by Max Walker
He smelled great. Like pine woods and lavender fields and rose petals. I got an even bigger whiff when I leaned in and stole a kiss, his eyes opening wide before I shut mine.
“Hey,” I replied, sitting back in my seat, leaving a slightly dumbstruck look across Sam’s face. He adjusted his glasses before fumbling with the seat belt. He swallowed loudly and appeared to be sinking farther and farther into the bucket seat, as if the red leather had been replaced with quicksand.
He’s not wearing a belt.
“You okay?” I asked, a smirk still playing across my face as I started to drive.
“Yup. Yeah, doing great. It’s just not every day I get picked up in a Corvette and kissed by, well, in gaming terms, I guess you’d be like the final boss. The impossible catch.”
“Don’t worry, there’s nothing impossible about me.”
“I beg to differ.” He looked over the thick rim of his glasses, his eyes catching the light of some passing streetlamps. With all this talk about me being impossible, it was really Sam who felt like the unreal one. “So what’s on the schedule for tonight?”
“The stand-up tickets fell through. I’ve got us a table at Oceanside Luna instead. Ever had it?”
“Are you joking right now? Of course I’d never had it, but I’ve seen all the Insta-posts with everyone who was lucky enough to get reservations. Holy crap. And the news said they were booked for the rest of the year.” He huffed and, almost to himself, said, “You really are the final boss.”
We chatted about nonsense the rest of the drive. Normally I didn’t like idle chitchat, preferring to sit in silence over discussing whatever had been trending last. But with Sam, as I had quickly come to find out, everything was the opposite. Expectations were turned on their heads. I found myself actively enjoying our conversation about the last big pop star scandal, laughing with Sam as we made silly jokes and effortlessly fell into another conversation about politics, a territory that could have potentially been dangerous, but not with Sam.
As I pulled up to the valet, we were chatting about Sam’s love for bad reality TV shows.
“I swear,” Sam said as he got out of the car, thanking the valet, “if you haven’t seen Bad Girls Club, then I don’t think this is going to work.”
I snorted. “I actually have seen that one. I had a client who was on the show. I got curious.” My brows rose and I shook my head. “That shit was crazy.”
Sam laughed, the sound cutting straight through the loud din of South Beach.
The restaurant was at the top of one of the tallest hotels in Miami Beach, with views that apparently rivaled anything else on this side of the world. The hotel was a modern marvel of sharp lines and bright lights, a row of soft blue lights leading up to the entrance and an army of tall palm trees on either side of the ramp that led up to the valet. There was a stone waterfall with the water streaming down over a neon-pink flamingo, the color popping through some of the white and frothing water. All around us were beachgoers, some walking up with their luggage to check in to the hotel, others walking past and loudly talking about the exclusive rooftop restaurant they were dying to go to.
The lobby of the hotel was just as elegant and modern as the outside, while still attracting a youthful vibe, with bright pops of neon and eye-catching art installations. There was a colorful “balloon elephant” sculpture next to the check-in desk, its trunk seemingly waving to us as we walked past to the elevator bays. Sam was wide-eyed the entire time, taking in everything around us.
It gave me time to take him in. Drink him like an aged red. His hair, still cut short, was styled slightly different tonight, a little more tamed. His glasses looked different, too. They were spotless and framed his face well, drawing attention to his bright and friendly eyes. He wore a pair of gray pants that clung to his form in a way that made me thirsty for a gallon of water. He wasn’t skinny, and he wasn’t thick; he was perfect for me, his legs looking like they’d fit just right wrapped around my waist. And that ass of his. I kept stealing glances, even as we rode the packed elevator up to the top floor of the hotel, not caring that the mirrored walls could potentially give me away.
Fuck it.
“After you,” I said as the door opened onto a breezy outdoor patio, palm trees growing up toward the sky, thick leaves rustling in the wind.
“This is nuts.” Sam looked around. I peeled my eyes off him, agreeing that the restaurant was pretty nuts. It was an open-air restaurant, so we could look up and count the couple of stars breaking through all the light pollution, the edge of the floor surrounded by tall glass walls, seemingly invisible when looked at from the right angle. The tables were set in a circle, allowing for each diner to have an infinite view of the city and the beach.
The hostess led us to our table, sitting underneath a palm tree and looking out to the tall and lit-up Downtown. Miami’s skyline had really transformed in the past years, and this view was just as breathtaking as a view of the ocean. The bay cut across and underneath the three bridges that connected Miami Beach to Downtown, the bridges alternating in color between blues, greens, and pinks.
Sam wasn’t admiring the view like I thought he would. He had his eyes turned down to the menu with a laser kind of focus. He looked a little pale even though the lights were casting a warm glow on us.
“You okay?” I asked as we settled into the comfortable white seats.
“Yup, mhmm, just looking at this really great menu. Whoever designed these, wow, they did a great job. Really great.”
He wasn’t moving, not even his eyes. As if he was sca… Ah fuck.
“You’re scared of heights.”
“You know. Funny story. I… well, yeah, maybe. I’ve never been higher up than my aunt’s condo, and hers is on the eighth floor. How high up are we again?”
“Just don’t think about it.” I wasn’t about to remind Sam that we were currently fifty-five floors aboveground. “Shit, sorry. I should have asked before making the reservations.”
“No, don’t even stress it. I would have said yes anyway. Before this moment, I for sure thought I wasn’t the ‘scared of heights’ type. Ha. Guess you should actually experience some heights before figuring out if you’re scared or not.”
I reached across the small circular table, making sure not to knock over the vase holding the three white roses. “Let’s go.”
Sam tore his eyes off the menu, latching them onto mine. “No. It’s fine, trust me. I just have to get over it.” He peeked to his side before snapping his eyes shut and taking a deep breath. “Wow, okay. That’s a lot to get over.”
The waitress came by then. “Thank you,” I said as she filled up our water glasses. “We’ll actually be heading out now, I’m sorry. My date isn’t feeling too well.”
Sam’s eyebrows shot up. “No, no, I’m fine. Sorry, can you just get me a glass of wine.”
“Do you have any preferences?” she asked, motioning toward the wine menu.
“Just wine. Any wine. Strong wine, preferably.”
She smiled an “I got you” smile and turned to me. “For you, sir?”
“Let’s do a bottle of the ’97 Lost Valley.”
A breeze danced through the palm tree leaves above us as the waitress left. It carried Sam’s scent my way. He didn’t look to his side, keeping his eyes pinned on me, but he did seem a little less pale.
“Of course you’re a wine guy,” Sam said. “You’re practically a professional James Bond cosplayer. I’m sure you also drink whiskey with one ice cube and frequently jump out of planes on the hunt for double agents.”
“Yes to one of those.”
He cocked his head and laughed. “Are you a big thrill seeker?” he asked, taking a drink of his water. I noticed he didn’t raise the glass, instead leaning down to bring his lips to the straw. I wondered if he was hiding his nerves.
“I can be. I’ve gone skydiving twice, and I’ve been shark diving once.”
Sam’s jaw cracked open. “Whoa, whoa. Shark divin
g?”
“It was for an investigation I was doing. The owner of the cage diving company was being investigated for potentially tampering with one of his cages, leading to the death of his ex’s boyfriend. It was suspicious from the jump. I went to his company and booked a cage diving session, wanting to just check out the process. To compare it, I booked another diving session with a rival company. That one convinced me to actually do it.”
“And? How was it? Did you see anything?”
“I saw four black-tipped reef sharks and one hammerhead. The hammerhead came right up to the bars of the cage. It was unbelievable.”
“Holy shhhhhark.”
“Nice,” I chuckled. “I recommend it, actually. There’s something really majestic about sharks, and being up close like that, in their own backyard, it kind of opens your eyes.”
“What happened with the guy you were investigating? Did he do it?”
“Oh absolutely. He weakened the bars of the cage and chummed the waters extra that day. I’ve got footage of two great whites swimming toward the cage before it cuts out.”
Sam’s brows almost fell off his face. “I can only repeat myself: holy mother-fucking shhhhhark.”
“Don’t worry, the owner’s now behind a set of bars, and those aren’t opening anytime soon. Don’t let that story make you cross off cage diving for good.”
“Right, well, it wasn’t really just that story that makes me nervous about me and sharks, but I’m not going to lie, it didn’t really help.”
The wine was brought out, our glasses filled before we clinked them together in a cheer. Sam was looking less and less scared as the seconds ticked by, color coming back to his face.
“So what is the craziest thing you’ve ever done?” I asked Sam.
“Craziest? Hmm. Well, I did eat an entire moldy slice of bread once before realizing anything was wrong. I was drunk off my ass, but yeah, that was pretty crazy.”
I laughed, kicking my foot out under the table. Sam’s shoe tapped against the edge of mine.
“I also stayed up for forty-eight hours straight playing a video game, and that was all for charity. I had a stream on for the Trevor Project. I raised a total of three thousand dollars. Not the best but the most I’d ever gotten in two days, that’s for sure. That was also pretty crazy.”
“That’s incredible,” I said. Sam took a drink of the wine. I watched his Adam’s apple bob up and down. I swallowed, feeling a different kind of heat rise inside me, one that had nothing to do with the external temperatures.
We ordered our food and kept chatting, Sam talking to me about his dream of opening up a game development studio. His passion bubbled up to the surface whenever he talked about video games. It reminded me of someone. He had the same light around him, the same kind of energy that my little brother always gave off when he talked about gaming.
It was toward the end of the dinner that I had realized something.
“You’re looking out at the view,” I said, my eyebrows rising in surprise. Sam nodded, looking out at the glittering city.
“I am… I guess you helped me get over my fear… huh.”
He wasn’t even just looking out at the view. He was admiring it. The fear that had him sinking into his chair earlier was nowhere to be found.
“Look, you can see Heaven’s Gate from here. It’s going to be the tallest building on the East Coast once it’s finished.” I pointed at the tall structure, still under construction but already taking up a large portion of the downtown Miami skyline.
“I can’t believe I would have missed this view, and for what? Fear is such a funny thing, a weird thing.” Sam finished the last of his wine. He used his napkin to dab at his mouth before settling it neatly on the table, next to his empty plate. “I’ve been feeling a lot of it lately. I’ve been scared of a lot, but… at the end of the day, you always have to climb over that fear. If I gave up and let the fear conquer me, then, shit, I would have given up that day I found Hazel.” He cleared his throat.
“Good. Hazel needed you.”
“She did. And now she needs you.”
“How’s she been doing?”
Sam shrugged. “As good as someone framed for a murder could possibly be doing. And I mean that in all honesty. She’s been handling it really well. I think she has a lot of hope. A lot of faith in you.”
A small ice cube formed in the pit of my stomach. It wasn’t that I felt like she had done it, it’s that I wasn’t entirely sure I could prove she didn’t. The waitress came around then with the bill, which Sam made an attempt at grabbing before I snatched it away. He smiled and mouthed a “thank you” as I handed my card over. I wanted to tell him that he never had to thank me, that whatever I did for him was because I wanted to do it for him.
I kept my mouth shut instead. A prickle of fear crept up my back as I started to realize the intensity of what I was feeling. As I looked across the table, locking eyes with the innocent and smiley Sam Clark, I realized that I was falling from a height that rivaled the building we were currently sitting on the very top of.
“Ready?” Sam asked, still smiling, as the waitress brought back my card.
I don’t think I’ll ever be ready.
“Let’s go,” I said.
Downstairs, the line for the valet seemed to wrap around the block. The poor guys were running back and forth with keys jingling in their hands as impatient guests tapped their shoes and crossed their arms. I could tell we weren’t going to be headed home right away, and that was completely fine with me. Any excuse I could have for spending more time with Sam, I’d take.
“Want to go for a walk?” I asked, looking down the busy street. We were on Collins Avenue, which was lined with clubs, restaurants, and boutiques. The sun had fallen, the boutiques all shutting but the clubs coming alive.
Sam nodded, smiling. I led the way, walking past the valet and down the street, slipping into the flow of people.
“Are you a big beach person?” Sam asked me.
“I used to be.”
“Oh?”
“My parents, they loved it. We’d go almost every weekend when I was a kid. Then my dad got a boat, and the game was over. He never wanted off that thing. I’m pretty sure if it were up to him, we would have lived on the boat. My mom wasn’t that into it, though.”
Only when I was finished did I realize what I had done.
Talked about them. I hadn’t talked about my parents… not out loud… not to anyone—I hadn’t done that in years. It felt like I was cracking open a cobweb-infested crypt.
“Are you an only child?”
Another question that should never have been as difficult as it was. I shook my head. The only answer I could manage to give.
Before Sam could ask anything else, we passed a particularly busy bar, the patrons clustered on the outdoor patio, cheering for an impending wedding, the bride wearing a small veil as she raised her beer-filled mug. Just then, they shouted that the show was about to start. I looked up and realized we were standing outside of Leopards, a strip club that had become one of the most popular spots on South Beach.
I looked to Sam. “Ever seen a show at Leopards?”
“Nope. Just the viral clips that take off online.”
I grabbed Sam’s hand and pulled him toward the entrance, a set of heavy gold-and-black doors where a bouncer sat on a stool, checking IDs as the last-minute arrivals showed up. We were let in and walked through a narrow hall lit up with blue and pink strips of light, signed pictures of celebrities hung up on the wall. The music was loud and vibrated through my bones as we walked down the hall.
“Is every night with you like this?” Sam asked, speaking over the music. A woman with red-bottom heels and a skintight snakeskin dress walked past us, strutting like she were walking down a catwalk.
“Not all of them,” I said. “Some get crazier.”
We turned into the main room. It was a large space with tables and booths arranged around a long and wide stage, three stri
pper poles gleaming on the stage, catching the beams of light. The walls were adorned with lighting fixtures that felt like they were pulled from an Alice in Wonderland book. There were flickering blue and purple candelabras next to a marble torch which sat underneath antlers with lights at the ends. Not all of them were on, but enough were to show off the leopard-patterned walls.
All the lights dimmed. We found a spot near the stage where we could stand and not obstruct anyone’s view. The music kicked up a notch, and the first pole dancer took the stage, commanding all the eyes in the room with her stunningly tall physique, her muscular legs stomping down the runway in heels that resembled something from an Alexander McQueen fashion show. Her black thong had been set with what appeared like diamonds all along the waistband, glittering underneath the spotlight as she wrapped a leg around the pole, grabbing with one hand and spinning around, gaining momentum, her grace making it look effortless, even as she let go and held herself parallel to the stage with her legs alone, her hands swirling in the air, her hair tumbling down in a silky waterfall of gold.
She continued to impress us, a shower of dollars appearing as she let go of the pole and landed in a split that left everyone’s jaws on the floor.
When she was finished, another dancer took the stage and showed off her gymnastic skills with some impressive and mesmerizing stunts. She was as beautiful as the last woman, with short hair and sharp features, as muscular and graceful, too.
I could hear Sam’s “oohs” and “ahhs” as he watched. I could feel him jump up ever so slightly whenever something crazy happened. He’d look back up at me on a couple occasions, almost as if he were checking if I were still there, as if I’d be anywhere else.
As I held on to Sam, watching this Cirque du Soleil strip show, I was hit by a wave of shock and realization.
I was letting Sam in. My walls were quickly crumbling, and it was all because of the man I held in my arms, his body fitting against mine, his breath matching mine. I could smell the strawberry and lavender in his hair, a scent I felt like I could never grow tired of.
