From “Sugar-Coated Hot Pepper”

I was sitting at a crowded outdoor café on DuVal Street two weeks after taking up residence in Key West, and he appeared before me on the other side of the café table I was at—one with two chairs at it and I only occupied one. He was holding a coffee mug and a croissant. I was folding up my New York Times and had an empty cup and a small plate with croissant crumbs in front of me. It was quite natural to get the idea that I was about ready to vacate the table.

“Excuse me. Were you about to leave? There don’t appear to be any other open chairs.”

I looked up at the young man. He was young, cute, Hispanic, and had a great smile and a small body to die for. His hair was black and curly, with a curl dipping down to an eyebrow. He was minimally dressed, with tight shorts, sandals—without socks, naturally—and a mesh shirt showing a nicely muscled, bronzed torso. There wasn’t anything unusual about that; all men dressed gay in Key West, and most were gay. The interesting thing, though, which caught my attention immediately—other than that he worn the uniform very well—was that the tight mesh T-shirt revealed to me that he had a ring in his left nipple. The signal wasn’t universal, by any means, but years ago a ring in the left nipple had replaced an earring in the right ear as a declaration of a seeking submissive bottom—my favorite brand of young gay men.

I did a fast look around the café. He hadn’t been shitting me. The only available chair was the one at my table, the one he was standing behind while looking oh so fuckable.

“Sure, no problem,” I answered breezily, “as long as you don’t mind sharing the table long enough for me to have a second cup.” I lifted my mug and looked for a waiter, there fortuitously being one almost at my elbow, and signaled that I wanted another hit of caffeine. It would be my third, not my second, cup of java, but who was counting?

With a smile and a, “Hi, my name is Manuel,” he sat down across from me.

“Chaz here,” I said. “It should be Charles, but this is Key West. We like to go very casual down here.”

“Yes we do,” he answered with a repeat glorious smile.

That led into a discussion of where we each came from, how old we were. I was relieved to hear him claim he was nineteen. He smiled when I said I was thirty-one and told me I looked a lot younger—and in great shape—but that he liked older men. I, of course, didn’t mention that I didn’t think thirty-one was an old man. We weren’t yet at the point where I could indignantly say that I could keep it up for hours, reload fast, and achieve three ejaculations in an hour—with pretty impressive wads of cum too. He gave me an “I didn’t mean to get into comparative ages” look and then we moved to what we were doing in Key West. I told him I worked for a news agency, which, in loose terms, was true. He told me he was a college student.

“Well, not what you would call a real college, I guess,” Manuel said. “I go to the Key West Yoga College of India, over on Southard Street. But I also do some part-time work with a caterer—serving at parties and such.”

“An Indian yoga college?” I asked, making my voice sound like I was intrigued. And of course I was.

“Yes. It’s a school of yoga. It helps with flexibility. I do some dancing, but I wanted to qualify as a yoga instructor, so—”

“Dancing?” I asked, fascinated.

“Yes. I dance a pole on weekend nights at the Bourbon Street Pub. Right up the street here, on . . .” He was blushing, as if he’d said too much. He hadn’t said too much for me.