Authors: Samantha Forest
Robert was gay, but most of the time his romantic affairs were with men who were nothing like this Barnaby. He was strong, domineering, and almost overwhelming in a sense. It didn’t help that Robert was usually the bottom despite it all. This man seemed to be a total alpha, and there was something strangely alluring about this man that he couldn’t put his finger on.
The two of them stayed at the diner, talking with one another for what seemed to be forever. Finally, Barnaby stood up, putting money on the counter.
“It’s on me,” the man said.
Robert looked at the other man, shock plastered on his face.
“But…why?” he asked.
“Why? Because I like you. Do I need another fucking reason?” the man said with a snapping tone.
Barnaby looked at Robert, expecting the answer. Robert shook his head. Even though it was unconventional at best, the man did have a point. He knew that Barnaby seemed to have some sort of interest in him. Whether or not it was anything more than mere companion, was up for them to decide.
“Thank you,” Robert said.
“Keep the receipt and change too. I left another present for you,” Barnaby stated. He sauntered out of the diner as soon as he said that, leaving Robert confused and alone.
“What the hell was that?” he mused. However, he grasped the piece of paper, looking at it.
It was his contact information. So he did convey interest to this other man. Maybe Robert was better at meeting people than he thought.
However, there was something very odd about this whole thing. The man seemed almost too nice to him, like there was something else that the man was afraid of expressing to others. Whatever it was, it bothered Robert to no end. He didn’t understand the situation, but he still pocketed the small piece of crumbled paper. Barnaby. The man definitely had a nice ring to his name, but there was something else that made Robert wonder for a while as he finished up his food. What did this mean? Did the man like him? There was no talk of women and past sexual experiences during their lengthy conversation, but there was also no talk of the subjects that gave Robert a slight idea of a man’s sexual orientation. The only thing he could do right now was to wait and see. He finished his food and started to walk back to his car. He took the piece of paper once more out of his pocket and gave it a thorough look. Barnaby…Barnaby…Barnaby. He could be the alpha he had been searching for. He placed the sheet back into his pocket and got in his car.
“What a day,” he said as he drove off in the darkness.
***
It had been about a week since the incident at the diner, and Robert hadn’t seen Barnaby since. He decided to visit the diner frequently, even at the time that they had met a week prior, but no luck. Every time he reached for the piece of paper baring Barnaby’s contact information, he hesitated before calling him.
“What if he forgot who I was, or better yet what if he just laughed at me and hung up when I asked to see him again?” Robert kept pondering every night.
The fire from the night of his interaction with Barnaby was still unsolved, and was without any suspects as well, even after all the questioning that Robert did with the staff and owners. No one had a grudge against the bar, but it definitely seemed as though someone or a group of people had burned it down. There was no sign of gasoline canisters at the scene, but the way the building looked after the arson made it seem as though someone used some sort of flamethrower.
However, even though it had been a week since that event, Robert could not focus his attention on the case because all he could think of was Barnaby, and the Alpha like nature he exuded. He decided to go for a drive down to the diner where he first met Barnaby, but as he was near arrival he notice something out of the corner of his eye. Any arson detective could notice when smoke coming off a building was either a minor, or major event to its life, but this visual was far worse than Robert had ever seen in his career as a detective.
It looked as though the fire had just occurred, and Robert decided to race over to the building. By the time he arrived, he realized that no one was around to call the fire department. He pulled out his phone and dialed 911, but before he could tell the operator the address to the location, something had caught his eye within the building. There was a large figure, about half the size of the warehouse within the flames.
“Sir, what is your emergency!” said the woman at the end of the line.
“Uh…..umm…oh! I’m sorry…the address is 147 Wheeler road! There is a fire….please come quick!” Robert said right before he immediately ended the call.
“What the hell is that?” he said to himself.
Before he could think about what he was looking at, the figure spiraled upwards into the sky until it was out of sight.
“There’s no way…those don’t exist,” Robert tried to explained to himself.
All that was left in front of Robert was half the structure of an old abandoned warehouse accompanied by flames that reached higher than where the building originally stood. Robert stood at the location with his mouth fully agape, realizing that all those bedtime stories that his mother had told him when he was younger were true. They weren’t fiction, they weren’t mythological, they were the real deal. He had just found his true suspect, a dragon that was as majestic as it was demonic. Getting its fix by scorching abandoned or empty buildings.
A red dragon.
What the hell? This had to be some sort of sick joke, like a joke some prankster kid would engage in. However, Robert knew that what he saw was real. There really was a dragon that was flying up into the air, disappearing into the clouds. It was what caused the fire here, and immediately, Robert heard the wail of sirens.
What did this mean though? There was no way he could go up to his boss and tell them that the perpetrator of a crime was the dragon. They would laugh at him, and they would call him crazy. This was growing pretty strange, and Robert wondered how he could tell others about this without being put into a mental hospital.
His assistant soon arrived to the location, and the investigation was conducted. He did not mention what he had seen to Natalie, as fear of judgement was foreseen. Robert looked back at the burned down building, and felt a strange presence lingering around him. For whatever reason, the dragon felt familiar, like it knew him or maybe had some sort of past relationship with him. Maybe his grandmother, or maybe even his great grandmother had resurrected in the form of a majestic being.
“That’s insane. Why would the dragon know me?” Robert asked himself.
“And why am I the one that has to deal with this?” he continued.
“Robert…You okay?” Natalie asked.
He whipped his head around. Sure enough, Natalie was there, looking at him with an innocent face.
“It’s nothing. I’m just trying to piece a few things together,” he explained.
“Okay. Here is the details of this incident,” she said as she handed him some paperwork.
He looked at the papers, but it was everything that he knew. Of course, they were missing the information that spoke of the dragon, but the only person who saw it was Robert. Robert finished up, and after he left he pulled out his cell phone, dialing Barnaby’s number. Without any hesitation, he clicked the call button.
After two short rings, the familiar curt voice was heard. “Yeah?” he asked.
“Hello Barnaby, it’s Robert…From the diner the other night,” he said.
“Oh hey. What’s up?” Barnaby asked him.
“Well, I was wondering if you wanted to get a quick bite to eat. I mean, it’s definitely last minute, but I need to speak with you again,” he said.
There was pause, and then a loud cough on the other line. “Sorry, had something stuck in my throat…that’s fine by me. I don’t have any other shit to do,” he said.
“Great. Do you want to meet up at the diner?” Robert asked.
“Yeah. But don’t think we’ll be staying there. I’m taking you somewhere else tonight right after we eat,” the other man replied.
Robert blushed. This man was so damn straightforward with everything he wanted to do, and in a sense, he heavily enjoyed it. It didn’t feel like he had to run around and pretend with this other man. Everything seemed to just be out there. He smiled at the thought of getting in bed alone with an Alpha male like that, but that smile soon turned into a confused look as he soon remember the severity of his current case. He looked back up at the building that looked as though it had just spit out itself into a fine black ash.
“I can’t think about this right now, I need to go and see Barnaby.” He told himself, as he walked over to his car.
***
He stood in front of the diner fifteen minutes later, ready to see the other man once again. He heard a motorcycle pull up in the alleyway on the side of the building, and sure enough, a minute later he saw the familiar face walk towards the front entryway.
“Hey, follow me,” Barnaby said in his usual tone.
Robert did as he was told, like a good omega, going along the corner of the street to the alleyway. There was a black motorcycle there, the engine still running.
“You ride a motorcycle? That very….thrilling,“ Robert said, trying to show how interested he was in the other man.
“Of course. I have an extra helmet for you. Since you’re a detective and shit, I would rather not be on the wrong side of the law,” the man said as he gave Robert a smirk.
Robert nodded, putting the helmet on. He clung to the back of the other man, and without hesitation the motorcycle zoomed off. Robert clung to the back of the Barnaby as hard as he could as he drove to what seemed to be the outskirts of town. Robert had no idea where Barnaby was taking him, but he all his faith in the other man. He drove surprisingly well for being an intimidating bad boy who was rude, crass, and curt.
“You’re a really good driver!” Robert said into Barnaby’s ear.
There was something charming about the way that he acted though, and it certainly was going to be interesting seeing the other man in his own element.
They got to what seemed to be a small clearing, and when Robert got off, he looked around.
“It’s a forest,” he said.
“Yeah, I come here a lot when I’m frustrated, and when I need some space. It’s been pretty crazy on my end as of late, and it’s been hard to do much else besides come here and think about things,” Barnaby said.
Robert listened, realizing that Barnaby was hiding something, but in a sense he was opening himself up.
“You’re quite the person. You’re someone I don’t even understand,” Robert said.
“Yeah, I get that a lot. I’ve just been going through a whole lot, and it’s been frustrating me,” the other man said.
Robert listened to this, and soon, the other man sat down on a log. Robert followed suit, looking at him with concern.
“What’s wrong?” he asked the other man.
Barnaby scoffed. “Like I would tell you. You’ve just met me, and I don’t think you would understand,” he said.
Robert turned to him, staring into his eyes.
“I think I will. I know it’s not easy to express your true feelings, but I know for a fact that if you can do that, everything will be okay. I want to be your friend Barnaby,” he said.
Barnaby looked at Robert with a serious glance. “Are you sure? Because I have a lot of fucked up baggage,” the man said.
“Of course. I mean, we’re all human, and we all have our dark sides. I won’t judge you,” Robert replied.
The man sat silently, looking at Robert for a moment.
“You have your heart so open right now. I wish I could do that. I wish that I could just tell someone my feelings about life, and the past that I’ve had. Maybe then the pain will go away,” he said.
The pain? What did he mean by that?
“What’s wrong?” Robert asked.
Barnaby was looking at Robert with a perplexed glance. This was the first time someone had actually asked him what was wrong and cared about the answer.
“Fine. You win. Well, I guess it’s time to start from the beginning,” he told Robert.
Robert looked at the other man and nodded, listening intently.
“You have my attention,” he said.
“I’m sure. Well, my name is Barnaby, and I’m from a run-down part of town. I had something happen when I was younger, something bad, and that’s when she came around. My stepmother,” he said.
“Your stepmother? What happened there?” Robert asked.
“She’s crazy, that’s what happened. My stepmother was an abusive cunt to put it lightly, and I was forced to live with her after the incident happened. My dad married that fool, and I was forced to give up the happy life that I had because my dad decided to marry the first whore that showed him attention after my mother had passed. We were well off before and in the beginning of their relationship, but the money started to deplete. After about 2 months of constant spending by her, we ended up being in debt. This was the worst because since she couldn’t go out and spend money she decided to just abuse me all day. I know for sure that it’s not the best thing in the world to say, but I wish she was dead,” he told Robert.