Chapter 11
EMILIO
Lucas was getting under my skin. In a good way.
The guy was a quick learner, and picked up on my instructions very quickly.
Only had to tell him once and he had it, something which never failed to impress me.
He was funny too, and we laughed a lot over his missteps during practice.
He was one of those people with whom you feel instant friendship and everything is... easy.
He was a snack too, which was becoming a problem.
There were moves in this dance which were done up close and personal, bodies connecting in places that weren't just hands.
It was all decent, of course, but the way my body heated simply at the sight of him, I just knew I was going to have a problem when we started practicing those moves.
Hiding my attraction was going to be difficult, and awkward if I couldn't. I was putting off practising those moves as long as I could.
After the first time we went for a drink after our lesson, it had become an unspoken agreement that we'd continue to do it each time we had one of these afternoon lessons. The crowd at the pub was loud but not rowdy, with most people winding down after a day of hard manual labor.
On one occasion I had to schedule an evening lesson, due to an unavoidable appointment with a client during the day. I'd grown accustomed to our after-lesson socialising, and it was late, so catching dinner together afterwards seemed like an obvious move.
"Wanna grab some food on the way out?" I asked Lucas, as I toweled my face down after our energetic session.
I'd played fast tracks for the entire lesson, putting off for as long as possible the time when I'd have to teach him the slow, sensual moves - the ones that would have us up close and personal - and we were both lathered in sweat.
"Yeah, man, I could eat - you really worked me over tonight! What do you fancy down your throat tonight?"
Lucas rubbed his towel through his damp hair, seemingly oblivious to what he'd just said.
Your dick, I thought, but instead said, "There's a good Thai place around the corner.
Food's great and they have a balcony upstairs where we can watch the street while we eat.
Or there's an Indian restaurant further along - that's good too.
Or we can just walk down the street and pick any restaurant you like...
there's pretty much every cuisine around here. "
"Actually, I love Thai. So, if it's that good, let's go there. I like the idea of sitting out on the balcony too."
"Excelente, parce! Give me five minutes to finish up for the night. I have to lock up tonight, so we can meet at the front desk and head out together. Okay?"
"Perfect."
Five minutes later, all the rooms except the reception area had been plunged into darkness and a strange quiet filled the empty spaces. The rooms that normally teemed with students, felt unnaturally still, brooding and solitary.
"Let's go! I've locked up everything I needed to, turned the air conditioning off. We're good to go," I told Lucas, rejoining him at the front desk and swiping my backpack from under the desk where the staff cubbies were located.
Lucas smiled and led the way out while I turned off the final light and locked the door behind us.
Out in the street, people wandered past. A light breeze from the passing traffic swirled dust and leaves along the footpath, the occasional stray piece of litter stirring in dark corners.
It was always busy here, close to student acccomodations, the CBD, and a vibrant LGBTQ+ community.
The street around the corner was alive with almost every type of restaurant, and although many looked dingey from the outside, they were almost always good.
There was too much choice here for bad food to be tolerated.
Any bad restaurants went out of business very fast.
"Wait til you try the pad thai," I groaned, thinking about my favorite dish. "You do like pad thai, don't you? I mean, it's non-negotiable if we're going to be friends."
"Of course I like pad thai," Lucas replied, mock affront on his face. "Do you think I'm a heathen?"
"Wasn't sure, you do live on the north side, after all.
" I bumped his shoulder with mine, feeling playful now we weren't in each other's space as much.
Standing side by side, shoulder to shoulder, I didn't have to worry that his soft breath or the citrusy, manly scent of him would trigger an unprofessional reaction.
It was a problem I'd never had before, while instructing.
"What! Don't tell me you live on the south side," Lucas feigned shock and glanced furtively over his shoulder.
"I sure hope no-one I know sees me with you.
God, the embarrassment..." He struck himself on the forehead as if it was all too much to bear, but his lips quirked as he barely contained his grin.
"Eh, parcero, if it's too embarrassing to be seen with me, I can go eat Thai by myself."
"Fucking oath, no! You've been boasting about this food all night, now you have to deliver."
Right about then, we reached a narrow shopfront.
A large glass panel opened onto a kitchen area, where three short, tanned cooks bustled around each other, frying in woks blackened with age and use, the contents - mince, chicken pieces or colorful vegetables - sizzling and the aroma of garlic heavy in the air.
A smiling woman with salt-and-pepper hair and years of wrinkles headed towards us as we walked in the door.
"Hey, Annie," I said. I wasn't sure if that was her real name, but it was what she'd told me to call her. I had a feeling her actual name was probably too difficult for most Aussies to pronounce. I wasn't Australian, of course, but she'd use a consistent name for all her customers.
"My favorite customer!" Annie beamed. Her eyes landed on Lucas. "Two tonight?" Her raised eyebrows pointedly asked a question. As the heat crept up my neck, there was only one thing to do.
Winking very obviously at her, I laughed it off, "You know me. Always sociable."
"Where would you like to sit?"
Annie slid two laminated menus off a pile near the register and gestured to the half-empty restaurant. The lack of customers wasn't a fair representation of the quality of the food - I knew most diners came here straight from work, and by 9pm on a mid-week night, the place was emptying out.
"Is the balcony free?"
"Yes, it is," she handed me the menus and waved a hand towards a narrow staircase lurking in the shadows against the wall. "You know where it is. I'll be up in a minute to take your order."
"Can we order our drinks now?" I asked. "We've been dancing. I'm parched."
"Of course. Your usual?"
I nodded.
"And your... friend?" The slight hesitation before adding the word had my skin heating, something which was becoming a habit around Lucas.
For the second time in a few minutes, I felt terribly exposed.
Lucas didn't know it, of course, but I never went out with my students, and I never brought any of my one night stands here.
He didn't know it. But she did. Not for the first time, I wondered what the fuck I was doing.
"I'll start with a water," Lucas said, "And then maybe I'll try a cocktail if that's okay?"
"Of course. You boys get yourselves settled and I'll be right up with the cocktail list and your place settings."
I led the way, the old wooden stairs creaking beneath my weight, but not so loudly that I didn't hear Annie murmur something softly to Lucas, although I couldn't make out what she said.
When I looked down, it was straight into Lucas' blue-grey eyes watching me with an expression I couldn't quite place.
He turned back to Annie and she nodded her head solemnly.
"What did she say to you?" I asked when we'd both reached the upper level. The upstairs room had fewer tables than downstairs, with the staircase taking up half the width of the room. Only one of the tables was occupied, and the couple sitting there had their attention focused on each other.
"Just that you bring a new man here every night," he said dead-pan.
"She did not!" I protested. "I never... I don't, I mean, did she?"
Lucas laughed. "Kidding!"
"Fuck you," I said, mock punching him in the shoulder.
Lucas' smile dawned slow and speculative. He opened his mouth to say something, then slammed it shut. He kept up that little smirk until I opened the glass door and led him out onto the tiny balcony.
"Oh, my God, it's beautiful," he gasped, forgetting about teasing me and moving straight to the railing which overlooked the street with all its colored lights. "Look at that!"
The Japanese restaurant across the road had a koi pond that you couldn't see from ground level.
At night the lights in the pond created a fluorescent glow against which the dark shapes of some rather large fish were silhouetted as they moved through the water.
Fairy lights strung in the maple bushes in the garden surrounding the fishpond added a fairytale quality to the scene.
I had seen it a dozen times but it never got old.
Further down the road, a Colombian cafe had red, blue and yellow lights strung along its awning, and customers sat at tables on the sidewalk, their conversations barely audible - except for occasional riotous laughter - over the blaring latin music, which somehow blended with the music from the Indian restaurant several buildings down without being discordant.
"I love it up here. That's why I wanted to show it to you. There's nothing quite like it in the street. It's like a private room of our own."
Lucas looked around the balcony and his eyebrows rose as he seemed to finally notice there was only one small table out here.
I suddenly realized how much this must be starting to look like a date.
For a minute, neither of us spoke, and then a burst of laughter from down in the street startled me out of my frozen state.
"I often come up here," I told him hoping to defuse any pressure that my choice of venue had caused. The wooden chair scraped noisily across the floorboards as I pulled it out, and creaked as I lowered my weight into it. Lucas grimaced. "It's alright. I haven't broken one yet."
Lucas relaxed, grinned, and pulled his own seat out more gently. It didn't make any protest at all as he slid into it.
"Show off!" I said, unable to stop a smile from teasing at the corners of my lips.
The creaking of the balcony door signaled Annie's arrival with our drinks. Placing a tall glass of water in front of Lucas and a beer on the table for me, she handed Lucas the cocktail list.
"Do you know what you want to eat?" she asked us. "Or shall I come back?"
"I already know what I want," I said. "I'll have the pad thai."
Lucas chewed on his bottom lip as he studied the menu.
After a moment, he said, "I'll try the chicken pad-kapow.
And a strawberry daiquiri." He handed all the menus back to her and she left us alone with the busy sounds of the street.
A jet plane roared overhead on its way to the airport, and after it had passed, Lucas asked, "Do you teach dancing full-time? "
"Oh no, that's a hobby. When I first moved out here I did teach full time, but that was just until I could get my qualification re-certified - I'm actually an engineer."
"An engineer? Really? How have you been managing to get off work in the afternoons to give me lessons? I would have thought an engineer would be busy all day."
"I work for myself, so I can set my own hours. I'd rather trade the extra dollars for more leisure time. Work-life balance, you know?"
We talked some more about that, and the similarities and differences in attitudes between Australia and most South American countries. He was interested to know how long I'd been living here. It was long enough to be a permanent resident and be thinking about applying for citizenship.
Then the food arrived and we were silent for a few moments until we were alone again.
"Smells good," said Lucas, leaning in and sniffing his meal.
"You're gonna love it."
"We'll see. You've promised big, so I have expectations."
I took my first mouthful and groaned in pleasure. Annie's kitchen made an amazing pad thai, though to be honest, I was hamming it up a bit. When I looked up, Lucas was watching me intently.
"What?"
"Just watching."
Rumbling filled the air as another plane flew overhead, and when it subsided, the conversation took a different direction.
"So you don't bring your boyfriends here?" Lucas asked, sticking his fork into his meal and scooping up a delicious-looking mouthful of chicken, beans and basil, and holding it paused inches from his lips as he waited for my answer.
"No. I just don't do boyfriends."
"Never? Is there... a reason for that? You don't have to tell me if you don't want to," he added hastily. The forkful of steaming stirfry finally made it through those lips and I watched, fascinated, as his tongue came out and swiped away a few drops of sauce that had stuck to them.
"Mmmm-mmm," he hummed in appreciation. My pants tightened and I shifted in my seat. Fuck.
"Not really, beyond the fact I enjoy variety. I didn't say I was celibate. It's like... why restrict yourself to one dish, when you can eat from the whole buffet?"
Lucas watched me intently. "What if you really like the dish? Do you ever eat it twice?"
I looked at my plate. "Well, I've obviously eaten Pad Thai more than once, but when it comes to men, no. One and done."
I kept my eyes on him, watching for his reaction, because from where I was sitting - or more accurately, how I was sitting - it was starting to seem a possibility that we might hook-up - after the lessons were done and I didn't have to maintain a professional attitude, that was.
I wouldn't have to wait too much longer, there was only one more lesson to go.
Lucas simply nodded and went on eating, unaware of the direction my thoughts had taken.
"What about you?"
"Are we talking food or men now?"
"Men. I already know you're going to be coming back to this place for more of that pad-kapow."
The shoulders of his t-shirt raised and dropped. Carajo! I really wanted to see what he looked like without his shirt. After 5 weeks of watching him dance, I was convinced those shoulders were lean and muscular, but man, I wanted to see.
"Well, it's good pad-kapow," he said, as his mouth closed around the fork, lips pink and glistening.
He chewed slowly, drawing out the moment.
I couldn't look away as his jaw worked, the muscles flexing and stretching.
His adam's apple bobbed as he swallowed, and that damn tongue came out and decadently licked the sauce from his lips again. Sheesh.
"I kind of went through my hook-up phase during uni," he said, slowly. "But for the right person, I'm not averse."