Chapter Eighteen
Giles
Windows. Windows. Windows.
I need to clean the windows. Now all my floors and surfaces are clean – all wiped or mopped three times – I should clean the windows.
They don’t really need doing. My eyes can see that, but my brain is insistent that they need to be sprayed and wiped down three separate times.
My brain is insisting that if I don’t do that, this meet-up, this whatever-this-is will all go horribly wrong.
My brain is persistent about me keeping busy rather than just sit and wait for Marcello to arrive like a normal person.
But surely even a so-called normal person wouldn’t be able to sit calmly and wait for their soon to be sex student to arrive.
Because that’s what Marcello is, right? He’s coming here to get queer sex lessons, so he can figure out his sexuality.
He’s not coming here to hang out, although I’ll be sure to offer him a cup of tea, or a beer if he prefers, and I did make sure my fridge was stocked up with food.
He’s definitely not coming here on a date; he made his feelings towards me, or rather towards somebody else, perfectly clear.
He’s coming here to fuck and to do so with one very specific purpose. To find out if he likes fucking men.
It’s at this moment, with my head stuck under the kitchen sink looking for glass cleaner and a clean cloth, that I realise how catastrophically this could go wrong.
What if he hates it? What if he is repulsed by me naked? What if he takes one look at my dick, or he touches it once, and that makes him want to throw up in his mouth? What if, worst of all, the simple press of my lips to his, makes him want to run away?
I continue to catastrophise like this as I walk across the room and stand in front of the windows. It really is remarkable how many disastrous scenarios I can come up with in just a few seconds. I close my eyes when I stop walking and take three deep breaths.
It helps. A bit
Opening my eyes, I take a moment to look out over the rooftops of North London and smile slightly when I see Alexandra Palace in the distance.
I fell in love with this view when I first looked at the flat nearly ten years ago.
As the agent showed me around, I stopped moving and became transfixed at the peaks of London’s skyline outside.
It didn’t take long for me to imagine what it would be like to share this view with a partner in the future.
Back then, aged thirty-five, it all seemed so possible, so inevitable somehow.
I would meet someone. I would end up sharing my life, and this view, with them. I wouldn’t be alone forever.
But I got that wrong. A decade later and I feel even further away from finding somebody to share my life with. And honestly, giving queer sex lessons to the bi-curious man I have an all-consuming crush on isn’t going to get me any closer. However, there’s nothing to be done about that now
Nothing but clean my windows – three times – because if I don’t, it will almost certainly result in one of those terrible situations I just imagined.
I start cleaning the large, rectangular windows that line one end of the sizeable space that is a combined living room and kitchen, with a small dining nook just off the kitchen.
It takes less than a minute to realise that none of those terrible scenarios are as bad as a new possibility that charges into my brain with so much force it actually makes me blink. Because the worst-case scenario is that whatever happens today is going to ruin our blossoming friendship, for good.
It’s one thing to still be training buddies after a weird matching erections moment in a shower. It’s quite another to have kissed or touched dicks and then go back to simply being training buddies.
Three more deep breaths.
Focus on cleaning these blasted windows, Giles.
And yet, Marcello doesn’t seem like the kind of guy who would make it weird. Even after I’d accepted his offer, he’d acted like I’d just agreed to go on an extra-long run with him. He was a little surprised, sure. He was grateful. And if anything, he was a little excited.
He’d been the same way on our run yesterday.
He’d reminded me that I didn’t have to do it.
That I could change my mind. He’d said that he could find someone else to help him.
And that was easily the worst thing he could have said.
Because immediately I felt horrified at the thought of someone else getting to kiss Marcello.
I felt distraught at the idea of Marcello’s naked skin sliding over another man’s.
I’d felt almost a little rage at the possibility I wouldn’t be the one to show him how good he could feel with another man.
Not better than being with a woman. That’s not my goal, because it’s an impossible goal. Rather different. Or maybe not so different at all. But either way, still so, so good.
It was in the shower yesterday after our run, after saying goodbye to Marcello, who had had to rush off and do an afternoon shift at the café, that I’d realised exactly what we would need to make this work and I am reminding myself of this now as I finish the third round of cleaning the glass in front of me.
Rules. We need rules.
Before I can start mentally spit-balling what those rules should be, my door buzzer sounds out, and it seems louder than usual, making me jump slightly.
I quickly finish the windows – thank goodness it was my third round cleaning them – and I rush to stow away the cloth and cleaner before moving to the intercom near my flat’s front door.
Seeing Marcello in the small fuzzy black and white screen suddenly makes this all very, very real.
I push the button to open the building door he’s standing in front of, and I tap the side of the intercom three times as I wait to see him move inside.
Likewise, I tap the door handle three times before I open it and stand there waiting for him.
I take a slow and measured breath – inhale for three, exhale for six – hoping it will calm me down somewhat and it does work.
I know this because when Marcello turns the corner and appears at the end of my corridor, my breathing just goes straight back to being erratic, my pulse thumping loudly in my ears.
He looks good. Really good.
Wearing jeans and a sage green polo T-shirt with all the buttons undone, I can see the golden tones of his tan under the strip lighting in the corridor ceiling.
There’s a bounce in his step as he approaches and a big smile on his face.
In his right arm, cradled almost like a baby, is a bottle of red wine.
“Hey!” he calls out upon seeing me and I find I don’t need to count my breaths. Just hearing his cheery voice and seeing his broad smile has a very similar effect on slowing my breathing right down and calming my unnecessarily busy brain.
“Hi,” I say, but then a little tension rises in me again suddenly.
How am I supposed to greet him? Fist-bumping like we do in the gym would be weird. Surely a handshake would be far too officious and formal. Considering we’re likely about to see each other naked in the next few hours, maybe we should hug…
I’m saved from this internal debate when Marcello extends the bottle of wine, bridging the gap between us and making that a priority over physical contact.
“I hope you like Italian red wine.”
“I do, but you didn’t have to bring anything.” I take the bottle and study the label appreciatively. It’s a Chianti, one of my favourites.
Marcello shrugs. “Felt a bit weird to show up empty-handed. But at the same time I didn’t want to go overboard with gifts because that would also be a bit weird.”
I laugh softly. “A bit too Pretty Woman?”
He chuckles with me. “Something like that. Although, does that make me Richard Gere?” He straightens his shoulders. “I could cope with that.”
“I could happily be Julia Roberts too.”
His eyebrow cocks. “Really?”
Feeling an unwanted blush heat my cheeks, I turn away. “Welcome to my humble abode.”
“Humble?” Marcello says from behind me as I cross the kitchen and place the wine down on the counter. “There is nothing humble about this. Business must be good.”
He walks deeper into the space and looks around him and I take full advantage to look at his height, at his long, lean legs and the bulk of his torso.
Rules, Giles, don’t forget you need rules!
“One bonus of having dead parents by the time you’re twenty. You have a nice inheritance to invest in business and property,” I say, my eyes still not peeled away from Marcello’s body.
He turns and a frown of concern makes me realise what I just said.
“Shit, that was a buzzkill moment, right?”
“Not really.” Marcello steps a little closer. “I mean, I can imagine it’s probably true, as sad as it is.”
“Yeah, but not everyone wants to hear about it.”
“I don’t mind hearing about it.” He shrugs. “Whenever you want to talk, I mean.”
“Okay,” I say, lost for any other words.
“But seriously,” he looks around him again, “you have a really nice place here. And, do your cleaners come on a Sunday?”
“No, why?”
“Because it’s incredibly clean in here. Like I can practically see my reflection in your kitchen floor.”
The blush returns although it’s not as hot. “That’s… me.”
“You like to clean? Or you like to have a clean place?” Marcello moves past me and walks into the kitchen, dragging his fingertips along the marble countertop.
“Both, I guess.”
“Oh, shit, I probably should have taken my shoes off,” he says and does this amusing tip-toe walk back to the front door where he bends over and takes off his trainers. “Sorry.”
“No big deal,” I say and I tell myself that I can clean the kitchen floor again as slightly perverse reward-slash-punishment later if this all goes horribly wrong.
“So,” Marcello says, digging his hands into his pockets. “I guess we should talk a bit about… this.”
“Yes.” I move to stand in the kitchen with him. “We should. Shall I make us some tea? Or open the wine?”