Second You Sin - Sherman, Scott Read online

  Second You Sin

  SCOTT SHERMAN

  KENSINGTON BOOKS

  www.kensingtonbooks.com

  All copyrighted material within is Attributor Protected.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Acknowledgements

  1 -Wet

  2-New York State of Mind

  3-Like a Straw in the Wind

  4-Isn’t It a Pity?

  5-Can’t Help Loving That Man

  6-Love in the Afternoon

  7-Mother

  8-Send in the Clowns

  9-A Sleeping Bee

  10-Honey, Can I Put on Your Clothes?

  11-The Main Event

  12-Putting It Together

  13-When You Wish Upon a Star

  14-He Touched Me

  15-Watch Closely Now

  16-The Best Thing You’ve Ever Done

  17-All I Ask of You

  18-Soon It’s Gonna Rain

  19-Crying Time

  20-Hands Off the Man

  21-I Got Plenty of Nothing

  22-Remembering

  23-Just Leave Everything to Me

  24-All in Love Is Fair

  25-Being at War with Each Other

  26-Who Are You Now?

  27-Ordinary Miracles

  28-Don’t Rain on My Parade

  29-New York State of Mind

  30-Don’t Believe Everything You Read

  31-What Are You Doing the Rest of Your Life?

  32-Some Good Things Never Last

  33-Gotta Move

  34-Doing the Reactionary

  35-Who’s Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf?

  36-Fight

  37-I’m the Greatest Star

  38-Tonight

  39-Wide-screen

  40-It Had to Be You

  41-Guilty

  42-I Can Do It

  43-Sleep in Heavenly Peace

  44-I’m Still Here

  45-Here We Are at Last

  Copyright Page

  This book is dedicated to Marc, who helped me through a

  very difficult time in my life with tremendous support, a

  listening ear, and a loving heart. There will always be

  traces of a song, places that belong to you.

  Thank you for joining Kevin and me for his second big adventure. We hope you enjoy the ride. There are several shout-outs in Second You Sinto some of our favorite artists. Already heavily featured in Kevin’s origin adventure,First You Fall,Barbra Streisand gets some love here, too. So do Ari Gold and Jay Brannan, two singer-songwriters from somewhat opposite sides of the musical spectrum but both of whom are great listens and lust-worthy on multiple levels.

  Many thanks to fellow writers Josh Lanyon and Neil Plakcy for their help, encouragement, advice, inspiration, and wonderful stories.

  This book wouldn’t exist but for two great gentlemen who helped me get it into your hands—my literary agent, Matthew Carnicelli, and my editor at Kensington, John Scognamiglio. Thanks, guys, for believing in this story.

  Two other fellows I have to acknowledge are my sons, Sasha and David. I love you boys bigger than the moon. By the time you’re old enough to be reading this, you’ll probably both be surly teenagers, but right now you’re more precious than words could ever express. (BTW: I’ll still love you when you’re pain-in-the-ass adolescents, I promise.)

  PS: There’s a theme in the chapter titles to this book —can you figure out what it is? Send in your correct answer to the link on the home page at www.firstyoufall.com. On February 1, 2012, I’ll pick a winner at random. If you’re right, you’ll have your choice between a signed copy of Second You Sin or the chance to have your name in print as a victim in one of Kevin’s next adventures. Or, if you say something nice about the book, maybe both.

  1

  Wet Despite my unconventional choice of profession, I tried to have a normal life. I really did.

  So how come weird stuff kept happening to me?

  I started my week in church, like the good boy I try to be.

  By the time the week was over, I’d find myself covered in whipped cream, attending a party in my underwear, defending my mother against a monster, working for a man I considered a Nazi, losing my semi-boyfriend, and fighting for my life.

  But I had to do it all.

  As I was soon to find out, someone was murdering the most beautiful male prostitutes in New York.

  And it was up to me to find out who.

  As a male hustler working in New York City, I’ve done plenty of kinky things. I’ve been tied up, scrubbed down, and hosed out. I’ve played every role my young-looking features lent themselves to. I’ve been the naughty schoolboy sent to the principal’s office for a paddling, the high school football hero treated for a pulled groin muscle by the horny coach, and the newspaper delivery boy who “accidentally” walks in on his customer in the nude. I’ve done it in the changing room of a major department store on Broadway, on a Thanksgiving float used in another store’s popular parade, and in the DJ booth of the city’s most popular dance club during an exclusive private party. With the DJ. I’ve been massaged, shaved, tickled, and wrapped in aluminum foil by some of New York’s wealthiest and most powerful men. I’ve been with guys who wore everything from tutus to superhero costumes to scuba suits.

  For the most part, I love my job. If you have an open mind, other people’s kinks are fun and kind of sweet. I like that I give my clients a place to act out the desires they’re afraid to show their boyfriends, partners, husbands, and wives. As long as the activity is safe, consensual, and semi-legal, I’m down with it.

  I do have my limits, though. Anything involving urine or, God forbid, that other thing, is out of the question. No how, no way, no matter how much he’s willing to pay. Not gonna happen.

  Which brings me to the question of how I found myself, on this particular Sunday in November, being peed on by one Willem Patrick O’Reilly III, the golden stream arcing majestically to soak the entire front of my two hundred dollar John Varvatos hoodie.

  “Pee!” Willem shouted happily. “I put my pee on you!”

  Yeah, I let Willem pee on me. It wasn’t so much that he was cute (though he was) or rich (well, his parents were) but the fact that he was three years old that let him get away with it.

  “Sorry, Kevin, I should have warned you he’s a soaker,” Cindy, my co-teacher in the playroom, called out as she watched Willem hose me down. “Some boys are like that. The minute you get their pants off, they can’t wait to celebrate.”

  Cindy was in her mid-sixties. She wore her long gray hair in a ponytail and dressed like a hippieWicca from Woodstock. She didn’t seem to have a mean or sarcastic bone in her body.

  “It’s OK,” I called back to her as she handed out more Play-Doh to the other kids in the class. “I’ll consider it a baptism.”

  I looked down at Willem on the changing table, where he lay with a delighted grin.

  “Good aim, kid.”

  Willem laughed. “I peeall overyou.”

  “I’ll notify the awards committee,” I told him. “Now we both have to get changed.”

  Willem stuck out his lower lip. “I don’t wanna get changed. I wanna play with Play-Doh!”

  “Sorry, buddy,” I said. I cleaned him with a baby wipe and put a fresh diaper on him. “Now that the missile’s back in the silo, you want to get back to the other kids?”

  Willem nodded enthusiastically.

  I lifted him to the floor.

  “How about next time,” I said, “you try to make that pee-pee in the potty?”

  Willem grimaced. “Potties are poopie,” he explained.

  “But
,” I said, “if you use the potty, you don’t have to get changed and you’ll have more time to play with the Play-Doh.”

  Willem looked thoughtful. “I scared of potty,” he said quietly.

  I knelt down. “Why are you scared of the potty, Willem?”

  “My brudder said I fall in and go to poopie land.”

  “Your brother’s just teasing you,” I said, thinking I’d have to mention something to Willem’s mother when she picked him up. “You can’t fall down the toilet. I promise.”

  Willem took my hand. “If I go potty, you come with me?”

  I gave him my most serious look. “I promise.”

  Willem kissed me on the cheek. “I wuv you, Kebbin.” He ran back to the Play-Doh.

  I love you, too, buddy,I thought.I love you, too.

  The truth was, I pretty much loved all kids. If I weren’t making such easy money as a hustler, I could see being a teacher. In the meantime, I satisfied my paternal yearnings here at the Sunday school program of The Metropolitan Unitarian Universalist Church of Manhattan.

  I started coming to the church a few months ago, after a near-death experience that found me hanging naked from the ceiling of a serial killer’s torture chamber. As said killer was choking me, I didn’t see my life flashing before me, but I did, in a very Peggy Lee moment, think,Is that all there is?

  Although I wound up being saved by my semiboyfriend, the incredibly beautiful and conflicted Officer Tony Rinaldi of the New York Police Department, I couldn’t shake the feeling that there had to be more to existence than just getting by.

  I might not have made it to heaven that night, but I got close enough that I wanted to make sure I knew the password.

  I wasn’t raised in a religion, so I asked friends about theirs. Eventually, I found out about Unitarian Universalism. It’s a religion that has no dogma and no ritual. They don’t tell you what to believe in or what to do. You’re encouraged to live in a way that’s honorable and respectful of the natural world and other living things. The UU principles value democracy and freedom. You don’t even have to believe in God or Jesus to be a UU—although you’re encouraged to be courteous to those who do.

  UU churches are supportive religious communities that prize diversity and intellectual curiosity.

  Plus, the reverend of my church is a brilliant, inspiring speaker, openly gay, and totally hot. Every week, I listen to his sermons and am simultaneously spiritually uplifted and turned on.

  Sexy enlightenment? Works for me.

  A couple of months ago, one of the Sunday school teachers called in sick. Reverend Jack asked if I could fill in. Although I had hoped that his first request of me would involve massage oil and nude wrestling, I would pretty much do anything he asked.

  So, I helped out. Working in the preschool room reminded me just how much I enjoy being around children. When an ongoing position there opened up, I was happy to volunteer. Now, every Sunday, I attend the early sermon and help run the preschool for the second session. The kids are great, and my coleader, Cindy, is funny and warm.

  She’s also been a teacher long enough to know just how uncomfortable working in a urine-soaked sweatshirt can be.

  “Go see Shirley in the office,” she told me. “She probably has some T-shirts left over from some church event or something.”

  Shirley-in-the-office was one of those women who seemed to work at every church in the world: somewhere between seventy and one hundred, hair pulled back in a tidy bun, harlequin glasses permanently perched on the tip of her patrician nose. She took a sniff as I walked into the room.

  “Let me guess,” she said in her hoarse rasp that proved that not everyone who smoked died young. “That’s not juice.”

  “It was at one point,” I offered. Shirley gave a little shudder. “That is just oneof the reasons I never had children. Filthy beasts.” She waved her hand as if shooing something away.

  “Listen,” I said. “Cindy thought you might have something I could change into.”

  Shirley got up slowly. Her bones creaked like a door that hadn’t been opened in years. I wanted to get her a can of oil.

  “In here,” she said, taking me into a small room behind her desk. Boxes were neatly stacked against the walls. She walked over to one and pulled out a white T-shirt that said “For Sale.”

  I didn’t think Shirley knew what I did for a living, but the coincidence was bizarre.

  “We used these for the mannequins at the church bazaar,” she explained. “But don’t worry, wearing it won’t make you look like a dummy.” She snorted at her joke.

  I waited for her to leave, but she stood there and stared.

  “Uh, I’m gonna get changed now,” I said.

  “I’d imagine you would,” Shirley answered. “You smell like a urinal.”

  “A little privacy?” I asked.

  “Honey, look at me. If I were any older, they’d hang a plaque around my neck and declare me a historical site. It’s not that often I get to see a cute young thing like you get half naked. Why do you suppose I watch those insipid soap operas—for the plots? If you think I’m missing this, you’re crazy.” She crossed her arms and nodded.

  I sighed and pulled my damp hoodie over my head. Shirley whistled.

  “Well, look at you. Strong little thing, ain’t you?”

  It’s a reaction I often get. I’m a small guy. Just five foot three and a buck twenty-five. But thanks to years of gymnastics and weight training, what little there is of me is pretty well built.

  Of course, for me, looking good is a job requirement. With my youthful features and blond unruly hair, I’m your typical boy next door. Assuming you live next door to an Abercrombie & Fitch.

  I keep myself in the best shape I can—not too muscular, but slim, lean, and cut. In my clothing, I look like a skinny kid, but when I’m undressed, the results of my hard work are evident.

  Shirley was getting a good show, as I had to struggle to get the T-shirt she’d given me over my head. I checked out the label. XXS.

  “You have anything bigger?” I asked her.

  “Sorry, that’s all we have left,” she rasped. “Keep working, it’ll stretch.” She looked down at her flattened chest. “Trust me, sooner or later everything does.”

  I continued to writhe. Eventually, I squeezed into it. If it were any tighter, I’d have died from strangulation. It clung to me like a second skin, the sleeves only covering the top inch of my biceps, and the bottom stopping an inch and a half above my belly button.

  “Woo-eee, look at those abbydominals,” Shirley observed. “You should dress like that all the time.” She dropped her voice down to a whisper. “Although, not in church, honey. It’s not really appropriate.”

  “Well, it’s not as if I chose this. . . .” I began. “Oh, never mind.”

  Shirley-in-the-office watched as I left the room. “You should wear tighter pants, though,” she offered. “Show off that cute butt of yours. Oh, yes, you’d fit right in on one of my shows.”

  As I walked back into the classroom, Cindy looked at me, blinked twice, and went back to reading the kids a story. When she was done, she pulled me out of earshot of the class and nodded toward my shirt. “Didn’t they have anything in an adult size?”

  I grimaced. “Shirley said this was all they had left.” “Well,” she said, “at least it’s better than walking around soaked in pee-pee.”

  “I look ridiculous, don’t I?”

  “Oh, no, you look fine,” she lied. “I mean, at least you have the figure for it. Just don’t walk past the middle school classes—those twelve-year-old girls will eat you alive.”

  2

  New York State of Mind After class was over, the parents came down to the classroom and picked up their kids. A few of them looked at me a little funny, but I tried not to make eye contact with anyone. My little talk with Willem’s parents would probably go better when I wasn’t dressed like the Whore of Babylon. A slap on my butt, though, got my attention.

&nb
sp; “Look at you,” said Nick, a darkly handsome guy in his late thirties who tended to be on the serious side. “Where have you been hiding all those muscles? And why bring them out to play today?”

  “Hey,” I said, giving him a quick hug. “Usual story. Changing a diaper, unexpected hose-down, had to grab whatever was handy.”

  “Yeah,” Nick said. “Been there, hated that. Could have been worse, though. Getting painted with what comes out the other end’s a real bitch.”

  Nick’s partner, Paul, walked over with their son, Aaron, in his arms. He was a really adorable kid they’d adopted through foster care.

  Aaron left one arm around Paul’s neck while hooking the other around Nick. He pulled the three of them as close together as his little arms could.

  “There’s your Christmas-card photo right there,” I said.

  “Hey, Kevin,” Paul said, giving me a peck on the cheek. Paul was about ten years younger than Nick, fairer, too, with a shy smile and cute, floppy hair. “You still have to come over for dinner one night. Aaron is dying to show you his action figure collection.”

  “I have Supahman and Ba-Man and Wonna Woman and ’Pider Man and . . .”

  Paul bounced him in his arms. “Whoa, big man, save the whole list for later, OK? We want Kevin to be surprised.”

  “OK,” Aaron whined.

  “But really,” Paul said, “you have to let Nick cook for you. He makes stuffed chicken breast to die for.”

  “Speaking of,” Nick said, “check out those pecs on little Kevin, huh?”

  Paul blushed, which was not unusual. He was definitely the sensitive type. He was also a pretty terrific painter. He was discovered by a gallery in LA a few years ago.

  I knew their move to New York was paid for by his sales. I wasn’t quite sure what Nick did, but I think he was in some kind of law enforcement. Maybe he’d get along with my semi-boyfriend, Tony. He was certainly butch enough—Tony wasn’t comfortable around anyone too flamboyant, and Nick was definitely a man’s man. He practically leaked testosterone.

  Nick pulled Paul closer. “Don’t worry, baby, you know I only have eyes for you.”

  “It’s not your eyes I’m worried about.”

  Nick tousled Paul’s shaggy hair.