“Hi. We’re all here now, aren’t we?” I ask.
“Only Lisa is missing. She’s probably taking a walk with Edoardo somewhere, since they’re inseparable now” Sophie says with a little sarcastic accent.
“Give me your jackets” Mara says, “I’ll lock them in my parents’ room. Lara has this bad habit of eating anything that comes her way, lately.”
“Same for Winnie! These are the third pair of Nikes I’ve bought because of him!” Giulia exclaims.
I have a few words with Tommaso and Anna, who fall immediately in love with my necklace. Mara goes downstairs to take something to drink and Davide starts to argue with Filippo because of last year, while Chiara smokes her cigarette.
Then, it comes to me and Giacomo. That’s the part where I should give a description of him, isn’t it? Well, he’s taller than me - it doesn’t take much, though -, he is dark-blonde haired and his eyes are small and dark, too. His face is really pretty, to be honest. He’s only sixteen and I’m nineteen, however he looks older than me. He likes football and videogames, but we only talk about the second ones since I’m not into sports. He also likes music, and I must say he has such a BAD taste (I mean, he only listens to rap music and he doesn’t listen to Lady Gaga!). He doesn’t like animals and everytime Tony and Lara come closer to him he just runs away. It takes a bit for him to understand things sometimes and I’m the only one who appreciates his cringe humor. I’m the only one who appreciates HIM at all, apparently. When I told Davide about my feelings towards Giacomo, he said that only I could fall in love with someone like that, but I slightly cared about it.
“Marco! What’s up?” he says, smiling. I try to hide my embarassment that shows up every damn time he smiles at me.
“I’m good. I didn’t expect you to be here. Did you cancel all of your important engagements for us?”
“What engagements? I’m just… studying.”
“Didn’t know that you’re attending a school where you actually have to study” I say, sarcastically. I’m referring to Giacomo’s terrible ratings at school.
“You have a prejudice against my school! Stop it.” He smiles again. I surprisingly make him smile many times.
“Oh, look! Mara brought the Tombola cards! I want to draw the numbers” Giacomo says.
“Please, no. Don’t you remember what Filippo did when you won EVERYTHING last year?”
“My face still hurts.”
“Well, bring a helmet next time.”
“Or box gloves, so I can return him the favor.”
I laugh. Maybe a little bit loud, since everybody turns to look at me. That’s one of the awkward moments that happens when I have Giacomo around. I get too excited and everything he says makes me laugh. Kind of annoying, I know, but he makes this effect on me.
We start the first Tombola round. Giacomo sits next to me and we make jokes on Filippo all the time, making him mad. This time, UNEXPECTEDLY, Filippo wins in the end! He starts to jump over Mara’s bed while she’s screaming that he’s going to destroy it and everyone’s laughing. After a few rounds, we decide to take a break and go downstairs to the living room. Tommaso and Sophie go for a walk since they’re dating; Davide, Anna, Giulia and Andrea start a boring conversation about Jordan shoes or something like this (I’m hopelessly devoted to Vans), while Mara, Chiara and Filippo spend some time with Mara’s dogs. I sit on the sofa and Giacomo sits next to me.
It comes to us again. I feel so embarrassed everytime we’re together alone, while he always seems so natural and comfortable. I guess that’s because I like him in a romantic way and he likes me just in a friend way. No need to be embarrassed with a friend. Things are different if you actually fancy that friend.
He’s the first to take the word.
“So… did you choose your Christmas presents? I bought a new game for my Switch and I suspect my parents bought me a new pair of shoes, but I’m not really sure about it” he says.
“Oh, well” I mumble, “I don’t know what my parents bought me, but I ordered the second volume of the Heartstopper graphic novel, since I completely DEVOURED the first book.”
“Heartstopper? Never heard of it.”
“That’s because you’re… straight, I guess.” What a stupid thing to say. Why am I like this?
“I mean, it is a gay story” I say, trying to repair the damage.
Giacomo stares at me with a look of confusion, but then I realize that’s the face he always has. I smile.
“Oh, isn’t it a Netflix series? You know, with that guy with curly hair and the other guy…”
“Yeah! It is based on a comic. I’ve watched that series a hundred times. Now I’m going… straight to the root.”
He smiles again. Please, he’s so pretty.
“Seems cool. I’m not into this… kind of things.”
I don’t know what my face looks like - maybe completely disappointed - but he immediately takes the word again.
“I mean, I don’t like love stories. Every kind. I prefer… you know, action or… stuff like that.”
I’m an idiot. I REALLY need to work on my involuntary face expressions. Maybe he thinks that I believe he’s homophobic.
“Already mentioned your bad taste in the past” I say, and he smiles. OK, everything’s alright, luckily.
He stares at me for a few seconds and I’m sure my cheeks are blushing.
“Can I ask you a question?” he says after a few seconds.
“Of course you can.”
“How… did you realize you’re gay? I mean, is it something you’ve always known or has there been a moment that made you realize it?”
Why is he asking me this? That’s not the first time he made me talk about myself and my experience as a gay guy in a small town. Sometimes he seems kind of… obsessed with it. Never understood why. Not much time ago I started to imagine a real story between me and Giacomo. I imagined that he actually liked me and that was the reason why he asked me all of those questions. That our lives were connected just like Nick and Charlie’s, that I was the one who would have made him realize he also liked guys. Stupid, in-love-guy thoughts. He is just curious, since he has never had gay friends. No need to suspect anything. It’s just a friendship, nothing less, nothing more.
“Well, I… I didn’t know it the whole time, actually. It was… not the best thing to discover.”
His face becomes even sweeter than usual.
“I was eleven, maybe twelve. Everybody has always expected me to have a girlfriend and a family in the future. I started to think about it, too. I actually had a girlfriend when I was eleven. Then… you know, there was this classmate of mine. Always looked at him like a friend, but I suddenly started to look at him in a different way. It came completely natural, I guess. You know, with puberty. You discover your body, and the same with your mind. But there are people who discover they’re gay even later, when they’re old, maybe because their families expect them not to be who they truly are and they convince themselves that they’re somebody else, too. Not my case, though. When my family discovered it, everybody was OK. Not the best supporters that I have, I must say, but at least they didn’t kick me out. That’s it, I guess.”
Giacomo has a strange face. Seems… proud? I can’t understand what he’s thinking - it rarely happens, he’s usually so predictable.
“Why did you say it wasn’t the best thing to discover? Your family seems pretty nice.”
“Yeah, they are… it’s just… you know. I’ve already told you about my ex…”
“What happened between you two has nothing to do with the fact that you’re gay.”
“I know. But… I feel like I’m collecting failures, one after the other. It’s kind of hard. I’ve always liked people who didn’t like me back or didn’t even know I liked them. That classmate I mentioned, he has never known what I felt for him. I even created a fake Instagram account and texted him, without saying that I was a boy.” Little laugh by both of us. God, that period was so degrading.
“I think you shouldn’t have done that. It is good to talk about our feelings. You should’ve told him.”
How lovely he is. Didn’t expect him to think that.
“Yeah, maybe you’re right.”
“And guess what? I don’t believe that there’s a single person who’s 100% straight. Maybe he wasn’t and you lost your chance!”
I start to tremble. Why is he saying that? Is he even talking about himself? Is he not straight? And does he want me to know it? I’m so confused. This happens every FUCKING time Giacomo and I are together. We always talk about this stuff and he always says things that confuse me. But this has gone over any other conversation we had.
I don’t know what to say. He stares at me and expects me to say something. His small eyes are the most intense I’ve ever seen.
“You’re right. But it’s hard when you look at a person in a… romantic way, and you know that they'll never look at you the same way. It’s… hard.”
I say this while staring at his eyes all the time. I want to tell him so bad…
“Yeah, I know.”
Silence.
He smiles, but there’s something different this time. He seems a little bit scared. I don’t know what’s happening. Suddenly the connection we established when we started the conversation breaks. He looks away from me and gets his phone, while I’m still staring at him. Is he… figuring it out? That I’m in love with him? Did I say too much? Anna and Sophie told me that it is pretty clear that I like him and he’s just so STUPID not to have figured it out yet. Maybe now he is? That’s all my fault! But why does he have to ask me gay stuff every damn time we are together?! Maybe he has always suspected it and asked me those things for this reason, and now his thoughts are confirmed… God, I’m such an idiot!
After a few seconds, Tommaso and Sophie return and we start another Tombola round. This time, Giacomo sits next to Tommaso, leaving me alone. He doesn’t talk to me for the rest of the evening, we just look at each other sometimes but he immediately looks away from me. Good, Marco. You managed to ruin another one of your days! I’m going to win a prize, sooner or later.
I really want to tell Giacomo the truth about my feelings, but everyone says that he would just make me suffer. And maybe they’re right. If he has figured out something this evening and that’s his reaction - ignoring me and leaving me alone -, well, it’s better not to tell him. But I shouldn’t have looked at him that way saying those things. I was just so surprised by what he was saying and I thought I could tell him a little more, but it wasn’t the right thing to do. I’m an idiot.
Before leaving Mara’s house, Davide comes to me.
“What happened? You’re acting so strange. Is it about Giacomo?”
I’m still surprised how Davide is good at understanding everything about me.
“I think I said too much this time. We were just talking and… he asked me how I realized that I’m gay. I told him and… I said it is hard because you can… I mean, fall in love with someone who would never look at you. Then he… changed. He ignored me and sat next to Tommaso and barely talked to me. Do you think he’s… figuring it out?”
“Oh, Jesus. Are you JOKING? We’re talking about Giacomo! His brain is smaller than a peanut. He just had to talk with Tommaso, I saw them chatting all the time. He won’t understand anything, trust me. Take it easy. Don’t let these stupid things ruin your days, Marco” Davide says.
“But he was so interested in what I said and then… he just looked away from me.”
“You can’t know what’s going on in his head. It won’t help you. You need to stop this and forget him. We already talked about that.”
“Not really easy since we hang out, like, every week.”
“Not really easy if YOU think you can tell him everything! I know you like him and he’s your friend, but he’s just a guy you met this summer. You can’t pretend that you’re, you know, best friends for life and you can tell him everything that happens to you. Has he ever slightly talked to you about HIS life? Or his feelings?”
Davide’s right. Every time we talk, it’s always about me.
“Your silence means no. You need to stop this. You’ve already suffered enough this year. There’s no need for a straight guy who asks you strange questions. However, he’s not thinking you like him. You can sleep in peace.”
“Yeah, I guess you’re right. I’m… such an idiot.”
“Of course you are. But we can work on it.”
I smile. It’s freaking good having friends like mine.
When I walk home, both Giacomo and Davide’s words ring in my head. And it’s so hard to admit that maybe I need to put some space between me and Giacomo.
Comments (2)
See all