The two men were huddled around a body lying on the frozen ground. It was swollen and ugly, the features of the man almost unrecognizable. That's what happened when you left a lynching victim hanging from a tree for over a week.

"Anything else you want to add to the report?"

Harry was holding the clipboard, trying to smooth down the paper as it fought to flap around in the wind. When he finally wrestled it into place, he looked over his own ugly scrawl on the page. He shook his head.

"Good. We can always look over the body one more time before I take it back to the station."

Harry had been waiting a long time (at least 30 minutes now), and he felt that it was finally the right moment.

"I have big news Kim."

The lieutenant, who was kneeling on the ground unzipping a body bag, looked up. "Okay…"

"I have decided to stop obsessing about my sexuality."

"Great. Imagine all the time you'll have for work now." He returned his focus to the body. "Matter of fact, we should get back to it right now."

"Just one thing though."

"What?" He asked absentmindedly, lining up the bag next to the victim.

"Are you part of the homosexual underground?"

Kim shook his head. "You didn't stop at all, did you? You're just obsessing about other people's sexuality now." He stood up, rubbing his gloved hands together in the cold.

"Yeah, but-"

"But am I? I'll spare you another 20 hour mind project…Yes, I am. Now let's get back to work."

The two men stood on the balcony, smoke curling out into the night air. Harry rolled the cigarette in between his finger and thumb, trying to keep his eyes focused on the warm glow of the bookstore across the street, and not on Kim standing next to him. All day, Harry had felt…twitchy. As though the slightest disturbance would send him into a trembling mess of erratic movements. And it had only worsened when he went out onto the balcony.

Was that a symptom of a heart attack? Oh god…He was dying wasn't he?

"Are you okay detective?"

Harry turned toward Kim's voice. Okay, he was definitely having a heart attack. It felt as though the violent pounding of his heart was making its way into his throat. His vision was blurring and he could barely make out the lieutenant's face in front of him.

"I'm fine."

"You don't look fine." Harry detected an edge of genuine concern under Kim's usual dry tone.

Harry leaned back against the wall, trying to stop his body from shutting down. All the warning lights were on, the emergency break wasn't working, and his body was rapidly speeding its way toward the edge of a cliff. Yep, this was the end.

Out of the corner of his eye, he could tell that Kim was studying him.

Then a realization struck him. He wasn't having a heart attack, surprisingly, with the way he'd treated his body for who knows how long.

Something in the animalistic, reptilian side of his brain was waking up. The two apes in his mind were duking it out, trying to determine if the thought was even allowed to be formed. The rational, professional ape was stomped into a bloody mess by the much larger ape…of love.

I…want to make fuck…with Kim.

He suddenly felt acutely aware of the lieutenant's eyes on him. Quick, he needed to say something.

"I am not on drugs. Just so you know."

"Um…okay." Kim was holding his cigarette to the side, letting the tobacco burn away. His face had returned to its usual expression when he looked at Harry: vague confusion. The hint of real concern was gone.

His features seemed to glow in the dim light: sharp jaw and neatly trimmed hair, light reflecting off of his glasses, the soft brown eyes behind them. His orange jacket, rustling slightly in the night breeze, partially unzipped to reveal the shape of his neck and his collarbone.

It's now or never Harry. If you back out of this now, you'll never have the courage again. Not without astronomic amounts of alcohol, and if you drink that much then you might not live to make fuck with anyone ever again.

"About what I said earlier…"

He said nothing, staring at Harry, bringing the cigarette to his lips.

"I think that I might, perhaps possibly…um…"

Kim was still waiting, blowing out the smoke from his last drag. God, Harry thought, if only he could look that damn cool right now. This was what a proper cop should look like.

"I want to have sex with you."

Kim blinked twice, expression unreadable. He stood frozen for a moment. "Oh. That is not what I expected you to say."

"What did you expect me to say?" Harry asked, fighting the sudden and, quite frankly very reasonable, in his opinion, urge to throw himself over the side of the balcony.

"I thought you were going to ask me about that man from the apartment complex. The smoker with the Sunday friend. You seem rather…enamored with him." he smirked. "I was going to advise you against it. I slept with him my first night here. He is a little…unusual in bed."

Harry stood still, unable to speak.

"But the answer is yes." He smiled. "You are experimenting, no? As long as this journey of self-discovery doesn't interfere with our investigation, I see no problem with it." He turned back toward the night sky and leaned against the railing. "And I would appreciate it if you keep…feelings out of this."

Got it. No feelings. I can do this.

Harry joined him against the railing, trying to imitate Kim's cool, unbothered demeanor. Don't blow this, Harry. Don't sound desperate.

"So you don't think I'm disgusting and annoying?"

Hm…okay. That was a little desperate. Maybe we can recover from this.

"No. No, I don't." He gazed out at the night sky thoughtfully. "I think we should wait until tomorrow night. That will give me time to pick up a few things. You can come back to my room with me after we conclude the investigation for the day."

Harry felt struck by how casual this all seemed. What had he expected? For Kim to fall into his arms while fireworks went off? For him to pull out his gun and shoot Harry in the chest for suggesting he defile his body with such an ugly beast?

Kim put out his cigarette against the railing. "We should get some sleep, detective." He flashed a smile that made Harry's whole body feel like jelly. "See you in the morning.

Once again, Harry felt his legs turning into noodles as he followed Kim down the hall and watched him turn the key in the lock. They hadn't seen each other for most of the day, since Kim had taken his Kineema to transport the body to the station. It had given him a little too much time to be nervous. He'd tried to distract himself by talking to Joyce for a while, but then he'd been tempted to ask her about the pale, and that hadn't fared well for his anxiety. Still, the existential anxiety and the performance anxiety had canceled out somewhat, since his mind couldn't decide what to focus on.

He had tried to remember if he had any game before losing his memory, but all he could come up with were useless facts about the revolution and obscure wrestlers.

"Please take your shoes off," he said, bending over to untie his own laces.

The room was neat and organized. There were clothes folded and stacked in orderly piles on top of the dresser, probably his clean laundry waiting to be put away. The bed was made, the blankets perfect except for a few wrinkles near the edge. He wondered if his room was always this clean or if Kim had cleaned up before Harry came over.

Kim lined up his boots next to the door and did the same with Harry's shoes. He followed him to the bed, his whole body pulsing with the rapid beating of his heart.

The two of them sat on the edge of the bed, Harry with both feet still planted firmly on the floor, Kim with one leg dangling over the side, swinging back and forth gently. Harry found this oddly endearing. It made him feel like there was a warmth spreading through his body, almost like the feeling when a shot of vodka made its way down his throat except…better.

"So, what prompted this sudden obsession with your own and others' sexualities?" He said payfully. He had this earnest smile on his face that Harry had never seen before.

"I don't know…maybe the whole memory loss thing just wasn't enough of a crisis for me."

"Hm." Kim reached out and touched Harry's cheek, his fingers sending a thousand little shivers through his body. "Tell me detective, are you nervous?" Harry realized that Kim had taken his gloves off. His fingers were slender and graceful, his hands smaller than Harry's. "You don't have to be nervous. I'm not that scary."

The next thing he knew, Harry was on top of Kim, his lips making their way up the lieutenant's neck. He felt soft and fragile and he smelled like pine aftershave. Kim had only let out a few quiet noises, but Harry hoped that he was doing an acceptable job, at least. Then he kissed a spot just behind Kim's ear, and he let out a noise that made it very obvious that Harry was doing a good job.

"Sorry, I am…very sensitive right there."

Harry tried to scrape together the small amount of charisma that he possessed.

"Where else are you sensitive?" He pulled away, looking at Kim's body in between his arms.

"Many places." He had never seen Kim look flustered before. He was usually so composed. But now his cheeks were red and he was looking up at him with hazy eyes, like he was waking from a very good dream.

He made his way up to his lips, longing to feel them, desperate, like a hungry animal. The warmth and the hot breath on his neck and the feeling of Kim's stubble, rough against his lips. The smell of pine trees.

All of it awakened something in Harry. The feeling of another person so close against you, of their skin and their scent. Many different sensations seemed to run over his body, the memory of the men and women that he had loved.

Kim grabbed him around the waist and moved his face next to Harry's neck. Harry felt Kim's glasses brushing against his chin and his body felt like it was about to dissolve in anticipation for the moment when he would feel his lips against his neck.

But then Kim pulled away. "We are still wearing our coats."

Right. Part of making fuck is getting naked. In front of another person. Who can judge you for your fat old man body and then reject you.

Kim was looking at him expectantly. "Well, then I guess I will take my coat off myself."

Harry watched him unzip his coat the rest of the way. He slid it off and let it fall onto the bed behind him. He was wearing a white tank top, and Harry could see his bare arms, the little bit of lean muscle flexing as lay back down.

"I'm thinking maybe I keep my clothes on for this." He looked too good lying there, arms behind his head, the perfect line of his lips…

"Don't be stupid," said Kim, sitting up again. He reached for the collar of Harry's coat, slowly pulling it back. Harry let him take it off the rest of the way.

As the night went on, Kim slowly tugged off more and more of his clothes. Harry found his body tangled up with Kim's, his bare legs on either side of Harry's body as he lay on the bed.

Kim pulled away again, gazing up at him steadily. "You still have your shirt on."

Harry said nothing.

"I'm not going to have sex with you if you keep your shirt on."

Harry took off his shirt reluctantly, but he made no move to get back on top of Kim. "Aw come on," said Harry, grabbing his large belly. "You don't really want this on top of you."

Kim stared at him. "Harry, with all due respect, I want you inside me. Right now. Fucking me. Hard."

Oh. Maybe getting naked in front of another person isn't so bad.