Chapter 2 Sai
Sai
The apartment is exactly the way I left it.
No one has a key except Koda and Koda would rather chew glass than come here without warning.
But I check anyway, my eyes running the room in the order I've trained them to follow: door, counter, table, window, hallway.
Everything in position. Everything where it belongs.
The shoes are aligned at the mat, toes flush with the edge, though one is slightly askew.
I adjust it, then hate myself for adjusting it.
The kitchen counter is bare except for the six items I've permitted to live there, each in its designated spot, the salt and the pepper and the olive oil and the knife block and the coffee press and the single white mug that I use every morning and wash immediately after and return to the exact same location on the exact same square of countertop.
Sometimes I wonder what would happen if I just... moved it two inches to the left. Just to see. Just to know.
Even though I live here, it feels more like I’m just maintaining it. And somebody else inside me wants to burn it all down.
I take off my jacket and hang it in the closet where everything faces the same direction, hangers spaced two finger-widths apart because I measured them once and now the measurement is law.
I want to jam the jacket in there sideways, to disrupt the perfect row.
My fingers twitch with the urge. Instead, I adjust the nearest hanger that's a millimeter off, hating myself for noticing, for caring, for not being able to walk away.
A frustrated sigh pulls from my lips as I head toward the fridge, my fingers hovering inches from the handle.
I should eat something. The salmon at dinner went untouched and there's food in the refrigerator, organized by expiration date, but choosing something to eat means opening the door and looking at the options and deciding between them.
I imagine taking every container and dumping them on the counter in a magnificent mess. But that would mean cleaning up afterwards and still being unsatisfied which would be worse than eating. I think.
A light throb starts just behind my right temple as I make my way past the living room, where the awards are hung on the west wall, four inches apart—I've measured them seventeen times—and the magazine covers are framed in identical black frames and arranged chronologically.
Sometimes I want to smash the glass or rearrange them by color just to see if I'd survive the chaos.
The books on the shelf are organized by spine height because alphabetical was not enough.
Three times I reorganized them in a single afternoon until the descending line was smooth and unbroken and I could look at the shelf without my pulse climbing.
I hate every part of this apartment and yet, it’s the only thing that keeps me sane. A prison and a sanctuary.
Ignoring everything, I step into the one room that brings me some comfort. The studio holds all of my photography equipment in perfect order, lenses in foam-lined cases, camera bodies arranged by frequency of use.
My assistants call it impressive. My former therapist called it concerning. I call it necessary, though sometimes I dream of sweeping it all to the floor, of making decisions without this exacting framework.
But I need my hands to find everything without looking, because looking means choosing and choosing means thinking and I need to remove the thinking so that the only decisions I have to make are the ones that matter. The angle. The light. The frame.
Excitement creeps outward in my chest as I twist just enough for my gaze to land on the display wall, the one meant as a canvas for my most precious pictures, ones that have won me awards and fame and spotlights.
But I haven’t put any of those on this wall.
While everything else in my life demands control, this wall is the place where the control comes apart or maybe where it becomes something worse.
I step closer, fingers outstretched as I drag them along the contour of a man’s face.
Each of these beautiful photos are unframed, pinned directly to the surface with small steel tacks.
Dozens of them, maybe more. I haven't counted.
I should count them. I need to count them.
I have counted every book on my shelf and every inch between my awards and every hanger in my closet.
But I have not counted the photographs on this wall because counting them would make the number real and the number would tell me something about myself that I am not ready to hear.
They are all of him.
Mavi. The Omega next door. Taken through my window, across the gap between our apartments, with a 200mm lens that renders the distance invisible.
I bought the apartment for the strange view, the back room decorated with two windows, one staring out at the street and the other facing my neighbor. That neighbor.
The small ‘U’ between our apartments allows me a perfect view directly into his building and with my lens, angled just right, I can see into his living room. I should take the pictures down. I should burn them. But they are so beautiful, so devastatingly perfect staring back at me.
I run my finger along another one of Mavi painting at his easel in the late morning, his left hand bracing the canvas while the right one moves in long strokes, his face concentrated and soft at the same time.
The excitement of the moment stretches as I move to another photograph, Mavi stretching in the first light that comes through his bedroom window, arms overhead, crop top riding up to expose the curve of his waist. The light is so good in that shot, so warm and directional, that I printed it twice, a violation twice over.
Each one has me letting out another gasp, my mind unraveling at the beauty I captured in these prints. His laughter, the blush lingerie showing off the perfect curve of his ass, his pensive moments, his loud ones, his everything.
Some pictures are repeats from slightly different angles, anything I could get from looking inside that world of his.
His perfect face and those plump lips stare back at me, begging for me to do something more than just stare. But I can’t do anything more than just move onto the next photograph, wondering what he would smell like, taste like, what his lips would feel like on my skin.
A shuddering breath wrecks through me, my cock thickening between my thighs at the thought of sinking into his perfectly round ass. The thought of knotting him has me rocking my hips forward, a moan tearing from my throat.
Every single one of these photographs was composed. I chose the lens and waited for the right light before I captured his essence.
These are not surveillance. These are studies. God, who am I kidding? They're both. Each one is a violation wrapped in artistic intent, a question I'm asking about a person I have never spoken to, though I could walk twelve feet across the gap and knock on his door.
Slowly, I grab the three prints from late last night and pin them to the wall.
Mavi had been setting up for his live stream, dressed in a baby blue lingerie set complete with sheer knee highs that almost had me falling apart right there.
One picture is of him bending over to fix the camera, another with him biting his lip, looking completely innocent, and the next had him staring at his screen, ready to put on a performance.
I step back and look at the full collection and I do what I always do, which is study it the way I study my professional work, looking for patterns and gaps and the moments where the framing succeeds and the moments where it fails.
This is the lie I tell myself, that this is work, that this is artistic practice, that the reason I spend more time in front of this wall than I spend in front of anything else in my life is because I am honing my craft and not because I am in love with someone I have never met and have no right to love.
Reaching up to my favorite photograph, I remove it from the wall and drop into my office chair, tracing the curve of Mavi’s ass in the blush set. It’s my favorite.
“You’re such a pretty doll,” I murmur.
I trace his face with my thumb, then jerk my hand away.
I pick it up again, tracing the line of his jaw.
The way his lashes sit against his cheek in the half-blink I captured.
I wonder what he smells like, then hate myself for wondering.
I have been close enough to guess, once, in the hallway last week, something sweet and bright that hit me so fast I lost my train of thought mid-step, but guessing is not knowing and I want to know.
I want to press my face to his neck and breathe until I can identify every note and then I want to catalog them the way I catalog everything, file them into the system, and give them a place.
Honey, I think. And something sharper underneath.
Citrus. I think about citrus and honey and my thumb moves lower, tracing the line of his collarbone, the edge of the lingerie, the place where pink fabric meets skin, and I can feel my body responding to the image the way it responds every time I hold this photograph, which is immediately and involuntarily, a heat building in the pit of my stomach and without any input from the part of my brain that is supposed to be in charge.
A notification on my phone steals my attention but only because it’s a certain kind of sound, a reminder for a very specific type of task.
A wild grin splits across my lips as I set the photograph down on the desk and open my laptop, flipping through windows until I find the right one. Velvet loads on my screen and then I click the Behind Glass tier, the highest paid subscription tier there is.
I found it three weeks after I started photographing him and I have watched every upload since, hating myself with each click and each payment authorization.
I have never commented. Never tipped. Never interacted.
I am a ghost in his audience, a number on his analytics, and the anonymity is necessary because engaging would be a choice and a choice would be a step and a step would bring me closer to a door I am not prepared to walk through, though God knows I've imagined knocking a thousand times.
“Have you been working hard, Doll?” I mumble, scrolling down to the bottom to find a recent upload.
It’s the blush set again.
I lean closer, loving the way the ring light is positioned at an angle that flatters the planes of his face.
The production quality is immaculate in a way that my professional eye cannot help but admire even as I despise myself for watching.
He knows his angles. He knows his light.
He builds his content with the same care I bring to my shoots and the recognition of that, the awareness that we are doing the same thing from different sides of the same obsession, makes something tighten in my chest every time I notice it.
“Good afternoon, Alpha,” Mavi purrs to the camera as he leans forward. He blows a kiss toward the screen, a gorgeous smile splitting across his face.
I know this is just for show but in moments like this, Mavi is only talking to me.
“Were you a good boy? I would hope so because I’ve brought you a present.”
My heart starts beating a little faster as the chaos in my head quiets. There’s no need to tap or count or sort and stack my thoughts. The only thing left is myself and my pretty little doll.
I hate the relief that comes with the silence even as much as I crave it.
Mavi twirls around and begins his routine, swaying and dancing in front of the camera like he was made for it.
The blush fabric shifts and pulls taut against his skin, slick coating his skin.
I catch it every time he stretches, just the sliver of pale skin between his thighs glistening with his mess.
“Doll, is that for me?” I ask to no one in particular. “God, you’re so fucking perfect.” I reach forward to touch the screen while shifting in my seat, my cock becoming painfully hard. My free hand moves to grab myself through my pants, my knot already starting to swell.
I shouldn’t.
A Hollis Alpha wouldn’t do this.
But I just… I can’t stop.
My fingers tighten around myself, the contact a relief so sharp it's almost pain, almost shame. I move the photograph to the side of the screen so I can have both versions of Mavi, the unguarded one and the one who’s performing for me.
“You like that, Alpha? Just like that, don’t you?”
My throat tightens as he shimmies the panties down his hips and then grabs the clear silicone dildo he favors. Mavi delicately takes a seat, kneeling just at the edge of his couch before twisting to the side and shoving the dildo up his ass.
He lets out a long, exaggerated moan, old comments flying up the side of the screen.
But I don’t care about any of them.
“So fucking pretty, Doll.”
I squeeze my cock again, trying to hold myself back but with every thrust into his sweet little ass, I just imagine replacing that dildo with myself.
What would happen if… I did?
A groan pulls from my throat as I place my hands on the desk, trying to fight my lack of control. Mavi’s obscene sounds pour through the room, my hips moving of their own accord, my knot swelling further.
My lips part as I watch the pretty Omega fall apart for his audience, my body reacting against my will. I reach down to grab my cock again, trying to hold back my orgasm but it’s no use.
My cock pulses in my grip just before I unload in my pants, rope after rope of cum coating the fabric until it’s soaked through.
“Just like that Alpha. You’re such a good boy, for me, aren’t you?”
It’s like he’s speaking to me, my release pulsing through me as another wave crashes. I continue to rock forward, riding the feeling until my pants are drenched through. “Sweet doll, fuck, look what you do to me.”
I wrap my hand around my knot, squeezing painfully hard to simulate locking into his ass, pretending that gorgeous blushed face on the screen is a result of my knot.
His video ends, the screen dimming to black and just like that, shame fills the silence. Hollis Alphas don’t do this. I’ve never wanted to be a Hollis Alpha less.