8. Silent Shadows
8
SILENT SHADOWS
W hen Mathias had proposed Alberto drink with him, the latter hesitated, his gaze sweeping across the room. Something was going on in his head. Pros and cons, probably, wondering what sort of reward was in it for him if he stayed.
He then said, “Okay.” Such a small, sober word, yet it lit a roaring fire in Mathias’s chest.
Alberto sat back down and contemplated his glass for a while before drinking, pulling a grimace when his tongue met the liquor. Mathias slipped his foot between his legs under the table, and he snorted in his drink, his cheeks reddening. It took all Mathias’s willpower not to grab that tie and pull it to bring their mouths together.
God, he was beautiful. Mathias would never understand how he could resent someone so much, grow ulcers at the sound of their name, yet feel weirdly ecstatic at the mere sight of their flushed face. He realized there was so much about himself he didn’t understand. He felt no one but his mother could help him shine a light on whatever was going on. His mother… and maybe the one in front of him.
Halfway through his first glass, Alberto swirled the wine around, his demon eyes glinting curiously. On the other side of the table, Mathias felt reckless. “I want to ask you something.”
“Ask me what?”
“Something I’ve wanted to ask you for some time.”
If— If I asked you to …
As if to brace himself for whatever Mathias was about to ask, Alberto gulped his wine down too fast and chortled. Mathias waited with bated breath, but in the end, Alberto didn’t smile. It was a thing of his, like his way of pronouncing p’s like they were intended to sound dirty, or that he never felt pain—whereas Mathias could only feel pain.
They couldn’t be more opposite, yet Mathias had grown to feel they were weirdly similar.Once, Mathias would have turned up his nose at Alberto’s earlier words, his admission of never liking Michael despite pursuing him so aggressively. Now, Mathias only felt helpless, and a little doomed, too. Whether or not he’d find the courage to ask, he already knew his answer, didn’t he?
“Why do you never smile?” Mathias changed directions abruptly, deciding to ask the other question later. After another drink, maybe.
Alberto shifted in his seat. “Smiling gives you wrinkles.”
Mathias thought he heard wrong at first, but Alberto repeated the same sentence and took a sip of wine as if to toast the words.
“What the fuck? Who told you that?”
Alberto put his glass down. “My mum.”
“You really believe that stuff?”
He shrugged.
“Your mother doesn’t want you to smile? She doesn’t want you to be happy?”
Alberto’s brows knitted together. “My mother wants me to be safe. If I become happy on the way, then it’s all the better, isn’t it? If not…” He waved his hand dismissively, then gasped. “Am I talking too much?”
“What? No.” Mathias stared at him, confused. Alberto met his eyes in kind. Mathias refilled his glass. They gave up talking, but kept drinking until some of the other guests called it a night. Soon, the fact that they were sitting together in the kitchen would start to look suspicious, yet Mathias’s feet were glued to the floor.
Alberto made the first move. He excused himself to use the bathroom, and Mathias noticed how badly he was swaying. Remarkable, considering he’d only drank three small glasses of wine. If Mathias knew one thing about rich kids, it’s that they could hold their liquor.
Disproving his point, Xavier, completely smashed, returned from the corridor with one girl under each arm. “I just saw Alberto. He threw me out of the bathroom. He’s really drunk!”
“So are you,” one of the girls said, dropping him onto a chair. “Good night.” They dumped him there and left .
Xavier slid down the chair with an anguished expression. “I really need to pee!”
“There’s another toilet upstairs,” Mathias said, getting up. He hurriedly went to the bathroom and recovered Alberto just as he exited, his hair damp and his shirt half-untucked. That bastard looked so good, Mathias had to wonder what Xavier had intended to do with him in the bathroom before he was kicked out.
“I can’t leave you alone for a second,” he muttered. Alberto gave a childish shrug, causing him to smile. “Come on, drunkard, let’s get you home.”
Mathias looked all around him. Everyone was pissed and having a good time. Back in the living room, Camille and Arthur were getting wrecked by Charles-Henry and Eric’s mom at some dance video game; they weren’t paying attention. Worried he’d stumble upon some other kind of wrecking, Mathias avoided checking on Eric to say goodbye, and, slipping his arm around Alberto’s waist, he dragged him happily toward the exit.
“ Sei il ragazzo più bello del mondo ? 1 ,” Alberto slurred, stumbling forward. Mathias caught him just in time.
“I don’t understand what you’re saying.”
Alberto leaned on him. “ Scusa ? 2 .”
Mathias scanned around for stray guests lingering in Eric’s courtyard and saw none. He pressed Alberto closer. “That’s okay. I like it when you speak Italian.”
The creature got all curly against him. “What else do you like?”
“You know, that thing you do… when you don’t talk.”
Drunk-Alberto puffed out a laugh and threw his arm around his shoulder. He was acting the opposite of his sober self; tactile and clingy. Delighted, Mathias wondered what sort of things he could extract from him if he pushed a little, but he was aware this wouldn’t be fair to him, so he decided to behave, until Alberto called out, “Mati…” so softly, Mathias’s heart suddenly dropped to his stomach.
“What now?”
Alberto flinched at the harsh tone of his voice. Mathias held him tighter, his way of apologizing.
“I don’t feel so good.”
“You can’t hold your liquor for shit! ”
“Of course I can’t. I never drink.”
“What?” Mathias looked at him. “Never ever?”
“Never ever ever.”
“Christ, pollito , why didn’t you tell me?”
Alberto blew a raspberry. “Hey, ascoltami. Per favore ? 3 .”
“Okay, I’ll listen, but you have to speak English or French. Do you know any French?”
“Only je t’aime ? 4 .”
Mathias almost dropped him. “Fantastic.”
“And voulez-vous coucher avec moi? ? 5 ”
“Shut the fuck up, then. Do me a favor.” A bead of sweat trickled down Mathias’s temple. “I need to get you home.” He couldn’t carry him home if his knees didn’t work.
“No, no.” Alberto’s legs, too, were like jelly. He hugged Mathias’s neck for support. “Listen to me, listen to me.”
“Yes?”
“I’m beautiful.”
“I know, you’re a demon.”
“So, you must listen.” Alberto’s childish pout was too damn cute. Mathias opened the gate and hauled him out onto the street with a racing heart.
“Listen to what?”
“Me.”
“I am!” Resisting the urge to laugh, Mathias attempted to prop him against the brick wall so he could use his phone, but he wouldn’t let go of his neck.
“Kiss me.”
“No, no, no.” Mathias used his elbow to pin him against the wall. Alberto groaned, then seemed to realize he was on the street and yelped.
“Get me a car, would you? Take me home.”
“That’s the plan, so hold tight.”
Mathias tried to find a number for a taxi online, but he had never needed one before. From the look of it, Paris had more taxi companies than inhabitants. Perhaps it would be best to just wait for one to drive by .
Alberto dropped his head onto his shoulder. “Where do you think we live?”
“We?”
“Where’s my home?”
“I’ve been to your place, remember?” Mathias pinched, then stroked his cheek. “God, what a handful you are.”
Alberto huffed. “My other home, my real home!”
“What the hell are you talking about? Italy?” When he started squirming, Mathias had to put his phone away to catch him.
“Why do you always call me a demon?”
“I don’t know.” Mathias’s movements paused. “Because I’m a jerk. Does that bother you?”
Alberto blew another raspberry right in his ear. “You can call me whatever you want, but first, you have to kiss me.”
“I can’t,” Mathias said, wiping spit off the side of his face. “I’m getting you a car.”
“Are you coming with me? You have to come with me.”
Mathias sighed. “I think I do. I can’t abandon you in that state, anyway.” He winced when Alberto tried to lick his cheek. “Stop it.”
“Don’t leave me. Al buio tutti i ragazzi sono brutti .? 6 ”
“Whatever you say.”
A cab couldn’t come fast enough, really. But of course, there was nothing in sight. Perhaps they were all too busy driving young Parisians home from the nightclubs.
“You must stay…” Alberto was saying, rubbing against him, oblivious to Mathias’s despair. “My bed is big enough for two. For three, even.”
“Good to know,” Mathias mumbled, wondering if he had ever put that theory to the test. “But I don’t think I should stay over.”
“Why?”
Mathias snorted. “I don’t want to get raped by your drunk ass.”
Alberto turned rigid against him. “… What?”
“I was joking, Alberto. Like you? You do it all the time.”
“What?” He repeated dumbly.
“Your dark jokes? To make people uncomfortable? ”
“I make pupils uncomfortable? I make peepholes inflatable?” He groaned. “ Cazzo ? 7 .”
Mathias pinched his waist. “You know you do. You get off on this.” Alberto started poking his chest while muttering in Italian. Mathias slapped his hand away. “Okay, stop. I’m not fighting you tonight.”
“Let’s have sex, then.”
“Same fucking thing. Here!” Mathias spotted a taxi coming up the street and gestured wildly at it. He watched it slow down to a stop before them with relief. “Now, be good and get in the car.”
Alberto tossed his wallet at him. “There, there. Take my money.”
“Oh, thank you.” Mathias waved it in front of his nose. “You’re so generous. I should run off with it and ditch you.”
Alberto clicked his tongue. “You’d take my money, but not me? I see, I see.”
Mathias laughed despite himself. “I will remind you of this night every day for the rest of your life.”
Alberto stumbled toward the car with a lot of attitude, but not much coordination. “Hey, open the door, would you? The back door, baby.”
“Asshole.”
“You said it. I said back d ?—”
“Shut the fuck up.”
The entire ride, Alberto, though half-asleep, clung to Mathias and wouldn’t stop chattering. Mathias had no clue what his mix of Italian and English—alternately slurred, whispered, then whined—meant, and he eventually tuned him out. But he did let him slump over his shoulder and hang on to his neck for the duration of the trip, stroking his hand to soothe him, and he tried his best to ignore the rude smirks from the taxi driver.
When they reached the gates of Alberto’s mansion, Mathias felt ten years older. From the way he was acting, Mathias had a feeling the word cazzo he kept saying had nothing to do with “houses” or “hunting,” but everything with what was between his legs. For once, Mathias was grateful for the biting cold, and he took a deep breath when he escaped the confines of the backseat.
“You’re home, Alberto,” he told him, gently spinning him toward his house .
Alberto looked at the gate in confusion, then his expression turned dark. “We have to be quiet.”
“Okay.”
“Really quiet.” He gripped his sleeve tightly. “Don’t let her catch you here.”
“Sure.” Mathias rolled his eyes. He wasn’t afraid of Alberto’s mom.
Alberto opened the gate, then pushed Mathias inside, asking him to check the lights. Everything was dark and quiet in the yard, with no lights coming from either the main house or the dependence. Only when Mathias swore did Alberto follow him in.
“She really can’t see us,” Alberto added.
Mathias’s firm nod seemed enough to reassure him for now. They scuttled across the lawn and crept into the house, two silent shadows stalking the gleaming floors. Then, a light was turned on outside, and Alberto flattened them both against the wall. Mathias chuckled, all too amused by this ridiculous situation, triggering another avalanche of Italian.
Ignoring his rambling, he took Alberto’s hand and led him up the staircase. “I’m taking you to your room. How can you be so drunk after three small glasses? I swear to God, you’re not human.”
Alberto replied something absolutely unintelligible, his knees giving way. Mathias had to half-carry him up the stairs.
“Okay, okay. We’re almost there.”
A few more steps. Funny how he could weigh so much tonight when he usually weighed so little in bed, Mathias reflected as he dragged him up the stairs.
“I was wrong,” Alberto suddenly muttered in his ear.
“You were wrong? About what?”
“I said I was wronged!”
“Wronged?”
“Yes.”
Mathias patted him gently on the shoulder. “Poor little demon.”
Alberto abruptly turned his head. “Come on, kiss me a little.”
“No.”
“I want you…”
“I’m not touching you tonight.”
“Why?” Alberto used his tricks, becoming as soft as a kitten against him. “Am I suddenly not good enough for you?” He staggered forward and covered his eyes. “Oh, I need to sleep.”
“Yes, you do. ”
“Just fuck me a little before you go.”
“No.”
“Just a bit.”
Mathias couldn’t help laughing. “No!”
Alberto lost his patience when they reached the top of the stairs. “Come on! Grab my arse or something!”
“Shh…” Mathias kept his laughter quiet and gave him a stern look. “You’ll wake your parents.”
“That arsehole’s not my dad.” Alberto clicked his tongue with annoyance. “And no one can hear us in here, I swear. You could slaughter a whole flock of lambs, no one would hear a thing.”
“Okay, okay, just calm down.”
“I’m always calm.” Alberto slumped into Mathias’s arms just as they entered the bedroom. The latter got excited from relief at the sight of the bed, and he was about to bluntly—if not nicely—throw that drunkard on the mattress, but Alberto caught him by surprise and pushed him down first.
“One little kiss,” he said, climbing on top of him.
Mathias burst out a laugh. “You’re one slutty drunk, you know that?”
Alberto crushed their lips clumsily together. Mathias returned the kiss first with impatience, then with growing desire, and he finally pushed Alberto off him and rolled him to the side of the bed.
“Well played, but it’s still no.”
With a dramatic sigh, Alberto finally lay flat on the mattress. “What if I’m slutty? What are you like when you’re drunk?”
“See for yourself.” Mathias leaned over him and flicked his lower lip with a smile. “I’m pretty drunk right now.”
“You don’t look drunk.”
“That’s probably because you’re seeing three of me right now, and they’re all blurry. I’m used to drinking, and I had proper food at the party. Did you even eat anything?” Alberto lifted his head and whispered some words in his ear before he swiped his tongue over it. Mathias shuddered and pushed him down. “Bed. Now.” He began removing Alberto’s clothes, but Alberto suddenly became very still. Perhaps he thought he was about to get what he wanted. His eyes wandered drunkenly around the room and fell on the door Mathias had left ajar.
“Lock the door,” he said.
“Yeah, in a minute. ”
“ Lookn’tshelf , inblulephant .”
“What?”
“The blue elephant!”
Mathias tried his best not to laugh out loud, so much so, the corners of his eyes were prickling. At last, Alberto’s clothes were removed, and Mathias was covering him with his plush comforter.
“Remember…?” Alberto whispered in the dark when Mathias’s lips grazed his forehead.
“What?”
“Remember the holidays?”
“Yes, I remember what happened a few weeks ago. I’m not like you.”
“Remember what we did?”
Mathias chuckled. “No. You tell me.”
“We had sex. A lot of it.”
“That’s true.”
Good sex, too, if he may be so bold. Fantastic sex, until that time he treated Alberto with the gentleness of a husband and got himself blacklisted for over a week.
“And also…” Alberto’s eyelids were now half-closed. Mathias wanted to kiss them, but he knew he had to exert restraint.
“Tell me.”
“We sang.”
“We what?”
“We sang songs, remember?”
Mathias smiled. “I remember.” They sang Bloodhound Gang songs in front of the mirror. They never got to the end of the last one; Mathias had never let him. He felt his heart grow heavy.
“I wish we…”
“You wish what, pollito ?” Mathias bent down to kiss Alberto’s lips, laughed, and drew back with a grimace. “You could use some mouthwash.”
“Mm.” Alberto sighed. “You too.”
“Thanks, bastardo .”
Alberto loosely pointed to the bathroom door. “Help yourself.” But when Mathias tried to leave, Alberto caught his hand. “Don’t go.”
“I’m not. I’m not going anywhere.”
“No?”
“I’ll be here tomorrow.”
“You will? ”
“Mm-hm. I’ll be right here, next to you.”
“Can we have sex then?”
Mathias pretended to think long and hard about it. “Depends how stinky you are.”
“I won’t be stinky!” Outrage twisted Alberto’s fine features, causing the corners of Mathias’s lips to curl upward.
“That will be for me to judge.”
Alberto giggled, and then he was out like a light, his hand falling back onto the mattress with a thump. Mathias blinked softly at him, his heart at rest for the first time in a long time, even if tonight, it was too late to ask him any more questions.
Earlier, he had almost found the courage, first by getting himself drunk, and then, despite failing to entice Alberto to come to his place, when he convinced him to stick around a while longer. The knowledge that he was his favorite lover had emboldened him; he felt, perhaps after a few drinks, he could ask the burning question that had been on his lips since the day they skipped school and he witnessed the depth of his eyes as he climaxed—when his heart had grown twice its size in his chest.
If I asked you to stop sleeping with other people, and to sleep only with me, if I asked you to be mine and only mine, in body at least, what would you say to me?
“What a prince,” he muttered once he was back in Alberto’s large and pristine bathroom. He opened the nearest drawer and found a spare head for the state-of-the-art electric toothbrush Alberto owned. When he was done washing up, he finally remembered Alberto asked him to lock the door. He returned to the bedroom, and, to his shock, he saw warm light pouring in from the corridor, and a man’s silhouette blocking the light. Mathias nervously retreated into the bathroom. Was that Alberto’s stepdad? Did they wake him by making too much noise?
Judging from Alberto’s insistence, it was vital his mom didn’t find out about Mathias’s presence, so naturally, he had to avoid the stepdad, too. Mathias watched quietly as the man pushed open the door, came in, and sat on the edge of Alberto’s bed, muttering some words. Alberto woke and groaned at first, then spoke back to him. Mathias couldn’t hear what they were saying to each other. He pressed his face into the opening until he felt his eyelashes brush against the doorframe.
The man put his hands on his fluffy comforter, his voice barely audible. Whatever he said forced Alberto to laboriously push himself to a sitting position while mumbling something. Considering how he was speaking in weird tongues two minutes ago, it was unlikely he’d recovered yet, and Mathias silently smirked at the thought of the nonsense he might be spewing. And then, his smile was wiped off his face, replaced with a look of pure shock.
Time came to a stop in the mansion, at least in Mathias’s mind. He thought of stepping forward, of stepping back, but his legs wouldn’t work, his mouth wouldn’t open. His blood pounding in his ears, he screwed his eyes shut. When he dared take a peek again, it was already over. The man was staggering out of the bedroom, and Alberto was falling back into the mattress with a sigh.
Burning up, yet frozen to his core, Mathias waited until the stepfather was gone, then he rushed forward to close the door, and only then did he spot the sculpture of a blue elephant on the bookshelf. He caught it with shaky fingers, saw the opening on top, flipped the whole thing upside down, and felt a key fall into his palm. He whirled around with a curse; Alberto was still passed out on his bed. Mathias used the key to lock the door, then, as if this simple action had worn him out, he fell to his knees in front of the bed.
Alberto was sleeping peacefully, his lips parted, still moist. Mathias watched him for a long time, until he felt a pain in his forehead from too much frowning. Silently, he leaned forward and wiped his lips dry with the pad of his thumb.