FIRE on Fire (FIRE on Fire Universe #1)

1. Kael

KAEL

I don’t need the guilt. I’d happily leave that behind with the condom wrapper and the empty water glass. What I need is my fucking jeans, wherever he tossed them in this dark studio apartment.

I find them by feel, careful not to let the belt buckle jingle, then drag them on and pull my shirt over my head. Leaving shouldn’t feel like sneaking out. I’m a grown-ass man. Ten hours and no promises should be a clean transaction, but somehow it never is.

I glance back at the real-life version of the profile I’d messaged last night to find golden hair tousled against the pillow and a toned body spilling out of the sheets.

To complete my self-loathing ritual, my brain serves up a brief, unwanted image of a life we’ll never have.

In a place this small, our lives couldn’t help but intertwine.

Seeing pots hanging from a wire rack above the kitchen counter is enough for my brain to decide he can cook, and in the fantasy, he’s at the stove when I come back from the studio.

Whatever he’s making fills the room with the smell of my gram’s kitchen.

His hips sway to Today’s Top Hits blaring from a tinny speaker on the counter as I come up behind him and wrap my arms around his waist. He startles, giving that adorable little jump, and we laugh and kiss and keep kissing until he almost burns whatever he was mak—

The cold, damp air of San Francisco’s morning fog slaps the fantasy out of me as soon as I hit the street.

This is the first fog, the grim one that belongs to early risers and people whose bosses pay by the hour. It punishes your eyes, makes you squint before crossing the street, and whispers that you’d better set your alarm early or people will start demanding things you never meant to give.

The other fog is for the people who think they own this city.

It rolls down from the hills like a velvet curtain, tucking them into glass boxes with heated bathroom floors.

When they happen to see this one, they call it mystical and spend the day posting photos of it, oblivious to the way the rest of us sneer at them for finding poetry in our daily commute.

They don’t notice, and why would they? The city’s lined with their money. My rent is too. They don’t need to dodge the messy complications of casual encounters; they’ve signed up for much more serious ones like marriages, trusts, and retainers. No, thank you.

I know that guy’s tall, muscular body better than anything else about him, and that’s the whole point. Like a stock character from a bad porno, he delivered one vague line about a new job and then we got down to it. Now we go our separate ways without last names, expectations, or time lost.

Walking away means an early start, a clean break, and room to breathe before I go back to being owned in more respectable ways.

The Church and 18th MUNI station is a ghost town populated by a few hunched spirits waiting for the train to carry them away from yesterday’s bad decisions. By Civic Center, my earlier guilt has thinned to something almost laughable.

Now I get to do what I love all day because of the early exit, not in spite of it.

Mostly.

By the time my key scrapes the lock of my studio, the sky’s gone from charcoal to dishwater gray. I flick on the overheads. The track lights click to life, spotlighting the stark white canvas at the center of the room.

I don’t believe in “creative block.” It’s a convenient myth artists tell themselves when they’d rather be fragile than disciplined.

That’s what I tell myself. It’s also what I told the man who fancies himself San Francisco’s patron of the arts, before his interest in my work turned into wire transfers and strings.

But the canvas has been empty for a week, and my beliefs haven’t done a damn thing about it.

A slap lands between my shoulders, jolting me forward.

“Paint,” Jamal says behind me. “I saw you when I first came in… like an hour ago. You haven’t moved. I’m getting coffee. Come on.”

I shouldn’t. I have a billionaire waiting for results and a canvas doing its best impression of my tombstone.

“Yass,” I say anyway. “Maybe the caffeine gods will have mercy.”

Staring at the problem isn’t banishing the ghost of creative block. Maybe coffee will at least give me something else to blame.

We walk past Jamal’s studio, one of twenty-eight in the building, each rented by someone chasing a dream. Mine feels stalled, but I’m still living a version of my childhood fantasy.

The coffee shop’s downstairs and across the street from the studio I still can’t quite believe is mine.

From my window, I can watch its sidewalk chalkboard menu change with the weather.

It’s independent, which is code for hanging by a thread, so coming here feels like generosity instead of irresponsibility.

And generosity comes easier with a billionaire footing the bill.

Jamal nudges me as we walk in, jerking his chin toward the barista, a new face beaming at us from behind the counter. He looks vaguely…

The barista’s golden hair pokes out from under a black beanie. Instead of rumpled sheets, there’s an apron and a loose black shirt over what I know is a chiseled body.

“Kael!” He says it just like he did last night, with way too much feeling for something that wasn’t supposed to mean anything.

Unbelievable.

“Heyyyy.” Shit. I stretch the word beyond reason to buy time to remember his name.

He bails me out and blows my cover in the same breath. “Pete. You’re Kael, right?”

“Kael,” I repeat, trying to say my own name before he can, to fake a mutual reintroduction.

His smile falters. “Yeah. I said it when you walked in.” Then he recovers, flashing a wide, dopey grin. “Pretty wild seeing you right after last night. I was worried I might not see you again.” There’s a little too much hope in his voice. “Must be fate! What can I get you?”

I grab the table tent advertising a new drink. “Is the MachiUnicorn Spice any good?”

“Not really.”

“I’ll try it anyway,” I say, earning a shrug.

“Cappuccino for me, please,” Jamal adds. The barista acknowledges him without eye contact. “I’ll just be over here… invisible,” Jamal mutters.

“Sorry I left so early,” I say, cutting to the chase and drawing Jamal back toward us instead of the corner table he was angling for. “Trying to get a full day in. You know how it is… life of an artist. I did have a great time, though.”

“You’re amazing,” he says, puppy-dog earnest. “Haven’t seen you post in weeks. When are you going to share what you’ve been working on?”

Of course he follows my feed. Art has been the only constant in my life, but the social media version of it still feels like standing naked in a crowded room and inviting everyone to rate my body.

“Oh, yeah.” I glance at Jamal, who doesn’t bother hiding his grin while I squirm. “It’s, uh… under wraps right now.”

“Can’t wait to see. I’d love to get together again. If you’re interested.”

“Yeah, man,” I say. “That would be great. I’ll hit you on Grindy.”

Jamal’s jaw drops.

“Ow!” The barista jerks his hand back from the steam wand. “I meant, like… a date.”

This morning’s picture-perfect fantasy of domestic bliss already faded.

A one-night stand is one thing, maybe even a two-nighter, but anything more starts to feel like an anchor.

He’d want things, and I’d do them to make him happy, even when I’d rather be in my studio, working.

I refuse to get tied to something I never wanted in the first place.

“Yeah, that’s… what I meant too,” I lie. “Sorry, uh… man.”

“Pete,” he repeats, gentle expression vanishing.

“Right.” Oh well. A tiny sigh squeezes my ribs. This would be easier if he’d just shrug it off. “Look, I’m not really into dating. I keep my schedule open—for my art. We’ve got chemistry. So, if you ever want to explore it casually just hit me up.”

Jamal lets out an audible snort, exiting his eavesdropping position to beeline for the corner table.

“Wow,” Pete mutters over the hiss of steaming milk, then slams the mini-fridge door beneath the counter.

“What?” I ask, daring him to confront my life choices. “Art takes time. Keeping it for myself isn’t a crime.”

“You’ve got, like, forty thousand followers,” he says. “You haven’t posted in weeks. I don’t think you’re a monster. I just feel sorry for you.”

He slides a cappuccino and a multicolored abomination across the counter, sloshing foam onto the saucer.

“Thanks.” I drop a dollar in the tip jar, not that I have any to spare, as a peace offering.

Heading over to Jamal, I hear Pete grumble, “Oh, now I can afford my rent.”

Heat crawls up my neck and floods my cheeks, a vivid red embarrassment I can’t hide. My skin is a terrible liar. I can’t afford my rent either, at least not on my own.

I slip into the booth across from Jamal, who leans in, smiling. I’m practically glowing while he stays annoyingly cool behind his mirrored shades, somehow carefree even though I know his bank account’s as empty as mine.

“Coffee and a show,” he whispers. “He thinks you’re a slut.”

The coffee shop is small, but our corner booth is hopefully out of earshot. Making enemies with the barista isn’t exactly conducive to the picturesque studio-across-from-a-coffee-shop vibe.

Whatever. He isn’t that cute.

“I just wish my muse got as much action as my Grindy profile,” I say, staring out the window at the studio and the empty canvas waiting upstairs.

I sip the MachiUnicorn-thing and can’t keep from puckering at the lukewarm concoction.

“Why do you always order that shit?” Jamal asks, making the same face just watching me drink it. “Just get something you like.”

“I like trying new things. No struggle, no strength,” I say, hearing my gram in my own voice.

“She did not mean for that to apply to a coffee order.”

I touch my heart, kiss my finger, and point to heaven. I’ve had enough of pitying baristas and ghosts of my grandmother for one morning. “Tell me what you’re working on.”

Jamal swipes to a photo on his cracked screen and holds it out. The word CLARISSA is stamped in his usual big block letters.

“Are those—” I squint at the details tucked into the L. “Are those… dildos?”

Jamal erupts into giggles, his shoulders shaking.

“Who’s this for? What is this?”

“I have no idea.” He covers his mouth, still laughing. “I take orders, but it’s got to be for a sex shop, right?”

“Clarissa?” It sounds more like a second-grade teacher than a sex shop to me.

“The owner, maybe? I don’t know, man. I’m just glad to pay the rent. We’re not all social media stars…” Jamal’s eyes drift toward Pete behind the counter. “No matter what he thinks.”

“Forty thousand followers gets me two hundred bucks a month, if I post.”

“Stick with it.” Jamal looks back at his phone. “What’s Alistair got you making in the meantime?”

“Dealer’s choice,” I say.

Jamal shakes his head, eyebrows pulling together.

“I don’t know. I think he means I should paint whatever I want, but I was going to do something poker-related as a joke.”

“The empty canvas?” he asks.

“That’s my progress. Or lack thereof.” I finish my lukewarm drink. “Think Clarissa wants photorealistic sex toys?”

“I can message her.”

“Imagine that shop,” I say, seeing it in my mind. Brightly colored, larger-than-life oil paintings of dildos and fuzzy cuffs hang in ornately carved wooden frames. “Could be dope.”

“You’ll be spending a lot of time in sex shops if you treat every guy who’s interested in you like that.” Jamal nods toward Pete.

Instead of turning to look, I reach into my jacket pocket and pull out my response: a smooth, one-pound river rock.

“Not this,” Jamal groans, rolling his eyes.

“Why can’t they be more like you, Rocky?” I say to the rock, rubbing my thumb over his head. Rocks don’t need anything but a pocket.

I painted a small red tie beneath his wide black eyes, little specks of Wite-Out making him look perpetually up and to the right.

“Very chic,” Jamal says, pointing back toward Pete, “and alarming that you’d trade that for this.”

“Don’t listen to him, Rocky.”

My phone buzzes, and I flip it face up on the table. Alistair’s name glares back, tightening my jaw as I read his text: Party at my place tonight. Bring your work. ok if it’s WIP.

I type back: Thx. I’ll think about it.

Pocketing my phone and Rocky, I say, “I should get back.”

“Living the dream,” Jamal replies, slurping the rest of his cappuccino.

“Living the dream,” I echo.

Across the street, Jamal disappears into his studio to crank through Etsy orders. My phone buzzes again as I reach the familiar threshold I’d failed to cross earlier.

Alistair: Think about whoever and whatever you want. When I invite you to a party, you come.

My artistic dreams would be a lot smaller without Alistair’s money. But being told to paint whatever I want is nothing like painting whatever I want.

Still, I type back: I’ll be there.