Free Finding the Thing Within by Coris/ciro Sceusa

could have murdered him but kissed him instead and they set off. When they were in the car together Rosario would caress Lorenzo’s legs and Lorenzo would do the same to Rosario’s hair, perhaps subconsciously seeking out the sensation of touching something that they themselves lacked. Just as Rosario had his own close friend Francesco, Lorenzo had a close relationship with his best friend, Tullio Chiazzese. Tullio was an architect and had known Lorenzo for a number of years and as Lorenzo was clear, they were very close. Never sexually, Tullio was 100% straight.
“Haven’t you ever wanted to tell Tullio?”
“Sure I’ve wanted to but I’m not brave enough. I’m
    scared that telling him about me would push him away.” “Sorry but didn’t you say he was a real friend, if
he’s a real friend then he’ll understand and stand by you,
no? If he doesn’t, it means he’s not a real friend and you
haven’t lost anything. All my friends are real friends and
they all know about me. More importantly, they all treated
me exactly the same both before and after I told them.” “It’s easy for you to say. You’re in the situation
where everyone already knows, so there’s no issue, is
there?”
“I was your age too, you know? I had problems
telling other people but if you think, they accepted me for
what I was, and this was twenty years ago, when it was still
taboo to even talk about homosexuality. I think they’ll accept you with no problems now that it’s fashionable to be
gay!”
“Yeah but I think it’s still too early for me to deal
with all this. What’s worse is that in building my
smokescreen, I’ve acquired a reputation as a bit of a player and I couldn’t disappoint everyone one day with ‘Hey
guys, I’m Gay!’ Do you know what that would mean? One
time I asked a female friend of mine what she would say if I
told her I was gay. You know what she said? Who, you? I’d
never believe it; you’re far too boyish to be gay. I had
wanted to set her straight and tell her the truth but in the
end I just laughed and said that, yeah, she was probably
right. I think everything has it’s right time and that you can’t
just rush things.”
“Ok but what would happen, say, if you told your
friends and it ended up meaning that it ruined your relationships with them, in that case, would you choose me or
them?”
“Shit you can’t ask me questions like that, it’s not
fair,” and after a moment of silence he went on. “Anyway,
I’d choose you but it would be really painful to have to
abandon my friends. You know, Tullio has helped out with this guy’s house who’s really into Hi-Fi like you, and has
made a sound studio,” and he gave him a business card. “Oh. That’s interesting, why don’t you introduce
me? We could talk about this sort of thing.”
“Why do you want to meet him?”
“Why not? I introduced you to my friends.” “Under what pretence? Where should I say I met
you?”
“You can just say that you met when you heard me
talking in a shop about stereos and you thought I should
talk to him.”
“No, it’s too complicated. He’s very clever at understanding people with sly questions. Let me think about it
and then we’ll talk again.”
    ***
    The morning flew by and he was free of thoughts and calm. They didn’t have sex but were content with kisses and touches when they were in the car, between one city and the other. They were like two people in love. Lorenzo followed him to all his appointments and was introduced as a young friend wanting to learn the trade of a salesman, and no suspicions were raised. At lunchtime, they stopped at a trattoria and, as they were waiting for the food to arrive, discussed the morning’s appointments.
    The trattoria was crowded and nearby sat two guys, also salesmen from the look of them. One was much older than the other, just like them. The elder was sitting facing away from them but they could see the younger one from the front. He was in his early