Tuesday, April 14, 2009

Chapter 8 - I know who you are

The next couple of days my food cache dwindled worryingly, and there was no sign of Angelo. I was considering rationing what little remained when late the following evening I heard the rumble of a car on the driveway and, heart thumping, climbed upstairs to see if it was him, the police, or a complete stranger coming to claim his house. Blinded by the headlights, I recognized the car only when it reached the yard: Luca´s convertible, with the top down, driven by Angelo. He was alone, and waved at me as he turned off the motor. The entire car seemed to be filled with bags that were spilling their contents all over; food, clothes, books. I ran down, my stomach growling in anticipation, and slammed the front door open.

“I can tell you´re glad to see me,” Angelo said with a chuckle, and gave me a bear hug in the shaft of light spilling from the living room.

“And all that food,” I said, extracting myself before he felt my swelling erection. “I was getting worried.”

He looked at me gravely, at arms lenght. “Sorry I couldn´t come earlier. The police have been following me, and it took some effort to slip away.”

“Luca must be loving all this.”

“He likes TV the best, actually. They´ve been saying pretty awful things about you. I saw your foster parents´ interview yesterday.”

I´d seen it, too. Christina Carlton had looked more pious than ever, with her hair pulled tightly back and streaked with grey, and her lips more sunken in and narrow than I had remembered. As I had expected, she had done all the talking, with Greg first standing next to her armchair, his military past evident in his haircut and erect bearing, and then settling down in his own chair by her side. Through the perfectly pressed and well-fitting blue shirt it was clear that he hadn´t given up his horseback riding and workout regimes, and for a guy in his mid-forties he was in great shape – for a guy of any age, actually. Strangely enough, he didn´t look any older to my eyes; when I´d last seen him I´d been too young to have much perspective for people´s ages. And after all these years, just seeing him had still the power to make me feel agitated, as I´d gained perspective on other matters as well and now knew how remarkably well-endowed he was inside the narrow-hipped khaki pants. During the whole interview he hadn´t uttered a single word, his face set in stone. No one would have guessed that he was probably feeling like a man about to be hanged. If and when I was caught, no defense team in their right mind would exclude him as part of their strategy, which meant that he´d inevitably join me in the slammer and with a far more infamous charge than mere manslaughter.

“She looked like a real bitch,” Angelo said, grabbing a handful of bags and hauling them out of the car. “Was it really hard living with them?”

I shook my head but said nothing, and Angelo threw me one of his quizzical glances.

Of course Christina Carlton had guessed what had been going on, and the interview was part of her payback for Greg, and a prelude for a hefty divorce settlement if everything was to come out.

I´d been living with them for less than three months when it happened for the first time. Christina, a registered nurse, regularly worked night shifts at the hospital and left the house shortly after dinner, leaving me and Greg to fend for ourselves. It had been fun; rented movies, the scooter, their outdoors jacuzzi in the Houston winter. We spent a lot of time together, in a mutual attempt to make my stay with them work – I didn´t want to go back to the institution – and somewhere along the way a new kind of tension crept in. I was still a skinny curious thirteen-year-old, and so I thought it was only natural that I´d covertly study Greg´s strong arms and legs, the smooth hair covering his pectorals, and the flexing of his abs as he climbed into the jacuzzi. And, most of all, the breathtakingly heavy bulge in his swimsuit when he then got up from the bubbling water, with the wet fabric clinging to his body and showing the thick curve of flesh inside.

I knew he had noticed me staring, but it still was a major shock to unexpectedly hear him enter my room without a word one night, to feel his weight on my bed and have the bedcovers pulled away, followed by my briefs, and a moment later, without any further preamble, the slick, large tongue of a man driving warmly between my spread asscheeks and into the sensitive little opening. A bewildering five minutes had followed, with me scampering away from him, half paralyzed with fear, and him holding me down, asking for my forgiveness, saying it had been a terrible misunderstanding, and that it would never happen again, and I should never tell anyone. All the while he talked, in my confusion I could think of little else but how good it had felt; his weight, the big hands, the slick warmth. I promised I´d never tell anyone, and he left my room, distraught. Less than a week later he had fucked me for the first time.

That´s how I got my run-down trailer at sixteen, telling him it couldn´t go on any longer and that he owed me a special arrangement for what he´d been doing to me for three years. He must have gone through hell convincing Christina to sign all the necessary papers. I never learned how Greg actually had managed it, but Christina hardly said a word to me ever after.

“You´re awfully quiet,” Angelo said, preoccupied, as we dragged the last bags into the kitchen. “Are you mad at me, for bringing you here? You´re thinking of going to the police, aren´t you?”

I looked at him, surprised. “Of course not. I mean, the case is closed. Everyone thinks I did it.”

“Not everyone.”

“You and Carola Chiara,” I grinned, knowing that the connection with the longest legs in Italy wouldn´t be much appreciated by him.

“Oh shut up,” he said, his smile then gradually hardening into a look that I recognized.

My heartbeat picked up. “So, did Jan call?” I asked, delaying the moment we´d end up upstairs.

“He did,” Angelo replied, self-satisfied, and nonchalantly studied the line of Barilla packages he´d brought, as if completely engrossed.

“So you´re fucking both of us now?” I asked, mock-scandalized.

“As a matter of fact, yes.” A mischievous grin. “Luca thinks I left for Tuscany two hours earlier than I actually did.”

“You´ve just fucked Jan?” Now I was a little scandalized, and not just a little jealous as well. However, I wasn´t quite sure if it was for Angelo or Jan. “Where?”

“What do you think?”

“You took him home? To your bed? You fucked him in a bed that smells of Luca?”

“You make it sound so evil,” Angelo said, pleased.

I imagined the two, and my throat went dry. “So what was he like? Embarrassed, frightened? Turned on?”

“All of the above, in that order.”

“You dog.” I stacked seven large packages of cherry and strawberry yoghurt in the fridge. “Has the police given you a lot of trouble?”

“Some. But mostly Channel 5,” Angelo replied. “They´re fixated on the idea that I desperately want to tell them everything about you.”

“How much are they offering?”

“Quite a lot, and much more if I hand over any photos of you which, quote, reveal your character, unquote.”

“Not those photos, I hope.”

He laughed. “No, although I must say they do reveal your character.” Several paperbacks appeared from yet another bag, and he piled them on the table.

I asked the big question. “The police really don´t know any more than what the TV says?”

“I´ve called them a few times, and my dad has some connections through his law firm, too. They´ve found no hard evidence about the two thugs.”

“And the mafia angle?”

Angelo looked grim, and shrugged. “Gabriele´s a national hero, and his company is one of the biggest Italian exporters. A mafia investigation would be considered most unpatriotic.”

I had to sit down. The last, weak glimmer of hope I´d been nursing was gone.

“I have a surprise for you,” Angelo said with a mysterious smile, his timing perfect as usual. “It´s in the trunk of the car.”

He reappeared, carrying a slim black bag, and a grey plastic one filled with DVDs. From the black bag he produced a brand-new notebook computer, and set it on the table.

“Angelo,” was all I could say.

“It has wireless and TV cards,” he told me. “You don´t have to watch that old horror any longer, and you have internet access. I brought a couple of games, too. But don´t email me – I´m sure my account is tapped, just like my phones.”

I was overwhelmed. The long days and nights in the house had started to become unbearable. But there was something I needed even more than games and movies.

“Want to go upstairs?”

Later, fresh from our shower together, Angelo checked his wristwatch and made a face.

“I have to go.” He started gathering his clothes, rumpled heaps on the floor. “I hate to leave you here.”

“Well, a country house in Tuscany isn´t nearly as bad as a jail cell in Milan. Even without all the tattooed brutes.” I watched him pull on his shorts. “You´re not going to get in trouble with the police, are you?”

“No, if I´m careful.”

A few minutes later he was gone. I sat in the kitchen, staring at the pile of DVDs and games, not nearly as sanguine as I´d been in front of Angelo, but trying to see the brighter side of things nevertheless. Then it crossed my mind that the police might not be the only ones keeping an eye on Angelo and following him. I quickly decided I didn´t like this line of reasoning, but now I was glad for the odd design of the house, the small downstairs windows and the unwieldy but sturdy front door that would be impossible to break down, along with the padlocked entrance to the shed.

I went online, and first checked out major news sites back home. A powerful New York publicist had just declared, earlier in the day, that two of her clients categorically – and truthfully – deniend having ever met me. One of the clients was a well-known movie star with a long history of fighting gay rumors. What the hell is this, I wondered, and skimming through the article I found out that I had allegedly started my hustling career already in New York, and my job at the Keller gym had merely been a cover. Keller had been forced to issue a statement denouncing any allegations that gay prostitutes used their gyms as hunting ground – truthfully again, at least as far as I knew – or that gay sex took place in the premises. The second claim, wishful at best, had undoubtedly provoked numerous chortles among New Yorkers.

The Italian media reports, for the most part, seemed somewhat more accurate. But there was one gaping omission: the phone book of my cellular. Differently from the crime scene photos, the police had managed to keep the memorized numbers from the press. This type of efficiency was highly unusual, not to say unique, which made it clear that among my clients there had been at least one person with nearly frightening clout, a person who would definitely prefer me to remain missing for ever. And there were two others who, although not quite in the same league with Gabriele Zaigler, would inevitably find themselves in every newscast if the phone numbers came out.

The sun was already coming up when I finished my news binge. I had a quick meal, brushed my teeth, and staggered to bed. It was going to be another hot, long day in Tuscany, slept away in the dark cool upstairs bedroom.


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June turned into a scorchingly hot July, and day by day, exhausted by the heat, the country dragged on towards the universal vacation month of August. Gabriele gradually slipped into yesterday´s news, and so did I, and only occasionally, when an unsuspecting Scandinavian tourist bearing a resemblance to me was hauled into questura to be questioned by the police, I was back on television. Supposedly I´d slipped through the EU border somewhere far from Italy, helped by malavita, or by the human traffickers who imported female prostitutes into the country. Even a few kooky conspiracy theories had cropped up, but curiously enough all of them had to do with politics and none with the mafia. Angelo kept showing up faithfully at least once a week, despite the deteriorating situation with Luca. There had been two more trips to the emergency room, one to stitch a badly bleeding cheekbone, and another for an almost broken arm. The two seemed to be walking an awfully thin line.

In Tuscany, however, life proceeded without drama. I slept through the hot days, with a large ventilator humming next to the bed, and woke up at dusk to spend the night with the computer, or reading paperback novels Angelo heaped on me, while the night wind stealing through the open windows gradually carried away the heat radiating from the thick walls of the farmhouse. Then, very late at night, when I was sure everyone in the neighborhood was fast asleep, I walked across the fields to the big house that claimed the hill next to mine and discharged my nervous energy in the dark cool water of the swimming pool. Every night, the pool was immaculate; clearly someone had to look after the house during the long, bright daylight hours that I spent asleep. The clean antiseptic smell of chlorine lingered in the water, there were never leaves floating on the surface, and the tiled pool area was swept of dust and leaves carried by the capricious Tuscan wind. Yet, at night, the magnificent house was always unlit, just a dark shadow rising up to the whirl of stars twinkling madly over the hill country.

One night, I was floating on my back in the pool, quietly staring upwards at the stars as I tried not to contemplate my future. Sooner or later, fall would be here, and I´d have nowhere to go. Angelo couldn´t keep protecting me forever. I took a deep breath, and plunged into the dark water, diving into the coolest water at the very bottom. Then, shockingly, the pool lights came on.

For a moment I froze, in a weird jack-knifed position I had blindly wiggled myself into in the dark water, and started drifting upwards. Quickly I kicked myself deeper into the water, instinctively seeking shelter, then realized it was the very wrong thing to do. I just had to get out as soon as possible, and make a run for it, leaving my clothes behind. I burst to the surface, swam to the edge of the pool, and pulled myself up, looking towards the house. Most of it was still dark; only one room on the ground floor had lights switched on, but I was too late just the same. The person who had caught me was already halfway between the house and the pool, and most likely had seen enough to recognize me. Yet he walked closer, although more slowly, and haltingly stopped thirty feet away, looking uncertain. He was only a boy of seventeen or eighteen, and had probably expected to find some local kid of his own age in the pool instead of an adult who was much taller and heavier than him, and clearly a foreigner as well. His little prank had turned into potentially serious business. For a moment neither of us moved, him standing hesitantly at the edge of the light, unsure if he should claim his rights as the owner of the place, in front of a naked, dripping man.

The kid was clearly Italian, with short, almost jet-black hair, and his large dark eyes, framed by exceptionally long lashes, glittered in the light reflected from the water. His nose was short and a little stubby, childlike, and the effect was emphasized by lips that seemed too full and with a curve too sensuous for a kid so young. Even his ears collaborated; they protruded ever so slightly, enough to make him look like an apprehensive little animal that had ventured out from a forest. The cheekbones were wide and softened by remains of baby fat he hadn´t had time to shed yet, but in contrast to the rest of his features the jawline was sturdy and masculine, and although slim as any kid of his age his body was clearly shaped by some kind of sport. He was wearing a pair of baggy shorts and a loose tank top, and even by Italian standards he was extremely good-looking, in a way the made one feel partly protective and partly roguish, and something more primitive still.

He frowned a little, as if trying to remember something, and then his eyes widened. With a sharp intake of breath he took one step backwards, trying to reason himself out of the situation, afraid he was wrong and would make a fool of himself. But there was no mistake; he knew who I was. Letting out a small, choked sound he turned and fled.

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