Chance Encounter

by David Horne

  “I don’t plan on telling anyone anything.” Alex tried to stick by what he said again. “Just leave me be and you can go do what you want.”

  “Maybe we’ll just move into town. How much do you think they’ll pay for protection?”

  “You know better than to do that.” Alex’s chest puffed up. It was an unspoken threat that he was sending along. But Popper just laughed and drove his bike away.

  Alex was left to think and worry about the life that he was trying to build. It had only barely started and was already being threatened. He didn’t know why they had gone through the effort to follow him this far away.

  He went back into the bar, frustration playing over his face. This was not the way that he expected his life to be when he was here. Tracey looked over the bar at him. “You all right?”

  “Yeah. I’m fine.” He nodded.

  “You don’t look fine.”

  “Just because I don’t look it, doesn’t mean that it isn’t real.” He shrugged and moved to help clean up the dining room.

  Chapter Six

  Benjamin sighed and stepped out of his apartment. He needed the air at that moment. There was too much going on for him to be able to focus anymore. A snag in the code that made him want to scream.

  Instead, he stepped into the hallway and started pacing. Anything to get out of the apartment that was starting to feel really cramped as compared to normal. So he paced through the hall and didn’t even notice the body bump into his.

  “Uh. Sorry.” He didn’t look up.

  At least not until the voice sounded. “What’s wrong?”

  Alex. Benjamin looked up at him and couldn’t help but smile slightly. Something about this man just made his heart skip a beat. They had been spending spare moments together when their schedules coincided. “Just stuck on a piece of code.”

  Alex wasn’t smiling though. “Need someone to sound off at?”

  “Sure. I’d like that.” Benjamin paused. “Is something wrong?”

  “Just a rough night at work last night, that’s all.”

  Benjamin wasn’t sure that he believed it, but he decided that it wasn’t a great idea to push for more information. “Sure. Want to come in and grab a drink?”

  “Something without booze?”

  “Yeah. I got some tea. You take it sweet or unsweet?”

  Alex laughed. “I missed being asked that question. Out west they don’t really do sweet tea much.”

  “No sweet tea? That’s a crime.” Benjamin smiled. “I’ve got some made up if you want some.”

  “I’d love that.” Alex followed Benjamin into the apartment.

  Benjamin walked to the kitchen, pulling down a glass and filling it from a pitcher in the fridge. “I make it myself. One of the few things I don’t like buying premade.”

  “That’s a lost art these days, making sweet tea.”

  “I learned it from my Mom.” Benjamin shrugged and passed over the glass coming over to sit next to Alex on the couch.

  The tattooed man took a sip of the tea. “She did a good job. Just perfect.”

  “Yeah. She was always pretty specific about the right amount of sweetness.”

  Alex leaned back against the couch. “So, what’s the problem?”

  “Just stuck on this line here.” The programmer physically pointed at the screen.

  Alex squinted. “Explain it to me.”

  Benjamin obliged, rambling on for nearly five minutes about the specifics of the hang-up that he was having and Alex mostly smiled and nodded while the man talked through the problems. Every few moments he would grow quiet and start tapping on the keyboard at a frantic pace, tweaking and fixing the lines that were giving him issues. “Thanks. That’s perfect.”

  “Glad I could help.” Alex seemed to be smiling a lot more honestly.

  “Did something happen?”

  “I’d rather not talk about it.” Alex shook his head.

  “You sure? You’ve helped me out a lot. Maybe I can help too.” Benjamin offered a smile.

  “Yeah. It’s nothing big.” The big man shrugged.

  “All right. So, what now?”

  “You ready for a break?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Maybe we could go pick up some lunch?”

  “That sounds great. What do you want?” Benjamin stood and grabbed his wallet.

  “Hmm. How does Chinese sound?”

  “I know this great place near here that has the best spring rolls.”

  “That sounds good. Want to meet there?”

  “I could give you a ride.” Benjamin offered.

  Alex’s eyes twinkled all of a sudden. “Or I could give you a ride.”

  “You don’t have a car.”

  “You ever ride on a bike?”

  Benjamin thought about it. It was one of those things that he had always thought was for a person that wasn’t him. It took less than a second for him to agree. “I never have, but I’d like to try.”

  Alex laughed. “Tell me where we’re going first.”

  “Sure.” Benjamin started to give out the directions.

  Alex paused for a second and pulled out his phone, looking at the map on his phone. “Right.”

  “Hey. My directions aren’t that bad.”

  “This is just a second source. That’s all.”

  “Why do you need to look it up?”

  “Oh, just double-checking. It helps because I can’t look it up on the road.”

  “Do you have a helmet?” Benjamin shifted his weight from one foot to the other.”

  “I think I got one that you can borrow.” He headed back to next door, coming back moments later with an older helmet that Benjamin could get over his head. Once downstairs, Alex helped him strap the helmet on his head before helping the man onto the back of the motorcycle.

  And just like that, the wind was flying by them. Alex drove with expert precision, able to compensate for the fact that Benjamin couldn’t figure out how to lean. He was a little scared during the trip, but it still felt amazing.

  He was smiling when they finally got to their destination. Alex laughed as he looked at Benjamin. “Did you like it?”

  “That was amazing.”

  “You should learn to ride someday.”

  “I don’t think I could ever do that.” Benjamin shook his head.

  “You would be surprised. You weren’t that bad as a passenger.”

  “Thanks. I didn’t know what to do with myself.”

  Alex laughed as they walked into the restaurant to order themselves some food. They spent a lot of time discussing various parts of their lives. Favorite colors and food over spring rolls and splitting an order of Moo Shu pork with a discussion of their childhoods. Benjamin learned all about Alex’s family and the kinds of things that they did when he was growing up.

  “You’re really a native?”

  “Yeah. Born and raised here. I moved out west as an adult.”

  “What did you do out there?”

  “I was hoping to find work.”

  “You couldn’t find work out here?”

  “Not the type I’d want my family to know about.”

  Benjamin frowned. He tried to think about the kind of jobs that people would go west for. He immediately discounted Silicon Valley. Alex wasn’t the type to get into tech work. It took a while for him to come up with something else that would work. “Oil fields or something?”

  “Something like that. It wasn’t exactly pleasant work.”

  “That probably explains the tattoos.”

  Alex’s smile seemed a bit strained as he nodded his agreement. “Yeah. Sure does.”

  Benjamin wanted to ask more, but it was clear that the man was a little uncomfortable. He decided to change the subject. “So, do you do the whole sports thing that the rest of town does?”

  “I don’t mind a good Chief’s game.” Alex smiled again.

  “I can’t say I’m really into sports.”

  “Good thing I’
m not completely stuck on it or anything.” Alex laughed. “I don’t worry about it much if I can’t watch the game, but if I have the time, I try to.”

  “Considering you work in a bar I guess game nights must be pretty busy.”

  “We aren’t really a sports bar, but I’ll have to see if it is or not.” They kept chatting over sports and other parts of day to day life until they finished their food and Benjamin found his arms wrapped around Alex once again. They were riding the bike back to the apartment and it was just as exhilarating as the first time the had taken him for a ride. By the time he got back, Benjamin could feel his heart beating faster and the heat of Alex’s body lingering on his skin. It made him want more of the man’s touch.

  It was all he could think about as they made their way up the stairs to Benjamin’s apartment. “Are you ever going to do it again?”

  “Huh?” Benjamin was taken by surprise with Alex’s words. “Do what again?”

  “Ride with me.”

  “Yeah. I’d really love that.” Benjamin grinned as he unlocked the door and let them both in. “It was a lot of fun. I wasn’t expecting anything like that.”

  “Most people don’t really get much out of it until they try it.”

  “Where did you learn to ride?”

  “My family has always been interested in bikes. A lot of us ride.”

  “Did you ride all the way out west?”

  “Yeah, I did.” The biker nodded. Alex had a genuine smile on his face. It was a good look on the big man and Benjamin couldn’t help but appreciate.

  “That had to be a lot of fun.”

  “I always enjoyed that sort of stuff.”

  Benjamin couldn’t keep the smile off his face as they plopped back onto the couch. They were a little closer this time. Benjamin felt a flush form on his cheeks as the closeness seemed to wash over them both. The silence grew a little heavy between them as Alex caught Benjamin’s gaze.

  Benjamin reached out and touched Alex’s leg, the man twitched, moving his leg a little closer than it was before. The programmer noticed this and took the opportunity to move in closer.

  Alex leaned in, pausing a few inches from Benjamin’s lips. It was up to the computer guy to move in the rest of the way and seal the deal. His heart was racing as he went through the possibilities. There was so much that could be done. So many options that could be taken. His mind raced. If he kissed Alex everything would change between them. They would leave the realm of being just friends.

  And they would have to figure out what else they could be and exactly what it could all mean. But none of that seemed to dissuade the burning desire to be closer to this tattooed behemoth of a man. He leaned in and finished the connection, a kiss shared between the pair that made Benjamin’s toes curl in his old sneakers.

  In an instant Alex’s hand was up on the side of Benjamin’s face, running up and down his jawbone. The programmer shivered as he reached up to touch the big man’s chest, running over the rough-hewn lines of skin that had been developed over the years. “You really do go to the gym a lot, don’t you?”

  Alex gave out a breathy laugh. “Yeah. Yeah, I do.”

  The programmer didn’t let go of the man’s chest, his hand tangled in the big man’s shirt, and the bouncer didn’t pull away. Instead, the tattooed man started to touch the smaller nerdy young man, pulling him in for another kiss.

  Before he could do more than swirl his tongue around the other man’s mouth, Benjamin could feel Alex pulling back. He was left breathless. “Sorry. I should go.”

  “Wait? Where are you going?”

  “We shouldn’t be doing this. We just met.”

  And with that Alex fled back to his apartment, leaving a confused Benjamin behind. It had felt so perfect. So right, but the man was just gone. Just like that. There must be something wrong. Benjamin couldn’t get the thought out of his mind. What had driven the man away? “Did I do something wrong?”

  His mind raced over possibilities, all of the worst cases that could cause a man to run away with that look of fear that Alex had done.

  But there was no obvious answer. There never would be. It was never that easy. All Benjamin could do was worry about the frustration that Alex had left him with.

  He tried to get back to work, but nothing seemed to work. He couldn’t get his mind back on the project that he had to do. Instead, he ended up grabbing himself a beer and lounging on the couch in front of the television.

  Chapter Seven

  Alex dropped his head in his hands. He had perched himself on the edge of his bed. “You know better.” He groaned, talking to himself. “You know better.” The words didn’t seem to help at all. He was still torturing himself. He felt like the worst kind of failure for what had happened.

  He had too many problems going on in his life. The last thing he needed was a romance with a nerdy guy that lived next door. There was something about Benjamin that made his mind go blank and he couldn’t think anymore.

  He got up off the bed with a groan. There was so much going on in his life at this point. Popper was in town and wanting him to come back to the gang that he had left to come up here too. Now there was a handsome man that seemed to share an attraction with him. He couldn’t be with Benjamin. Not while all this other stuff was going on.

  He couldn’t put Benjamin at risk. He considered moving, but there was no way that he could afford doing that. Running wasn’t an option. That would take the money and it had taken just about everything that he had just to start his life here. And he had a job that was counting on him. He couldn’t let his family down again just to run from his problems.

  He knew that he had to do something about Popper. Nothing could move forward until that was handled. But the big question was how he was going to solve this problem.

  Somehow at least. “What are you going to do?”

  The answers didn’t come. Something told him nothing was going to be as easy as he wanted it to be. Adding to that, his mind just kept going back to the feel of Benjamin’s skin under his hands.

  The man had an appeal to him that stopped Alex from being able to focus on much else. But he tried. He wanted to be with Benjamin and it made him want to solve the problems with his own gang with even more desperation.

  He was just starting to pace when the knock sounded on the door. Alex frowned, wondering if Benjamin was chasing him over here. He couldn’t blame the man. The bouncer had made quite the fuss when he had run from the kiss that they had shared. Benjamin must have been worried.

  “Benjamin?” He called out, but no one answered his call.

  He tried again. “Benjamin?” Then he listened intently. But no sound could be heard.

  He moved closer to the door to listen closer. Maybe Benjamin didn’t want to say anything. Maybe he had gotten scared and went back to his apartment. He couldn’t think of anyone else that would come and look for him here. He wasn’t expecting his family to come over. They weren’t the type to come to this neighborhood.

  He knew that they would come if he asked, but he wouldn’t ask any of them to come here. He knew that he could handle this neighborhood. He had the history that made him the type of guy that belonged in dangerous places.

  “Who is it?” He tried once again, but again there was no response to his call. His mind raced through the urban legends of home invasions happening like this. There was always some rumor or another talking about knocks that didn’t have a response ending in a smash and grab the second the door was opened.

  “Anyone there?” He tried one more time, but once again, there was nothing. No answer. He wondered if he had heard things.

  He gave up and walked to the door, peeking out of the small peephole in the door.

  There was no one there. No new knock sounded.

  “It must have been a mistake. Or a delivery to the wrong address.” He talked himself into opening the door.

  Once he did, he could see the shadow near the stairwell. Alex squinted. “Popper?”
>
  Popper straightened himself up. “You going to invite me in?”

  “What are you doing here?”

  “I can’t visit an old friend?”

  “I wouldn’t exactly call us friends.” Alex frowned. He knew better than to say things like this.

  Popper smiled like he had won. “That so? You used to call me a friend.”

  “Times changed.”

  “You so sure about that?” Popper moved closer, but the older biker didn’t touch him.

  Alex moved to block his entrance to his apartment the moment that Popper threatened to invade his space. “What do you want?”

  “You aren’t going to invite me in?” Popper asked again and what he meant was suddenly very clear. Alex didn’t really have a choice. The man was going to come in one way or the other and it wouldn’t do the big man any favors to test that.

  Alex gulped. This was the last thing he wanted. He wanted Popper to leave. But he knew better than to draw any more ire from this guy or cause a fuss right in the hallway in front of Benjamin’s door. The last thing that he wanted was to let Benjamin see that part of his past. He knew what he had to do. “Sure. Come in.”

  Popper moved slowly with a soft smirk on his face. The man was a good head shorter than Alex was, but that didn’t make him any less intimidating. Popper was a powerful man with his hand in so many pots that he only survived by being one of the most dangerous men in his gang. “Good to see you finally getting some sense.” Popper smiled.

  “I just don’t want you bothering all my neighbors.” Alex closed the door the moment the man walked in.

  Popper looked around and snorted. “This is really where you’re living?”

  “Yeah. It’s a start at least.”

  “You could have a nicer place.”

  “I don’t want a nicer place. My family needed me. I had to come and help them out.” Alex shook his head. “I just need a place big enough for me.”

  “You could live in an actual house. And a decent house on top of it.”

  “How much time would I spend there?”

  “Enough. The boss can give you some extra time to respond.” Popper explained.