Steve assumes most if not all of what the boy is saying is lies, but he feels for the pretty youth & offers to buy him an espresso.

It's a tragic but all too common occurrence, these pretty young boys come to L.A. seeking fame & end up resorting to prostitution & the porn industry. He offers Luke some cash to help him out, but he declines the sexual favor offered in return. Steve is no prude & he can't say he's never had an anonymous encounter in a bath house, but he feels very strongly about honesty & fidelity in a committed relationship like he has with Adam. Steve doesn't advocate gay marriage just so he can be an adulterer: he considers marriage not just a right, but a responsibility that the straight world seems to have blown off while at the same time denying it to him based on the absurd notion that straight marriages & their 50% divorce rate are somehow 'sacred' & his faithful relationship to Adam is somehow not.

Steve returns to work & does his surgeries, routine breast jobs, and his mind now is pre-occupied not with Adam, but with this fascinating young Luke. It was just a cup of espresso, just a brief conversation, Steve wasn't even all that tempted by the sexual offer: what he has at home can top anything out there, anyway. So why now does the pretty young man's face keep arising in his mind, why does he keep wondering about him, about who he really is, what he really does?

When he gets home, he gets Adam into the hot tub right away. Steve wants to be cleansed of even his unfaithful thoughts, he wants his gorgeous Adam to drive any thoughts of any other man right out of his mind.

Adam responds in kind, and Steve can't help but worry that Adam too has some guilty thought that he needs driven out of his mind.

In just this past day, he & Adam have made love more often & more passionately than they had since when they were first falling in love...It should be wonderful....

But Steve knows they are using passion to mask some other problems. Steve is unlikely to ever run into Luke again, & he knows he has the strength of will to resist any temptations that might arise if the lovely youth were ever to show up again, so it is only a matter of letting time & determination do away with his stray thoughts. But Adam, sweet, creative Adam, is not as strong emotionally as he is & Steve is worried now, about what temptations Adam is facing out there.

NEXT