“I’m the only one here.” But Oberon’s eyes were already searching the dim room for the tablet. He let Ángel go and crawled to the edge of the bed, extending a long arm to grab the tablet, baring his ass to Ángel as he did so. He lay on his stomach on the bed and tapped the tablet to life, reading Con’s blog.

Ángel took the opportunity to scramble away from him, leaning against the headboard, wrapping his arms around his knees. He wanted to remove himself from Oberon’s all-seeing touch for a minute. But he didn’t deny himself the exceptional view: Oberon in the moonlight, apparently unmindful of his nakedness, lying on his belly in a tangle of sheets, his ankles crossed. The shadowed groove of his spine led Ángel’s gaze down to his lean waist, then over the exceptionally gorgeous globes of his ass.

“This song is about you,” said Oberon.

“Yep.”

“Gabriel is the name for an angel, feminized. It’s a . . . a reference that you were intended to understand?”

“Maybe. Of course he had to make it a female name, so his fans wouldn’t suspect he likes dick.”

Oberon turned to gaze at him. “This song . . . this is not a gift? This offends you?”

Ángel sighed. “That’s not how it happened,” he complained. “It wasn’t like he was in love with me and I was just fucking him. That’s—” He stopped, impatient with himself. Tried again. “Oberon, the thing is this. The world is full of the exes of songwriters, and every one of us is saying, ‘Hey, that’s not what happened!’ But nobody cares. We don’t have a leg to stand on. Artists get to use whatever they want. It doesn’t matter.”

“A leg to stand on.”

“Metaphor.”

“Yes. But your feelings are hurt. It does matter.”

“Yeah, well,” grumbled Ángel, crossing his arms over his chest. “Not to anyone but me.” He looked over at the tablet in Oberon’s hands, the words there shining in the darkness, and annoyance bubbled up in him again. “It’s a shitty song, for another thing,” he said. “Doesn’t scan. A four-year-old could have come up with those rhymes. ‘You played me like a game’? You play a game, you don’t play like a game. That is not a metaphor.” He scowled, then laughed at himself suddenly. “Man, there is nothing that doesn’t piss me off about that song.”

“You could write him an email and explain to him how you feel,” suggested Oberon.

It was hard to stay mad when Oberon was looking at him like that, over his shoulder, his bare back a smooth panorama of gorgeousness.

“He doesn’t care how I feel.” Ángel shrugged, trying to dismiss his bitterness. “He knew I’d be mad when he wrote this, but he wrote it anyway.”

“Is that a violation of custom? Impolite?”