Chapter 16
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
“We look like a knockoff Blue Man Group,” Ollie says. “Tabarnak.”
“Yeah, Tess, I don’t think they’re coming,” Leo says, watching the headlights of taxis and motorbikes streak past them. “We can go. It’s fine. Really.”
“No, I told Gabe to meet us here,” she says. “He said they were down. They’ll come.”
“I do sort of have to pee,” Liv says, grimacing.
“Did he tell you they were on their way?” Leo asks.
“Well, no,” Tess says. “Not yet.”
“We should get to the party,” Leo says. “It’s already getting late.”
“Are you sure?” Tess asks him quietly.
“Yeah,” he says, the disappointment settling in his gut. “I haven’t heard from him, either.”
“He could still show. I’ll keep an eye on my phone,” she says, putting a hand on his arm before addressing the group. “Okay, friends. Let’s go have a ball.”
Tess turns around and steps up confidently to the nondescript pharmacy, which is dark inside given that it’s nearly midnight, and it’s as if she’s been here a million times to pick up a prescription.
Beside the door, she flips open the lid of a keypad and punches in a series of numbers.
Leo hears the door click. She pulls it open and turns back to the group.
“All right, are we ready to go?” she asks.
“I beg your actual pardon?” Ollie says. “Where are we going? To get some Robitussin?”
“Did you just break into a pharmacy?” Leo asks.
“Come on,” she says, gesturing for them to enter. “You’ll see.”
One by one, they walk into the pharmacy, and as Leo walks down one of the aisles, he stops to lean closer to the items on the shelves and picks up a tube of toothpaste.
“They’re not real,” he says to himself, excitedly.
“Look at these!” Liv exclaims, holding up a box of tampons from the next aisle. She pulls out a couple that were poking through the top of the box. “They’re just felt!”
“It’s all fake,” Tess says slyly, an eyebrow raised. “Follow me.”
Leo walks to the back of the store, admiring the adorable felt toothbrushes and pill bottles and condoms on the way. Tess leads him and the group into what appears to be a stockroom, where a man who looks like the Babadook greets them.
“Bonsoir,” he says. There’s white paint brushed along his cheekbones, a tiny slit of a black mask across his eyes, and a top hat resting on his shoulder-length black hair. “Quatre?”
“Oui,” Tess says, and the Babadook clicks his tally counter four times.
“Parfait, par ici, s’il vous pla?t,” he says, and opens the door for them.
The group steps through, walks up a short staircase, and opens yet another door.
They then enter an abandoned four-story townhome with grand cobwebbed chandeliers, patches of burgundy and gold wallpaper peeling, and graffiti sprayed everywhere, the legible bits telling them things like, “TOUT EST POSSIBLE” and “PARIS EST A NOUS.” On one side of the ground floor is a DJ in a scarlet Venetian masquerade gown, a white mask covering her entire face, and a scarlet feather sticking out of her up-do.
On the other side is a bar flanked by monstrous brass candelabras and tended by three shirtless men in black pants and black masks.
The place is dim, aglow only with candles, the tall arched windows covered with sheets, like ghosts overseeing the soiree.
Stepping into the center of the room, Leo looks straight up and, along with a few pigeons perched on a skylight at the very top, he sees that on each floor, masked guests are dancing to the thumping house music, some with sparklers in their hands.
“So?” Tess yells to them over the music. “What do we think?”
“Tess,” Ollie says, “I don’t know how else to ask this, so I just will: Is this a sex party? Like, is this an orgy? Are we in an Eyes Wide Shut situation right now?”
“Great reference, but no, not a sex party,” Tess says.
“Though, I think there are some rooms for that on the top floor if you’re interested.
All I’ll say is that I made it on a list for this group that throws secret parties all over Paris.
Good thing we’re all out of Roland-Garros already, or we wouldn’t have been able to come. ”
“This woman is a legend,” Liv says, lifting her hands in praise, the sleeves of her oversized tuxedo blazer slipping down her arms. Her blond hair is slicked back.
“Hear hear,” Leo says, looking around the place in amazement.
Tess curtsies in her black tulle dress.
“First round’s on me!” Ollie shouts, heading for the bar. “Tess drinks free tonight!”
Like Ollie, Leo is wearing a tailored black suit, but opted to wear a white T-shirt underneath instead of a button-down.
He checks that it’s still neatly tucked in and makes his way over to the bar, quickly realizing that scanning the room for Gabe is a futile endeavor thanks to all the masks.
His cerulean eyes pop beneath his own mask of royal blue and gold.
With a French 75 in his hand, Leo wanders around the party with the group, getting the lay of this lustful land.
There’s something decidedly spooky about it, too, as if the attendees are specters, still here, dancing years after the final party at this home ended, before it sank into disarray, left to decay.
It doesn’t help that as the party grows more crowded, Leo loses his group on the second floor, left alone to move among the masks, the limbs of their owners swinging languidly.
A man with a white mask covering half his face like the Phantom of the Opera, tugs at Leo’s jacket sleeve, interested.
“Sorry, I’m looking for someone,” Leo says bashfully.
As he continues his search through each level of the party, he leans on the railing of the third floor to get a bird’s-eye view, peering over. The spooky feeling of the place only increases when he hears a whisper from behind him.
“Leonardo,” the voice says quietly and eerily.
He whips around to his left, but no one’s there. When he turns back, he looks to his right and discovers that it’s not a ghost. Although, isn’t it?
“Hey,” Gabe says.
He’s standing there, leaning on the railing, in a red and gold mask, a buttoned black suit vest—no shirt or jacket—and baggy black pants. Must this man continue to torture Leo with his arms? With his chest?
Leo swallows. “You made it,” he says.
“You think I’d miss this?” Gabe says, looking around at the party.
“Yeah, Tess had a feeling you wouldn’t be able to resist.”
“I tried to message you both, but the service in here sucks, sorry.”
“Oh, have you been here a while?” Leo asks.
“For a bit, yeah,” Gabe says. “Billie’s around here somewhere. We wanted to wait for y’all, but we were way too curious.”
“What, um, have you been up to so far?” Leo asks.
“I actually just came from the fourth floor,” Gabe says, pointing up with his thumb, “railing some twink in one of the sex rooms.”
Leo nearly spits out his drink.
“Relax,” he says, laughing. “It was really more of an Eiffel Tower. Felt more appropriate for the setting.”
“Ha, ha,” Leo says.
“No, we’ve just been dancing a little, checking things out. I love how haunted this place feels, right?”
“Yeah, it’s incredible,” Leo says, glancing down below. “I don’t know how Tess does it.”
“What?”
“She always knows the cool places to eat, the cool stuff everybody’s up to on tour, the cool parties to go to. Everywhere we go.”
Gabe smiles. “She seems like a great friend to have.”
“I, um, told her about us today,” Leo says. “I hope that’s okay.”
“About us?”
“Not that there’s an ‘us,’ ” Leo says, suddenly panicking. “Just that, you know, we, well, kissed, and that we’ve gotten to know each other better. That’s all, really. She didn’t know I’m gay and, I don’t know, it felt like the right time to tell her, and—”
Gabe puts his hand on Leo’s shoulder. “Take a breath,” he says. “That’s amazing that you got to talk to her about it.”
Leo smiles and nods. Best not to open his mouth again.
Gabe takes a sip of his drink. “Do you … want there to be an ‘us’?”
Leo looks at this man standing in front of him. His curls, his soft skin, his eyes made even more golden-brown by the sheen of his mask. This beautiful man with his beautiful heart. Leo’s wasted so much time already. There’s no way he’s running again.
“More than you know,” Leo says in a low voice.
Gabe moves closer. “Are you sure?”
“Can I kiss you?” Leo asks.
Gabe nods.
There’s no hesitancy this time. No gradual meeting in the middle.
The past two months of agony keeping himself away from this man rush forward into a deep, fervent kiss, his right hand on Gabe’s cheek as he shows him just how sure he is that he wants—needs—them to be together now.
As other guests lift their sparklers into the air and the taste of prosecco lingers on his tongue, Leo feels hot, fizzy, bubbling over.
Their lips move in sync, their hands study the curves of the other’s body.
Before the kiss turns frantic, Leo pulls away to catch his breath.
They stare at each other for a moment.
“That was a yes, by the way,” Leo says. “I’m sure.”
“Yeah, I got that,” Gabe says as he thumbs the corner of his mouth, still wet from Leo’s.
Leo turns away, biting his lip to keep from smiling wildly. When he looks down to the second floor, he sees Tess and Billie leaning on the railing, Billie in a black, strapless jumpsuit. A cheeky grin on both of them, they each give a nod of approval and then clink their glasses. A job well done.
“Do you want to go dance with our friends for a bit?” Leo asks.
“Yes,” Gabe says, leaning in closer. “And then I want to bring you back to my room and do what I’ve been imagining ever since we kissed in Miami.”
“Okay, yeah, maybe only one dance,” Leo says breathlessly, grabbing Gabe’s hand and pulling him along to find Tess and Billie as quickly as possible.
Leo’s glad to see that Tess has Billie to hang out with tonight, considering he found Ollie and Liv also making out in a corner.
“Gee, who could’ve seen that coming?” Tess asks Leo, smiling.