Page 1 of Erotic Temptations 2

Winter Blast

Rental keys in hand, I headed to my car, exhausted from my flight. Holiday travel was the worst, only made slightly better by the cute guy who’d sat next to me. My hopes of a possible mile-high experience deflated when he said he was married, bragging about child three on the way. No matter the situation, if there was a straight guy near, my busted-ass gaydar pointed me right toward him.

It was as if I was doomed to stay single for the rest of my life.

After tossing my bag into the trunk, I slid into the car then wrinkled my nose. What on earth was that stench? It smelled like someone had left old socks under the seat. If this was a prediction of my Christmas vacation, I was screwed. I adjusted the seat and started the car, ready to be at my parents’ already.

The engine coughed to life with a noise like a dying blender. Not very Christmas-movie, but then my life had never been one of those anyway. Heat eventually blasted out but only after a full minute of blowing cold air directly at my knees. Why do rental cars do that? Somewhere, some engineer was cackling.

I maneuvered out of the rental lot, already regretting my choice of shoes. Who wears slip-ons in a New England winter? Only someone who’d been away too long. The holiday traffic crawled along, an endless line of brake lights, snowflakesswirling in the headlights. It looked pretty, if you weren’t the one driving through it with a headache and a sock-scented car.

My old neighborhood hadn’t changed much. Same stick-figure trees slouched under the weight of snow, same mailbox shaped like a dolphin for no reason, same vague sense of low-level dread at seeing it all again. Houses lined both sides of the street, decked in enough blinking lights to cause seizures. My parents had always gone for understated class—wreath on the door, white lights, a plastic reindeer that’d lost one leg sometime before I hit puberty.

Christmas had always been Mom’s thing, though. And apparently still was, because I nearly blinded myself pulling up to their driveway. Every tree branch sparkled, and the windows glowed with candles. They’d even gone for one of those inflatable Santas in a hot air balloon. I could practically hear Dad swearing at it from here.

The driveway was freshly shoveled, uneven lines like my dad had given up halfway through. I’d barely put the car into Park before Mom burst out the front door, apron on under her puffer vest.

“You’re here!” She opened her arms in a gesture that suggested I was returning from war, not from a time zone away and a layover in Detroit.

“Hey, Mom.” I climbed out, knees protesting, and tried not to inhale. The rental car funk had clung to my coat.

Mom’s hug nearly knocked the wind out of me. It also felt good, safe, and comforting. “You look tired! Why do you look tired? Are you eating enough?”

One question in and I was already regressing to adolescence. “I eat. Sometimes even vegetables.”

She clicked her tongue. “You always were skinny. Here, let me see you.” She pushed me back to arm’s length, peered at myface, then patted my cheeks like I was six and had just lost my baby teeth.

Dad appeared behind her, holding a snow shovel in one hand and a mug of something suspiciously non-alcoholic in the other. “You made it,” he said, as if every airline in the country had been plotting my doom.

“Barely. But yes. I’m here.” I grabbed my suitcase from the trunk. It slid from my hand and dropped into a slush puddle. Christmas miracles, they never end.

Inside, the house was a fire hazard of cinnamon-scented candles, garland, and stuff Mom called “decor” and Dad called “crap from the basement.” The tree was huge, taking up half the living room, and covered in family ornaments. A glittery macaroni angel I’d made in ’97 still clung to a branch near the top. It looked about as stable as my love life.

Mom fussed over me as I peeled off my coat and shoes. “You hungry?”

“I could eat,” I said, because I’d have eaten a shoe if she’d offered. Anything to get the taste of airport food out of my mouth.

“Dinner’s almost ready. You remember your room?”

“As if I could forget.” I hauled my suitcase up the stairs. My old bedroom waited at the end of the hall, door still painted the same blue. Inside, it was like stepping into a time capsule, except the “cool” posters of boy bands were now slightly yellowed and curling at the edges. The bedspread from high school was still there, too, probably because it was easier to leave it than to explain the stains.

I set my bag down and flopped onto the bed, springs protesting. Outside, snow spun in the gray winter sky. I stared at the ceiling and tried not to think about work, or dating apps, or the fact that every year I was more single than the year before. Maybe they should decorate me instead of the tree.

Mom called up the stairs, “Dinner in half an hour!”

“Got it,” I shouted back. My voice echoed, which felt metaphorical.

Peeling out of my jeans, I changed into sweatpants pilfered from my suitcase, then wandered to the window for a little nostalgia and self-pity. The view was pure Norman Rockwell—snow-draped lawns, icicles, windows glowing amber against the dusk. Across the street, the old Miller house stood, still adorned with its green shutters. And there, shovel in hand, was Ryan.

He wore a battered blue jacket and a hat pulled low, face mostly hidden except for the scruff on his jaw. Years ago, I’d spent an embarrassing number of hours watching him from this same window.

Back in high school, he’d been the golden-boy-next-door, the poster child for small-town masculinity. He’d been on the football team and crowned the prom king, the kind of guy who peeled off his shirt at the pool and made everyone else look like they should’ve just stayed inside.

We’d been friends, sort of. He came over for video games, drove me home from parties, never treated me like the weird gay neighbor.

Of course, I never told him I’d spent half my teenage years quietly obsessed with his laugh, his eyes, the way he was always just a little too close when we watched movies sprawled on this bed.

I watched him work the shovel, snow spraying up with each scoop. He looked good. Better than good. Adulthood had hit him like a Marvel movie origin story. He’d gotten bulkier, arms stretching the seams of his jacket, and taller, somehow. Not that I was staring.