Once Upon a Time by Sabrina Hunt

Heat Rating: Just a Spark

Content Warnings: GLBT gay romance

Magic is in the air, and love has a chance.

Once Upon a Time sat in the space between two larger buildings, walls pounding with music and the life contained within. Brick and mortar trembled, sending red and white dust falling in powdery rain on the alleyways. The side buildings seemed to breathe heavily around the nuisance like two parents trying to subdue a child. The tyke refused to acknowledge them, preferring its neon to their brick. Dance and laughter went interrupted beneath an October moon.

On the street, looking at the club with eyes of awe and fear, stood a man in white and blue all trimmed with gold brocade. Save for the moon realness about his face, his wood-god dark blond hair, and a gaze flicking like a nervous deer, he could have stepped out of an animated world prepared to sweep a cinder-princess off to his palace. Except he did not own a palace, merely a one bedroom efficiency apartment three streets north. The beat of life from across the street often called to him through many nights in steady, electronic drumbeats of dance and verve, but not until tonight had he gathered enough courage to make reply. Tonight he dared, but only for one reason.

Taking a deep breath, Prince Charming settled a white mask over his face and stepped into the street. Five confident steps brought him to the other side, and ten timid ones to the guarded doors. The two bouncers carefully considered his ID before deciding he was of legal age to drink himself into a stupor and wake in bed with a stranger. Not that he would do such a thing; he was not that sort of man. Still, when they handed back his ID, he took another deep breath and stepped through the doors.