Here goes nothing.
Shaney squared his shoulders, staring at a black mark on the floor. If he could just aim for that. If the floor would just stopped moving…
“We’re just waiting for the nurse,” Todd said, his back to Shaney, as he watched the door.
Todd’s words hovered outside of Shaney’s sphere of intense concentration. He lowered a tentative foot and felt for the firmness of the ground. Holding his breath, he pushed off the gurney.
“She’s bringing you a wheel chair, so don’t mo—”
Without warning, the floor tilted sharply to the right, catapulting Shaney’s body straight at Todd as the man turned to face him. Todd’s arm flew out to stop Shaney’s momentum and he clotheslined Shaney in the stomach. Just as the curtain flew open, Shaney’s stomach emptied, vomit spewing from his mouth and nose until he was dry heaving his stomach into his esophagus.
Shaney blinked tears from his eyes, and that was when he saw that his fate had been sealed, his theory proven. He was in Hell, and his vomit splattered all over those tight black jeans and black work boots was the undeniable proof.
“Ugh, Shaney. That’s just gross,” Todd stated flatly.
Maybe when the monster hatched from his head, it would eat Shaney first.
Chapter Three
Shaney groaned, rolling away from the sun streaming through his bedroom window. The pounding in his head had quieted to a dull drumbeat. Tenderly, he rubbed at the swollen knot on his head. The disappointment that the bulge hadn’t hatched into a flesh-eating monster was waning because wouldn’t that have just been a huge mess to deal with? In the end, everyone would have pinned the entire fiasco on Shaney anyway, as if he could deliberately make space debris hit him on the head and implant an alien monster.
Shaney sighed. Alien monsters were the least of his problems. His breakfast had ended up all over the man of his wet dreams, and he didn’t even know his name. If Shaney focused on the vision of the dark-haired god, as he was before the grill incident, well, those memories were quite pleasing. Shaney’s visceral reaction to the man returned. Heat flushed his face at the memory of the smooth play of muscles beneath that tight, red shirt. A tingle started in his belly as he pictured those large, manly hands. Were they soft or rough from hard work? Would they grab Shaney and manipulate his body to the hunky man’s will? Oh, yes, those hands would grab him, and Shaney would lean in close and inhale the scent of spicy aftershave and leather.
Shaney shoved his hand into his sleep pants and grabbed his aching dick. Oh, that feels good. He envisioned sliding down that massive body, planting his knees on the floor, and opening Mr. Tall, Dark, and Hunky’s belt. Beneath Shaney’s hands, his hips would buck with anticipation. Shaney would gaze from beneath his lashes, up over the hard plane of that expansive chest to those blue eyes, those lickable lips. Slightly parted, they would open and then…
That’s when the fantasy deteriorated and memories of the incident at the hospital deflated his erection, leaving him frustrated right up to his balls. Replacing the hot, manly, feels-so-good, action, was the man’s priceless and puzzling reaction to Shaney’s vomit.
“Goddammit, Shaney!” he’d bellowed. And hadn’t that just been a tad too familiar coming from a virtual stranger? That sort of exclamation tended to come from individuals who’d known Shaney for at least a day—half a day, tops. Add to that the man’s disappointed tone and disgusted expression, and someone might have mistaken them for acquaintances sharing more than a George Foreman Grill and a pile of puke.
Shaney hadn’t stuck around to discuss the implications. After swearing he wouldn’t toss his cookies in Todd’s car, they’d made it to their apartment, and Shaney had settled into a routine. Pain meds. Sleep. Being yanked out of sleep every two hours to check if he was in a coma. Todd assessed Shaney’s cognitive abilities by having him recite the crawl from the beginning of the original Star Wars. Once upon a time in a galaxy far, far away… was about as far as Shaney had gotten. Pain meds. Sleep. Star Wars…etcetera. That had been his life for two days. Throw in a few phone calls from loud, screechy sisters away at college, and an over-bearing and exasperated mother whose departing words—“someday your curiosity will get the better of you”—should be Shaney’s tag line, and Shaney’s life was proceeding on its normal course.
Sitting up slowly on the edge of the bed, Shaney waited out the dizziness. His world was coming back on axis, relieving Todd of his nursing duties, which had included bathroom duty. Todd’s creative use of swear words while assisting Shaney in hitting the hole in the seat was worthy of some kind of award. Todd had mumbled about the numerous friendship lines that act had crossed. For Shaney, Todd assisting him in the bathroom had been downright humiliating.