it you need?”

“...Is there any way you could find me a copy of Casablanca?”

I paused. “You mean the movie?”

“Yeah. It’s not available on-demand here, and I don’t have a cord to plug my computer in to the TV, and… I just need a copy of it. If you could find one.”

“Of course. Sure thing.”

“If Mason hadn’t gone home already, I would have asked him about the movie. I’m sor—”

“You’ve got to stop apologizing,” I said. “I’ll be up as soon as I can.”

We hung up, and I collected myself.

It was fine. I could see exactly what was going on here. He wanted to watch a romantic movie with her, make cocktails as they cozied up together, and then be prepared with coffee in the morning, fresh and hot for Maxine.

Adrian Terrance was a gentleman, after all.

As I shrugged on my jacket and texted the other on-duty staff to let them know I had to step out for a few minutes, I found myself growing angry.

I didn’t like that I had this strange insight into Adrian’s personal life. It felt gross, unwarranted, and kind of creepy. It was clear that Adrian didn’t feel the same way—in fact, it seemed like I was just a member of his staff, and he was using me to do the job I was paid for.

But I felt like I knew too much. More than I wanted to know.

Luckily, I knew exactly where to find a DVD of Casablanca: a copy of it was sitting on my coffee table at home, nestled in a stack of six other movies I’d borrowed from the library the other day. I’d been on an old movies kick for almost a month now, and I’d watched The Maltese Falcon and Casablanca just this week.

I half-walked, half-ran the sixteen blocks back to my apartment. It was a Friday night, and the streets of the city were packed with people going on dates of their own. The air was crisp and the night felt alive in a way I would have loved years ago. The fall air used to make me think of new beginnings and new opportunities, but now, it just felt like another night at work.

I got to my place in record time, and ran up the flights of stairs. When I swung open the front door to the apartment, I saw that my roommates, Vanessa and Ethan, were gathered around the kitchen counter, surrounded by the biggest mess of dirty dishes I had ever seen.

“Josh, you’re already off work?” Vanessa said, tossing back her hair. It was dyed green and blue this week, but I was sure it would be pink by next. Vanessa called her hair her blank canvas.

“Not quite. I had to stop by here to grab something for work,” I said, looking over at Ethan’s hands, which were covered in raw dough all the way up to his elbows. “What exactly are you guys… doing?”

“Well, we found a recipe on Pinterest,” Ethan said, glancing around the kitchen.

“A collection of recipes, really,” Vanessa added.

“The first one was supposed to be black forest cake, and it tasted something similar to hot rubber mixed with sand,” Ethan said. “The second one was a little better.”

“It was a recipe for brownies with black beans in it,” Vanessa said.

“It was vegan,” Ethan added.

Vanessa shook her head. “Mistakes were made.”

“I’m sorry, guys,” I said, biting back a smile.

“It’s okay. We’re making chocolate peppermint focaccia now. Vanessa wants to dye it green, no surprise there.”

“Oh, shut up,” she said.

“Isn’t focaccia bread supposed to be… savory? How are you going to make it with chocolate?” I asked.

They both shrugged at me in unison. “It’s popular on Pinterest,” Vanessa said, and the two of them dove back into cooking.

This was more or less how my roommates operated. They’d been friends for years, and in all of their free time, they devised harebrained projects to delve into. It kept them out of my hair, though, and I was continually grateful for that.

I crossed over to the living room, shuffling through my DVDs for Casablanca. I stuffed a few DVDs in my jacket, wished Vanessa and Ethan good luck, and got on my way back to the hotel. I swung by the housekeeping lounge again when I got back, grabbing wine glasses and coffee filters, and then made my way up to Adrian’s suite.

I took a deep breath before knocking on his door.

When he answered the door, it was pretty much as I expected: I could see that he had multiple candles lit, and Adrian was already shirtless, his taut abdominal muscles on display again. I heard the sound of the bath running in the background as he greeted me.

This really was too private for me to see.

“Here,” I said, holding out the kitchen items first.

“Josh. You are a lifesaver,” he said, shaking his head.

“Don’t you already have your fancy wine glasses? The kind you said are better than the hotel has?”

“Maxine broke them,” he said, keeping his voice low. “It was an honest mistake. She… didn’t see them when she was putting her purse on the table.”

“I’m sorry to hear that,” I replied. After shrugging, he took the glasses and filters and ran back to place them on a table before coming back to the doorway. I held out the DVDs and he looked down, his eyes wide.

“You found all of these?”

I nodded. “Had them lying around at my place. I threw in The Maltese Falcon, and also one I haven’t watched yet—Night Train to Munich—but it’s supposed to be a good old romantic thriller, too.”

“Josh, you’re too much,” Adrian said, looking from the DVDs back up to me. Behind him, I glimpsed Maxine, walking out of his bedroom in a robe. I tore my eyes away right as Adrian leaned forward to give me a tight hug.

“My lifesaver,” he said close to my ear, and as he pulled away, he pressed a small kiss to my cheek. It was a shock, a gesture I hadn’t expected at all, certainly not now.

But to him, it was probably just a common thing.

“No problem,” I said. “Enjoy.”

I took off down the hallway, hearing his door click shut behind me as I walked away. God damn. Why had it felt like such a spike to the heart to see Maxine there with him? A thousand thoughts ran through my mind as I waited for the elevator, one of them clawing its way to the forefront.

Maybe it’s time to ask Mason to assign someone else to the VIP.

But when Grace retired, I wanted that promotion more than anything. And asking to be moved away from the new owner of the hotel was a surefire way to jeopardize that promotion. Sure, Adrian tried to be nice, and I was sure he would never treat me like his parents did, but there was no question that he would wonder why I didn’t want to associate with him.

No. I just had to do my job, and deal with the up-close look at Adrian’s life it gave me.

When I got back to my apartment later that night, I found Vanessa and Ethan relaxing on the couch. I slumped down in the chair nearby, sighing.

“Bad night?” Vanessa asked. She was in her sweatpants now, but they were still in vibrant Vanessa style, checkered in bright purple and blue.

“Yeah,” I replied, glancing over at the old horror movie they had on TV. “Not the best.”

“Aww,” Vanessa said, leaning over and giving my arm a quick squeeze. “What happened?”

I shook my head. “It’s just… there’s a guest staying at the hotel who’s… hard to deal with.”

“Oh shit,” Ethan said, turning to me. “Rich dickhead?”

“Nothing like that,” I said. “Rich, sure. But not a dickhead. Just… someone who reminds me of who I used to be. Way back in the day, before all the drugs and sex and the art world.”

“Someone from, like, high school, you mean?” Vanessa asked. The two of them knew all about my past, and that the last time I’d been truly clean was in high school.

I nodded.

“Is that a bad thing?” Ethan asked.

I paused a moment, watching the cartoonish monster on TV. “I guess it’s not a bad thing in itself. Maybe it’s a good thing, actually. He’s just… someone who made me feel special, back in high school. And tonight he’s with someone else. A woman.”

“Ohh,” they both said, nodding.

“Bummer,” Vanessa added.

Ethan shook his head. “Hate it when they’re straight.”

“I didn’t even… think he was straight, either,” I said. “But apparently he is. Or he’s trying to be. I don’t know. I shouldn’t even be thinking about this person, for a million fucking reasons.”

“Well, if he’s straight, then just don’t bother,” Vanessa said. “Why do you always fall for the unavailable ones, Josh?” she asked, picking up a throw pillow and launching it over at me. It hit me in the stomach, and I glared at her.

“I do not. And what the hell is this on TV, anyway? Why are you watching this shitty movie?” I asked, tossing the pillow back at Vanessa.

“Shut up! It’s great,” she said, reaching over to the remote and turning up the volume. “We’re preparing for Halloween.”

“You know Halloween is still many weeks away, right?”

“It’s never too early to watch Death Bed: the Bed that Eats.”

I rolled my eyes, getting up off the chair. “I’m going to bed. Have fun, guys.”

“Love ya, Josh,” Vanessa called after me, and I gave her a wave as I crossed over to my room.

As I collapsed into bed, my mind was still swimming.

I hadn’t realized it before, but Adrian’s return really was a subtle reminder of the life I used to have. In high school, everything had been so simple. It was before I’d discovered drugs, discovered casual sex, grown jaded and hardened to the world.

Back then, I’d just been a nerdy outsider who loved painting. That’s who I’d been when Adrian first came up to me, when he first picked me out of a crowd and made me feel like I was someone worth talking to.

I still remembered with stunning clarity how I had felt that night. Adrian had made me feel special. The moon, the grass underneath us, the ghost of wine on our lips as we kissed… it was better than any drug I’d ever done since, and I didn’t know if I was capable of feeling that way anymore.

But when he’d invited me up to his suite last week—me, instead of other workers, me, for no reason other than a high school memory—I’d had a glimpse of that feeling again. Adrian taking interest in me now felt just as strange and wonderful as it had back then.

Because at the heart of it, he knew who I was. He had seen me before the world had its way with me, and that was the only Josh he remembered. Not like all the other people who’d known me, people who just remembered me as Josh the Hookup, Josh the Guy with the Pills, or Josh the Burnout Loser.

I wasn’t any of those things to Adrian, and it felt better than it should have. Made me realize how long it had been since I had felt anything close to a true connection with someone.

I still felt one with him. And it was a shocking slap in the face.

So when I saw where his focus really was—on finding a girlfriend, who could then be a wife, who could then complete the life that was planned out for him—it felt like finally coming up for air only to be pushed back down under the water again.

Everything had been easier before he had come home. I’d forgotten about him, and now it just felt like an ancient wound had been ripped back open for no reason.

By the time I started falling asleep, it was late enough that the crowds on the streets had thinned out, and the only ambient sounds from the street were the occasional cricket and car driving by. I stared out at the outline of a big tree through the window, watching as the leaves blew off one by one in the wind. I thought of another fall, ten years ago, when I’d also been telling myself every reason why it had been stupid to have any hope about Adrian Terrance.

Back then, I had a future full of art and college and new boys to distract me.

But tonight, all I had was my tiny apartment, and the memory of his lips on my cheek.