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little.
    “Those blotches on your skin. They’re darker, rougher.”
    “Really?” Todd felt queasy as he hurried over to the room’s one mirror. It didn’t show him any difference in his appearance.
    To his eyes, in fact, the rash hadn’t changed at all in the past month. Fallon and Jake had said the same about theirs. The blots had simply appeared one morning, like patches of wildfire on his face and neck and forearms. They never got better, never got worse.
    Gabriel, on the other hand, could barely see the rash at first. When it became more obvious to him, which was sometime last week, he claimed the redness wasn’t any worse than “an old whore’s blush.”
    Todd faced his coworker, who still stood beside the couch. “You mean they’re worse than when you first got here today?”
    “Yeah.” Gabriel’s curious, concerned gaze moved over Todd’s face and arms.
    “Maybe it’s the chemicals, not the latex. Did your doctor mention that possibility?”
    Todd distractedly shook his head. The point was moot, since his doctor could neither see nor feel even the slightest hint of any abnormality. And then there was the fact that Fallon and Jake, who never came near embalming solutions, had the same condition.
    “How bad is it?” Todd asked, lightly touching an afflicted area on his cheek.
    “You should be able to tell. You just looked.”
    “I know, but…” I’m probably not seeing what you’re seeing . “I just want an honest opinion. Is it really disgusting? I mean, disgusting enough to make people cringe when I’m near them?”
    Gabe approached him. He looked into Todd’s eyes, not at his damaged skin. Then he slowly ran his fingertips along Todd’s right forearm. “I can’t speak for other people. But it doesn’t bother me .”
    The unflinching glide of his hand was more a caress than an analytical touch. Todd quivered inside. “You wouldn’t be afraid of…” He couldn’t say it, didn’t want to acknowledge what he was thinking and feeling by giving it words.
    “I wouldn’t be afraid,” Gabe said quietly. His hand fell away from Todd’s arm.

    Todd cleared his throat. “Well, maybe we should go on a date.”
    “You think so?”
    “Yeah.” Todd uttered a tense laugh. “Nobody’s wanted to touch me in a month.” The mere prospect of sex after his period of forced celibacy made Todd squirmy in the groin.
    Gabe’s face fell. He watched Todd a few beats longer—studied him, actually—then said, “Maybe we shouldn’t after all.”
    The abrupt one-eighty set Todd back on his heels. “Uh…I don’t get it.”
    “You will. Ask me again when you do.”
    “What? Gabriel, you’ve been inviting me out nearly every week since you started working here.”
    “Exactly,” said Gabe. “And I’ve been turned down nearly every week since I started working here.”
    The heat that flashed through Todd’s face didn’t come from his rash. “I had reasons for—”
    Apparently not through with his indictment, Gabe broke in. “Tell me something.
    Have you scored at all since you started looking like a tanning salon disaster?”
    His question, and especially his blunt description, made Todd wilt from the inside out. Embarrassment seared his tentative hope. “What difference does it make?”
    “ All the difference. If you haven’t scored, it explains why you’re suddenly interested in me.”
    Gabriel didn’t look or sound angry. Although his words implied indignation, his face and voice conveyed a quiet self-possession steeled with pride. Todd felt like a jerk.
    “I don’t fault you for wanting some sexual healing,” Gabe said, more like his mild-mannered self again, “but I can’t give it to you.” His mouth slipped briefly into a regretful smile before he headed for the door.
    “Why?” Todd asked abruptly. He sounded pitiful…but not, he realized, because of his desperation. He felt no desperation. This wasn’t the only time in his life he’d gone for weeks without getting