tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-89913396753381645892024-02-20T16:29:48.208-08:00the last canvas | laurent under the sun EPsillustrated online novelAnonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10000213495439627694noreply@blogger.comBlogger124125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8991339675338164589.post-58134925764448221432017-07-05T06:28:00.000-07:002017-07-05T06:30:33.526-07:00Episode 22.II - Rains Season<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Silently, the daring clouds arrived like a magnificent fleet that nothing could deter; in a few hours, victorious conquering the whole sky for the next months. Bringing the sky closer to earth, they extended and unified their reigns under the pour down.</div>
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Deporting the sun from view, their dark barrier made the days seem shorter, as the light grew dim -- until liquid light started falling from the sky, in the form of thick, shiny raindrops. As with great determination they gathered in puddles on the soil, taken hostage to their own will and purpose of reflecting the mother clouds above, Armand had the impression that the earth itself had liquefied too, becoming part of sky, drenched in one single element.</div>
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After days of running wild and free from their obligations, Armand and Dave readily resumed the former monastic discipline of meditating for several hours each session, many sessions a day, with renewed diligence. </div>
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Instead of the monastery bells, rolling thunders and the splattering of water marked the steady rhythm of their meditation. Through their half-open eyes they observed as the rain fell continually, sometimes so thick and heavy as to fall in neat vertical curtains, other times lighter and brighter, often carried by gushes of wind, arching through the landscape like wild horses rearing to the menacing strikes of purple lighting that flogged the horizon.</div>
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Concentrating on his breathing passing in and out of his nostrils, Armand felt the quality of air change, as it grew heavily humid -- and he started to understand Dave's warnings about how everything about them would grow impossibly moist -- even his lungs, it seemed. </div>
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He often felt like he was drowning from breathing the vapour of water that reached him, through the closed curtains even. Since they hadn't put the monastic robes on, staying in their underwear the whole day through, Armand became very aware of how the temperature oscillated several times, too. From a nasty, indolent warmth that made him sleepy, to the chilly breeze agitating the curtains and giving him goose bumps, there no longer was any possible comfortable circumstance to meditate. </div>
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And as if his body was trying to become one with the dominant element, Armand sweated profusely. But except for the different odour, it was hard to tell if what covered him, and ran in streams along his muscles, was sweat or raindrops. It seemed pointless to bathe in the lake, once they never were really dry any longer.</div>
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Armand started regretting the rain not for having drawn away the silence, nor for ruining the books, the words of the Buddha turned discontinuous as their pages grew thick and glued to one another, or for spoiling the food -- but for making him and Dave grow apart.</div>
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They would surely endure the lighter rain without leaving their cushions, but still had often to retreat far back into their precarious rooms to escape the violence of passing storms, when the streams of water could hit them with the force of whips. </div>
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After having kept constant company to each other for weeks, Armand hurt as a mere wall stood as a painful obstacle between them. Like before with Carlo, who had occupied the room next to his on the Île du Blanchomme, Armand could not decide whether to venture into Dave's cubicle -- even if it were to start a conversation he should have had weeks ago already.</div>
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Suddenly becoming aware to have not reciprocated Dave's confession, he regretted it now -- withholding his own sexuality from his colleague. But Armand had often sensed there was no space -- or need? --, no openness -- or interest? -- indeed, for him to talk about himself to his friend. Dave's confession had versed on his professional sexuality only, with all its torments, which included a guilty pride that ultimately stimulated fantasies from Armand's part. Nothing of a more personal, intimate nature had been hinted -- except, perhaps, for that film crew member who seemed to have taken Dave's virginity and, in the end, recruited him to the porn industry. Perhaps it was Armand's tragic tendency, which had led him into so much frustration, that of separating love and sex, almost opposing the romantic involvement he longed for, and the physical satisfaction he craved for, that made Dave's straightforward, cold and detached openness seem the more mysterious to Armand.</div>
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Armand's surrender to Dave's dominance was slow, and so subtle, that it soon became complete. In all everyday aspects, Dave knew better how to organize their retreat. Having learned the sutras by heart, he taught Armand how to correctly recite them while holding the privilege to conduct their religious practices. In practical matters, too, his experience with prior rains seasons had led him to take care even of the cooking, determining the times they ate their meals, imprinting the rhythm of their daily routine. Dave loved tea and prepared it throughout the day for both of them, often adding dried petals or peels of fruits to the leaves -- that Armand drank with pleasure. Naturally, the surfer monk conducted their tea ceremonies, too. </div>
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"Drink your cloud", he commanded Armand, with an inviting smile, as he offered him a cup of fragrant -- if oftentimes a bit too bitter -- tea. "Drink your mountain, drink your sun."</div>
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Dave could be surprisingly poetic, he could be strikingly philosophical.</div>
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But Armand wanted more, needed more, longed for more.</div>
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He wanted the surfer monk to be romantic, too.</div>
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Instead, as days passed under unceasing rain, and being confined to their rooms, perhaps just a little less wet than everything else around them, and to a monastic routine that demanded hours of immobility, made the tension and discomfort grow between them -- and not peace and camaraderie, that they should be cultivating.</div>
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During the brief intervals when the sun shone, in awe Armand observed Dave practice martial arts. With grunts and shouts, he cut the air with sharp punches and powerful kicks in continuous pirouettes, as if he were trying to bring down the bad weather with his violent fighting. When he couldn't, and the rain resumed, in frustration Dave would let out a cry of protest that sent shivers up Armand's spine.</div>
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One evening, weeks into their rain season's retreat, Armand had a dream. It was a welcome distraction, for he had been feeling sick -- though he could not precise how, since his stomach functioned normally, and there was neither fever nor any other symptom of any disease --, continually dizzy, tortured by constant headaches.</div>
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Not a complete dream, though. There was no action in it. It was just a scene, one that Armand had often fantasized about since Dave had shared with him about his days of hustling. Dressed in a tight tank top and jeans, that left little to imagination, wearing a cowboy hat and boots, Dave stood against a lamppost, waiting for clients. But none appeared, and he grew increasingly impatient and anguished, violent even, stamping his foot on the sidewalk. Until he found out there were no clients anymore, and the reason for that was Armand, who intently observed him from the distance, driving all other men away. </div>
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For, in fact, in Thailand, on their floating monastery, they were indeed the only two men, living in enforced chastity.</div>
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Armand woke up suffocating, locked against the bottom of the hammock. On top of him, muscles bulging with rage, Dave weighed a ton.</div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;"><b>*****</b></span></div>
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<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10000213495439627694noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8991339675338164589.post-8270622369617137132016-08-11T09:01:00.001-07:002017-07-05T06:30:19.053-07:00Episode 21. II - Porn and Practice<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<i><span style="font-size: x-small;">nudity and sex </span></i></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;">"</span><b><span style="font-size: x-large;">I am leaving</span></b><span style="font-size: large;">. The Sangha has no place for me</span>, and I don't intend to camp under torrential rains." Dave briskly told Armand, a few days later. Building proper accommodations, no matter how rudimentary, was taking longer than expected, and the monks could not host the novice Surfer Monk -- who confessed to having left another Sangha farther South, where the Rains Season lasted even longer, when mould started growing on his feet. </div>
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<i>Nor shall they host me</i>, Armand concluded, at his colleague's announcement, glad to be able to pay for the house on the lake, indefinitely.</div>
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"Come stay with me, Brother Dave!" Armand mouthed, from within a thick, confusing haze of lust and romantic expectations that blinded him. Longing for another relationship that would make him forget Carlo, and too eager to please ever evading Dave, Armand believed to be thus giving them a chance. Becoming roommates, their friendship should deepen, and expand its limits, and meanings --for it had, with Carlo, and in the isolation of the forest, he hoped it also would, with Dave.</div>
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Without formally accepting Armand's offer, ever, Dave was instantly throwing a list of urgent practical measures to face the Rains Season. After inquiring around, they found a native who, having a pile of unused wooden planks, willingly sold them at Armand's generous offer. </div>
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In silent agreement -- Dave being very strong and skilled with tools, while Armand held the know-how -- they formed a team that worked magically smooth. Without any discussions, tasks were naturally divided according to their own talents, while any cooperation was a happy occasion for harmonizing and leveling their efforts, so that they progressed efficiently. Always implying in more sweat and sore muscles from one, and more concerns, calculations and sleepless nights from the other, together they built a reinforced roof, properly inclined towards the lake to drain the rain. Firm, windowless walls followed, to close a corner of the floating platform. They were invaded by a sense of great accomplishment at every step they concluded, and the physical work bonded them way stronger than the spiritual practice ever had. In less than a week, walls facing three directions -- the fourth was left open to be sheltered by curtains, that would be open whenever possible to welcome the sun and try to combat the mould --, two bedrooms of humble proportions had been erected. They called these -- that, in their bare simplicity, did resemble monastic cells --, their 'private monastery'.</div>
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Armand counted the <a href="http://www.bhphotovideo.com/images/images2500x2500/Kodak_135_36_200_Color_Print_27712.jpg" target="_blank">roll films</a> he had already used, photographing the plants and flowers in the nearby grove, wondering when -- and if -- he would ever have them developed. To see their outcome, or to renew the stock, he would have to go to Bangkok someday -- and the perspective did not thrill him. Maybe he would become a monk after all, and the rolls he now stored in a protective plastic bag might be forgotten or trashed when he finally, and definitely, robed. Maybe he should send them to Paris, to Monsieur de Montbelle, as a farewell gift -- and in an impulse, he wrote his father's Parisian address and labeled the bag before storing it.</div>
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He had enough rolls to go through the Rains Season and, most important, to document the undergoing transformation of the house on the lake. A register for posterity, was what Armand kept telling himself -- but in the back of his mind, he kept thinking of Carlo, and how he wished to have bought that camera and have it on the Île du Blanchomme already, where he could have photographed his Italian ex-roommate. He owned but a single self-portrait by Carlo, now safely stored in Paris, and olny a couple of Polaroids, made by a colleague at the <i>École</i>, kept inside a book he no longer remembered which, to remind him of the beautiful Roman profile of his lost love. </div>
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This time, though, he would not miss the opportunity of photographing his new roommate and newfound love, the Super Surfer Monk.</div>
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"Smile!" he said, before snapping the first picture of Dave, feeling goose bumps as the other man's rough beauty, his chiseled profile enhanced by the frame of the visor, was supposedly captured in a click. Armand quickly readjusted the focus, when Dave turned to face him, and it was through the lens that he watched rage petrify his friend's face who, letting a roar -- that sent in flight a pair of birds that had built a nest on the awnings of their rooms --, leaped across the bridge towards Armand.</div>
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"What the fuck are you doing?!" He yelled.</div>
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The bridge trembled when Dave landed at Armand's side, at once colliding with him like a well trained quarterback would. Trying to snatch the camera from Armand's hand, who had instinctively lowered the expensive object to protect it from the collision, Dave instead hit Armand in the face. The punch was strong enough to make the smaller man swirl on his feet, and lose balance. He was about to tumble overboard into the lake when Dave pulled him -- not so much to keep Armand from hitting the water, but to snatch the camera from his hand.</div>
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"Fucking give me that!" The bigger man cried, at that same moment taking possession of the equipment with a firm grip.</div>
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"<i>Non</i>! What are you doing?" Armand whined, when he saw Dave was about to throw the camera into the lake. "What is wrong with you? <i>Arrête</i>!" He had been screaming in French, and the command in a foreign idiom seemed to make Dave hesitate for a moment, and finally detain him.</div>
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Dave let the camera fall to the floor. With a metallic bang, it kicked on the wooden planks, rolling away. Making the whole bridge shake, Dave dropped noisily onto his knees, a short and dangerous distance from where Armand had fallen, coiling. </div>
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Armand's legs trembled uncontrollably. He observed how his hands shook while he checked his face -- still hot and stinging, the cheek reddened from the blow --, for any more signs of blood, other than what he felt filling his mouth.</div>
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"I'm sorry, man." Dave said, placing a sweaty hand on Armand's shoulder, who actually shook it off, dragging his body away. "I don't like being in pictures." He hissed.</div>
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"You don't <i>like</i> it?" Armand retorted, incredulous. His voice sounded groggy. The blood made a thick paste in his mouth, while he tried to check with his tongue for any broken tooth. Cautiously, he glanced at the capsized camera, sitting next to a column, many feet away. Like himself, its exterior looked intact. The lens had not broken. But was it functioning still? The matter now was not how expensive it had been. Had it been damaged, Armand doubted he would find someone to fix it, even in Bangkok. He wanted to crawl towards it, but suddenly aware of the novice monk's menacing strength, Armand was afraid at Dave's next violent reaction. What if he tried to retrieve the camera? How would the man try to stop him, this time? "But why?" </div>
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"I fucked it up, man!" Dave cried. Aggressiveness giving way to sadness, his jaw relaxed as tears welled up in his eyes. "I fucked up my life, that's why!"</div>
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Seeing the other man's aggressive posture start to loosen, though his swollen muscles -- which Armand had gladly admired during their labor -- had acquired a menacing quality that was, from then on, impossible to dissociate from their sculptural aspect, Armand relaxed too. He decided to sit closer to the novice monk who, despite a certain feverish glow in his blue eyes, that indicated he was not quite lucid and at peace yet, embarked on a story murmured at a low voice that, aimed at justifying his impulse of violence, complemented and clarified his testimony at breakfast, just a few days ago.</div>
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The money not being that good, and having never settled with the many oddities of the lumberjack's community, nor ever finding a proper, fixed work post, after many months of trying to fit in, loosing his wages in gambling and drinking and with prostitutes, Dave had decided to venture in another direction. With little money left, he boarded a bus headed to California. He was convinced that he would become an actor, having been convinced that he could become an actor. Before embarking, he had phoned that one film crew member, who had not only given him Kerouac's book -- with his home telephone inscribed on the first page --, but also waved with the possibility of inserting Dave in the movies industry, that he called 'the entertainment industry', to be more specific -- or perhaps more generic? Hosting him in California for a modest fee and some personal favors, the guy -- who had taken Dave's virginity back at the farm -- did just as promised. A few days only after his arrival in Los Angeles, Dave was filming already. </div>
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"With Jack Wrangler!" Dave stated proudly, a smile -- that still held a sinister quality to it -- contorting his mouth. "It was my first scene, and I was with The Man, already!"</div>
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Armand tried to recall all B or independent directors from the American movies he had ever watched, at the <i>Cinématèque Française</i>, and even some lesser known actor thus named -- and he blushed when he finally understood Dave was speaking of a whole other kind of movie. Armand had been only twice to porn theaters in Paris, and he could not claim to have watched the movies, for they were more a bait to gather the crowd who actually wanted only to find sexual release in the audience. Armand recalled the ambient of abundant, anonymous, affectionless sex sessions in the dark, to access his own guilt, trying to empathize with Dave's.</div>
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Oscillating between pity and perplexity, Armand listened to Dave's confession, as it oscillated too, between pride and shame. </div>
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No longer a newcomer, but still bearing his ways in the porn industry, he had quickly fallen from a promising act and a prodigy to making just enough money to survive, shooting less scenes each month as he became less of a novelty. Though hung and more handsome than most actors, he had proven exceedingly histrionic -- and worse, unworthy of trust. Substituting him soon proved easier than waiting for him, who was never punctual, and often quarreled, and twice abandoned the set. He was also considered too dry for the money shots, since he never spared his semen in his other professional encounters -- for he was kept busier and earned much more in prostituting himself on the boulevards. </div>
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To bear the doubts and torments of his new, unwanted life, he soon was doing drugs -- and next selling them, as another means of making money. In his first year in town, he'd been to jail several times, but luckily, nearly got killed just once. When he almost died from overdoses, having been saved just because a bunch of guys had dragged and deposited him in front of a hospital, he finally quit everything to come to Thailand, a little after having been kicked out by his host, who had concluded he was more trouble than fun. Why Thailand, Dave never clarified.</div>
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"I've never been happier than here, you know." David confessed, not without losing the inward, overcast look his eyes had kept while he recollected, seemingly blind to his present moment. </div>
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Was <i>here</i> Thailand in general, or the Sangha, or the house on the lake?, Armand asked himself.</div>
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"Never happier than as a monk." Dave complemented. "Because I know I cannot go back."</div>
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"To the US?" Armand asked shyly, still feeling defensive, his voice thinner than usual, despite the thick paste of blood circulating in his mouth, that he dare not spit out.</div>
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"Yeah, also." Dave glanced towards Armand, without really seeing him. "But I cannot go back to normal life. You see, my movies -- they are all out there. I met this guy, once, who immediately recognized me, from a scene where a played a cowboy who is tied down by three Indians and..." Dave nodded gravely, at what seemed unpleasant recollections. "He had only watched it, and yet thought he <i>knew</i> me. He thought I was that guy from the screen, and that he really, really <i>knew</i> me, though he'd seen only the worst of me. I had to drink and drug and drag myself into that scene, you know, brother. And do you think I was paid well for taking three..." Dave spit far into the lake, when Armand had just decided to swallow the blood. "Shit man, that guy made me feel like crap, when he wanted to buy me so cheap. He offered so little, that night in Long Beach, that I..." </div>
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For a moment, Armand observed Dave tensing again, the muscles of the Surfer Monk readying for the violence his repugnant memories seemed to inspire him, the already impressive bulk bulging aggressively, as his irritation and outrage grew. But the shrill cry of a bird -- maybe one of those who left the nest at Dave's roar --, coming from the shores of the lake, seemed to awaken the novice monk, and bring him back to Armand's inoffensive company. </div>
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"But that is not me. You know me better, <i>don't you</i>, brother?" He asked, with a force not yet destitute of threat, that allowed no room for a confronting answer. For he did not want an answer from Armand, not even for his next questions. "Will you forgive me?" he asked, and "Will you still have me here on <i>our</i> private monastery?" he next said. But what he really meant was that there was nothing to forgive, and no other chance for Armand but to house Dave for as long as he wanted to stay -- unless, of course, Armand would himself leave first.</div>
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It was irreversible. Like Dave had stated himself, after all the heavy work done in preparation for the Rains Season, the house on the lake had become <i>their</i> private monastery, and not just Armand's. He could not send Dave away, and in fact, strongly believed -- or was led to believe -- there was no reason to do so.</div>
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The Surfer Monk had been valiant in confessing a past he hated with all his might, and another part of which he was ashamed of. Yet, no matter how painful or sinful, they lent force for Dave's sincere conversion to monasticism, leading Armand to admire his brother in the practice even more. His love grew with the novice monk's emotional confession. Having understood a bit more of his modest, miserable background and troubled upbringing, Armand started looking at Dave with new eyes, turning the simpleton of a cowboy into a spiritual hero.</div>
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Having seen Dave denude his soul, Armand shouldn't have been ashamed when, on a hot morning, the novice took all his clothes off to bathe in the nude. They hadn't really discussed the matter, but both tacitly agreed on leaving the Sangha and practicing on their own -- and when they disrobed, too, the moment they left the forest groove, was to never go back. </div>
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Armand regretted that it seemed much easier for Dave to undress from his secular clothes, and remain naked even after he had finished washing himself in the lake, to then swim and sun bathe. Armand wanted to think it was his concern for the locals, whose modesty would never accept nudity, that made him shudder at the vision of his nude friend. Though a mighty, glorious vision it was, for him alone to appreciate! Armand thought it improbable that the owner would request the house back based on moral grounds, but Dave's nudity would certainly shock and drive the locals away, for yet another reason. He had already realized they never came close to the haunted lake -- except on full moon nights, for the offerings laid at the drowned boy's memorial --, making those placid waters practically private while standing in the openness of Nature.</div>
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It was that insincere argument, though, that he tried with Dave, who did not fall for it.</div>
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"I see you blushing, brother, I see you lower your eyes." Dave smiled when Armand again blushed and lowered his eyes, like he had just said, while being disarmed in his argumentation. "Don't blame it on the locals. It's all the Puritan's shit for me, and the Catholic's for you, that shames nudity, when it is no more than natural. To all of mankind, no exceptions made. Or do you think pastors and priests shit and shower in their robes?" Dave laughed out loud, beckoning Armand. "Come on, undress yourself, and get in the water with me. Come, brother!"</div>
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They had been taking refuge in the haunted grove, during the hottest hours of the afternoon -- and there, they were certain to find no other living person. Still, Armand opposed to the idea of such forced intimacy, for he heard in each of Dave's invitations the voice of a cheesy actor, trying to recite the script, and miserably failing to sound natural. </div>
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Truth is -- a porn actor he had been, and still was, utterly conscious of the physical attraction he wielded on Armand. Yet, Dave tried to convince his friend with another original, insincere argument, to counter Armand's own, but which did not sound as bad.</div>
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"I've lived through a Rains Season, brother Armand, and you still haven't. Mould will grow and multiply on everything around you... The walls, the books, the candles, the food... It will grow even around your nostrils, for breathing the humid air day after day. And on your fingernails, and making in between your toes turn a greenish blue... It's despairing, believe me! And we will need all the sun and warmth we can get now, as a reserve of health for the months that lie ahead. Please believe me, brother, and burn or bury that shame, along with your underwear. Come sun bathe in the nude with me."</div>
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Armand knew feeling shame not to be the problem, but controlling his lust, in front of Dave, who now insisted that they meditate without any clothes on, too. </div>
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Despite all the fantasies inspired by Dave's past performances, as a cowboy raped by Indians or a prisoner having to service the guards, and having renewed, daily chances to check the novice ex-monk's sizeable talents, that had made him instantly famous on the sidewalks of L.A., if not in the 'entertainment industry', in the couple of weeks proceeding the Rains Season's arrival nothing between Armand and his colleague in the practice ever happened -- nothing that could be called erotic, other than that nudity that soon lost all its eroticism, with the continued meditation sessions. </div>
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Though Armand's goal in coming to Thailand had been becoming a monk, thus leading a pious life, following the Buddha's path to see himself free of suffering -- and at some point, for his heartfelt discipline and sincere commitment seemed to entitle him to, even attain enlightenment -- he was now confronted with his own hypocrisy. Trying to forget Raymond and Carlo, he saw himself now infatuated for yet another handsome, masculine man -- supposedly, his companion on the Buddha's path. Not that they weren't on it anymore, but theirs was rather different from the life and practice of a monastery. </div>
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Dave's suggestion of meditating in the nude, though apparently no more than a plot from a porn movie to quicken sensual fantasies and lead into sex, had indeed turned their nakedness into something less of a fantasy, less sexually appealing, less driving. If any of them saw their organs inflate during a meditation, the engorged meat standing up as a proud reminder of the mundane desires they were trying to overcome, it would simply, naturally deflate during their long sitting sessions of concentrating on their breathing. The mounting tension of unconfessed feelings and desires, that Armand had experienced before with his former lovers -- who had never actually been it --, gradually dissolved. It was indeed a victory, that of not being dominated by lust or craving, nor feel the need to act to satisfy those maddening impulses -- but Armand was not quite sure about his newly found sanctity, when before him was seated a newly found love.</div>
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That's what occupied his mind -- until they arrived.</div>
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<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10000213495439627694noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8991339675338164589.post-56180372927154301652016-06-13T07:05:00.000-07:002016-08-11T09:03:27.461-07:00Episode 20.II | The Super Surfer Monk<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<i><span style="font-size: large;"><b><span style="font-size: x-large;">My mind </span><span style="font-size: large;">having drifted elsewhere, I watched</span></b></span><span style="font-size: medium;"> as the white crest of waves</span></i> washed across my own reflection in the glass. They were the only thing barely visible through the kitchen's large window, rolling outside in the deep dark night that smoothly enveloped both the sea and the sky. Other than Armand's house, and the historic cabin I was occupying, just one more construction --and source of artificial light -- stood on the whole island, where a ranger or keeper would sometimes lodge, but that was vacant at the moment. </div>
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Armand was so accustomed to his own solitude that almost surely he had already forgotten I stood in the kitchen with him. True, he was cooking a vegetarian dinner for two -- like in the past he had cooked meals for my father --, but so concentrated and silent that I could have gone upstairs, to check the rest of the house, or wander outside, to inspect the world of darkness in which we seemed to be the only human beings, that he wouldn't have noticed -- not my presence, nor my absence. It was another form of meditation, I knew, that of silently and mindfully slicing vegetables, that I too had been taught at the Zen monastery in France.</div>
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Leaning against a different counter from where Armand peacefully busied himself, I couldn't be less mindful, lost in my own incessant stream of conjunctures.</div>
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Obviously, I was recalling my father's bewilderment at his noble friend, brought up as a prince, cooking for him -- so that I wasn't as surprised myself to have Armand preparing a meal for me. But I did wonder whether he was recalling it, too, and seeing any parallels and continuation or connections. Even if Armand wasn't my uncle, for Catherine was apparently not his sister, my mother had still stolen his lover from him -- already carrying his seed in her belly, taken Carlo away with her to be my father. All of a sudden, I was very ashamed, conscious to be the physical proof of their love making -- just if not love, really. Of their betrayal, ultimately.</div>
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Instead, I tried to think of the tall, handsome Surfer Monk. I knew Armand, after losing Carlo, had had a long lasting partner, to whom he even dedicated the Pritzker Prize. But I couldn't recall his name, or nationality -- if those had ever been mentioned in any interviews, actually. Was he the Surfer Monk?</div>
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And why would Armand hide from the world in this cold island, when he had once retreated to inhabit much warmer, tropical shores? </div>
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"Is this island haunted too, Armand?"</div>
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"Haunted? Haunted <i>too</i>? Why do you ask that, Laurent?"</div>
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"I don't know. I was thinking... The Île du Blanchomme was haunted." Armand did not glance at me, but for a second he stopped slicing the carrot, and I could sense his surprise. "Those spirits waiting to be born, tormented because they never would incarnate... My father told me all about it." I clarified, and Armand went back to his slicing meditation, that I probably was ruining by chatting to him. "And so was the house you took, on the lake in Thailand. The drowned boy... It was what kept the locals away, wasn't it?"</div>
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"And you were thinking ghosts would keep the Swedish people away from this little gem of an island? Is that it, Laurent?"</div>
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"Well, it isn't exactly <i>easy</i> to reach this island..." <i>Nor you</i>, I thought, considering it had taken me two years to finally meet Armand. For someone so famous and important, Armand seemed infuriatingly determined to hide himself. "And you've said it yourself, that we are the only two human beings here tonight..." Again, I thought of that picturesque Île in the Indian Ocean, and how my father and Armand had spent a week or so all on their own. With their good looks and exceeding health, a long lasting intimacy that was not just spiritual, it was hard to believe nothing but a platonic love affair had ensued between the two young men, all the time dressed only shorts, a private tropical paradise at their sole disposal. </div>
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"Yes, we are isolated here, aren't we? And I'm sorry if you can't get a signal for your mobile. It's frustrating, isn't it?" I was about to retort I had never said that, though actually I did feel it, but Armand went on. "Maybe you're right, and this place is haunted, Laurent. But they are not Swedish -- I've brought my own ghosts here..."</div>
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Was he talking about the living or the deceased? About Carlo, and Catherine? Or was it Monsieur de Montbelle, and my grandmother, Celeste? Or his own mother, Madame de Montbelle? </div>
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"Is it the Surfer Monk who haunts you?" I asked instead. It was my best guess. I wanted so much to hear more about the man, venturing it was him who Armand had found so attractive and interesting as to spend the rest of his life with -- or, at least until the Surfer Monk's passing away, a few years before; the Pritzker Prize had been dedicated posthumously. </div>
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"<i>What</i>?" Armand's voice broke. He dropped the vegetable peeler, to instead grab the biggest knife laying on the counter. Turning to stare at me directly, he held the blade in his left hand, clearly preparing to defend himself from any advance on my part. "How can you possibly <i>know</i>?" Armand had tensed, and like a trapped animal, he looked truly frightened. He then blinked a few times, as if trying to focus on me, to finally give a smile and, his posture again relaxing, resume slicing the vegetables. "No, of course you don't."</div>
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"What was his name?" I asked, confused with the extremes of his reaction, going from fear to looking carefree in seconds; until then, I had watched Armand remain perfectly calm and centered since my arrival.</div>
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"Dave." Armand answered, tilting his head as if to express doubt. "Or at least, that's what he wanted people to call him. Even if, in fact, I was the only person to call him anything, in a language he understood. And it was Dave."</div>
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"Dave..." The novice monk told Armand, introducing himself again on his first visit to the lake house, with a warmth and smile he hadn't used weeks before when introducing himself with his Pali name, that Armand had never understood. "Yeah, you can call me Dave..." Smiling broad like a monkey, displaying his rosy gums, Armand noticed Dave had big teeth, yellowed with tartar. Not his best feature, a sign of his humble upbringing, Dave´s smiles always ended in a self-conscious grin.</div>
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"Please come in, Dave."</div>
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To Armand -- following the Surfer Monk across the bridge, staying a few steps behind to adequately demonstrate the respect their difference of monastic rank inspired him --, it seemed like the other was not quite sure of his own name. Dave, he had murmured. But could it have been Pete? Or Mike? Had he used his Pali name for too long now, to have forgotten his worldly name? But what was 'too long' for a novice? Two years, maybe three? <i>Maybe I'm not familiar with the intonation of North American English, that's what</i>, Armand thought -- guiltily setting aside that initial lack of trust in his new friend, that might have made him a bit or a whole lot more cautious towards the Surfer Monk -- he would remain thinking of him that way, even having "Dave" to call him. Had he listened to his own instinctive lack of trust, Armand might have spared himself all the subsequent suffering, that endangered his own life, and his father's.</div>
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But he was already too smitten with the Surfer Monk -- or perhaps Super Monk was more adequate, as Armand observed Dave's muscles bulging, as they walked towards the floating house. Comparing it to pictures he had seen, Armand thought Dave's butt was outrageously big, gorgeously round, and remarkably firm only like a football player's. A bulky sportsman, Dave tried his best to fit his physical majesty into the modest vests of a Buddhist monk -- but why? But then, why would an architect aspire to become a forest monk? Again, Armand set aside all prudent concerns and valuable doubts to savior the unexpected presence of the person that insistently filled his daydreaming.</div>
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"I finally realized you weren't staying with us. I was concerned about your well-being. I inquired around and found about this lake house. I can see you are doing very well, better than us, in fact." Dave meant the monastic community. "How did you come across this place?" </div>
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Dave demonstrated a bit of impatience as Armand tried his best to explain it in an English that was still rusty -- but soon to become almost fluent as their friendship would grow. </div>
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"I see. It is hard to let go of our old habits, isn't it? I can see how you still need privacy. And a bit of luxury, alright." Dave turned around on his feet, to encompass the pretty view that the wall-less house, standing in the middle of the lake, the canvas curtains flapping above the liquid surface, gave to the forested margins, where tall bushes of flowers grew and among which, every now and then, a small animal would come drink water. "And not sharing any of it, keeping it all to yourself!" He gave his wicked, grimly smile that embarrassed Armand, and made him feel like a nasty little boy caught in the act. But what act, really? "I don't think, though, that's very good for the practice."</div>
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Armand was aware of being lectured and scolded by the Surfer Monk, but as an inferior to his monastic brother, he tried to gladly accept the lesson. To reinforce his words, Dave would take advantage of his height and bulk, leaning almost threateningly over the person he talked too, and not rarely inflate his bulging biceps or raise his mountainous shoulders. Convinced he would no be confronted, hoovering one head taller above Armand, Dave went on.</div>
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"I have to wonder. Do you observe our rules for only one meal a day? Or do you take snacks when no one is checking on you?" Again, a wicked smile, preparing Armand for the next question. "I bet you do you have lustful thoughts. Do you often fantasize about having sex? Do you jerk off when you are here all on your own? Well, but then," Dave blinked, "here you are always on your own..." He laughed.</div>
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Armand was shocked at the boldness, unprecedented in a monastic. And ashamed, too, as much as impressed with the Surfer Monk's ability to read his mind. Armand wasn't such a bad practitioner after all, and though he had once or twice infringed the rule of no meals after midday with a mango or some rice, he had usually been able to stop his hand before sexually pleasuring himself. What he could not stop was indulging in gorgeous fantasies about the Super Monk -- which preferably replaced painful fantasies of Carlo and Catherine --, nor the raging hard-ons he could only subside with long, diligent breathing exercises. They would return in his sleep, though, when his body took control over his mind -- and by now, the hammock he had bought only two months ago was already stained from repeated wet dreams.</div>
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"I think it would be good for you. I shall represent the <i>Sangha</i>, making this place less of a private retreat for you. Shall we begin?" Taking place by Armand's home altar, where a candle was always lit whenever he was home, Dave made his command sound like a question. "I see you have many books; we could later read and study a <i>sutta</i>, too."</div>
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Armand eagerly agreed to what would be his loveliest sitting session in the floating house until then. Not that he finally achieved enlightenment. He could hardly concentrate. Used to having only the fragrance of the flowers blooming on the margins of the lake reaching his nostrils, or sometimes have them assaulted by the odor of animal excrement, the scent of Dave's body sweating under the sun inebriated him. It was not simply manly, but strongly masculine. Travelling abroad, Armand had noticed Westerners smelled differently from Asians, or Africans. Maybe it was the milk they were used to drinking, and all the derivatives they would eat, that made Westerners smell sour. Not Dave, particularly, who smelled more vital and primitive, of red meat and hormones. </div>
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Armand couldn't keep his eyes closed, either, having the Super Surfer Monk sitting only a few steps away from him. He had watched his strong back and firm butt many times now, during the walking meditations. It was the first occasion they sat facing one another, though, and Armand could instead bask in the vision of Dave's broad chest partially bared, glistening with sweat, watching its rise and fall -- when he should instead be observing and concentrating on his own. He could also, for the first time, through his half-closed eyes, intently look at the novice's beautiful face, and let his gaze linger. Sometimes Armand guessed the other man was observing him too; maybe it was just his mind running wild, fantasizing the other monk was fantasizing about him too, and in the unspeakable same way.</div>
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Chastity had been an easy practice among the anodyne Asian monks. But lust, diminished over the weeks if not entirely subdued, had struck him with heightened force at the arrival of the Surfer Monk. Dave, like Armand, had not shaved the eyebrows -- a norm among ordained monks, and even with local men who converted temporarily --, and those tiny patches of dark hair suddenly seemed inappropriately explicit, as if indicating the color and texture of the other hair Dave must have on his body. </div>
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Armand tried to concentrate on his breath, but instead was mesmerized by the vision -- and again, the smell -- of the sweaty hair sticking out of the Surfer Monk's armpit, a nice bush of hirsute brown hair that had Armand, shocked with himself, wondering what Dave's pubic hair was like. He was tempted to try checking on it, when the breeze kept inflating Dave's robe, revealing powerful legs and hairy inner thighs up to the blue, loose shorts he wore for underwear. As if chastity was a lost battle long forgotten or abandoned, Armand was next fighting an embarrassing erection, his heart beating faster at each menacing throb, bringing him unbearably close to an eruption that he could predict catastrophic in abundance and force, after so many months being subjugated. He would at least try not to moan, on the moment of his shameful capitulation. </div>
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Armand found a new joy in meditating, and a new incentive to leave his cozy hammock at 3:30 in the morning, and join the group of monks in the grove -- if it were to feel Dave's proximity. The forty, sometimes fifty minutes that had previously separated him from the Sangha suddenly turned into thirty minutes or less. As he sped up on uneven paths to meet his friend, animals he did not care to recognize fled into the bushes; he no longer feared them, nor the sharp gravel that sometimes hurt his feet.</div>
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But not until the end of the morning session, and not until they bowed to one another -- after having bowed to the altar, to the Buddha, to the stream of noble teachers and the teachings -- when Armand was able to look into the Surfer Monk's blue eyes, not until then did his day begin. Even if they maintained Noble Silence for a couple more hours, being thus unable to speak to one another, the spark of recognition and retribution in Dave's eyes, reflecting his own, and his sweet smile ending in that vexed grin, meant to Armand "<i>Good morning</i>" like nothing else before.</div>
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Armand's practice strengthened -- even if not quite the way it should have. His attention and concentration no longer belonged to him -- like a butterfly fluttering about for the next more colorful flower, they followed Dave, that soon became the center of Armand's world. It seemed OK, though, when the other monk's physical strength, that allowed him to sit for very long periods, stimulated Armand's own endurance and diligence -- even if it were the wrong kind of diligence, according to the Buddha.</div>
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Dave demonstrated extensive knowledge not only of the sacred texts in Pali, but enough fluency in Thai to start translating the speeches for Armand, who could finally start understanding, and being understood. </div>
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After some time, in which he seemed to observe the foreigners, though still rather reluctant, the new master finally agreed on a private counseling session with them. He didn't look so young when Armand and Dave sat close to him, under the thick shade of a pair of banyan trees. The man was perhaps in his forties, which was still relatively young for a master -- and maybe that's why he behaved so strictly, displaying little compassion towards the foreigners who seemed to misunderstand the practice.</div>
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The wise man sat perfectly upright -- but not uptight -- on a flat stone, naturally resembling a throne as it was almost completely encased by two of the largest banyan trees in the forest. The thick trunks arching to lean against one another, their vast canopies intertwined like elements in a Gothic cathedral's roof, several meters high above the place where they sat on the ground. Aerial roots descended like divine arms from the sky, to create a natural partition that protected and embraced the master, sheltering him from the sun. There was an unmistakable if subtle might about the man, sitting solid like a rock, yet looking relaxed like a flower that had just sprung from the damp soil, to immediately bloom, on its way to check the sky. Maybe it were the bushes of flowers surrounding him, but Armand did have the impression that the wise man smelled to fresh blossoms.</div>
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He listened with deep attention to Dave's translation of Armand's whispered question, his eyes shut. Both were surprised when he stared at them to answer, a madly magnified pair of black bulbs that indicated how thick the lenses to his glasses were. But it must have been its poor quality that so monstrously distorted his eyes, to look like a cross-eyed lizard's or a blind cow's, and made Dave and Armand wonder how much did he indeed see, or how could he walk without tripping all the time, or leading the line of monastics to a precipice.</div>
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"Practicing, when in the practice, is easy." Were his first words, that Dave translated as soon as the sentence was pronounced. There was a bit of affectation in translating so fast, as if to show off his own skills, but Armand did not mind. The gratitude he felt for his foreign companion only added to the infatuation he felt growing in him. </div>
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"Sitting long is not sitting well. Chicken can sit for days. Not wise. Long is just long. Well is other." Dave translated further, speaking whenever the master fell silent and, to Armand's perception, actually interrupting the man, to whom a moment of silence was part of his discourse and gave it continuity, instead of meaning its end, as Dave seemed to interpret it. "Sitting long is good training. But is not good sitting." And then, Dave whispered discreetly to Armand, as a comment, "<i>It's not my English, OK</i>?<i> His discourse is broken like that. But it does make at least a little sense, doesn't it</i>?"</div>
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Tempting as it was to agree, Armand was aware that not understanding a word of Thai -- except the basic for being polite and asking for water and food, for the bus and a room -- might have influenced his impression that the master spoke as if the words were stones he was throwing at them. The man did spit a bit, every once in a while, as his lips only moved, the rest of him in perfect stillness, to the image of unaccountable statues of the Buddha.</div>
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"Posture is not practice. Practice is not in a posture. Practice even when you don't practice. Practice while cooking. While working." He let Dave translate before continuing, "That is to go beyond the practice. And it takes a lot of practice to achieve wisdom. If you have wisdom, then you understand sitting and books are not practice nor wisdom." Again, Dave commented, "<i>He must have seen us sitting around when they were working. He wants us to work for him, I think.</i>" And he added, in a whisper, "<i>He is not very kind, is he</i>?"</div>
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Above all, Armand wanted to inquire about his lust, that often dominated and embarrassed him -- but how could he, when it was Dave, his translator, the source of his craving? Instead, he conjured his strong desires -- the desire to become a monk and teach others, the desire to achieve enlightenment and help others achieve it, too.</div>
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"You can't help even yourself, if you have desire. Desire to be free prevents your freedom. Desire for enlightenment will keep you from achieving it." Dave translated this only after giving it some thought. For once, before he could add any comments, the master spoke again, and Dave listened carefully. "Let go. Don't cling to your desires. Don't cling to achievements. Don't cling to states of mind. Let go. That is the practice." And with those words for closure, accompanied by a watchful assistant that had stayed close to the trio all during the interview, the master bowed briefly to them and smoothly glided off the flat stone, leaving both Armand and Dave baffled. They bowed as low as the soil would let them, their heads touching the damp leaves, to show proper respect for the teacher, and gratitude for the teachings -- even if they could not have apprehended all its meanings at once.</div>
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Armand was surprised at Dave's generosity to simply translate, and let Armand pose all the questions relating to his own practice -- when, being a novice still, he must have had his own doubts. But they had been discussing it for days now, to reach the conclusion that their questions were pretty much alike and the answers would be good for both.</div>
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To unwind, and practice while not practicing, Armand took Dave to the grove that was considered haunted by the locals; where, for all the occasions he had visited to take photographs, he had never met another human being. It felt like sharing a secret with his friend, Armand thought -- and that is exactly what the grove inspired both of them to do.</div>
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They had been sitting in the haunted grove at one of Armand's favorite corner, where the otherwise calm brook fell abruptly into a pool, with a cascading sound joyfully singing of vitality. Where the water splashed and sprayed the margins, among the lush foliage, Armand had often spotted -- and photographed -- toads of acid colors sitting unmovable on the stones covered with lichens of most intricate forms. Spotting a tiny frog of yellow and black skin, he now had to think of the masters words about chickens sitting, and how sitting was not necessarily meditation. </div>
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"Why the <i>strong desire</i> to become a monk, Brother Armand?"</div>
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Armand startled at Dave's voice. No matter how sweet, and grave and pleasant it was, the nearly guttural American accent made his name sound too funny -- the <i>Ar</i>- rolling exceedingly long and not aspired, the -<i>mand</i> too nasal. <i>Arrrmein</i>.</div>
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The answer sprung in his mind as a glimpse of classic beauty, not as vital as Dave's, but rather more refined, speaking of antique origins. <i>Carlo</i>. Armand asked himself if he could mention the man he had loved so thoroughly to his monastic brother. Feeling he should be honest, Armand also calculated it too soon, at that stage of their friendship. An alternative answer to his broken heart, that he thought would never mend? Why mention it now, when it had just started healing? He was aware that, impelled by lust and gratitude, he had been slowly falling in love with Dave, the Super Healer Surfer Monk.</div>
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"Brother Armand? Does your family know you are here?" His questions sounding so casual, Dave prevented Armand from ever suspecting the intentions behind his interrogatory.</div>
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Armand had been lying on his stomach, feeling the cool and damp soil contrasting with the warmth of the sun on his back, contemplating a line of ants hastily carrying severed leaves and petals. He wondered whether, like in the fable, they were preparing themselves not for the European winter, but for the Rains Season in Thailand, and whether he should start preparing, too. </div>
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Dave's questions hit and hurt like flogging. Armand was slowly turning on his back, to face Dave, not sure what to answer him about his strong desire, when, with his friend's second question came an insight.</div>
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It was not Carlo, nor Raymond, with whom he had fallen in love before meeting Carlo. They couldn't have been any more different, the peasant artist from the mountains in Italy, and the aristocratic diplomat, born in Paris but belonging to the world. And what in common did they have with Dave, the Surfer Monk? Or with any of the men Armand had taken to bed -- when, in fact he had been searching for a minimal doses of affection at least, even while engaging only in sex.</div>
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Monsieur de Montbelle. Obvious as it must have seemed to others, for the first time Armand saw it clearly -- he tried to get from other men what he had never received from his father. Appreciation, approval, affection -- to stay with the A letter only. Raymond, Carlo, Dave -- he wanted them fill a gap that had not been created by them, he finally realized.</div>
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"My mother is dead." Armand answered, tears already filling his eyes. "And I am dead to my father." He concluded, without any bitterness, simply realizing the sad truth. He then explained to Dave how he had continuously tried to live up to his father's expectations, despite and against his own will and inclinations, and how, by becoming a monk, he was letting go of everything -- whatever it was his father had wanted for him, and whatever he had ever wanted for himself. "Because, you know, I don't seem to fit anywhere." <i>Not even here, with these monks, not until you came</i>, Armand thought, but never shared with Dave.</div>
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"It's alright, brother." Dave whispered, seeing Armand's tears slowly form a stream dripping from the corners of his eyes. He had held Armand's hand at the first tear, and all the time while listening to him, increasing the pressure of his touch as to anchor Armand in his company, and not let the other be washed away by his torrent of suffering. "You may cry. Just cry mindfully, you know." He suggested, with a soft smile and his awkward grin, alerting Armand about his own tormented state of mind.</div>
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That sufficed to dry the vicious source of Armand's tears -- sufferings past, sufferings he no longer wanted to think of, or even talk about. He almost regretted having already shared them with Dave, who until a few minutes ago did not know anything about Monsieur and Madame de Montbelle. Armand had lost his opportunity of letting them stay in the gloomy basement of his past, back in France. Voicing that painful part of his history seemed to lend force to undesirable ghosts that should not have been invited to sunny Thailand, nor introduced to beautiful Dave.</div>
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"What about you, brother?" Armand asked in retribution. "Why become a monk? Does your family know about it?"</div>
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They were alone in the forest, their bodies too close to one another, their hearts getting closer at each confession, so much that Armand was actually glad when Dave, demonstrating the same uneasiness -- but for different reasons, which Armand could not yet guess --, suggested that they walk back to the <i>Sangha</i> to join the last sitting meditation of the day. His suggestion broke the spell of an intimate moment that could lead to a kiss, which would certainly deliver a fatal blow on their vows of chastity.</div>
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"I'm not ignoring you, Brother Armand." Dave said, after a few minutes they had walked side by side in silence. Sunset was less than an hour or so away, but the limpid water of the brook, which their path bordered in a curvy zigzag, had already taken on the first golden tones. Armand was aware of the buzz and hazardous movements of what he called '<i>the rush hour</i>' in the forest, when the daily animals were retreating and the nocturne prepared to take over. Birds sang their goodbye songs, waving their wings in farewell flights to the day. "I heard your questions. But don't you think your sharing was emotional enough for today? We'll come back to my own shit in another opportunity, I'm sure." Armand was about to feel embarrassed for having burdened his friend with confessions of a dysfunctional family -- though he had left Monsieur de Montbelle's second family out of that conversation --, when Dave added "Thank you for confiding in me. I'm very honored."</div>
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Armand had no reason to suspect of Dave, then, and why he was so reluctant to share his own past.</div>
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Dave's own 'confession' -- if a bunch of relative truths, that were very close to lies, can be called that -- came a few days later, when they were having breakfast at Armand's house. For a few days already, when the first sitting meditation in the grove ended, they would leave the monks to their own busy activities in the monastery that was being built, feeling both that their future did not belong with them. They had started joking about forming their own <i>Sangha</i> of two -- tentative words Armand was tempted to interpret as a veiled message from Dave, about them forming a lovely couple indeed. With Armand's money, Dave said, they could hire the best master in Thailand to teach them -- though, of course, they knew no master was for hire.</div>
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They would spend more time meditating and studying on their own. Though not a master by any standards, Dave's knowledge of Pali, and his deep understanding of the sacred texts, astonished Armand. Of course he preferred listening to whatever wisdom his friend had to share with him, in English, than listening to the forest master talk for an hour in Thai, and next get a summary from Dave. In the end, he just enjoyed Dave's company and conversation more than he ever did like the estranged, displaced <i>Sangha</i> he had joined by mistake. He had thought of leaving, looking for another proper group to practice, maybe search for the master he had once received instructions from -- but he loved his house on the lake, and now he had found his self-sufficient <i>Sangha</i> in Dave.</div>
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Apparently, the Surfer Monk had never surfed in his life, after all. It seemed he was more of a Cowboy monk. His long rolling and lazy "R", that always made Armand's name sound funny, was perfected in a small farm in south-central USA, where he had spent most of his life among horses and corn. Dave was the only surviving child out of three. His father died when he was seven, and his mother, that he described as a weak, submissive woman, remarried to a man that oscillated between strict morals dictated by the Bible. and severe beatings on both his wife and her son when he was drunk. Dave's only joy in his daily work routines came from the horses -- that he missed immensely in Thailand -- and one single, outstanding event in what he called an otherwise "uneventful, hard life on the boring plains". </div>
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Once, a filming crew had stopped at their farm. They were shooting a documentary on rural life in the Bible belt, and wanted Dave's stepfather to be in it -- even if the farm he ran belonged to his wife and son, those he would beat whenever he wanted. But one day the man, drunk and furious, chase the whole crew away, claiming they were molesting his wife and the boy. Dave had indeed befriend one of the guys in the crew who, before he left, gave him the book he was reading, as a proposed alternative to the miserable life the boy was living. It was '<i>Dharma Bums</i>', by Jack Kerouac. At 16, having decided living with his abusive stepfather and helpless mother was unbearable, Dave fled home, headed North to the forests described by Kerouac. He never reached them, though, nor did he work as a fire lookout like the author -- instead, in need of money, he joined the logging industry.</div>
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Dave seemed exhausted by the end of his "confession". It was very inexact, leaving dates and names of places behind. Armand didn't care about that, for he had omitted the Rue du Furstemberg and the <i>École des Beaux-Arts</i> from Dave, guessing they would make no difference for the All-American boy, like the farm being in Arkansas or Kentucky made difference for Armand either. Still, he wanted to know more.</div>
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"May I ask how old are you, Brother Dave?" It was funny to keep calling themselves brothers, when more and more their relationship evolved far from the monastic life, away from the <i>Sangha</i>, and their words and reasons to be together less and less had to do with the sacred texts and the Buddha's teachings. "And how did you join the forest monks?"</div>
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"You see, I was robbed when I first got here. Another foreigner I met. I couldn't, like, go to American Express and ask my family to wire me money -- for, you see, I had left no family back home. Like yours, my mother died too, did I tell you already? Not a sickness like Madame; my mother must have been beaten to death, I'll never know. Weird thing is, she wrote a testament leaving the farm to that drunkard, so that I was entitled to nothing. I'm pretty sure he must have forced her before finally killing her... Anyway, I needed money in Thailand, and when I heard forests were being cut down, I knew just what to do. But when I first met a community of monks, that I had displaced from their forest with my own hands, perhaps influenced by that Kerouac book I still carry in my backpack, I decided to join them. It was an alternative to my miserable life, not just because I'd never need any fucking money again, but because everything in the practice was about freedom, the one thing I have ever and most longed for!"</div>
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"When did you first arrive in Thailand, Brother Dave?" Armand was not trying to investigate his friend's life, though it must have seemed so for his friend, who wanted to keep some things secret. Armand was wondering whether they might have first come together to Thailand in the same year, but not met. "How long have been a novice monk?"</div>
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Dave tried to hide his discomfort with Armand's questions behind a veil of travelers' philosophy. "Do you know how you lose track of time when traveling? Because time takes different dimensions in different cultures, doesn't it? Even the weekdays seem to blur, even if for the single fact that they are called differently from the Tuesday and Wednesday I used to know back home.". He shrugged. "Do you know what day of the week it is, Brother Armand? And then, those references of the passing of time, like the school years you share with your friends, or the birthdays and funerals you share with your family... They don't exist anymore, and because of that, time seems less real, if real it is, at all..." He shrugged again. "And you know what? Everybody seems to think they speak English, but it certainly isn't like back home, where we are natives. I mean, your English is OK, but not fluent, is it? And that funny accent of yours... Seems like you are speaking some sort of French that I can understand, for the words are English, but not their pronunciation. You know, I've been in Asia for so long now that sometimes I forget my own name! How long have I been traveling? Since I got here, or since I left the farm? Who knows, and who cares, you know?" Dave shrugged one last time, as if by now it had become a bodily tic.</div>
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"Now, if you excuse me." Dave was clearly nervous and disturbed when he briskly left the house on the lake, leaving Armand at the table, breakfast unfinished. Armand was afraid he had pushed their budding friendship boundaries too far. And he regretted it having been out of sheer curiosity. Why should he know his friend's age, when he already knew by heart how many wrinkles precociously adorned his beautiful face? But it was no longer a polite interest what Armand took in Dave, who actually intrigued and fascinated him, like a romantic anti-hero from one of Jack Kerouac's books -- that seemed so to inspire the trajectory of the Super Surfer Monk. </div>
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Armand had no reasons to doubt Dave, or guess of his impersonation. There had been as many death's in each of their lives, so why should Armand suspect he was now risking his own life?</div>
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“I still had one last chance to shut the door at the vampire, you know, leaving him out of my home… Literally speaking, of course, for there were no doors at the house on the lake.” Armand was pouting, as he pondered. “Leaving him out of my life, really, for that’s where he’s established himself. And yes, I’m talking about Dave, and how, like the vampire, a soul-sucking vampire rather than the blood-sucking one, he became indestructible once invited into one's house. That’s what I did, when he announced he was leaving the Sangha, instead of simply saying goodbye. His presence was already more important to me than the master’s, and I cherished words coming from him more than those in the sacred texts.” Armand sighed, lifting eyes from his plate to the kitchen window, and as if not finding any relief nor distraction, staring at me again. “Do you know that old song ‘<i>I fall in love too easily</i>’, Laurent?” I nodded, listening to Chet Baker sing the chorus in my mind, and Armand continued. “It states my main flaw, it seems. I’ve never dealt properly with my lust, instead confusing it with love. There were so many guys I should have simply had sex with, raw and rapid satisfaction, but instead I wanted to feel love before bedding them, and worse, expecting to be loved in return, too… That’s how I conferred Dave power over me. Deciding as fellow monks we should never have sex, I replaced and re-scaled my expectations to a much more complicated, tormented platonic love. So foolish of me, really.”</div>
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We had been eating the first course -- a dish reminiscent of Armand’s crudivore period of a few years ago --, consisting of thinly sliced green, yellow and red peppers, plus carrots and onions, that he had left marinating in a rich, fragant sauce of olive oil, lemon juice, soy sauce, mustard seeds and a mix of pepper grains. Despite being cold and raw in appearance, it tasted surprisingly hot and tender to the tongue. </div>
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By now, I no longer mistook Dave for Armand’s long lasting partner – unless he would convert the '<i>soul-sucking</i> <i>vampire</i>' into a person whom deserved his love and loyalty, his friendship and gratitude. It did not seem possible, though, from the way he referred to the Surfer Monk. I was on the edge of my seat, not quite making sense of his telling that story to me, but so very willing to know.</div>
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“Did I hear you say you put your life in danger… and that of… Monsieur de Montbelle?” I had wanted to call ‘<i>Grandfather</i>’ the great nobleman that had obsessed my mother, as much as I had wished to call Armand my ‘<i>Uncle</i>’. “How come? How did Monsieur and Dave ever meet, I mean? Did Monsieur visit you in Thailand?” </div>
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The kitchen had become warm. Sitting right next to the kitchen window, I had been observing condensed water form tiny drops on the glass from the inside, to match the thicker foam of the sea sprinkling the outside. From the oven at the back wall arrived a rich mix of scents of our next dish, slowly being baked -- feta cheese roughly grated in between long slices of aubergine and courgette, topped by a fresh tomato sauce enriched with fine herbs, chive and olives, and a handful of fresh basil leaves Armand had picked from a small vase, sitting on a shelf by the kitchen’s glass door. </div>
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Watching his preparations I had been expecting something Thai to go with his experience among the forest monks, but instead we were having it shamelessly Mediterranean, that night in Sweden -- and I had to think how much my father, to whom I supposed that gastronomic homage was being paid, would have enjoyed Armand’s food again – and not just the food.</div>
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<i>* Raymond, the diplomat mentioned above, was one of Armand's Parisian flings, and the secret reason why Armand came to Asia for the first time. More about them in the </i><span style="background-color: #8e7cc3;"><b><a href="http://lutsepisodes.blogspot.com.br/2014/11/episode-18.html" target="_blank">episode Luxurious Lies</a></b></span><br />
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<i>** There is a small glossary of Buddhist terms at the end of the</i> <a href="http://lutsepisodes.blogspot.com.br/2016/05/episode-19ii.html" style="background-color: #6fa8dc; text-align: center;" target="_blank">previous episode</a>, <i>in case you need it.</i>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10000213495439627694noreply@blogger.com0Indochina15.192586673664096 100.99254100000007-0.46004732633590528 80.338244000000074 30.845220673664095 121.64683800000007tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8991339675338164589.post-48475804102244161462016-05-26T06:42:00.001-07:002016-06-13T07:05:55.781-07:00Episode 19.II | The forest monks<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<i><span style="font-size: x-small;">* </span></i><i><span style="font-size: x-small;">for the Buddhist terms used in this episode, </span></i><i><span style="font-size: x-small;">there is a small glossary at the end</span></i></div>
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I ran after the rays of the setting sun, that warmed and blinded me.</div>
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At my ex-uncle Armand suggestion, I had changed into warmer clothes, picking a sexy Moncler long sleeved, second skin shirt that I had initially reserved for my return to civilization, for my nights out in Stockholm, since it delineated my muscles in a very generous way. But now I wanted to look good for Armand, more than to any anonymous Swedish guy I'd meet later.</div>
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Instead of waiting outside my hut, he had walked on his own towards the rocky point where we would watch the sun set. I had seen him start on the path of the setting sun on a deliberately slow walk, probably doing walking meditation.</div>
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As much as he wanted to give me time on my own, he probably needed it, too. But while changing -- into pants that did not leave any doubts that I had powerful thighs --, I could only feel the escalating excitement of being the lost heir of a Russian dynasty, that hadn't ended with Prince Aleksander Rostoff after all. Later I'd think more about that, probably try to get a signal for my mobile and call Catherine in ST. Petersburg at once -- and somehow celebrate.</div>
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I was aware Armand did not have much to celebrate, though. Except, perhaps, having survived my father and mother's betrayal, and his father and Celeste Mortinné's campaign against him. Armand had been too kind as to share all the ghosts in his life to simply justify why he was not my uncle.</div>
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I observed Armand's beautiful posture, as I approached him on the shore. He stood very straight without looking rigid, as if an invisible string was pulling the top of his head and sustaining him in the sky. He wasn't a tall or strong man -- and for a moment, I was ashamed to think how perfectly he would fit into my father's arms, or mine --, but he seemed to tower above all things. Slim as he was, he looked powerful. He was presence and center, and somehow all the beauty of sky and sea all around us seemed to emanate from him.</div>
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"So, what is it that you wanted to ask me, Laurent?" He asked softly.</div>
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I had expected we would watch the sun set in silence, as some sort of meditative exercise, like he had often done with my father on the Île du Blanchomme. But probably I was all on my own on the imaginary Île of their past, while Armand dwelled in the present.</div>
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"I'd love to hear about your experience as a monk." I said. I wanted badly to inquire about the Rostoff family -- that was now my own -- and about the dossier itself. And about Monsieur de Montbelle, guessing it might have been the last time Armand must have seen his father alive. Instead, I decided to spare my ex-uncle the prolonged torture, giving him the chance to share about a time that he reputed as one of the best in his life (I had read it in one of his rare interviews that versed on personal matters too).</div>
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"Really?" He gasped. Though Armand de Montbelle -- having won the Pritzker Prize like he had, the most important and prestigious any architect could wish for -- was not an insecure man, he seemed to doubt anyone could be interested in his personal life and not just his work and career, that had shaped and changed the world for better. "Why?" He asked, genuinely curious.</div>
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"I have thought of becoming a monk myself." I said. It was almost true. Having in my childhood learned meditation from my father -- who had learned it from Armand, I loved to recall that detail --, at least the basics, I had picked it again after Angelo dumped me. Having then spent some nurturing weeks in a Zen Buddhist monastery in France, I had almost considered becoming a monk -- almost. And now again, after my disastrous, frustrating conversation with Fabrizio, I had resumed meditating. So it was almost true.</div>
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"Really?" As Armand eyed me from head to feet, I had to wonder what he was seeing. Did he recognize my father -- once his sweetheart -- in me, putting his image upon mine every time he looked at me, I wondered. Though appreciative, his kind half smile did not reveal what he thought about me. Maybe, with my muscles and good looks, my <i>physique du rôle</i> was more adequate for a porn movie monk than a real life one?</div>
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Having been with the forest monks in Thailand a little over a year before his return to become a monk himself, Armand was surprised to find they had been recently displaced, once more. The forest where he first met them had been cut down, the noble wood sold for furniture companies in Europe. Lifeless, ordained rows of eucalyptus grew instead in the grove where they had once practiced.</div>
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Happy to see a foreigner wishing to take the path of the Buddha, villagers indicated and even led the way to the monk's new dwelling. Armand followed uphill, until the source of a stream of limpid water -- that had already weakened but not yet totally dried --, to find the <i>bikkhus</i> had taken higher ground, in a forest that was less lush and shaded than that they were used to having for a canopy to embrace their practice. But they were not complaining. They would never protest, and instead see the teachings in each misfortune, that they did not even judged to be harmful or unwelcome.</div>
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With their own meager means and high skills, as an offer and honor, the villagers were still building huts to shelter the monastic community in the new location. Since not even the monks were quite settled in yet, Armand realized he would have to look for temporary accommodations until he could properly join them -- probably for the Rains Season, when more monks would come, and several laymen temporarily ordained. </div>
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A local entrepreneur had the lovely idea to build a restaurant as a floating house over a lake. After erecting the whole structure in wood, he realized to have no idea on how to bring electricity to the building. Back in the 1970s, electricity was reputed as a great attraction, since some villages around still did not have it, and especially for foreigners -- who had then just started exploring that part of the country --, used to those comforts back home. Armand was among the first foreigners in the region, then, on his first visit to the forest monks, and had been invited to help the amateur builder in finding a solution. </div>
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More than difficulties with idiom, they diverged in opinions and aims until Armand realized what his true -- and very humble, very limited -- role was. The architect in him wanted to consider security as a priority, without overlooking aesthetics, while his improbable, improvised and very practical client thought only of the costs. But even before they implemented a compromising solution, the man's 3 years old boy fell into the lake, while his father worked, and drowned. </div>
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The restaurant was abandoned forever.</div>
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Or at least until Armand proposed to rent it for the entire dry season of 1975, by the end of which, with the arrival of continued rains, he expected to be a proper novice living with his monastic brothers in the forest.</div>
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Like on the Île du Blanchomme before, he had unexpected trouble finding workers who would help him with the property -- despite it being a valley of poor people, with few working alternatives but agriculture. Everyday, families would say goodbye to their youngsters, who left for the metropolitan centers in search of jobs and education. Despite his generous money offer, and being genuinely happy that Armand wanted to become a monastic -- a few even offered him shelter in their own homes --, they would not work for him in the abandoned restaurant. Like the Île, it was believed to be haunted, or at least a place of bad omens. </div>
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But he did not need many men, nor for long, since his project to make the restaurant livable was simple and did not include electricity nor running water -- and in a couple of weeks, after three different teams of scared workers had abandoned the site even if he paid overly well, the place was made adequate for his bare needs. </div>
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Leaving the room he had rented, Armand happily moved into the floating restaurant.</div>
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Instead of having built the missing walls, he placed light canvases on all side of the building. In less than 24 hours, he discovered none of them had been properly fixed to the wooden columns, all flapping to the wind like curtains. Though the noise was a bit annoying, when he looked around from the center of the big wooden square platform placed in the middle of the lake, he realized the privilege of having the neighboring groves only as walls, and no roof but the beams over his head. His sight wandered over the gleaming water -- so crystalline he could spot the fishes swimming in the lake -- without meeting any fixed limits at the margins, since bushes and trees swayed in the constant breeze, making inconstant walls. Everyday, new flowers blooming on the trees and bushes attracted his eyes with their bright reds and yellows and oranges, vivid like the perfume they emitted to attract the insects, making his nostrils tremble in the same process. Sometimes, he thought he could even perceive the growth of the plants around, and almost hear the sap running in them. Daily above him it were vast blue skies, crowded with stars in the evenings. The sensation of freedom he had once experienced on the Île du Blanchomme again returned to nurture him.</div>
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Yet, privacy was melancholically guaranteed by the wandering soul of the poor drowned boy. In the days to come, Armand would find a small altar with food, water and other offerings placed on the most remote corner of the lake -- that was as far as the villagers would approach the haunted property. </div>
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He started thinking of the refurbished, floating restaurant as his private, wall-less monastery where, except for the insistent mosquitoes tormenting trying to feast on him, he greatly enjoyed living in solitude and the gentle, wide embrace of the natural elements. </div>
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One particularly warm and humid night, Armand woke up to an explosion of light. He had been dreaming of shooting stars, and for a moment, thought one had touched his heart. Instead, yet not less poetic, what had startled him was a firefly, landed inches away from his face, where it stood shining its emerald green light. On and off, on and off, to the beating of Armand's heart. </div>
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His watch indicated a quarter before 4 AM. </div>
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Determined to join the <i>Sangha</i> in the forest at once, he walked for some 40 minutes until spotting the warm, flickering light of a fire that led him to the group of monastics, quietly sitting in the coolest corner of the forested hill. It was about 4:30 in the morning, but the monks seemed immersed in deep meditation already. Armand, realizing to be late on his first day, approached carefully.</div>
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Doubting he might have recognized some of the faces in the semi darkness -- heads and eyebrows shaved, eyes closed, their faces displaying various shades of concentration and contentment, but floating equally neutral above the brown robes --, he did notice the former master to be gone, either dead or designated to a new monastery. The new teacher sitting at his place was much younger -- and that might explain why the <i>Sangha</i> was considerably smaller than previously, its members much younger, too. </div>
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Armand took seat in the periphery of the monastic group, a great distance separating him from the new master, who sat on a stone embraced by the thick aerial roots of a pair of giant banyan trees that leaned against one another. Armand had chosen a gentle slope where he wouldn't go unnoticed by the <i>bikkhus</i> -- not in his brand new, clean and shiny white vests of aspirant. At first he chose an open spot to be enveloped by the gentle, redeeming breeze, for he had already begun to sweat and smell, but soon felt concerned to have chosen ground higher than that were the master sat, which was considered an unforgivable offense. He thus moved to the bottom of the slope, where it seemed impossibly humid but adequate for a beginner like him -- a rather tactful move, for he was to find the younger teacher to be a whole more traditional, and very reluctant to accept a foreigner in the group.</div>
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Once he established his attention and then concentrated on the rise and fall of his abdomen, following the air in and out of his nostrils, Armand knew he could go on in the sitting position for hours, undisturbed -- proudly determined as he was to show them his commitment to the practice.</div>
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More than the heat and humidity, it was the night noises that annoyed him at first. Mysterious shrieks in the form of urgent calls echoed in the dark, and he could not guess if they came from birds in their nests or whatever sort of animals occupying the nearby caves. He could hear movement on the branches above him, near and far, and steps on the rug of fallen leaves all around him. Night birds flew about, some of them dangerously close to his head. He realized they were bats. He worried of smelling differently from the other monks, and to shine more than any other in his white robe -- and therefore attract animals that were otherwise accustomed to the group. Aware monkeys could be quite nasty and even aggressive sometimes, it was not of giant snakes and felines he was afraid of, but the hairy spiders, and treacherous scorpions. Even so, without ever opening his eyes to try to identify the source of the noises, he observed his fears rise and fall like his own belly with the breath, without judging them silly, disproportionate or even real. And as his concentration grew, he saw them dissipate and gradually disappear, grown weaker each time they tried to assault him.</div>
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Armand did not open his eyes nor move when the bell rang short after the sunrise, signaling the sitting was over. Hoping the monks, who slowly and almost inaudibly rose to their feet, would see it, he shone a smile on his face to indicate he was not asleep, but rather awake. He knew they were about to go on <i>pindabat</i> -- the alms round -- but wasn't sure he would be allowed to go with them, not under this new master. Being quite full from several days of cooking his own healthy food, he decided to skip all morning activities and instead endure the sitting position, until the monks would return for a second session. </div>
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Maybe later that same week he could help with building the huts -- he heard noises of construction all through the morning --, but firstly he wanted to establish and demonstrate the quality of his sitting.</div>
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And that's what he did, for days. He just sat and sat, each time trying to find a spot closer to the monastic group, which he did not try to contact. Nor did they ever try to contact him. In silence, he demonstrated his respect to the practice, the honesty of his intentions. And he thought they seemed to accept it -- he hoped.</div>
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For there was the barrier of language. Apart from daily greeting a few familiar villagers on his way to the meditation grove, openly smiling and being shyly smiled at in return, Armand spent his days in complete silence. He eagerly joined the monastic community in the chanting and other recitations, for he knew many verses by heart -- though not necessarily their meaning. He could even recognize a few terms from the <i>suttas</i>, but when it came to the teachings, given in Thai, it couldn't have been more frustrating. Apart from a few words in <i>Pali</i>, the simplest, he understood absolutely nothing. During the sermons, he could feel the master's reluctance growing almost solidly into despise -- or was it Armand's own reluctance growing into despair?</div>
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Armand had heard from a monk that the <i>Dhamma</i> -- the teachings of the Buddha -- was like rain. One would profit from it even when one did not quite understand it. The rain was not just for washing the leaves, or moistening and softening the superficial grounds. The teachings, like the rain, would naturally sink into the soil of his mind, reaching the deepest roots and seeds in his consciousness, without him doing nothing but willingly accepting and allowing it to happen. Still, it was too frustrating to just sit there, like an empty vessel, listening to word after word without them meaning anything to him.</div>
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He fell asleep during one of those sermons. </div>
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The previous night had been particularly tormented. After a period of relative peace with himself and the world, busying himself with remodeling the restaurant, lately he had started recalling Carlo. And Catherine. During the meditation session he did on his own, just before going to bed at home, they had sprung into his mind -- not as individuals, but more painfully, as a couple. He tried to get rid of his recollections of them -- but the more he fought his memories, and the sufferings past, the more they gave way to fantasies of the present. He saw them together, in each other's arms, and though he did not wish them any harm -- on the contrary, tried to wish them all the best --, their happiness harmed him, excluding his own.</div>
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That evening, he gave up the meditative battle against the lovers, and leaving his position on the cushion placed before the small altar, around which all other pieces of furniture seemed unimportant, he tried to slip into the oblivion of sleep instead. But on the bed it seemed even worse than the meditation cushion -- for it was the lover's place <i>par excellence</i>. Not until he moved on to the hammock, that was less comfortable and probably much warmer, but that he found empty of ghosts, did he meet some and little sleep.</div>
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Armand was ashamed to startle to his own snore, and regain conscience that the teacher was still giving the sermon. Shame was good, though, as he again felt alert -- but not for long, and he dozed back into sleep to be woken later by the bell, when all the other monks but him rose to their feet and bowed before the teachers -- the present master, and the Buddha, and the string of teachers connecting past and present -- to thank for the precious teachings that remained mysterious to him.</div>
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Feeling defeated, Armand gave it up for the rest of the day, and made his way home, very slowly, feeling Carlo and Catherine's ghosts would be there to greet him. Instead of shooing them, his only chance lied in making peace with them, letting them be, and making peace with his own suffering. That he knew. For, unlike the drowned, local boy who was believed to haunt the lake, Armand was aware to have imported his own ghosts. They walked with him; they lived in him.</div>
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Some days, when the monks left the grove to go on their alms round, Armand -- no longer feeling the need to prove how long he could sit --, simply returned to his floating house to eat and rest, study and meditate. </div>
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At the bottom of one of his backpacks, he found the camera he had bought in Paris on an impulse, and since then, forgotten about it. He had heard of a Tibetan master living in the US who was encouraging his students to take on all tasks mindfully -- arts among them. And why not meditative photography? Armand decided to try it in a nearby grove. Not only had it survived deforestation so far, but it had remained virtually untouched by the villagers, who considered it haunted. </div>
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As he went from one flower to the other, and his eye followed the flights of insects and birds, he observed not just his awareness increase, but also his joy. And pleasure. For the first time he felt to be in Thailand enjoying himself, rather than punishing himself. More and more, he desired to stay on his own, feeling his practice was not being embraced by the <i>bikkhus</i>.</div>
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One afternoon, knowing no one would actually care, he arrived late for the second sitting of the day. At once, he spotted him, in a dark orange robe that indicate he belonged to another Sangha, where he must have been a novice -- another foreign monk. The young man was two heads taller than all the other Asian monks, even seated. And stronger, with broad shoulders stretching his outfit, and a tanned skin that fitted better on a surfer, or a swimmer.</div>
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Strategically taking his place again at the back of the group, from where he could see them all, Armand tried to focus on his breath ten thousand times, losing his concentration ten thousand and one times. Everything distracted him, from the poignant fragrance of the flowers blooming on the trees above him, to the erratic flight of bright butterflies, that mirrored his own mind state. The fast beating of the birds' wings, and their nervous shrill, was enough to accelerate his already jumping heart. He could hardly keep his eyes shut, fearing the surfer monk would evaporate, proving to be no more than a beautiful mirage created by his loneliness and desire. And Armand was genuinely relieved when, after the worst meditation session ever since he had arrived in Thailand, to the sound of the bell that ended the sitting, the young man did not disappear before his eyes.</div>
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For the first time, Armand joined the monks in their walking meditation. Placing himself right behind the foreign monk, to be the last in line according to his rank, he walked in rapture, without feeling the ground beneath his feet, knowing only that he was stepping where the other guy had stepped a moment before. </div>
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He tried to read the young man's nationality in his powerful neck, and guess his language from the light blond hair on his strong forearms. He calculated the newly arrived must be in his early twenties, despite some early wrinkles on the corners of his eyes that, together with calluses on his big hands, spoke of labors under the sun, or the disciplined practice of professional sport. A farmer, a basketball player?</div>
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Burning with curiosity, Armand jumped at the foreigner when the <i>Sangha</i> disbanded, at the end of the walking meditation, close to where the stream met a group of rocks and made an u-turn, starting to slowly make its descend towards the deforested plain below.</div>
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"<i>Bienvenue, frére</i>!" He said tentatively, joining the palms of his hands and bowing low to demonstrate his respect to a monk his superior -- though the guy was so tall, enough to be a basketball player, that anyone would always bow low to him.</div>
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"<i>Je suis désolé</i>." The man answered formally, in a voice that was grave and soft. Joining his palms and bowing to Armand, he did not stop walking as he said, "<i>Je ne parle pas Français</i>."</div>
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His accent did not leave any doubts about where he came from, Armand thought. Nor his typical All-American boy good looks.</div>
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"Welcome then, brother." Aware of the excitement in his own voice, Armand stepped into the other monk's orbit as if approaching a waterfall, like one does after weeks lost in the desert, unsure whether to start by sipping the water and plunging into the pool -- but certain of drowning anyhow. "My name is Armand. I'm very happy to have you here." </div>
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Filled with joy, Armand was smiling like he hadn't for months. But lost in the boy's blue eyes, bluer than the tropical skies above their heads, Armand overheard the young monk's <i>Pali</i> name and title when he introduced himself.</div>
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"I'm happy that you are happy." The monk added immediately, not giving Armand the chance to ask his name again. Even taken by ravishment, Armand could sense how the foreigner had tensed up to his proximity. On the guy's neck, strong like a bull's, and on his forehead, peeling from a recent sunburn, Armand could see veins swell and throb, tensely. "Now, if you will excuse me..." The handsome man added, while hastily walking away from Armand's presence, without ever reciprocating the smile. Despite his bulk, the young man's retreating steps made no whatsoever sound on the carpet of fallen leaves and flowers. A gymnast, a ballet dancer? And Armand was left behind hating the beautiful giant ferns around him for smelling so sensually of mating.</div>
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For days, Armand followed the surfer monk -- in lack of a proper name, that's how he referred to him in his thoughts -- with his eyes only. The young man kept clearly demonstrating his intention to keep his privacy and distance, leaving no chance for Armand to approach him.</div>
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Armand could empathize with him, though. He had always himself enjoyed being the only foreigner in places. Countless times during his first trip to Asia he had felt frustrated upon meeting another <i>gringo</i> in the most remote villages, only to move further and farther. </div>
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And it was not only about the feeling of being unique.</div>
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Another foreigner brought back so many things he was trying to leave behind -- the possibility of conversations he would not like to have, on topics he'd rather forget, of impressions he would not like to share. Foreign languages stirred less emotions, he thought -- if any. Armand was aware of being a runaway, one running only after forgetfulness -- and he could understand when other foreigners behaved just like him, keeping the distance from one another.</div>
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So he was quite surprised -- to the point of almost dropping his cup of oolong tea, to then immediately depose it and run across the entrance bridge -- when, one afternoon, upon hearing clapping coming from the margins of the lake, his name was called. </div>
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"Brother Armand?" </div>
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He wouldn't have recognized his own name if he weren't living quite isolated there, hearing day after day the cries of parrots only. <i>Armein</i>. The accent making it sound so funny was unmistakable, the voice as powerful as the ample chest from which it originated. </div>
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"Are you there?"</div>
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"Laurent, look!"</div>
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Armand had slowly turned his back to the setting sun, when it disappeared behind the horizon, and was pointing to the opposite shore of the island, where the full moon was rising.</div>
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Tears welled up in my eyes, as I immediately recalled one of many nights decades ago, when Armand and my father had watched the sun set and the moon rise, on the Île du Blanchomme. I wondered whether Armand recalled that too, and how they had called it "going to the movies" or something like it, in reference to one of their best loved dates in Paris, which was going to the<i> Cinematéque Française. </i>But those memories were fresher to me than to him, having just heard them from my father a couple of years ago. And it was very probable that, instead of touching Armand like did to me, they must have hurt.</div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><i>bhikkhu</i>: A Buddhist monk</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><i>Dhamma</i>: The qualities of mind one should develop so as to realize the inherent quality of the mind in and of itself as taught by the Buddha.<br /><i>Pāḷi</i>: The canon of texts preserved by the Theravāda school of Buddhism and, by extension, the language in which those texts are composed.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><i>Saṅgha</i>: On the conventional level, this term denotes the communities of Buddhist monks and nuns; on the ideal level, it denotes those followers of the Buddha, lay or ordained.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;"><i>sutta</i>: Literally, "thread"; a discourse or sermon by the Buddha or his contemporary disciples. After the Buddha's death the suttas were passed down in the Pali language according to a well-established oral tradition, and were finally committed to written form in Sri Lanka around 100 BCE.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">for more and complete information click <a href="http://www.accesstoinsight.org/glossary.html">HERE</a></span>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10000213495439627694noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8991339675338164589.post-74793716019145696092016-05-11T06:47:00.000-07:002016-06-13T05:28:18.326-07:00Episode 18-II | The lover had a lover<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-size: x-large;"><b><i>Monsieur de Montbelle</i></b></span> <span style="font-size: large;">entered the office</span> wearing a silk <i>robe de chambre</i>, indicating to Armand that he was not included in his father's official schedule for the day. The young man was more like a morning distraction, or a brief annoyance. But the perfectly combed silver white hair, and a sophisticated smell of musky <i>eau de cologne</i> about him discarded any notion that Monsieur might have just woken up, despite still having his pajamas pants on. </div>
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After a moment of hesitation, Monsieur de Montbelle marched straight to his massive table, turning the exquisite art deco lamp on, to be himself in a pool of light like the works of art surrounding him. The charming secretary was immediately swept away by a storm of responsibilities and tasks, leaving father and son alone.</div>
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Wondering whether his father had, in a single glance, perceived the ongoing, secretive connection between his employee and son, Armand now feared for the secretary's position. But he found next the real reason of his father's discomfort, and why he hadn't approached to shake hands, simply motioning Armand to take a seat in front of his desk. Armand did notice the expensive damask before he sat, and knowing his father did not care about home decor, wondered if that was Celeste Mortinné's taste and influence. Armand was astonished to see a vase of fresh roses adorning his work table -- having always prohibited Madame de Montbelle to place them in whichever room he used, claiming to be allergic, Monsieur seemed to accept or at least stand them now, coming from his lover.</div>
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"What with that hair, now?" The elder man asked, in a tone that revealed ill disposition against his son's constant, ridiculous changes. No good morning, welcome, how are you son, nothing. "Lice?"</div>
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Armand had forgotten about his tresses, or lack of, until that moment when the secretary had first mentioned them. He should have at least then started expecting his father's reaction to be even stronger than the last time, when he had sported a ponytail. He should have braced himself, and thought in advance of a better answer.</div>
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"I'm becoming a monk." Armand mouthed, disastrously.</div>
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Monsieur de Montbelle fell silent, fixing his gaze on the old copy of Machiavelli's 'The Prince', probably a most expensive rarity, that lay open on his desktop. More than any other room in the apartment, everything in that office -- from the endless rows of leather cover books to the best liquor from most exclusive origins --, was carefully chosen to demonstrate wealth and boast power -- for it was where dignitaries, bankers, politicians and businessmen held private interviews, that could not ever make the newspapers, with Monsieur.</div>
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"In Thailand." Armand added shyly. Knowing no detail would repair the damage done by his first declaration, he now simply intended to take his father out of a stubborn mutism. "A buddhist monk. A forest monk."</div>
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"You are not joining any sect, I assure you." Monsieur hissed, raising a finger to advert and intimidate Armand, as if he was still a small boy. That finger used to signal Monsieur's explosions of anger, when he could use his belt to beat his son, well into Armand's adolescence. The silk band he used at that moment was not very intimidating, though, and Armand had to control himself not to laugh.</div>
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"Buddhism is not a sect, don't you worry." He replied, trying to placate his father.</div>
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"I am not worried." Monsieur tapped his fingers on the marble desktop. Not so much nervously, but as if rehearsing a tune on the piano. He was trying to control himself. "You are not joining. I forbid you." He sentenced, seriously.</div>
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Armand had already felt coffee in his father's breath, floating towards him across the table, but just now he identified another particular smell, that he had learned to attribute to Monsieur since childhood -- newspapers. Monsieur de Montbelle read newspapers in several languages, many of them along each day, from morning to evening, and his fingers were impregnated with that smell, that would spread when the man agitated his hands like now.</div>
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"Everything is set, already." Armand informed, most calmly. His decision to retreat from mundane life had nothing to do with his father, against whom, formerly, he had so strongly revolted. "I return to Asia in a couple of days. I know what I'm doing. I know this master."</div>
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As tiring as it usually felt, he was aware that everything between father and son essentially came down to a dispute of power. Each conversation was an intricate negotiation, and the son had to clearly mark his territory to leave his father's tyrannical rules at the borders.</div>
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"What do you mean by master? Someone you have to obey?"</div>
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"Oh yes. Not blindly, though." Monsieur must have been thinking of those mad religious leaders who led their credulous congregations into mass suicide; his incredulity heightened at the thought of his only son obeying another man, while disobeying his own father. "More like a teacher, a spiritual teacher. A <i>guru</i>.", he informed. Though the correct term was <i>arahant</i>, Armand sensed Monsieur de Montbelle might know the other word better.</div>
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But Monsieur had overheard everything.</div>
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"I shall disinherit you, Armand." He said sharply.</div>
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Armand's confusion at his father's unexpected remark was less just than his irritation. But as if he was before his spiritual master -- and he was, in fact! --, Armand observed his anger rise and manifest, and tried not to react or speak out of it. He answered rationally, in a language his father would certainly comprehend. </div>
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"I believe the sum my mother left me is enough for..."</div>
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Monsieur de Montbelle cut him short. "Your sanity can be easily contested, in this case. I'll take you to court if you try to donate money for any sect..."</div>
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"Oh, so that's your concern, then!" Armand smiled condescendingly. "They don't ask for money. They don't need any money at all. It's not like a club where you pay a fee to join."</div>
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"How do they eat? Where do these people live? In a forest, you said?" Monsieur de Montbelle made everything sound exotic, improbable, or foolish, instead of simple and sensible as they really were.</div>
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"We do one alms round everyday, begging for food, and accepting whatever people give us. And believe me, a single meal suffices when..."</div>
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"You mean you'll <i>beg</i> for food?" The elder man sneered. "My son, you are out of your mind!" </div>
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"Not yet. I need to meditate a lot, still, to go out of my mind..."</div>
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Falling silent again, Monsieur de Montbelle fixed his eyes on the Pre-Raphaelite preciosity across the room, a painting which he had contemplated more than a hundred times -- an ageing courtesan playing the mandolin, immersed in the shadows of a cavern or tavern, which did not quite disguise the woman's wrinkled neck and breasts. She had lost her beauty, but would not let go of her joys and pleasure, which she exercised in the form of music and a shameless smile. That melancholic painting had a soothing effect on Monsieur, making him ponder about his own fate in life, a valuable aid in the negotiations he held in the office -- when behind him, and in full view to his visitors, he had placed another painting, from the same period, depicting a voluptuous nymph. Languidly reclined, a blue cloth so thin as to enhance more than hide her curves, letting her beautifully rigid breasts and nipples subtly show underneath, in one hand she held a purse, and the other rested between her soft thighs, where shadows both hid and let guess the tip of her fingers. More than one visitor had joked about the painting being an allegory to -- or an exertion to -- masturbation. Its observation usually troubled or excited his visitors -- and that was the reason why Monsieur had placed it behind him, facing them .</div>
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But he guessed the sensuous nymph would neither excite nor trouble his son, who was indifferent to her charms. </div>
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"Is it a cure for your sickness you are seeking?" He asked Armand.</div>
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"Sickness?" Armand asked in return.</div>
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"Yes, your... <i>personal sickness</i>." reinforced Monsieur, stressing significantly the words he wanted his son to comprehend, without further explanations.</div>
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"I don't know what you are talking about, Gaston." Armand rarely called his father that. "I am not sick. Do I look sick?"</div>
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"You know, your... <i>sick preferences</i>." For a brief moment, Monsieur de Montbelle seemed embarrassed. </div>
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"Oh..." Armand sighed. "That is no sickness."</div>
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"It most certainly is." His father insisted. "It's not simply a shameful sin. Homosexualism is a sickness. Just look it up on the dictionary." Monsieur de Montbelle couldn't hide his agitation. He was sweating, and particularly annoyed that he might have to take a bath before continuing with his schedule. "Have you considered the problems it will bring you? Professionally, socially. You'll be easily blackmailed, or passed over."</div>
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"As a monk?" Armand asked simply.</div>
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"Stay in France, Armand, I command you. They'll find a cure to it, sometime. I can offer you the best physicians, the best institutions, the best medicine..."</div>
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<i>Like you did with my mother</i>? Armand thought. <i>Will you lock me in the castle, too</i>?</div>
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"I don't need to be cured of anything, father." He retorted. "In fact, I'm not here to talk about myself."</div>
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"Well, I'm wondering." said Monsieur, momentarily abandoning the grounds of the battle against his son's sexuality, where he was soon venturing again, to try to win. "Why are you here, then, and not at that church already?"</div>
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There is no church in Buddhism, Armand wanted to explain. But he knew his father did not want to learn. "It's about my sister."</div>
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"Who?"</div>
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"My half-sister, Catherine."</div>
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"That inconsequential girl! The way she dropped the Sorbonne was outrageous! We still can't believe she went after you..."</div>
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"Weren't you aware of her trip?"</div>
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"No, we weren't."</div>
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"Well, I believe your..." How should he mention Celeste? Maybe in the meantime their status had changed. "...<i>lover </i>was."</div>
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"Celly?" Monsieur de Montbelle enjoyed calling her that, but just when Celeste was not listening. "No, she wasn't." He seemed to consider something, or make some sort of calculation. "But why that sudden interest in Catherine?"</div>
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"I tried to ignore my sister, but now I want to be just to her." <i>Before I leave this world</i>, Armand thought, but it sounded too melodramatic, threatening even, to be pronounced. "Can I beseech you to recognize her as your daughter?"</div>
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"She is not my daughter, Armand." Monsieur de Montbelle was taken aghast.</div>
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"Why do you deny it? Or am I not your son, as well?"</div>
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"Of course you are. But she isn't." Monsieur promptly dismissed it.</div>
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"I should probably have brought her along with me to this meeting. You have never had this conversation face to face with her, have you?" Armand insisted, feeling he owned it to the girl. "Do you know how she suffers with all this?"</div>
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"Brought her along?" Monsieur smiled somberly. "How?" </div>
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Armand was very conscious of the way his father picked certain words, choosing elements of his son's sentences, to redirect the conversation towards grounds of his own preference.</div>
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"I believe she is in Paris." Armand proposed, carefully.</div>
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"No, Armand, she isn't." </div>
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"I believe she is..." Armand had just decided to direct the conversation himself. "I saw Carlo today."</div>
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"Saw him as in met him?" Monsieur de Montbelle gasped. His eyes were fixed on his son, who unfortunately had chosen the chair farthest from the table lamp, to suspiciously remain partially in the shadows. Despite Celeste's exquisite taste for decoration, he had to order his secretary to buy a new and more functional lamp, or a brighter bulb, immediately, for Monsieur liked to observe his visitors, more than to be observed. "Are you doing drugs, Armand?"</div>
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"No, I did not meet him, but I saw him walking down a street today." Armand decided to sustain his lie, guessing his father actually knew and would reveal Carlo's true directions.</div>
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"Utterly impossible." Monsieur shook his head to vehemently discard such a possibility. "They are not in Paris. Not even in France."</div>
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"Where are they?" Armand pressed.</div>
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"Do you think I'd tell you where that doomed boy is, Armand?" Monsieur de Montbelle gave a half smile, to make his son understand he could not be so easily manipulated. He calculated farther ahead than most of his opponents. And then he spoke softly, as if to himself. "I wonder what he has got to drive you both out of your minds..." Raising his voice again, loaded with contempt, he demanded, "Is he a dealer of some sort of ecstatic drug? Does he run a mad sect himself, who worship him? Please, tell me what sort of filthy <i>pimp</i> he is!"</div>
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The idea of Carlo dealing drugs made Armand smile. He had grown addicted indeed to his friends charms, to his honesty, his loyalty, his simplicity, to his naivety -- if those qualities could ever be called drugs, then mankind needed to be heavily addicted on a whole lot more of them. As to worship him, be it for his beauty, or for his kindness, that was perfectly understandable. Like a spring from the highest fields, Carlo used to be the purest, sweetest man Armand had ever known. But all that had collapsed, once Carlo chose Catherine over him. His ex-friend hadn't abruptly become a bad person, it was not that -- but now his loyalty belonged to Catherine. And they lived in each other's arms in some remote corner of the world that would remain unknown to Armand.</div>
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"Pimp? Do you believe I'd fall in love with a pimp, Gaston?" Armand laughed, and decided to tease his father. "No matter how endowed he is, I am sure..."</div>
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The bold mention of Carlo's physical attributes immediately disgusted and angered Monsieur. "This interview is over, Armand. We have wasted enough time, and I have a busy day ahead. Please excuse me." And the elder man started lifting himself off the chair.</div>
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"No, it is not over." Armand reclined against the back of his chair, indicating he was going nowhere. "I came here to straighten things about Catherine, and I am not leaving until you commit to treating her fairly."</div>
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"But I do!" Monsieur cried. "I do! I always have! I've always treated her as if she were <i>my own child </i>-- though she isn't! I'm telling you, Catherine is not your half-sister, Armand." </div>
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"How can you be so positive about it?"</div>
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Monsieur fumbled in the lower drawer, taking out one of the compromising dossiers for which he was famous and feared. Threateningly accurate, Monsieur de Montbelle's dossiers were essential to the certainty with which he exuded authority, and to the extent of power he exerted on his peers -- men who might be socially, economically or politically more influential than him, even more wealthy, but not as well informed as Monsieur, who had in Celeste Mortinné a great ally. </div>
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"Take a look at this." He said, handling it to Armand. "I give you five minutes, and if you still feel the need, you can pose your questions."</div>
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Grand Duke Felix Michael Pavlov Rostoff, Prince Albert Nikolai Stepan Rostoff, Prince Paul Sergei Boris Rostoff, Prince Vladimir Dmitri Rostoff, Prince Aleksander Nikolai Rostoff... The long list opening the dossier indicated that the Rostoffs were a persistent, fruitful lineage of male aristocrats. Originally from St. Petersburg, with branches in Riga and Moscow, informed the Almanacs. Armand flipped quickly through the boring newspapers cuts that followed, most of them in Russian, very few translated in French. Gossip columns from a Cannes periodic covered the family members vacations on the French Riviera for the three decades preceding the First World War. Addresses, copies of birth certificates, letter and postcards, even telegrams composed the Rostoff dossier. Armand thought more fascinating and worth examining a series of yellowed black and white photographs, indicating sadness more than beauty was transmitted along with rather pure, heavy Slavic features in the Rostoff dynasty. One boy, several young adults and older men -- but no women --, almost all of them clad in military attire, looking dull or stiff in their studio poses. Dumbfounded, Armand checked again the name on the cover of the dossier -- Prince Aleksander Nikolai Rostoff, the last name appearing in the long list, when the lineage seemed to have come to an end. Below his name was the date of his birth, in St. Petersburg -- but also of his passing, in Paris.</div>
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"I don't understand it. Who is he? Aleksander..."</div>
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"He was Catherine's father."</div>
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"A Russian prince?" Armand lowered his eyes to the dossier again, trying to find the one picture of the single man he had found truly attractive among the lot. Despite a dandiesque mustache, the youngster was the only Rostoff to spot a smile on his lips and eyes, and to sport a tuxedo instead of an uniform. Handsome indeed. For whatever reason, he hoped that was Prince Aleksander, but the name and date on the back of the photo had been erased. "Does she know it?"</div>
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"I believe she doesn't. And I am not the one supposed to tell her, when her mother denies the truth herself."</div>
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"I don't understand it."</div>
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"You blame me for having had a lover, don't you, Armand?" Monsieur smiled bitterly. "Well, my lover had a lover herself. This impoverished Russian prince."</div>
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"Can I make a copy of this dossier, Gaston?"</div>
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"No you can't. And why would you?"</div>
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"I want to read it with more attention."</div>
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"You have nothing to do with this story. Even less than I do. Simply forget it."</div>
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"But Catherine is entitled to know!" Armand protested. Would that new fact put an end to her vengeance, he wondered. If Armand would help Catherine so thoroughly as to find her a new aristocratic cradle -- she might, even, release Carlo?</div>
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Monsieur de Montbelle shook his head.</div>
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"This is not for us to decide." He shrugged.</div>
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"A Russian prince... was Catherine's father?" I whistled.</div>
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"That's what my father believed in, though your grandmother denied it."</div>
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Blue blood ran in my veins! If not from the De Montbelle, from the Rostoff family. It felt like my ex-uncle Armand had momentarily taken one lollipop from my mouth to immediately present another, even tastier.</div>
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"I believe your mother is in Russia right now, isn't she? Probably researching her origins, don't you think?" Armand rejoined. </div>
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Concomitantly to have been trying to fight her way into the De Montbelle family through French courts, Catherine had continually pursued her very personal obsession for Russia. From her early love for Russian writers, that had turned into that abandoned thesis of a Russian mystic, until her Masters studies that had enabled her to teach Russian literature, my mother must have been unconsciously following the thread of her origins, led by instincts running with her blood. </div>
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She had mentioned something about researching our family origins indeed, in our last lengthy conversation over the phone, years ago, when I still dated Gabriel. But now the question was -- when had she shifted her interest from the De Montbelle to the Rostoff household, and why? Had she finally had access to that dossier Armand read in the 70s -- and why only now?</div>
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"Can I ask you a question, Armand?" I posed, carefully.</div>
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"Of course you can." Armand's eyes was again on my body, and after leaving my landscape of muscles, he closed them for a moment. They were full of sadness when he opened them again. "But I see you are cold, Laurent. Don't you want to change into something warmer?" His melancholy revealed to be a sort of nostalgia, when he next asked, "We could walk to the other side of the island to watch the sun set, how about that? It doesn't happen as an spectacle everyday, but today seems to be the case, we are lucky. And then we'll have dinner, while we talk."</div>
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And I felt I was finally on the Île du Blanchomme of my conception, where my father and Armand had done just that, every single day.</div>
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<span style="background-color: #6fa8dc; font-size: x-large;"><a href="http://lutsepisodes.blogspot.com.br/2016/05/episode-19ii.html" target="_blank">next episode</a></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">The Rostoffs I refer to in this episode are supposedly a fictional dynasty from the short story "Love in the Night" by Scott Fitzgerald, that I have loved -- both the writer and the story -- from the first time I read it -- and ever since, always again upon re-reading it, like just before writing this episode of The Last Canvas.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">You can read it online <i><a href="https://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/f/fitzgerald/f_scott/short/chapter8.html" target="_blank">HERE</a></i>.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">For more background on the love triangle between Armand, Carlo and Catherine, and how he decided to become a monk and finally accept his half-sister, please see the links in the <a href="http://lutsepisodes.blogspot.com.br/2016/04/episode-17-ii-of-seagulls-and-airplanes.html" target="_blank">footnotes of the previous episode</a>.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Thanks for reading</span>!Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10000213495439627694noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8991339675338164589.post-58487060135185182432016-04-27T06:22:00.000-07:002016-05-12T11:50:37.966-07:00Episode 17-II | Of seagulls and airplanes <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<span style="background-color: #3d85c6; font-size: large;"><a href="http://lutsepisodes.blogspot.com.br/2016/02/episode-16ii.html">previous episode</a></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;"><i>Thin clouds</i></span><span style="font-size: large;"> traveled fast above us</span>, the weather changing rapid and constantly. One moment, I felt caressed by the sun -- the next, it was gone, and the wind made its entrance in the bay to blow ripples on the water, and on my skin. In seconds, it would change from being comfortably warm to surprisingly cold. I guessed I would have to at least put a shirt on, if I were to be high jacked to Paris in the 70s, a time in Armand's past that probably coincided with my birth. Still, I could not move, for an immense tiredness had descended upon me. </div>
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Being almost naked on a beach of cold currents was only the most visible sign of my own foolishness. The vain desire to belong to the aristocratic De Montbelle family line had trapped me on that faraway island. For a while, I had dared to dream of being their lost heir. But as I resignedly listened to my ex-uncle Armand, our differences heightened. </div>
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I recalled Carlo praising Armand's voice -- and his dictation, too. His French demonstrated the impeccable upbringing in the best schools of Europe -- while I still sounded like the uneducated islander I had first been, learning French from natives that spoke it as a foreign, second language.</div>
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Armand sat only steps away from me -- but he actually existed in the parallel world where he came from. The castle of his childhood and adolescence, that was no fairy tale, still stood tall around him, and the subsequent array of private islands to take refuge in, that most of us could only dream of, was a path that he alone as an adult had followed. Suddenly, I was so aware of having been brought up in a borrowed, derelict hut, in the far back of someone else's mansion. </div>
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Mustn't my father, the peasant, have felt exactly the same in his best friend's presence? Armand was neither snobbish nor distant, or condescending. But his manners, even his physical posture, denounced nobility. His hands would move lightly and agile like butterflies, yet with the certainty and determination of hawks, knowing they could grab anything desired. For they could easily come to own anything they desired. </div>
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But Armand's hands never moved -- already owning everything desired.</div>
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Except, perhaps, my father. Not much must have remained unattainable for a man like Armand de Montbelle during his life -- but my father had, I thought, when I saw Armand's eyes land on my body. He had never really owned Carlo's body, no matter how much he had longed for it. </div>
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What if he could own my father now? Finally own my father, nearly forty years later, in my body -- through my body? </div>
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I wondered how much of that hung Italian hunk Armand had loved was before his eyes now, recognizable to him, as I nonchalantly flexed my muscles, and tightened my abs. Through the corner of my eyes I watched as my ex-uncle's eyes followed the path of blonde hair leading from my bellybutton into my crotch, the bulge on which his eyes rested for a moment, before diverting to a past he seemed to meet again, lying between my open thighs.</div>
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It would be the last sunny day in weeks. Though he couldn't have known nor guessed, Armand decided to fully enjoy it by taking the longest way to his father's apartment on the Rue de Furstemberg.</div>
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Sunlight shone illuminating all things, equally and beautifully. Man could believe in, or at least be tempted to dream of <i>égalité</i>, on such a bright day. Yet, Armand felt comfortably warm only because he had indulged in buying a new sweater, at the prestigious Pierre Cardin boutique next to his hotel. He tried to think of that nice and expensive piece of clothing, from one of the <i>avant-garde couturiers</i> he had admired most, as one last luxury before he became a monk -- as much as a necessity against the chilly day that had made him wake up early that morning to his own loud sneezing.</div>
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Autumn was a might ruler to Paris. Ice cream parlors, puppet theaters and other outdoor venues were closing for the season. Green chairs that had lied scattered on the parks alleys were now being piled, and would remain so for the next months. When he thought he had left France in definitive after his mother's death, all things around seemed merry to be having yet another chance to greet him <i>Welcome</i> to his country, while bidding <i>Farewell</i> to the fair season. </div>
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Strolling along the alleys of the <i>Champ de Mars</i>, where tourists still abounded, Armand thought of the lines from Rilke's poem '<i>He who is alone shall long remain so; shall stay awake, read, write endless letters, and wander restlessly in the alleys, where the leaves drift</i>.' Despite his broken heart, and the burdening melancholy of being back to the city where he had last been to bury his mother, Armand relished on the beautiful day. The warm sun and the cool breeze both gently hit his face and shaved scalp, from different sides, as he wandered about the naked flower beds -- some of them, too, being put behind fences. </div>
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Having already decided not to visit the cemetery, his mother having remained alive in him, for he felt to be her continuation, Armand felt instead like dancing -- despite it all. </div>
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Paris remained impregnated with Carlo's presence, Armand soon found out. All the small bookshops where as a student he had bought piles of books to supply their '<i>Church</i>', were painful reminders of the lovely hours they had spent together, and he avoided entering them -- trying to convince himself he wouldn't need French books in his monastic life in Asia. Streets he had once walked arm in arm with Carlo, turned ghostly, he now ventured melancholically alone. </div>
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Strength to be all on his own in such a haunted Paris came only when he thought of the noble mission that had brought him to town. But was it noble at all, when it included engaging in anonymous hook ups?</div>
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Armand had been sitting on a bench just outside the boutique, enjoying both the new sweater and the sun, when he thought to have spotted him, walking down the street. Armand had completely lost track of Carlo -- and Catherine --, when they left the Île du Blanchomme. Only now it occurred to him that Paris had been their most probable destination. As much as it was the only address to resolve his family issues, the Rue de Furstemberg might also be the best place for Armand to try to meet Carlo again.</div>
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Armand's heart jumped at the unexpected marvel, the familiar sight of broad shoulders, strong arms and powerful thighs. The guy confidently striding had Carlo's beautiful dark complexion, and the same admirable tightly packed muscles that no clothes could ever quite hide -- and on the contrary, tight jeans quite enhanced --, which Armand had so often admired with lustful, secret adoration. The curly, short hair, and the exuberant classical nose, spoke of strong Roman ancestry. In a glance, Armand knew the hunk that now passed his bench without noticing him was Italian -- and though equally handsome and sexy, he wasn't Carlo, after all. </div>
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Still, Armand followed him, taking the opposite direction of his father's address. He had bought the expensive sweater knowing it was his last chance to use something so fine and fancy before putting on the monastic robe. Likewise, he knew this might be his last chance to undress, and caress, such a gorgeous male body. His lustful determination lasted for half a block, until the guy abruptly turned around to face him, and rather rudely ask, </div>
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"Do you follow me? <i>Ma che cazzo vuoi</i>? What you want?"</div>
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The hunk's French was tainted with an accent heavier than Carlo's, as much as the hands he waved while speaking were bigger and rougher. Armand could not help as his eyes fell on the man's bulge, seeking to compare it to Carlo's. The guy, who was unmistakably proud of his good looks, living to enjoy the feeling of superiority his masculine appearance exuded, noticed Armand's inquisitive look between his thighs.</div>
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"My hotel is near here. Can I invite you to drink something with me?" Armand finally asked.</div>
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"You want to drink my piss, eh?" The arrogant Italian hunk shouted, grabbing his crotch, and laughing with cruelty. "Want my horse dick in your ass, eh? Go fuck yourself, queer!" He made an obscene gesture with his fist, and leaving behind a stray of Italian swearing words from which Armand could only understand '<i>cazzo</i>', the guy noisily moved away.</div>
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Tormented, Armand lost his way a few times, through expensive neighborhoods that were too familiar to him, until finally arriving at Monsieur de Montbelle's <i>pied-à-terre</i> on the Rue de Furstemberg. He was aware that his father's lover, Celeste Mortinné, Catherine's mother, lived directly below him, as he passed her door on the way up to the last floor. It was said that spiral stairs located in a secret corner, known only by the two lovers, connected both apartments. </div>
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Armand tried not to think of the theater's ex-diva -- whom he had never met, but who had caused his mother so much suffering --, while holding in his heart the justness of his purpose in coming to Paris. His noble mission. Even if, when he pictured his half-sister -- who was the aim of that mission --, he pictured her all the time in Carlo's arms. </div>
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Being almost half an hour late, Armand wasn't surprised to learn through Monsieur de Montbelle's secretary that his father would make him wait.</div>
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Armand had met the secretary before, upon Madame de Montbelle's death, but for the first time he actually glanced at the guy. A fine young man of Arabic ascendance, Monsiuer de Montbelle's employee was clearly, maybe dangerously trying to compensate the father's lack of understanding, or excess of <i>rigueur</i> towards the son, with a kindness that exceeded in charms. But not exactly in manners, as his next comment gave in.</div>
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"Who would say beauty could be enhanced by loss?" were the secretary's words as he led Armand into Monsieur de Montbelle's sumptuous home office, smelling to noble woods, cork and dust. That single room displayed enough works of art to probably triple the size of the collections of most small Parisian museums, such as the neighboring Musée Eugène Delacroix. Beauty on display in the room took distinct forms -- elegant Greek vases, Renaissance masterful paintings, the finest dynastic Chinese porcelains, intricate Egyptian figurines -- all of them attested originals, even if their acquisition might have not come through the uttermost honest means. Still, the secretary was clearly addressing Armand, and what was supposedly his beauty, that should beat all the preciosities in the room.</div>
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"I beg your pardon?" He asked in dismay. "My... <i>loss</i>?!" He could only guess the secretary was referring to Madame de Montbelle's death, which was the occasion they had first and last seen each other. But Armand could not picture his father having a man so rudely indiscreet and cruel as his most qualified helper -- though he could not picture, either, his homophobic father having taken a gay man under his service, which was obviously the case. </div>
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"No, please..." Taking a manicured hand to his own chest, the secretary pressed it against his velvety, old fashioned waistcoat, rather theatrically beating his heart. The last remains of blood had rushed out of the young man's pale skin, that beautifully contrasted with his raven black hair, as the secretary realized the misunderstanding. "Not <i>that</i> loss! No!" He whined.</div>
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Because the works of art only were under pools of light in Monsieur de Montbelle's office, Armand drew closer to gaze into the other man's sparkling green eyes, shining with intelligence under thick lenses. While waiting for a justification, and an excuse, Armand wondered whether they both would be so daring as to start an affair on the very grounds of the enemy. Though far from the hunky types he preferred -- his father's employee being a thin man --, still he brimmed with enough elegance and initiative as to have Armand wondering what kind of lover the Arab man would make. The frail frame seemed to disappear under the young man's every purposeful word and movement, and Armand hinted of a dominant, rough lover, that could recite poems of love, though never really capable himself of loving. A dangerous, fascinating charade of a man, Armand thought.</div>
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"Not <i>that</i> loss!" The young man repeated. "That fine cascade of hair, the color of wheat, that adorned your face the last time we..." The man stuttered, loosing his thread of thought once he me Armand's eyes. "Like a frame to the most beautiful work of art..." He rejoined, "Who could guess that the painting would glow to its fullest once the frame was removed?"</div>
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Armand acquiesced. Such a nice compliment should have been enough for him, in a terminal state of desperation and humiliation, to gratefully kiss the lips that had proffered it. They were only half a step away, his owner ready and willing as much as Armand could perceive it. </div>
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But something in the secretary's tone made Armand think that the fairly handsome man was well aware of his other and most recent loss, and being referring to that -- instead of Armand's hair, elusively used only to cover the secretary's lack of discreetness. A subject he must have overheard whispered, or perhaps even heard openly discussed in that apartment, and the apartment below. </div>
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Carlo -- and how Armand's lover-to-be had instead chosen his half-sister, Catherine.</div>
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Surprised, almost shocked, I pondered Armand's recollections of that distant Fall day -- all I had just heard, mingled here to what I learned later. Despite being heartbroken, he had not hesitated in hunting down an anonymous Italian hunk on the streets of Paris, where he had just arrived. Nor considering having an affair with his father's closest, most private and personal employee. Or just a one-night stand, probably. In his desperation, he seemed capable of pushing down the secretary on the regal sofa of Monsieur de Montbelle's office, and having him right then and there, adding to the explosive joy of fast sex, the thrill of risking being caught.</div>
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I could picture the effervescence of gay life in the 70s, from several movies I had watched. Paris -- rivaled only by New York -- was then a fabulous world of free, unlimited sex in underground nudist clubs and famed discothèques, like Le Sept, that attracted <i>tout le monde</i> of the international jet set. Fantasies about being there myself, stumbling upon young Yves Saint Laurent or Karl Lagerfeld, to steal a kiss or a night from them, made my groins tingle. Though, probably it would be Jacques de Bascher -- the man who had turned the two <i>couturiers</i> into enemies for life -- to sniff my promiscuity and come after me for a fix or a quickie. </div>
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It was more difficult to place Armand in that wild scene of equally dangerous angels and devils, alongside Kenzo or Andy Warhol, when in fact he seemed to have stayed just on its safer, more civilized borders of casual encounters on side streets and parks. </div>
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Still, I would have liked to think of my ex-uncle suffering longer for Carlo, for years melancholically sighing after memories of my father. Becoming a monk -- choosing to be chaste and retreating from the world -- to try to heal his broken heart. Instead, he had tried to shamelessly replace him in bed with the first pair of swollen biceps that had seemed attractive enough to him -- and Italian enough, too. </div>
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<i>Were I Italian enough for him</i>?, I caught myself wondering.</div>
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As Armand's words died, I followed his eyes when they raised to the sky, where a flock of seagulls choreographed elongated circles above the bay, letting loud, piercing cries. It took me perhaps half a minute to hear the other sound, graver, more like a tremor in the background, and spot what had really caught Armand's attention. A single bird had left the circles that seemed to entertain its companions, and in an impossibly straight line aimed at colliding with an airplane that crossed the same blue sky, leaving a thin track of condensed air behind him -- but impossibly high. </div>
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The fates of bird and airplane, of course, never met, though their trajectories did cross before my eyes. And there was something, in the opposition of the seagulls' organic circles, and the straight line of the airplane's course, and the fact that its coldness had a destination and a purpose in flying, while the foolish birds seemed to randomly and pointlessly exercise their wings; something in those contrasting forms of being -- and altitudes -- sparkled an insight.</div>
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Armand spoke of himself as if he was speaking of someone else -- an impression I would have repeatedly, in the days I'd spend with him on the island. With such good humor as to denote not being afraid of looking foolish or joke about himself. Unlike everybody else, seemingly delighted in speaking of themselves, to Armand his own stories sounded nearly a sacrifice. Not quite, for there was no suffering in his revelations -- more like an offering. And an offering directed at me.</div>
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I realized he spoke of himself to help me better understand myself. For, when I was about to blame him for so easily trying to forget my father, who should have been the love of his life, until that point and maybe still so, to shame how he had hungrily chased the Italian hunk -- just then did I realize how I had acted exactly the same, after Angelo had dumped me. But while Armand seemed to have less luck, or far more scruples, to stop himself before further embarrassment, I had instead plunged into promiscuity. He couldn't have known about Angelo, and it was not the case to say it was in the family's blood, since Armand was about to justify why he was not my uncle. It was simply the typical act of hurt men, whether straight or gay. Still, it brought me closer to my ex-uncle, to learn he was far more human than I had imagined.</div>
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Without a warning other than intensifying or perhaps interrupting the piercing cries, a loud explosion was heard, when the seagulls started dive-bombing into the pearly waters of the bay, to next emerge with their victims kicking between their beaks. Their flying in circles had been not so aimless after all.</div>
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Nor had Armand's confession been. Who, by my side, was asking, "Laurent, are you still with me?"</div>
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<i>This episode makes many references to Part ONE of The Last Canvas, when Carlo D'Allegro left his <span style="background-color: #ea9999;"><a href="http://lutsepisodes.blogspot.com.br/2014/11/episode-04.html" style="background-color: #ea9999;" target="_blank"><b>atelier set in an abandoned factory in Paris</b></a><span style="background-color: white;"> </span></span>to <span style="background-color: #f6b26b;"><a href="http://lutsepisodes.blogspot.com.br/2014/11/episode-08.html" target="_blank"><b>travel to the Indian Ocean</b></a></span>, responding to an invitation to <a href="http://lutsepisodes.blogspot.com.br/2014/11/episode-09.html" style="background-color: #93c47d;" target="_blank"><b>meet his friend and former roommate Armand de Montbelle</b></a>, and the <span style="background-color: #ffd966;"><a href="http://lutsepisodes.blogspot.com.br/2014/11/episode-41.html" target="_blank"><b>impossible love triangle</b></a></span> that followed with <span style="background-color: #6fa8dc;"><a href="http://lutsepisodes.blogspot.com.br/2014/11/episode-31-wrong-delivery.html" target="_blank"><b>Catherine Mortinné's arrival </b></a></span>and <a href="http://lutsepisodes.blogspot.com.br/2014/11/episode-35.html" style="background-color: #8e7cc3;" target="_blank"><b>troubled stay on the Île du Blanchomme</b></a>, until the <span style="background-color: #c27ba0;"><a href="http://lutsepisodes.blogspot.com.br/2014/11/episode-48-kissing-dartagnan.html" target="_blank"><b>painful unfolding</b></a></span> when these three characters parted (click to read specific episode, some of them NSFW, I'm afraid).</i><br />
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<i>Laurent (and you, reader) is the first person to hear all three sides of this story, though I must say it is far from coming to an end or being the whole truth about the events that led to his birth.</i><br />
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<i>If you'd like to learn a bit more about the live 70s disco scene in Paris, you can check <b><a href="http://daily.redbullmusicacademy.com/2016/01/nightclubbing-guy-cuevas-feature" target="_blank">here</a></b> and <b><a href="http://paris70.free.fr/palace.htm" target="_blank">here</a></b>.</i>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10000213495439627694noreply@blogger.com0Paris, France48.856614 2.352221900000017748.6894645 2.0294984000000178 49.0237635 2.6749454000000177tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8991339675338164589.post-65444148738300432692016-02-24T04:11:00.000-08:002016-04-28T13:21:59.702-07:00Episode 16-II | Not what you think<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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"Laurent, I am not what you think I am." Armand said to me, in a whisper. </div>
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Despite his gentleness, I felt the blow of his words. My knees suddenly unable to sustain me, I had to drop immediately onto them, following my blood pressure, or risk falling towards the other side, again into the sea.</div>
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But first I had to get into the sea, an hour or so before.</div>
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Having woken well after midday, I had looked for my uncle in his house. I did not dare enter it, when it was clearly empty. And though the island seemed small enough to find Armand on a short yelling expedition, I preferred going back to the cottage to eat everything he had stuffed in the mini fridge for me.</div>
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Risking a congestion, I then tried the beach before the cottage. Skies were blue, though clouds had already started gathering, and the sun shone like I had experienced only in California. The air was almost warm, when it stood still.</div>
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Advancing in short, reluctant steps into the cold water, I knew diving into the North Sea was not an option for the tropical boy I would always be. So I just walked about aimlessly, listening to the silence that included gushes of wind, the cry of sea gulls and the timid murmur of the tide. An unsettling silence, that excluded the whole human race. In that placid bay reminding me of the Punaouilo waters of my childhood, I took one step at a time, watching the dangerous approach of ripples, careful to keep my short trunks dry, afraid my balls would freeze if touched by the water, and fall to join the pebbles under my feet.</div>
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I wondered where Armand could be, and what was he thinking of me. Heavy sleeper? Lazy? Sick?</div>
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Watching the sun start to descend, I was thinking of Samsara Heights, too. How I had made that journey towards West myself. Where Angelo still was, where Fabrizio would also be. America, and the West Coast, had become home -- where I would return, soon -- to the past, to my future?</div>
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Unconsciously, much deeper within than the waters I was grazing, I must have been thinking of the final scene from that movie. Before my uncle even mentioned it, having seen the book that originated it in the small library of the cottage. Death in Venice, by Thomas Mann. But I was not clearly thinking of it when I halted, for the first time feeling I could trust the slippery ground below me. Lifting one arm, I pointed towards the sun. A deliberately slow, delicate gesture, not without theatricality, for I was emulating a gracious teenage actor. But I am sure that it was my other hand, brought to gently lie on my waist, that must have given Armand the hint. </div>
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"I am not planning to die on the beach this afternoon!" Armand's voice came with the breeze, loud enough for me to hear it, yet soft like a murmur, and full of good humor. </div>
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I looked around the broken ring of rocks encircling the bay, and slowly turned on my feet to face him, before answering, "You shouldn't. I'm far too old to play a convincing Tadzio." I cried back. "And you are not old enough to play Von Aschenbach." I said, immediately abandoning the pose, feeling embarrassed enough to even blush. </div>
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"We are always younger today, than we shall be tomorrow, Laurent." </div>
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We are also older today than we were yesterday, I wanted to tell uncle Armand, but he went on without having heard my thoughts.</div>
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"Anyway, I am impressed that someone your age has watched such a film. Paying enough attention to recreate it." He exclaimed, leaving the ridge where I could outline him against the sun. Taking mindful steps, he started descending towards the beach, not the least hurrying.</div>
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"Maybe you are miscalculating my age, Armand." I said, taking careful steps too, towards the beach to meet him.</div>
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He stopped, as if he couldn't walk and talk at the same time. Had my presence disrupted his walking meditation? If that was the case, he could have avoided the bay, or talking to me. "I know exactly the year you were born, Laurent." His voice, sounding brisk but not harsh, made me realize my mistake -- leading him back to the past, to think of my birth.</div>
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"I could have tried to strike a pose from Titanic." I was trying to divert his attention. "But I never watched it." I stopped walking, trying to calculate where Armand should reach the beach, so that I wouldn't leave the water too far from him. "And I don't know if I would take Leo or Kate's pose, for at least that scene of their embrace I have seen around the internet." I gave a short laugh. "Probably I'd take Kate's. To be in Leonardo de Caprio's arms" I laughed again.</div>
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Armand laughed too. "You seem to choose the poses of the young, the blonde and the beautiful, all of them." And a gesture he made had me thinking he was beckoning me. Maybe, like me, he was just using his hands to keep his balance. Nevertheless, I resumed walking in his direction. "Very appropriate for you, Laurent." He added.</div>
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I wondered if, with that, my uncle was complimenting me. Or simply being ironic? Even if he were, it would be a private joke between us, from now on. I was happy to have forged a connection to him through cinema, remembering how Carlo and him had been <i>habitués</i> of the <i>Cinematéque Française</i>, during their years as roommates in Paris. </div>
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I wondered, too, whether Armand knew my name had been inspired by a character in a movie he quoted several to my father on the Île du Blanchomme. But I could simply not remember what movie it was, nor the quote, realizing it was best to leave that part of the past to the past. It was still hard for me to think the island of my conception no longer existed.</div>
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"It's good to find you so inspired this morning, Laurent. Seems like you had a lot of things to sleep off."</div>
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"I'm sorry, Armand." I wished, but I could not bring myself to call him uncle, not yet. "I had some trouble sleeping last night. The silence, you see. I'm not used to it." I lied. My house in Samsara Heights was pretty much isolated too, and not far from the ocean and its sounds either. </div>
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"Sorry about that. I guess that cannot be changed." Armand halted again, staring in my direction. The reflections of the sun on the water illuminated my face, and I was afraid he could read the lie stamped on it. "Are you hungry?"</div>
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I had missed dinner with him. And breakfast. And lunch.</div>
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"Not really. I went looking for you." I waved my shoulder, indicating where his house lied. The building could not be seen behind the rocks, not even its bright red metallic roof. Now I was glad I did not succumb to idea of swimming naked, in the presumed privacy of the little bay. I might have, had it been summer, and then Armand would have seen a naked Tadzio. "But I did empty the fridge in the cottage, I'm sorry."</div>
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"It's OK. I left the food there for you." I saw him smile. "This is the time of the day I usually go for a walk."</div>
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Armand had finally reached the beach, and I started taking surer steps towards the point where he was. Our conversation was going well, I thought, but it was also going nowhere. </div>
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"So, what are your plans for today, Laurent? What are your plans for the island?"</div>
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It sounded more like he wanted to know how long I was planning to stay, or my purpose to have come, and I wanted to chose my words carefully. Closer to the beach, the pebbles were slippery, and concentrating on not falling, I remained silent until I actually being before Armand. He were exactly the same clothes from the previous afternoon, but they looked fresh on him. Not the least wrinkled, as if he had just put them on. </div>
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He might have missed my intention of approaching him to then speak, though, and sounding impatient he again asked, "Why did you come, Laurent? Why now?"</div>
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Because you haven't come for me, I thought. Knowing I couldn't say that, I took a deep breath. I had rehearsed many answers. In fact, during the couple of years I spent trying to reach Armand, I had rehearsed a thousand imaginary conversations I'd be having with my uncle.</div>
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"Because, not until two years ago, did I learn that I had an uncle." Feeling very emotional, I tried to smile, when it was easier to start crying. "Can I call you uncle?"</div>
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To adjust his canvas shoes, Armand had knelt on the beach. I did the same, even if just for hierarchy, just a few feet away from him. </div>
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"Laurent, I am not what you think." He lowered his voice, but his astonishment was clear. "I am not your uncle! Who told you that?"</div>
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"What do you mean, Armand? Carlo told me everything. How the three of you... confronted. On the Île du Blanchomme. How Catherine went to check on the property... Entitled to half of it as she was, being your... sister." I gulped. "Is she not?"</div>
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"Did she tell you this? Did she send you here?"</div>
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"No she didn't. Nor did Carlo. Send me here, I mean."</div>
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"Did she tell you that or not? I can't believe your parents have sustained that... version of the story." He was being very careful with the words. I thought he was going to say "lie", for that was the word revolving in my mind.</div>
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"My parents are no longer together." It was my turn to surprise Armand, who suddenly tensed. "Carlo left home over twenty years ago..." I saw my ex-uncle knew nothing about that, and told him briefly how I hadn't spoken to my father for twenty years, until in 2008 he had told me the whole story. "Maybe Catherine didn't have the chance to tell him... the news..." I wanted to believe that. It was the only way to save my father from being a traitor and a liar. "... that she is not your sister? Half sister, even?"</div>
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I was trying to control myself, and to behave and be as polite as the man before me. But I was exploding within, not quite sure who the lies were coming from... Or was it Armand that was lying?</div>
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"I am sorry, Laurent. But why did Catherine hide it from you? She is in Russia right now, isn't she? You know about that, don't you? Or... don't you speak to your mother either?"</div>
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I noticed the look of concern on Armand's face. He must have been trying to figure out the situation of my broken family.</div>
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'I do, I do, but...' -- the truth was I hadn't spoken much to Catherine since our conversations over the telephone, when we had quarreled about Armand and almost everything else Carlo had told me. I hadn't completely stopped talking to her, but I had limited our communication to formal occasions only -- birthday, Christmas and New Year's Eve. It was rather unsatisfactory and tense, but I had finally wanted my distance from Catherine. I was sick of running after her approval and affection. In my own terms, I wanted to be a mother to myself, and a better mother than Catherine had ever been.</div>
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"Your mother is in Russia, isn't she? Certainly researching about the Rostoffs and... her father, who was Russian. A Russian aristocrat. Something like an exiled prince in Paris. I gave her all the information when I finally got hold of my father's dossiers... I thought we were settled. The judicial process was halted by your mother's own demand. Your mother knows we are not siblings... How could she..."</div>
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"She doesn't know I'm here." A Russian noble? Instead of De Montbelle blood, I descended from a Russian prince? My head spun. </div>
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"I am sorry Laurent."</div>
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As I slowly rose to my feet, I was fighting against the impulse of running away. But I was dizzy, an easy prey to my ex-uncle Armand's undesirable words.</div>
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"But then..." He gasped, standing up to face me. "Until this very moment, you still believed it! That I was you uncle!" He looked me straight into the eye, and must have realized I was trying no to cry. "You came here..."</div>
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All of a sudden, I understood what Armand was thinking. Like my mother almost 40 years ago, I had come to his island to check on him. Maybe to demand something from him, like my mother had... 40 years later, I was standing before him, mirroring my mother. What an awful feeling!</div>
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"That is not why I came here. I don't want anything from you. Not even to be recognized..."</div>
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"But you came here thinking we were family! You came here..."</div>
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I interrupted him. "Yes, I came here to visit my uncle." My voice broke.</div>
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"Laurent, do you really believe..." Armand shook his head, and searched another approach to the matter. "If I had known I had a nephew, do you think I would have avoided him? For more than three decades? Stay away from you?"</div>
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Lies. I was again being confronted with lies. Lies that made my family again shrink, just like the world had shrunk when the Île had been washed away. Suddenly, I recalled how Armand had avoided my mother, upon uncovering he had a sister. His reaction had been ignoring her. I closed my eyes. </div>
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"I see." He continued. "I did that to your mother, and I am terribly sorry for having treated her that way. I have made that mistake once, Laurent. I ignored your mother. I am ashamed of what I have done when I thought she was my half-sister. I have apologized with her. But I would never do that again in my life. You are not my nephew, and that is why I never went after you, Laurent."</div>
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"How can you be so sure?" My voice trembled.</div>
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"I heard it from my father."</div>
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"Monsieur de Montbelle?" I had wished to call Gaston my grandfather, but that seemed no longer possible.</div>
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"Yes." Armand was trying to smile, but there was concern in his eyes. I probably knew more than he had thought I'd know. "I spoke to him. In Paris. In person, I mean."</div>
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"When was that?" As if following a lug trail, I was trying to confront all the versions I had heard. But sensing that, the more I asked, the deeper I would dwell in lies. Still, like some eager masochist, I couldn't stop myself from listening to yet another tale of the intangible past.</div>
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"Right after I left the Île. Why?"</div>
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Armand was being so straightforward, and calm, that it was hard not to believe him. "Carlo told me you left for Thailand, to become a monk... Son of a bitch of a liar!"</div>
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"Please calm down, Laurent. I am not lying to you..."</div>
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"Not you." I was surprised Armand should think I was swearing at him, and take it so lightly. Had his training as a Buddhist monk been that powerful? "My father... He is..."</div>
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"He did not lie to you." Armand seemed surprised with himself, for defending Carlo so promptly. He blushed as he said, "He probably doesn't know I went to Paris before I went back to Thailand... It doesn't seem logic, when I was in that corner of the world already, to return to Europe." Armand shook his head. Closing his eyes, he exhaled deeply. He was not happy to be again dealing with that part of the past. But what else could he do, when I stood before him? Dismiss me, and all that I represented? He seemed braver and calmer and wiser than that. "Do you want to go sit somewhere so we can talk?" He asked, gently.</div>
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"Let's stay right here." I said, allowing my knees to finally bend under the weight of a burden greater than I could ever handle -- that of losing my uncle, a mirage created by my father's lies, evaporating forever in a second. </div>
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The sand was just a thin layer, and my butt hit the rock hard.</div>
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<span style="background-color: #3d85c6; font-size: large;"><a href="http://lutsepisodes.blogspot.com.br/2016/04/episode-17-ii-of-seagulls-and-airplanes.html">next episode</a></span></div>
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** The wonderful novel '<i>Death in Venice</i>' by Thomas Mann was adapted to cinema (not simply nowadays movies, and more like art) by the great Luchino Visconti, and <b><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=36QBU474nqM" target="_blank">this is the scene</a></b> mentioned in this episode.Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10000213495439627694noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8991339675338164589.post-60950936913524773752015-10-12T06:30:00.000-07:002016-02-24T04:22:29.406-08:00Episode 15-II | Cherry snow sleep<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-size: x-large;"><i><b>All</b> through</i> </span><span style="font-size: large;">the four years</span> of my relationship with Angelo in France, I had been able to keep my secret. From him, from my mother, from Edoardo.</div>
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They all had different ideas of what had caused my resistance to leave right after New Year's Eve and join university in Vice City for the Spring semester. Angelo was guessing I wanted to spend one last birthday in France -- but I couldn't care less about my birthdays. Or, like him, about France. My mother thought I was full of fear of leaving for the US, understanding it was much more Angelo's will than mine. And Edoardo -- I don't know what thoughts crossed his mind, but at least once he was thankful to me, for the extra time with his son.</div>
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But none of them would know my real reason to stay. None of them could ever guess. </div>
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None of them would understand. Angelo would kill me, if he knew what was keeping us away from the US. My mother would be disappointed with my weakening sentimentality. Edoardo would despise me for being even more foolish than he thought. </div>
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<a href="http://lutsepisodes.blogspot.com.br/2015/02/episode-100.html" target="_blank">The cherry tree on the hill.</a></div>
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I wanted to see her blossom one last time -- not just to say goodbye.</div>
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I wanted to feel the miracle of her colorful presence one last time, feel her perfumed embrace. </div>
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My most constant friend for all those years, my only confident -- I wanted to request guidance one last time, before leaving her forever.</div>
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A cool evening, when everybody in the house was busy with their own affairs, I left for a walk. It was known that I needed time on my own, and that I enjoyed the nights to wander. Nobody asked where I was going, maybe nobody saw me leaving. Nobody cared, actually.</div>
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I had been watching the cherry tree, and I knew it would soon blossom to its fullest.</div>
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As I walked up the slope, the vision of a dark pink cloud towering the hill told me my dear friend would present herself in full glory before me.</div>
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I, instead, decided to undress, and present myself before her in my humblest, purest nudity. </div>
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Disarmed.</div>
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Leaving my clothes in a bundle at the bottom of the hill, I walked guided by the light of the full moon. The shinny, moist grass breaking under my bare feet was the only audible sound, and that of a faraway bird.</div>
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Like I had done all over the years, I carried a question in my heart. Slowly approaching the tree with reverence, I reached out my hand. Opening my palm, I let the question fly in that cloud of subtle perfume, like a bird or a butterfly I was freeing.</div>
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I had learned to be patient. I had understood the tree had its own time, and it could be days before she'd murmur an answer.</div>
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But not that evening. </div>
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<i>Will I ever see my father again</i>?, I had asked the first Spring. Her silence, her stillness had only indicated I had would have to wait, patiently. Not for another answer -- that never came --, but to again meet him.</div>
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<i>Is Angelo the right man</i>? A bird bursting into singing, remaining invisible among the higher branches was the answer. Or was the answer the moment he had fled, flying away from the other side of the tree, where I could not devise it, leaving just waving flowers and falling petals as a sign of his vanishing. Exactly like Angelo would, later in my life.</div>
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<i>Should I go to the US</i>?, had been the question, last Spring. A sudden gust of wind, blowing a rain of petals in my direction, had been the answer -- that I had understood as a flamboyant yes, followed as it was by a cloud of fireflies encircling me.</div>
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<i>Am I doing the right thing with my life</i>?, was my question that year.</div>
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I was ready to come back night after night, or as many afternoons as it took, to receive my answer. </div>
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I was aware it was the broadest question I had asked thus far.</div>
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It was also the quickest answer I ever got.</div>
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After perhaps twenty minutes -- or less -- of having stayed under the tree in perfect stillness, concentrating on my breathing like I had been taught by my father in Punaouilo, when he had shared brief meditation lessons with me, and repeating the question in my heart as a solemn mantra, the answer came.</div>
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Before my eyes, the prettiest cherry flower slowly descended from the tree. Its petals shone under the moonlight, resembling an iridescent bug in its brief flight. I swear I did not move my hand an inch -- yet, it landed perfectly on my open palm. </div>
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The answer seemed clearer than ever before. I must be doing the right thing going with Angelo to the US. </div>
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Even if later it proved that the only right thing was going to the US, where I'd begin my life anew, and a career -- and not Angelo. But he was my motivation to go. And even when he left me, I did not cogitate going back to France. It was like taking the wrong car to get to the right place.</div>
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In that delicate flower resting on my palm, I could not foresee how my relationship with my boyfriend would end. I'm now glad for my own limitations in understanding the message from the cherry tree. If it told me I would part from Angelo in the US, I might have chosen not to go, and hold him in France.</div>
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The evening breeze agitated the flower in my palm. So light its petals of translucent pink were, they fluttered like the wings of a butterfly. And my heart with it. Pacified. Appeased. </div>
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But the doubt would return, a few nights after my visit to the cherry tree.</div>
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I was awoken by Angelo's shouts from the heavy sleep that would hit me after having sex. At first, I thought he was dreaming. But as I opened my eyes, I realized he was indeed jumping before the windows of our room, pointing to the darkness outside.</div>
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"It's snowing, Laurent! It's snowing!" He laughed boisterously, clapping his hands, and while dancing, dragged me out of our room.</div>
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"We can't go out like that!" I exclaimed, as we headed downstairs.</div>
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"Do you want to put on your polar gear, Laurent?" Angelo laughed, in the best of moods. "We'll check the snow only. We are not going to the North Pole."</div>
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"Still." I said, releasing myself from Angelo's grasp. "It must be below zero to be snowing!"</div>
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Angelo agreed to put on the t-shirt I grabbed for him, while I went downstairs using a warm pullover -- and our rather skimpy underwear.</div>
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What seemed impossible, what seemed like a reverie, and that had never happened before in that part of Southern France -- not that I knew, or had heard of -- was actually happening. </div>
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It was snowing. Lightly, timidly. Enough just to cover the ground with a thin layer of shining blue white. When it stopped, after less than half an hour, under the trees' canopies the grass had remained untouched.</div>
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Angelo and I danced and screamed and ran, trying to make snowballs to throw at one another -- but there was not that much snow. Enough just to excite and marvel us.</div>
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There were no witnesses to our frenzy -- or the snow.</div>
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Catherine was away, teaching in Belgium. Edoardo never left his room, never appeared on the balcony to check our mess. In my mother's absence, lately Edoardo would lock himself in their bedroom, and drink himself heavily into oblivion.</div>
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I used to think, back then, that he was trying to forget his son's impending departure, and not to have to lay eyes on our shameless romance, as he reputed it.</div>
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Now I tend to think he had learned already about being seriously ill, but had not communicated it to my mother yet. That left him to bear all alone with his own impending departure -- death. Because when he did tell my mother, she immediately resigned from her position at the university. She had told me she was tired of travelling to Belgium and teaching, but later I found her real reason for quitting was to stay 24 hours by Eduardo's side, and dedicate herself completely to him only. So strong and desperate was their love.</div>
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But at the time, as we were about to leave to the US, I couldn't care less about Edoardo, and I was glad he remained locked in his room, probably sleeping the heavy sleep of drunkards. </div>
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After Angelo and I grew tired of running around, we collapsed onto the wet floor. The snow would rapidly melt under our hot, sweating bodies -- and despite the dirty mess, we were enchanted. Specially me, the boy from the tropics, who had never seen snow before.</div>
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"This is the sign, Laurent." Angelo said. "This is the sign that it is time to leave France. This is the USA calling us, beckoning us."</div>
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"But didn't you tell Catherine it never snows in Vice City?" I retorted, confused.</div>
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"Of course it doesn't, Laurent." He slapped my ass. "Don't be silly. I'm just saying this snow represents the USA, calling us. Can't you see it?"</div>
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I was about to tell Angelo it snowed in other parts of France, so I couldn't see why the snow should represent the US to us -- but we engaged in a passionate kiss that left me breathless and unwillingly to say anything that would taint that magic moment.</div>
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But as we kissed, a saddening thought did cross my mind, and partially disengaged me from what should have been an unforgettable moment -- though my body continued to respond to Angelo's caresses, and we almost made love right there on the cold ground.</div>
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I thought of the cherry tree. And how the snow should have killed it's flowers. I could picture the petals freezing, and falling to the ground. The tree would certainly survive the low temperature of that single cold evening, but be left bare. <i>The flowers must be all dead, already</i> -- I remember thinking, as Angelo kissed and caressed me. </div>
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I never went back to check on the cherry tree, see whether any flowers had survived. I understood that, like Angelo said, the snow was indeed a calling to go to the US, having killed the cherry flowers.</div>
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It was time to leave. </div>
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And it was time to go back to bed.</div>
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As the last log collapsed into charcoal, and I heard the faint chirping of birds grow louder and stronger, the light dawned on my uncle Armand's island. And then I recalled he was the only reason why I had come this far -- and not to recollect about Angelo, or Edoardo, or our little family that had never been anything but a bitter impossibility.</div>
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The snow, I reconsidered, had been a clear indication of how things between Angelo and I would grow cold and wither away. But I did not know it then.</div>
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What saddened me the most, as I returned to bed after having peed, was not so much the hideous years of fighting Edoardo, that had shaped my early adulthood, and my disposition to fight back all forms of bullying.</div>
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It saddened me that, in a single sleepless night in Sweden, the most precious memories of my teenager years had exploded in my memory like fireworks, brilliant, noisy and buoyant with love and hope, to next fade and vanish in the dark smoke of the lies and deception that had followed. The only light that remained in my heart, the constant bonfire that had consumed me through the years, was the grudge I held against the Vivaces. Edoardo, already deceased -- and yet I could not bring myself to think of him with the least tenderness -- and his son, my ex-boyfriend Angelo -- whom I hated.</div>
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Four years. </div>
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Four precious years of my life, when I had found my first love, my first boyfriend, when I had first kissed and had sex for the first time, when I had come out to my mother to be embraced by her, only to have to fight against my boyfriend's father irrational prejudice in my own house. </div>
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During those four years I had let myself be guided and then convinced to follow Angelo into the dream of his life of living abroad, I had experienced the fear of losing him to death, and found the courage to drag him out of his desperation and catapult us into a new life -- all that, the pain, the pleasure, the joy, the sadness, the doubts, the struggles, the discoveries, all would be revived in very few hours, abridged in one sleepless night. It seemed too melancholic how life, even as it progressed and the years mounted, could be contained in the space of scarce hours, memories brought back to life and left behind to die during a single night. For in the tragedy of surviving the days, weeks, months, years, there were but a few memorable moments that would last and be remembered.</div>
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Hoping I would not again dream of the sunken Île du Blanchomme, the nightmare that had first woken me up, I finally slept -- knowing I would need all the rest and strength to have a probably emotional conversation with my uncle Armand in the day that had already started outside my historic cottage.</div>
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But nothing would prepare me for the next blow.</div>
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<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10000213495439627694noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8991339675338164589.post-14914604043895592222015-09-10T06:58:00.001-07:002015-10-12T06:29:50.041-07:00Episode 14-II - The last celebration<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-size: x-large;"><b>"<i>Give me back my son</i>!"</b></span></div>
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Sometime during that same December, in the weeks between Angelo's birthday and Christmas.</div>
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Walking to the shelf on the end of the corridor, next to the TV room, I wanted to grab some book. I don't remember which, nor for what reason.</div>
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I noticed the door to Catherine and Edoardo's room being ajar, his voice coming from within. The man was clearly drunk -- since I had complained too often about it, he had at least given to drinking in his bedroom. </div>
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I couldn't quite understand what he said -- nor, apparently, could my mother. He was speaking in Italian.</div>
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"<i>I don't speak that language, Edoardo</i>." She complained. "<i>Nor do I intend to</i>."</div>
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It was then that he turned to his awful French. More than the words, it was his begging tone that caught my attention. I stopped to listen.</div>
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"<i>Give me back my son. Please, Catherine</i>."</div>
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I froze in the corridor, a few steps away from the shelf. My mother must have seen me through the reflex on the wall mirror in her room. I am guessing, here. Because she immediately closed the door, not before eyeing me with a very significant look I could not understand, then. There was anger and there was fear in her look, there was an accusation and an apology in it. It lasted only a second, before she slammed the door, to muffle her voice and scold Edoardo.</div>
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It lasted only a second, but lingered with me for my whole life. It would take a few years still to completely understand it -- but the moment I received it, I knew I had done something wrong by listening on the adults conversation. And that my mother liked me even less for that.</div>
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I was nevertheless touched. I had heard Edoardo often whine, when he was drunk, inconsolable with our impending departure. I had witnessed another one, a few weeks before.</div>
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"<i>Why are you letting them be</i>? <i>Why are you letting our sons leave</i>?" a whimpering Edoardo had asked, between hiccups. "<i>Why are you taking my son away from me</i>?".</div>
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"<i>We have to let them grow, mon amour</i>..." Catherine would caress Edoardo's thick black hair, trying to comfort him, and kiss his blue eyes to dry them. And do nothing to try to stop us from traveling.</div>
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"<i>This is not right, Catherine. This is too wrong, and you know it</i>."</div>
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Edoardo had lost his parents, had lost his first wife. I had lost my father, too, though not to death, and I could relate to his pain of losing Angelo. Knowing he could not stop us, I felt magnanimous -- and in that state of mind I had decided not to quarrel with my boyfriend's father any longer.</div>
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The incident about the driving had been a minor thing, I thought. In my self-righteousness, I thought perfectly justifiable to cry for a drunken man to leave the wheel. Even if driving was the sole thing that man would do the whole evening.</div>
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Catherine had not simply chosen the restaurant -- she was paying for it, too. She had chosen the full New Year's Celebration menu for us -- an impressive sequence of delicacies in stunning presentation, if rather small portions, from which I can only remember the veal. Even Edoardo was somewhat impressed, though it was not his Italian food. </div>
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The red wine he had chosen, of course, was Italian. Again, I complicated things when I kept Catherine from drinking it with him.</div>
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"You are driving. You cannot drink." I declared. "Unless we are going to spend the night somewhere around here. Is this place also a guesthouse?"</div>
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"<i>Mérde</i>, Laurent. Will you drive, then?" My mother replied, snorting.</div>
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Edoardo said something in Italian, in the sense that I was a bad driver. It was his time to stay out of the car if I were driving.</div>
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And he was right. I disliked driving, and cars in general. I drove very slowly, sometimes dangerously slowly.</div>
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Angelo did enjoy driving, and was our last possibility to save the evening. But he didn't utter a word. Those days he was behaving like a marshal defeated in his most important battle. I guess he couldn't keep out of his mind that he had intended to celebrate New Year's Eve in the US, and not in rural France. He would be happier eating hot dogs and drinking soda than tasting French delicacies and celebrating with champagne.</div>
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That was right at the start of dinner, as the <i>entrées</i> were being served. Catherine took one or two sips from her glass of wine, just to tease me, but never again touched it, sullenly drinking sparkling water instead. </div>
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My mother was the sole responsible for conversation, that evening. She was the only one talking to everyone else on the table. Edoardo and I wouldn't engage in any conversation, of course, nor even look at one another across the table. Angelo sat before me, but he too pretended I did not exist. He still couldn't understand why I hadn't helped him with the campaign to join the Journalism School in the Spring term still. He thought we were losing it simply because I wanted to celebrate one last birthday in France, like he had just celebrated his.</div>
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It was sometime after midnight -- and technically already in the new year of 1994, </div>
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that we wouldn't spend as a whole in France --, that it dawned upon me. How mighty my mother was! That evening, she was paying for everything. Not just the restaurant bill. It was Catherine's car, and her fuel. Even the clothes I wore -- and for that matter, Edoardo's new clothes, too. Angelo's fancy blazer, that I had given him for birthday -- Catherine had brought it from Belgium, too, bought with her money.</div>
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"Catherine. What was your best-selling title again?" I inquired. To be honest, I could hardly name any of my mother's books correctly. I had just realized to be living on them -- not on her teacher's salary, for sure. Yet, I had never taken real interest in my mother's career.</div>
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She was delighted with my question. Seeing her career as my concurrent to her time and affection, I had tried to ignore it. Finally, I realized how my lack of interest had disappointed, saddened her.</div>
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But it was not my true intention to suddenly catch up with her. </div>
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During that evening, a feeling of enmity against the Vivaces grew in me. Edoardo and Angelo, sitting on the other side of the table, kept conversing in Italian, while my mother and I spoke French. They rudely mocked the <i>maitre d'</i>, who was indeed snobbish to the point of seeming foolish. </div>
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But that they simply went on exchanging private jokes in Italian, while my mother was talking about her career, made me explode.</div>
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"Thank you for paying for this evening Catherine!" I burst, suddenly. My mother gave a start. She had just spoken about her forthcoming book, and I guess she expected me to further question her. "How expensive must this restaurant be!" I said louder, to catch the attention of the other side of the table. "Thank you for paying everything for <i>all of us</i>." I clarified, pronouncing it very clearly, so that Edoardo wouldn't miss a word. Whenever I did this I sounded a bit dumb -- being it a tone of voice I reserved for Edoardo only, everybody at the table knew I was aiming at him. "Thank you for my nice clothes. And for his, and his clothes too" I continued, pointing at the father and son across us, who stared at me in disbelief. "I propose a toast!" I raised my glass. Though feeling ruthlessly powerful -- with the power of my family's money --, I considered standing up, too, but thought it might be excessive. "Let's congratulate Catherine for her successful career! And let's cheer Celeste, too," I said, looking Angelo straight in the eye, "for we owe her a lot!"</div>
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I never looked in Edoardo's direction as I spoke, all the time watching Angelo blush, growing purple of anger.</div>
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With the corner of my eye, I watched my mother, as she raised her hand and calmly landed it on mine, putting my glass of champagne down. </div>
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But in the next second, Angelo was raising his own glass, responding with cheers and praise for Catherine and Celeste. The whole time averting his gaze from mine, he concentrated on my mother while uttering truly beautiful words of gratitude -- so much that Catherine even took a hand to her heart, and next to her eyes, to dry a tear. </div>
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Angelo made use of his best discoursing skills, and though left envious of his unparalleled ease with words, I won't recall any. Because what I do recall came next.</div>
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"And I want to express my gratitude to my deceased mother, too." His voice caught. "I never forget you!" He said, looking straight into the champagne glass, as if the tiny bubbles that could be seen rising against the glass were giving rise to his mother's spirit. "I want to thank my father, too." He continued, turning momentarily towards Edoardo, to finally stare at me. "For always having stayed with me." He paused, and I predicted what he was going to say next. "For having never abandoned me."</div>
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I gasped. Suddenly, Carlo was among us, his heavy absence turned into a tangible silence. It lasted a few seconds, while Angelo paused -- maybe six or seven, and each second equaled a stab in my heart.</div>
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"I should thank you also, Laurent." He touched my glass slightly with his glass, but enough to make it clink. "Maybe tomorrow I will. But not today." Taking a sip of his champagne, he concluded "Cheers!"</div>
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When dessert arrived, it was left untouched. The <i>maitre</i> was already apologizing for anything that had happened with the food and the restaurant. Catherine left instead a generous tip to prove everything was alright -- just not with our family.</div>
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I recall Edoardo's little impersonation saying he would like to share the bill with my mother. He wasn't man enough to pay for the whole dinner. <i>Nor was I</i>, actually, now that I think of it. My only thought, then, is that probably Edoardo did not have enough money in his wallet to pay for a drink -- if he had brought any.</div>
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We left the restaurant in a funeral procession -- Catherine in Edoardo's arm ahead, followed by Angelo a few steps back, and finally me, way behind. I watched my mother whisper something to Edoardo and leave his arm, let Angelo walk past her murmuring something like "<i>Go with your father, darling</i>" -- and I stopped.</div>
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I panicked, certain to get slain.</div>
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Or what else could she do? Forbid me from going to the US? She was paying everything for me -- I was in her hands indeed. Maybe expel me? Make me get a job? Ask Celeste to withdraw her help to Angelo... <i>Or worse</i>, and I trembled when I thought what her best option was... My mother was a writer, she knew how to plot -- and plot well, otherwise she wouldn't be a bestselling author.</div>
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<i>Catherine could keep me in France</i>, if she wanted to -- <i>and let Angelo leave</i>!</div>
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The two Italian men had halted, too, and were expectantly looking in our direction, each creating their own scenery for what was about to happen.</div>
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I knew I had gone too far, stretching to the abhorrent limit the bonds of affection between Catherine and I, that were already not too consistent. </div>
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My mother had never been physically violent with me. She never beat me, never slap me -- just her eyes, and her calculated words did. And I doubted she would start now, in front of the other men. </div>
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Calmly walking in my direction, apparently self-possessed, I expected her at her cruelest. </div>
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And I tried to look my coolest. Defiantly, I pretended to peruse a corner of the garden. </div>
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"I am sorry, Laurent." Her voice at its gravest, she sounded very serious. Having halted just before her breasts touched my arm, I could still feel them vibrate as she spoke. "I wish we could have worked this out differently. I wish we would have made this happen. And I do wish you had tried harder." She paused. I felt her breath on my neck. Her proximity wasn't threatening; yet, my heart was racing as if I were in great danger. <i>Danger of losing her</i>. "You disappointed me, greatly." My heart skipped a beat when she again paused. I held my breath until her next sentence finally came. "But I do understand you. More than you think. More than you understand it yourself. Because, darling, I know the reasons why you act like this." At her other pause, I looked over my shoulder and peered right into her eyes, trying to scrutinize her expression. I shivered, when I saw piety in her glance. Sorrow. Compassion. Understanding. In fact, her glance on me was drenched in sympathy. I gasped. "I forgive you, now. If only you'll forgive me too, when you have the chance."</div>
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Crickets, a distant truck, the power generator of the restaurant, her breath and my mine -- and loudest than all, my heart banging in my chest -- could be distinctly heard in the long silence that followed her last word. Because that was it. It was no soft introduction for a scolding. And like the patron saint of fashionable souls, in her beautiful gown that reminded me of a moving flower bed, she took three or four steps backwards, softly retreating to join the rest of the family, leaving me behind with the remains of her newly discovered piety and forgiveness.</div>
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I had just received a beating. A whispering lashing. The humiliation I had inflicted on others had just been returned on me. It had been me against then, and I was left alone.</div>
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I felt my strength leaving me, my intention to behave like an adult, and was about to start to cry when she turned back, holding out her hand.</div>
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"Come, darling. Let's go home." She shivered. It might have been the cold, and the dew that infused the night air. Or, like me, she must have thought that 'home' wouldn't last much longer for me. Urging me, she added, "Come. There is a whole new year ahead of us."</div>
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<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10000213495439627694noreply@blogger.com0France44.042489205204532 5.476688453125007141.156546705204534 0.31311445312500741 46.928431705204531 10.640262453125008tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8991339675338164589.post-79578595228654618042015-08-12T04:55:00.003-07:002015-10-08T11:44:05.683-07:00Episode 13-II | Household battles<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-size: x-large;">"<b>We</b> found someone</span><span style="font-size: large;"> who will help</span> fulfill Angelo's dream of progressing in life by going to the US to study in one of the best universities of that country." </div>
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Feeling confident and happy, I made this announcement in one breath. Solemnly, although the last part about Vice City's University was not exactly true. Both Catherine and Edoardo eyed me in disbelief. They had gone on a romantic date, and upon returning home, a revolution had been launched.</div>
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"She will sponsor all his needs." I observed Catherine raising her eyebrows, while Edoardo`s tightened in a frown, "At least until he can make a living on his own." Again, I was lying about Celeste's disposition. All I wanted was to make it sound so completely irreversible that Edoardo would have to simply accept is as<i> fait accompli</i>. In fact, he was about to utter something when Catherine touched his arm slightly, to prevent him.</div>
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"My grandmother was very comprehensive about his will..." I cleared my throat, "that is, our will... to study to become a journalist. She understands studying is very important, for us to progress in life--" I stopped, when my mother lifted a hand in my direction, indicating I had lied enough about Celeste, that she knew so well.</div>
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Edoardo turned his back on me, and just before he rushed upstairs, I gave the best news I had saved to the end.</div>
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"Angelo is so happy that he is eating again. He had <i>pane con prosciutto</i>..." I hesitated, but could not avoid adding, "and milk." I laughed.</div>
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<i>My prosciutto and milk</i>, I wanted to clarify, but knew I'd better not. After that phone call, my boyfriend had thanked me effusively, skillfully using his mouth and tongue on me. His appetite opened after he swallowed all the protein I had kept for him, in weeks we hadn't had sex -- and he had indeed eaten a sandwich I prepared him.</div>
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A week went by before another crisis between Edoardo and me cooled down. I had implied in my discourse that a father, in his present, difficult financial situation, not being able to help his son was perfectly understandable, even justifiable. But prohibiting Angelo of getting help was unthinkable, and would only reveal Edoardo's ill will. </div>
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He relented. Internally, I celebrated it as my final victory over him. The fact is, the final battle was still being fought, and his final, definitive blow, that I failed to anticipate, would come from the grave, nearly two decades after his death.</div>
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Things again accelerated. The same day Angelo left his bed, he started making international phone calls. He had a notebook with numbers and names written down. Soon, letters were being exchanged. Documents were translated and sent by fax and mail to the US. Applications were filled, long essays written and translated. Instead of the usual piles of Cds and Lps, our room floor was a labyrinth of sheets of paper and piles of books. There were guides to the US, tutorials on filling different applications, text books for English Grammar.</div>
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Aware of all that was being spent, I asked Catherine about the money Celeste had sent us on my mother's bank account, worried whether it would suffice. She laughed.</div>
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"Celeste has sent enough money to send you boys to the moon. Just don't waste it, but go on, Laurent!" She had encouraged me.</div>
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I had to study harder than Angelo for the proficiency tests. But after having learnt the dialect of the mountains to speak to Fabio, my first crush, learning English to accompany my boyfriend seemed easy. And though less than Angelo, I still had a talent for languages.</div>
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"I'm very impressed, Laurent." Catherine commented, after I updated her on the situation. She had just returned from Belgium, and I helped her unload the car, full with books. We had gotten our scholarships -- full for Angelo, like he had intended to, and partial for me, which was a good surprise. "If just with your love and dedication for Angelo." She added, "I hope he values and reciprocates your love, <i>mon cher</i>."</div>
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"He does, Catherine! You see, I owe him everything that is happening to me!" Now that all was settled, I was elated with the new life before me. </div>
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"Don't you think it's the opposite, Laurent?" I just blinked, and looked at my mother in dismay. She was alarmed, and clarified. "Angelo would not be going to the US without your help, Laurent."</div>
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"No mother. None of this would have happened without Angelo. He did all the paperwork and--"</div>
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Catherine interrupted me. </div>
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"You really don't see it, Laurent? Or you don't want to see it?" She inquired, looking me straight in the eyes.</div>
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I just shrugged, and carried a pile of books inside the house, contentedly observing the swollen muscles of my arms, aware that soon I would be showing them off in the US, land of the gyms.</div>
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The last battle, in the war that our household had become, was to be lost by Angelo. Against a surprising coalition formed by Catherine, Edoardo and me.</div>
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My boyfriend wanted to leave France as soon as possible. That still was a possibility that we could join the University for the Spring term. But for that, we should leave before Christmas to arrange accommodations before classes started, since there were no dorms.</div>
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Edoardo not just insisted, but forced Angelo to attend what he called the 'last' Christmas and New Year's Eve they would spend together. My guess is that he new about his degenerative condition already, but hid it from his son.</div>
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Angelo gave in, trying to set our departure for January 1st, since classes would start only on the 6th. </div>
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It was Catherine to raise impediments, then. To begin with, she was alarmed that we would fly. Worse, that we would fly during Winter. News about snow storms in the US were just too frequent. Angelo tried to make her see we were flying to the South of the US. </div>
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'<i>Where</i> <i>Summer is everlasting</i>', he assured her. </div>
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One evening, that I recall being in November, around Angelo's birthday, the four of us were watching television. Suddenly, to the sight of stranded people sleeping on benches of closed airports, Catherine had responded with abundant tears. It was rare that my mother would cry, at least in public. I was heartbroken, and astonished that she did not hide her emotions. Leaving the sofa I shared with Angelo, I sat at her feet. Edoardo took her hand in his hand. At my mother's tears, Angelo pressed his hand to his chest, as if he had been stabbed and was trying to stop the bleeding. </div>
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Not a single word was uttered. My mother just sat there, silently crying. Even when losing control, she remained elegant and discreet. When the news changed to the latest gossip on François Miterrand's secret daughter, she let out a deep sigh. A secret daughter herself, with dignity she stood up, and quietly made her way to the bedroom. A few moments later, Edoardo followed her. </div>
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Left alone with Angelo, I gasped when I gazed in his direction. He seemed to have fainted on the sofa, one arm covering his face, the other hand tugging his clothes around his chest. For a moment, I feared he could attempt suicide again. But no matter how bad Catherine's tears had been for a birthday present, indicating the Spring term was an aborted plan, the US still shone right before Angelo. </div>
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He would just have to conform to our parents wishes. And be patient. </div>
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New Year's Eve dinner was never a tradition in my family.</div>
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Since it would be the last occasion the four of us would celebrate something formal living under the same roof, it promised to be a big event.</div>
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The problem was -- Edoardo wanted to cook. Foreseeing a greasy <i>ossobuco</i> and plain pasta, I placed my protests.</div>
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"We are in France, not in Italy." I stated. Full of confidence since Celeste had started backing us, I no longer feared confronting Edoardo in front of my mother. "I'm not eating anything but French food." I said, clapping my hands, like Catherine would sometimes do, and as I had seen in a documentary about Tibetan Buddhist monks. " French food, or I won't eat."</div>
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Without much drama and further ado, I won that battle, too. </div>
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Catherine made reservations at the only Michelin starred restaurant in our region. Dressing our best clothes as an attempt to lift our spirits for the occasion -- a gloomy farewell, more than a celebration of the year to come, when we would split -- we got ready. </div>
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Upon seeing Edoardo starting my mother's car, I started complaining.</div>
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"I won't get inside this car if he is driving." I announced. Calmly. Instead, it sounded like a shot. </div>
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A few minutes passed, as I stubbornly paced near the car. The road starting at our door turned into a <i>cul-de-sac</i>. Catherine and Angelo tried to dissuade me. But then and there, I promised myself I would not die in a car accident caused by the man I loathed.</div>
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"We are getting late, Laurent. Please!" My mother begged taking the passenger's seat.</div>
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"You can go, then. I'll stay. Happy New Year to everyone!" I said, loosening my tie. Only when I backed a few steps towards the house, did Catherine realize I was not just bickering. Motioning Edoardo out of the car, she let loose a strange choreography. </div>
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"<i>Mérde</i>!" she uttered, stepping out of the car and going around the front of the vehicle to take the driver's seat.</div>
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Only when Edoardo stepped out, too, did I approach the car again. From the inside, Angelo observed us with a bored look. True hostility ensued when Edoardo bumped violently into me on his way to the passenger's seat. Gasping, I fell against the car's door. But in a moment I regained balance to, in turn, push him against the car, too. Even if only slightly drunk, Edoardo bumped against the car and then fell to the right. The mirror held him, before breaking. My mother screamed, and that seemed to take Edoardo over the edge -- he ripped the hanging mirror off the car and threw it on the floor. We did not hear the crash because Catherine started blowing the horn in rage. </div>
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"Someone will have to pay for this!" She shouted, looking at me through the mirror.</div>
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"Sure." I retorted, "The person who broke it. But he doesn't have--"</div>
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"Shut up, Laurent." Angelo said, coldly, before Catherine could reprimand me.</div>
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"Shut up, Edoardo." She said, when Edoardo entered the car, swearing in Italian.</div>
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Catherine still protested one last time, before starting the car. "This will ruin my gown!" -- and from then on, there was only our silence and the sound of the engine accelerating.</div>
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We made it sharp on time, thanks to Catherine dangerously overtaking all cars and trucks we met on our way. </div>
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The restaurant had been someone's house. I mean someone important, famous or historic -- but I did not care to check who. There was an extraordinary garden around it, that could rival Monet's . The murmur of crickets blended to the soft spray of fountains, underlined by invisible toads sitting on the margins of the water mirrors, spoke of enduring summers and sequestered winters. The trees canopies stood like a mass of dark clouds lingering over the garden, but above them, stars shone in the crisp clear night. Pale lights placed on the floor along the paths illuminated the bushes bearing perennial varieties of flowers. </div>
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Catherine took Edoardo by the arm to explore it.</div>
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What an extreme change, I thought. The same person who had ordered Uncle Will to cut all the bushes around our cottage in Punaouilo was inspecting the flowers and letting out sighs and exclamations of contentment. Wearing a gown of black velvet covered with hand painted flowers in red and orange, Catherine looked like a flower bed moving among other flower beds.</div>
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Edoardo followed her like the sequitur of a queen, in an attitude of adoration. While my mother had eyes only for the flowers, I noticed how his eyes never left her figure, as if she was the only thing he could see. No matter how much I loathed him, I had to give in to the fact that he truly loved her. He seemed to have quieted her sexual appetite -- and Edoardo himself seemed to be faithful to my mother.</div>
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She looked impossibly beautiful and young. A woman of over forty, she seemed to be thirty, or even a couple years younger than that. Just slightly older than when she had given birth to me. I had grown to be eighteen, almost nineteen, while those nearly two decades had imprinted only a few more years on her. </div>
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Her fountain of youth, I knew, was the Italian man standing by her side. I wish it had been another Italian man -- Carlo, my father. But with him she had only quarreled, while with Edoardo she hardly fought. </div>
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That evening, despite my bellicose disposition, I finally realized the woman my Catherine was -- not just my mother. And Edoardo too -- the man he was, and not simply Angelo's father. And how that woman and man lived a great love. How, as parents, they might have worried about our trip to the US -- but as a couple, they might be secretly relieved at the fact that we were leaving them alone, to their own story -- their love story.</div>
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When Angelo went to the washroom, while we waited to be seated, I overheard the murmurs of Catherine and Edoardo's conversation.</div>
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"I love this place, already. Don't you, chéri? So many magnificent flowers!" she exclaimed, delighted with the arrangements that decorated a table at the entrance hall. Personally, I found the whole atmosphere too old fashioned, and not as sophisticated as I'd have expected. I had my doubts that Celeste, for instance, would approve of the restaurant. <i>Rather provincial</i>, she would have nailed.</div>
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"<i>Fiori</i>?" I heard Edoardo asking Catherine. "What flowers? I don't see any flowers..."</div>
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Catherine gazed at him in disbelief, inspecting his countenance. Had he drunk too much? But Edoardo went on, before she could say anything.</div>
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"I see only one flower!" He whispered, in a husky voice. And because his French was often not clear enough, he took her by the waist. Softly, yet very manly, in a gesture that made me think of how passionate their sex life should be like. "There is only one flower for me." he added, pulling her closer. Catherine seemed to offer no resistance, a subtle smile on her lips telling she was enjoying it. "The only flower I need in the garden of my life."</div>
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Of course, they had kissed, despite being a public. I simply turned my back to them, embarrassed.</div>
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<span id="goog_1731510893"></span><span id="goog_1731510894"></span><br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10000213495439627694noreply@blogger.com0Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur, France43.884333848445912 6.322635718750007142.43200634844591 3.7408487187500072 45.336661348445915 8.9044227187500073tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8991339675338164589.post-49317323279780923762015-07-22T06:19:00.000-07:002015-10-08T11:44:30.100-07:00Episode 12-II | Laurent who?<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-size: x-large;"><b><i>A</i></b> brief fight</span><span style="font-size: large;"> ensued when,</span> wanting to change Angelo's stained sheets, I tried to move him to the other bed -- my bed. He resisted me. If he were feeling stronger, he might have simply pushed me away, or punched me. His first reaction was hitting my chest with his fist. I was caught by surprise, and gasped. It hurt, but I guess it hurt him more, and all he could do was then slap me, repeatedly. </div>
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I did not react, as I worked on the bed. The succession of slaps resounded in the empty house like lashing. I think we were both surprised at Angelo's violence -- though none of us was surprised that he was acting violently. It was not like when he asked me to smash his butt, as I was inside him, like porn actors would do in the movies. His slaps -- on my arm, on my chest, on my thigh -- were meant to hurt me. </div>
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He would slap me five, six times in a row -- until I moved about the room, away from him. When again I came within reach, he would slap me more. Fearing to have seriously injured him, my heart pounded painfully. I took his beating in silence, blushing with shame. After each outburst of anger, Angelo cleaned his hand on the damaged sheets with disgust, as I was sweating cold, and was left gasping breathlessly. He was so weak -- but his frustration was fierce. And my lack of reaction to his anger only left him feeling more frustrated. I accepted that he tried to take revenge on me, though I thought Edoardo deserved a good spanking, too. </div>
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Angelo never looked me in the face, while he beat me. Pretending to be concentrated and busy with the bed, as if I not being hit, I avoided his glance, too. At least, I thought, his slaps were reddening my skin, that somehow burned, too. He was crying again when I applied salve on the skin of his left chest, that looked pretty bad -- red, swollen and blistered. I foresaw being condemned by Catherine and Edoardo for my foolish idea of serving coffee to a sick person. By the time I helped him recline against the pillows, Angelo was sobbing, hiding his face under his thinned arm. </div>
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I thought I had made the bed nicely, fresh and perfumed as it was, with new sheets I had washed myself. Suddenly, I realized how it must have been for Angelo, instead. He had been confined to the room for weeks now, and to that bed. But worse than that -- he was feeling confined in our house, in France. Life, to him, was on a dead end.</div>
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His freedom depended on me, only.</div>
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I started crying, too.</div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;"><b>*****</b></span></div>
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I had cried as I stood before the 'white people', on my single visit to the Louvre, during my only stay in Paris.</div>
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Catching a brief glance of Mademoiselle Monalisa had been frustrating, like Catherine had said it would. My mother did not allow me to squeeze through the crowd of taller people between me and Mademoiselle. When I tried to push my way, she towed me away.</div>
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I had then asked to see the 'white people'.</div>
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"What white people, Laurent?" Catherine asked.</div>
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"Those mummies, maman".</div>
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Catherine took me to the Egyptian collection, but I shook my head at the sarcophagi. </div>
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"Not these mummies, maman. The ones who stand."</div>
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Catherine was confused, and growing impatient. The Louvre -- a museum that she considered too touristy -- had never been among her favorite places in Paris.</div>
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<span lang="EN-US">"I don't know what you are talking
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<span lang="EN-US">“Not these mummies <i>maman</i>. These are dressed…” I blushed and gulped before I found the
courage to say, “Please, the white people who are naked, maman.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">I could not explain properly, but when I
stood in a pose like one of them, my mother sighed in dismay at my ignorance.
How could an intellectual like her have such a little savage from the tropics
like me as a son? Still, she took me by the hand to the Greek and Roman antiquities
collection.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">"These are not mummies, dear. These
are sculptures." In her constant struggle against my nature, Catherine straightened
my hair. I might have been an obedient
child, but my hair had been wild and
very curly when I was a boy -- only in my teenage would it become smooth
like hers. She straightened my clothes, too, wishing she could ultimately
straighten my intelligence. "Statues, like you have seen before, at the
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<span lang="EN-US">Yet, I had never seen anything that
perfect. Most of them were life size, and I thought they were real people.
Catherine allowed me to touch one of the statues that stood in a corner, for a
brief moment, when no one was looking.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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"See, Laurent. They are not people. They are made of marble. Stone."</div>
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Next, I was telling Catherine the story I had read about King Minos, and how he turned people into gold. Perhaps there was someone else around turning them into stone, I said.</div>
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"Right." Catherine had smiled, condescendingly. "That was Medusa. But they are myths. And this is real, Laurent. This is art. A sculptor made these. With great physical effort, he drew these images from a block of stone. Can you believe it? He was using tools like a hammer to hit the stone! Yet, it look marvelously smooth, doesn't it? Like they had been made by the sculptor's gentle caresses. So fine that it makes you think that these are real people. They are not Laurent. This is Art, my dear."</div>
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Before I understood what a sculptor was -- and it did not happened that same day -- I was terrorized to see that many of the 'white people' had been beheaded. Almost all of them had had their arms cut off their bodies. I asked Catherine why.</div>
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"Barbarians, Laurent. Invaders damaged them. Arms were cut off at the stroke of swords. And earthquakes, too, made these statues fall, and break into pieces. They have gone through a lot. It's surprising that they have survived so many centuries of destruction and wars and have finally reached us."</div>
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"Did it hurt, maman?" I had whined, tears springing to my eyes.</div>
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"I've told you already, Laurent! Of course it didn't hurt." I saw her clenching her fist. But unlike other mothers, Catherine had never hit me, and I was not afraid of her rage. If she ever beat me, it was verbally. "These are not real people! Could you learn it once and for all?" Losing her patience, she dragged me away, when she saw that I was crying.</div>
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I might have understood it did not hurt the stone. But still, it hurt me to see beauty and perfection damaged. What impressed me most was that many noses were missing -- be it a sword or an earthquake to cut them, I hoped statues did not need to breathe.</div>
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Angelo was beautiful like a Greek sculpture -- or Roman, of course, since he was Roman himself. His skin was pale and fine like the white people's, and his muscles displayed the same perfection. Or used to. His body, thinning, no longer resembled that of a Greek athlete. He had dark spots around his eyes, and now I had damaged his beauty and perfection myself. The horrid purple blister on his chest indicated that I could be worse than a barbarian or an earthquake. </div>
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Do earthquakes cry, and repent?</div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;"><b>*****</b></span></div>
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"I'll see if Madame is available, and willing to talk to you." Said the maid. "Can you call back in fifteen minutes, please?"</div>
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Not just arrogant, the woman had sounded rude, impolite, abusive. I was pissed off, and wondered if it were a sign not to call again and avoid further humiliation and trouble.</div>
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But then I had a different understanding. </div>
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I had carefully rehearsed the call, having pondered each word. I just hadn't expected being answered by a maid -- though I should have -- and that seemed to make my discourse -- and my courage --evaporate. </div>
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Nervously waiting and trying to decide whether to place a second call or not, I at least had the smart idea of taking the cordless phone into my room and letting Angelo listen to the whole conversation. Even if I failed in my request, he would still know that I had at least tried.</div>
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At my second call, the maid had again picked the telephone, and hearing my voice, passed it on to my grandmother. </div>
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"Celeste." I took a deep breath, "This is Laurent." </div>
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"Laurent who?" She had coldly asked.</div>
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She knew who I was. I had told the maid, and she must have told Celeste, or she wouldn't even have come on the telephone. I certainly was not Yves Saint-Laurent.</div>
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Then I realized she was testing me.</div>
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"Catherine's son." She wouldn't ask Catherine who, would she? Or was she friends to Catherine Deneuve? "Laurent." I repeated, aware that I could not complement it saying '<i>your grandson</i>'. I actually longed to call her <i>grandmére</i>. If, only, she would behave like one.</div>
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My neutral answer, not addressing my mother as her daughter, too, seemed to satisfy Celeste. Pretending to recognize me just then, she asked "Is she dead?"</div>
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I gasped, disconcerted. "Dead? Who?"</div>
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"Catherine. Is she dead? Did anything happen to her?" She feigned concern.</div>
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"No." I mumbled. "She is not dead... Why?" Did my mother have some mysterious illness she had hidden from me? Celeste's words dumbfounded me, and by then I had completely forgotten the discourse I had rehearsed.</div>
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At least, that crazy introduction woke Angelo up, who had been taking a restoring nap after the coffee tragedy. I noticed he was paying attention to my conversation, and wondering why I was having it in the room, next to his bed. Had he listened when I said my grandmother's name? </div>
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"Why should she be dead, Celeste?" I asked, deciding it was better to repeat her name, saying it clearly for Angelo to hear. Instantly, he grew alert, but did not glance in my direction, remaining with his back turned onto me.</div>
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"She <i>shouldn't</i> be dead." If not a good actress, Celeste must have been a very convincing one. As to leave no doubt about her intentions, she used words sensing their power. Her intonation was clear -- my comment had been dumb, and I felt like an idiot. "But why else should you be calling?" Suddenly, she changed to a softer tone, still not like a grandmother's, but mild enough, like a priest who wanted to end her scolding sermon on a conciliatory note. "You have never called me, have you, darling? That's why I thought something must have happened to Catherine. </div>
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She is not getting married, is she?"</div>
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"No!" I cried. This time, Angelo glanced in my direction. Once Celeste was conducting the conversation, he was hearing just my short interjections, and they might have seemed more stupid to him than they truly were as replies to my grandmother.</div>
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"Oh! I see don't like that man, either." She laughed contentedly at the aversion and disgust I had manifested in my cry. </div>
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I didn't know it then, but Celeste had been very disappointed in Catherine. She had raised her daughter not as a child but as an investment, hoping that my mother would tie her knots with one of the best, noblest, richest families in France. But to Catherine, that family was the De Montbelle, to which she thought she should rightfully -- and would forcefully -- belong. That's when she had become Celete's enemy, insisting in a paternity process against Gaston. And then Catherine had gotten pregnant -- from a penniless Italian painter. And to Celeste, her daughter was incurring in the same mistake twice, falling for Edoardo -- a penniless Italian chef. I couldn't see any of that, not even the fact that I had chosen my own share of penniless Italian lovers -- falling in love with Tarso's employee, Fabio, and now Angelo. </div>
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"I'm glad to hear she isn't. And we know you are not get married either, right, darling?" She giggled.</div>
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"<i>Do we</i>?" I was confused. Why was Celeste talking about my marriage? What did she <i>know</i> about me? "Well, I'm too young for marriage--"</div>
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"No, darling. You're too gay for marriage, that's what I mean." My grandmother let out a laugh that was not far from being evil.</div>
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I gasped, and felt again like crying. "So you know..." When and why would Catherine have outed me for Celeste? "Did Catherine--"</div>
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"I knew it, darling. Right away, the day I laid eyes on you."</div>
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How could it have been possible? I was just a ten years old boy then, at the only time my grandmother had 'laid eyes on me'. She answered it next.</div>
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"There is something about gay men that is so easily recognizable. Even when they pretend to be straight. They might even look straight. And you -- you were too sweet a boy. The way you sat. And walked. And talked. You were also too pretty for a boy, and delicate. I wondered how Catherine wouldn't spot it, when it was so clear." Celeste giggled." But I wasn't going to be the one to give her the shocking news about her own son, would I?"</div>
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When Celeste again laughed, I was impressed that she was amusing herself so very much conversing with me. I recalled her being a cold, distant, inaccessible woman. I had foreseen a very different course for our conversation, trying to figure out how I would place my request to her. Not only did she take upon herself the task of setting the agenda -- she excelled in doing so, foreseeing my steps.</div>
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"If it is not death, not marriage, then it must be money." Hearing her, I sucked in my breath, and my grandmother laughed at that, too. "I see, I should have started by it. How much is it that you want? And what is it for? Try to be convincing, darling child."</div>
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"I want to move to the USA!" I mouthed.</div>
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"This is simply outrageous. Why that country?" Celeste inquired, not hiding her despise.</div>
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Having already spoken to Catherine, I knew I had to make the subject sound like a major thing, and not just vacations. Thinking I had made a brilliant start, I was paralyzed at Celeste's response.</div>
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"I want to study there. Journalism." Angelo had tilted his head, looking in my direction. He knew who I was speaking to, and he knew what I was going to talk about, too.</div>
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"Oh!" She feigned surprise. "I suppose you can speak English very well, then. And write with excellence in their language, of course." She left her comment hanging like a question.</div>
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"I think so..." I was studying hard for the proficiency test I would have to take. But I was confident. I had quickly learned enough of the dialect of the mountains to have conversations with Fabio, understanding the overall meaning. English was easier and much more neat than that.</div>
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"You'd better know, child. Suppose you become a journalist." Celeste was not scolding me. She sounded teacher like, and explanatory. "Who do you suppose is going to read your articles? Cowboys? Basketball players?"</div>
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I sighed. I did not want to argue with Celeste. She could keep her prejudice about the US to herself. My motivation was not to change her -- I just needed her to help me. </div>
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Suddenly, I recalled the days spent in her apartment in Paris, and how she used to listen to music while dressing. Like a puppet waiting for his master, I would sometimes sit at her door, that she kept always closed, and listen to her humming to what Catherine had informed me were old American jazz songs. A few years later, I was with my mother when she bought a very expensive box of CDs to send to Celeste.</div>
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<span lang="EN-US">"Frank Sinatra." I said,
recalling the name of who I guessed was her favorite singer. "He might
read my texts in English."<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">Celeste laughed and clapped her
hands in delight. I was then certain she was talking on the cordless
telephone that Catherine had bought for her. She had hated it at
first, because the antenna would get entangled in her earrings, or damage her
hair. But when she discovered the speakerphone option, she had been conquered.
I had won her too, though she preferred Bing Crosby.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">"So what is your proposal if I am to
help you write for Sinatra?" She laughed, a crystalline and genuine laugh
like a little girl's. Suddenly I realized Celeste had once been young, a
girl, a child, a baby even -- and I no longer feared her. "Do you want me
to pay for the university? Or..." She hesitated. "And support you
through those years, too?"<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">I whistled. Her offer was far better than I
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<span lang="EN-US">"But I'll have to talk to Catherine,
first." She added. "I suppose if you're asking me it's because she has said no--"<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">I interrupted my grandmother to explain
what had happened -- how Catherine had agreed to help me, but Angelo's father
could not help him. I went on to explain I was asking money for Angelo, to pay
for all the bureaucracy until he got his scholarship, which he was certain to obtain. We needed money to pay for tests and documents that would have to be
translated. And for his airplane ticket, too, in the future, though we did not
have a date set yet. I spoke and spoke, trying to leave far behind in the
conversation the part where I had mentioned Edoardo <i>could</i> not help Angelo,
instead of <i>would</i> not. A minor lie. What I feared is that she would ask whether his father agreed with
Angelo going to the US. At the same time, I sensed she would gladly stand
against his will, since she seemed to dislike Edoardo, too.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">"And Angelo is...?" She asked, instead.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">I realized I had been asking Celeste a
favor for a person about which existence she ignored completely. He could have
been a neighbor, a friend, a teacher.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">"He is... <i>l'homme de ma vie</i>!" I declared, sound and clear, for Celeste
and Angelo to hear.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">She was immediately suspicious. Or maybe
she had just sounded so. She started walking about her room, her voice
fading a little bit in the distance every once in a while -- but she was using on me the technique she had
learned to impose her voice to audiences, and I marveled at all my
grandmother's talents. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">I heard a champagne bottle being opened,
as she gave orders to her maid. Announcing she would soon start getting
dressed for the Opera, she still wanted to know everything about Angelo -- his
age, where I had met him. She had pictured him older, and someone who might be
taking advantage of me.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">"<i>Sweet sixteen</i>..." She commented,
in English, with the funniest accent I had ever heard -- and that I might have
had myself. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">I was surprised that my grandmother could
speak English. But instead of complimenting her, I retorted instead, "I am... We are eighteen, already!"<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">"So sweet, nevertheless." She had come close to the speaker again, and I could even hear her sipping the champagne,
while she gave instructed the maid about which new dresses she wanted taken out of
the closet and placed on her bed for her to pick one for that evening. </span><br />
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<span lang="EN-US">"Do you love this boy?" She asked.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US">"Yes, I love..." I was about to
say 'him', but since it could refer to any man, I knew I had to be more
specific, when he was going to listen to it himself, "Angelo!" I
pronounced his name like if I was letting a butterfly come out of my mouth.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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"Oh, he is by your side then!" Celeste had guessed it. "Are we on the speakerphone, Laurent?" She sounded annoyed, but again calmed down when I assured her we won't. "Good. You know, it's okay to love this boy. And I am not saying it is okay to be gay. That shouldn't be a problem at all. But no matter how much you love this Angelo boy... An Italian, is he? I wonder why is it that you and your mother have to have this fixation down there..." </div>
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She paused, and while she spoke to the maid in a harsher tone, I wondered. By 'down there' did Celeste mean Italy, or male genitals? And she might not have made the connection yet, that Catherine's and my boyfriend were father and son. Every time I thought of that, it seemed to be some sort of perversion. I heard Celeste grunt. </div>
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"These immigrants are impossible!" She seemed to throw something, as I heard a thump in the distance. Maybe a cushion on the maid, or against the wall. "Anyway, <i>c'est beau l'amour</i>. Love is beautiful, but it is also a foolishness. Don't let yourself be fooled by anyone, Laurent. Don't hand your happiness to anyone, ever. It is really nice of Angelo that he wants to accompany you to the United States..." I suddenly felt dizzy. I had to close my eyes and lean against the window, when I heard my grandmother stating that. What would she say instead, if she knew it was the exact opposite? "But don't trust him. I don't mean him, specifically. Don't ever trust anyone you fall in love with. The people we love are the first ones to betray or fail us. I am sure Angelo will betray and fail you. I am sure you will fail him." I couldn't say exactly how her voice and discourse had changed, but it sounded rather melancholic. Bitter, even. I loathed her trying to be nice and advise me more than I disliked her scolding or being arrogant. In the end, being nice did not suit Celeste well. </div>
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"One way or another, you will fail me, Laurent." She continued. "And I have failed you, already, haven't I? Your mother, too, she has failed me. And I have failed and betrayed her many times, oh, how many times..." Was she acting sentimental? Or was she really getting emotional, I asked myself.</div>
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Suddenly, Celeste shouted. </div>
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I startled, and Angelo gave a start in response, too. He tried to stand on his elbow, put the pain was too bad and he again collapsed on the bed. He lay on his side, panting. I could see sweat streaming down his back and dripping on the fresh sheets. There was a big wet circle on the waistband of his underwear, accompanying the lovely curve of his buttocks. No matter how much he had thinned, his butt had remained perfectly round -- fat but muscled. A real turn on, and after so many weeks, the longing to be inside Angelo awoke my groin.</div>
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"Laurent, I have to go now!" I heard the glass of champagne being laid on a table or a tray with a tinkle, and the sound of Celeste standing up and walking away from the telephone. "This is a tragedy!" She was clearly upset, and I was worried something really awful was happening. What if a burglar had broken into her apartment? "This is an original Balmain! Not one of those ridiculous, fake dresses you use yourself, young woman!" I understood it was a problem with the maid and her dresses. "And they don't understand French, these awful people!" She had turned in the direction of the phone, and then again towards the maid "I am scolding you, you foolish creature! Do you have anything else to wear on your face other than that stupid look?" I could hear the maid babbling her excuses in a shrill. '<i>Madame</i>' was the only word I could distinguish. </div>
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"Laurent, are you still there?" </div>
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"I am..." I almost said '<i>grandmére</i>', for I had lost my concentration watching Angelo, but stopped just in time.</div>
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"We are all set, then. I'll talk to Catherine about the practicalities. I suppose you still don't have a bank account, and you are not opening one now that you are deserting your country..." She paused, and I did not know if it was for effect, to make me feel bad for being a defector, or if the maid had caught her attention again. "That is not blood red, for God's sake!" She shouted. "That is brown! That is the color of gore... How can you not see it?" Celeste snored. "I'll send the money to your mother, as usual." She was referring to my birthdays and Christmas. "How much do you think you need?"</div>
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I did not know, in fact. I said Catherine would tell her. And then I started crying again.</div>
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"Thank you, Celeste. Thank you a thousand times!" I wanted to say more than that, but telling her that I loved her sounded false. And she was not with me anymore -- just wanting to close our conversation to jump on the maid's neck.</div>
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"<i>Oui, oui</i>." She kept saying, listening to my thanks. "It's all good. Fine. O-K-A-Y Laurent!" She raised her voice a little, to finally dismiss me. "Call me again. To tell me how everything is going. Or if you need anything else. I have enjoyed talking to you, young man. Now I r-e-a-l-l-y-h-a-v-e-t-o-g-o!" </div>
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And she hang up.</div>
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<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10000213495439627694noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8991339675338164589.post-1788238348579399562015-07-08T06:37:00.000-07:002015-07-25T10:37:10.300-07:00Episode 11-II | A macchiato person<div style="text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-size: x-large;"><b><i>But what is</i></b></span><span style="font-size: large;"> the right measure for poisoning oneself</span><span style="font-size: x-large;"><b>? </b></span></div>
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I don't think Angelo had planned it for that night, and the medicine cabinet was out of reach for him, in my mother's bathroom. Downstairs, he took whatever was available in the kitchen. He would never have died from a mix of strong spices, vitamin pills and cleaning products, but he did get a severe intoxication that equaled to a mild poisoning.</div>
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For several weeks, after he returned from the hospital, he complained about pain in his stomach, and also in the throat, from the medical procedures. Stubbornly refusing to eat anything , he accepted only water and light juices -- and often threw them up, after spasms and convulsions that shook his whole body and the bed. He grew frail, thinner than himself as a teenager. We tried to eat as family in the bedroom, to keep him company, but quit it -- to the sight and smell of food, he would vomit.</div>
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"A sin leads to another sin", I overheard Edoardo's comment to my mother. </div>
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It was clearly intended as an accusation. Even in the gravest of moments, he could not leave his prejudice aside, condemning our love as the cause of Angelo's suicide attempt -- and never his own lack of support. </div>
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'<i>The intolerance of a father will lead to the death of a son</i>', I wanted to reply. But wouldn't I sound intolerant myself? I preferred to practice temperance, and anyways, I could never have pronounced the word 'death'. I did not want to even cogitate that Angelo could die.</div>
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It was a torment to watch him loose weight every day. Worse, his mood did not improve. He avoided facing us, and denied to talk to us. He flinched at our touch, and seemed to oppose my presence close to him.</div>
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We were afraid that he would try it again, and thus never left him alone. When I had to shower or go to the bathroom, Edoardo stayed by his side. Edoardo was cooking as usual, and I did the washing, while Catherine had to resume her routine of writing and teaching in Belgium, leaving her house to her men. </div>
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As usual, Edoardo did not knock on the door to come into our room -- because I was leaving the door always open.</div>
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Edoardo and I were no longer speaking to one another -- but the silence between us had changed from being another wicked form of aggression and despise into a belligerent peace treaty. To avoid quarreling, we avoided simply talking to one another. That way, at least, we were able to occupy the same room, the room which Angelo never left. </div>
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Probably suspecting that Angelo and I were going to have sex in the shower, like so often when we were teenagers, Edoardo had invited upon himself things like bathing and changing his son. It was moving to see them back to how it must have been in the first year of their relationship -- that if Edoardo, a patriarchal macho, had ever helped Angelo's mother to take care of the baby. And hadn't he, his time had arrived. He was even humming songs as he tended to Angelo, awfully melancholic melodies that were not the least uplifting -- and though I thought them inopportune for the recovery of someone depressed, I no longer criticized anything Edoardo did.</div>
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"<i>Io te voglio tanto, tanto benne, figlio mio</i>." Edoardo would often whisper love declarations for Angelo. I was touched.</div>
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Sometimes, the father would try to get in bed with the son, and try to cuddle. </div>
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But Angelo continued to dismiss all displays of affection, be it from his father or me.</div>
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Especially me, it seemed.</div>
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"Alone." I would often hear Angelo whisper, out of nothing. But since it was said loud enough, I knew it was supposed to arrive at my ears. </div>
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"What? Why do you say that?" There was no point in asking -- Angelo knew we were not leaving him on his own. We all thought he still wanted to die, because he was not eating, and often refused to take his medicine. Not as desperate, it seemed like another form of suicide was going on. He had refused to see a psychologist, too. "I am here for you." I replied. Weren't we a pair, a couple, a team any longer?</div>
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Angelo seemed to think not. '<i>I am alone</i>.' he would say, when I was right on the bed next to him, just like it had always been, since he had moved into my bedroom. </div>
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Looking back, the weeks of Angelo's recovery -- though he was not really recovering -- marked the end of our teenage years. My boyfriend's health and well-being -- life, essentially -- had me willing to answer accordingly to his importance to me, and I grew up a lot. I matured.</div>
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*****</div>
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Angelo was a <i>macchiato</i> person.</div>
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Until Edoardo came to live with us, coffee had never been part of our household. Carlo reputed it was too strong for the senses, hindering his meditation and the finer aspects of his sensitivity and concentration. Catherine thought it killed the aftertaste of the exquisite wines she enjoyed so much.</div>
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Edoardo brought with him a professional espresso machine, that he intended to use later in his restaurant. That occasion, of course, never happened. But he would put it to use daily, justifying he had to keep it working well. He liked his espresso '<i>corto</i>', really strong. To my dismay, even Catherine started having it, '<i>lungo</i>', just to join her partner.</div>
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Because it was an Edoardo thing, I decided to hate coffee -- though I loved its aroma. And above all, I enjoyed preparing it for Angelo. When he once said I had the best hand for coffee he had ever seen, another dispute between his father and me started. But to my boyfriend, I was the undisputed winner.</div>
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When once more Angelo did not touch his lunch, I figured out I could bring his appetite back by fixing him the best cup of <i>macchiato</i> ever. It was not so easy to achieve the exact proportion of coffee and milk foam, and when I tried too hard and too carefully, it would chill a little bit -- and Angelo hated that.</div>
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After three tries, I decided I had made the perfect <i>macchiato</i>, my best ever. I ran upstairs to deliver it properly hot. Angelo would have preferred a <i>cannolo</i> as by side, but I could only find an <i>éclair</i> in the fridge, and hoped it would do.</div>
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Coffee was not very appropriate for someone who had his stomach hurt by chemicals, but my intention was to bring a smile to ngelo's lips, and a taste he loved. Ultimately, I wanted to bring back his will to live, his intensity and enthusiasm -- even if it were for arguing with me.</div>
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He did not smile, as I placed the coffee by his side, on the bed. But his eyes did lit like I still hadn't seen in weeks. I helped him recline on his elbow. Like me, Angelo was in his underwear only -- it was sultry, one of those summer days when cicadas scream higher and higher, indicating the temperature is always increasing. I could not help but notice the difference between his arm and mine. He had always been beefier than me, and to grab his biceps and triceps while we made love had been a fetish to me, since our first time. But no longer. He had thinned so rapidly and heavily that it seemed like someone had sliced his flesh away. I was saddened, and touched, and my hands trembled as I took the cup to his pale and lackluster lips, that once had been so juicy and red. </div>
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He sipped the coffee eagerly, and I was instantly made happy -- for a few seconds only. </div>
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I observed his eyes widen suddenly, and coffee ooze from the corners of his mouth. I might have been giving it too fast for him to drink. Next, Angelo chocked, and trying to push the cup away, spilled the burning liquid on his own chest. He screamed. </div>
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"Fuck you!" He loved swearing in English. I was paralyzed in the chair that I had placed at his bed side. When, nearly half a minute later, I did react, things got worse. His delicate white skin had instantly grown from rosy to red into purple, and I hurt him more by rubbing it, trying to dry the coffee. He didn't have the strength to back off, but he did slap my hand "Fuck off, Laurent! Are you trying to kill me?" He started crying, from the pain and the humiliation. And I cried, too, seeing my boyfriend laying in the dark pool staining his bed sheets. The last drops of coffee were still finding their way down the side of his chest, into his armpit. When, within seconds, small blisters started visibly springing up on his burnt skin, I started sobbing.</div>
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Angelo yelled at me, commanding me to leave the room. I was glad that Edoardo and Catherine had both left after lunch, and there was no one to witness my goofiness. No matter how much he shouted, I did not leave Angelo. I wasn't supposed even to have been downstairs fixing coffee, abandoning my boyfriend all on his own -- for that, alone, I could be blamed. What had seemed like a wonderful idea turned out to be disastrous.</div>
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"I hate you!" Angelo yelled, before turning on his stomach and hiding his head under the pillow, moaning in pain. </div>
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Angelo's suicide attempt, and his reluctance in claiming his health back, contained a clear message of lasting desperation -- but his father seemed unable, or unwilling to hear, or interpret , or understand it. </div>
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I concluded Edoardo would not change his mind. Ever. He was unable to see how his intolerance and lack of support was hurting his son. He thought Angelo's damnation had one source only -- sin, or his love for me.</div>
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But hadn't I been just as intolerant myself? I hadn't helped Angelo like he had asked me to. A Matisse? What was a Matisse compared to someone's life?</div>
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Silently, or yelling, from within his suffering Angelo kept pointing at how useless I was. </div>
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<i>I hate you</i>. In three words, he had stated very clearly how I was responsible for his misery. Edoardo might not have helped his son handing him the money he would need for himself and his restaurant -- that is, if he did have the money, for it was never clear to me. But I, I could have helped Angelo -- had I really wanted to go to the USA. </div>
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I knew just what I had to do.</div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10000213495439627694noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8991339675338164589.post-55132726880179312002015-06-02T06:34:00.000-07:002015-07-13T07:03:21.810-07:00episode 10-II | Ultimatum<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<i>sensitive issues</i></div>
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<b><i><span style="font-size: x-large;">I didn't</span><span style="font-size: large;"> realize Angelo</span></i></b><span style="font-size: large;"> was feeling so lonely, and isolated.</span></div>
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In my mind, I had done what he expected from me. I had decided to follow him to America, and I had communicated it to my mother. My own expectation was that he would then take over everything else. He had gathered information about the whole process of applying to the American universities. He had the addresses, the phone numbers -- but what he did not have was money to start and carry on with that bureaucracy.</div>
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When Edoardo refused to help him, Angelo wanted me to talk to my mother to help the two of us. Reluctant, I wanted to hear from Catherine first. I thought once she agreed to help me, she wouldn't mind helping my boyfriend, too.</div>
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But in the meantime, she and Edoardo arrived to a decision. They were going to care for their respective sons only, and not interfere in the other's decisions -- that settled, they never again fought.</div>
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Of course they knew what that meant. If Angelo couldn't go anywhere without getting his father's financial aid, it meant I wasn't going anywhere either, even if Catherine would help me. I was just accompanying him, and had no will of my own to move towards our future in America.</div>
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"You don't love me, do you, Laurent?"</div>
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"Of course I do!" I protested. </div>
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"No. I'm just another toy for you. I get it now. You just like my body. You like my ass. You use me for sex, for fun."</div>
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"Don't be ridiculous, Angelo." I almost said 'melodramatic', but it would sound too much like Catherine.</div>
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"You don't understand me. You don't respect me. You don't care about my needs. My dreams."</div>
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"Of course I do." I repeated myself.</div>
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"No, you don't. And that's why you don't want to help me."</div>
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"Don't be unfair, Angelo. I've done everything I could..."</div>
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"No you haven't. And you know it."</div>
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Angelo had come up with another idea. He wanted me to ask for my grandmother Celeste's help.</div>
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He was aware that she sent me money every Christmas and birthday. With that, I had gathered a considerable amount in savings. That money could have helped us -- but Angelo himself had helped me to spend it all. We -- or I -- had bought a new music player, and plenty of long-plays, shirts, jeans, tennis shoes, and junk food. Actually, he was responsible for us having no money, having exchanged it for fun.</div>
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"Your grandmother is rich, Laurent. You could convince her to sell one of the paintings in her collection, or her jewelry. Then we would have the money we need."</div>
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But I knew Celeste did not have to sell anything to have money. That was Angelo's family history -- how they had sold all the artifacts from his archaeologist grandparents, even the furniture and finally the apartment in Rome, to go to the United States for his mother's treatments.</div>
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"I can't do that, Angelo." </div>
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And I'm glad I never did, even if it led to tragedy in our household. But how could I? I hadn't seen Celeste again in eight years, though we every once in a while spoke over the phone. Catherine would sometimes visit her in Paris, on her trips to Belgium, but I was never again invited to her house.</div>
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"Of course you can. She has never denied you money, has she?"</div>
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"No. Simply because I have never asked her for money. Do you get it?"</div>
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It would have been funny to see what Celeste's reaction would be, had I asked her to sell one of her paintings. What would the painting be? Her Picasso? Her Renoir? Or the Monet? She could get rid of her Bonnard, or the Leger. She owned at least one painting from most French painters starting with the Impressionist period, and also of those foreigners that had made Paris their home for a while. Not that I knew any of that when I was eighteen. And I knew nothing about Monsieur de Montbelle either, who had bought her many of those paintings, and from whom she had inherited several others. </div>
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Seeing so much art at my grandmother's apartment had confused me, when I was ten years old.</div>
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"<i>Maman</i>, why does... <i>grandma</i>--" I recall whispering the word, afraid that Celeste would hear it, "live in a museum?"</div>
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"Oh, <i>mon cher</i>. This is not a museum. Though Celeste's apartment is just as full of preciosities."</div>
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But I had never been to major art museums before visiting Paris, and to me they were no different from my grandmother's apartment -- except, perhaps, in scale. </div>
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Catherine tried to enlighten my ignorance. When I elected two paintings I had liked best, she proceeded to explain who had been their painters, Chagall and Matisse. At some point, she said they were very famous.</div>
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"Not more famous than my papa!" I declared in triumph.</div>
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"Oh, much more famous than Carlo, <i>mon cher</i>."</div>
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"Certainly not, <i>maman</i>. I had never heard of them before. And I have know my father is a painter since... forever!"</div>
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"Besides," I continued my argument with Angelo, "we don't need so much money to go to the US, do we?" I was starting to doubt his intentions. Any of those paintings would have sold for millions of francs. (*)</div>
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"You will always need money in this life, Laurent. As much as you can have. Don't be silly."</div>
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"How can I ask her such a thing? <i>Grandma</i>," she would kill me at calling her that, "<i>why do you need two</i> <i>Matisses</i>? <i>Why don't you sell one of them</i>?"</div>
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"That would be perfectly fine. Because these paintings are yours already. Don't you see? You don't have to wait until she dies to sell them. Or are you going to keep all her old stuff?"</div>
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"You are out of your mind, Angelo!"</div>
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"Then don't sell anything. Just ask for her spare change. She is filthy rich, didn't you say so? She shall have enough francs to help us coming from her purse only. How much money do you think she keeps at home?"</div>
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"I can't do that, Angelo. And you're sounding like you want to rob my grandmother."</div>
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"It's not that you <i>can't</i>. The truth is you <i>don't want</i> to, Laurent."</div>
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"Let's wait."</div>
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"Wait for what, Laurent?"</div>
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"Your father might change his mind..."</div>
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"I can't wait, Laurent." Angelo had expected we would be studying in the US in the second semester of 1993 already, but we hadn't moved any closer to that. "Not in this hole." And then he threatened me again. "I am leaving, Laurent. No matter what, no matter how, I am leaving."</div>
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Angelo stormed out of the room.</div>
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Not until very late that evening did I start worrying. It must have been 3, maybe 4 AM. When we fought, both Angelo and I liked being alone, and we could spend hours not speaking to one another. But we hardly skipped sex, and the previous weeks, full of tension and expectations, we were doing it at least twice a day to dilute the stress.</div>
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I confess I was horny, more than worried, when I went looking for him. First, I checked the room in the back, where I had slept when we had guests, and where Carlo would seek refuge when he fought with Catherine. To keep the tradition, it was Angelo to occupy it now, when he wanted to get away from me.</div>
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I opened the door slightly, enough to peek into the room and check that he was not in there. I closed it again, and decided I would not go after him into the fields. Or could he have ran away? His words about leaving suddenly sounded more serious than usual to me. But he wouldn't have ran away without taking a backpack, would he? At least I wouldn't. But when I thought my father had disappeared just like that, to never ever send any news, I had icy goose bumps. I couldn't bear the perspective of being abandoned once again.</div>
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I opened the door again. The room was unusually stinky. In the dark, I saw the undone bed. Hoping Angelo had at least written a message, I walked towards the side table, where he had left a book open.</div>
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I screamed when I saw him lying in his own vomit. Incredibly pale, his body tense, fists clenched -- he was frozen with pain. Reminding me of one of those petrified inhabitants of Pompeii, his face was twisted in a clownesque grimace. I shouted again, and again, as I collapsed onto the floor, crawling next to him, to take him in my arms. His body was lifeless and covered in cold sweat. I shivered. I had never seen a corpse before, but as I held Angelo, I knew he was dead.</div>
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Catherine did not scream when she arrived in the room, taking in the scene of Angelo's suicide. To her, life was only a tragedy in books. She dealt rather coolly with reality, as if it were an experiment in a laboratory. There was always something she could use in a future book -- even her own son's misery at the death of his boyfriend.</div>
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But she did shout at me when I fought Edoardo, as he tried to fetch Angelo from me.</div>
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"Please let go of him , Laurent! We need to take him to the hospital!"</div>
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As Edoardo ran away with Angelo in his arms, Catherine stayed behind with me. Patting me on the shoulder, she tried to reason me out of my shock, but I don't recall her words. </div>
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I did not cry, as I realized I was being abandoned again. It was useless, I knew. I had cried for Carlo, but my tears hadn't brought him back.</div>
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For several months after the incident at the country club, that led to my decision of quitting the swim team, I had contemplated the practical problems of suicide. At fourteen years old, suicide was a thing from books, and that's where I researched my possibilities. </div>
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Catherine was a very well organized writer, and she kept lists for everything -- from names for characters to a thorough table of colours. In her archives, I found under S a list of suicides in books, and that's where I learned that Romeo drank poison, Heathcliff starved to death, Othello and Juliet stabbed themselves, Werther shot himself, Mme Bovary ingested arsenic. As I went through my mother's list, I learned about those who had hanged themselves, and drowned. </div>
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Some suicides seemed noble, like Plato's, and other were beautifully tragic, like Anna Karenina's, who stepped on the train track. And in the company of so many suicidal characters, my desperation eased and I realized how my own death would only seem pathetic. I also understood I was a coward, and inflicting death upon myself seemed harder than coping with my shame and guilt.</div>
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Unlike me, Angelo was brave, full of determination and will to live -- or to die. Whatever he chose, he would accomplish. If he couldn't leave France, he could leave this life. Whichever direction he favored, he would travel. </div>
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Unlike me, he did not seem to fear death as his final destination.</div>
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<b><span style="background-color: #6fa8dc; font-size: large;"><a href="http://lutsepisodes.blogspot.com.br/2015/07/episode-11-ii.html">next episode</a></span></b></div>
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(*) <i>this in Laurent's memories is the year of 1993, and French franc was the currency then</i>.</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10000213495439627694noreply@blogger.com0France44.419246974636437 5.233864188194274941.606433474636439 0.070290188194275238 47.232060474636434 10.397438188194275tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8991339675338164589.post-36289695708118570022015-05-20T08:36:00.001-07:002015-05-29T12:41:23.140-07:00Liebster Award x3<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I was nominated for this award by generous <a href="http://codenamedanger.blogspot.com.br/" target="_blank"><b>Daijah V </b>from<b> Codename: Danger</b></a>, a very prolific, talented and versatile writer who engages in different genres and yet is never bounded by their characteristics -- an iconoclast she is, too.<br />
<br />
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I was nominated again by<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><a href="https://pamelatroy.wordpress.com/" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;" target="_blank"><b><span lang="EN-US">Jinx/Pamela Troy</span></b></a><span class="apple-converted-space" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span lang="EN-US"> </span></span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">from<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><a href="https://pamelatroy.wordpress.com/" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;" target="_blank"><b><span lang="EN-US">Tales from Touperdu</span></b></a><span class="apple-converted-space" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span lang="EN-US"> </span></span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">-- a writer I found out about only now, through this nomination.</span><br />
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">A third nomination comes from <a href="http://mrdavidveiga.blogspot.com.br/2015/05/meu-primeiro-liebster-award.html" target="_blank"><b>David from Mr. David Veiga</b></a>, where he runs a journal for his Simself. He is also a creator of great custom content, especially for male Sims.</span><br />
<br />
Please read below my answers to all.<br />
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<br />
<br />
<b>The Liebster Award</b> is given by bloggers to bloggers, to promote the blogging sites we love and support.<br />
<br />
Accepting the nomination comes with these conditions:<br />
1. Post the award on your blog.<br />
2. Thank the blogger who presented the award and link back to their blog.<br />
3. Nominate 5-11 bloggers whom you feel deserve this award and have fewer than or equal to 3,000 followers.<br />
4. Answer 11 questions posted by the nominator, and ask your nominees 11 questions.<br />
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<br />
<u>My Nominations:</u><br />
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<span style="background-color: #cc0000;">LateKnightSimmer</span> for <b><a href="http://maximuszenteri.blogspot.com.br/" target="_blank">Echoes of Eternity</a></b></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="background-color: #e69138;">Lily Parker</span> for <b><a href="https://jillthomas100babychallenge.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">Jill's 100 Baby Challenge</a></b></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="background-color: #f1c232;">Rebecca Thornheart</span> for <b><a href="https://thornheartssims.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">6 Degrees of Separation</a></b></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="background-color: #6aa84f;">Lizzie Gudkov</span> for <b><i><a href="http://lizziegudkov.blogspot.pt/" target="_blank">all of her writings</a></i></b></div>
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<b><br /></b></div>
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<span style="background-color: #45818e;">Marsar Pru</span> for <a href="http://moonlightandsims.blogspot.com.es/" target="_blank"><b>A Pair of Brown Eyes</b></a></div>
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<span style="background-color: #674ea7;">Caterpillarsims</span> for <b><a href="https://summerdreamsims3.wordpress.com/" target="_blank">Summerdream</a></b></div>
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<b><br /></b></div>
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<span style="background-color: #a64d79;">Matt and Brad</span> for <b><a href="http://2boysinlove.blogspot.com.br/" target="_blank">2 Boys in Love</a></b></div>
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<br />
<u>Questions to my nominees:</u><br />
<br />
01- Why do you write?<br />
02 - What motivates you to write?<br />
03 - When did you start writing? And blogging?<br />
04 - Does publishing online interfere with your writing process, and how?<br />
05 - What is your writing process -- do you have a preferred place, hour, a ritual to write?<br />
06 - Do your online readers influence you, and how?<br />
07 - Have social medias changed your writing, and how?<br />
08 - What do you do to overcome writer's block?<br />
09 - What are you favorite authors -- in Literature, cinema?<br />
10 - Does writing help you in your personal life, and how?<br />
11- You're free to deliver whatever message you want for whomever reads this.<br />
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<br />
<br />
<u>Answering Daijah V's questions:</u></div>
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</div>
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<b>01. When did you start writing?</b><br />
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Around 8 or 9 years old, I started writing adventure plots, in response to reading Jules Verne's books one after the other. I was also illustrating my childish books -- and as my drawings seemed to impress people more than my stories, it led me to later in life become an illustrator, while putting writing aside. It was not until a couple of years ago when I recalled I illustrated the stories I wrote, instead of writing stories to illustrate them.<br />
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I am now dedicated to writing, much more than drawing.</div>
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<b>02. Are any of your characters or situations based on real people or events?</b></div>
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Often. Very often, yes.<br />
<br /></div>
<div>
In <i>The Last Canvas, </i>the protagonist<i> </i>Laurent D'Allegro is my alter ego, and some of the stuff he endures and enjoys I have been through myself. That's why I often have writer's block -- Laurent is too personal and too close to my own experiences. But he also gives me the opportunity to live those things differently, and arrive to different insights and experiences. In a way, Laurent helps me rewrite my own story. Armand de Montbelle, the French nobleman, takes on another side of my life -- when I have wanted to become a Buddhist monk. But he chooses a different tradition and part of the world to ordinate. Carlo D'Allegro, the peasant who becomes a visual artist, is loosely based on some of my visual artists friends, who share his same struggles and achievements. Angelo Vivace, Laurent's boyfriend, impersonates some of the people I am glad to no longer have in my life -- and the way he makes Laurent suffer is another major source of writer's block, since I have to dig into my own past suffering.</div>
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My other story, <i>As the mirror breathes</i>, <a href="http://www.wattpad.com/121321179-as-the-mirror-breathes-where-the-road-ends-part-1" target="_blank">currently being published on Wattpad</a>, contains too many autobiographical events, and I am certainly not making them explicit.</div>
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In my fiction, I also enjoy revisiting places and traveling to countries I have been in real life. There is plenty of this in both <i>The Last Canvas</i> and <i>As the mirror breathes</i>.</div>
<div>
<br />
<b>03. What inspires you to write?</b></div>
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Everything.<br />
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I'm very visual, and while in the past I made collages for each character and their ways of live, I now keep boards on Pinterest for them all, and the cities I place them.<br />
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I pay attention to people, and -- shame on me? -- I am that kind who listens in on other people conversations, when they talk loud. I go about the internet, too, researching a lot and reading stories about people from different parts of the world.<br />
<br />
That's when I'm productive -- because when I have writer's block, I have to search inspiration in other arts, like cinema, music and fashion.<br />
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Meditating too, helps clean and calm my mind and always opens space for inspiration to emerge.<br />
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<b>04. Which of your characters is your favorite?</b></div>
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The obvious pick -- Laurent D'Allegro from <i>The Last Canvas</i>, and the couple Kim and Joh from <i>As the mirror breathes</i> (I'm still working on their part).</div>
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<br />
<b>05. Who is your favorite author? </b></div>
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I have had many, in different ages. Jules Verne and Maurice Druon when I was a child, and then Scott Fitzgerald, Jorge Luis Borges, Julio Cortazar, Marguerite Yourcenar and JMG Le Clézio in my late teens, and then Virginia Woolf, Italo Calvino, Thomas Mann, Dino Buzatti, Guimaraes Rosa, Lawrence Durrell and Paul Bowles. At the moment, there are Ismail Kadare, Cormac McCarthy, Ces Nootebom, Ian MacEwan and Kazuo Ishiguro.</div>
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<b>06. What kind of books do you read?</b></div>
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Literature, as stated by the names above, and poetry -- Konstantinos Kavafis, Cecilia Meireles, Rilke, Yeats, collections of haiku and many more.</div>
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<b>07. If you could use the Sims Time Machine, where would you go and why?</b></div>
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I'd like to be transported to the heart and soul of each of my characters, to get to know them deeply. Or else materialize my characters, and bring them to my presence. That would be superb!</div>
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<b>08. You're stranded on a deserted island with 4 characters from your story(ies). Who are they and what do you think would happen?</b></div>
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That is exactly what happens in the first part of what I called "The First Transmission" of <i>The Last Canvas</i>, when we follow the impossible love triangle -- Carlo D'Allegro, Armand de Montbelle and Catherine Mortinné, <a href="http://lutsepisodes.blogspot.com.br/2014/11/episode-09.html" target="_blank">on the deserted Île du Blanchomme</a>, lost in the Indian Ocean. The apparition that haunts Carlo is the fourth character here.</div>
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<b>09. If you could be any character from a book or movie, who would you be and why?</b></div>
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I choose Kit Moresby from 'The Sheltering Sky', both from the novel by Paul Bowles and the movie adaptation by Bernardo Bertollucci. On the big screen she was played by Debra Winger, and I have more than once dreamed with her beautiful presence and gleaming eyes. I am mesmerized by Kit's trajectory of abandonment, how she slowly surrenders to the men she meets, to her foreign surroundings, to her own doubts and torments, letting it all invade her to finally lose and free herself completely from the world. To me, it seems like an analogy of living life itself, and the open ending is the most perfect death one can meet.</div>
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<b>10. If you could marry the man/woman of your dreams, who would you choose and why?</b></div>
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This is accomplished, my dreams fulfilled at this very moment.</div>
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<b>11. Sims have a lot of quirky and fun inventions and objects not found in real life. If you could choose one thing (for example, spellbook, time machine, Bonehilda) what would it be and why?</b></div>
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Being able to enter whatever cheats in my own life whenever I need them would be great. I always start by making everyone happy.<br />
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Thank you again, <b><a href="http://codenamedanger.blogspot.com.br/" target="_blank">Daijah V</a></b>, for the support, your generosity, and this nomination.<br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;"><b>~~~~~~~~~</b></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><u><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">My answers to Pamela/Jinx's questions:</span></u><span style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">1. Are any of your sims based
on real people?<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Many of them are. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I have even created a Sims for Karl Lagerfeld, the creative genius whose work I
adore. But his impeccable ponytail got bugged, and I never was able to fix
that. I Simmed his whole entourage – Baptiste Giabiconi, Sébastien Jondeau,
Cara Delevingne, Stella Tennant.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">2. Do you use simming as a
sort of platform for writing text stories?<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">That’s all I use Sims for. After only a few days playing Sims, having disliked
the gameplay in every aspect, I was about to quit when I decided to investigate
the character I had created – Laurent D’Allegro. He seemed rather lonely and
tormented in his huge designer’s house, and unhappy despite being
professionally successful. That’s how The Last Canvas started. And then I
discovered CCs and the wonderful creators we have out there, and pose
player – that's when game became a ‘platform’ exactly, and I never played it, in the strict sense, again.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">3. What part of the world
seizes your imagination? Deserts? Islands? The tropics? Europe, Asia, or the
US?<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The Mediterranean. It always has, since I was a child.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">It will play a very important role in The Last Canvas, especially in
Laurent’s story -- the picture I consider to be the closing one is supposedly in Algeria. </span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><br /></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Soon we shall visit Morocco, where Armand de Montbelle lived
for quite a while, after having abandoned the monastic life in Thailand. I have loved building and rebuilding those sets.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">4. What era or century do you
like to write about?<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">There is not a particular one -- though I am fascinated about Greek
classical history, having read a lot about it, and their Mythology. But I don’t
think I could write about it.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I do take great care with the time table of my stories, since I’m often
mentioning the characters ages and the years of the events, often related to
real events. It’s the most complicated part of my writing process, where it’s
easier for me to get lost.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">5. What music, if any, do you
consider the “theme” to your sims stories?<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The first version of The Last Canvas had a song for theme of each
chapter, a link to the video and its lyrics. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">There was even an instrumental playlist on the site, and I have made it
available as podcasts. The links to listen/download them can be found in the <a href="http://lutsepisodes.blogspot.com.br/p/soundtrack_21.html" target="_blank"><b>Soundtrack</b> <b>tab above</b></a>.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">6. Sims 2, Sims 3 or Sims
4? Which do you prefer?<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I only use Sims 3 for the illustrations, to build the scenery and pose
the characters. The graphics from the other two versions do not appeal to me.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">7. What novels/movies/tv
shows do you love?<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">So many books by so many authors – mainly the ones quoted in my answers
to Daijah V, above.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">And I love cinema, too, mostly European (French and Russian especially)
and Asian movies. Directors like Fellini, Bertollucci, Kurosawa, Wong Kar-Wai,
Fassbinder, Kim Ki-duk, Angelopoulos, Tarkovski have taught my eye.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I never watch TV. I don’t even own one.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">8. Do you modify your sims’
appearance so they are a bit more ordinary, or do you aim for beauty?<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">It depends on the Sim.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">NO, I’m not being honest here.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I always aim for beauty.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">It’s my perdition in this life. I can spend days building a set. And I’ll
usually edit the pics a lot before being satisfied. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">9. What is the best place
you’ve ever lived?<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Ladakh, in the Hymalayas. Absolutely
stunning -- for its people, traditions and landscape. You can only spend the
extended summer season there, about four months, and I intend to go back one
day, and rent a room for an entire season.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Living in a Zen monastery in France for six months was also quite an
experience.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">10. What kind of snack food do
you eat while you’re simming/writing?<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I don’t. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I might drink tea or cappuccino, but since I bathed my Mac and it never
worked properly again, I try to avoid drinking while on the computer.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b>11. Are you ever inspired by fiction you’ve read or movies you’ve watched? </b><br />
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I certainly am.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I often watch movies as research for writing about places and situations
that belong to my characters’ lives and worlds, while not to mine. That’s a
part I love about writing -- it enriches my own life, and broadens it. I am now
researching contemporary Australia for “As the mirror breathes”. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">I had this rule of not reading fiction when I was writing it – to be not
influenced by other author’s styles. But I have never written anything lengthy
like The Last Canvas, so the rule no longer applies. I also need to be
constantly reading in English to be able to write without making too many
mistakes – otherwise, it would be worse than this. I learn new words daily.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Thank you again Pamela Troy/Jinx for the nomination!</span><br />
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><br /></span>
<br />
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><b style="font-size: xx-large; text-align: center;"> ~~~~~~~~~</b></span></div>
<span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"><b style="font-size: xx-large; text-align: center;"><br /></b></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><u>My answers to David Veiga's questions (Google Translate):</u></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b>1 - If you were a Sim in which world like living?</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><a href="http://www.freshprincecreations.com/ts3vicecity.htm" target="_blank"><b>Fresh Prince's Vice City</b></a> and <a href="http://simtech.forumotion.co.uk/t1619-tropical-island-by-jack-s-creations-fixed-15-08-2013" target="_blank"><b>Jack Wilson's Tropical Island</b></a> have been key to the narrative of <i>The Last Canvas</i>, and I love them both. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">In a way, I have lived in them through my characters.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b>2 - There is a gaming townie who is your favorite?</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">No. The are all too goofy, aren't they?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b>3 - What is your favorite stuff and expansion pack?</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I don't own any.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b>4 - What year met the Sims?</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I started using it in 2013. I was looking for a program where I could render both the scenery and avatars I would create. Sims 3 offers a good compromise.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b>5 - What was the first The Sims you played?</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I only use Sims 3 to illustrate my story.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b>6 - What is the maximum hours of playing?</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I do spend a lot of time building houses and sets for each part of my story, as much as I spend time looking for custom content. Posing for the scenes I have written requires some time, too. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">But I believe applying filters and editing the pictures to the desired effect takes more time than all that -- but still, less than taking care of the text itself.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b>7 - What is the worst: Error 12 or Sims3.exe stopped working?</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I have no idea. My game will very rarely crash, thanks God!</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b>8 - Which format you prefer: Sims3pack or Package?</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Packages are easier to uninstall after you no longer need them.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b>9 - Your Sims already was some supernatural being? If so, what?</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">No.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b>10 - Among all The Sims, which your favorite. (Among consoles, mobiles and PC)</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">I only use Sims 3.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b>11 - In your opinion, what is the best: The Sims 3 or The Sims 4? Why?</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Again, I only use Sims 3. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Sims 4 is incredibly ugly in my opinion. Of course, very capable CC creators are already doing wonderful things, and they might change even the light, but they can't change how awful the landscape looks. It might be great, though, for those who only pose Sims against walls or other simple backgrounds.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;">Thank you David for the nomination!</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<b style="font-size: xx-large; text-align: center;"> ~~~~~~~~~</b><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><br /></span>
Andante Zen</div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10000213495439627694noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8991339675338164589.post-29702070964259114542015-05-20T07:24:00.000-07:002015-06-03T10:17:49.353-07:00episode 09-II | I want to follow him<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I thought I understood why my uncle Armand had chosen that island. Not just because it lied farther apart from the others, but because it was located on one of the rare blind spots on Earth for communication signals. I had already checked -- more than once -- for an internet signal, and there was none.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Thinking of Angelo was making me miserable -- and horny, too, I have to confess. My determination to fasten sexually included not masturbating, and I was made restless. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Though my instructions about not running away from my own emotions had been clear, and I should concentrate on my breathing while trying to observe my feelings and thoughts like they belonged to some character in a movie, I'd rather seek some distraction. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It was two thirty in the morning. How many hours had I been lying in bed already, without being able to even nap? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Maybe Fabrizio had written something else, and when I finally gave up trying to connect to the internet, I reread his last message.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">'<i>The crossing has begun</i>.' It was more concise than a haiku, and not very satisfying when I was feeling lonely.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I had decided not to encourage him. Not until he definitely quit his fianceé, Andara. In that new period of my life, when I was trying to make my own crossing, full of commitments mainly on what not to do, I had promised myself I was not going to be his lover. No matter how good looking he was. No matter how magically we had connected. No matter all the coincidences and preferences that we shared -- no matter how unique a love relationship between us might have been.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I wondered what the '<i>crossing</i>' might mean for him. The odds were that, if he was keeping me informed about it, I might be on the other margin of the river of his life. But what if he was simply counting on me like a friend -- the only guy to whom he had opened up? What if I was alone in that romantic reverie, and Fabrizio was not thinking of me like I was, aiming at love? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Sometimes, I tried to pretend to myself I couldn't care less -- but the truth is, it would not be so easy to give up on him and ignore his presence on this planet, when I thought Fabrizio might be <em>l'homme de ma vie</em>. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Just like, two decades earlier, I had thought Angelo was it, too. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And how wrong I was.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">No, I wasn't wrong. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Angelo had indeed been the man of my life. And he would still be, hadn't he dumped me. And maybe I had been the man of his life, too. He had cheated on me with several guys, but he always returned. And when he left me, it was for a woman.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">On that night in Sweden, it dawned upon me that I was trying to replace Angelo with Fabrizio. It was so wicked, and I blushed at the thought. Freud might have explained the fact that the men I had fallen in love for were two Italian hunks, exactly like Carlo was? Had I tried to replace my father with Angelo? Yes, I probably had. The abandonment I felt, the rejection and silence coming from Carlo, how defenseless I had been, and how it led to my personal tragedy. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><em>Mérde</em>. I had used Angelo. I might retell the story to give the impression that he used me -- and he did, oh yes did! But for the first time I realized I had also used him -- to hide the hollow left by my father's abandonment. And the question seemed to be... <i>Why did I need a man in my life to fill in the gap</i>? And <i>what gap</i> was that? Because it was a hollowness I could not masquerade, no matter how many lovers. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I had come to loathe him, to despise him, to wish him bad -- Angelo had been the man of my life, and he was still occupying that place. No, his place was not left vacant. Hatred had taken the space of love. That's how I had kept my heart busy all over the years. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And that's why Fabrizio could not enter my life, not yet. Not because my bed had been full of men. My broken heart was still taken. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">By one man.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">At eighteen years old, I was so sure that Angelo was and would forever be the man of my life -- and the love I felt for him gave me the strength to finally decide to join him on that adventure of living abroad.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The hardest part was telling Catherine about my decision, and asking for her financial support.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Angelo and I had discussed about the best moment and how to approach her. I wanted to be diplomatic and careful, while he thought I should be bold.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Now, at the door of Catherine's studio, that I had rarely entered, I tried to brace myself.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">She had converted Carlo's studio into her own writing corner -- and if once I had been an habitué at my father's studio, I was banned from my mother's office. Not that she forbid me to go there, but I sensed I wasn't welcome. She did not like interruptions when she was immersed in her creative process.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0AUQaNRMtsm_SFbEwoDTGPe_rhNOgpEP3uuhT0H5P48jH4fMMXIoHzLTED4Y8qbduol4kVTH9evbx0cFTkw4ogmmMIp_jnM43JwjKM1o2QE2qaSiD1-6whrvBEDS8cBlA-h07FAhyCrem/s1600/05-+hq+Screenshot-30.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg0AUQaNRMtsm_SFbEwoDTGPe_rhNOgpEP3uuhT0H5P48jH4fMMXIoHzLTED4Y8qbduol4kVTH9evbx0cFTkw4ogmmMIp_jnM43JwjKM1o2QE2qaSiD1-6whrvBEDS8cBlA-h07FAhyCrem/s1600/05-+hq+Screenshot-30.png" width="640" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It was awkward how swiftly Carlo's presence had been erased from our house. Apart from the three portraits in the upper floor, the pool was the only thing that indicated that he had lived there. His name was never mentioned, neither by Catherine nor me. Just like Angelo, Edoardo must have known about my father, but they too had decided to ignore him.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I hadn't quarreled with Edoardo for days. Not because I had not had reasons to -- I would have punched him everyday, if I could. I felt inexplicably violent in his presence. But once I decided to leave France with Angelo, I knew I would have to be nicer to him to at least please my mother. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Another reason for our truce was that my boyfriend needed his father's money.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That was the preamble before I knocked at Catherine's office door, on a morning by the end of Spring. I had been consulting with the cherry tree, but when the petals had all fallen and the signs of the first fruits appeared, I knew my time with my mother had arrived.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEguyEMQsKVXgYsuQe2I47HSVuvk5VapWqpUdSr-TWzItrhXOby9y-_xuKtZ7GlZ7C049_m4rX1xnVUCQJpA-eFmxhiow30l0ZPZwimhT21RXI2BeDO7jtX7QS80ggNTBuNlSwmutfoGcWgv/s1600/06-+hq+Screenshot-226.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEguyEMQsKVXgYsuQe2I47HSVuvk5VapWqpUdSr-TWzItrhXOby9y-_xuKtZ7GlZ7C049_m4rX1xnVUCQJpA-eFmxhiow30l0ZPZwimhT21RXI2BeDO7jtX7QS80ggNTBuNlSwmutfoGcWgv/s1600/06-+hq+Screenshot-226.png" width="640" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I knocked once, twice, and not until the third time did Catherine's eyes leave the computer screen. She bent her head and just looked at me, for a whole minute perhaps, before summoning me into the office with a very charming smile. And I knew, from years of experience, that her smile was not addressed at me, though she had recognized her own son, but at her text. She might be satisfied with something she had just written.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I just need a minute or two to finish a paragraph, <em>mon cher."</em></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> Like my father, I am not good at numbers, and I might lose track of time. But I thought I had overheard my mother, and instead of minutes she had said hours, because it took her half an hour to again talk to me.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"So, why have you decided to honor my studio with your presence?" My mother said, as she stood up. And she wasn't being ironic. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Catherine was in a good mood. Maybe it was my informal peace treaty with Edoardo that was pleasing her. But not just that. She was prettier, too. Since Edoardo had moved in with us, she was always wearing nice clothes, jewelry and perfume, even if she was not going out. I had to recognize it -- no matter how I loathed him, Edoardo was making Catherine happy.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"You don't come here much, do you, Laurent? You should come around more often. There are many books here you could benefit from! Instead of listening to that kind of music..."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Catherine was talking about the songs I listened to with Angelo, in our room. Grunge, and all that noisy, dirty stuff I have never heard again since we broke up. It was 1993. Radiohead -- one of the few bands Angelo and I agreed about -- had just released 'Pablo Honey', their first album. Together, we would sing 'Creep', with lyrics I had immediately related to, and 'Blow Out' -- the loudest we could, and scream along Thom Yorke at 'You'.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Catherine's remark surprised me. Angelo and I weren't even allowed to use the swimming pool when she was in the studio. It seemed as teenagers we were treated like inconvenient children, because we would be using the trampoline to compete for the biggest splash, running around screaming -- things we were allowed to do only when the adults were not home. We could sun bathe, that's all we were allowed to, when Catherine was in her studio, and without any background music.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEspmTweO3eWk2E49Y0ZQBYPegXqUk5WLBo5kiPbWdIrBtxqTB4qrQ3pLDMd_JbWm3yH4Ul4X6scZ-q66N9JGml3No54YCgA_Lnq3k102INsbXTRFKkscj2gD944b7jvqEZ6_BVFnYaDwx/s1600/08-+liq+Screenshot-240.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEspmTweO3eWk2E49Y0ZQBYPegXqUk5WLBo5kiPbWdIrBtxqTB4qrQ3pLDMd_JbWm3yH4Ul4X6scZ-q66N9JGml3No54YCgA_Lnq3k102INsbXTRFKkscj2gD944b7jvqEZ6_BVFnYaDwx/s1600/08-+liq+Screenshot-240.png" width="640" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"What is that shirt, honey?" My mother asked. It had taken her a few minutes to land at the studio, after she had finished writing. I knew exactly how that was like. When writing, it was if her contact with the real world diminished. During the creation of her first historical romance, she had been so immersed in the times of horses and carriages that I thought we were going to suffer an accident whenever she drove her car. And she had screamed at me once, "<em>Mon Dieu</em>,<i> Laurent</i>! <i>Do want to kill me</i>? <i>What is that noise</i>?", when I had used the blender. "<i>How have we come to that</i>?" she asked, looking horrified both at me and the device. I had felt so inappropriate.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Angelo gave it to me." Angelo and I had thought that using an American football t-shirt was a good introduction, and I was glad that Catherine had noticed it right away.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"You look so different, Laurent... You have... bloomed!" Probably, Catherine was comparing my image to the last time she had seen me against the same background... and when was it that I had last entered her studio? Never in Angelo's company, though he had been there a few times, invited by my mother. At least three, maybe even four years before. And since then, I had '<i>bloomed</i>' indeed.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Well, thank you mom, I guess..." It could also be that, since school had finished, Angelo and I were dedicating our long and boring days mostly to cultivating muscles, and it showed already.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I don't like that t-shirt on you." My heart skipped a beat when she disapproved the first part of our plan. "But I am happy to hear it was a present from Angelo." </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In respect for Edoardo, she had never again referred to Angelo as my boyfriend. Though she wouldn't tolerate any homophobic remark coming from Edoardo, not even about stuff they watched on TV or read in the newspapers, mainly about Aids.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"<i>Respect, my love</i>" She had recommended him, "<i>Because I know you enjoy being treated with respect.</i>" Edoardo did respect Catherine. And obeyed her, too.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Catherine was also referring to the fact that it was usually the other way around -- I was the one giving presents to Angelo. I would often ask Catherine, when she went to Belgium, to buy this or that to give to my boyfriend. But because he and his father were in such a poor financial condition, Angelo couldn't quite reciprocate.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Catherine..." I don't know when I started calling her more by the name and less by her motherly function. Maybe after Angelo. "I have something to tell you."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Let's sit, then. Do I have to worry about what you are going to tell me? Are you ill or something?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"No!" I knew she was thinking about Aids, because I was always thinking about it too. What if I had contracted it? I had never tested, yet, Angelo and I were not using condoms. "It's just that... I want to go to the United States." I blurted. Having rehearsed several approaches with Angelo, I did not recall any.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Oh!" Catherine raised her eyebrows and was thoughtful for a moment. "Now that you have finished school, traveling would certainly do you good... But why not go on vacations to Greece? Or even Paris... I think you could profit from Paris now that you are eighteen, Laurent... Though I don't think your grandmother would host you... Anyways, why the United States, <em>mon cher</em>? Was it Angelo's idea?" She was aware of his fixation for the US.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"It's not on holidays, mom..." I braced myself. "I... We..." I could not avoid it, I needed my boyfriend's strength to aid me in such difficult situations, "...want to live there."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Catherine gasped.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I don't think I understand it, Laurent." She was suddenly very serious. And a bit upset, too. It was noticeable by the way she had twisted the corners of her mouth.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I tried to explain myself as best as I could. But talking to her about America, Vice City, university, Journalism... It all seemed nonsense to me.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Why would you want to study Journalism, Laurent?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Because..." <i>Angelo chose it</i>, I wanted to confess. <i>Because it is his path to success, and I just want to follow him,</i> "...I want to be a writer myself!"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Don't you think you should study Literature instead, darling?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Oh no, that sounds..." I almost said "boring", which was Angelo's opinion about the subject my mother taught in Belgium, "too serious!"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Then you don't want to be a serious writer, is that right?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I was at loss. Maybe I should have used '<i>boring</i>' after all, because it was justifiable that I did not want to become a boring writer.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"And why America? Why not Paris? Or even Belgium, Laurent? I could recommend you..."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I dreamed of Paris. But my life was Angelo. I knew Catherine understood perfectly well why I had chosen America, but she wanted to hear it from me. Maybe she also wanted to give myself the chance to listen to my words and realize my own foolishness. I engaged in an explanation that promoted America like the country of the future and the land of opportunities, while it buried France and Europe in the past, exactly like I had heard from Angelo.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"You really love this boy, don't you, Laurent?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I do, mom, I do."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"So much that you want to follow him into his dreams?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Yes, Catherine. That much!"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Wouldn't you rather pursue your own dreams, Laurent?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I don't think I have any, mom..."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I had not expected it would be such a difficult conversation. I had suffered years of silent agony, thinking I would die to my mother's heart when she learned about my sexuality... But instead, she had welcomed and accepted it at once, and in doing so, pacified me. My revelation had been filtered first through her intellectualism, and once thus understood and acknowledged, she was perfectly willing to honor me as gay. It had even brought a major turn in her literary career, when she had started including a gay character in each of her novels. Sometimes, they were as remarkable as her heroines, and she never made these guys her protagonists just because female main characters were her distinctive mark. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And to something much more simple like living abroad, and that hadn't make me suffer much, she had so many doubts and so many questions.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"America, Laurent?" She raised her eyebrows in dismay. "What do you intend to do in that country... Apart from studying... Journalism to become... a writer?" She emphasized the contradiction.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Angelo had trained me well on that.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Dickens was a journalist before he became a novelist. And so was Mark Twain, and Hemingway, and Truman Capote and..." But at each name I mentioned from the list I had memorized, Catherine's look of consternation only worsened. I continued, "And there is Tom Wolfe..." We knew we couldn't mention just dead people, and a living success might impress Catherine. "And Ken Follet..."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">With a gesture, my mother dismissed all her North American colleagues.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I can see Angelo there, but you? I can see him wearing this t-shirt and even becoming a professional football player... But you, in America? Aren't you going to lose yourself, Laurent?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I won't become a cheer leader just to accompany Angelo... I don't believe I am a transsexual, mom..." I laughed at my own joke.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"That's rather gross from you." Catherine cut me short. "I don't believe you are down rating someone based on gender, Laurent! Don't be disrespectful! Or are you homophobic?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"How can I be homophobic if I am..." I realized I had to struggle to say the word -- '<em>gay</em>?' -- I did not know any other gay men, then, and I was frightened by what I saw in movies like <em>Querelle</em>, <em>L'homme blessé</em> and <em>Les Nuits Fauves</em>, that Cyril Collard had released just the previous year. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Many gay men are homophobic. Especially the closeted." Catherine remarked, and again grew silent. I then understood she was not answering the question she had addressed me. I would have to answer it throughout my own life. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Do you sometimes consider that Angelo might be abusing you just because you love him so much?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"He has never abused me, Catherine!" I objected. In fact, I almost reprimanded my mother for her remark.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I don't mean sexually. Of course not. I know you are in charge there. You are still in charge of it, aren't you, Laurent?" I did not respond, and she moved on. "I mean... emotionally. Sometimes I wonder whether this relationship is doing you any good, Laurent."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"He is all I have, mother." I pleaded, "Will you please help him?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Laurent, please! Don't be melodramatic. But... I hadn't seen this coming. I can't promise you anything right now... Does Edoardo know about your decision?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"No mom, please don't tell him!"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"But Laurent... he has to know what you boys are planning."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Angelo would be talking to his father that same day. Perhaps, they were talking at that very moment. But cautiously, we had decided to keep me out of his communication to his father. Edoardo was against our relationship, and at first he might agree with Angelo living abroad just to separate us. I feared Catherine wouldn't co-opt in hiding it from her own partner, but we wanted her to keep my decision a secret at least until our trip was set. In reality there was no chance, since the preparations would take almost a year.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Angelo will tell him. But Edoardo..." <em>hates me</em>, I was going to say, "can't know about my decision, not yet... Please, Catherine!"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"So... it is a decision you are communicating, Laurent?" Catherine smiled. "You are not asking my permission, are you?" </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I was embarrassed.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I know, <em>mon cher</em>. You think you don't need my permission, but you still need me for your decision, don't you?" She made a gesture that implied she was talking about money.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Mom, I am sorry... I..." I had taken her financial support for granted.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Let's hope America will eradicate this awful habit that you have... Will you take your feet down, Laurent?" </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Oh, I am sorry..." I then realized my tennis shoes on Catherine's beautiful sofa. "And..." H</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">ad that been a <i>yes</i>? Through her remark </span><em style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">America will change me</em><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Don't worry, Laurent. We will talk about this again. But not today."</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> Catherine let out a loud sigh. "A non-serious writer in America. Who would have thought of that?" She shook her head. "I think I need time to rest now. Will you excuse me?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Later, I lied to Angelo about my conversation with Catherine, to shine some hope onto our plans. Edoardo had refused to help his son.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That was a strange symmetry between us. Angelo had always felt loved by his mother, while I struggled to obtain Catherine's approval and recognition -- I won't even say love.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But my problems with Catherine were little compared to how Edoardo mistreated his son. My mother might have been cold and distant with me, but Edoardo thoroughly disrespected Angelo. While I had never experienced anything like that from Carlo, who had always been considerate and attentive and caring -- loving, indeed.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"<i>Find a job</i>." Edoardo told Angelo, when he refused to help.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Not a serious suggestion, it was just Edoardo's way of keeping Angelo around. Truth is, he did not want to part from his son. He knew it would take anyone ages, working as a waiter, to gather money to buy an airplane ticket and pay the application fees, tuition and have enough for the first couple of months in America, before Angelo found yet another job there. Even if he won a full scholarship, like he later would, Angelo would still need financial support.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Edoardo had justified he couldn't help his son because he needed the money to open his restaurant.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But after three years of procrastination, we knew it wasn't true. Edoardo was always trying new recipes and improving the classical ones -- that was the reason why he couldn't accomplish a menu. He had found a few places where he thought he could open up shop, but he would always find this or that obstruction and again give up. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We knew it wasn't going to happen. The project of a restaurant was the restaurant itself, all that was ever going to exist. We knew it -- and I wanted to shout it out at Edoardo, whom I regarded as a complete failure. How could my mother have complained about my father, when Carlo's paintings had become a commercial hit? How could she instead love Edoardo, an opportunist who actually depended on her money? Carlo had built a swimming pool for our home -- Edoardo couldn't afford building a pit.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"He is my father, Laurent. He is the only relative I can depend on. Don't ruin everything, please. I have my own ways with him. He will help me, you will see."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">A couple of weeks went by. One evening, when we thought Edoardo was in bed already, he came down to catch Angelo and I in the living room. We were dressed and just kissing, trying to divert from the disappointment of not getting any further with our plans. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"<i>Madonna mia</i>, this is a shame!" And once he started bailing about sin and all the catholic prejudice I couldn't stand, I lost my temper.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I won't allow you to say what is a shame or not in my own house, Edoardo." I tried reasoning with him at first.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"This is Catherine's house, <i>Laurente</i>." With his ugly accent, he made my name sound like a slap. "This is not your house."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Fuck you! This is my house much more than yours! You are a guest here." I immediately recalled Catherine saying that we should be especially kind and polite with our guests. I had no problem being nice to Mr. Chabrol and Mr. Resnais, for instance, but I couldn't include Edoardo in the respectable category. Still, I decided to quit that line of attack. In fact, the whole attack, by just dismissing him. "I don't care what you think!"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Yes, you have to care. Because you are going to hell!"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Sometimes I thought Edoardo was really silly. Why didn't he take the chance to end an argument when I'd propitiate it to him? Since he insisted in quarreling, I was going to retort how primitive his prejudices were, and that instead <i>he</i> should go to hell.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"No." Suddenly, I felt calm. I did not want to swear anymore. I had found the perfect response. "I am not going to hell. This is hell, already. I will actually be going away from hell. Do you understand, Edoardo? You are hell, for me. Hell is where you are. <i>Capisce</i>?" I knew that, if I wanted to deliver a blow on Edoardo, I'd have to speak Italian with him. Angelo had long ago stopped translating our discussions. "<i>Tu sei proprio l'inferno</i>, Edoardo! <i>Capisce</i>?" </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It had the desired effect on Edoardo, who just gulped, swallowing my words. He was motionless for a moment, then he backed up, and staring down he left the room.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"<i>Io sono felice da te lasciare</i>, Edoardo." I did not care whether it was grammatically correct, as long as it sounded Italian. "<i>E di non te vedere mai</i>! <i>Mai più</i>!" I added, though I knew I had hurt him already.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Enough, Laurent." I heard Angelo behind me.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"You are a lame gigolo, Edoardo! You should be happy that you will be left alone to use my mother as you want..." I shout after him.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Shut up, Laurent!" I heard from behind me.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Edoardo hadn't answered my comment. He was already heading upstairs, and he probably did not understand my remark, since I had done it in French, spitting the words. And I have to confess I wasn't aiming it at Edoardo.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Fuck you Laurent!" Angelo exploded. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I knew it. Humiliating Edoardo when it came to money, I was also humiliating Angelo. And for days after that, Angelo did not speak to me, and in the evenings he occupied the little room next to the studio, just like Carlo had when he quarreled with Catherine.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When my mother once more came back from Belgium, she found the house silent; the three men in it exhausted and exsangue, dead one to another like victims of a war that had finally ended. With no winners.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Entrenched in my pride and self righteousness</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I never apologized to Angelo for that humiliation. It's one of those episodes that remained unsolved and unspoken between us.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And from then on, I started ignoring Edoardo. It only caused further distress and severance in our household, and led to Angelo's desperation and sense of isolation.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Surprisingly, I would still have a chance to become closer to my boyfriend's father, before we left France. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In fact, having Angelo's death in perspective almost led me to make peace with Edoardo. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><b style="background-color: #6fa8dc;"><a href="http://lutsepisodes.blogspot.com.br/2015/06/episode-10-ii.html">next episode</a></b></span></div>
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<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10000213495439627694noreply@blogger.com1Sweden60.128161000000013 18.64350100000001544.530202500000016 -22.665092999999985 75.72611950000001 59.952095000000014tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8991339675338164589.post-38149838356355617612015-05-06T05:38:00.000-07:002016-02-16T06:45:40.708-08:00Episode 08-II | A carousel in Paris<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<b><i><span style="font-size: x-large;">Between Angelo and me</span></i><span style="font-size: large;"> there were coincidences and convergences</span></b> which, ultimately, were circumstantial. But there were also differences and contrasts -- that were fundamental. And that is why our love was not destined to last.</div>
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With Edoardo, the only thing I had in common were Angelo and Catherine. And how we competed for them, specially for her. As for the rest, we were opposites in everything. If I was slightly feminine, he was totally masculine. In our fights, I would have to scream louder to try to cover his resounding, baritone voice. I often regretted my high, girly pitch, feeling I was losing my arguments just because of that. I was indecisive, soft and thoughtful, a teenager experimenting with my opinions and values, while Edoardo -- except when it came to opening his restaurant -- was very assertive and righteous, fixed in his ideals, beliefs and judgments.</div>
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I fought Edoardo like a plague, as if he was an aberration -- because, in fact, I sensed he regarded me and my love for his son as the aberration. </div>
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I was often, if not always, overreacting. I now know it, but I thought I was just defending myself from an adult bully that had entered my household. <i>I won't tolerate being abused in my own house</i>, I kept telling to myself. </div>
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It was never openly mentioned, but there was this expectation that he should act like my stepfather. But I never wanted him to. My father was not dead, not that I knew -- Carlo had just vanished. Edoardo's presence in my house not only aggravated my resentment towards Carlo, for having abandoned me, but it was enough to trigger revolt and a sense of justice in me.</div>
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Carlo and Edoardo could never have been more different. Where Carlo had been gentle and caring, Edoardo was strict and arrogant. Angelo was often lowering his head at Edoardo's shouts of reprimand, while I usually fought him back.</div>
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"Why don't you fight Edoardo back with me, Angelo? You are always submitting..."</div>
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"Because I need his aid to go to the US. Where else will I get the money? Will you give me that money, Laurent? Are you going to pay for my ticket and expenses?" Once Angelo had suggested that, the seed stayed with me to first sprout like a challenge, and then to become a plan. "Because if you are, then you'll have me on your side."</div>
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I did not feel like I was being manipulated, instead, I felt I had a place in his life, that I was important to him.</div>
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And Angelo was usually on my side, I have to say. He might not have been faithful to me, but he was loyal. At school, when he got picked for a group, he would usually bring me with him, too. It became an unspoken agreement with our colleagues -- if you want Angelo, you will have to take Laurent, too. Every now and then, I would be picked before him, if we were forming study groups. But when it came down to sports, my notorious clumsiness with a ball would always leave me out. </div>
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When the other kids understood what the deal was, they left Angelo for the end, to be last to complete the team, so that he could not pick me. Once, realizing what was happening, he simply enacted a stomach ache and left the gym, calling me to aid him.</div>
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"We are going to teach those bastards a lesson, Laurent! You and I, we are the team. They are the rest, isn't it so?"</div>
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Was Angelo being sincere about us? Sometimes, I am inclined to think so. Other times, I have to guess it was just another way of seducing me into his plans of going to the US.</div>
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He had already made up his mind -- he just had to convince me to join him. He had extensively spoken to Catherine, and instead of joining a Literature faculty, they had agreed that Journalism and Communications was more his field. And that's how I ended up at the Journalism School in Vice City -- I did not get to chose anything, just to follow Angelo.</div>
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But my decision took time.</div>
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"Are you coming or not?" he had been asking me for some time already, and then it turned into, "Are you joining me or not?"</div>
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Every once in a while, Edoardo tried to be nice to me.</div>
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"What can I cook for you, <i>Laurente</i>?"</div>
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"I don't know." I wanted to tell him to just pronounce my name properly, that would do. "Whatever."</div>
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Why care, indeed? He was always cooking pasta the Italian way, and I did not like it the least.</div>
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"Thank you for being kind to Edoardo, Laurent." My mother once told me. I knew she must have been thanking Edoardo for trying to be nice to me, too. Just because of her, we tried to make a convivial effort. "It makes me really happy to see the two of you getting along." She smiled.</div>
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Indeed, I had never seen Catherine any happier. She was looking prettier and dressing even better because of Edoardo's presence in our house and in her life. I had never seen her kissing Carlo, and though I had witnessed her kissing another man, seeing her was always kind of shocking and stirred difficult emotions in me. Why couldn't she have been like that with my father? But with time, and observing how Edoardo grabbed her waist and held her tight and was often making her sit on his lap and constantly kissing her -- I started wondering if it might not have been Carlo's own fault, that Catherine had lost interest in him. </div>
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"But could you try to show some interest for Edoardo's things, Laurent?" Catherine had suggested. "I know he misses that from you..."</div>
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"You mean... His cooking?" Because his interests seemed to be limited to the kitchen, and limited to Italian dishes. Latter, he would start preparing <i>ossobuco</i> and other stuff that he considered delicacies, but that I thought were quite heavy. "I think I have taken at you, Catherine..." By that I meant that my mother and the kitchen had always been worlds apart... Until she met Edoardo, whom she followed into the kitchen, often staying at his side while he cooked, while she read a book. "But I shall try!" I gave my mother the answer she had wanted, and off she went, satisfied with me. I knew I was being a hypocrite, but I did not care as long as I had my mother's approval.</div>
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But I was also increasingly concerned about Edoardo's drinking habits, and how they were affecting Catherine.</div>
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"Will you help me drink this one until the end?" he would invite my mother. And maybe that would have been the second bottle of wine already, and they might open a third to share. Angelo and I weren't allowed to drink, nor did we want to. I'd rather have my soft drinks than wine, and Angelo had suffered too long from his father's alcoholism, because I think we can call it that, to be interested himself in drinking. Later, he would experiment with drugs in Vice City, but not with alcohol.</div>
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"Sometimes, he would vanish." Angelo was telling me about the time when they had lived in Vice City. "For days, perhaps. Specially when my mother had a new crisis. I know he had to make difficult decisions and take responsibilities, and how that must have been stressful for him. But why did he have to drink to escape them? A new surgery, that would put my mother's life at risk but that at the same time could save her? She was often too sedated to take part in the decision, and I had no right to say anything. My father had to take it all. And he would then disappear, be it before or after the surgery, once he had decided for it. The situation was hard enough on me, but without my father is was even worse. Sometimes, I'd skip school to stay with my mother at the hospital, where my father wouldn't show up for days. The doctors and nurses were specially nice, bringing all sorts of foods and drinks from the vending machines for me, since they knew I could not afford it. There was even a therapist giving informal, free sessions for me, and it took me a while to realize she a psychologist. I was being taken care of, if by strangers. I don't know where did my father go when he would vanish, what did he drink. I just knew he was drinking. At least he always had the decency to show up sober at the hospital, often looking like a wreck, stinking to liquor and in rags, as if he had been sleeping on the streets, and with terrible hangovers -- but sober."</div>
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I was always impressed with how much Angelo had already experienced. And touched, that it had been at such a tender age. I admired his strength. His mother had died when he was just thirteen, and I could only imagine how torturing it must have been to be left alone with a sick and dying mother at a hospital at the age of eleven, twelve. </div>
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I was being bullied at that age, but now that it was over, it did not seem as tragic as Angelo's experiences, and I was ashamed to share it with him. I felt I had been a voluntary victim while I had suffered it in silence, a coward for not fighting it back from the start. Angelo had been an involuntary victim, and although he had been a brave boy, his mother's terminal disease was not something he could fight for. </div>
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And there was certainly no point -- and no reason for him -- to fight his father.</div>
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I wasn't more concerned about how Edoardo and Catherine were often getting drunk because it seemed to do them more good than bad. And by that I mean that Edoardo, when stuffed with liquor, did not get more irascible than he already was -- quite on the contrary, he would get foolishly sentimental and even depressive, while Catherine was made silent, drowning in her own thoughts. I was just a teenager, and the love of an adult couple seemed very heavy and complicated to me. I would have my fights with Angelo -- but next we would be dancing and singing together, or running screaming through the woods, until "The Sources" where we could have sex and be as loud as we wanted. But both Catherine and Edoardo had had their sharing of suffering in the past, and sometimes it seemed too much for them to bear -- it had broken my heart to see them hugging and crying in each other's arms, once. I wonder whether they already knew about Edoardo's degenerative condition, and the disease that would kill him in less than a decade. </div>
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There was something else. Edoardo was really taking his time and presence in our house to experiment and develop new recipes -- and that's how Angelo and I became the receptacle of both Catherine's developing plots and Edoardo's culinary experimentation. It might have been pleasurable, if it hadn't been oppressing.</div>
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As we grew up, the house became a prison to us. Even my room seemed too small. When we thought of Angelo moving in, we fantasized about having sex daily -- even before breakfast. But with our parents in the room next to us, we were always trying to muffle the sounds of our love making -- Angelo wouldn't moan any more like he enjoyed to, and consequently I wouldn't be as excited. Even how our bodies collided, we felt we had to soften that too.</div>
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We liberated ourselves only at 'The Sources', but even there we were afraid Edoardo would follow and surprise us.</div>
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Like Carlo before, Edoardo stayed home almost every day. He wasn't really looking for a place to open his restaurant any longer. Why should he, when at home he could cook without any pressure, and still have Catherine pay for his expenses and continuously congratulate him on his preparations?</div>
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Angelo was not concerned with the situation. He thought his father was saving their money for his trip to the US. Angelo would do everything to obtain a scholarship, which in fact he latter did, but he still needed money for the expenses of living in such a cosmopolitan town like Vice City.</div>
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All to myself, I had been brooding the idea of moving to Paris, instead of Vice City.</div>
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"Paris? It lives from glories of the past! And I am fed up with the past! The past killed my grandparents" Every now and then, Angelo would mention his grandparents, the famous archaeologists, who had died in an excavation in Algeria, even before he had been born, I think. "Plus, it is full of rats and it stinks to piss!" </div>
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Angelo had never been to Paris, but he was so ready to down rate the city. Having been born in Rome, where he lived for a few years of his childhood, seemed to turn him into an expert about the past. And he longed for the future. America was his destination and his destiny, and nothing would move him one inch away from his route. I mentioned Paris just that once to him, and never again.</div>
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I had been only once to Paris myself, when I was ten years old, in 1985.</div>
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Two years of permanence in France had gone by, before Celeste finally agreed to meet me. </div>
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"<i>Mon Dieu</i>, Celeste! Carlo wants to take him to his family in Italy... How can I allow Laurent to see the peasant life before seeing the civilized world?" Catherine had complained.</div>
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Of course Celeste wouldn't come to our rural home. Though she herself had bought it for her daughter -- not because she thought it was pretty, nor a good home in a picturesque part of the country. "<i>It's just because it's far away enough from her</i>!", Catherine had explained once, when I had asked why did we live where we live, after mentioning that the house had been given to her.</div>
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Paris allowed me the opportunity to see my own mother in a new perspective -- that of the daughter. At her former home, she was obedient to Celeste's commands. I had wanted to go to the beach, or even to the Apennines with Carlo, but instead Catherine had taken me to Paris. I expected we would go by plane, but that is the occasion when I first learned my mother was terrified of flying. It was my first disappointment in a trip that was going to be loaded with them.</div>
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I had never been to a house so luxurious as Celeste's apartment. Everything was olden and golden and smelling to history and looking classical and outrageously expensive -- though none of that was family stuff, as I was to later discover in Catherine's '<i>On the ex-diva's divan</i>', my mother's greatest best-seller, yet a long way from being written.</div>
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"Is that a dinosaur's egg, <i>grand-mère</i>?" </div>
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Of all things, I had been mesmerized by an egg that might have been a Fabergé or a Lalique; not that I knew any of them at the time. It was big, gleaming, otherworldly -- I was fascinated. </div>
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"Don’t ever call me grandma again! Ever!" Celeste shrieked. "Do you hear me?! Not ever again in your life!' I was dumbfounded. I thought I was being formal, like Catherine had instructed me to. Other children at school called their grandmothers '<i>mémé</i>'. Why couldn't I? Feeling that I was being unfairly treated I still nodded. As I assented, Celeste grew calmer, and just instructed me. 'And don’t dare touch THAT egg!"</div>
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"Don't worry, Celeste. Laurent has been warned." Catherine tried to calm her mother down."He won’t touch anything in the house. Especially not… your hair."</div>
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"If it's not dinosaur's, I bet it's an ostrich's!" I went on, proud of my knowledge. </div>
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"<i>Mon Dieu</i>! These children from nowadays are so wild! What have you been teaching the boy anyways, Catherine?" Celeste sounded disgusted. "I cannot believe the poor has never seen a Fabergé before!" She had patted my head, condescendingly. "This is a work of art, child."</div>
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"At Puanouilo, Celeste?" My mother had intervened, "The only eggs he has seen were from turtles… Not even chicken's." Catherine turned to me. "Be quiet, Laurent. You're embarrassing me."</div>
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I fell silent, still considering how to snatch THAT egg from my grandmother.</div>
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"What are you staring at, little man?" Celeste had inquired, the single occasion Catherine and I had entered my grandmother's bedroom. And I was struck by the fact that the room where she slept was bigger than I remembered our cottage in Punaouilo being, that we had shared as a family. "Is there anything wrong with me?"</div>
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I had immediately averted my gaze from her, to stare at something else and marvel at every single detail of the room. The bed stood as tall as me, and it was bigger than my bathroom, with curtains hanging from as high as the ceiling, all around it (and I fantasized about closing all of them and hiding myself in there, though I never had the chance to ever again enter Celeste's bedroom in our stay). There were mirrors everywhere, reflecting the same warm tone of red with which intricate stencils adorned the walls, perfectly matching the patterns of all sophisticated cloths. Yet, my feeling was that of being inside a huge animal's mouth or maybe its stomach. The dinosaur? And Celeste seemed to have been digested and regurgitated herself -- that thought perhaps gave me the terrified look that annoyed my grandmother. That afternoon, she was getting dressed to some gala event, and she was wearing a dark patterned red long dress, with matching gloves, as if she were part of the decoration, and carefully chosen to fit in. I might have been staring at her jewelry, specially, that shone like nothing I had ever seen before, and certainly not on Catherine, who had never worn anything as fancy. I might have been asking myself the question -- if my grandmother is so rich, how could I have been so poor in my tropical childhood?</div>
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"Of course there is nothing wrong with you Celeste!" Catherine had answered before me. "Laurent is just hypnotized with your stunning looks, I am sure."</div>
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"I can recognize an admirer when I see one, Catherine." Celeste had snorted, glancing at me severely as she guided us out of her room.</div>
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Catherine was in Paris to launch one more of her novels -- that was one reason. The other, that I knew nothing about at the time, was the judicial process claiming part of the De Montbelle inheritance -- details that the two women wanted to carefully discuss, and that led to a considerable amount of money later coming to the Mortinné household. Though not the desired Chateau, that remained with Armand -- my unknown uncle, at the time. </div>
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I had been brought along because Catherine thought it was time Celeste get to know me -- not because Celeste actually wanted to. And I guess my mother might have considered me of some use as an emotional pawn in the paternity recognition process she wanted to start. After all, I was the youngest De Montbelle heir, but the women could not agree on how and when to use me -- not that I was aware of any of that. </div>
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What I knew is that I was not welcome at adult's events, and since both Catherine and Celeste had many appointments, I often stayed home long hours on my own. I was not allowed to talk to the maid -- Celeste had lost her long time chambermaid and felt she couldn't trust the new ones -- nor touch anything.</div>
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"Please promise me that you won't touch anything in the living room, will you Laurent? Especially not that egg, am I being clear? It is as untouchable as your grandmother's hair, do you understand me?"</div>
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I said I did, but in fact I didn't. Not that I ever broke anything in Celeste's apartment -- I was a very obedient boy, and the way I misunderstood my mother's recommendation to avoid touching anything is that I thought I couldn't even sit on the chairs and sofas, and so I spent hours reading on the floor or either in the room I shared with Catherine, where I thought I was allowed to touch at least the sofa I slept on.</div>
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There had been a problem about that before. It was one afternoon when the two women might have been talking about judicial problems, I guess. They could have done it openly in front of me, because I was unable to understand anything. Even if they had mentioned Armand and Gaston's names, I would have totally overheard them. Because I think at that point, Catherine was going for her posthumous paternity process, and the women could never agree on that matter.</div>
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I had the bad habit of sitting and placing a foot on the chair. Catherine had quarreled with me about that before; still, I kept forgetting.</div>
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"Oh <i>mon Dieu</i>! What do you think you are doing, Laurent?!" Catherine had reprimanded me.</div>
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But I hadn't heard it. I had been engrossed in entertaining thoughts about the dinosaur's egg. It was the one thing to make my grandmother and Paris special and unforgettable to me -- I never thought I'd actually see one. And of course I could understand Celeste was so nervous and careful about her rare egg.</div>
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"Laurent!" My grandmother had yelled at me. "Take off your feet from that chair! Now!"</div>
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I startled, but because I was far, lost in the Mesozoic Era, it took me a while to follow her command. My delay caused great commotion between the two women. It was the only time I saw them raise their voices between them -- Celeste was outraged, Catherine was embarrassed, and I was in trouble. They would sometimes shout at me, but even when they were talking about urgent matters of which I knew nothing -- like the De Montbelle legacy and the Chateau's most probable destination --, they never quarreled. It was more like they battled each other with the swords of sarcasm and gird, but all was done very elegantly, because there was a subtle duel on vanity between mother and daughter, too. </div>
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"And you too, Catherine, for that matter! Why do you have to sit on the sofa arm? Gosh, where are the civilized people in this world?" Celeste had taken the chance to reprimand her daughter, too.</div>
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"<i>Maman</i>, when will we go back home?" I wasn't happy at all in Paris. I missed my father, and I was bored to hell.</div>
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"Soon, darling. But I still have some appointments here. Oh Laurent, couldn't you be more considerate and helpful?" I knew what she was talking about. Not exactly on purpose, I had again placed my foot on the sit of an armchair while we waited for Celeste. When I realized what I had done, at Celeste's angry glance as she emerged out of her bedroom, where she had been dressing for hours -- I had frozen. My nervousness, that made me paralyze, was taken as defiance by my grandmother, and she had demanded from Catherine "<i>How much longer do you plan to stay</i>?"</div>
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Catherine would no longer forgive another fault from me, she had warned.</div>
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"Please try to show respect to your grandmother. She is our host! She rules here, do you understand? She has been spoiled by the admiration of her fan club for decades now, and she can't bear anything less than that... Do you understand, Laurent?"</div>
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"But she treats me like a baby..." I had complained. Even the few toys Celeste had handed me were for babies, and probably for girls. They might have been Catherine's, I guessed, though I never asked.</div>
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"Like a baby? I don't think Celeste can treat anyone like a baby, darling, not even a proper baby..." Catherine might have been opening her heart about her own upbringing, but I was not able to comprehend it then.</div>
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The first time Catherine and Celeste had taken me around Paris, they were bewildered at how confused and afraid and excited I was at seeing so many cars and the crowds of people. I had continuously stumbled against the passersby, and startled at horns of cars and the engines of the buses. Thus, I was not allowed out of the building on my own, and could only go down to the lobby and hang out there. Since I was not allowed on the apartment's balcony either, for safety reasons, at least at the ground floor I was able to glance through the windows into the street. But Celeste lived on a rather quiet and exclusive street, and there wasn't much going on outside either.</div>
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So that my Parisian experience wouldn't be thoroughly associated to confinement, Catherine did take me around Paris every few days. She had no idea what to show to a child, and she couldn't quite fathom what my interests were -- apart from the sea, at that age I might have had none. I might have wanted to meet the King of France, whomever I thought he was, probably the convergence to Charles Magne and Louis XIV or XV, but my mother told me they were dead. </div>
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"Do you want to see their palaces, Laurent?" Catherine had thought of Versailles, but I wasn't enthusiastic. Why would I want to see another luxurious residence, when that was my only daily experience of Paris?</div>
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Visiting <i>Mademoiselle</i> Mona Lisa had also occurred to me.</div>
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"Oh no, not that, Laurent! She is just a dwarf surrounded by a big, nervous crowd. You probably wouldn't catch a glimpse of her!"</div>
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She would take me to the Louvre, some other day. But that day she was tired, and impatient, and we ended up just wandering around, like often we did -- from one ice cream parlor to another, that's how I remember Paris, which was actually nice. </div>
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"Is the sea far from here? That river is going there, you know, Catherine?" I had learned at school that all rivers flowed to the sea, and I was fascinated with that promise. Wouldn't I reach the sea if I threw myself into the Seine? I had run along the banks for a few minutes, thinking that maybe the ocean would be after the next curve. But of course I never met it in Paris.</div>
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"Is Paris bigger than Punaouilo, <i>maman</i>?" We had been walking the whole afternoon and the city seemed to have no end, and that had been one more of my silly questions directed at my mother. To my understanding, if we had walked so much on the island of my birth, we should already have met the sea.</div>
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!Oh, <i>mon cher</i>, of course it is..." Catherine hadn't been mad at my ignorance, but heartbroken, instead. "Oh Laurent, I hope you will someday overcome those years wasted at that useless, uncivilized hole..." I hadn't understood if she was addressing my beloved Puanouilo or our rural residence, "...and become a citizen of the world, one day..." She was really upset about it, because she had been feeling sorry for own exile in the tropics.</div>
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One event stands above all from our stay in Paris.</div>
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My mother had taken me to the carousel at the <i>Jardin des Tuileries</i>. I had never seen anything more beautiful and intriguing before. At first, I had just observed as other people were merrily riding it -- the ups and downs of the enchanted animals, the constant yet smooth going round, the dazzling lights and the joyous music were overwhelming to me. Then I had wanted to ride it myself, and after the first round I had demanded another one from Catherine.</div>
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"I want to ride on all different animals, <i>maman</i>, can I?"</div>
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Catherine was generous with me, and she had instructed the keeper to count the times and let me ride as much as I wanted, while she would go check on some books in a nearby store.</div>
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Riding it without my mother watching me wasn't so much fun, though -- and it even seemed dangerous. So many strangers were coming and going and addressing me, saying I was a pretty boy, patting me on the shoulder and head, or even pinching my cheeks. I wasn't used to that, and soon I was scared. But I was afraid to leave the carousel, since I did know where to search Catherine, so I kept on riding, holding onto the same horse round after round -- until I feel asleep, and the keeper had to take me off before I was catapulted off the carousel.</div>
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When I saw myself on the ground, still dizzy from sleep and so many merry go rounds, I had started crying. I was afraid -- I was afraid my mother had abandoned me, like she had before, in Punaouilo. "<i>Where do you live</i>? <i>What is your address</i>?" People tried to help, but they just scared me more with questions I did not know how to answer. How would I get home, how would I find Carlo?</div>
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I was still sobbing when Catherine finally returned. To avoid the criticism of people who were actually concerned about me, she had swiftly taken me away from the carousel. And I guess when she was about to admonish me, she realized how terrified I was, and instead she congratulated me.</div>
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"You were a wise boy, Laurent. I'd forgotten to tell you that if, in any case you get lost, don't try to search for me. Stay where you are. I'll come looking for you, do you understand? Don't move, stay wherever you are! Get it, <i>mon cher</i>?"</div>
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I tried to, but I don't think I could. </div>
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My mother was asking me to trust her? To actually believe she was always coming after me? But how long could that take? My crying in the afternoon had turned into sobbing with the night, and that carousel in Paris had taught me a lesson I wish I hadn't had to learn, ever.</div>
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I doubted, in case I'd like to move to Paris, that I would be welcome at Celeste's apartment. I had never seen her ever since, though I received a generous sum of money from her every birthday and Christmas. What if I asked her to pay for Angelo's ticket to the US? I knew we were heading towards the uncivilized world, according to her, but since we had always been living in the uncivilized world -- as she regarded whatever lay outside the bounds of her personal experience of Paris -- it didn't really seem to make any difference, did it?</div>
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Finally, the restrained intimacy that was oppressing Angelo and me, and the fights that still ensued between Edoardo and me -- there was a point when we had overcome the border of the swearing, and it was really nasty how often we called each other the worst names in Italian and French --, or even between father and son, and how that affected Angelo and me -- it made me decide for Angelo's project of living abroad.</div>
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And when I did, Angelo was not as happy as I thought he would -- and should -- have been. He was more relieved, and a bit blasé, as if he couldn't understand why it had taken me so long to agree with him.</div>
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"Better late than early!" he had just commented, before kissing me. Angelo was a great kisser, passionate, and I gladly surrendered. "Now we have a decision, there!"</div>
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But I was still uncertain of my move. It merely seemed better than not moving at all.</div>
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But when Angelo and I communicated our decision of studying abroad to Catherine and Edoardo, things again accelerated and my choice took the feature of an irrevocable promise to my best friend and lover.</div>
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"You are going to love it there, Laurent, you'll see!"</div>
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Yet, the only thing I could clearly see was my love for Angelo. Desperate and dependent, I was addicted to him -- and I called it love.</div>
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<span style="background-color: #6fa8dc;"><b><span style="font-size: x-large;">next episode</span></b></span><br />
<span style="background-color: #6fa8dc;"><b><a href="http://lutsepisodes.blogspot.com.br/2015/05/episode-09-ii.html">http://lutsepisodes.blogspot.com.br/2015/05/episode-09-ii.html</a></b></span></div>
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<i style="text-align: center;"><b>Author's note:</b> having been </i><i style="text-align: center;">imported from a former version of the story, </i><i style="text-align: center;">some of the comments below are dated previous to this post. Once the plot has not been altered, just the pagination, I am keeping them since they are very dear and precious to me.</i><br />
<br />Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10000213495439627694noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8991339675338164589.post-16004995833540627592015-04-22T05:25:00.000-07:002015-06-02T07:55:50.823-07:00Episode 07-II | Front and rear<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><i><span style="font-size: x-large;">The first time I met Edoardo</span></i></b> was an early dinner at our home, when he had cooked. After having failed in engaging in any sort of conversation, we moved on from the living room to the kitchen area, where it had taken ages for him to prepare some very simple pasta with olive oil and herbs. It was rather plain and tasted to almost nothing in my opinion, despite him praising the Italian homemade pasta. Later that evening, I was going to assault the fridge looking for a proper meal, but at the table I tried to please him by eating as much as I could from that unimaginative food.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In a bad way, Edoardo reminded me of Tarso. He was just as silent and reserved as my great-grandfather had been. That went so well with Angelo and Catherine, who could be so talkative. But because I was also more silent than not, and a 'good listener' like my mother had already stated, it was often that between Edoardo and I a very tense, uncomfortable silence fell. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">My first impression was that he was ill humored, bad tempered and arrogant, and I wondered why my mother had fallen for him. He was good looking and well built, attractive in a very manly way -- but so had Carlo been.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I might have been simply jealous. I had never seen Catherine trying to speak Italian to my father -- first of all, because Carlo's French was fluent, if tinged by a rather charming accent. But Edoardo's was really poor -- he had never properly learned French, and he was never going to. I thought it was extremely indelicate of him to try to impose Italian right from his arrival.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I heard you speak good Italian, <i>Laurente</i>!" were Edoardo's first words to me. I hated how my name sounded when he pronounced it, like a stone falling on cement, or like a long burp, though he had tried to compliment and include me in the Italian night we were about to celebrate. "But it can always improve, don't you think?", he had added. But I did not want to speak Italian, and I did not say a word that evening that was not in French, though I normally used Italian words with Angelo. And I felt mad at Catherine for actually trying to speak their language. Why hadn't she ever tried it with my father, and only criticized him in the rare occasions when he had accidentally exclaimed something like "<i>Madonna mia</i>!"... Why? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Because they were our guests at the table and at our home, Laurent. And you might as well try to please guests and make them feel welcome, can't you?" Catherine had reprimanded me, weeks later.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUwzu8jOw-1Ae8F6pK8ogFuRMBEa2H1DdRaf0oHXKAA9-eydfFKc2ae2Gb54DBem474RtAZn2x0knQHNT3K9rgW5hHQRAtpXXTl2ROKtNoy4d0I46tRvbBiNatxrZWSdFNzaYn7zpzcAgn/s1600/20-+Screenshot-192.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="388" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUwzu8jOw-1Ae8F6pK8ogFuRMBEa2H1DdRaf0oHXKAA9-eydfFKc2ae2Gb54DBem474RtAZn2x0knQHNT3K9rgW5hHQRAtpXXTl2ROKtNoy4d0I46tRvbBiNatxrZWSdFNzaYn7zpzcAgn/s1600/20-+Screenshot-192.png" width="640" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And it was about to get worse. When I finished my food, realizing there was only more of that plain pasta to eat and no dessert, I thought dinner had finished for me, and saying "Excuse me" I stood up to take my plate into the kitchen.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I haven't finished yet!" Edoardo declared, rather sharply.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Oh, I am sorry..." And I truly was. I had done that mistake before, with a few others of Catherine's guests, and I was again ashamed. Some of them had been famous movie directors and accomplished writers or brilliant professors, and yet none of them had told me what I heard next.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Now sit." arrived the order from Edoardo. He made a hand gesture that was not the least inviting, but demonstrated his was the last word about me standing up and walking away or not.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I beg you pardon?" I still tried to be polite, but no longer sincerely. My heart was pumping hard, my hands had started shaking.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Edoardo did not repeat his marching order. He just glanced in my direction with a severe look, lowering his eyebrows like he often would glance in my direction. He had said it once, and it should be enough, his demeanor indicated.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjfkLcy0uWqzz9fxMGpALhqNW3ZVMEj7HspMPqHf15D-2dwDlitelFvCgz5yMojaIDVVyjVIXMoBv1anGatVol-gKvp1lQSJ7_mRWm1FrZM9cZXOkvvtOvW18vXSu26InbOMW8hAxkdHs2A/s1600/21-+liq+Screenshot-589.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="398" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjfkLcy0uWqzz9fxMGpALhqNW3ZVMEj7HspMPqHf15D-2dwDlitelFvCgz5yMojaIDVVyjVIXMoBv1anGatVol-gKvp1lQSJ7_mRWm1FrZM9cZXOkvvtOvW18vXSu26InbOMW8hAxkdHs2A/s1600/21-+liq+Screenshot-589.png" width="640" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That moment, I decided my whole future, concerning my relationship with my mother's greatest and perhaps only love, who was the father of my own boyfriend. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I turned my back on Edoardo and walked into the kitchen area.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"<i>Laurente</i>!" I heard him shout, and at the same time coming from my mother, "Where do you think you're going, Laurent?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"To the toilet." I replied. It wasn't true, but it was the only reply that occurred me in the heat of the moment. It was almost a polite and very appropriate excuse, had I intended to come back. And then, giving in to my anger, I blurted "I need to shit."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It was the equivalent to an scandal in our house. Of course there had been quarrels and fights before -- Carlo and Catherine, Angelo and me. But it was the first time I was confronting an adult -- and if there is one thing I can thank Edoardo for, and that's the only thing I can think of, plus the fact that he had the ability to please Catherine and make her truly happy, is that he aggravated me so much and constantly that my daily confrontations with him, sometimes with shouts, sometimes in a tense silence, were very important in my blossoming into a young adult, developing my own confidence and imposing the limits that people could not trespass with me.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1aqpzA7J8UhAVlNJ73MOpNHYL1iXNxsHjgHSdEcAqwztb918uRZc0RtzRBGy_njzVJ4ZAlcBB9admRQBAKf1zT9GodTnGdGXxsW4YLyDpPDI7bzohPFr6LBz_0mNi73-_927GdyMqVXBW/s1600/22-+liq+night+Screenshot-199.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="398" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1aqpzA7J8UhAVlNJ73MOpNHYL1iXNxsHjgHSdEcAqwztb918uRZc0RtzRBGy_njzVJ4ZAlcBB9admRQBAKf1zT9GodTnGdGXxsW4YLyDpPDI7bzohPFr6LBz_0mNi73-_927GdyMqVXBW/s1600/22-+liq+night+Screenshot-199.png" width="640" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That evening of our dinner, I went upstairs and waited for Angelo to show up in my room -- the room that we were going to share. But he never came. Although it was a Friday night and he could and should have stayed with me, Edoardo decided to tow him away to their motel room. I did not see Catherine either, because she did not come to my room -- I heard the door of hers bang, and that ended the disastrous night.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It might have been my first clash with Edoardo that changed plans for us all -- and instead of Angelo moving in first, Edoardo moved in with him at once.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Catherine never talked to me about that incident. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">She simply left home, without warning me where she was going. And if she would return. I had to go into her bedroom to check whether her traveling bags where there or not -- to actually start hinting that she had probably gone abroad, maybe to Belgium where she was still teaching. I don't remember exactly for how many days she was gone, but nevertheless, enough for me to again feel the panic of losing my mother. Angelo knew nothing either, and at school we just sat side by side apathetically. Every time I was struck by the fear of having lost my mother's affection, I was back at Punaouilo, to the days when she had returned to France and for months not given me any news. The difference was that now Carlo was no longer there for me, and he hadn't send any news in years himself. I was all on my own.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It was a rather puzzling process, that of growing up and yet, going back to infantile feelings of abandonment; that of developing the confidence to confront Edoardo and yet being terrorized of losing my mother. I was tore between two extremes, aggressiveness and passivity -- and that's how I grew up to be what I am. That's also how I forgot about Carlo, trying to find a balance between fighting for my space and dignity in my own home, and at once relegating all the things I found unacceptable in Edoardo -- for the promise of being still loved by my mother.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjqdEkzB5-YLAJY0NaCgRpQ375GBt6gGGwq-neW6NskBikdlD-T1JSWtUnzQaHXamZK878aKiMRr_gkPAIkLyCnuNJVlZq0r2AMORU2JKgH0xpbd7TF3X4JMO4BC2e9d8mS21_qFURpFWqU/s1600/24-+liq+night+Screenshot-192.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="412" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjqdEkzB5-YLAJY0NaCgRpQ375GBt6gGGwq-neW6NskBikdlD-T1JSWtUnzQaHXamZK878aKiMRr_gkPAIkLyCnuNJVlZq0r2AMORU2JKgH0xpbd7TF3X4JMO4BC2e9d8mS21_qFURpFWqU/s1600/24-+liq+night+Screenshot-192.png" width="640" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">For the first time in all those years, Catherine did not call me from Belgium to check how I was. Not even once. I cried everyday, sitting in her empty room. If I was still in doubt, her silence and the ostracism I was condemned to, made me fully realize there was a new condition for Catherine's affection -- or maybe, a new opportunity? Being a good student, obedient, taking care of the house chores and respecting my mother's need for privacy and distance had never facilitated my access to her heart. Maybe bearing Edoardo was a new key I was being given the chance to try?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When she came back from Belgium, and Edoardo moved in with Angelo a few days later, I had fully repented. I was determined to soften my edges and be as polite as I could, even if I sounded hypocrite. I'd do anything for my mother, even treat cordially her loathed boyfriend. That I sometimes forgot was also my boyfriend's father.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And that is why it was easier for me than for Angelo to pardon a few things coming from Catherine and Edoardo --- because when I thought of my mother, I was willing to forgive and forget. While Angelo didn't think of anyone but himself.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgN4ah4a4JHCzeHKc1JqRORthtj1WFAhLaebHuGN7DI2h4r80VPHHL2fQR3ttkikXbI0UA1SVMtX9mCLQwXq70sq-9i3PCWcY5tkgoSMay3THTN3Y2ZNoQOxX6Tn0_sU-pO7HoA2_I3xJYM/s1600/25-+liq+Screenshot-25.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="398" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgN4ah4a4JHCzeHKc1JqRORthtj1WFAhLaebHuGN7DI2h4r80VPHHL2fQR3ttkikXbI0UA1SVMtX9mCLQwXq70sq-9i3PCWcY5tkgoSMay3THTN3Y2ZNoQOxX6Tn0_sU-pO7HoA2_I3xJYM/s1600/25-+liq+Screenshot-25.png" width="640" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It was a very uncomfortable and delicate situation when Edoardo and Catherine made love in their room, that was directly next to us. I had heard Carlo and Catherine making love before, and I have already expressed how happy I was when the sounds of their intercourses reached my room, for it meant that after their quarrels, they were making peace that way. And Catherine had never brought any lovers home, at least not when I was there. So this was new and confusing to me, as much as it was annoying to Angelo.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And Carlo had always been a gentle lover, and his love making must have been the same, despite or perhaps because of his being well endowed and easily hurting Catherine when he penetrated her.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Edoardo, if I was to take his son for example, would need to be a fierce and very skilled lover to make the best use of a rather mediocre tool -- and that's exactly what he was. We would often wake up to the sound of their bed forcefully banging against the wall dividing our rooms. Catherine did not hold back her moaning under Edoardo's power, and his grunts were heard even louder than my mother's cries when they came.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We would each time be awoken by their noises, which we listened to in dismay. No, it did not excite us the least, nor inspired us to do like them.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">First of all, because my relationship with Angelo remained a secret kept from Edoardo. Around Edoardo, we had to pretend to be two little boys, and look like brothers, never like lovers. I tried to constantly tease Angelo, and give him hard-ons, but that only upset him, and in time I had to stop.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhj2u9Ufb10NKIFSwm7uovyiRq7H2AYzFbOEWVotmzKAnM6uH1caHyISjHmqU4771rBZt7MgC-LxBl3cmNL5RTXteEKSNRv_qAkAhyphenhyphenAEywqCiE75JSg6IxwvVvK-SAU7IHZv7H3i05RGcWP/s1600/26-+hq+Screenshot-10+vib.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="398" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhj2u9Ufb10NKIFSwm7uovyiRq7H2AYzFbOEWVotmzKAnM6uH1caHyISjHmqU4771rBZt7MgC-LxBl3cmNL5RTXteEKSNRv_qAkAhyphenhyphenAEywqCiE75JSg6IxwvVvK-SAU7IHZv7H3i05RGcWP/s1600/26-+hq+Screenshot-10+vib.png" width="640" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Now quit it, Laurent! I'm not letting you make me gay before my father, too! No way! There is no coming out because I am not gay, do you understand it? Opening up to my father is not an option. That's it!"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Why are you so afraid of your father?" I had challenged Angelo.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I am not. But I know him. It will only worsen things."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I couldn't imagine it being any worse than it already was. We had lost our freedom at home. And since the door to my bedroom couldn't be locked, we were confined to have sex in the bathroom, with the shower and the music on. It was a rather melancholic backlash from the times when we had taken the whole house for our experiments with different positions and add-ons, like whipped cream from the kitchen or the very convenient lounge with interchangeable cushions at the living room.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And it did get worse.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">From the fight that had started at the adults bedroom upstairs, Angelo and I knew we just had to wait for a while until the storm fell upon us, too. Edoardo came down to the living room to meet us. He spoke only Italian, but I understood it fairly well.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Do you have anything to tell me, Angelo?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Nothing new at the front, father."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Well, maybe at the back?" I gasped at Edoardo's words, and I was not quite sure to have understood them, but Angelo kept on his cool act. "Because I think you do! And just before you say it, let me tell you already... I am disgusted!"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Really, father? Why?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I thought Angelo's cynical approach was dangerous, for it seemed to aggravate Edoardo. But this time it was my turn to just be present and silent, like before Angelo had stood by my side when I came out to my mother.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6l9aKdR2aqdyK54bJcCJejFzZunuE39CZ47IYJEsPKqaK9KkX9-mJ5O1MboN7EYcxu94LV-bS7i9hccblEJay2xgXruoauSaUBffgbLQd6l4Wjy9eHr76kwwqcgl2QCX27TBVFsPb8lIm/s1600/30-+hq+Screenshot-262.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="398" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6l9aKdR2aqdyK54bJcCJejFzZunuE39CZ47IYJEsPKqaK9KkX9-mJ5O1MboN7EYcxu94LV-bS7i9hccblEJay2xgXruoauSaUBffgbLQd6l4Wjy9eHr76kwwqcgl2QCX27TBVFsPb8lIm/s1600/30-+hq+Screenshot-262.png" width="640" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Don't mess with me, you little brat! You know perfectly well! This is unacceptable!" Edoardo's deep voice thundered.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"It depends on who is willing to accept what..."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Now shut up, Angelo! You have not been invited to speak. This is a sin! This has to stop! This is filthy, this dirty, this is unnatural..."</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjHq83r4gJLMrnw4redWdltF4n1IRUwLgkBcItkxs6JcFvFY4J_7Zty4lCl9w5wtE7EbREXxwqRFi1z37ZOeGp57JwkNi0mtmPScxcelmaU1TxLSmGiPeIuxOFDsDolrQ9IKOZQJCAakE7/s1600/31-+hq+Screenshot-269.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="398" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjHq83r4gJLMrnw4redWdltF4n1IRUwLgkBcItkxs6JcFvFY4J_7Zty4lCl9w5wtE7EbREXxwqRFi1z37ZOeGp57JwkNi0mtmPScxcelmaU1TxLSmGiPeIuxOFDsDolrQ9IKOZQJCAakE7/s1600/31-+hq+Screenshot-269.png" width="640" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And Edoardo would have gone on with his ranting if I hadn't interrupted him.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"And this is the Medieval ages, again." I blurted.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Our luck was that I spoke in French, and Edoardo didn't really catch it.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"What did you say there? Repeat it! Repeat it to me if you are a man, <i>Laurente</i>! What did he say?" Edoardo demanded translation from Angelo.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And I think I would have repeated it, if Angelo hadn't asked me to go upstairs.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTO2jtD-DX9-kVpwU5kOpTmmnfbbzuS8ZCU8wSLgYoEk29Kb_hDvhRkeDHy3zzwcJOkgPtbdJ9ZMEXNyewjBpJtDD8V9uao8m-HiS9_mSjQqe78t7p-yV5cQdeGuMI-njaD_8fDzBzAuDq/s1600/32-+hq+Screenshot-272.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="398" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTO2jtD-DX9-kVpwU5kOpTmmnfbbzuS8ZCU8wSLgYoEk29Kb_hDvhRkeDHy3zzwcJOkgPtbdJ9ZMEXNyewjBpJtDD8V9uao8m-HiS9_mSjQqe78t7p-yV5cQdeGuMI-njaD_8fDzBzAuDq/s1600/32-+hq+Screenshot-272.png" width="640" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Let me sort this out with my father. Please, Laurent, please!" It was the first, and perhaps the last time that I saw Angelo kindly asking me to do anything, almost imploring it.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And that's how it got worse. We started being stalked. From then on, Edoardo would break into our room, always checking and trying to catch on us.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"You have no right to come into my room like that! You will have to knock first!" I had hurled at him once.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I will come in whenever I want!" he had retorted, just before storming out of the room, banging the door behind him. "My son is in this room, too!" </span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjI43FaRYyNlW5iUZ3DBkZOPKQX_-nVrt9QTfhbq841F47mhXF3bFB7ND_FD4BRkE7y81uWP7LE24Olh64GJgJQ1W7FEZwGjnGPRJZwJTiNQiNf1wa6Rp9DRfwgaDnmwrtGlC9cAr6_fXqJ/s1600/33-+hq+Screenshot-13+vib.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="398" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjI43FaRYyNlW5iUZ3DBkZOPKQX_-nVrt9QTfhbq841F47mhXF3bFB7ND_FD4BRkE7y81uWP7LE24Olh64GJgJQ1W7FEZwGjnGPRJZwJTiNQiNf1wa6Rp9DRfwgaDnmwrtGlC9cAr6_fXqJ/s1600/33-+hq+Screenshot-13+vib.png" width="640" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That's how the only privacy we'd find was in our bathroom. But even there. We almost had a double heart attack when we were at it, and suddenly Edoardo was banging at the door, almost bringing it down. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Go away! We are fucking!" I had shouted. In French, because I did not really want Edoardo to understand it.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Next, Angelo was pushing me away, and swiftly getting dressed, and going out of the bathroom to calm his father.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"What did you tell him? Have you explained that we shower together to save water, haha!?!" I had ironically inquired.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Shut up, Laurent!" Angelo had retorted; our sex session for that day being thus canceled. "Go fuck yourself!"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Most of this happened when Catherine was away, be it for a few hours or a few days. She had changed her teaching routine and never again spent more than a week in Belgium -- and even that was long enough for our home to be turned into a battle field. But when she was home, though there was tension and often mutual provocations between Edoardo and me, it was all veiled and kept at a decent level. He loved Catherine, and so did I -- but we found it unbearable and impossible to even accept the other's presence in the same room. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But when the sounds of my mother and his father making love would start, it was Angelo who responded worst. He felt so tormented. Often, he left the room, which we considered to be our private kingdom, and went downstairs; other times, he tried to muffle the sounds by burying his head in a pile of pillows, when he would snatch mine even. Once, he said he thought the noise was aimed at him, as if his father was demonstrating how a true man behaved, making love to a woman. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"You have to consider, Laurent, that they could be making a baby!" he threatened.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I was immediately alarmed. Sharing a territory that in sixteen years I had never fully conquered, to which Catherine had always been a reluctant queen? The idea seemed hideous. A baby was too definitive an establishment of Edoardo in our household -- because I still hoped that someday Catherine would realize the loser jerk he was, and get rid of him.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Oh gosh, no! Please no!" I grimaced and shivered at the prospect of having to compete for attention in my own home with a baby brother. But I knew Catherine had no talent as a mother, and she wouldn't make that mistake again, not when she was over forty already.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I was surprised when one day, after having started narrating what he thought was being enacted on the other side of the wall, Angelo had screamed above the adults moans and groans.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Wooohooo! Go, go, go, go, goal!!!!" he shouted.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">For a moment, Catherine and Edoardo had silenced, and I was afraid that they had mistaken Angelo's voice for mine. For a whole minute I awaited for Edoardo to storm into my room, and finally try to beat me. But they had simply resumed their love making, muffling the sounds, at least for the rest of that session.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Please, Angelo. We have to respect them..." </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Respect? What do you mean by 'respect', Laurent? They are not showing any respect for us! Listen! Today it must be anal! It's when your mother screams the most!"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Angelo!" I was truly offended, "This is my mother's house! You have to respect her."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"And we finally come to this! Yes, this is her house! And I respect her. You know that very well, Laurent, how much I admire your mother! But I am not going to let her rule over me. Catherine can rule over the other two meek men in this house... But not over me!"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"What are you talking about, Angelo?" But I knew what he was talking about. My mother manipulated Edoardo and me the whole time, making us practice hypocrisy as the highest form of art, for it actually was the only thing to keep us at a minimum convivial level, instead of exchanging punches from breakfast until supper.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I am talking about leaving, Laurent. That's what I am talking about!"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Would you do that to me, Angelo?" My voice broke with my heart at the perspective of being abandoned again.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"From the day I got here, you know very well what my single plan is, Laurent. I am not staying in this God forsaken, shitty hole! And you can come with me or not, I don't care. I am leaving. You can stay in this hellish situation, if you wish, but I shall not. I know you don't have much will or determination, so I will share mine with you. Are you coming with me or not, Laurent?"</span></div>
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<i><b>Author's note:</b> having been </i><i>imported from a former version of the story, </i><i>some of the comments below are dated previous to this post. Once the plot has not been altered, just the pagination, I am keeping them since they are very dear and precious to me.</i></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10000213495439627694noreply@blogger.com2Sweden60.128161000000013 18.64350100000001544.530202500000016 -22.665092999999985 75.72611950000001 59.952095000000014tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8991339675338164589.post-88390696690639292382015-04-08T05:55:00.000-07:002015-06-02T07:56:18.913-07:00Episode 06-II - An odd type of community<div style="text-align: center;">
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<i>nudity</i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><i><span style="font-size: x-large;">Realizing</span></i><span style="font-size: large;"> I had tensed up,</span></b> I recalled a zen monk's advice to relax. He was just a novice, but years ahead of me into the practice.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgv5UdqbmCxI79r11GegoTHgQZFCYYSkFCxl-u1Vs4-bvnt8_-H9KXsbMQGCGgK-xAZxyqdF6_27P1BnADwI8qgr1pwMNmAiqvdw9DSFZ4vCZAtu1QikzJqdfN1StNcSQH3E0I6DJ0IqN9G/s1600/01-+liq+night+Screenshot-224.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="398" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgv5UdqbmCxI79r11GegoTHgQZFCYYSkFCxl-u1Vs4-bvnt8_-H9KXsbMQGCGgK-xAZxyqdF6_27P1BnADwI8qgr1pwMNmAiqvdw9DSFZ4vCZAtu1QikzJqdfN1StNcSQH3E0I6DJ0IqN9G/s1600/01-+liq+night+Screenshot-224.png" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"<i>I might not sleep some nights. But still, I shall try to relax. Not fighting my feelings, nor the situation. I will calmly breath in and breath out. Aware of breathing, I let emotions and thoughts cross my mind. Like night birds in flight. I don't try to catch them. I surely don't cogitate shooting them. No corpses of emotions and thoughts, you know...</i>" The young monk had a sweet smile, and once it gradually overtook his face, it would just as slowly fade, but never quite disappear. "<i>And in the morning, having relaxed might do better, even, than a tense, drugged sleep</i>."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But easier said than done. Because once I had surrendered to my recollections of Angelo, it felt more like a World War raid of thoughts and feelings than a simple flock of birds frolicking across my mind.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I know, I am being unjust -- with myself, with Angelo, and with our budding love.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I am contaminated with everything that happened afterwards, how gloomily our relationship ended, and doing no justice to the empowering sense of well being, joy and happiness that invaded us both from the moment we met, when we were just fifteen.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Angelo had been ultimately as lonely as I had. We were both an only child and, in a way, orphans too. And suddenly, we had found in each other a best friend and lover.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I am letting my bitterness and sorrow overshadow how we delighted in each other's company. How we became accomplices at school, knowing what the other was thinking with just one glance -- and helping each other with tests that otherwise would have been really hard. As a team, we excelled.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I am trying to recall how our sensuality build in a series of innocent episodes, until it actually exploded into our inebriating sexuality. How in school I often glanced sidewards at Angelo, when he was concentrated in reading, and how I eagerly drank his beauty. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I was convinced that his beauty was necessary for my survival.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I recall sometimes losing myself contemplating just his forearm, noticing every little detail of it, from the marbled paleness of his skin that lent his entire figure a deceiving veil of purity (and again, I am losing it here, because at fifteen I had no reason to believe that anything about Angelo was deceitful), to the veins popping on the surface of the muscles he had started cultivating, and that would lead to his physical perfection just a few years later. I remember being thrilled -- and excited -- at the rays of sun dancing on the hair of his forearm, and almost getting a sensation of vertigo from that vision. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Maybe because I was always too close to Angelo -- still, longing to have him even closer and hold him forever in my arms. As if I saw him in a microscope, I was constantly overwhelmed. I never stopped marveling at his chiseled beauty.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I can still recall the thrill of glancing at Angelo's naked body for the first times, in the shower, or when he went to bed -- he enjoyed sleeping naked, perhaps just to tease me. Our nudity would become usual when we discovered "The Sources", and when we started making love there. And it became natural, too, to the point that, years later, Angelo's nudity wouldn't necessarily arouse me any longer.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> We spent hours at the natural pools, and also at the swimming pool that my father had built as his legacy to me, swimming naked when Catherine was not home -- and she usually wasn't! I'll have to agree with Angelo -- we never again were so free as when we were teenagers. Which is pretty uncommon and a privilege in adolescence. I owe that one to Catherine.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The rural landscape that enveloped us was boring, and again I recall Garcia Marquez and his '<i>Hundred Years of Solitude</i>', because we tried to conquer those Hundred Miles of Solitude around us and stamp it with our youthful energy. We were screaming like crazy at the top every mount we climbed -- despite having ran uphill, we were never breathless, never tired, doing everything to escape boredom as if it were a plague.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We were often dancing, too, like two madmen. I hadn't been so much into music before I met Angelo. Carlo would sometimes listen to opera when he was painting, but I thought those people screaming their life and love and tragedies and daily affairs plus death out of their lungs was pretty weird, funny and kitsch -- and I still do. Catherine did not enjoy music so much -- her thing was cinema, probably from having dated more than a movie maker in her youth in Paris, and all the hours spent at the <i>Cinematéque Française</i> -- though she did listen every now and then to jazz, mostly the soundtracks of the <i>nouvelle vague</i> movies. Back then I thought jazz was a boring cacophony, until as a young adult I started going to a Jazz Bar near the apartment Angelo and I rented in Vice City. Then, it became the soundtrack to my life.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Angelo loved American pop -- what else? -- and he gave me this taste for songs in English. "It is the most beautiful language to be sung, don't you think?", he enthusiastically stated, more than once. I don't think I agreed with him, but I am sure I did not want to confront him, either. And so we listened and danced to the American hit parade of the late eighties and early nineties -- whatever we got on the radio, from TV clips and the albums Catherine would sometimes bring us.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I'm not sure whether I appreciate this influence Angelo is having on you, Laurent. The US? Couldn't he have picked a more interesting country, with a richer and deeper cultural life? Aren't your tastes and interests becoming a little too shallow and limited, my son?" </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But that did not mean she wouldn't look for and buy the albums we requested her.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Never mind, <i>maman</i>. I like Britpop better than grunge." Not that it made any difference for Catherine, but I had finally realized that, in listening to songs in English, I'd prefer Oasis to Nirvana, and on a different ground, anything Annie Lennox to everything Madonna.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It were times of limitless discoveries, made more fun and wider because Angelo and I had each other as magnifying glasses.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Why, then, even while making this effort to stick to the good elements of that early stage of our relationship, do I have to recall that conversation that we had at the lake? We had just had a fight over something silly -- and it might have been a dispute about music, even. Angelo was always down rating my preferences, saying that I was too conservative and rather limited. He loved to remind me that I had been born at one forgotten edge of the world, making the tropical paradise of my childhood sound like a nasty uncivilized corner where there were cannibals who still dedicated themselves to black magic and sacrificial rituals. He was Roman, a citizen of the metropolitan world from birth.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Why, then, are you with me, Angelo?" I had finally complained, one day, when his criticism felt too much to bear. I might have been particularly sensitive over some issue at school, I don't remember. Or it might have been the time when he started his campaign to get rid of my glasses, saying they made me particularly ugly, and trying to get me to wear contact lenses. "'Sometimes I think you don't like me at all..."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Look around, Laurent." That's all he commented.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But there was nothing to see, really. Just the boring rural landscape, and two boys lost in it.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Look around us, Laurent. Do you see anyone else?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">My heart skipped a beat. I still couldn't rationalize what Angelo was trying to tell me. Years later, I would turn the lyrics of Radiohead's song '<i>All I need</i>' into the hurtful sentence Angelo uttered that afternoon. Because of that, I can't remember what he told me at the edge of the lake, when we were "lying in the reeds", exactly like in the song.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"<i>I only stick with you because there are no others</i>." Angelo did not say that, but that's what he meant. He might have said something, "Do you see any option for me?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">How is that, for a love declaration? And it might have been on our first anniversary, I don't remember. I tried to celebrate those dates, but Angelo always and simply dismissed them.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I am not gay, remember, Laurent? I'm gay just when I'm with you!" He sighed. "It's all your fault, Laurent. It's all your fault!" He did not hide the melancholy that was depressing him. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Yet, though Angelo was not gay, we probably had sex that same day, maybe more than once, for horny teenagers we were, with lots of time and the whole house available to us. Sex in the swimming pool, sex in the kitchen, sex in the balcony, sex in the backyard. Left alone in my house, we felt free to do it wherever we wanted.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That sets this conversation by the lake before my coming out, when I finally tricked Angelo into being my official boyfriend.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">For some time after my coming out, we were expectant about Catherine's decision on Angelo moving in with us. When one day she called me into her room, I knew it must be it -- she had arrived to a decision.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"<i>Mon cher</i>. This is going to be a bit weird. But we have to talk about it."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Catherine was looking prettier than ever, all dressed up for a date, having added make up and perfume. She was wearing a designer's gown -- most probably Yves Saint-Laurent, the <i>couturier</i> I got my name from. Of pale salmon, it enhanced my mother's natural colors and lovely curves. She looked happy, too, so I thought the conversation shouldn't be about anything nasty nor difficult.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Every boy has to have a man to man conversation at least once. About the facts of life, you know. But being a woman, I was avoiding that. Until I actually understood that <i>because I am a woman</i> I can take better care of that <i>than a man ever would</i>..." After this short preamble, that left me wondering where our conversation was heading to, Catherine blurted, "Are you and Angelo having sex yet?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"We are..." I mumbled, blushing.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I thought so. What are your... positions, if you know what I mean? Comparatively... Relatively speaking?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"<i>Maman</i>!" The way she posed her question was funny, yet I understood it perfectly and blushed even more.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Catherine was surprised when I finally told her that I was topping Angelo. She had never given a second thought about homosexual relationships, though from then on she would include at least one gay character in each of her novels, sometimes in very prominent roles. But at that point, all she had were a few stereotypes in which she had framed me and Angelo -- and because he was the dominant alpha male most everywhere he went, or at least he tried to be, even when we were among adults, Catherine and whoever looked at us as a couple would have thought Angelo was dominating me... And he was, even if he was the bottom. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I have to confess that, because of my refusal to vary positions, we had also conformed to those stereotypes as a couple. That was a bit sad and boring for two very young and horny men, who could have played and experimented so much more. I am the one to blame -- but I can already say that such a conformation wouldn't last until the end of our relationship, and later I would be forced to bottom for Angelo.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Oh, really?"- I watched Catherine trying to readjust our roles in sex as she had pictured. My feeling is that, as much as she showed interest for me, her son, she was also researching for a new scope of characters she hadn't envisioned before. "Then I'll have to go into something else before we talk about condoms and all that..." Catherine was determined to act like my father, and the thought crossed my mind that she could be doing field research with me for a scene she might want to write between a boy and his father. "I know you have taken to... your father... in terms of... size matters!"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Mom!" I exclaimed again. I couldn't think of anything else to retort, and a sentence of more than two words might get me stuttering in that situation. Still, I looked at her dazzled, wondering how could she know...</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Laurent! It shows, you know. When you were a boy, even Joanna was commenting on it, when she bathed you. And of course I've seen you naked, darling. And I've seen you wearing swim trunks more than once, haven't I? And now that you keep having these involuntary erections even at the lunch table... Especially when Angelo is here with us..."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Mom, please!" I felt like fainting. I wanted to evaporate. In fact, just at hearing those things from Catherine, blood had rushed into my organ and it was inflating already.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I just want you to be careful with Angelo, will you? I have... experiences with that, do you understand, Laurent? Don't think hurting is nice, my son, because it is not. That is not to be a man's pride in love! It is not size that matters, but how you use it... Are you following me?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Mom..." I repeated. I guess all that talk suddenly reverted my shame into pride, and I blurted. "Angelo loves it!"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Good, Laurent." Catherine blinked at me. And every once in a while the image of my mother looking pretty in her sexy designer's gown had popped into my mind, years later, as I was having sex with partners that were particularly impressed with my size. "Now. I will also ask you to be discreet when you and Angelo do it, now that we are going to live together..."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And that was how Catherine announced Angelo was moving in! I exulted, but before I could manifest my happiness, she quickly moved on to another subject.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I have met and spoken to his father." Catherine smiled, sweet and mysterious. "He is a very traditional, conservative man, and though he is very busy at the moment looking for a place where he can open a restaurant, and not seeing much of Angelo lately, he was not happy to be separated from his son... So this is going to be a first period of experience, when Angelo moves in..."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Something in Catherine's words, or how she did not finish the sentence, or maybe her intonation, or how she looked merrier than I had ever seen her -- and I knew it was not about my boyfriend moving into our house -- rang an alarm, as I felt my heart sink.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"<i>First</i>? Will there be a second period?"- I was in dismay.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Yes, darling. When Edoardo moves in, too."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"What?" I gasped.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I am dating Edoardo." I was so dumbfounded that she had to clarify, '"Angelo's father! You knew his name, didn't you? Isn't that wonderful, Laurent? It is now all in the family... You and I, Angelo and Edoardo..."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I wanted to faint to escape that scene. The thought that my mother was dating the father of my boyfriend was not very appalling. It was very wicked, indeed. And the perspective that Edoardo was later moving in with us took away all the pleasure and joy of Angelo moving in first.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I don't know, mom..."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I hope you understand the situation, Laurent." Suddenly, Catherine had become very serious. "You love Angelo. You long to be close to your boyfriend. Everyday. He is moving in with us. It is exactly the same, with me and Edoardo. I am sure you understand that, Laurent!"</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTUcTGDKUvHXax8Gn9cx10Nwuk-kpA5fJyHo2t2yjWZ0iCH6j3UMR5RsnFPKMnDeWbvUNr59OU0CwSkA9HmakVjOC44Cj7XGsWduEx4gQLWEBhmONnhj0B2Yilii0hppF_ubnIJ3fo31Kz/s1600/16-+hq+Screenshot-52.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="398" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTUcTGDKUvHXax8Gn9cx10Nwuk-kpA5fJyHo2t2yjWZ0iCH6j3UMR5RsnFPKMnDeWbvUNr59OU0CwSkA9HmakVjOC44Cj7XGsWduEx4gQLWEBhmONnhj0B2Yilii0hppF_ubnIJ3fo31Kz/s1600/16-+hq+Screenshot-52.png" width="640" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"You... <i>love</i> Edoardo?" I had never seen my mother talk about love before. I knew she had lovers, that she dated every now and then, but love... <i>love</i> was very definitive, I thought! And for adults, it implied many things. "Are you going to marry him?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Is that why you look so worried?" Catherine laughed. "</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">No, Laurent! </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">At least, not yet. I hope you understand it. You are old enough for that, already. And now you have your own experiences about love, don't you? This is a fresh start for you and me, do you realize that, my son? We were... never really a family before..." It hurt me to hear Catherine dismissing Carlo like that, but her resentment against him did resonate with me. "And now, we might build one. With our boyfriends! Don't you think this is pretty </span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">cool</i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">, Laurent?" Catherine rarely used slang, and it sounded so misplaced in her discourse. I realized she was trying to reach out for me. "And because it will be two small families joining, we shall immediately experience a new family conformation, how about that? But that is not what's important here! I hope you understand it changes nothing in our relationship, Laurent. You and I, we are the original pair. And we have to stand for one another, no matter what! Do you think you can do that, darling? For me? For us?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I did not quite get whether "us" meant she and I, or she and her lover. But I understood Catherine's offer at once. She was no longer addressing a childish teenager son. She was asking me to act like an adult. She was giving me the opportunity to grow. To take responsibility for the forthcoming new period in our household. I was flattered.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Yes I can, <i>maman</i>."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And with that, bright and beautiful like a night butterfly, with a light kiss on my forehead, off Catherine went happily to her date -- with Edoardo, I was suddenly aware.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Angelo heard the news that same evening. He was as worried as I had been. And our happiness of finally living together -- we were starting our life as a couple, that would last eight years -- diminished at the perspective of living in an odd type of community.</span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10000213495439627694noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8991339675338164589.post-859277868697269282015-03-11T08:49:00.000-07:002015-06-02T07:56:45.289-07:00episode 05-II | My coming out - for two<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><i><span style="font-size: x-large;">More than twenty years later,</span></i></b> I still don't know what to make of that episode.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Was Angelo teasing me, or was he threatening me? Hadn't I known that I did not deserve such a handsome boy? Hadn't I known that it was by sheer luck that he had sat by my side -- had he spoken Mandarin, I'd never met him. And hadn't I known how fortunate and lucky were I that our friendship had incorporated kissing, which later expanded to sex? Obviously not because I was extremely handsome to be able to attract The Hottest Boy in School... Hadn't I known that he could dump me any time? I didn't need Angelo to tell that there was a crowd behind me, a long line eagerly waiting for a chance with him. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">He certainly was playing with my natural insecurity, and from that day on, I regarded the girls at school,</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> along with the good looking boys,</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> as a veritable menace. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It was also as if Angelo had caught a glimpse of the future. Though I don't know of any other girl in his life, it was only when he met Laura von Tschimmel that he finally decided to dump me. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Now, that conversation makes me think of Garcia Marquez' book 'Chronicle of a Death Foretold' -- seen in retrospect, a very appropriate description of my eight years love relationship with Angelo. But I hadn't read the book yet in 1991, though I had seen it around in my house.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That conversation helped to accelerate things again. I was so terrified of losing Angelo that I decided to try a double move, involving Catherine and him.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Would like to move in with us, Angelo?" I knew how sad it was for him to return during the week days to the roadside motel where he shared a cheap room with his father. And how, instead, he loved coming home with me on weekends. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Are you serious, Laurent? You want me to move in with you? You mean like... share the room with you and all?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"We already do it, don't we?" We even shared the bed, sometimes. "But now it wouldn't be only two days a week... How do you like that?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Angelo had howled and cheered and spun on his heels in amazement.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"And do you think Catherine will agree to that?" He asked, after he had kissed me more passionately than ever.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I'll talk to her." Suddenly, I understood what that implied, and I was apprehensive. "But maybe I'll have to... open up about us..."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"You mean... Like..." Angelo was taken aghast, "You are coming out to your mother?!"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I wouldn't have ever. Not at sixteen, and not in a small community in rural France. If it weren't for Angelo. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It was an strategic move -- I did not want to risk losing him for anyone else, and I thought I'd better bring him under my wings. Bring him home, into my room and bed, literally. I mean, I already gravitated in his aura of beauty and charisma -- but so did many other people; of all ages, I must say. Angelo was a charmer, and I was just another of his victims -- willingly, his main victim, but still one among various others. Somehow, I felt it was my turn to try to bring him into my orbit. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And I had just envisioned how to do that.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I carefully chose the right moment, or at least I tried to. When Catherine was going out into town, all dressed up and with many interesting appointments ahead of her, she was at her best. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Mom. We have something..." I glanced at Angelo and as he grimaced, I knew I had chosen the wrong start. "<i>I</i> have something... to tell you about..." Not "us" again, I pondered, "...about <i>me</i>."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"What is it, <i>mon cher</i>?" That afternoon, she did not seem to be in a hurry, too, which was even better.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhTRarwOzPW3r7u-C3WhwuUIN3DHTE2fa5Cjn1yy7RUbF8JDr6ZtgqV9jG1yXX0UQlcLEv4XrwxivwkexPEp40HkXWftWMKfLv3mDUb1fzXyV7vZ4-RydFJ-nVyAzoRdbAWmNlH0kGUjMFR/s1600/27-+Screenshot-42.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="392" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhTRarwOzPW3r7u-C3WhwuUIN3DHTE2fa5Cjn1yy7RUbF8JDr6ZtgqV9jG1yXX0UQlcLEv4XrwxivwkexPEp40HkXWftWMKfLv3mDUb1fzXyV7vZ4-RydFJ-nVyAzoRdbAWmNlH0kGUjMFR/s1600/27-+Screenshot-42.png" width="640" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Angelo is my boyfriend." I blurted.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I don't remember what I was expecting my mother's reaction would be. Catherine was not dramatic, so nothing tragic would come from her -- she wouldn't cry, scream, try to hit me nor leave the room. But who knows from what depth come people's reactions in stressful moments?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Catherine's reaction was funny, and unexpected. She went blank. For a whole minute or so, it seemed like she was absent. She froze in a gesture, her eyes lost their focus, and it was clear her mind was wandering elsewhere, as if she had left the room. Had she retreated because of the shock of my revelation? Was she perplexed? What must she be thinking? What were her feelings? </span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhycQH7edymmXUUZdsARsyIMJGfz0_4FpMOCX74Bz1BWwXS7vAJ2DpkdJGuwvmwVmiWbt2nk7OlmNhl2jkh2WkXd-i_FTgMYsfLGv-FSj-hs5GRJxnLBUNCPC1XoaDPKTURZgzUD9q_0_Zt/s1600/28-+liq+night+Screenshot-194.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="398" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhycQH7edymmXUUZdsARsyIMJGfz0_4FpMOCX74Bz1BWwXS7vAJ2DpkdJGuwvmwVmiWbt2nk7OlmNhl2jkh2WkXd-i_FTgMYsfLGv-FSj-hs5GRJxnLBUNCPC1XoaDPKTURZgzUD9q_0_Zt/s1600/28-+liq+night+Screenshot-194.png" width="640" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The logs burning in my uncle's cottage in Sweden liberated a very fine smell, and reminded me of how I had waited in agony, while listening to the crackling and watching that other fireplace in the living room of our house in rural France, twenty years ago, for what seemed like the longest minute of my life. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">How young, how fragile, how fearful I had been!</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiK58Wox7H5m_Mw0TgJRhc-xx3QLs24bLZCnjF0BcWXkEpMZNjC6msPhf_THpzbPY2NzvHAk2TWYyf7ct-i_FzRWNLwP95yE5GVXGM9dAP9fyHwsZM_-VIeo9_ZkFiXyPXeaelCLCwtKWvd/s1600/29-+Screenshot-40.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="398" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiK58Wox7H5m_Mw0TgJRhc-xx3QLs24bLZCnjF0BcWXkEpMZNjC6msPhf_THpzbPY2NzvHAk2TWYyf7ct-i_FzRWNLwP95yE5GVXGM9dAP9fyHwsZM_-VIeo9_ZkFiXyPXeaelCLCwtKWvd/s1600/29-+Screenshot-40.png" width="640" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Are you telling me..." Catherine finally blinked, her presence slowly returning to our cozy living room. "Are you telling me that you are gay, <i>mon cher</i>?" She wasn't upset; she sounded curious.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I am. I am sorry, mom. I..." I whined.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"No!" She exclaimed. "Don't be sorry, darling. There is no problem there. It is alright... It might..." For a few seconds, she went blank again, "It might bring you some difficulties in life, I guess, but... It's perfectly fine with me!"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Oh, <i>maman</i>..." Of course, I got very emotional and started crying and hugged my mother and started sobbing... but stopped when I realized she was a bit concerned that I was wetting her shoulder and the fancy fur that adorned her designer's coat.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"It's alright, Laurent, it's alright..." As my mother patted me, I felt like laughing. Years of desperation and agony were ending right there. All the lies -- except one, that I would carry on my whole life through, and the secret it conceived --, they seemed now a futile effort, before my mother's smooth reaction to my coming out. All the worries, all the fear, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">all the deceit, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">all the anticipation, the shame, the guilt -- everything dissolved, at least for a few minutes, while I lay in my mother's arms. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Catherine was first and above all an intellectual -- and as long as she could <i>understand</i> something, she could cope with it. My best guess is that her immediate reaction was to rationalize my coming out so that she could deal with it. And that's why it had been so smooth, almost like a celebration between my mother and me. With my boyfriend right there to witness my incredible luck. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And for a little while, I was appalled. School, society, religion and all the rest of the fuckers and bigots would again step in and try to reduce me to misery for the rest of my life, but for a moment, with my mother, I felt free.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I am happy for you boys!" She hugged Angelo, too, who had been watching everything in dismay. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">He had tried to rehearse my coming out with me, but the fact is I did not know what I was going to say until the moment the words actually sprang out. Angelo was pissed off that I had come out through him -- but in fact, it was very skillful of me to include him in my statement. It immediately turned us into <i>official</i> boyfriends, at least before Catherine's eyes. It made her think Angelo was also gay. And because she thought that we were thus going to support and protect one another, she started treating him with </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">even </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">more care and consideration. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Angelo, of course, realized he had fallen in my trap, but he was flattered with the renewed importance Catherine gave him -- and with the years, he would turn the position of being my <i>official</i> boyfriend to his own benefit.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">From that day on, Angelo stopped fighting our relationship. He must have come to the conclusion that being my boyfriend was as good or as bad as being anybody else's. Specially when <i>there was no one around</i>. "<i>I only stick with you because there are no others... You are all I need</i>..." How could I forget it?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But I knew my mission was not over yet.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Mom. There is something else..."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"<i>Mon Dieu</i>, Laurent! You could have at least invited me to sit, don't you think, <i>mon cher</i>?" She giggled.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I thought you were in a hurry, mom..." I tried to apologize. Even in the most dramatic moments, Catherine was trying to educate me.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"What gave you that idea, Laurent? Anyways, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">it's nothing bad, is it? I don't think I can take in much more today..."</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> Catherine was fanning herself. Maybe we had been standing too close to the fireplace, and she was too warm in her tweed coat. "</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Too many emotions, do you understand, dear?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"No, this is good!" I breathed deeply, "Can Angelo live here with us?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I heard Angelo gasp and next, Catherine froze again, her eyes losing their focus. What was she thinking? Where had she gone?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"By <i>live</i> here with us... You mean, move in with us?" Catherine then turned towards Angelo. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Before she said anything, he blurted out, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I know nothing about this, Catherine!" -- he had quit calling her Miss Mortinné. At her own request, done rather humorously, unlike Celeste, who had screamed at me when I called her 'grandma'.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I did not understand why Angelo lied to my mother, when he should have backed me. Later, he said he felt like punching me, for he had never seen anyone so unskillful with words. "<i>Why, when I have tried to help you with that, Laurent</i>? <i>You're so arrogant sometimes</i>! <i>It's just because your mother is such an intelligent person that your words did not lead us into a catastrophe</i>!"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Angelo has a father." Catherine pondered, "I will have to talk to him about that first. But even before that, let me think some more. Angelo, what do you think about that? You seemed to be as surprised as I am..." And only when Angelo had said quite nonchalant that it was "okay" with him, Catherine decided to give it some more thinking. "I don't know, boys... This is totally unexpected! I can't answer it right now. And I really have to go... I'd better go, just before you have something else to tell me, <i>mon cher</i>!" She giggled. "<i>Mon Dieu</i>! I'm late for theater! Bye darlings, and behave well!" She headed to the door, but just before walking out, she glanced in our direction. "Boyfriends, are you? This house is going fall!"</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> Again she laughed, a bit nervously, and by the way she looked at us, maybe she was thinking for the first time of all the things we had been doing in her absence. Sex, a lot of sex indeed. Then she blinked, and off she went.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We would still have plenty of time to convince Catherine about Angelo moving in. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And when we finally did, we celebrated it as if we had been admitted to Heaven.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Little did we know that the flames of hell had just started burning.</span></div>
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<i><b>Author's note:</b> having been </i><i>imported from a former version of the story, </i><i>some of the comments below are dated previous to this post. Once the plot has not been altered, just the pagination, I am keeping them since they are very dear and precious to me.</i></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10000213495439627694noreply@blogger.com2Sweden60.128161000000013 18.64350100000001544.530202500000016 -22.665092999999985 75.72611950000001 59.952095000000014tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8991339675338164589.post-54489927615679751002015-02-26T11:42:00.000-08:002015-04-27T06:32:26.134-07:00Episode 04-II | I'm not gay<br />
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<i>nudity and sex</i></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><span style="font-size: x-large;"><i>The night </i>on the island </span></b>grew to a cold statement of silence and solitude. Twisting and turning like acrobats, the last autumn leaves passed by the window next to my bed, blown by the wind. A few would hit the glass and flutter against it for a few moments, before taking flight again. I could hear wavelets hit the shore, as the sea, starting no more than ten meters from the front door, was increasingly rippling. Inside the old cottage, though, it remained cozy and warm. The crisp and snapping sounds of the logs crackling in the fireplace, and the sweet scent they liberated, would have been enough to keep me awake -- but there was something else burning in me, now.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I had avoided thinking of Angelo for almost a decade -- but running away from a shadow hadn't helped me get rid of it. The insight I had had at a retreat was clear -- I would only heal if I faced my illness. The illness named Angelo, a high fever with delectable deliriums that had carried me through eight years. And the end of that fever, when Angelo had dumped me without further explanations other than that he had a woman -- and she was pregnant, I'd later find out --, hadn't brought any healing. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">On the opposite, that's when suffering had begun, a suffering so great that I had to pass it on to other men.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I hadn't been ready -- nor willing -- to face my suffering before. When I tried, I had been dragged by my sorrows like quick sand. But Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh had answered my question about how to heal years of suffering by sweetly saying that, if I was to enter the dark cave of my sufferings, I should first light the torch of my mindfulness. Otherwise, I would get lost in the darkness. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Being aware of my own feelings but not succumbing to nor being burdened by them was the first step to heal -- the torch of mindfulness represented that. <i>Feel to heal</i>, instead of kill to heal. With that torch in hand, I would be able to wander in the cave of my sufferings without falling into holes or traps, peacefully noticing and avoiding them. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And my uncle Armand, whom I knew was a dedicated practitioner of meditation, seemed to be giving me that precious opportunity of silence and isolation -- and the gift of having nothing to do and nowhere to go -- so that I could confront what needed to be confronted. Peacefully confront it all.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Angelo's bold love declaration at the table would have accelerated everything -- but when I became responsible for our approximation, it went really slow.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I guess one of the obstacles was that things were happening in my house. I mean, Angelo was always stunning at the fact that we would spend our weekends away from any adults, but I could not share his joyful sense of freedom.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That house had separated me from the sea. In that house, I had lost my father. In that house, I had come back from school terrified, after having been ambushed in the toilets, and daily dragged to the back of the school to pay my tool -- in that house, I had hidden from my parents about being mocked, beaten, humiliated. In that house, I had lied to my parents about the bruises and the watch I had to sell to collect money to pay my bullies, when I could not longer find small change to steal from Carlo's wallet and Catherine's purse. And all the Belgian chocolate I had not eaten, but used to save my own skin. And even if that time was past, at fifteen I still feared it could revive. In that house, I had come back from the country club burdened with shame, filling dirty and guilty, and I had lied to Catherine about the reasons why I wanted to quit the swim team. In that house, I had entertained suicidal thoughts, I held fear as my only constant companion, and I had practiced being a liar and an impostor about my sexuality.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgamDlWY8rc859j89tai9Hsh1t4XSB6_T0t1C1cAzaB64pSGum8jpKByG-DHEYcfILhKQHY4XryltMR7mgJnZvr6AhuhtKWT9H3IRjW12FghYMv9x5MaFLA28evy30N6HvVq-FN3ojexwlz/s1600/05-+liq+Screenshot-153+copy.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgamDlWY8rc859j89tai9Hsh1t4XSB6_T0t1C1cAzaB64pSGum8jpKByG-DHEYcfILhKQHY4XryltMR7mgJnZvr6AhuhtKWT9H3IRjW12FghYMv9x5MaFLA28evy30N6HvVq-FN3ojexwlz/s1600/05-+liq+Screenshot-153+copy.png" height="398" width="640" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Angelo was unaware of all that, and I wasn't willing to share any of it with him.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Ours was a happy friendship, and I don't think my friend would have been pleased to hear about all the suffering I had gone through. I had suffered on my own and I would continue to do so. But now there was Angelo as an antidote, listening loud to American songs and making me sing and dance along, impersonating characters from a few popular American sitcoms broadcasted in France, whom I'd have to guess -- and to my greater joy, there was Angelo being utterly handsome and sexy, running around in his briefs and sleeping naked -- The Hottest Boy in School only to myself.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghjqeRMwxw05Ctzi5d2qdPHgyDKCM0GneL1eKHasx_XQATXHJAbqGaXrB38H_J2TQAVG0Kbn5uQMG4HNLjI7r-ymvV5s6kwvfr0JleUaHwBUfr6QtSNAGJKJuW0Oks5VN08M9wZRJB21uL/s1600/06-+hq+liq+Screenshot-136.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghjqeRMwxw05Ctzi5d2qdPHgyDKCM0GneL1eKHasx_XQATXHJAbqGaXrB38H_J2TQAVG0Kbn5uQMG4HNLjI7r-ymvV5s6kwvfr0JleUaHwBUfr6QtSNAGJKJuW0Oks5VN08M9wZRJB21uL/s1600/06-+hq+liq+Screenshot-136.png" height="398" width="640" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">To add to the anxiety I usually experimented at my house, there was the sexual tension of two 15 years old horny boys who, I feared, had lost their chance to come out to one another -- and the poking games that we played at the bus prolonged into our weekends.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But all that </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">accumulated </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">strain and stimulation, as if it were water, was to overflow one afternoon at "The Sources", our beautiful hideaway and our private garden of Eden.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Come on, Laurent. The water is not cold!" Angelo teased me. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I knew the water was incredibly cold, springing from among rocks under the trees like it did. Being a tropical boy, I preferred to stay in the sun, watching Angelo bathe. I was still amazed that I could watch and marvel at the body and face of such a beautiful boy so openly. Angelo was aware that I was constantly checking on him, and he seemed to enjoy it. Every chance I had, I would gladly sit as his audience. With the secret fear that something or someone would take him away from me, I just enjoyed watching him, specially at the Sources where he was only in his trunks -- until the moment he would drag me into the water and move me around at his own will, holding me tight by the waist. It was a bit humiliating, but I didn't care since I loved being held tight in his arms.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Angelo owned our place. He would jump from the rocks into the pools, but I refrained, fearing accidents. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Come on, Laurent. We know where the water is not shallow. Come on, don't be such a coward!"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The only pool I wasn't afraid of was 'The Swirl Pool', as we had named it. We could never understand nor explain it, but at the center of that pool, which seemed to be the deepest, there was a swirl strong enough to drag us both into it, and make us spin around. Angelo pondered that the swirl might come from a fissure in the ground, and though we never actually saw it, because the bottom was dark, he thought it was the only dangerous place to dive. But I was so confident about my swimming skills that had turned me into a junior champion and had some people predicting that I was destined to be an Olympian. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Angelo was always tense when I got into 'The Swirl Pool'.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWUJQ8LqqAiw3df3JTqaOKt6KI8rMe8WMts7KBk2cephFdcCI9D17zC9S1qUtpeIGtdmNQi5Eiwfhi5o8GDqWRphjwZd7XM6mudb5T9N3O2HxuDTIRi9VRds08kii5LdQ3O3ttRRiwK92c/s1600/08-+hqliq+Screenshot-145.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWUJQ8LqqAiw3df3JTqaOKt6KI8rMe8WMts7KBk2cephFdcCI9D17zC9S1qUtpeIGtdmNQi5Eiwfhi5o8GDqWRphjwZd7XM6mudb5T9N3O2HxuDTIRi9VRds08kii5LdQ3O3ttRRiwK92c/s1600/08-+hqliq+Screenshot-145.png" height="398" width="640" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Why do you have to do that, Laurent? Don't be a jerk! Were you one of those kids who would spin in the washing machine?" He tried to stop me.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It might have been really dangerous, but I missed the club. I missed swimming for many hours and training hard everyday. I missed my aborted career. Risking myself was the redemption of my personal failure. Whenever the swirl was about to drag me to the bottom, I swam as fast and vigorously I could to escape its force. A symbol of my own adolescence and the suicidal thoughts I had avoided? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And that's how my cowardice diminished at Angelo's eyes. I did not enjoy the cold water, I did not like jumping from slippery rocks, and did not want to linger in the pools after sunset, when animals seemed to take over the place -- but I wasn't afraid of the swirl. Clearly, Angelo had to down rate my bravery, saying it was foolish. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"And don't you think I'm jumping into the water if you are drowning, Laurent. No one could save you from that swirl, and I'm not going to try!" Angelo threatened me. Yet, I always felt he would risk his own life to save me. Though maybe, in face of how our relationship ended, it might have been just wishful thinking from my part, as the teenager in love I was. Because no, now I think he would not have... saved me.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"What do I do with you, Laurent?" He asked one afternoon, when again I refused to stay in the pools after the sun had gone down.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I loved watching the sun set, and how the landscape was bathed in a beautiful golden light that somehow reminded me of Punaouilo, rather than go on with our water wars.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"What do I do with you, Angelo?" I had answered back, defiantly.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That's when Angelo approached me, and asked "What do we do with each other, then?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> He had the answer. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">He kissed me.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Our first kiss did not last longer than a few seconds, because I startled at some noise near us.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"No one comes here, Laurent. Come on, what are you afraid of?" Angelo was breathless, and eagerly seeking for my lips.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Our second kiss lasted some good minutes, until Angelo and I exploded inside our shorts from rubbing our bodies against each other. We collapsed, with Angelo on top of me.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">For days, we just kissed, pretending everything was normal and we remained just best mates -- who would also kiss. Neither Angelo nor I could take the next step -- but after a couple of weeks, while we kissed we started actually touching the other with yearning, skilled hands.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Again, we remained some time at that stage -- kissing and mutual masturbation. Time enough to neglect our studies. On weekends, we wouldn't even open our books -- we undressed instead, and spent long hours edging, in what seemed the natural development of the poking games we played at the bus. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It was a beautiful period of intimacy, as Angelo and I lost our inhibitions and, next, were going down on one another. To prolong our pleasure, we dissolved the sexual tension with laughter, and sometimes engaged in crazy itchy duels that reduced us both to tears -- while some other times we just wanted to explode as fast as our horniness demanded.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Then I failed my first test, and Angelo failed it too. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">He proposed that we hide it from our parents, and just study harder to recover. But I had never hidden anything </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">about my education</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> from Catherine. Having hidden already too many intimate things from her, I showed her the lowest grade I ever got in my years at school.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"<i>Mérde</i>!" She was off white, when she told me I wouldn't be seeing Angelo on the weekends anymore until I again excelled at school. It worsened when I got low grades on another two tests from that same period, and Catherine grew very strict on me.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I'm very disappointed with you, Laurent! I have trusted you, and you have betrayed that trust!"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> I cried when I heard Catherine bitterly expressing her disappointment, and my heart sank twice as deep when I saw I was losing my mother and Angelo at the same time.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In school, he and I no longer sat together -- we had been separated because of our constant chit chat. We didn't see much of each other for a couple of weeks -- Angelo was occupied with a group that wanted to include new sports and even have a gymnasium </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">built</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> in our school, and he hadn't much free time to spend with me. His father wasn't as strict as Catherine about grades, but Angelo himself decided we had to do better in school -- not because he cared about his education, but because he wanted to graduate in just the right amount of time.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"You know, it's like... I don't want to waste any day longer than necessary in this fucking hole, Laurent!"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I was in agony during our separation, but my torment increased one school break when he asked </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Have you ever kissed a girl, Laurent?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"No, of course not!" I shrieked, "I have only kissed..." I lowered my voice, so that no one in the patio could hear, "...you."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Don't you want to kiss a girl, Laurent?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">To be quite sincere, I hadn't approached nor been approached by any girls yet. Opposite to Angelo, who had his own fan club of girls who were constantly flirting with him.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Because I think I want to kiss a girl. And I think I want to kiss a girl today!" Angelo sprang to his feet. "Who do you think it should be, Laurent? You can come with me. I'll ask her to kiss us both." When he swayed his body in the direction of the other students, Angelo had instinctively bit his lips to make them redder. He broadened his chest, his eyes were flashing blue, and even his nostril dilated, and were trembling. It was the first occasion I observed Angelo getting ready to attack -- but not the last time, in our joint life.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">At that moment, I couldn't fathom why Angelo announced that to me. Why did he want me to watch him kissing a girl? As far as I knew, he could have kissed many girls already -- there were plenty throwing themselves at him. Only years later, already in Vice City, when he told me he was having sex with other guys, did he give me his reason for that.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Don't you think it is exciting, Laurent? When you enter me, and other guys have been there before?" But that's way ahead in years, when Angelo moaned in sheer pleasure while I was so disheartened and disgusted.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I'm just mentioning this because it might have been the same ground for him coming to me after he had kissed a girl in the patio -- one of those that, just like him, kept being elected The Hottest in School, and that everyone thought was the perfect match for Angelo --, and trying to kiss me.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"You know, it feels exactly the same. Just another kiss." Yet, I had noticed how he had grabbed her butt and tits, and how she hadn't resisted him. "But she is such a sissy, and I don't like her perfume. And I had never noticed before... You know, it's like... her arms are hairier than yours!" He grimaced. "</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And her skin is not as smooth as yours...</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> Kiss me now, Laurent. I want to be sure that your lips feel so much better."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I hadn't wanted to kiss him, not when he still smelled to that girl's perfume. But I wouldn't want to contradict Angelo and risk losing him either. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That's when I understood I would have to act it out with him, were I ready or not to lose my virginity.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It was hard to convince Catherine that Angelo would help me with my studies more than not, but maybe because she had her own errands on that weekend, she agreed to it.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Just like our first kiss, our first time was at "The Sources", on a beautiful afternoon. We weren't ready for that next step, and with our forced separation we had lost all the intimacy cultivated in our long mutual masturbation sessions. First, Angelo tried to penetrate me -- and I might have warned him it wouldn't work out that way, but I thought he might as well try. I tensed, and though he was comparatively small, he simply wouldn't break in. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">For a second, as we exchanged positions and I placed myself behind Angelo, the thought that I might have Aids crossed my mind. But I pushed it away like I would do with my suicidal thoughts, and the fear of never seeing my father again. Then, I slipped into him -- and I almost at once withdrew, when he started laughing. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"No..." Angelo moaned, as he drew me tighter against his body, "Don't stop now, Laurent... This is... just awesome!" </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Only a couple of years later would Angelo be able to explain why he often burst laughing as I penetrated him.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"It's like... My legs all spread, as I open to you... And in doing this I'm doing what most men think is shameful... You know... I know I can actually do this... Offer myself to you... And it's soooo liberating! To be fucked, I mean. Gosh, I feel so free!" </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It was truly a privilege that our first time, and the subsequent times, were at 'The Sources'. Our sex did not seem wrong nor forbidden to us, once we were doing it in the open air, surrounded by nature, in a beautiful environment, under the day light. It was all so pretty and natural, in accordance to our budding love.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> "Oh... You're sooo fucking big! Ah!" Angelo was a moaner, which turned me on. "You make me feel sooo free, Laurent... Now <i>melt</i> me!" At each of my thrusts, Angelo moaned and seemed to languidly melt in my arms, and thus in our private language we referred to sex as "<i>melting</i>".</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And that's what sex for Angelo was -- his daily dose of freedom. He felt liberated and sexy. He mentioned he felt manlier, too, because I was big and he felt brave for taking me up to the hilt. And with times, he was to grow increasingly addicted to his freedom -- sex --, and I would not be able to thoroughly satisfy him, not in the variety of sizes and shapes he wanted to have. But that came later, when we went abroad.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Having sex and with good grades, we glided across our first year together at school. Angelo had his birthday in December, and we celebrated it, just the two of us. Catherine was away, again teaching in Belgium, I think, and dining with his father had sufficed as a family celebration for Angelo.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Since it was his birthday, Angelo had chosen the menu -- every type of junk food coming from the US, among them a few packages of snacks and biscuits Catherine had bought at the airport, as my gift for my boyfriend. </span></span><br />
<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span><span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Actually no. That night, when I toasted for him, I found out Angelo did not want me as his boyfriend.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"We are not boyfriends, Laurent." Angelo declared, after we had the celebratory love making session for his birthday.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Then what are we?" it took me almost a minute to retort. I was shocked. We had been kissing and fucking for almost six months, and that made us what?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Friends with benefits!" Angelo said it in English, and it took me a while to grasp what the term meant. I was so dumbfounded that he tried amending it. "Best friends with benefits! Best friends forever with benefits! BFFB! Do you like that? They have that a lot, in the US."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The US was Angelo's monomania, and his reverie. If his mother hadn't died, Angelo was sure that he would have convinced her to stay in America. The happily ever after that had never arrived for him.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"You gonna love it there, Laurent! Don't you say you like hot weather? Well, it is always hot in Vice City. It's like... Veeeery hot! Sultry even! Have I taught you that word already? Sultry! And don't you say you miss the sea? There are so many beaches in that town! It's amazing! You gonna love it! And there are huge supermarkets and shopping centers! The cars are huge, too! Everything is king size! We are going to live like kings, you'll see! Even when we order a Coke, it's king size!" He had laughed happily. Talking about the US and remembering the two years he had spent there put Angelo in the best, smoothest of moods.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I'm not sure why Angelo assumed right from the start that I was going to live in the US with him -- or that he would actually immigrate, for that matter</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">. I tried to listen attentively to everything he said and explained about the country, but I wasn't neither enthusiastic nor convinced that I would like it there. I just didn't want to let him down, and risk losing his friendship, that was based a lot on the things we shared -- he shared -- about 'America'. I thought of America much more as South America, and the Carnival and beaches in Brazil. I couldn't help being the tropical boy I was at soul.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But when another year </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">at school </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">began, Angelo did start behaving more like my boyfriend. </span><br />
<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span><span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Not that we would kiss in public. Nor even hold hands. That would have been too bold in a rural community. </span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But he did not hide the fact that our intimacy was greater than the usual between two boys, in the way he embraced me from behind, placing his chin on my shoulder, our ears touching. When he was feeling bold, he would capture me in his embrace for the whole duration of the break -- though I was the one trying desperately to hide my erection, since his was hidden, pressed against my butt. Angelo enjoyed teasing me, and wanted to shock the other students.</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">During the vacations, he had lost part of his popularity. Away from his presence that radiated authority, far from his charisma that enveloped people like an aura, and without seeing his beauty that instilled desire, some students had come to the conclusion that Angelo was an arrogant, overrated brat. He started having haters and detractors -- but his fan club still outnumbered them.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Some people mocked us, and I was so afraid that I would slip back into the dreaded times when I had suffered bullying. I had never had haters like Angelo -- most people just despised me and wanted to make fun of me; my active bullies were very few -- and I feared it would be even worse than before.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But Angelo confronted them all. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"It's okay to be gay, Laurent. You're gay, aren't you?" Angelo had inquired, quite nonchalant, when he realized what my main social insecurity derived from.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Aren't you?!?" I retorted, in dismay.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Only when we fuck, Laurent." He shrugged. "No, I don't think I'm gay. It's like... I don't like Madonna... Or Cher."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"But they are all American, aren't they?" I retorted, but Angelo just shrugged again. "And I don't like them either!" Angelo didn't seem to care about my musical preferences, that were more inclined to Brit Pop. "Then what are you, Angelo?!?" What then, when he had been taking it from me for almost a year?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I'm bi, Laurent."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"How do you know that? Have you ever done it to a girl?" I felt like fainting.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"No. Not yet. But I might. And I'll let you know when I feel like trying it, if you want to try it with me..."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I don't want to try anything with any girl!" I shrieked.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">'Well, you see? That's the difference between us. It's like... I love it when you <i>melt</i> me, Laurent, but that doesn't make me gay."</span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10000213495439627694noreply@blogger.com0France46.227638 2.213749000000007134.9722085 -18.440547999999993 57.4830675 22.868046000000007tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8991339675338164589.post-52844165143945349892015-02-19T04:10:00.000-08:002015-04-27T06:32:00.137-07:00Episode 03-II | Angelo<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><i><span style="font-size: x-large;">In five minutes,</span></i></b> we reached the opposite shore, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">where Armand pointed his house standing on a deserted corner -- but instead, he took me to an old cottage sitting before a small bay of placid waters, near the only tree grove on the whole island.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"This is where I lived, when I first arrived on this island, many years ago. The house I now occupy was in ruins then, having been damaged by a fierce storm. And while restoring it, I stayed in this cottage, that belonged to the first settlers. It is cozy, indeed, just like you said it before."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The cottage stood some five hundred meters apart from the main house, that could not be spotted behind the trees. I confess I was a bit disappointed that I was going to be staying away from my uncle. At the same time, I understood that he wanted to keep his privacy, and I humbly accepted whatever kind of hospitality he had to offer me. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I am sure you are going to enjoy staying here, Laurent, instead of sharing a room with me... and my snoring. I am pretty sure you won't be bothered by it from this distance, ha-ha!" Armand laughed wholeheartedly, a bit like a child or like only Buddhist monks could. "Of course, you are joining me at the other house so that we can have our meals together. Tonight I should dine at seven, which allows you almost two hours to settle and rest a little bit. I suppose it's been a long trip for you. At the same time, feel free to turn in early if you need to. If you don't show up by seven, I'll understand it. Then we will have breakfast together, tomorrow, how about that? I could bring more food over to the cottage, if that sounds like a good idea to you."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And with that, we parted. I thought I hadn't misunderstood my uncle's message -- he wasn't really expecting me to join him that evening. Nor even wanting it to happen, it seemed. The cottage was equipped with a small refrigerator, he had explained, that he had filled with fresh food just that morning.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"There is a small bowl with yogurt that I've made myself, Laurent. Will you please start with that, if hunger you may feel? I'm sure you are going to appreciate it, and it should taste better today."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When left on my own, I realized how tired I was. I had started over twenty four hours ago, driving from Samsara Heights to the LAX airport, and then the unbearably long flight to Stockholm, where I should have stayed at least one night, instead of heading straight to the port to catch an early ferry.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But I had been in Stockholm before, and I knew how easily I could fall into temptation in that town. Male top models seemed to be everywhere, working in museums and shops, and as guards, wall painters, repairmen, waiters. There was not one single place you'd enter and not stumble upon a gorgeous man. And I was really trying my best to disintoxicate from the unbridled sex life I had been leading until Gabriel -- and for that matter, trying to overcome him, too. For as hard as it was, I had the intention to keep my bed empty, until I found the meaning of true love.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I knew I needed time on my own, no matter how hard it was for me. But I hadn't expected to be left all alone like that, and though the prospect of solitude on that silent, isolated island did frighten me a little bit, I was willing to accept the improvised challenge proposed by my uncle.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I immediately felt at home. The cottage was just as big -- or just as small, if you wish -- as the bungalow we had occupied in Punaouilo, for the first eight years of my life. And it was stocked not only with healthy food, but also with a well curated small library that included poetry, short stories and novels by authors from all over the world. Specially some Swedish ones I had never heard of before. I could picture Armand carefully choosing the authors he wanted to offer to me -- like later he would confirm he had done, indeed.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And I was not just physically tired. I had finally arrived at my uncle's shores, after a quest of two years, and I was just starting to relax, as if something had been achieved. But the story on how the Île du Blanchomme, the island of my true conception -- opposed to the tale I had always heard on how my parents had met in a chic resort in Punaouilo, where I had been born --, had been erased from the surface of the planet had deeply impacted me.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I still did not know to what extent, until I decided to actually skip dinner with Armand and turn in early, just like he had suggested. With a prayer of gratitude, that I might not have recited until the end, laying in a small, antique bed that hardly fitted me but was nevertheless comfortable, I drifted into my sleep and dreams.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I dreamed of Carlo. He was as young as he had been in Punaouilo, a gorgeous Italian hunk. But the dream was about the ocean as much as it was about my father. At first, all I could see was a great extension of blue water, gleaming like liquid jewel under the sun. The light was so strong that I could not discern the horizon -- maybe, in the dream, there was actually none. Sky and sea were both blue and made of the same element, that somehow mingled air and water. And I sensed him before I saw him, as my view zoomed on my father, swimming in those waters -- or maybe flying in that air -- of transcendental blue. He had just gone for a swim, like he often had on the Île du Blanchomme. But after what in the dream seemed like more than an hour that he kept on swimming, I understood my father was not exercising. He was lost. He had left the shores of the island, but now he couldn't find it again. And I knew why. He hadn't been caught by one of the treacherous currents. He had always been careful about them. No. While he was swimming, the Île du Blanchomme had been swallowed by an earthquake, and that's why he swan in all directions and wasn't able to find it. The island had forever disappeared. The thing is -- I knew it had vanished, but my father didn't. And there was no way I could let him know about it. And he just went on swimming, in all directions, back and forth, increasingly confused and lost. Weakening. But even if I could not communicate with him, still, in that awkward emotional and mental confusion typical of dreams, I was able to feel whatever he felt -- and his desperation was mine, his fatigue and pained body were mine, and in that vast ocean that no longer held any possibility of refuge for him, we both knew we were going to die by sinking and drowning, after we could no longer sustain ourselves on the surface of the water.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When I woke up, feeling breathless and sweating cold, I could not go back to sleep again. My mind was agitated, and the heart was pumping so hard that it actually ached, just like my muscles, as if I had been swimming too.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When I started meditating I had read a list, apparently by the Buddha himself and not some neuro-scientist, on what would improve in my life with meditation -- sleeping better was item number one. I had never had a problem with my sleep, but since the last retreat I was prone to nightmares. They had started during the retreat, and when I asked the master if there was a way to avoid them, he had simply said "<i>Awareness always increases. It goes forward. No, there is no way to stop it</i>."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I hadn't quite understood what the relation between my nightmares to meditation and awareness was, so now I simply had to face the fact that I was awake. The night had grown cold, and I lighted the fire. But eating from Armand's delicious yogurt and even trying reading a book -- Cormac McCarthy's "The Crossing", inspired in Fabrizio's words and my own moment -- didn't make me any more relaxed or sleepy.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I would need a few more years to figure out of that dream with Carlo, but the master's words about awareness started to make sense that same evening.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Angelo. I knew the time had come to finally face the harm he had done in my life. Carlo was right -- I had been trying to hurt other men because I had been hurt by Angelo. I had been screwing around with so many guys because Angelo had screwed around with so many of them while dating me. And I had tried to put a pathetic distance of men between him and me. Still, I hadn't been able to forget -- nor forgive -- him. And if I hadn't had any other serious relationship since him, it was because, deep in my heart, I was still in a relationship with him. No longer the bliss it used to be, now there was only sorrow left – no longer love, that had long ago turned into hatred -- but still in a relationship with him.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It still hurt to see a picture of Angelo. All those years, I had avoided watching his interviews program on the television, and I would switch the channel if by any chance he was the one being interviewed at a party or any other fancy social event like the Met Gala, where he was an habitué and a celebrated guest.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Angelo's beauty, enhanced by his charisma, had also taken him to the pages of many magazines -- and a few covers, even. Those were harder to avoid, as I glanced through them at the dentist's waiting room or at the airport bookshops. His image always delivered a blow right in my guts -- and it was even worse if he was in the company of Laura, his ever so perfect wife, with whom he had had two perfect children. Angelo was a model of male beauty, and he hardly wouldn't make it to those annual lists of the sexiest celebrities. Not the best dressed lists -- but he would be placed at the top of the best undressed.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And it had always been so, when in his first week of school he was voted the Hottest Boy. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZ-wDZf7MGdppwrek4n_lXiW3523h1RgHNZIubEmv4tW50EtencYDHepVNr9GuInHgwWv436jlyG6ZmRKL8VRXoeF6Ui3pgy4o0qvr9ixcM41F0J2WRPe3D_0ttb3cCEazzIcbt4EF_em8/s1600/12-+night+Screenshot-177.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZ-wDZf7MGdppwrek4n_lXiW3523h1RgHNZIubEmv4tW50EtencYDHepVNr9GuInHgwWv436jlyG6ZmRKL8VRXoeF6Ui3pgy4o0qvr9ixcM41F0J2WRPe3D_0ttb3cCEazzIcbt4EF_em8/s1600/12-+night+Screenshot-177.png" height="398" width="640" /></a></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I still remember the Sunday night Catherine came to me, just before bed, saying that someone from school had phoned.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Has there been any problem, <i>maman</i>?" My voice trembled and awfully modulated as I shivered.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Should there be any, Laurent?" Catherine inquired.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There shouldn't. But I was always afraid something was going to jump on me from somewhere. Maybe coming from the country club -- someone from the swim team had learned about my true reasons for quitting. And I recall being terrified at the possibility that I had caught Aids. What if someone had caught it from me, drinking from the same glass? I knew very little about it. I</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">n my teens the information about the disease was not so widespread yet, and trying to learn more about it could arise suspicion -- not so much about having Aids myself, but about being gay, which in my mind were inextricably connected. So I'd rather keep my anguish to myself, and live in despair. My sexuality was to remain hidden at all costs.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It were rather complex emotions that I experienced at that stage in my adolescence. If I had been asked to judge myself, I would undoubtedly have condemned fifteen years old Laurent -- to the punishment I was already receiving, which was living my own life, full of fear and lies. I reputed myself being guilty of all charges -- my sexuality was shameful, making me the justified and natural recipient of despise and hatred in society. And because I had to hide it to try to survive in that same society, I had become a daily liar, a great pretender, the worst impostor -- and that was another condemnation.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3ww0jJbiCcYsV-emLZlKg8YYaZoSLOc0Qt73HWKmAEHdeKJXysp0E9mIQ0o7L_UK05MRjBJKtYNET17HQVeUbJyHJi7TCF7Fa6tZiZt_xVzdyZv4uJehT2MFVOXrOzVb6R60PyvAlnBy6/s1600/13-+Screenshot-593.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg3ww0jJbiCcYsV-emLZlKg8YYaZoSLOc0Qt73HWKmAEHdeKJXysp0E9mIQ0o7L_UK05MRjBJKtYNET17HQVeUbJyHJi7TCF7Fa6tZiZt_xVzdyZv4uJehT2MFVOXrOzVb6R60PyvAlnBy6/s1600/13-+Screenshot-593.png" height="398" width="640" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"They have phoned because they want you to help an Italian boy that is joining your class. They want you to translate for him, at least for a few weeks. Do you think you can do that, Laurent?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"No! I don't speak Italian, <i>maman</i>! And I don't want to be anybody's translator... No!" I had whined at the prospect of attracting attention to myself through a new foreign student. Wasn't I foreign enough already? All I wanted at school was to be left alone, away and apart from the other kids. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I did not ask you if you wanted to do it, Laurent. I asked you if you feel you can do it. I have already agreed that you are going to help the boy. Even if I dislike the fact that you are going to speak Italian... Let's hope he doesn't speak some awful dialect like... Carlo did. Anyway, the boy starts tomorrow." </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Oh <i>maman, non</i>..." I wanted to protest, but I was afraid of contradicting Catherine. After giving me the marching orders, she sent me straight to bed. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"By the way. His name is Angelo."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Thus Angelo, in the year of 1990, entered my life on a Monday morning that would have been otherwise boring -- but that became unforgetable. I had thought of skipping school, but I knew Catherine wouldn't have bought any sickness from me.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEsy5i8CgMneLKXwQdZ7WqYcEWGo4fXqUdMXgwpJCtrB25lAz4kFfU3EPoQDKyxzS5QJ51PnkQTG4im3mHg9MFJsCZcHP-j0fKa6BhafGaWf4ZiAbe3elpQ8jcBkfz5YWZ6HwqDAqYG3oo/s1600/15-+Screenshot-10.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEsy5i8CgMneLKXwQdZ7WqYcEWGo4fXqUdMXgwpJCtrB25lAz4kFfU3EPoQDKyxzS5QJ51PnkQTG4im3mHg9MFJsCZcHP-j0fKa6BhafGaWf4ZiAbe3elpQ8jcBkfz5YWZ6HwqDAqYG3oo/s1600/15-+Screenshot-10.png" height="398" width="640" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I was stunned the moment he walked into the classroom. "<i>Angelo Vivace</i>", he confidently introduced himself , holding his gaze high and encompassing the whole room, before being told to occupy the place next to me. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I couldn't believe that such a beautiful boy was actually going to sit by my side... That I was going to have the opportunity to talk to him and to look at him from that close! I was used to glance at good looking boys with the corner of my eyes, and I was aware that I wouldn't otherwise have ever approached such a handsome boy. That very moment, as he took the chair next to mine, I felt so thankful for having learned a bit of Italian -- because I needed to communicate with my great-grandfather as much as I had wanted to chat to Fabio. But it was for a very brief moment only, that I thought of my first crush and the D'Allegro farm in the Apennines -- from the moment I had Angelo by my side I wouldn't want to leave his presence and escape the present moment any longer.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I started worshiping his beauty from that very first day -- and if I can't say it was love at first sight I felt for Angelo, it's only because I wouldn't have been so bold as to fall in love for the most beautiful boy I had ever met. I was aware of how ugly I looked, with my nerdy glasses, my awkward white hair and all the Belgian chocolate pimples across my face -- while, if a teenager could have had the most perfect skin ever, that was Angelo. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">His complexion was so pale -- he seemed to be made of marble. In a stunning contrast, his hair was shiny dark, as his eyebrows and the long, lush eyelashes were, too. He had rosy cheeks, and beautiful lips, that he kept constantly licking and biting, which increased the blood circulation and made their gorgeous red glow. But it were his eyes, of a light and clear blue, shining with piercing observation, that most impressed me. His tremendous beauty took my breath away, but it was in Angelo's eyes that I drowned. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Of course, I wasn't the only one to marvel at Angelo's ideal beauty.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Every once in a while, the girls would throw pools for the hottest boy and girl in the school, and in each class. There was a general award, and minor ones for specific parts of the body -- once, I had been voted for the most beautiful shoulders, probably as a result from swimming or simply as a joke.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That same week Angelo joined the school, the girls decided to vote. I think it might have been their way to officially welcome him -- and Angelo was awarded The Hottest Boy in School.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I was with him when the girls came to congratulate him. After all, I was his official translator -- a function I delighted in for it gave me the alibi to continuously stare at him, what otherwise would have been illicit.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"And what is the prize?" He had asked at once.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The girls were taken aghast. No one ever had asked for a prize. For them, it was pretty daring that a newcomer, and a foreigner, had been awarded on his first week at school. He had been noticed, he had beaten all the other boys that in other versions had won. Wasn't it grand enough?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"The prize is... that you were chosen The Hottest Boy in the School!!!" They giggled.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Angelo had laughed.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I know that, already! I don't need you to tell me! Do you think I don't have a mirror at home?" Angelo lifted his eyebrows, and then bit and lick his lips, doing the trick that made so many people declare he had the most irresistibly kissable lips they had ever seen. "Is that all?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The girls still looked at me in consternation, as if I must have translated something wrong, before fleeing our presence, feeling at once disappointed and insulted. I was concerned that they would plot against Angelo, and he would soon become a school castaway like me. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But he was so charismatic, and defiantly self confident, that his dismissal of the award hadn't sounded like a snobbery. From that day on, he was regarded as superior. He was to be invited to every group, his opinion asked about parties and other social events for the students. He refused all invitations to collaborate, and the more he dismissed them, the harder people fought to have his participation and approval. His presence became an honor and a prestige to be disputed. After my grandmother Celeste, Angelo was the diva I got to know better -- how he couldn't care less about thanking others for their worship and adoration. It seemed like he didn't give a shit about other people's opinion -- but just because he continuously manipulated them, and was certain of their loyalty to his fan club, no matter what.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The second week, he led a movement to improve the food offered at school. It was a common complaint that was heard over and over again -- but no one had ever done anything about it. Angelo was disgusted -- his father was a chef, he pointed out, and therefore he knew and was accustomed to the best food --, and with me as translator, he articulated with the student council a strike that emptied and paralyzed the cafeteria, until they not only improved the food but also lowered the prices. Quite an achievement for a fifteen year old newcomer. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Within one month, Angelo was known by all sorts of people in the school -- students, teachers, the management board, the principal himself, but also by the servants. He would chat to everyone, which according to him meant that he exchanged useless words with the only goal of building a social network, always with my aid as a translator -- but he would only <i>talk</i> to me. For no good reason unless that I was the one designated to help him, he had chosen me as his single friend and confidant.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Angelo wore an earring on his right ear. Everybody noticed it, but no one had ever mentioned nor commented it. People seemed to admire and respect him, but also fear him. Because he was haughty, evasive and slippery in his interactions, everyone at school -- and specially in our classroom -- seemed to avoid confronting him, or saying anything that could annoy him. I could not fathom how he had become so popular in such a short period of time.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Apart from a girl who ran a gossip-zine, I had been the only one to inquire about the earring. Like everybody else, I hadn't commented nor criticized it; I just wanted to know why he had chosen to wear it. It was a fairly big diamond, and I wondered if it was fake -- but of course, I never asked that.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"This gem has belonged to my mother. And before that, to her mother, and to her grandmother... Well, that kind of stuff, like... you know?" Angelo confided me, in a mixture of Italian, French and English that would become our official private language and that just the two of us would have understood. "It was a ring. She gave it to me, just before she died. I think she feared that my father would sell it after her death. And she wanted to keep it in the family. Even if she hadn't had a daughter to whom she could pass the ring on, she must have thought I'd give it to my wife... Maybe, one day." I remember my heart sank, along all my romantic fantasies about Angelo, when I heard him talking about marrying a girl. "But for now, I made an earring of it, and I pierced my ear... You now, like... I carry my mother all over with me now, do you understand?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I was touched. Angelo's mother had had a brain tumor. His father had tried every doctor in Italy, and then decided to move to America to try a well known specialist there. That's how Angelo had first been to Vice City, when he was eleven years old. For two years, while his mother underwent the proper surgeries and treatments, Angelo had been going to school and living the life of an American boy. And how he had loved it! But in 1988, the same year Carlo had left, his mother died. After all the expensive treatment that hadn't saved her, being left almost penniless, his father had returned to Europe with Angelo -- against his will. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">His father, who had never settled in America, wanted to start over and first tried to work in a restaurant in Rome. Just recently had he chosen to sell their house and open an Italian restaurant in France. He had searched for a locality that did not have one already, and that's how they had arrived at that part of the country -- and the reason why Angelo had joined my school.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That also explained a few other things about my friend, like his resistance to learn French. He did not intend to stay in Europe -- his dream was to return to America, and make a living there. His English was fluent already -- and fearing he would lose it, he tried to teach it to me so that we could practice together, instead of learning French from me. Because he had no whatsoever interest in France, and no intention to live in the country. His most constant subject was on how to emigrate to the US.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I was the only one to know that Angelo could already speak decent French after a couple of months. He had an immense talent for languages -- for anything that regarded communication, in fact. But to everybody else, he pretended to still need my help in understanding whatever was going on around him, and to communicate with people. But one day, during class, I saw him write a very complicated sentence on my notebook, indicating how good his French had already become. I don't remember what the sentence was about, but I was dumbfounded since I still believed he knew very little. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"<i>This is our little secret</i>", he had written, also in French, at the end of the sentence.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"It's also a way to help you communicate, Laurent!" He had declared, ironically. Keeping me as his translator, he thought he would be offering me more contact and visibility among the other students. But as Angelo's voice, I couldn't be more invisible. "You don't seem to enjoy the company of our colleagues very much, do you?" Angelo had already realized my tendency for isolation, that I had envised as a means of protection, and he actually enjoyed that I hadn't been '<i>contaminated by the environment</i>'. "Well, neither do I. Not these uptight rednecks, anyway. You should have seen the kids in America! They were so cool, Laurent! And they have all sorts of electronic devices there! Well, you know, this here feels like the Stone Age!" </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It was a very convenient secret, for both of us. For a while, we were allowed even to take tests together. I was supposed to explain the questions and texts to him, despite my rudimentary Italian, but of course we would profit from our proximity and even solve Math problems together. My grades increased in subjects like Physics and Chemistry, that were hardest to me, due to my collaboration with Angelo.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And that's how Catherine came to thoroughly approve of my friendship with him. She noticed how happier I had become, but my improved grades were determinant when I asked her if I could invite my friend over for a weekend. We had a paper to write -- that was my excuse to bring Angelo home. And Catherine gave her permission without any further questioning.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"So... You seem to like the Italian boy, don't you Laurent? He is your friend, isn't he?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"<i>Oui, maman</i>. We are very good friends."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I'm glad you've found someone, Laurent. I just hope that it is not some weird sort of Electra complex from your part..."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"What is that, mom?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Never mind, Laurent, never mind..." Catherine couldn't have known how right she was about the Electra complex; neither could I, since I did not know what it was. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Inviting someone over to study at your place is so cliché and such an old trick -- but I don't recall having any devious plans about that weekend with Angelo. Not even many expectations. He was the absolute star of our class, and many girls were flirting with him. Sissies, rednecks -- he despised them, but still encouraged them to fall for him and to join his fan club. I didn't think I stand a chance with my gorgeous friend, but I might have wished to take a peek of him naked in the shower.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Angelo was living with his father in a road motel. They shared the same room -- and only when he told me that, did I realize how precarious their financial situation was. I had already realized that some of Angelo's clothes looked a bit old, even raggedy -- but I thought it suited his intended Grunge style. They looked a bit small on him too -- and when I had guessed he liked them that way to show off his chest and bare his nipples and navel, I was later to find out that his father was not buying him any new clothes -- in a period of our life when we were steadily </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">growing</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Poor Angelo. I had also noticed that he could often smell bad. His sweat was acrid, but the odor was also in his clothes -- since his mother had been inhabiting hospitals, he was washing them himself, with cheap soap and in the sink, letting them dry wherever he could lay them, and rarely under the sun. Sadly, I think he was aware of his smell, because from that first weekend on, he would bring his clothes to be washed in our machine. I couldn't grasp how humiliating those things were for Angelo -- for this and many more reasons, he was so glad to be back in the routine of a home! Even if my home, with a missing father and an absent mother, had not much really of a routine on offer.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Our stories had many similarities and differences, though I was the only one to seem to notice them. He and I had been born in different years, but just a couple of months apart, he being the elder. We were both fifteen -- but so was almost everybody else in our classroom. A nice coincidence was that we were exactly the same height -- a plus, when you kiss someone. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I had explained to Angelo how my father had left home unexpectedly, without ever sending any news -- but to that he had only said "<i>okay, cool</i>". Angelo enjoyed talking about himself over listening to anybody else -- even me, or specially me. The only exception, yet to be raised, would be Catherine. But she had been away that first weekend, and did not meet Angelo until perhaps a month later.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> Although with his "<i>okay, cool</i>", Angelo was not simply dismissing my story. I was surprised when, after giving it some thought, he spoke his heart out.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I'd rather be like you, Laurent. You know, like... Having kept my mother, instead of my father. I mean, no. Well, he is like... cool." I was sometimes irritated when Angelo used American slang; in time, his efforts to sound like an American boy would fade. "But if I'd have to make a choice, do you understand?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I had never considered that. <i>If I had had a choice</i>? Despite all the anger and resentment I felt towards my father... The truth is, I'd have chosen to be with him! And of course, for the rest of my life, I'll deny I have said that. Because I have never said it, never! And I shouldn't have written it, either. It's just the way Angelo put things. Yes, Catherine was "cool". But if I could have chosen...</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It was a very emotional moment, for both of us, that Friday night after school, the first of many he would spend at my home -- later to become our home.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Angelo was absorbed by his own thoughts and recollections, and like he had been fumbling with a pen, he then reached over and touched my hand, and started playing with my fingers. He seemed distracted, and completely unaware that he was caressing me. I, instead, had become very self conscious, frozen to my chair, gasping for air, as I guiltily delighted in his touch.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I was afraid that, just like it had started, Angelo would again quit playing with my fingers and choose something else on the table. I was surely enjoying it, but because I was full of expectations, while at the same time having to deal with my lust on the rise and the corresponding shame, being afraid that at any moment he would realize what he was doing and stop it exclaiming "What the fuck?", I could not surrender to his touch. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But I realized he wasn't oblivious of my presence and caressing me in a reverie when he sprang from the chair and declared, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Laurent, you are the best friend I have ever had! I love you." He said, placing a hand over his heart. Did he bare a nipple on purpose too, to crown his gesture, or was it just the t-shirt a few sizes too small?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I did not answer. I just gulped, and smiled. And I didn't respond, either. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Now I know I should have stood up and hugged him, and perhaps it would have turned into a kiss -- but the erection in my shorts kept me from that. I was paralyzed. Angelo would always be more extravagant in manifesting his emotions, and at that very start of our relationship, the contrast was even greater. I was shy and uptight, while he was easy and out-going, all vibrant and radiant where I tried to be discreet and remain unnoticed. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">After that event, when Angelo had made his advance and I hadn't responded, he retreated and grew cold towards me. Just naturally so. He was hurt -- proportionally to the energy and courage he had invested in that love declaration. He was bold for a teenager, but not as bold as to be rejected once and insist and risk being rejected again. From that moment on, it was my sole responsibility to build our love relationship. It was also the only occasion I heard him say "I love you" -- for the rest of the years, it would be "Yeah, I love you too."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I don't blame Angelo for how things unfolded from that event on -- as if I had to beg for his friendship, and do everything I could to compensate that first rejection -- I blame myself. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I had to deliver constant proofs of my affection to him, of how important our friendship was to me, and to try to turn it into something more than that. In a sense, Angelo became my client -- and I had to deliver the best service to try to keep him satisfied and coming back for more -- more friendship, more affection, more approval, more worship, more love. He was demanding and to grow ever more demanding, when he realized what the power equation between us was.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But it was never a problem to get him to come to my house on weekends. Every Friday, he would board the public bus that headed towards my side of the county, delivering us about one kilometer down the road from my house.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> It was a ride full of adventures -- how our thighs would brush against the other's, or how one of our hands would carelessly find itself under the other's leg, or on top of the other's hand, our shoulders and forearms against each other's, and the wide range of subtle caresses enabled by those furtive contacts. We were both terrified that someone in the bus could realize our play, but at the same time, that made them the more exciting. I had huge, leaking erections -- and I guess so did Angelo. But we never talked about that, and still pretended that fondling was unintentional, done from a dreamy state and place we would readily deny if caught in public -- and also deny it to ourselves. Even when his fingers were running up and down my thigh, Angelo looked the other direction and pretended not to notice what he was doing to me. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And when we jumped off the bus, we would both run up the road to my house, trying to wear down our excitement, and ultimately subside our erections.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Nor was it difficult to have Catherine's approval to what became the weekend's ritual -- instead of returning to his father at the motel, Angelo caught that bus on Friday with me and yet another one on Monday mornings, back to school. He loved the freedom that we had at my house, and he always marveled at how my mother would leave me all on my own when she went abroad to teach. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But it was exactly Angelo's presence that made Catherine leave our home on weekends even when she was in France. Not that she disliked my friend -- knowing that I had company, she did not feel she had to worry about me anymore. "<i>I'm not sure whether two teenagers taking care of each other is more or less trouble, but... Let's give it a try</i>." And with that, Catherine was able to stay the weekends away -- when she was not in the process of writing, she loved going to the movies, visiting museums and libraries, shopping for fancy clothes -- happily leaving our rural house.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">My relationship with Angelo was partially built on his relationship with my mother. At first, I was jealous of their friendship. The first time they met, they connected already. They started talking about religion, that they both dreaded. My mother had never spoken to me like that -- as if I was her equal. Whenever Catherine and I engaged in a conversation, it seemed like she was explaining things to me, as if I could not understand them, until I actually saw it from her point of view, always more mature and deeper than mine. My mother was continuously educating me. And whenever Angelo and I engaged in a conversation, I felt that I had to surrender to his willful opinions and preferences and tastes, too, if I was to remain his best friend and preferred company. With me, Angelo would talk about all things America, and that's all -- I had never guessed he could know anything about "adult topics", and not so much that he could discuss them with my mother.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Or so I thought. I loved and admired Angelo so much that I couldn't conceive that anyone wouldn't be impressed with him too. Especially my mother. From my point of view, Angelo must have been brilliant to be making conversation to Catherine -- she who was used to writers, movie directors and all sorts of intellectuals. And she seemed to love talking to him. But it wasn't exactly so, at least not unreservedly.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Your friend is very well articulated. For a teenager, anyways." She said, with a grimace, and I understood she was being condescendingly patient with him, "And gosh, does he love to talk! No wonder you are a good match... You have always been a good listener, Laurent." Which was so true. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Angelo wanted to be a journalist, to have a program on TV, in America of course, and I was his first audience.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">My logic was that, because Angelo had had a good and loving mother for thirteen years, he knew how to access my own mother. Catherine seemed to be closer and nicer to my friend than she had ever been to me. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But later I understood that, because Angelo had loved his mother and been loved by her, he accessed Catherine as a person and woman -- more than once I saw him peeking at Catherine's legs --, and not as the mother. Because I was so insecure, and still unsure and begging for her love, I was always demanding from Catherine that she be solely my mother -- and I lost other sides of her, that Angelo had gained immediate access to. She didn't feel like educating him, and that's why they got along so nicely -- while I had turned my relationship with Catherine into a form of tortured slavery, a fixation with very determined roles. And perhaps, just like her mother had done to her, Catherine would like to be by my side like a sister, or a friend, and not necessarily and always as the mother.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There was a common interest between Catherine and Angelo that left me feeling jealous. It was a point of contact with me, too, but they developed a very close and intimate relationship all of their own about reading. And later on, about writing, too. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I never minded that Angelo peeked at my mother's legs -- they were long and slim, beautiful indeed -- nor at her breasts -- which were small but firm and with a strong presence, because Catherine always held her chest proudly. Catherine was growing prettier as she grew older, becoming more confident and developing her own style in fashion. And with time I came to think that having had so many men love her body, caress her, please her, had helped my mother keep her good shape and health at her 40th birthday.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But I was so jealous when Catherine let Angelo have a peek of her latest novel, before she even sent it to her editor. I know I had refused reading Catherine's drafts before, and Angelo never would -- but still, as her son, I felt that I deserved the privilege of being offered first, even if to politely turn it down, like I always had. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">At 15 years old, I had already lost the interest and showed no patience for Catherine's stories -- not the written ones, nor those she told when she was home, experimenting plots for her books. Angelo, instead, was an avid listener -- I guess Catherine was the only person that could silence my friend, and whom he would attentively listen to.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Like Catherine, Angelo was an eager reader. I’ll leave any interpretations about this coincidence to Freud. And when again I saw myself having to compete with books for the attention of my best friend, to become my boyfriend and lover for eight years, I decided to finally become a dedicated reader myself. But I never had Angelo's focus and concentration, and I was not able to read as fast as him, nor memorize entire passages in a single reading like he would. Even Catherine marveled at his skills.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"The boy has a real talent there." She had commented with me. And I had to wonder what my talents were, and if I had any. Not that my mother had ever mentioned one.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Angelo never turned down any book that Catherine lend him, and soon they shared a passion for Russian Literature -- or so I thought.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"It's so depressing. Always so heavy! Does the sun ever shine in Russia? Not in books, I guess. I don't understand why Catherine likes their Literature!" Angelo confided, one day. He had been reading it to become close to Catherine, but he would forever drop the Russians when we moved to Vice City. "And now she is talking about going to Russia... To live there, did she tell you?" And no, my mother hadn't told me anything about any plans of moving. Mr. Gorbachev had just imploded the whole Soviet and Communist blocks, and yet I could not understand Catherine's renewed interest in that part of the world. "Do you want to live in Russia, Laurent? Do they give passports there?" Angelo continued, ironically, "Maybe you won't even be allowed to visit me in the US. I will be on the enemy's side, ha-ha! No, I don't think you should go to Russia. Come to the US with me instead, Laurent."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Angelo had the drive for fame – and money --, and as much as it was a reason to want to emigrate to the United States, where people became "thoroughly and worldly famous", according to him, that was another reason to admire Catherine also. In my adolescence, Catherine was already a consistent author, with several bestsellers in a row. Her "<i>Deep in Winter, a Flower</i>" had made the list of Europe's top ten books the previous year -- and Angelo was hypnotized with the lessons Catherine gave him on writing, the activity he then picked as his way to fame, clearly inspired in my mother's.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"You have to find your original voice, Angelo." I just listened as Catherine gave my friend advice she had never given me, though I had been writing stories trying to capture her interest since I was a child. But again, I must have been aiming at my mother, and her approval and affection, while Angelo accessed the professional in her. "In the beginning, it is okay to emulate someone's voice. But not for too long. James Joyce and Guimarães Rosa were so great because they found their own voices, but you don't have to make up words like they did to find your own voice. Are you following, Angelo?" </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But what Angelo really wanted was a voice that would bring him big money. He had no literary aspirations. Being left penniless was a tragedy in his life as big as his mother’s death, which had caused their financial ruin. They had lived on his grandparents inheritance – a couple of famous Italian archaeologists -- from his father’s side. But even the last artifacts had been sold to pay for the medical expenses in the US, and for his father’s last try of opening up shop – the Italian restaurant in rural France that had brought Angelo to my side. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"There isn't any Italian restaurant in this part of the country because people don’t want one, I keep telling my father! I hope he doesn't ruin us entirely… I’ll need money to go to the US when this shitty school of us finishes…" Angelo was very unsure about his father’s financial support. Actually, he knew he was bound to take care of himself, and even of his father, too. "Do you think your mother will allow you to join me, Laurent?" Angelo’s campaign for me to follow him on his American adventure had already started, even before our love affair had, but we were still years away from the days of planning for Vice City, the town he wanted to return to.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"For now, try finding your literary voice, Angelo." Catherine had recommended.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I wonder how does money speak…" Angelo had later summarized his concerns in a comment, when Catherine had gone on her errands and we were on our own.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">My mother had never cared that much about my writings -- but to me, they were just a pastime and a means of attracting Catherine's attention, while to Angelo they were his professional future. The energy, commitment and effort we put into our stories was completely diverse. It probably showed in the quality of our texts. Catherine, at least, had noticed it clearly, and something else, too.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Are you jealous, Laurent?" She had inquired one day.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Of course not, <i>maman</i>." Of course <i>I was</i>.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Good. Because your friend needs attention, and our help. His mother has died not long ago, in the most terrible way. Did he tell you?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Of course he did, mom. After all he is <i>my</i> friend!" I retorted, giving way to my jealousy.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"<i>Bien sur</i>. Take good care of <i>your</i> friend then, Laurent."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It was not uncommon that Angelo and I went on our explorations of the fields carrying books. We could forget the drinkable water, but not the books.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Angelo loved the outdoors, and that was another reason to come to my house. I had been exploring the surroundings just because I couldn't stand being home, feeling the hollow left by Carlo's absence, and often enough, Catherine's absence too.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">While with Angelo, we explored beyond the limits I had already known. There was always the lake, a fifteen minutes run from my backyard, that became our territory. But further up a hill we came to a group of water sources springing from rocks that formed several small crystalline pools. Hidden in the midst of a grove of trees, they were shaded and the water very cool. There many flowers surrounding the pools, perfuming the atmosphere, and the constant humming of bees and the songs of birds were our soundtrack at what we named 'The Sources'.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">We turned it into our private paradise.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It was there, embraced by beauty, that we first kissed. It happened six months after Angelo and I had met. And that meant we were six months already into our romance that would last eight years. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But I did not know our relationship had an expiry date, and such a limited validity -- and I wouldn't have believed it back then, at an end, when I was a fifteen years old helplessly falling in love with my best friend, who corresponded to it.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I don't remember having believed in Santa Claus nor the Tooth Fairy. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But I did believe I was going to live my first love forever.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What a joke, what a pity.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">to read more about the Electra complex mentioned in this chapter, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electra_complex" target="_blank">click here.</a></span></div>
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<i style="text-align: center;"><b>Author's note:</b> having been </i><i style="text-align: center;">imported from a former version of the story, </i><i style="text-align: center;">some of the comments below are dated previous to this post. Once the plot has not been altered, just the pagination, I am keeping them since they are very dear and precious to me.</i>Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10000213495439627694noreply@blogger.com4Sweden60.128161000000013 18.64350100000001544.530202500000016 -22.665092999999985 75.72611950000001 59.952095000000014tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8991339675338164589.post-4452780502553001002015-02-12T05:47:00.001-08:002015-04-27T06:31:40.854-07:00Episode 02-II | Beneath the waves<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-large;"><b><i>Arriving</i></b> in Smögen,</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> I found out I had misread the transportation chart. I thought there was a regular boat going to Armand's island -- when there wasn't any. I'd have to depend on someone going that direction that day to be willing to take me along. The team at the small tourist office was very friendly and promptly engaged in finding someone heading that direction, yet, they still recommended that I do my own search at the port.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Smögen was a beautiful island, one of the most celebrated on the charming Swedish West Coast. But there was a general feeling of hangover after the high season had long withered away. I was able to find a lovely restaurant offering a gorgeous view, from where I watched the sky become a mass of grey clouds and the sea turn into liquid metal. It must have been fascinating shades of silver evolving right before my eyes, but as my own mood darkened, I missed the exquisite luminosity of the North Sea.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">While I wandered at the port, not sure if I was just waiting for a message from the tourist information to arrive on my mobile or an actual boat to pick me up, I could not help but recall how my father had seen himself stranded on an island he did not know the name, all alone, wondering whether his friend would come to rescue him or not -- that same friend who had turned to be my uncle. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I was sure Armand wasn't coming for me, since I had agreed on reaching his island on my own. I knew my situation was not as precarious as Carlo's had been -- this was Sweden and everybody spoke better English than I did, instead of the native language my father had barely understood when he arrived in the Indian Ocean. And I could afford a neat hotel if I had to spend the night in Smögen, before heading to Armand's island -- unlike my father, who had slept rough, feeling cold and hungry and afraid of the rats.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Of course, I hadn't told my parents about my visit to Armand. It was weird to be hiding things from them like a five years old child when I was thirty five. Yet, it was not that simple.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">First, I don't think they would have helped me reach my uncle. Catherine might even have complicated things. And trying on my own had been hard enough. It had taken me two years to get an appointment with him -- but somehow, I felt Armand had understood the personal nature of our meeting and had thus invited me as his guest to his private retreat, instead of scheduling me for a meeting at one of his offices around the world.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Second, my communication with my parents had never been very close, nor constant.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">After a twenty years gap, Carlo and I had reconnected and our friendship had been revived, yes -- but that didn't mean we were now intimate confidants. I tried to imagine how the sound of the telephone ringing could disrupt Carlo's tranquil and silent routine in the high mountains in central Italy, where he lived all on his own. He hadn't been randomly nicknamed 'The Hermit of the Brushes' by art critics. And though he had never mentioned it, I realized he usually started our conversations with some level of anxiety. It was as if my calls represented an emergency. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Carlo had always deciphered and perceived me without the need for words. Like when we had visited the Apennines together, and he had sensed my sexuality as I was falling in love for Fabio -- though not quite understanding it myself. Carlo knew me, intuitively, without the need for further elaborations. Privileges of being a father, perhaps? It had been a grand opportunity for both of us to have that long and clarifying conversation in Vice City -- but since then, we had gone back to our mute mode. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Having reestablished a direct connection to my father seemed to suffice. I knew I could count on him. But after two decades, I had </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">also </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">learned to live without him. His presence on the planet, or just knowing that I again dwell in his heart and thoughts, brought me enough comfort. I did not need to press on him for proofs of his love. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What had </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">naturally </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">developed in the relationship with my father turned into a struggle when it came to my mother.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Catherine had been a constant presence in my life -- as much as she had been a constant absence in my life, too. Since she had left me at the age of six behind in Punaouilo without any news, my insecurity about her feelings towards me had risen to uncontrolled levels. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In France, during my adolescence, she was often going abroad to teach. She would leave me alone for days, knowing that I would diligently perform my duties at school and in our rural home. I don't think that, lawfully, Catherine could have left me alone at the age of thirteen and fourteen, and been gone abroad for weeks. But it became a routine for a couple of years. She had been doing that when Carlo was there -- he would take care of me. And she kept doing it when he no longer was with us, expecting that I would take care of myself. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I should have enjoyed that unprecedented level of independence, and the demonstration of faith from a mother towards her teenager son -- but the truth is I feared that she would also leave me, just like Carlo had. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">An outcast in my mother's intellectual life, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I started surfing a wave of high anxiety the moment Catherine left for Belgium. I would even help her load the car with her luggage. One heavy bag contained mostly books, another lighter yet bigger one with designers clothes, a third one with shoes and accessories, and finally her oversize <i>necessaire</i> with creams and her signature perfume for that season. She must have been the best dressed teacher in Belgium, perhaps in whole Europe, I guessed, as I carried her luggage downstairs. She carried so much luggage that I always feared she was leaving home without telling me. She could spend months away, on her provision of books and clothes. Only when she returned home did I actually relax again, feeling I had once more crashed upon her shores.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Catherine would return each time with a dozen chocolate boxes for me. Belgians reputedly made the best chocolate, and once I had fought my bullies and did not have to 'share' it with them any longer, my problem became to have the correspondent best pimples ever.</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiB3U1NgCwXw1jox26EF0_hMuIU7-efFG1kqzbjyhTZB2MskFZrrJ0tvVMHFqPDiN_mYixyProaQO3zfa6xtjrg-w1TeOwQfvj0M6mEE-_ekr0BQzMZxUSUr1cnZx5bi3ykKGsoBptfouXI/s1600/33-+hq+LAU+SMO+Screenshot-261.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiB3U1NgCwXw1jox26EF0_hMuIU7-efFG1kqzbjyhTZB2MskFZrrJ0tvVMHFqPDiN_mYixyProaQO3zfa6xtjrg-w1TeOwQfvj0M6mEE-_ekr0BQzMZxUSUr1cnZx5bi3ykKGsoBptfouXI/s1600/33-+hq+LAU+SMO+Screenshot-261.png" height="398" width="640" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Once, Catherine had phoned me to say she would stay an extra week away. Instead of returning home, she would go directly to some congress in the Netherlands, and try to buy new clothes there.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"<i>Do you have enough food at home, Laurent</i>?" Since she couldn't cook and did not really care for food, we had a freezer that was larger than our refrigerator. From loafs of bread to portions of steak tartar, all food at home was either frozen or canned. Even fruits only existed in our home as preserves. "<i>You know you can always eat at the club, don't you, mon cher</i>? <i>And you know where to find money</i>? <i>You can call me in any emergency, do you understand</i>?" Which meant I should never call her unless it was tremendously important, and instead wait until she checked on me every four or five days. "<i>Are you going to be alright</i>?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I answered yes to all questions -- what else could I have said? She didn't allow me time to say anything else, firing her questions in a row. And I was thirteen years old -- just or already. No longer I was a child to beg "<i>Maman, maman</i>, <i>please come home... I am afraid to stay alone in this isolated house,</i> <i>maman</i>" But it was often true, specially in the evenings, when the fields around were utterly dark. Wouldn't it have been ridiculous of me, though, to wimp and implore for my mother's return?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">When, after that phone call about her delay, I had found a couple of Belgian chocolate boxes in our mailbox, I immediately thought Catherine was saying goodbye to me. She seemed to love the academic environment she had found in Belgium. She had probably found a lover there, too, since in France she had calmed down regarding her love life. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">One day after the other, I had sobbed while devouring the chocolate she had posted, watching my mother's last present to me disappear down my throat -- and it was no consolation to know that they would again surface as pimples. Yet, I was aware that the fear of losing my mother was not a serious and practical enough reason to call her abroad. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">My desperation had only ceased when again Catherine came home. The moment I heard her car winding up the road that ended at our garden, my anxiety receded. If someone had shown me a movie of myself crying over the chocolate, sobbing before the television that I watched while devouring peach preserves, or the tears that were still falling as I masturbated -- I would have sworn to be someone else. I saluted her as if nothing had happened. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I was convinced my mother would have stopped me from searching for Armand. Thus I hadn't asked her </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">for </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">help. She must have all his contacts through her lawyers, but I did not want to use those channels. Just like I did not alert my father about my trip to Sweden to visit his former friend. I did not want to go as an emissary of my parents, though I knew I would probably be received like that by my uncle Armand.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The same reason why Catherine had forbid me to meet him, made me more curious to actually go and confront him.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">If my uncle had known about my existence all along, why hadn't he tried to contact me? I could imagine how hurt he must have been with Catherine and Celeste in the whole De Montbelle judicial process. I understood that he could even blame them for his mother's death. But that guilt would extend and fall even upon me? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">After a slow lunch, followed by a piece of lemon pie and linden infusion, I had strolled along the wharf until a cold wind started blowing. I made my way back to Smögen's tourist office where I had left my backpack. It was a really small piece of luggage; for after so many trips around the world I had learned better to always travel light. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">As I made myself warmer, I received the good news -- the super helpful team at the office had found someone heading the same direction I was going. The man had agreed to take me on his boat until Armand's island. We were due in one hour or so.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiY8e14aSabuFKdyUFtdauiBb0qPs1Gnq_v8tAltdJJDJZwxSXtJ1f7zq_zbM7MxUOcVdZraczW8X5yhAtvTiLy39EvlKCJYFDZEJmYqi1_aIvXPPFowG5xsJCoXw9zWLtskQiTVimsarMx/s1600/35-+Screenshot-121.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiY8e14aSabuFKdyUFtdauiBb0qPs1Gnq_v8tAltdJJDJZwxSXtJ1f7zq_zbM7MxUOcVdZraczW8X5yhAtvTiLy39EvlKCJYFDZEJmYqi1_aIvXPPFowG5xsJCoXw9zWLtskQiTVimsarMx/s1600/35-+Screenshot-121.png" height="398" width="640" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"He is a very famous architect!" I tried to chat with the owner of the boat, "He was awarded the most important prize in Architecture!"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I don't know anything about that, so I guess he is not famous for me. No." The man, who somehow reminded me of my great-grandfather Tarso, was very circumspect and after a while I realized I had to shut up in respect to my host, and simply enjoy and be thankful for the ride. I closed my eyes and enjoyed the mist brought in the wind and the sun on my face. The sky had cleared, and a bright light greeted me on my way to the reunion with my lost uncle.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Who must have heard the boat approaching, for Armand was on the deck when I disembarked. As I set foot on the weather beaten wooden floor, I felt Carlo was disembarking with me, like once he had on the Indian Ocean, carrying me as a seed.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgtJn2Zy-dCZkgMXGBm5e8Ar6BTUkOiMJq_WpAjffnNPIqGVrU3aaRwZPqGEe4kf69KdiMVxx0eGHtB6OkRFqLZe_0RfEQw8ZgbWAIFSO9-IL3SjJmeVqwcPABaU3DJvDgiI6M2x2np5Wkk/s1600/hq+Screenshot-120.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgtJn2Zy-dCZkgMXGBm5e8Ar6BTUkOiMJq_WpAjffnNPIqGVrU3aaRwZPqGEe4kf69KdiMVxx0eGHtB6OkRFqLZe_0RfEQw8ZgbWAIFSO9-IL3SjJmeVqwcPABaU3DJvDgiI6M2x2np5Wkk/s1600/hq+Screenshot-120.png" height="398" width="640" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I was happy and thrilled to be meeting my long lost uncle for the first time in my life -- but at once I also realized how embarrassing that meeting was, specially for him, and I was grateful to his generosity and openness.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The fact was I did not know what to expect. I had done the most thorough research on Armand de Montbelle that the internet had allowed -- considering that professionally he used the name of Armand Purlux Drurien, after his mother's family.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There were very few pictures of him on the web, compared to the countless images of the buildings he had created around the world. But nothing had prepared me to his... aura? I guess I can call it that, by the way he stood before me, looking solidly grounded to the earth, yet light and airy as if he were ever ready to depart. He had a presence that could not be described as strong, but perhaps as intense, in the sense of a wholeness that did not exclude a certain disembodiment, I thought. Like all things zen, he seemed hard to be grasped and reduced to a few distinct qualities. But there was a sense of calmness about him that was disarming, even the more in contrast to my own nervousness and expectancy. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"<i>Bonjour</i>, Laurent. <i>Bienvenue</i>." He saluted me as I left the boat. His voice was melodic and silky like Carlo had described, and I was still to marvel on his silvery pronunciation, that was effortlessly better than Catherine's even, she who had always strived to speak so correctly. His vocabulary, I'd find it richer and more poetical than anyone I had ever heard before.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">He was dressed very simply, with a tunic, pants and slippers that made him look like a very elegant monastic -- because his simplicity was that of Kenzo or Miyake, judging by the quality and cut of the clothes in a beautiful shade of gray, that changed colors with the sunlight, as if it were mother of pearl. We couldn't be farther from France and the Chateau de Montbelle, but I could see how he always carried around him the echoes of the sophisticated ambients he had been raised in, like an exquisite shell.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> I had fantasized about a welcome hug between the uncle and his never seen before nephew. Despite all the tragedies, deceit and vileness in the story that united us, we carried the same blood, at least partially, and that seemed to matter and stand above all to me. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Armand just shook my hand, from a polite distance, and though his expression was not tense nor serious, it did not demonstrate any happiness either. Nor was it neutral, because I sensed his curiosity. He must be trying to guess what had brought me to him -- and I wondered if I knew it clearly myself.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"<i>Merci beaucoup</i>, Armand." I didn't know how to proceed, and his silence and bland expression was not making it any easier for me. I pondered that the lovely scenery was an unemotional enough subject to start our communication. "This island is so..." I couldn't possibly say tiny, not even small, for it would sound like I was downgrading the place I had just arrived to, "--cozy." I tried.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Armand finally smiled, for a brief moment. I would soon realize he could be as reserved as my father, and given to long silences, too. No wonder they had been best friends, and their daily life as roommates had always been harmonious and peaceful -- at least, until lust had intruded into their relationship.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I imagine this is..." I did not want to repeat 'cozy', yet I couldn't find any other word, "pretty much like the Île du Blanchomme?" </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Armand stared at me, inquiringly. It was the first mention to the past that I made, only five minutes after having arrived, pointing to the story I had come to rescue. I think right there and then he started wondering how much I knew. But he didn't lift his shield of silence.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I mean, this is a Northern version of the Île, I guess." I tried a little laugh and winked; again, to no reaction from my uncle. He seemed to be patiently waiting to see where I would lead the conversation to, and I decided to open up. "You know, I want to visit the Île du Blanchomme, where--"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And I stopped. I was about to say "<i>where my life began</i>", but I realized how inappropriate that was. My conception actually meant betrayal to my uncle. It was in his bed that Catherine and Carlo had made love repeatedly, and I suddenly realized how aggressive my simple existence -- and now my inconvenient presence -- in my uncle's life should be. As much as I intended a fresh start with him, I must have been the personification of old wounds. He might have reunited my father and mother, but that hadn't been his will, ever.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"The Île no longer exists." I heard Armand quietly say. At first, I thought he was metaphorically speaking, stating that the past was over.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Oh... You mean they changed its name, right?" The last two years, as much as I had been chasing Armand, I had researched on the internet about the island of my conception. But I could find no information at all. Since the colonial government had left, many islands in that part of the world had changed their names back to their native denominations, and many records had been erased. Not even looking for Herr Weissmann had brought any results, since that was a fictitious name, given to him by the locals because he was German and so white, even whiter in that part of the world. I had no clue about his real name, that I intended to obtain from my uncle Armand. "I read that some of the islands are now open air museums, displaying the local culture--"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"The Île du Blanchomme no longer exists on this planet." Armand interrupted me. He wasn't being rude; it was more as if he wanted to end my agony. He spoke very calmly, and I realized he was being tactful, for he sensed I would be shocked. "A tsunami has washed it away. It has simply vanished."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"But... but..." Attutering, I felt my heart start to shrink, "Hadn't Herr Weissmann built the house on poles? Hadn't he predicted tidal waves? How come it...?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"No one ever predicted a tidal wave of that magnitude. And it might not have been the wave at all. The Île stood right on the line where the Sunda Trench ruptured. The earthquake alone might have erased it."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"You mean..." I was dumbfounded, still trying to adapt to the fact that the Île du Blanchomme no longer existed, when one of the reasons I had come was to gather enough information to locate and visit it, "...that 2004 notorious tsunami?" I was now wondering if the island still existed when Carlo had first mentioned its existence to me, back in 2008 during our conversation at the Nirvana Lounge.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"No, it was later. It was a tsunami in 2006."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"The house was destroyed, then?" I mumbled.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Not only the house, Laurent." My name sounded sweet in my uncle's voice, but everything else he communicated was bitter. "The entire island disappeared from the map! The Île du Blanchomme was merely a tiny blotch of sand topping a coral and perhaps a bed of lava, standing just few meters above the ocean. It was a single source of water that made it so special, and suitable for life. And Herr Weissmann's superior inventiveness and building skills, too. But it was all rather fragile. It might have existed for a couple centuries only, maybe not even that long. And in the dance of tectonic plates and the rising sea level, just like it once rose above the waters, the Île du Blanchomme again sank to the bottom of the ocean."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"You mean..." I felt tears welling up, "nothing remains of it?" I was trying to imagine the house I longed to visit wiped off and turned into floating debris.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"If anything remains, it is a tiny chunk of land mass beneath the waves." Armand's words, that he tonelessly uttered, without any display of emotion, astounded me. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">As if it was not about a place from his own past, from my own past, where an important event in our lives had taken place. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I guess he realized my confusion and sadness, and he complemented, softly, most kindly. "And our memories of it shall remain, too."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And I finally understood. The tenuous geographical contours of my personal world had been forever altered and diminished. The piece that had recently fallen into place went missing again. It did not matter whether it had been the 2004 or a 2006 tsunami to erase the Île du Blanchomme from the surface of the Earth. Nothing was left of it -- and the irony was it already didn't exist when I had first heard of it. A delusion like a mirage -- m</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">y father must have been completely unaware of the island's extinction. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And all the plans I had made to visit it, once I had found its exact location with my uncle's help, sank with the island, just like my heart sank, too. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Shall we go home, Laurent?" Armand whispered to me, closing that subject, perhaps realizing my emotional state.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I recalled Carlo saying the Île du Blanchomme had the shape of a heart. No longer. And I let the tears flow freely, as I grabbed my backpack and followed my uncle on the path along the coast into this other island. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Not too close to him, in case I started sobbing. I wouldn't want to embarrass him, crying right on my arrival -- just like he had himself, I recalled, on that first night my father had spent with him on the extinct Île du Blanchomme.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i style="text-align: center;"><b>Author's note:</b> having been </i><i style="text-align: center;">imported from a former version of the story, </i><i style="text-align: center;">some of the comments below are dated previous to this post. Once the plot has not been altered, just the pagination, I am keeping them since they are very dear and precious to me.</i>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10000213495439627694noreply@blogger.com4450 43 Smögen, Sweden58.3582191 11.23138970000002220.6875091 -71.385797799999978 90 93.848577200000022tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8991339675338164589.post-81109385182081257622015-02-04T04:54:00.000-08:002015-04-27T06:31:19.826-07:00Episode 01-II | La vie en rose<div class="" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><b style="background-color: #6fa8dc;"><a href="http://lutsepisodes.blogspot.com.br/2015/02/interlogue.html">previous episode</a></b></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-large;"><b>Second Transmission | The Body</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;"><u>| PART ONE |</u></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large;"><u><br /></u></span><span style="font-size: x-large;"><b>Sweden, 2010</b></span></div>
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<i><span style="font-size: x-large;"><b>Laurent & Armand</b></span></i><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><b><span style="font-size: x-large;"><i>That I </i></span><span style="font-size: large;">was heading</span></b><span style="font-size: large;"> to yet another island</span> was not by chance, not in my life.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">'No man is an island', goes John Donne's line.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But I might be -- to some extent. I was conceived on the tiny Île du Blanchomme in the Indian Ocean, and born on the fanciful resort island of Punaouilo in the Pacific Ocean, where I spent the only happy years of my childhood.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I was finally on my way. To visit he who had brought his best friend and the man he had loved -- to become my father -- and the half-sister he had despised -- who would be my mother -- together on that first of all islands in my life. My lost uncle, Armand, who now lived on an island himself, off the Swedish coast.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> The ferry would take me only to a nearby dock in Smögen. From there I would have to take a smaller boat to reach the tiny, more secluded island where he had his house. That journey reminded me of my father's, thirty six years ago, headed to the Indian Ocean.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Standing on the deck with my eyes closed tight, I saluted the rising sun. I watched my inner darkness become increasingly pink, as the golden light broke across the horizon and through my eyelids.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It was a game I had been playing since I was a teenager, that of seeing colors inside myself. It helped me think that my personal darkness wasn't so impenetrable.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But that was as close as I ever got to seeing <i>la vie en rose</i>. At thirty five years old, I thought I still hadn't found the man who would take me in his arms and make my life pink. Though, at that stage, I already fantasized that Fabrizio Caprice could be the one. Even after our first disastrous date at his apartment in Vice City. With the condition that he would leave his fiancé, of course. And those e-mails he had recently sent about his "crossing" gave me some hope.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">If a family is like a building -- and sometimes, it's the only place where you can or might want to live, even if it is in ruins --, I had just started digging for the foundations of mine.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There had always been something missing in my life, from as far as I remember. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">As a child, it was just a feeling that I couldn't quite express. Until Catherine returned to France, leaving me behind in Punaouilo. Then, I could name it: I missed my mother. Later, when my father and I joined her, I started missing Punaouilo, the tropical island of my birthplace -- and the sea! And when Carlo left home, for years I missed him. Next, when together with Angelo I moved abroad, I should have missed France -- but I didn't. And when Angelo left me -- I almost died.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">On that boat that took me along the picturesque coast of Sweden, I got a bit closer to understanding what I had missed longest wasn't any of the things I had lost along my life -- but the things that I had never had. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I felt nostalgia for people I had never met, for the places I had never been -- but that, unconsciously, I knew should have belonged in my life. Like my grandfather Gaston and my uncle Armand -- the De Montbelle family branch that had been hidden from me.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Two years had gone by since that conversation with Carlo at the Nirvana Lounge. I had been trying to contact Armand, through his professional e-mail, on the phone in his office, by letter, but he always dismissed me. Until, all of a sudden, I got my appointment to meet him. Not at one of his offices around the world, not at the Chatêau de Montbelle that had been <i>l'objet du désir</i> of my grandmother Celeste, and that I wanted so much to visit -- but at my uncle's personal retreat on the idyllic Swedish coast.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That morning, at sunrise, quiet and relaxed on the deck, embraced by the salty breeze, I recalled the one thing I missed from France. I smiled an welcomed the memory that was sweet, colorful, perfumed and painful at once.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Behind our rural house in the French countryside, there had been a secluded lake. It was small enough that a blood-red bug flying among the reeds on the other margin could be spotted -- if I had my glasses on.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It was not until my father left home that I started exploring the neighborhood. It had looked dull and deserted to me. Woods and fields and hills and mountains stretching in monotonous beauty, as far as the eye could reach. But without Carlo, our empty house seemed even more boring and desolate than the landscape around, and at thirteen years old I became an explorer of the countryside.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">My mother was often absent, teaching in Belgium at the time. Or locked into the painting studio that she had converted into her own writing corner. And once in there, she had nothing to remind herself of her son's existence, so that I had long hours to wander around the fields in solitude, without being missed. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Once I found the lake behind the hills, it became my hideaway. I would go there everyday -- and sometimes, even in the evenings too. I'd bring food and drinks and books and the notebooks where I wrote down stories and illustrated them. I lived the happiest hours of a couple of my teenage years there, reading, writing and drawing in seclusion.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I had been a loner since I arrived in France, but after the bullying at school, and my personal tragedy I became a boy full of fears, and never swam in that lake. Until one day I took Angelo with me, and before I could catch my breath, he had already undressed and jumped into the waters that, dark and deep, never revealed the bottom of the lake.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Catherine had bought the property where the lake was from its previous owner. Not because she loved the land, but because she thought it was good business. It was so cheap then, and its value had increased vertiginously with the years. She made good profit when she finally sold it.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhab7Ti6QdwC7FeBA4t8tWilcROWCZoSdj2Q_s2K-fE0zq0ww83RhCzhUY4uK3yMjAkGuW5EsZRWYrXeef5bT6PJd7vbJMh0XNMPJL4TFctEVJd1u5Xm7Md-GpPG37LCHyepBINaIgcCOvB/s1600/07-+cherry+08-%25EF%2580%25A1LAU+lake+Screenshot-107.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhab7Ti6QdwC7FeBA4t8tWilcROWCZoSdj2Q_s2K-fE0zq0ww83RhCzhUY4uK3yMjAkGuW5EsZRWYrXeef5bT6PJd7vbJMh0XNMPJL4TFctEVJd1u5Xm7Md-GpPG37LCHyepBINaIgcCOvB/s1600/07-+cherry+08-%25EF%2580%25A1LAU+lake+Screenshot-107.png" height="446" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But still, it was not my hideaway at the lake that I missed most. Though the house in ruins on its shores was so poetical and matched perfectly my mood, back then. Ruins seemed very appropriate to depict that stage of my own life. Being as psychological as I may, I was probably trying to compensate my father's absence when I had fallen in love with my coach, who was twenty years older than me. He had simply ignored my ludicrous passes, and after him, there had come yet another older guy from the country club -- an affair that had led me into disaster. </span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEioZTbZJwfbF0FysXGUFs8EDyVNms4Euc-ca4yUaIeOzQK4WiTcBFlVjR5F_AGkRi1A6Jtf-XK4JiTEx-rOQiTd1SDxdWwMQC3fQc_0ojuOI75vXwj4Oj4rRDwwNGOAvp_QwRihscKdg9vu/s1600/08-%25EF%2580%25A1LAU+Lake+Screenshot-2.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEioZTbZJwfbF0FysXGUFs8EDyVNms4Euc-ca4yUaIeOzQK4WiTcBFlVjR5F_AGkRi1A6Jtf-XK4JiTEx-rOQiTd1SDxdWwMQC3fQc_0ojuOI75vXwj4Oj4rRDwwNGOAvp_QwRihscKdg9vu/s1600/08-%25EF%2580%25A1LAU+Lake+Screenshot-2.png" height="414" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Neither was it the hidden lake itself that I missed. Everything that I had shared with Angelo, after he dumped me, became doomed, and so had the lake. Or perhaps it had been doomed even before that, for it was said that the reason why the land was sold so cheap, and the house left to crumble, was that the owner's wife had drowned in those waters. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I wasn't so sure about that local legend of a foreign ghost, but I tended to believe that at least the part of the story that said the woman was Japanese must have been consistent. It was said that when her family fell in disgrace in Japan, and her brother committed <i>harakiri</i>, she had killed herself, too.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhe0FsfSB_8e-dUbhYR8-A0zzatDAMvWdgX8_0YhfflfKuKMe_fMgyIiCx42t-vv0KmPIE2ygw1buQVn8B5PQGPlL9AWBlZuR_1DtsE2WwqRECLQeSl-WAgRo3YtW6zqxXIrFuAViAdnVK/s1600/09-%25EF%2580%25A1cherry+Screenshot-37.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhe0FsfSB_8e-dUbhYR8-A0zzatDAMvWdgX8_0YhfflfKuKMe_fMgyIiCx42t-vv0KmPIE2ygw1buQVn8B5PQGPlL9AWBlZuR_1DtsE2WwqRECLQeSl-WAgRo3YtW6zqxXIrFuAViAdnVK/s1600/09-%25EF%2580%25A1cherry+Screenshot-37.png" height="386" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And the reason why I knew she was Japanese was the tree that would turn my life pink and peaceful every Spring from 1989 until 1994, when Angelo and I moved abroad.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">One afternoon, I was at the lake when, my eyes wandering up a hill as I was looking for inspiration to finish a sentence, I saw a riveting blotch of pink in a scenery that was plainly green and gray from the trees and rocks. Being bored and yet full of energy, I closed my notebook, hid it in a trunk in the ruined house and decided to run uphill towards the intriguing pink. And that's the day when I met the sakura cherry tree.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3_hEYFISTAy-wIg-AxENK-nzXszb0Mzwe6Xb-u14y3oXhneNQIvUt4dxOewtAtKdq3gMSk3STS4X8Y3TTriGU5jJbtj0fgCizQ5yi5AsGWTN1e1JeNJUo-8DwRpXK2r0VpbNxdPCVONHr/s1600/10-%25EF%2580%25A1cherry+Screenshot-39.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3_hEYFISTAy-wIg-AxENK-nzXszb0Mzwe6Xb-u14y3oXhneNQIvUt4dxOewtAtKdq3gMSk3STS4X8Y3TTriGU5jJbtj0fgCizQ5yi5AsGWTN1e1JeNJUo-8DwRpXK2r0VpbNxdPCVONHr/s1600/10-%25EF%2580%25A1cherry+Screenshot-39.png" height="382" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I know, I should have written 'the day <i>I found</i> the tree', instead of 'met' -- but that cherry tree was a being with a soul. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Not just an ordinary tree like all the others around her.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Obedient and respectful, I had dutifully submitted to my parents and teachers -- but before that cherry tree I felt something new, that I was not quite able to name at the time -- and that I wouldn't feel again until one decade later, when I met my first Buddhist master. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Reverence.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGydEWhXjYvVX2oTvujBz99Csb2Teysrdu_I0l41pS5nBpjqe7ivlOL6dReyYfmA93_jenCYpcOesYaL1kiloqkzD2oz6GH2Ao2NuyhiXckY7uReuo70XBxx6fi2cGnLVZ8c2GN9luey3C/s1600/12-%25EF%2580%25A1cherry+Screenshot-48.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGydEWhXjYvVX2oTvujBz99Csb2Teysrdu_I0l41pS5nBpjqe7ivlOL6dReyYfmA93_jenCYpcOesYaL1kiloqkzD2oz6GH2Ao2NuyhiXckY7uReuo70XBxx6fi2cGnLVZ8c2GN9luey3C/s1600/12-%25EF%2580%25A1cherry+Screenshot-48.png" height="398" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I was breathless, and not because I had ran up the hill, as I stood still in front of the cherry tree. I had never seen anything more vivacious or beautiful. As I stood there, recomposing my breath, I realized the profusion of flowers gradually blossoming at once. It was like a prolonged explosion in slow motion, that I couldn't so much distinguish with my eyes -- but with my awareness. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">A shiver went up my spine, and I felt tears welling up as I slowly approached the tree, entering its soft cloud of heavenly perfume and delicate colors.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjl3dkNEUVUDvdRHWjZw5QnP8ONcDzBN-OfGtxiaE67IzgSgzoM6bmfjDy7PQ1XUGWOJ9zZox11-RS7GoQ_lQTTS2mTtBw5iFsOeTmkg2bwW3x8RaC7kghT9i0KUmz26lfsPALO9KEn_S3m/s1600/13-+hq+cherry+Screenshot-209.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjl3dkNEUVUDvdRHWjZw5QnP8ONcDzBN-OfGtxiaE67IzgSgzoM6bmfjDy7PQ1XUGWOJ9zZox11-RS7GoQ_lQTTS2mTtBw5iFsOeTmkg2bwW3x8RaC7kghT9i0KUmz26lfsPALO9KEn_S3m/s1600/13-+hq+cherry+Screenshot-209.png" height="388" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">How could there be such a </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">tranquil </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">display of beauty, when my own life was a baffling torture, where I had lost track of myself? My father had left, and without his surveillance I felt defenseless. I suffered bullying and I fought it in silence. I hid it simply because revealing my struggles would only lead into further damnation. I fancied boys, and that what condemned me and legitimated the hate and despise falling upon me, I knew was actually my deepest, unchangeable truth. I managed fighting the boys that bullied me better than I did battling my own desire for those same boys. I judged myself sincerely guilty. My shame was complete and genuine. It took deep roots in my despair. </span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiW0NTwgNU5oyVP3iKgpityKv07UrJTtSW___h7BVQ9za9mewKaLc8jnq9zGv-cjNL9PuFr3KeYVw6WJqE7DSJJWvuTozdvj3xXRtWKv7uEmAZ3d4ZwGrrnM1YjR-okhChwVmLvXNpFT6bE/s1600/14-+hq+cherry+Screenshot-201.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiW0NTwgNU5oyVP3iKgpityKv07UrJTtSW___h7BVQ9za9mewKaLc8jnq9zGv-cjNL9PuFr3KeYVw6WJqE7DSJJWvuTozdvj3xXRtWKv7uEmAZ3d4ZwGrrnM1YjR-okhChwVmLvXNpFT6bE/s1600/14-+hq+cherry+Screenshot-201.png" height="398" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Is everything alright with you, Laurent?" Catherine had inquired, shortly after I quit the swim team. I was trying my best to hide the physical marks and the emotional scar that the encounter at the showers had left, and I was terrified when she had asked. I had not thought of an excuse to quit, and revealing the truth was opening up my shame and guilt. I decided to lie because I did not want to die at my mother's eyes. Having just turned fourteen, and living in a small rural community, coming out was not an option for me.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"<i>A bien sur, maman</i>." I avoided her stare. "Sometimes school is too hard for me. Too much homework, you know?" Trying daily to hide my sexuality had given me a scary ease to lie. "I need more time to study, instead of swimming." That's how I had justified my abrupt decision.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"You're old enough to know for yourself what's best for you, Laurent. If school is hard means you are being challenged, and then your education should be appropriate, I guess!" Nodding approvingly, she had ended our conversation and returned to her novel, the one she was either writing or reading.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiw_rGl-pKfivgi0Z9gEL-nM3YiAyp5O1diRAtxr872zh8ssVt-jqif3DmX1A2KZpRRifNPSXwQ-pmeemIXmAE31D-zEviuTjpZ5i4RgoIHbWtibVYxY9AWz4xVJ3-Yi5CVxGWDuZcNCmC7/s1600/15-+hq+cherry+Screenshot-210.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiw_rGl-pKfivgi0Z9gEL-nM3YiAyp5O1diRAtxr872zh8ssVt-jqif3DmX1A2KZpRRifNPSXwQ-pmeemIXmAE31D-zEviuTjpZ5i4RgoIHbWtibVYxY9AWz4xVJ3-Yi5CVxGWDuZcNCmC7/s1600/15-+hq+cherry+Screenshot-210.png" height="398" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I had been carrying a question in my heart, when I first arrived at the top of the hill. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>WHY</i>? I had silently yelled at the sakura tree. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">WHY do I have to be like this? My sexuality that painstakingly placed me off the curve was an ever present affliction.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">WHY can't I change, for Heaven's sake? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">WHY does life has to feel like being my opponent, my enemy?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> WHY am I being punished? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And WHY do I have to endure it all on my own? WHY?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I was not Saint Francis of Assissi and there was no almond tree to perform a miracle for me -- my Japanese cherry tree was the miracle itself.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Because there must have been a bird quietly sitting on the tree, that first day. I didn't notice it, but I'm convinced it must have been there. Having found refuge like myself, it probably was nested among the flowers. And it must have gotten scared when I did not scream, instead burying my cry for help deeper inside my soul. Could a bird have listened to my aggrieved heart? And it must have flown away, agitating the branches of the tree -- otherwise, how to explain that a rain of pink, perfumed petals, like a rain of blessings and balm, fell on me that memorable afternoon?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And the miracle, bear with me, was not that I was covered in perfumed pink. But that I was suddenly so happy! So joyful, exultant in the grimmest times of my adolescence. That first healing rain of smooth petals signaled towards the happiest days of my teenage years in France, that would soon start with Angelo.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRw0SluHGMUtZzwos_4Q_H7LY2_-qKSOx8AMmg_yELWziNZslPZRm6k8yBHu8PwWB17I_ZRS8pygYwyW2MtAWpR6sRUJ7E_GilDc55aIHsv4rf-NboO_Smw97CpOUklRv_V_nVudvdeM4D/s1600/17-+hq+cherry+Screenshot-206+copy.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRw0SluHGMUtZzwos_4Q_H7LY2_-qKSOx8AMmg_yELWziNZslPZRm6k8yBHu8PwWB17I_ZRS8pygYwyW2MtAWpR6sRUJ7E_GilDc55aIHsv4rf-NboO_Smw97CpOUklRv_V_nVudvdeM4D/s1600/17-+hq+cherry+Screenshot-206+copy.png" height="446" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And that's how a private ritual I would repeat every year began. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">By the end of winter I would already run up the hill to check whether the blossoms were coming, in anticipation, until it became fully alive again and the pink miracle would once more be staged. I would then daily visit the tree in adoration, seeking constant consolation, until the petals were all gone, and the cherries started growing. I preferred strawberries to cherries, and I knew I did not need to return to the tree until next Spring -- with another question in my heart.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I kept the cherry tree my secret. I tried to share it once with Angelo. I told him about the secret lake, and he had loved it. For all the years we spent together in France, we had never seen another person there. But the tree didn't move him.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfOA2zQtHzv8qBJUmIJVdZZU8A0UNa3rjcUA1rzvNKkeF8PG-heo5sFu7Xewq5kSQJRzjdnc90VkGqhbtIIYcUku_76bOzSUfyuWGJXI6Vb4yZsMx4fIuwLIJ-9yna74UK__QorHM_V62V/s1600/18-+HQ+Screenshot-40.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfOA2zQtHzv8qBJUmIJVdZZU8A0UNa3rjcUA1rzvNKkeF8PG-heo5sFu7Xewq5kSQJRzjdnc90VkGqhbtIIYcUku_76bOzSUfyuWGJXI6Vb4yZsMx4fIuwLIJ-9yna74UK__QorHM_V62V/s1600/18-+HQ+Screenshot-40.png" height="398" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Why would I want to see a bloody tree? Don't we see many already? What is it so special about it?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I don't know..." I immediately retreated. "Nothing, actually."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"You're funny sometimes, Laurent. Or not the least funny, actually! Come on!" Angelo had jumped again into the cold waters of the lake we both loved.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhCtwCoGmxbG3hiBD74RcEzW97YihTS27ddLu40OnpWSGx_J58fLxDRfVp81DuVPhbndjeWNiBHzeZyFWPrU0Al6CXLirT3a8zCJVQJBv95HF4CVl3wW8u_OMxs6HNePCmGzvCR8WHB6xZ/s1600/19-+Screenshot-198.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhCtwCoGmxbG3hiBD74RcEzW97YihTS27ddLu40OnpWSGx_J58fLxDRfVp81DuVPhbndjeWNiBHzeZyFWPrU0Al6CXLirT3a8zCJVQJBv95HF4CVl3wW8u_OMxs6HNePCmGzvCR8WHB6xZ/s1600/19-+Screenshot-198.png" height="398" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Did I lend that tree a soul? </span></span><br />
<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span><span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I had no friends at the time. My heart was broken and still cracking open after Carlo had left. The affairs with older men I had tried to have at the country club had only opened more and deeper wounds. </span></span><br />
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<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Or did the tree have the soul of the suicidal Japanese woman? In a period when I was myself daily contemplating suicide, had I somehow connected to her ghost?<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Because I was sure she had planted the sakura tree. Or maybe, her husband had planted it in tribute to his deceased wife. Anyways, it must have been the sole Japanese cherry tree in that part of France at the time. Maybe it still is -- that is, if it still exists.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjoTs4V3clONPnn0ftKsazMrvf-mQf_9Bi2d4Rm9NCh0tViS2S0wsU_LSmEp521B_k9MjW6nRzyGabr7OEG8TDWlQn6Y-c57yQa6uXdwB2ReQgh40GAPrnHGiOie42zgeBcfCOhctw1qHtK/s1600/20-+hq+cherry+Screenshot-211.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjoTs4V3clONPnn0ftKsazMrvf-mQf_9Bi2d4Rm9NCh0tViS2S0wsU_LSmEp521B_k9MjW6nRzyGabr7OEG8TDWlQn6Y-c57yQa6uXdwB2ReQgh40GAPrnHGiOie42zgeBcfCOhctw1qHtK/s1600/20-+hq+cherry+Screenshot-211.png" height="398" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">How did I know that the cherry tree had a soul?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Because from that first encounter, it answered my questions. Though sometimes it did not really answer them -- it just talked to me, in that delicate and subtle language of the cherry trees in blossom, of branches swaying and waving at me. I aspired the delicious perfume and I felt I was in the known.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And even when it wouldn't answer my questions, nor talk to me, it helped me to stay silent and concentrated, expectantly waiting for an answer. It was, perhaps, my first experience of meditation.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And it listened to me, too -- patiently listened to my pained heart. I used to cry in the bedroom, or even in my bathroom if Catherine was in the house and I was afraid that she'd listen to me -- but while alone my crying had easily turned into sobbing, under the protection of the cherry tree my tears had an unexpected cleansing quality, and I'd feel comforted.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It sheltered me, and saved me from my own will to end my life, as the blossoms murmured of promises and new hopes. It was the sakura cherry tree to carry me through another year, since I wanted to meet her yet another Spring -- just enough time for Angelo to enter my life and give it a new meaning and direction.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhrUarnVM45nuWAy8xui9XXhUut1aTgniaTJYGRaXIz-v_67KltTUhHxZzN86cOirKW9uwCBtVpHVDRvl6YMa4PkLyOCjpBhSyXAEcmsk_WzB7eFUpxLCX6bj7iZZDKeOVYDT_LG2_NhAf6/s1600/21-+Screenshot-55.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"></span></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiIL8x-epHaI3eMPRgV0FU_Zes9vuCNi3oJ1Fi1x8c0gL9K5h1L1M8vd_sXDDXdTYTVokeuPv1Co8QmSH0HpWTMjoVmayc2MpZmYCknZymKgxGeC7rDfu5Rc9EY2z2e-I1ZH4lIG7gKweDL/s1600/21-+Screenshot-55.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiIL8x-epHaI3eMPRgV0FU_Zes9vuCNi3oJ1Fi1x8c0gL9K5h1L1M8vd_sXDDXdTYTVokeuPv1Co8QmSH0HpWTMjoVmayc2MpZmYCknZymKgxGeC7rDfu5Rc9EY2z2e-I1ZH4lIG7gKweDL/s1600/21-+Screenshot-55.png" height="398" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">My reverie ended with a click and slam of the door behind me, and I was back on the deck of the ferry boat. No longer a lonely teen cultivating suicidal thoughts in rural France, this was Sweden, and it was 2010. I had endured, and I had survived. I was on my way to meet my uncle Armand.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Inspired by my father, just that year I had been on two meditation retreats already. Yet, I still realized how easily abducted from the present I could be. My memories would drag me into the swamp of my past, where I'd drown in old sorrows and wounds -- but it was already a victory that the noise of a door could awaken me and bring me back to the present moment! </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Just in time to watch the tip of the sun break over the horizon.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5EH3D9bklgIvG5W6pWsSIWQtgJtF-UIbutc7n6OZBoxNAMuhYu0LY885MxVdeVSTELDp0uKUCDK9bF00dd1e0a8iXjx8aBxszKRDfEXd7LaGfYVHLjW7157PA1n-XbP3iXhR1NFJiwFGm/s1600/22-+Screenshot-57.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi5EH3D9bklgIvG5W6pWsSIWQtgJtF-UIbutc7n6OZBoxNAMuhYu0LY885MxVdeVSTELDp0uKUCDK9bF00dd1e0a8iXjx8aBxszKRDfEXd7LaGfYVHLjW7157PA1n-XbP3iXhR1NFJiwFGm/s1600/22-+Screenshot-57.png" height="398" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">With the corner of my eyes, I checked who had arrived on the deck.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And when I realized he was a tall, red-haired and good looking guy, I immediately became self-conscious. I turned and stared at him openly, just like he was staring in my direction.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Since the night I left Fabrizio's apartment in Vice City, when I had picked that Jason or Justin boy who had cried as I dumped him after we had fucked -- since then, I hadn't been with another guy. I hadn't paid attention to his name, like I had instead delighted in his pretty bubble butt. He had been as young as myself when Angelo had dumped me, and his heartfelt tears had mirrored mine back then. I hadn't been heartbroken when I turned my back on him and walked out of the motel room, but later I did regret how I had treated Jason, or Justin -- and now,</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> despite not knowing his name, I could not forget him.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">So much time without sex was a world record to me! Since Angelo had broken up with me, and my recovery period having involved as many torrid encounters as I could have as a means to leave him behind and put some distance between us -- measured in beds, it seemed -- I had never sexually fastened for so many months. In fact, I had never fastened before.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I knew I wasn't going to do anything with that red-haired guy, but I still wanted something from him, as much as he seemed to be seeking something, too. A demonstration of our mutual attraction? The confirmation that I was attractive, and so was he? A recognition of the fact that we could make it, even if we wouldn't make it? The identification of ourselves as brothers in arms, who would love and not beat the other? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In other times, I would have needed to take those forms of approval to a physical level to placate my own insecurity, and we should have sought the closest restroom, for I needed to profit from every chance to feel accepted when so often I had been rejected.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRHwtckzXDwO8aFrynEK5ndf4eDIDnEg_I1iHSasLFSGXllIfd3a_v_Qbx6wDKHzd3_28JnCIZUyu_O8-TTE-0tAs19Io2Qqf4fFh90T0ECDlksUuCb80Pc6L2l03mqaZZwnqJceZwg-n4/s1600/23-+Screenshot-61.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhRHwtckzXDwO8aFrynEK5ndf4eDIDnEg_I1iHSasLFSGXllIfd3a_v_Qbx6wDKHzd3_28JnCIZUyu_O8-TTE-0tAs19Io2Qqf4fFh90T0ECDlksUuCb80Pc6L2l03mqaZZwnqJceZwg-n4/s1600/23-+Screenshot-61.png" height="382" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I no longer had the excuse that I was going to paint him afterwards, and turn him into memories and money. I knew I wasn't going to do anything with the guy, but I still wanted him to try -- just to reject him?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But what he did next was not some cheesy move like grabbing his crotch to indicate his intentions towards me. From guys who lifted their shirts to show off their chiseled abs, to others who would start opening their flies to indicate the urgent nature of their lust and the need to satisfy it, I had seen almost it all before. But not that one -- he just did this subtle movement with his chin, not indicating where the toilets we should be heading to were, but pointing towards the spectacle that hadn't stopped behind me.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And when I turned towards the horizon, I saw I had lost it.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The sun hadn't waited while I checked the hot guy and played with my expectations of what should and could happen between us.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The sun was already above the horizon, and though technically it could still be considered the sunrise, I knew I had lost its most magical moment -- and this realization delivered a powerful blow on me.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I wouldn't often think of myself as '<i>The Sunrise Son</i>', but since Carlo had again shared the anecdote of my announced birth inspiring the famous song, it had become increasingly important as a symbol of renewal in my own life. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But now, I had lost it. And like all the other times before that, I had lost it to another man. </span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And I had lost that man, too -- when I turned to glance at the guy on the deck, he was nowhere to be seen anymore. He might have gone back inside without any noise this time... or he might have been a dream. An apparition, maybe -- as '<i>The Sunrise Son</i>', I should have been an expert in ghostly manifestations at the sun up, shouldn't I?<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And I was left alone on the deck, having missed the sunrise, having lost the guy.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But hadn't that been the tragedy of my whole life since I had met Angelo? I had given him the right and power to seduce and convince and talk me into satisfying his needs -- that's how we had both gone abroad, leaving France to study Journalism at Vice City. I had never dreamed about America, I had never cared about Journalism -- those were Angelo's dreams, but his life circumstances would never have allowed him to achieve any of that, not without me.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Once he hadn't needed me any longer, he had dumped me. And I found myself in a foreign country with no good friends -- and yet, I did not consider going back to France, where nothing awaited me but boredom and again submitting to my mother.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Why I had gone to Vice City in the first place? Because I had nothing better to do, nothing else to try. Having no dream or goal of my own, I had willingly embraced Angelo's. But at the end of our relationship I was left with nothing, back to the hollowness that had always been the core of my existence.</span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10000213495439627694noreply@blogger.com0450 43 Smögen, Sweden58.3582191 11.23138970000002232.836184599999996 -30.077204299999977 83.8802536 52.539983700000022tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8991339675338164589.post-15427402067516385022015-02-02T19:51:00.000-08:002015-06-03T13:11:03.019-07:00Interlogue<br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif; font-size: x-large;"><b>Samsara Heights</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-large;"><b><i>Have I loved</i></b> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">-- no, not loved, just worshiped -- an impostor?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The most constant, solid presence throughout my adult life, during the past fifteen years, everything I have achieved was under his guidance.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">To his suggestion I have moved to Samsara Heights, where I watch the sun set over the sea thinking it is headed to Punaouilo, the island of my birth. This nostalgic happiness -- or was it unhappiness? -- that softens my days in a city where I have practically no friends, I owe it to him.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That I now have the Pacific Ocean of my childhood at my feet -- that, too, I owe him. One just needs descend the hill, wandering through an enchanted garden trail, the final steps leading to the beach where I can relish bathing in the same waters of my early years. Melancholically poetical and marvelous as it is, it has been his idea, first of all, that I moved to the West Coast.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Once I bought the land, he indicated the best contemporary architects to build my dream house. Yet, it took him three years, since it has been completed, to accept the invitation to visit me. Now, I am not just anxious with his visit -- I fear it. I fear how our relationship will evolve from there. The questions I am about to ask him won't necessarily lead to disaster -- but most possibly. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">My artistic career -- I owe it thoroughly to him. And to my talent, too, of course. Since the day he first visited my atelier, it has been under his sole guidance. I have entrusted him the power to determine my steps in the art world. Be it my solid prestige in the museums circuit, or my thundering commercial success, Dan Charmand has led me all along the controversies of my triumphant career.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That envious people call me Dan's boy, or Dan's toy, I couldn't care less. They are right -- to some extent. I am his creature. A happy creature have I been, so far -- living in ignorance of what, now, I think have been his ruthless intentions.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">For love of my father, Dan will probably have to step out of my life. Like before, as I am led to believe, my father has gotten out of my life because of him.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Quite naturally, he occupied the place left vacant by my father. At twenty, when we first met, without being conscious of it, I was eager to find an adult masculine figure to replace Carlo. Angelo, then my boyfriend -- and through whom I met Dan -- was sure a strong enough manly presence in my days. But he was just as young and lost as I was, making me the more lost. Having been dumped, in the labyrinth of loss and hollowness that Angelo's absence ensued, Dan had taken the center of stage -- to never, ever again leave it.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Irascible to most, Dan took me into his liking. Because, like Catherine used to say, I was an obedient boy? Dan's advices were guidance to me, his suggestions like marching orders. Books I should read, movies I should watch, exhibitions I should visit -- I was always up to date with his check lists. Jazz to Britt pop, Japanese food to hamburgers. He told me what I should prefer, if I were to be the '<i>citizen of the world</i>' he wanted to turn me into -- and turned me into it he has. In ways I could not guess -- at least not until now --, he echoed my grandmother Celeste. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"<i>Do you think Charmand gets to choose D'Allegro's underwear color, or if he should put no underwear at all</i>?" Jokes about us abounded. No matter how many lovers I was 'allowed' to have, I remained being Dan's boy. But I was no puppet of his. I was not just free in sex -- there was intelligent life for me outside Dan's perimeter. For instance, he wanted me to dress Boss, but I had insisted on Armani. I had kept my own style -- unless I was to accompany him to a dinner party, or a gala evening. Then I would need Dan's approval on how I dressed. I had to match his impeccable elegance to remain being his constant escort to ballets and operas and all other openings. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">He does not have a family -- not a single member. He once mentioned being raised by a grandmother in Tunisia -- or was it Algeria? --, who has already died. Once, when I was crying over Angelo, he implied to have suffered a great loss, due to a tragedy of some sort. "<i>Death only should be mourned, Laurent.</i>", he had stated. To that, I dried my tears, and never let them flow again, not for my ex-boyfriend. Even his scolding was benevolent.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That is all I know about the story of his life. No details, nothing concrete. I have never had the occasion to ask any further. There is no space for personal matters in his days. The present only exists for him, dominated by impressive professional achievements -- 24/7, Dan is the almighty director of Vice City's acclaimed Contemporary Art Museum. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I do not worry who will inherit his fortune, his precious art collection, his ultra elegant penthouse, his partnerships in several businesses -- such material matters concern the gossipers only. Why should I think about Dan's death, when he is the best thing to have happened in my life in all the years spent at Vice City? I already have the unique privilege of being his intellectual heir.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I have been family for him, and he has been family, for me. We do not try to disguise a rather compensatory father and son relationship -- that people mistake for a daddy and son fantasy. I couldn't care less. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What I do care, though, is that he has lied to me. No, not perhaps lied -- just omitted. But omitted too great a deal, from our very start.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I had to go to Sweden to find out about Dan's passage through Paris. Nothing unusual, for someone who, in the sixties or seventies, wished to make a career in the arts. But I am left breathless, my heart racing, at the simple recollection of the nature of his connection to Monsieur de Montbelle -- my grandfather, if I am to still believe Catherine. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I have heard it from the mouth of Armand de Montbelle himself . Plus many other facts that gets me wondering why I couldn't have a normal family like everybody else -- instead of that kaleidoscopical mess that leaves me gaping and panting and traveling from one corner of the planet to another, trying to gain some sense and perspective on my own origins.</span> </div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10000213495439627694noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8991339675338164589.post-63551554074264143872015-01-28T15:36:00.000-08:002015-03-26T04:23:59.658-07:00Episode 99 | Nobody's hallway<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: x-large;"><b><i>C</i>atherine</b> had declared</span><span style="font-size: large;"> the hallway of her apartment 'Nobody's Land'</span> -- like most of the public spaces in Russia. Recalling Paris, and how there had always been fresh flowers adorning a table at the elegant entryway of the building on the Rue de Furstemberg, on her first week in St. Petersburg she had bought a bouquet of champagne roses, that she thought would suit the damask in tones of gold and bronze on the walls. Coming back from lunch, she </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">artfully </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">arranged them -- one among the classical refinements she had learned from Celeste -- on the table </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">standing alone under a dimly lit lamp </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">on the corner. The table was stained and unstable, if still classy and solid, and the lampshade was dusty and </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">charmingly</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> torn -- but her flowers had instantly enlivened the ambient, poising as an antidote to the decaying elegance. When leaving for tea, later in the afternoon, she found they had been stolen already, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">together with the little crystal vase acquired at the Udelnaya flea market</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">. In the evening, she placed back the dried flowers and the plastic vase she had trashed earlier, wondering if they could have been dear to any of her neighbors.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Just then did she really notice how worn the carpet at the stairs landing was, to later find it had been placed there to hide a horrendously executed repair that had damaged the wooden floor, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">permanently</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">. Nobody seemed to care about</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">the peeling wallpaper, the stained mirror, the molded ceiling where rain had once leaked, the crannied marble of the doorposts -- all was considered historical, it seemed. Termites had been tenants in that building longer than any other people, she hinted, shrugging to those problems under the privilege of being a foreigner.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Standing in the hallway, Catherine would fantasize that Raskolnikov was just waiting to jump on her from behind one of the five other doors -- not to kill her, though, but to beg to appear in one of her novels. Because she was actually aware that the neighbors were spying on her through their peepholes -- she could see and sometimes even hear them being lifted, and the change of light in the holes as eyes were being pressed to them. Not so much scary, she didn't really care about that intrusion, and always thought that, through their provincial curiosity, they might learn a few lessons from her. At least on how to dress elegantly, and move lightly -- for her neighbors walked around in a </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">rhinoceros </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">stampede that made the crystal chandelier in the hall tremble and tinkle.</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In that hallway, that often smelled to boiled eggs and coarse tobacco, she realized the heated dialogue with Laurent was a scene many of her neighbors were watching from behind their doors. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">She pictured them in old underwear or pajamas, picking their teeth or noses, unable to</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> understand more than just a few words -- if any of them spoke French, she hadn't come across him or her yet. While she was ready to go to theater herself -- wearing the new Prada black gown she had bought that very morning --, they were enjoying their homely stage with her.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Upon identifying Laurent's name on the mobile's screen, she had asked Vladimir to fetch her stole, though she was comfortable enough. Catherine had been waiting for her son to make contact, for she knew it would be worse to push him when he was in one of his hurtful moods. She also knew she should better no longer avoid talking to him. She picked the call at Laurent's second try, entertaining hope that they wouldn't fight -- but they had seriously argued, and the end of their conversation couldn't have been more melancholic.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Laurent? Listen to me... Laurent!" It seemed like he had not only hang up, but typically, also disconnected his phone. She had heard a shower being turned on in the back of their conversation, and it was very probable that her son was not alone. Was he, ever?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Your son is not a child, Katerina." She startled,</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> hearing Vlad's comment immediately after Laurent had hang up. "</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">He is old." </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Her young lover was at the mirror, grooming himself -- or pretending to, since the light in the hallway was so dim and on the tainted surface, images were barely visible.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Old? He is older than you, Vlad, but not so much older, I should say..." She giggled.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Old <i>enough</i>, Katerina, that's what I want to say. You should not treat him like a child. You are justifying his very bad behavior." He was at the mirror trying to look busy and self-important, as if he hadn't been there plainly waiting for her. And showing off his costume, too, because he knew she liked it when he dressed more formally.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Not that again, Vlad!" She had chosen and bought his new clothes, and they fitted him perfectly. It was much better than the ragged jeans and the stained leather jacket he used to wear trying to look modern and European. Still, wearing formal clothes as if they were a plaster cast, Vladimir's unlikely elegance was, </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">at best,</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> that of a Russian mafioso. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"There is another case of pederasty in the newspapers today. Another dirty priest." He sounded awfully serious and offended. Maybe it was his way of protesting, when she had fooled him about the coat, and kept him waiting for so long.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"And how does that relate to my son?" Catherine asked, with a sigh. Vlad's reasoning being like quicksand, she knew she was going to be dragged into the darkest ages of prejudice. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"The priest was an homosexual molesting little boys. You are not going to defend pederasty, Katerina, are you?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Of course not!"</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> She hadn't taken her earring off, and after having pressed it against the screen of her mobile phone for so many minutes, she had a headache, making her</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> feel defeated before the combat had even started</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">.</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> "Pederasty is a crime! And those priests are sick, and they need treatment. But do you realize you didn't mention them in your first sentence as homosexuals? The problem here is not their homosexuality, but their pederasty."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Katerina! Don't try to fool me! They molested little boys, not little girls! They are sick homosexuals." </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">She tried to think Vlad's bad French was keeping him from being a more reasonable person, unable to express what he really meant... Or maybe it was actually preventing him from being even worse?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"That is not the problem." She continued. "It's probably because they are claustrophobically closeted, and in a position of social power, that they become abusers. Laurent is gay but he has never abused a boy, because he can live his sexuality openly, in a very healthy and happy manner. Religion, and its hypocritical rigidity, might be much more the problem here, leading to sexual abuse. And of course they abuse little girls, too, if that's their sexual preference. If they could be open about their sexuality, and have partners, those priests might not be abusing boys--"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Are you talking about openly gay priests?" Vladimir grunted, either emphasizing his opinion, or from having removed one of the many blackhead that dotted his face. "That we should accept gay priests? And that they could have partners? Gay married priests? That's so sick! You must be crazy, Katerina!" He sneered.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"I know. I am crazy. Happily crazy!" They had been shopping that morning, and she had spent a small fortune. Designer clothes in Russia were much more expensive than in Paris, but she wouldn't deprive herself. Buying fashion was also a way to honor Celeste's inheritance, that she was now living on, and instead investing all her royalties and paychecks. "Otherwise, life would be so boring, and I, myself, so tedious! Don't you think so, darling? And you, Vlad? Don't you think you might be gay? You can't stop talking about my son, and specially about the fact that he is gay. Maybe you are falling for my handsome son--"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"You are crazy indeed, woman." He glanced sideways at her from the mirror, where his reflection appeared horribly distorted. "Of course I am not gay! I am a very healthy person! I don't desire little boys. And how can you be so sure about your son? I mean, how do you know he has never abused little boys? It's very common among gays, you see... Maybe you are hiding a criminal, and defending him!" Vlad was left nearly breathless by his impassioned opinions.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Laurent, a criminal! That's grotesque and obtuse, and so rude of you, Vlad! I shall always defend my son, of course, whenever it's appropriate to defend him." <i>Such an irony</i>, she thought, <i>when currently he keeps accusing me</i>. "And I will always defend him against himself, that is the most important, you see." She murmured the last sentence, wanting to keep it to herself, but not willing to silence it. "</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And he always seems to need it..."</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"See, Katerina, even you agree with me that you need to defend your son against himself."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Just like I should defend you from yourself, Vlad..."<i> If only I cared for you like I care for my son</i>, she thought. "</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I should defend you from your monstrously antiquated prejudices, for instance. Vlad, you are so similar to Laurent, more than you'd like to admit! I know you have been dating older women, almost exclusively. Don't you think you might be seeking your mother in them?" <i>A</i></span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">nd am I not impersonating your mother right now</i><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">, she wondered. "Just like Laurent is seeking his father in all the men he dates. The boy he loved most was Italian, like his father... and--" Catherine decide to quit talking about Laurent, realizing she was just giving more ammunition to her lover.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Then he's been seeking a lot, Katerina!" Vlad grimaced, and his voice was leaking irony. "I read on the internet that in his exhibition are displayed the portraits of 45 of his ex-lovers... Do you think that is normal, Katerina?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Naturally, she knew that already. Instead of being the least horrified, Catherine thought she should have kept a record of all the lovers Laurent had mentioned to her -- at least as a list for male character's names. She was pretty sure they were a couple of hundred at least, and not just forty five. When everybody thought Laurent was making up and showing off, she actually knew her son was being quite modest and discreet.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Laurent has a big heart." She hesitated, since she wanted to mention another big organ her son had, just to shock Vladimir. "A big broken heart. And the wounds have made his heart even bigger, by cracking it open... Laurent's heart is constantly bleeding, continuously swelling..." She loved the image of men being swollen by Laurent's big heart, and that when they were ejected off it, or simply dumped, they came out bleeding like him. But it was not the same sort of blood she seemed to find everywhere in Russia, where all stories ended or began with assassination; Laurent's was the tragically romantic blood of a brokenhearted heartbreaker. "Maybe I should break your heart, Vlad." It had just occurred to her. "And you know why? Because it would grow a bit larger, and perhaps more compassionate too, so that more people would fit in it. Unless you are a coward, and decide to protect yourself by shrinking it. But I don't think you are a coward. Nor do I think you love me enough to be heartbroken if we'd split."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">From inside one of the apartments, a cat screeched, and from another, an alarm clock had started. She had heard it before, and knew it could go on for hours, if the tenant had left. She also noticed that a few more pieces from the crystal chandelier were missing. Someone was either selling them or taking them to repair their own.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Vlad finally left the mirror, and took two heavy steps in her direction, menacingly. "Of course I'm not a coward, Katerina! And of course I love you! But don't try to break my heart... or I'll break your legs!" His whole body tensed, as he hissed those last words. She saw saliva flying from his mouth, and she backed a little, giving the wrong impression that she feared him.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>He must be speaking like his father now</i>, Catherine guessed. He probably would like to be spanking like him, too -- Vladimir had clutched his fist and seemed to make an effort to avoid hitting her. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But she wasn't afraid. Again, she wondered what kind of abuses Vladimir must have suffered from his father. He had actually started their conversation by mentioning little boys being abused. Looking at Vladimir, for the first time she realized her tormented lover would make a wonderful and practical research field on domestic violence, and Catherine started thinking she should consider that as one of the main themes for her next novel. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Otherwise, having a young lover was so tedious, Catherine thought. Because she had teased him about being gay and a coward, he would probably be more passionate at love making that evening, as they'd come back from theater and dinner. Just to prove to himself he was a real macho. It was that easy to arouse him. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And he would also try to be romantic, to prove that he loved her. No flowers nor any presents, since Vlad was always penniless -- and she have to ask herself seriously one day if poor men were a fetish she cultivated, unconsciously. He would probably deliver another poem overflowing with powerfully evocative words, written within a few minutes, at the dozens if he wanted to. Obviously, the poem would be in Russian, and when he'd try to translate it into French Vlad would be utterly frustrated, and maybe again find some motivation to go back to the University to study French. She surely enjoyed having the young man in her bed, but she'd like to have him again among her students rank, too. Trying to communicate with her would enable him to finally communicate with everyone else in France, Catherine pondered, and she was just trying to act like a bait to the big lazy fish boy.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It was that easy to manipulate men -- a talent that was innate to her as much as it had been refined and perfected with Celeste's practical lessons at home.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"We can go now. I hate being late." On saying those words, Catherine shivered, for they sounded awfully like her mother's.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Well, it's not my fault if we are late." His outrage made him drool. "And I know, again you will defend and protect your son. Let's go." He snatched her coat from the arm of the single, rickety chair that stood in the hallway, where he had left it hanging. "I'm tired of waiting!"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Watching Vladimir fleeing down the steps, Catherine wondered if he was still feeling embarrassed.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That morning, she had surprised him on her computer, looking at the picture of a naked, well hung man.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Oh, I'm sorry if I'm intruding!" She giggled at the vision of the beautifully well defined torso and powerful thighs that reminded her of the Riace bronzes -- though, unlike them, the depicted young man boasted an impressive erection.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"It's not what you think!" Her lover had retorted swiftly, openly ashamed, startling at her presence by his side.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Of course not!" She retorted, amused. She had dated young men before, and a couple of them had declared themselves bisexuals. Vlad wouldn't state anything so contemporary and defiant about himself, but still, she wouldn't be surprised if, like other men his age, he was experimenting with his sexuality. "That's a boner in the picture, that's all. It can be a metaphorical image, I guess! It's not porn, is it?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">"Do you think it's porn, Katerina?" Vladimir inquired, and by his triumphant tone, Catherine knew she had been caught in a trap. "Well... supposedly, this is art!" He twisted his mouth with disgust. "Your son's art, Katerina! How about that?"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And though they had engaged in yet another discussion about Laurent, his sexuality and his 'degenerate art', in her lover's own terms, Catherine wondered whether the young man's fixation on her son wasn't down to sexual attraction, like her boyfriend so vehemently insisted in denying.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">So -- would Laurent's revenge come that way, she wondered? Hooking her Russian lover across the oceans? The explicit nudity of his paintings were all over the internet now, though she hadn't checked them herself.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But the possibility of Laurent taking revenge on her did not exist. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Since he couldn't possibly know that, just once, she had stolen <i>a guy</i> from him. It was more like she had borrowed him -- it had been a one night affair, tormented and fiery and redemptive. She hadn't foreseen it, unthinkable as it was that she should compete with her son for the love of men. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Laurent couldn't possibly know -- he <i>shouldn't</i> know, and she dismissed those memories with a shiver, her heart shattering at the simple thought that he could one day find it out.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large; font-weight: normal;">this is the conclusion of</span></h2>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: x-large;"><u>First Trasmission | The Heart</u></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: #6fa8dc;"><b><a href="http://lutsepisodes.blogspot.com.br/2015/02/interlogue.html"> <span style="font-size: large;">Second Transmission | The Body</span></a></b></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: large;"><b style="background-color: #6fa8dc;"><a href="http://lutsepisodes.blogspot.com.br/2015/02/interlogue.html">click here for the next episode</a></b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i style="text-align: center;"><b>Author's note:</b> having been </i><i style="text-align: center;">imported from a former version of the story, </i><i style="text-align: center;">some of the comments below are dated previous to this post. Once the plot has not been altered, just the pagination, I am keeping them since they are very dear and precious to me.</i></span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10000213495439627694noreply@blogger.com2Saint Petersburg, Russia59.9342802 30.33509860000003859.4248817 29.044205100000038 60.443678700000007 31.625992100000037