Milk

Milk.

Milk is the talk of the town. The darling of New York City. I feel like I see him all over New York, on bus advertisements and people's Instagram feeds on the subway and on those big billboards when I'm unfortunate enough to have to drive tourists through Times Square. A couple of weeks ago no one knew who Milk was and now he's the new it thing.

Walking down 45th in my neatly pressed suit, sweat under my armpits, I gaze at an ad with Milk on it. He's tall and slender, practically see-through with the way you can see his ribs. His fur is appropriately milky white but his ears and his belly are a light pink. And in every ad I see him in, he's wearing nothing but a pair of white Wear and Tear briefs. With the way he's just kind of standing there, no expression on his face, you could be tempted to say you don’t get it. But you look at him a little longer, you stand on the street with the rest of the tourists and stare gobsmacked, and you get it.

When my friend in the bodyguard business Rock passed along the job posting for Milk's bodyguard, I laughed. I technically have all the requisite requirements – 10 years of bouncing for clubs, doing security at retail places, and driving tourists around New York City – but there's no way Milk would hire some Bronx rottweiler punk like me to be his bodyguard. I applied anyway, just because standing around a cute dog all day like Milk sounds a lot more appealing than having drunk club girls throw up in the back of my car every night.

And somehow, I got an interview.

I walk around until I find an unmarked building sandwiched between two other unmarked buildings. "Hey, boss," I say to the doorman.

He daps me up. I'm glad to see someone from a similar walk of life in this building that seems to be made up of exclusively marble. "Got an interview with that underwear model?"

"Yes sir."

"Good luck. I've seen guys coming and going all day. Elevators are down and to the right, it's gonna be on the 34th floor."

I walk through a long, empty, marble hallway. Every step makes my dress shoes clack against the floor and echo through the whole building. I get in the elevator and wait. Upstairs, I'm in another similarly long hallway, but there are three nice, velveted chairs outside of a glass door. I take a seat and wait until I'm called.

A lithe buck with a mullet, mustache, and a stylish dress shirt unbuttoned about halfway down his body comes to the door with a clipboard. "Tony D'Augustino?"

"Yes, that's me. I go by Toast as well."

He marks that on his clipboard and smiles. "Come with me."

He leads me down another hallway, this time with headshots of various high-status models framed on the walls. The buck opens the door for me. Inside, framed from behind with a gorgeous view of the New York City skyline, is Milk. And amazingly, he looks exactly like all of the photos.

Milk is sitting there in a oversized black tee-shirt that shows off his midriff, a tiny white skirt that I’d almost call frumpy if it didn’t have a half-inch in-seam, garters, and knee-high boots. He’s so casual but so poised, with that same unknownable facial expression from all of the ads. Next to him is a large, hippie-ish older lion. He’s in this odd flowy material that reminds me of rattan, but the knitting is so wide that I can see his fur underneath. It would be nice at the beach.

The buck who led me in takes a seat in the corner. I feel ridiculously overdressed for the room.

"Greetings," the lion says, leaning over the table to shake my paw. I shake it confidently. "Please, take a seat."

"Thank you for having me."

"I'm D'Angelo," he says, "Milk's manager. We're very delighted to be having this interview with you."

I look over at Milk and smile at him. He doesn't give anything back.

"Now I just have to ask," D'Angelo says, "Are you from the Bronx?"

"Mmhmm. Up and to the right."

"A man of my own heart!" he roars. "I'm sure we'll get along just fine. Now, I'm sure you're already very familiar with Milk, but just so you get an idea of what we're looking for, we're not just looking for a bodyguard. Milk is our most important client but isn't in need of the protections that a more, let's say, high-profile client would need. We're looking for a chauffeur and someone to be with him throughout the workday. The other stipulation being that you will be photographed often and we want someone who pairs well with the little dog."

"Oh, sure."

"Alright, let's get down to brass tacks."

I walk D'Angelo through my resume. Milk watches but has no input. I feel a little embarrassed talking about driving Ubers and working at the Macy's in Times Square, but they're asking and so I will tell him. I had to send a bunch of references in, probably about how many jobs I’ve had total, and I walk with him through what every single one said. D'Angelo asks me a plethora of questions about what I would do in certain scenarios, times I had to act fast and what I did, and about various accreditations I have. He's particularly amused by my degree from The New School.

I don't bomb the interview, at least, but Milk doesn't say anything the entire time. I keep looking over at him for some sort of confirmation or acknowledgement and he just doesn't offer anything back. After about 20 minutes of sweaty talking, Milk finally leans over to D'Angelo and whispers something in his ear.

"Alright!" D'Angelo says, immediately standing up and dusting his paws. "Looks like we have everything we need from you, Toast. We'll have a decision for you before tomorrow morning."

"Oh, wow. Thank you. Thank you both for the opportunity."

The buck (his nametag says Rahul, now that I'm reading it) leads me to the elevators with a smile. There's another dog with a similar build as me in a similar suit sitting in the seats I was sitting in. I head down and outside, the summer air hitting me like a bus.

I'm exhausted. I take the 1 train all the way up to my shitty studio apartment, I strip down to nothing, open the window wide, and lay down on my mattress.

I definitely did not get that job. Given what the doorman said and the barrage of men who look just like me who also applied, I'm just another Bronx native in a sea of applicants. And they probably have experience being a bodyguard and got more of a reaction out of Milk than complete indifference.

I grab my phone and text my friend who passed along the job listing a thank you, then look up Milk. I don't even have to add "model" afterwards, because when you look up Milk photos of him come up. He has this big campaign with Wear and Tear where he's standing around in a white void in nothing but various pairs of briefs, but it isn't hard to look around and find a bunch of other photoshoots of him too. The ones that aren't in the white void are around New York City, some in places I've been to hundreds of times. There's one photoshoot of him in a pair of white briefs that was taken literally 5 blocks from my apartment.

He's really cute. Of course, looking through all of the social media threads between people with Milk profile pictures, I'm not the only person to think this. I click on an article called "Milk and Julia Fox spotted at an Upper West Side Restaurant" which has no more content than the title and a bunch of photos of the two of them eating dinner.

There's one photo, one of him laying on the ground with an orange Speedo around his thighs, his thick white butt completely exposed, that gets me a little excited sexually. He just looks fiiiine. He is just begging you to push yourself inside of him. My paw sneaks down to my quickly-hardening dick. I definitely should not be doing this to a photo of someone I might be hired to bodyguard, but I'm also definitely not getting this job.

I quickly look up "Milk nudes" but nothing comes up. There's a Reddit thread from r/askgaybros where someone asks if Milk has ever done nude photography, another person responding with the same image that got me hard in the first place, saying this is the extent of it. Okay. I go back to just 'Milk' and scroll through the photos, jerking off with fervor.

This dog is fucking cute. I am particularly focused on the soft pink of his belly. I would just love to give him a kiss there, to hold his thin waist in my paws and to explore deep inside of him. He's 6 foot but probably only weighs a little over a hundred pounds, all of that being fur and bones.

I was so fucking stressed, so the pleasure of jerking off to this little dog (as his manager said) is indescribable. It doesn't take me long to get myself right to the edge. I find that photo of him with the Speedo down around his legs and I finish myself off to it, looking into his sweet eyes as I let out a thick load.

After I finish, I don't even bother wiping the cum off my stomach. It's only 7 but the sun is streaming through the window and I am absolutely boiling. Between the relief of orgasm, the heat, and finally being done with the interview I was waiting all week for, I am quick to fall asleep.

Not two hours later, I am thrust awake from the sound of my phone ringing. I scramble to find it in the sheets. It's from an unknown number.

"Hello?" I say.

"Hello," Rahul the deer's suave voice says. "Am I speaking to Toast D'Augustino?"

"This is him."

"I'm calling from Atlas Modeling Agency. We are delighted to offer you the position of Milk's bodyguard."

"Oh, shit, really?" I bark. "Fuck, sorry."

Rahul laughs. "That's okay."

"Uh, uhh, yeah. I would love to accept the position."

"Great! Are you ready to receive some onboarding information?"

I lumber up and go to my kitchen counter. I grab a golf pencil and an old pizza box. "Uh huh."

I am in a daze as Rahul walks me through the information I need to know. I scribble the information down all over the pizza box, knowing I'm not going to be able to read my handwriting in the morning.

"And... that should be it!"

"Okay. Thank you. Thank you very much for this opportunity."

And with a click, the phone call is over.

I am astounded. In the blink of an eye, I went from Toast, the third guy named Tony D'Augustino at my schmuck Bronx high school, to the bodyguard of supermodel Milk. I stare at myself in the mirror. I'm a 6 foot 5 rottweiler, broad-shouldered, muscular and a little chubby. The cum from earlier is still caked onto my stomach.

I'm looking into the eyes of Milk's motherfucking bodyguard.

I go through a few days of training where I don't see Milk at all. I'm mostly working with Rahul, his assistant. I'm on call at all times with this job, likely up to 16 hours a day. I would complain, but the wage is an eyewatering number I never thought I would be paid in my life.

I am to meet Milk at his apartment every morning, walk with him to the car provided by the company (another luxury I didn't know was possible; although I am specifically not allowed to use it for matters that don't pertain to Milk), then drive him to whatever appointments, shoots, and meetings he has. I am to be with him the entire time he is out in public, not more than 10 feet away from him. My goal is to keep Milk safe, to keep people away from Milk, and to identify the proper method of egress for any scenario we are in. I'm given an earpiece and a handgun. (I honestly didn’t think my time in the military before college would go towards keeping fans away from a stick thin underwear model, but I guess I did swear to protect the people and Milk is one of those people.)

It's, frankly, insane, but of course there would be this level of security for someone as important as Milk. I've worked two jobs at a time before, I’ve been deployed, I've worked the graveyard shift straight through to 4 in the middle of the day. I've done it all. But I have never done something that requires this level of commitment. This is the life of a bodyguard. I already didn't have much of a life before, doing security work and driving for Uber in my free time, so at least I'll be doing all of that for a good reason now.

I'm really nervous the evening before my first day with Milk. My friend invites me out to get drinks but I tell him I need to get to bed early. Instead, I spend all night scouring the internet for interviews with Milk. I cannot find anything but a few interviews with D'Angelo where he repeats the same couple of talking points about Milk's 'unknowable, stunning beauty.' It doesn't seem like he runs his Instagram, but even then there's no video on it where he's speaking. A couple of gossip magazines call him notoriously quiet. A New York Times opinion piece says that Milk is the first male example of pretty people being seen, not heard, and the comments are filled with detractors who more or less agree with the article but want to defend Milk against the negative tone.

Now looking at his underwear photoshoots, I feel a little guilty. I jerked off to his photos thinking I would in a million years get the job. As his first line of protection, that's completley unacceptable. I will never do it again.

Once I've read just about every single piece of content about Milk on the internet, I look up and I realize it's three in the morning. I set multiple alarms and go to bed.

In the morning, I'm a bundle of nerves. I was told to dress far more casually than I did for the interview, and I was actually given multiple boards of clothing inspo and a neatly folded bag of clothes to pour through from his stylist. I suppose the idea is that I'm supposed to look more like his entourage or his friend than his bodyguard. The clothes are remarkably normal. I’m pretty sure I could dig out this creme colored tee-shirt and the khakis out of my closet, although I’ve probably gained a few pounds since I’ve worn them last.

I head down to pick up the car from the lot. It's brand fucking new slim, black model with tinted windows. Already sitting in the car is a 24-pack of those fancy glass water bottles and a motherfucking minifridge stocked with strawberries, olives, blue cheese, and hummus. This is all for Milk, I guess.

I drive up to his apartment on 127th street. He lives on an inconspicuous street lined with beautiful brownstones. I find a parking space right outside of his apartment and take a deep breath before heading up the stairs and pressing the buzzer, forgetting I have a copy of his keys in the car. I know where he's going and also he's an adult man, so it's not like I'm handling a broken bag of flour, but I am still exceedingly nervous. I still haven't said anything to the little dog.

"Hello?" Rahul over the intercom says. "Who is this?"

"Toast D'Augustino."

"Toast! Come on up!"

I guess there are other people with him there. I walk up three flights of stairs before I end up at his floor. The door opens. There is a whole production going on inside Milk’s apartment.

"Hey!" Rahul says. "Looking sharp."

"Thank you. What's, uh, going on here?"

"So today," the deer says, beckoning me inside. We step into the kitchen which is just about as big as my whole apartment. "We're shooting 'A Day In The Life of Milk' for New York Magazine."

"Oh shit!" I bite my lip. "I really need to stop swearing."

"You're just keeping it real, girl!"

Girl. I have never been called girl before.

In the living room, Milk is sitting on his couch in a bathrobe and a pair of briefs from a brand I've never heard of. There's a camera operator, a person adjusting some lights, D'Angelo, the stylist, Rahul, and me. On the table in front of Milk is a plate of bright green avocado toast and a cup of coffee.

"Can we get one with you holding the coffee?" the cameraman asks.

Milk picks up the coffee cup and takes a sip, giving that same coy look to the camera. D'Angelo steps next to me. "Look at it, man. Isn't he beautiful?"

"He is," I nod.

"Take it in. You're one of the only people in the world who gets to see this in action. This is the most exclusive club you'll ever be in." He nods. "What a dog."

I watch silently as Milk half-poses for the camera. He doesn't have to do anything and he looks fucking beautiful, D'Angelo shouting endless praise at him from behind the cameera.

"So, wait," I whisper to Rahul. "What part of the day is this? I thought his photoshoot wasn't until later."

"This is his breakfast," Rahul says. "It's candid."

"This doesn't seem very candid."

Rahul chuckles. "Yeah. But that's not what people are looking for. They're looking for the verisimilitude of candidness more than candid itself."

"Uh huh."

Milk's apartment is really nice and meticulously clean. I can't believe an actual person lives here. In front of me, Milk lets out a yawn and there's a flutter of clicks from the cameraman. "YES!" D'Angelo calls out. "Yes yes yes. That is what I like to see."

In person, Milk is just so gorgeous. I hate to say it, but seeing him innocently lounged out on the couch like that, his briefs almost slipping off of his body, his little white tail poking out from under his butt, I get half of a hard on. I excuse myself to the bathroom and splash my face with water in his marble black basin. He has a waterfall shower with a bunch of different fur products lined up along the rim. I feel like if I opened his medicine cabinet a rainbow would fall out.

Rahul seems aggressively gay and D'Angelo seems like a free love kind of 60s hippie. I don't know how they aren't both packing a stiffie watching Milk pose like that.

I head back out and count my lucky stars that I don't get another hard on during the rest of this photoshoot. Milk puts his half-finished coffee down (I guess it was candid after all) and stands up. D'Angelo walks Milk into his room.

A couple of minutes later, Milk comes out dressed in this odd oversized gray shirt where essentially the whole front is cut out. I can see his ribs, his stomach, his black briefs. From behind him, D'Angelo gives me a nod.

"Good morning, Milk," I say as he walks by me. Before he's given a chance to respond, though, there's a rush of everyone exiting the apartment with him. I'm rounding out the very back.

The cameraman, stylist, and lighting operator get into one car, while Rahul goes shotgun and Milk and D'Angelo pile into the back. I get behind the wheel and watch in the rear-view mirror as D'Angelo puts his big paw on Milk's bare shoulder. "Good job, little dog."

Milk whispers something back to him. I turn my ears to try and hear what they're saying, but Rahul stops me. "Do you know where we're going?"

"Mmhmm. Let's get you where you're supposed to go."

Traffic sucks but Milk and D'Angelo wouldn't know it sitting in the back of the car. I stop at traffic lights by groups of people who don't know that Milk is sitting 5 feet away from them. Behind me, I watch Milk eat a single strawberry which stains the fur around his mouth red.

"Arlight," D'Angelo says. "Hope the union people don't mind." And he snaps a photo of Milk just like that.

After twice as long as it would have taken to take the 2 train, we end up at the studio. I park, then head around the back to open the door for Milk. As he gets out of the car, onlookers literally stop and stare at him. At least one person takes a photo that I'm in.

I quickly guide Milk into the building. It seems like the receptionist already knows what's up, because with a hoof on Milk's back, she leads him straight to the elevator. I look back at D'Angelo and Rahul who are rushing into the building just behind us.

Upstairs, there is a flurry of people throughout the studio. I’ve lost sight of Milk, the one thing I’m specifically not supposed to do, but it seems like D’Angelo and Rahul don’t mind. I stand in the back of the room and watch everything happen.

In front of me, a fluffy brown and white dog steps out in a bathrobe. Based on the way he’s talking to an assistant while another person powders his face, I’d guess he’s another model being photographed today. He’s stunning, with one blue eye and one brown eye.

A few minutes later, Milk steps out in another bathrobe. The two of them greet each other and then step out onto the set. There’s a simple, neat bed being lit from just about every single angle that they both sit on the edge of. D’Angelo positions himself right next to the camera operator as the two dogs shed their bathrobes and a production assistant carries them away. Both of them are dressed in white briefs from Wear and Tear.

I watch D’Angelo gesticulate wildly as the two dogs listen. The brown dog is distinctly more animated than Milk, but he gives that same supermodel stare in between profuse nods.

Eventually, I guess, D’Angelo is ready to begin. A hush falls over the rest of the people as D’Angelo works his magic. The dogs pose separately on the bed and they take photos of that for a while, then D’Angelo steps in and positions them on top of each other. They’re sort of lounging pressed against one another in this unbothered way, staring at the camera like this wouldn’t otherwise be a particularly intimate moment.

They do this for a while. I stand there, transfixed.

“Do we have the intimacy coordinator on standby?” D’Angelo calls out. An ibex steps up to him and they talk for a second, then she goes out and talks to the dogs. They both nod at her. “Alright, puppies, how do we feel about a little kiss?”

Milk vaguely nods. “Let’s do it,” the brown dog says.

“Mihail, can you just give Milk a little lick on the cheek there?”

He does. The camera operator eats it up.

“Yes yes yes,” D’Angelo cheers. “Just like that.”

Mihail, the fluffy brown dog, keeps licking at Milk’s face, then he puts a paw on Milk’s cheek and turns his muzzle towards him. The two dogs start properly making out with each other.

“Fucking beautiful,” D’Angelo says. “They’re going to fucking eat this up.”

Mihail pulls away and Milk is left sitting there with his mouth agape, spit dripping down his soft, flexed tongue. I stare at his mouth and somehow between all of the scantily-clad dogs and the making out, that’s when I get my second hard-on of the day.

Even if I’m not that big, my erection is extremely obvious in these tan pants, so I excuse myself to the craft services table (Uber never gave me a craft services table, by the way.) I linger there for a bit, piling my plate with rugelach and those little ham and cheese things rolled up into a pinwheel. I’m just going to get hard again if I stare at Milk and Mihail making out or fucking each other doggy style or whatever D’Angelo has them doing now.

I want to talk to Rahul, the only other person I really know here, but he’s talking to the stylist. Normally I have to be good at striking up a conversation with anyone, but that’s when I’m with people who are like me. Every single person here is, despite my college degree, way more educated than me and way more sophisticated than me.

I look around until I see another guy who’s basically doing what I’m doing, a stylish white horse dude with a giant horn as if he was a unicorn. I don’t know, maybe I’ve reached the tax bracket where the guys really are unicorns. Getting closer to him, I realize it’s a prosthetic horn, obviously. He’s standing near where I was standing earlier, watching Mihail and Milk going at it.

“Yo, boss,” I say. “What’s good?”

“Just appreciating the live entertainment,” he says with a grin in a thick Spanish accent. “I’m Yami.”

“Yo. I’m Toast.”

“Ah, Milk’s new bodyguard, hm?”

“Oh, yeah.”

“I’m the Mihail’s makeup artist,” he says with a nod, “And his fiance.”

“Oh, you and Mihail…” I glance up at Mihail and Milk, who are laying on top of each other with their bulges pressed together, the intimacy coordinator just out of frame. I’m not sure you can even see their underwear from the camera’s view. “Are you okay with him making out with Milk?”

“Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Doesn’t that make you worried he’s going to, like, lose feelings for you or something?”

“I mean, he better still like me since we’re getting married in two weeks.”

“Oh, shit, really? Congratulations.”

“It’s just part of the business.” He guffaws. “Mihail, Milk and I go way back, way before Milk ever made it big. This is Milk doing us a little favor, actually.”

“I guess I’d let my fiance make out with someone else if it meant global recognition.”

“I’d let Mihail make out with him for way less.” He chuckles. “How are you liking the job so far, friend?”

“Everything about it is so excellent. I’ve heard some horror stories from my bodyguard friend but Milk seems to be super chill and everyone has been great.” I pause. Mihail starts straddling Milk. “But it’s hard to get a read on him.”

“Oh, relax. He likes you.”

“Really?”

“He’s always been very particular about who he lets in. He’s not gonna let any schmuck be around him 24/7.”

“I kind of am just any schmuck.”
“ALRIGHT!” D’Angelo calls out, the intimacy coordinator tugging at his sleeve. “Let’s take two! Two minutes!”

Mihail slips on his bathrobe and steps over to us. Yami wraps his muscular arms tight around Mihail and brings him in for a kiss. The middle school kiss transference principle goes through my head as I watch it happen. At least a little bit of Milk’s spit is in Yami’s mouth. “Mihail, this is Toast. Toast, Mihail.”

“Toast!” Mihail exclaims. His eyes shine as he turns to me and smiles. “Hi hi hi. Nice to meet you.”

“It’s nice to meet you too.”
“Toast was just explaining how hard it is to get a read on Milk.”

“Really?” Mihail says, tilting his head. “I find him so easy to read.”

“... Yeah?”

“No, I’m kidding. Oh my god. Try making plans with Milk. Do you wanna go see a movie? Do you wanna get dinner? Wanna go clubbing? C’mon, don’t give me that face, Milk.” He giggles. “Oh my god, trying not to get a boner is so hard.”

“Tell me about it,” I blurt. They both laugh, but I am thoroughly embarrassed that I just said that.

“They can’t get you an ice cube or something?” Yami asks.

“I’m trying to think about that bad Chinese food place next to our apartment but I’m not giving the face I need to. I feel like I’m blowing it.”

“You’re not blowing it, mi cachorrito.”

“Yeah, but Milk is like, serving cunt every second of every day and he’s not even getting hard doing it.”

“D’Angelo loves you. He fucking loves you.”

“He loves Milk. I’m just here.”

“ALRIGHT EVERYONE!” D’Angelo calls. “GET BACK HERE!”

“Has the self-doubt killed your boner yet?”

“Just about.”

Yami smiles and kisses Mihail on the forehead. “Go get ‘em.”
Mihail wags his tail and runs back to the bed where Milk was sitting the whole time. They throw off their bathrobes together.
“That’s the man I’m going to marry,” Yami grins, “In bed with another man.”

That goes on for a while. I didn’t think a photo shoot could possibly take this long (to be honest, and I’m sorry for thinking this, but I didn’t think models had real jobs at all), but the hours trudge along. At the end of the day, I haven’t done anything at all but drive Milk for 25 minutes and get enough boners to lift a car. D’Angelo wraps up production and Rahul saunters over to me, clipboard in his hoof.

“Should be good to just drive him home now,” he says.

“Is there more ‘day in the life of’ stuff to shoot?”

“Uh, we’re going to do that tomorrow.”

“Kind of defeats the point, right?”

“New York Magazine readers don’t know the difference.”

“I would say that is despicable and low-brow.”

That really amuses Rahul. “You read New York Magazine?”

“I’m familiar with the sections.”

I guess the idea of a bodyguard reading New York Magazine is hilarious to him. Regardless, I finally have work to do. I find Milk chatting with Mihail and Yami, but when I get over to them Milk seems to have clammed up.

“Can you drive us back to Milk’s place?” Yami asks. “We’re gonna order out Thai.”

“Ooh, can you drive to the Thai restaurant and pick up the Thai?” Mihail adds.

“He’s not a delivery driver.”

“Yeah, but when was the last time you were friends with someone with a personal bodyguard?”

“I did Tamika London’s makeup once on a talk show.”

“Oh, she is fierce.”

“She smells great. Like honey lavender.”

“I did not like FurHouse though. They just talked about their feelings the whole time. Boo.”

“I can drive you guys, yeah,” I add to break up the Tamika London conversation.

“Yay!” Mihail says. “Let’s go!”

There’s about three seconds where the three of them are outside but not in the car, and I don’t get to do any bodyguard work in that time. They talk in the back but I can’t really hear what their conversation is about. I go pick up the Thai food, then drive them back to Milk’s apartment. I carry the food with me as I walk them inside.

It’s nice seeing Milk’s apartment filled with friends laughing together instead of cameras and lights. Milk laughs too, but I missed what they were talking about. They crowd around the kitchen counter and pull takeout containers out of the paper bag as I stand back and watch them.

“Do you… want me to clear out?” I ask.

“I think we’ll be okay, right?” Yami asks.

Milk nods.

“Thank you!” Mihail says. “Have a good night, Toast.”

And that’s it. I step out of the apartment, lock the door, and go down to the car . Somehow, even though I didn’t work more than 45 minutes total today, I’m exhausted. I sit in the car with my head against the steering wheel and I just breathe for a second.

Then, of course, New York being New York, someone pulls up behind me and honks. I quickly back out of the spot and they take my place. I drive home, circle around for 10 minutes looking for a parking spot, then load up the meter overnight.

I go upstairs, throw all my fake bodyguard clothes off, and lie down on my mattress once again. Between the dogs making out, Yami’s endorsement of his fiance rubbing dicks with another man, and all of that mind-numbing standing around, it was a long day. I thought it was odd that, throughout all of that, I didn’t get a single word in with Milk. Not only that, but he still didn’t say anything.

Now that I’m thinking about it, with the way they were ushering me out, Milk, Mihail and Yami are probably having a threesome right now. So at least they get to end the day well.

But as I’m brushing my teeth and getting ready to go to bed, the phone rings. It’s an unknown number.

“Hello?”

“Hi?” someone with a thick Brooklyn accent says. “Is this Toast?”

“Who is this?”

“It’s Milk. We wanna go clubbing. Can you drive us?”

It turns out, the job of a bodyguard is the same as a personal chauffeur with a little more waiting involved. Honestly, if I wasn’t working for Milk right now, I’d probably be in my Uber driving people around anyway. There’s something very pleasing about being at Milk’s beck and call and having him finally call on me, like I’m actually doing my fucking job. I’m rocking out to the radio and finger drumming on the wheel as I make my way back to Milk’s apartment with significantly less traffic than earlier in the day.

I park and head upstairs, swinging Milk’s keys around my forefinger. I give the door three solid knocks, then make my way in. Inside, the three of them are standing around in the kitchen, a bottle of vodka about halfway finished on the counter.

“Hey, boss,” I say.

Milk is dressed in this really tight-looking white denim bustier top that Yami is currently struggling to zip all the way up, a very short plastic skirt that shows off his black briefs, arm warmers, and a different color of those cowboy boots he was wearing the day he interviewed me. He looks stunning and he’s showing just about as much skin as you can show off without being naked. He looks at me with those coy eyes and I can’t help but smile.

Mihail steps out in a gray crop top, all of the fluff of his chest pouring out, and large distressed denim jeans with a jockstrap poking out the back. Yami, a little older and a little taller than the two dogs, is wearing a houndstooth fitted shirt unbuttoned about halfway down and white khakis, his unicorn horn prosthetic still hanging on.

“Yay yay yay!” Mihail exclaims. “Thank you for coming to get us!”

“It’s all in a day’s work. You three look good.”

“Where’s your club outfit, papi?” Yami laughs.

“Oh, I thought this was, I thought this was,” I open my arms out, wearing the same sweat-stained thing from earlier. “To be honest, I was sitting on my bed naked 25 minutes ago.”

Yami and Mihail laugh. I look at Milk trying to get some sort of reaction out of him now that he’s finally spoken his first words to me, but he still offers nothing.

“Are you ready to head out?”

“Yes,” Yami says, before putting a finger up. He takes a swig of vodka, still holding his finger up, then another, then finally puts it down. “Yes.”

Milk leads us out of the apartment, Yami and Mihail holding hands as they walk out. Even just walking you can see a peak of Milk’s black panties, and when he bends over to grab his bag, you can see everything.

I load them all up in the car without much trouble, then watch them explore the minifridge in the rear-view mirror. “So, where are we heading?”

“llamame in Brooklyn?” Mihail upspeaks. “We used to go there a lot before Milk hit it big.”

“Yeah, except we’d have to take the Q for an hour and a half to get there,” Yami adds.

“Hopefully they’ll still let him in. He’ll probably ruin the underground vibe.”

“We are singlehandedly gentrifying llamame tonight, bitches.”

It’s more of the same as I drive them the million miles all the way down to Brooklyn. There’s some sort of pileup on the Grand Central Parkway so, during a lull in their conversation, I speak up. “Yo, boss.”

Milk pokes his head up. I watch him in the rear-view mirror.

“What do you want me to do tonight? Are you planning on flirting around a little? Should I keep the guys away from you?”

“Oh my god,” Mihail butts in with. “You’re going to need to be on him at all times. Guys flock to Milk like a fucking seagull to french fries.”

“I’m glad we don’t have to do the whole club thing anymore,” Yami responds.

“You’re the horniest bitch in that place,” Mihail kids.

I merge lanes, waiting for a response. “Milk?”

“I just want to have fun with Yami and Mihail,” he says in his flat Brooklyn accent, “I don’t really want anyone else around me.”

“You got it, boss.”

When we arrive, I find parking down the street and pay for the meter. I get the guys out of the car and stay an inch behind Milk as we walk down the street. It’s nearing midnight so this block is a mix of people flocking to the club and unsavory types that I don’t want around Milk. The entrance to the club, an assuming warehouse, has a line literally around the block, but as soon as the bouncer sees us he gives me a grin and ushers us in. Every single person in that line is staring at Milk. A few people take photos. I dap up the bouncer and guide the boys inside.

“God,” Mihail smiles, “This place used to be underground!”

It’s dark in here. The lighting is a deep red and there is bubbly foam everywhere falling all over the audience from the ceiling. The DJ is playing some sort of incredibly loud synth pop. The dance floor is absolutely packed, so I make sure to stay right behind Milk as the boys worm their way to the center.

They start dancing with each other immediately. Milk seems to be in the flow of it, sticking his arms up and gyrating around. I can’t get a good look at it but I’m sure his ass is pretty much out right now. The three close their eyes and dance together.

I’ve never been a clubgoer, more of a club employee who has to be there until 5 in the morning, so dancing doesn’t come naturally to me. I feel weird being the only one not moving in this crowd of people slathering each other in thick foam bubbles, so I nod and bounce just enough that I don’t look out of place.

Milk looks so happy. He’s not smiling, but he looks so into the dancing. The way he’s standing is exposing his whole tummy and the lighting just makes him look absolutely beautiful. Then he opens his eyes and looks right at me with that same coy expression. If it was anyone else, I’d think he was inviting me to dance with him.

No one seems to notice that Milk’s there, or rather, no one seems to be able to tell it’s him. Over the next couple of hours, Mihail and Yami go and get the three of them what I would call a few too many drinks. Their dancing gets a little less dignified and they bark at each other a little louder. Mihail and Yami, at least. Milk kind of stays the same. Besides having to force a few guys away who get a little handsy with Milk, everything goes very well.

Eventually, Mihail and Yami wander off. I see them chatting with someone else out of the corner of my eye, leaving Milk to dance by himself. I watch him, his slim body, his little tail wagging as he enjoys himself out on the dance floor.

Yami taps my shoulder. “Hey, papi!”
“What’s up?”

“Mihail and I are gonna, uh–” He motions to Mihail, who’s talking to this larger bull. “We’re gonna go have some fun, alright?”

“Are you gonna be having that fun too?”

Yami smiles. “So much fun.”

“Are you going to need a ride home?”

“I think we’ve mooched off of Milk enough. We’ll get an Uber home.”

That might be me too, I think to myself as I nod at Yami. Yami, Mihail and the bull reunite and make their way out of my eyesight.

That leaves just me and Milk. The song switches to this slow, sensual one and the lighting turns a deep blue. The lights are right behind him so he’s framed in this lovely silhouette as he slowly shifts his body around. Once again, he opens his eyes and looks right at me. And fuck, I still don’t really know if he wants me to dance, but I feel it in my body and in our eye contact and I make my way over to him.

And then, standing in front of Milk, I realize that he is really, really drunk.

He slumps into my arms as I stand in front of him. What I was interpreting as sexy dancing was actually him stumbling around, but his face was the same the whole time so I couldn’t really tell. I put a paw on his back and tilt his face towards mine. “Are you okay?”

“I had too much to drink…” he mumbles into my chest.

“Oh, puppy…” I say, tucking his face back down. “Let’s get you out of here, alright?”

He feebly nods at me and wraps his paws around my outstretched arms. As I guide him through the crowd, I think I might have to pick him up and carry him, but he makes it out just fine. Outside, and I’m not expecting this, there’s a couple of men with cameras who immediately kneel to take photos of us. Fucking paparazi! What kind of life am I living?

I go into bodyguard mode, stepping in front of Milk and getting ready to ask the bouncer if there’s another way we can get out. Somehow, Milk steps out from behind me and struts down that street like he isn’t drunk at all. He gives the paparazzi his little coy look and lets his butt poke out a little as I follow right behind him down to the car.

“No photos, guys,” I say, putting an arm up as I guide him into the back of the car. “No photos.”

It’s a flutter of clicks as I pull out of there. My heart is pounding, actually, which I didn’t expect, but I manage to keep a calm face for Milk. In the back, Milk is laying with his head on the leather seat.

“You okay back there?”

“Mmhmm…” Milk moans.

“Do you want water? Want me to stop?”

“No…”

“Okay, boss. Just let me know.”

I drive him all the way back. He doesn’t throw up in the back of the car, which, given the state that he’s in, is kind of a miracle. Every so often I try to lightly tempt him with music or water but he doesn’t budge. I keep glancing back at him just in case he falls asleep so I can stop and put him in the recovery position, but he lays there with his eyes slightly open the whole time. Yami is, I think, being cucked right now, and I’m driving a drunk person home like I always do.

Luckily there’s no one on Milk’s street. I park then go around back to get Milk out. “Are you feeling okay to walk, boss?”

“Mmmm,” he whimpers.

“Do you want me to carry you?”

“Mmmm,” he whimpers again, same tone but I’m pretty sure in the affirmative. I could pick Milk up and throw him against the wall so wiggling my paws under him and coaxing him out of the car is nothing. I open the door with one paw as I carry him bridal style, his head tucked into my chest. “I’m sorry…” he whispers.

“Why are you sorry, Milk?” I coo as I step up the stairs with him. I could probably run up but I’m being very careful to not disorient him anymore. “You didn’t do anything wrong.”

“I don’t want to be a burden…”

“It’s my job to take care of you.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay. Here.” I jiggle his keys out my pocket and get his door open. “Do you need to use the bathroom?”

“Mmm mmm.”

“Alright. Let’s get you to bed, alright?”

“Okay…”

I drop him on his bed. He sits there and looks at me, leaning on his forearms, and he looks like just the feeblest little dog in the world. “Can you help me…?” he mumbles.

“What do you need?”

“Get this off?”

“Your top?”

He barely nods.

“Okay, Milk.” I sit next to him and help zip off his bustier. It basically explodes off of him once I give the zipper a nudge. His back is so bony. He flops back onto the bed and whimpers. “Hm?”

“This too…”

“Your skirt?”

He nods.

I step in front of him, undo his belt, and pull his skirt off. I don’t feel anything but a protective instinct even as he’s laying in front of me in his little black briefs. Seeing how thin he is, how his waistband bridges over his stomach without touching it, all I feel is the desire to keep him safe and to make him happy. He’s just so small, so dainty, such a little dog. I lift him up and get him under the covers in the recovery position. It’s like moving around a potted plant.

“There we go. That’s better, isn’t it?”

He whines.

“What’s wrong?”

“My… vitamin C… skincare routine…”

“You can do it in the morning, alright?”

He nods feebly.

“Are you sleepy, little dog?”

He has no response to that, his eyes fully closed now. I pull the covers over him tight, then watch him for a couple of seconds just to make sure he’s still breathing.

I go into his crazy bathroom and find him an Advil (no rainbows fall out of the cabinet, although his 15-step skincare routine almost does), then pour him a tall glass of water. He’s sleeping soundly when I step back into his bedroom and I place it all next to him. I watch him sleep for a second.

I shouldn’t leave. If he throws up in his sleep, I want to be there. And more than that, I want to be here for him. I imagine him waking up in the morning alone and the thought just makes me so viscerally sad. Standing against his wall, I slide until I’m sitting and I just sit and listen to him breathe.

“Goodnight, Milk,” I whisper. “Sweet dreams.”

“Hey.”

I wake up to Milk squatting in front of me in nothing but that skimpy pair of black briefs he has. He’s right at my eye level, emoting in his vague manner. Behind him, dawn is just emerging. Mourning doves coo.

“Hi, Milk,” I say, rubbing my eyes. I guess I fell asleep leaning on Milk’s wall.

He takes a step back and sits on his bed, taking a sip from the glass of water I poured him last night. “Thank you for taking care of me.”

“Of course. I would do anything for you.”

“You didn’t have to sleep here.”

“I just wanted to make sure you were okay.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay, Milk.”

He yawns, stretching his arms way up. With the morning light behind him, you can practically see through his body. “I’m going to take a shower. Are you hungry?”

“I could use a bite.”

“You can go through my fridge if you want.”

“That’s very sweet of you.”

He stands up and stretches again, his mouth opening wide and his little tongue sticking out. This is what they should be photographing for that New York Magazine article. He’s beautiful.

Milk steps into the en suite as I head out to the kitchen. I have to shake out my arms and legs as I peel my briefs out of my asscrack. I’m definitely no underwear model, that’s for sure.

His fridge is the kind that’s built into the sage cabinets around them, which I realize after flailing around for thirty seconds opening all of the drawers in his kitchen. The vibe is similar to his mini fridge in the car — strawberries, mangoes, grapes, blue cheese, goat cheese, other kinds of cheeses I’ve never heard of before, olives, grape leaves, hummus, baba ganoush, crystallized honey, more of those glass bottles of water, vegan sausages, and, obviously, two gallons of milk. I was expecting, like, eggs or something. There’s no takeout containers or evidence of opened food.

I close the fridge door and return to Milk’s room. I feel weird sitting on his bed, so I stand by the door and look forward. A few minutes later, the water shuts off and the bathroom door opens. Milk walks in the room in nothing but a towel. Before I can excuse myself, though, he steps up to his wardrobe and hangs the towel up. I have a full view of his ass, the same view I was getting in that photo I couldn’t help myself with. The transition between his bony back and his full butt is insane.

“Did you grab anything?” he asks so casually that I don’t leave. I guess he’s more than used to being around other people naked.

“You have lots of fruit and hummus.”

“Yeah.” He swipes through the rack looking for something. “We can go to the bodega if you want.”

“Oh, there’s no need.”

“I kind of want an egg and cheese.”

“What do you get in on?”

“Sesame roll.”

“Good. Good choice.”

He ends up with a thin white crop top, a black pair of short shorts that can’t be any larger than what he went to sleep in, and a lacy tulle thing that I assume is supposed to go over the shorts. I catch a glimpse of his sheath as he walks over to his mirror (the trifold kind that they do suit fittings in), then I can see his sheath and balls from every possible angle.

I stare straight at the floor and try to come up with a response. To offer him my bagel order seems inappropriate. I just stand there in silence, but as I understand, silence is what he likes.

Now dressed, he grabs a pair of sunglasses off of his vanity and puts them on his head, then steps into his cowboy boots.

“You look really pretty,” I say as he stands in front of me. He does. The crop top hides nothing and the tulle is just coy enough to make you need to see more.

“Thank you,” he responds quietly.

“Do you want to head out?”

He nods.

We walk down the street together. It’s a little less hot than the recent string of New York City days we’ve been having, the kind where the streets smell like baked piss. It’s actually pretty pleasant, the lush greenery of the well-manicured trees shading us and an open fire hydrant gushing water onto the street and misting us with cool, pleasant air. We turn the corner onto a busy street and people don’t immediately begin taking photos of us.

I stay close behind Milk as we walk into a bodega. The cat behind the counter smiles at us. “Egg and cheese on a sesame roll?” he asks with a Spanish accent.

Milk nods.

“And what about you?”

“Kaiser roll with lox spread.” I take an orange juice out of the fridge. “And this, sir.”
I pay for us while Milk stands and stares at all of the smears they have available. “I never get any of these,” he muses.

“They’re just for show,” I respond.

Milk starts walking the tight aisles and I follow behind him. We look at the various Spanish snacks they have available, the drain cleaner and the dusty Snapples. He wipes the front of the bottle with his pawpad and I do the same. I follow him out of the aisle and we wait for our orders to be ready.

The cat places a kraft paper bag and grins at us. I thank him and we head back out, then turn down the same quiet street we came from.

It’s the strangest feeling in the world walking next to Milk like we’re both normal people. We’re getting breakfast together, we’re quipping (ish) about the state of the bodega, we’re walking together. We could have done this together in any number of lives, but here we are doing it in the world where he’s a celebrity and I’m his bodyguard. I look at him and I can’t help but smile.

And then, and I really don’t expect this, Milk puts his paw out and grabs mine.

I take it.

My paw is so much bigger than his, my fur so much darker. I’m already a little sweaty, to be honest, and that was the hand I was holding the hot sandwiches in, but Milk seems to pay no attention. We stroll down the quiet street paw in paw like it’s the most normal thing in the world.

But arriving in front of his apartment, there’s cars double-parked on an already narrow street. I pull my paw away from his and open the door for him. When we head upstairs, the whole operation has begun once again, with Rahul and D’Angelo and the stylists and the camera operators and the PAs.

“There’s my model!” D’Angelo says with a wide smile when he spots us. “Just in time.”

“We were out getting breakfast,” I feel the need to defend him with.

“Oh, you should’ve let one of the camera crew follow you. That would have been perfect.”

It would have been perfect, I think, to have been squeezed in between those shelves with Milk, the products going all the way up to the ceiling. To hear the cat behind the counter frantically cooking Milk’s eggs on the griddle, belting along to the radio. To leave your pawprint in the dust with him. But there were no cameras there. Only me and Milk.

But once again, Milk is whisked away into his little model world and I am left to watch. He gets about three bites of his sandwich as he talks with his stylist and D’Angelo at the same time. I bite on the ketchup packets at the bottom of the paper bag and watch as the production moves into Milk’s bathroom.

D’Angelo and Milk step into his bedroom, and a minute later Milk comes out in a bathrobe. They go into the bathroom and I’m the last one in. Even with his crazy New York City square footage apartment, fitting all of us in here is still a tight squeeze. The bath has already been drawn, a PA dumping some sort of yellow powder into it.

There’s a good amount of space for Milk to step forward, though.

In front of all of us, Rahul furiously scribbling notes on a notepad, the camera operators and the lighting people fiddling with their equipment, D’Angelo giving his directorial smile, and his loyal bodyguard, we all watch Milk strip off the robe to reveal nothing underneath. No underwear, no pasties, just his bare body. His sheath and his balls.

I feel an instant pang of something. Of jealousy or possessiveness, maybe, like I saw him naked earlier and now everyone else is seeing it too. Or of protection, if I’m putting it nicely, like he shouldn’t have to bare his body to everyone. Of sadness or an almost paternal instinct. He’s just a little dog. I know that more now than I’ve ever known it before. He’s just a little dog, and here he is standing in front of cameras and lights and all of New York, really, with nothing to protect him.

He steps into the bathtub which I’m now learning is filled with turmeric. He closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. The PA layers some other floral thing on top of the bath to make sure his sheath is covered. And the camera operator begins to take their photos.

---

So that’s what the next two weeks are like. They weren’t kidding when they said I would be on call 24/7. On the days that I don’t fall asleep in Milk’s apartment, I barely have enough time to get home and take my clothes off before I pass out in bed. I haven’t seen my friend Rock this whole time, which he laughs about in our text messages as just part of the job as we push off plans another weekend.

I don’t even think about the money part of it anymore. I was really only buying food, gas, and drinks with Rock before. The first two are comped, the third is no longer a concern. I’m making my monthly rent in two-and-a-half days, a kind of financial freedom I’ve never experienced in my life. So really, it’s just about taking care of Milk. And that I can do. I’ve been in the military, I’ve driven an Uber in Times Square, this is nothing at all.

He does a lot of photoshoots. He does (when he isn’t hungover), a lot of skincare. A shit ton of skincare. I’ll sit with him for 90 minutes straight as he does skincare and listens to that old boy band, FurReal. He does a lot of photoshoots. He gets lunch with Julia Fox and Gabriette and doesn’t say a word. Not doing interviews really cuts down on stupid meetings, but there are still a lot of stupid meetings. D’Angelo has thrown himself on the Milk train just as much as I have, coming in with a new stuffed binder every meeting.

It’s amazing how many people can be working to keep this operation running. D’Angelo, of course, Rahul, Yami, his stylist, his camera operators, the lighting crew, his photo editors, his social media manager. I know Milk. I’ve seen Milk at his most vulnerable, in his most private moments, and the idea that there are all of these people running around to create the illusion of the supermodel Milk is insane to me.

One night, Rock texts me an article from TMZ. “Who is Milk holding paws with? The Dirt On Toast D’Augustino, Milk’s New Bodyguard!” is the title, with a grainy photo of me and Milk on his street from behind. My heart thumps thinking that there might actually be dirt on me.

“Dude,” he writes, “WTF is this?”

The article contains basically no more information than the title and what you can obtain from a cursory Google search and a glance at my old MySpace page. I grew up in the Bronx, served in the military, went to The New School, and then the biography drops off right after people stopped using MySpace. “A steamy romance might be brewing between beautiful supermodel Milk and his rough-and-tumble bodyguard Toast D’Augustino.”

“I think this guy was my Uber driver once,” one of the comments says. “4 stars.”

“Who is Toast D’Augustino?” I text Rock back with a smirk. “Never heard of him.”

“You’re holding paws with him? WTF?”

“He just wanted to be close to me.”

“What the hell kind of fantasy world are you living in?”

---

That’s the question I’m asking myself when Rahul is briefing me on Milk’s upcoming week and he brings up the wedding. “So, did you meet Yami, Milk’s makeup artist?”

“With the, the big horn, yeah.”

“So him and his fiance–”
“Mihail.”

“Yes. Their wedding is this week. They’ve blocked out Friday, Saturday and Sunday for it; Friday for everyone to get in, Saturday for the ceremony, and then Sunday for a brunch. It’s at this beautiful, um, I don’t know how to quite describe it, sort of like elevated campground upstate. Pretty bougie but I checked it out on Instagram and it looks lovely.”

“Oh, wow.”

“It’s supposed to be pretty lowkey, but we’re all kind of afraid that Milk being there might be a problem? Like it’s in the middle of the woods, so kind of anyone could just drive in and start taking photos. Yami already confirmed to me that there is a no phones policy for the weekend and we’re going to be releasing content like normal, so there’s no reason that anyone should know Milk is there until after the fact. Regardless, you’re going to be Milk’s line of defense in case paparazzi show up.”

“I’m sure Mihail wouldn’t mind a few more cameramen at his wedding,” I quip back.

On Friday, we get out of a photoshoot and after a quick stop at the bodega I’m driving Milk up the Henry Hudson Parkway out of New York City. The view of New Jersey over the river is stunning and (once we clear an absolutely wrecked car) there’s no traffic at all. “I used to go upstate with my dad,” I muse. “He was worried me and my brothers wouldn’t know what nature was like, so we’d go on these weekend trips together.”

“I’ve never been,” he says.

“Really?”

“I’ve never left the city.”

“You’re, what, 26 and you’ve never left New York?”

“No reason to.”

I laugh. “Your supermodel escapades have never taken you anywhere else?”

“I’ve only been a supermodel for a month,” he responds.

“Upstate New York is the most beautiful place on Earth. I’m a New Yorker through and through, but when I die, I’m going to die in a cabin in the woods in Upstate New York.”

“I always thought I was going to die on the subway.”

“I’m here to make sure you don’t.”

I watch in the rear-view mirror as Milk leans his head on the window and looks outside. He nibbles on a strawberry and watches the beautiful Hudson pass by, bald eagles soaring in the air and lovely rock formations jutting out of the water. He looks so beautiful enraptured with the world like that.

“I don’t think I know where you went to high school,” I say.

“LaGuardia.”

“Ohhhhhhhh. That makes sense.”

“I went for chamber instruments, actually. I was a violist.”

“Wow. So you were, you were a freshman when I had just graduated high school in the Bronx. That’s so funny. We were so close this whole time.” I merge onto the 684. “And how did you get into modeling?”

“I just did it after high school. I heard a lot about how that could be a good career path for me so I started doing it and it worked. Then D’Angelo found me a couple of months ago and he gambled and it paid off, I guess.”
It’s funny, with those two questions, I might know more about Milk than anyone else in the world right now. I’m a little surprised that there was more information about my past than Milk’s online. You’d think that one of those three thousand performing arts students he went to high school with would be champing at the bit to dish on their super famous classmate.

I let him look out the window in peace. The Hudson eventually turns into long stretches of highway, just trees and road. Milk still looks outside with (from what I can read) great intrigue.

“How are Yami and Mihail getting up?”

“Amtrack,” he responds. “I said they could come with us, but.”

“Oh, man. If they want to be stranded in New Paltz and never get married, I’d suggest they take Amtrak, but.” I laugh. “They’re a really cute couple.”

“They’re great for each other. When Mihail and I were roommates and working the business, Yami was his makeup artist one day and they just hit off.”

“Oh! I didn’t know you were roommates.”

“We got into modeling at the same time,” Milk deadpans. “He’s my best friend.”

“Your best friend’s getting married!” The image of Milk and Mihail making out, which started many speculative TMZ articles about the nature of their relationship and 20 terabytes worth of online discussion about the definition of cuckolding, is burned into my head. That’s a complicated friendship. “That’s so fun.”

“Yeah.”

I can’t tell what kind of response that is. “Is it not fun?”

“I’m very happy for them.”

“Alright.”

We make idle chatter about old New York landmarks (the 9 train and the Toys ‘R Us in Times Square, for two examples) which is just about the most conversation I think anyone’s gotten out of Milk. I feel honored to be the one hearing it, to be two friends talking about the city we grew up in.

A few hours of driving later, the sun is setting. I’ve been off of the highway for a while now, driving down local roads. Behind me, Milk is resting. I spot the sign for Maple Acres Camp, which is, I guess, the wedding campground thing that Yami and Mihail are getting married at. We drive down a long gravel path before the trees open up to the most gorgeous field I have ever seen, the tall grass and wildflowers almost glowing in the afternoon light. There’s a large main house, then a few other cabin looking houses scattered around.

I park and retrieve Milk from the back. We head to the main lobby which is actually two connected houses with a covered courtyard in the middle. The right house seems to be what used to be the mess hall. We head into the left one where the reception desk is. The place is chicly decorated, with a fireplace and butterfly boards on the wall and big armchairs that look like they’ve never been touched before, but it’s so modern that it feels like more of the suggestion of a campground than an actual campground.

“Oh, shit,” the receptionist says when we walk up. I think she thinks she was quiet.

“Hello, ma’am,” I say. “We’re checking in two right now.”

“Yeah, yeah yeah yeah. D’Augustino. And Milk.”

“Yeah.”

“Milk, um,” she says, “I am a really big fan. Really big fan of your work.”
“Thank you,” Milk responds, barely tilting his sunglasses down to look at her.

“Alright, let me show you to your cabin.”

She takes us on a fucking golf cart over to our cabin even though it’s probably only a drive of three blocks. Beautiful oranges and yellows and purples are swaying in the breeze, crickets chirping and cicadas screaming. Milk’s expression is the same but his mouth is agape looking out at the field. He seems enchanted. Me and the receptionist almost tussle over who will take Milk’s baggage to the room but I let her win out.

The cabin is amazing. It’s one room, with a big, plush bed, a fireplace, a little kitchen, and gorgeous wood all around. If I didn’t know any better, with the bottle of champagne and the chocolates on the table, the hot tub out back, and the farmhouse door to the bathroom with a bathtub the size of my apartment, I would say this is the honeymoon suite.

“Dinner is in 30 minutes,” the receptionist smiles, handing us a piece of printed cardstock, “And you can find the rest of the schedule here.”

“Thank you very much,” I respond, pulling out my wallet for a tip.
“Oh, no need. Thank you.”

And with that, she leaves. Leaving beautiful supermodel Milk alone with his rough-and-tumble bodyguard in a cabin with only one bed. Rock was right. I am living in some sort of fucked up fantasy world.

---

I wait on the bed as Milk takes a shower and gets dressed. Once again, he steps into the main room where I’m sitting, and after he rummages through his suitcase, he drops his robe to reveal nothing underneath. I have to look down at my lap so I don’t look at his sheath and balls, even if he’s unphased enough to be naked in this room with giant, giant windows.

“Toast,” he says.

I look up at him. He’s holding up two dresses, his sheath framed in between the draping fabric. I think that might be the first time he’s said my name. “Yeah, boss?”

“Which dress?”

The first is a short, stiff holographic dress made of this almost umbrella-like material, the other one this long, drapey, what I would call dragonfruit-themed dress. And his sheath is still staring at me in between them.

“I would wear the holographic one with these underwear,” he says, pulling a lacy white pair of lingerie out of the suitcase.

“I think this one is more of a nighttime dress,” I say. “It’ll look beautiful under the lights. And then the pink one will be nice at brunch.”

“You’re right.” He drops the dragonfruit dress. “Thank you.”

I feel okay watching him as he gets dressed. He knows my gaze is on him and he’s paying no mind. He looks beautiful stepping into those panties. There’s a strange sense of satisfaction I get from understanding how his bulge works now, which part is his balls and which part is his sheath. Stepping into the dress, I know we made the right choice.

“You’re beautiful,” I say, the words just slipping out of my mouth. I know he hears those words every single day and it won’t mean anything more hearing me say it, but I earnestly mean it. “You’re stunning.”

“What do you like?” he asks, and it’s just about the most disarming thing he could have said. I genuinely search for a response for half of a moment before he flicks his tail. “Just being silly.”

I am so utterly charmed by his little tailwag. “I mean it, boss.”

It’s like a switch flips in my head. For the last two weeks, I have felt nothing but protective love for Milk. Besides my initial interaction with his photo and the erection I got watching him make out with Mihail (which you really can’t blame me for), my sexual feelings for Milk have all but subsided. The reality of being his bodyguard quickly subsumed any sort of primal lust I was feeling.

But now I know him so intimately in a way that no one has ever known him before. I take one look at the little dog and I feel an overwhelming sexual desire. Overwhelming, like the same primal reaction we have that makes it hard to touch a hot stove. I know, I know, I know I shouldn’t be thinking this about Milk. I know I know I know.

I get up and go to take a leak. I have to sit on the toilet because I can’t make my erection go down. And as I lead my brain away from the place I was, the lust I was feeling is replaced with an overwhelming guilt. I feel fucking awful for thinking something like that about Milk. It’s hilarious, because his entire appeal is how fucking sexy he is, but it’s different being right in front of him. It feels wrong to think of him like that. It feels so wrong.

---

The next few hours are a whirlwind. I like watching Milk and Mihail embrace and hold each other tight in front of the firepit, half expecting them to start making out with each other. I do feel like the ugliest motherfucker in the world in my frumpy suit next to all of Mihail’s model friends, but the dinner makes up for it. Our table shares this giant charcuterie board which Milk gets a kick out of. I get a mocktail themed around local mushrooms which is surprisingly drinkable while Mihail and Yami just get a shit ton of alcohol. I feel obligated to not drink even if I’m less on duty than usual. Milk doesn’t drink either. I get a strip steak for dinner with asparagus and potato puree. Milk gets a giant plate of squid ink pasta he barely touches and a gem lettuce salad.

Afterwards, everyone transitions out into the field. Mihail and Yami hand out disposable cameras and glow sticks and everyone runs around whooping and taking photos illuminated only by the light of the moon and the fluorescent greens and pinks of the glow sticks. A lot of people take photos of Milk with the little cameras, Milk doing his natural ethereal supermodel posing in all of them. Everyone is super drunk and happy, a big group of the sexy models stripping down to just their underwear and going swimming in the lake.

After Milk, Yami and Mihail run off to join the rest of the group in the lake. I stand there by myself and watch the pink and green lights thrashing around as everyone laughs and plays around.

Eventually, Milk returns to me all tuckered out. He rests his head on my shoulder and whispers, “Can we head back to the room, please?”

“Of course, boss.”

I lead him back to the cabin, paw in paw. It’s quiet, just the buzz of cicadas and the occasional drunken chatter of wedding guests walking by.

Milk takes a shower and then steps out of the bathroom dried off and wearing nothing at all. He takes a seat on the bed and I grab his lotion for him. He thanks me and starts massaging it into his legs. I drag my suitcase into the bathroom and wash off all of the driving stank under the waterfall showerhead, gazing at Milk’s bespoke lavender-rose body wash he brought with him. I dry off and get dressed in another suit.

“Hi,” he says as I step out, having moved to the vanity to do the other part of his skincare routine.

I step behind him. “What is that?”

“A jade roller,” he responds, rolling the green stone under his eyes. “It helps reduce muscle tension.”

And then, unprompted. He looks at me right in the eyes and he smiles. Just a little smile, with his tongue stuck out, but it’s so, so beautiful.

I put a paw on his head and scruff him up a little. He tilts his head upwards into my paw and his smile grows.

“Toast,” he almost whimpers.

I pull my paw away. “Sorry, boss.”

With that, he stands up and goes over to his suitcase to get a pair of underwear. I watch him get dressed, and then I have to excuse myself outside.

And feeling the cool air against the fur of my thighs, hearing the rush of cicadas and seeing the dotting of fireflies against the dark sky, I can’t help but let out a sob. I let out one sob, a tear rolling down my face, then another. I love him so much. I feel so bad for him. He’s just a little fucking dog. A sweet dog who took two weeks to even crack a smile at me. I know he certainly doesn’t have anything to complain about, he’s a fucking supermodel, but the sobbing just pours out of me. I love him so fucking much.

I have to reign myself back in so I reign myself back in. I wipe my face against my suit sleeve and I take a couple of deep breaths and then I head back inside. Milk looks none the wiser.

I stand against the wall and watch him for the rest of the night. He finishes up his skincare routine and then lays in bed still completely naked. It might be the biggest bed I’ve ever seen. It’s raised well off the ground, the fresh white sheets tucked so tight there isn’t even the suggestion of a wrinkle, six pillows leaning on the metal headboard.

He lets out a big yawn. “I’m sleepy.”

“You wanna go to bed?”

“Mmhmm.”

I get up and turn the lights off. The room is still nicely illuminated by the moon, a soft glow on Milk’s face as he untucks the covers and gets snuggled underneath. I take a seat against the wall and gaze at him all bundled up.

“Goodnight, boss,” I say.

“Goodnight, Toast,” he responds.

---

I wake up with the sunlight. I’ve slept in some awful places in my life, so on Milk’s floor curled up like his dog isn’t half-bad. I have a raging case of morning wood. On the bed with the blanket half sloughed off, Milk is asleep. His chest slowly rising and falling, his tongue poking out of his mouth just a little bit.

I once again pull my briefs out of my asscrack, go brush my teeth, and then sit out on the balcony and watch the sunrise. A few minutes later, I glance behind me. Milk is stirring awake, his tail lazily swishing around. He opens his eyes and looks right at me. I grin.

Milk sits on the edge of the bed, stretches up, then steps out onto the balcony with me, naked. I feel a rush of concern about paparazzi but Milk seems to care so little that I don’t do anything. “Hi, Toast.”

“Good morning, boss. How’d you sleep?”

“Well. How about you?”

“Okay.”

“You don’t have to sleep on the floor.”

“That’s not your concern, Milk.”

“The bed is big.”

I pause, struck with the idea that he’s inviting me to sleep in bed with him, but I don’t say anything. He puts his paw on mine. I feel a pang of guilt but I don’t want to pull away, so I let him keep it there. We watch the sunrise together.

I scroll Reddit while he does yoga out in the grass and play some stupid game on my phone while he showers and does his skincare routine. I can pay 99 cents to remove the ads now, so I go ahead and do that. Breaking the no phones rule, I know, but it’s my duty to keep Milk safe and I need my phone to do that. And to scroll Reddit. After he gets dressed, we head out for breakfast.

Breakfast is wonderful. There’s a big buffet-style table set up, I guess in reference to the camp theme that’s going on. I stack my plate high with potatoes and eggs, bacon and grits. Next to me, Milk gets a bowl of coconut yogurt and puts (I count them) 12 raisins on it. Mihail and Yami are with their families, so Milk and I sit by ourselves. Besides one person who I have to tell off for taking photos, even if it’s just with the plastic camera, it’s a quiet experience.

After breakfast, I walk Milk over to Mihail’s cabin. They’re going to spend a few hours together getting Mihail ready for the wedding. When he opens the door, Mihail comes bounding over in a bathrobe. There’s another brown fluffy dog like Mihail who looks just as stunningly beautiful but a little chubbier, I guess his brother, and a few more of those model types sitting around in the room. “Hi! Hi hi hi!” He brings Milk into a hug. “I’m getting married!”

They hug for a long time before Mihail finally releases him. Mihail gives me a lazy smile. “Hey, Toast.”

“Congratulations, Mihail.” I take a step backwards. We didn’t talk about what Milk wanted me to do but this seems like the kind of moment you don’t want your famous friend’s bodyguard there for. “Well. I’ll see you at the ceremony, Milk.”

“Okay. Bye.”

Milk and Mihail step inside and I start walking away. I turn around and watch the cabin for a second. They have the blinds completely closed. I keep walking away, then turn around to look at it again.

I guess I should just stand outside and wait. That’s what a good bodyguard would do. Then again, Rahul texted me and confirmed that there isn’t a whiff of suspicion that Milk isn’t in New York City, and I know that although beautiful, none of these models are famous enough to warrant paparazzi themselves. I want Milk to have his moment with his best friend before his wedding.

I head back to the cabin. I know I could be walking around the grounds or doing a spa treatment (don’t know how they make that one camp-themed), but as soon as I walk through the door I just about collapse on the bed. I haven’t gotten a moment of waking solitude in two weeks.

I could jerk off, I guess. I get up and lock the door just to make sure we don’t have an HR situation going on, then pull down my pants and worm my already erect dick out of the fly of my briefs. My cock literally aches with pleasure as I hold it in my paw, so I know I sorely needed this.

I close my eyes and begin to slowly stroke myself. I don’t even need to think about anything and I get a little leaky. A few strokes and I’m grabbing the pillow to moan into.

But as I pleasure myself, my mind drifts back to Milk. If he’s safe right now, if he feels comfortable. This is the first time he’s been without me in broad daylight for two weeks. He’s with his best friend so that must give him some sort of security, but I don’t think a bunch of pretty models would know how to fight or use a gun if need be. I could probably run there in a minute and a half if I stuffed my dick away in time and sprinted. And then I would grab him, maybe even pick him up if he’s too frazzled, and run to the car and drive away.

Once I have my egress plan decided, I feel a little better. I put my attention back on what I’m doing with my paw.

Man, when does Milk have the time to jerk off? Maybe when you’re that thin and that pushed around by your manager, your body feels no more need to get off anymore. But at least in the last two weeks, the only times I feel like he could have been jerking off were in the shower or after I left after he fell asleep. Maybe “skincare routine” just means that he’s jerking off in the bathroom. I’d sure love to give him a skincare routine.

Maybe he only has sex. Milk is a sex symbol but people have somehow severed that away from the idea of him being a sexual being, which of course he is. I feel like I’d be having sex all the time if I was him, everyone constantly praising me like that. I mean, I’m ugly, so it’s not like people are lining up to have sex with me. I’ve only properly dated one guy and hooked up with a few more and none of them were begging to see me again. Maybe when you’re that beautiful, people finding you beautiful doesn’t mean anything anymore and having sex doesn’t mean anything anymore and your body transcends sexual desire.

I’m acutely aware that I’m thinking about Milk while I jerk off, but in my horny brain, it sort of makes sense. It’s my duty to protect Milk, so of course my mind is going to go to him even in an intimate moment like this. It’s all swirled into one thing like the dirty water in between the subway tracks.

And then I am struck with the panic that something might be going wrong and Milk might need me. That I would have to go to D’Angelo and explain that Milk got hurt because I was too busy jerking off. The idea that I’m letting Milk down puts me off so much that I go soft, when 30 seconds ago I thought i was about to finish myself off. I know how I get when I don’t jerk off and this was going to be a laid powerful enough to run my nice suit and maybe blast a hole through the wall behind me.

I put myself away, rub my eyes, and get up to go do my fucking job.

---

At three, we head out to the wedding ceremony. There’s a beautiful archway overlooking the lake with rows of chairs set up in front of it and a string quartet playing an arrangement of “360” by charli xcx. He’s wearing a black suit. It’s funny seeing him in something so not ostentatious, but all of the other men are wearing the same black suit too. It’s basically suction cupped to his body anyway. He looks great.

I gesture to the violist. “Could’ve been you.”

“Would you still be my bodyguard?”

“Of course.”

He takes a seat in the front row and I sit next to him on the very end so I don’t block anyone’s views behind me. The chatter settles down as the quartet starts playing an arrangement of “Hit Me Baby One More Time” and Mihail walks down the aisle.

Milk’s tail wags nervously.

“Are you okay?” I whisper.
“I’m okay,” he responds.

I put my paw on his knee and he slows down. He gives me one look with his big eyes and then looks back at Yami walk down the aisle. I don’t move my paw.

“Yami,” Mihail starts before letting out a sob. “Oh my god, I didn’t think I would start crying right away.”

“It’s okay, mi cachorrito. Talk to me.”

“Ugh. That’s why you’re so fucking great.” Mihail turns to the audience. “He’s so great. Too bad you all can’t marry him.”

The crowd laughs. Mihail gives his vows, then Yami, and by the end of it there are tears pouring down both of their faces. Milk’s tail is wagging again so I give his thigh a squeeze and he calms down again.

“Do you take this man to be your lawfully wedded husband?” the officiant asks.

“I do,” Yami smiles.

“Do you take this man to be your lawfully wedded husband?” he directs to Mihail now.

“I do,” Mihail says.

“I now pronounce you wedded. You may kiss your husband.”

Mihail and Yami give each other a kiss, then Yami grabs Mihail’s thighs and picks him up and they start making out like that. He moves Mihail into a bridal position and they both grin out at the cheering crowd before making out again. “Excuse us!” Yami calls out as he walks Mihail down the aisle. “We’re gonna go lock this down! Have fun!”

“Formal photos after!” Mihail whoops. “After we FUCK!”

Everyone starts getting up and chatting. Milk and I sit there. I finally pull my paw away.

“That was wonderful,” I say.

“It was.”

“What do you want to do now, boss?”

“We have to go to the reception.”

“Sure.”

I bodyguard him while he goes around having people talk at him, I’m sure trying to network with Milk the supermodel. I pick at the snack table. Eventually, Mihail and Yami walk in and everyone cheers, Mihail walking a little funny. Mihail and Milk take a bunch of photos together (we couldn’t avoid that, even at this no phones wedding), including one where they’re kissing each other like in D’Angelo’s photoshoot. Just about every combination of beautiful, identical thin model takes a photo with Mihail and Yami, and models have a way of making a simple photo take 30 times as long, so we’re there for a while.

As the party goes on and people start getting more and more drunk, Milk finds me at the table in the back and we sit together. I let him rest his head against my shoulder and I feel him softly sigh.

“Everything alright, boss?”

“Can we go for a walk?”

“Of course.”

I pick a random path that leads away from the venue and lead him down it. On either side of us is tall grass and beautiful wildflowers, then trees, then the mountains of Upstate New York. Fireflies blink on and off. The stars are almost twinkling.

We walk until we can’t hear anyone else, just the sounds of nature around us. Milk grabs my paw. I squeeze his tight.

I love you, I think. And it’s such an absurd, confused thought, but holding Milk’s dainty paw in mine, I can’t think anything else.

“It is really lovely around here,” he says. “I can’t believe I’ve never been.”

“What a beautiful place to get married.”

“Are you feeling alright?”

“I’m alright.”

“Are you sure?”

He pauses for a second. “It makes me sad a little.”

“Oh, yeah?” I do some mental calculations in my head. I’m guessing they used to have a lot of sex or date or something when they used to be roommates. It just kind of seems like the kind of thing two models would do. “Why?”

“I don’t really know.”

“Oh, that’s fine. I didn’t mean to press, boss.”

“It’s okay.”

We keep walking until we reach the edge of campus. Beyond here, it’s just trees for hundreds of miles. There’s a small stone bench and an unlit firepit. Milk takes a seat, his bare thighs on the cold stone. I sit next to him. He leans his head on my shoulder.

“I’m very happy for him,” he whispers. “It just used to be me and Mihail against the world. We would come home from modeling gigs at two AM and eat takeout on the floor of our apartment. And take each other’s headshots and do photoshoots together. He’s the only person who’s ever…”

“Yeah?”

“Known me.”

“Oh.”

“No one has ever known me. I’ve never let anyone know me. Because I’ve always been quiet and pretty. And pretty does all of the talking for you, you know?”

“Well, I don’t personally know, but.”

He giggles. “You’re pretty.”

“No, Milk, I’m not.”

“You are.”

“What do you like?” I find myself responding, the same question he asked before.

“I like your eyebrows,” he says.

I can’t help but chuckle. “Yeah?”

“I like that they’re always down. I like your scary resting face. I know what that’s like.”

“But that’s not pretty, it’s scary.”

“I find it pretty.”
I smile. “Thank you.”

“Yeah, but… even Mihail didn’t really know me. He’s my best friend, or the closest thing I’ve had to a best friend, but there’s always been a disconnect between us.”

“What does it mean to know Milk?”

He looks down.

“Who is Milk?”

“My whole thing is my vague unknowableness.”

“That’s your thing. Who are you?”

“I don’t know.”

I pull him in closer. “You know.”

“Sometimes I just feel like a dog. Like I’m just kind of everyone’s dog, like a pretty street dog. And everyone can look at me and everyone can see me but no one can really know me. Because there’s nothing to know.”

“I think you’re sweet,” I respond. “I think you like hummus and blue cheese and strawberries. And you play the viola. You like clubbing and dancing. You’re closed off but you love your friends. And you have such a lovely smile.”

I feel him nod. “Is that who I am?”

“That’s what I’ve seen.”

“And do you like that?”

“I love it.”

“Do you like being my bodyguard?” he asks out of left field.

“I do.”

“It’s not stressful?”

“It’s really stressful but I don’t mind.”

“I don’t want to stress you out. I know you haven’t gotten any alone time in weeks.”

“Yeah, but I was in the military. I drove Uber. I’m used to it, and I’d much rather be doing it for a sweet dog like you.” I pause. “When I was a kid...”

He looks at me. “Yeah?”

“No one was ever looking out for me. I had my brothers and my dad, but it was really me against the world. And I’ve had to work for everything I’ve had. No one ever took care of me. No one ever knew me. So I know what that’s like.”

“I’m sorry.”
“What are you sorry for?”

“That you have to take care of me. When no one’s taken care of you.”
“Don’t say that. I love taking care of you.” I pause. “You know that Mihail still loves you, right?”

“Yeah.”

“And you know,” the words come spilling out, “That I love you, right?”

“I love you too,” he says. “Thank you again for always taking care of me.”

“It’s my job,” is what I’ve said when he’s said this to me before, but somehow that response doesn’t feel accurate anymore. I would take care of Milk even if it wasn’t my job. “Thank you for letting me take care of you,” is how I end up responding.

And in me, I feel all of that tension from earlier resolve. The anxiety of viewing him as a sexual object, as a thing I have to take care of, as an unknowable being, as a little innocent dog. All of it all at once. It all blurs together in the joy of knowing Milk and having him know me.

---

I hold his paw and walk him back to the room. It all comes so naturally to me. Once we get there, he takes a shower, dries off, and sits on the bed without putting any briefs on as he does his skincare routine. I watch him the whole time, acutely aware that he’s watching me back.

“You ready to go to bed?” I ask after he’s all done, getting ready for another night on the floor.

“You don’t have to sleep on the floor, Toast,” he responds.

“No no,” I say, getting ready to do this routine again. “You get the bed, boss. It’s okay.”

He sits on the edge of the bed. “You can relax.”

“It’s my job to take care of you.”

He stands up. “Toast.”

He steps toward me. I stand there against the wall as he moves closer and closer to me, gazing at me with his big eyes. “Boss,” I respond, unsure.

He puts his paws on my suit jacket and moves to take it off of me, inches away from my body. I am packing the hardest erection I’ve ever had in my life as I extend my paws out and let him take it off of me.

“Milk,” I respond, our faces inches away from each other. “What are you doing?”

He starts to undo my shirt buttons and I am in complete denial of what’s happening. It’s only as he lowers himself onto his knees and he puts his paws on my belt buckle that the reality of the situation sets in. He undoes my belt, pops open the button, and takes my pants and briefs down in one swoop. My dick, fully freed from my sheath, hits my stomach.

“You’ve taken care of me enough,” he whispers. “Let me take care of you.”

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