One more Chapter left. You'll be pleased to know I am halfway through writing it as we speak. Why, you might ask am I then on here posting this chapter? Procrastination. No better way than that to put it. Need time for the movie
to play out in my head.

Chapter 4

“Told you.”

Alan stood a few steps away from Denny, staring at the lips that he had been kissing seconds earlier, desperately wanting to kiss them again. Alan was attempting to catch his breath while still maintaining an unruffled, calm, appearance but he wasn’t sure that he was succeeding.

His mind should be reeling with all the implications of what he had just done. Of the impact he had just made to their friendship, their relationship, and to their lives from now on.

But instead, he couldn’t stop himself from celebrating internally. Finally! There was some hard proof that Denny’s feelings for him went beyond cigars, scotch and stimulating conversation.

And by hard proof, Alan meant the insistent bulge he had felt pressing against his thigh moments earlier. He had been somewhat terrified when he had moved in to kiss Denny, hoping against hope that even if the man’s affection for him wasn’t physical, that it might at least be deep enough to stop him from picking Alan up and throwing him over the balcony. The enormous triumph that he’d felt when Denny had not only relented to that fateful kiss, but reciprocated, was enough to make him want to skip down the office hallway naked singing “Let’s hear it for the boy”.

Denny stood quite still, hands dropped at his sides, the forgotten cigar still sitting on the balcony ledge. He had that thoughtful look on his face. The one that could make people believe that the toughened, stubborn, immovable Denny Crane was actually considering someone else’s opinion for once.

After a few moments of silence, Denny spoke up.

“Told me what?”

Alan bit the corner of his lip and lowered his eyebrows in confusion.

“...I told you... you have feelings... I was...”

“I know what you were doing, but you haven’t proved anything to me. I always knew I was attracted to you; I just manipulated you into doing something about it.”

Alan slowly smiled. This must be the only way Denny could possibly reconcile what had just happened, by completely taking responsibility for it. Turning everything around so that it appeared that he’d known what was going on all along.

Denny Crane was a proud man, so to admit that some important change had taken place in his life without him having orchestrated it, was simply not acceptable.

Denny turned back to the balcony ledge and picked up his cigar, stuck it in his mouth and took a victory puff while staring out at the twinkling cityscape before him. Alan allowed his tense shoulders to drop and slightly shaking himself, he smoothly fell back into the familiar routine with his friend.

“In that case, congratulations are in order. You certainly had me fooled.”

Denny quickly downed what was left of his scotch and surveyed the empty glass in his hand.

“Part of the plan, had to be convincing.”

Alan nodded at this self denial and gently took Denny’s glass. He went back inside and came out a short time later with two freshly filled ones. Handing Denny one and drinking a mouthful of his, Alan walked over and sat down, making sure to straighten his jacket as he sat. An old habit he’d formed in court proceedings that he would probably never grow out of.

“Denny.”

Denny turned and caught Alan’s eyes.

“Not to impugn the brilliance of your plan, but... What now?”

Denny faltered a little at this.

“What do you mean, ‘what now?’?”

“Well, you’ve admitted that you’re attracted to me, I think you’re fairly aware by now that I’m attracted to you...”

“You are?”

“Yes, Denny.”

“I knew it.”

Denny scoffed triumphantly and took a swig from his scotch, sticking his cigar back in his mouth and puffing away in an almost exultant manner.

“Denny Crane. Everyone wants a piece.”

Alan was unfazed.

“Indeed. So you’ve cleverly established that we are both attracted to each other, I only wonder if you know what should happen next. Should we follow the path most people tend to take in this situation?”

Denny shook his head and sighed.

“You will do anything to get me into bed.”

Alan chuckled and Denny laughed with him, both men sharing in the irony of Denny repeating what he’d said many times before but within this new context.

Once they were quiet again, Alan decided to press the issue, knowing that the more that the time elapsed, the more chance Denny would have to blame this whole incident on ‘mad cow’ and disavow all knowledge that it had occurred.

“So? What’s the plan?”

Denny shook his head and took another puff of his cigar.

“No idea, didn’t get that far. What with the mad cow and...”

Alan smirked to himself, having taken all responsibility for his manipulation of the situation, Denny was putting the ball back in his court.

Alan pretended to think hard about what to say.

“You know, I’m not completely sure these night terrors have subsided...”

Denny interjected in an innocent, seemingly considerate way.

“Need me to come over? Keep an eye on you? Tie you up with rope again?”

Alan smiled wickedly, catching Denny’s bright eyes and the hint of lust growing behind them.

“If it’s not too much trouble.”

“No! Not at all, happy to do it.”

Alan continued to stare into Denny’s eyes, prompting Denny to stub out his cigar and gulp down the rest of his scotch. Throat still burning from the drink he rasped out,

“I’m all done, let’s go.”

Alan smiled at Denny’s eagerness. He stood up and offered his arm to his friend.

“Shall we?”

Denny linked his arm with Alan’s theatrically, and together, they walked back inside.