I am now being a total twat staying silent when I should be screaming it from the top of my lungs. Shouting ‘Yes please!’ into his mouth and smashing my lips against his. Instead I am stroking his back. Long firm strokes up and down his spine. Letting my fingertip find softness at the bottom of the hem. Tentatively just pressing the pad of my index finger against the warmth. Little slides of my finger tracing the shapes of his vertebrae, hard angles resting under membranes and skin.
“Sorry,” he whispers. His body slacks against mine.
“Sweet,” I reply. THE FUCK, MAX? I have watched every high school romcom. Every romantic shit-fest of high school romance shite. I know what to say to make this right and that is all I can squeeze out?
“Sweet?” he splutters. Yeah. Now he is laughing at me.
“Look, Matteo…” My voice falters. I should just go and throw myself head first out of the window. Seriously.
“I get it. You just don’t feel that way about me and that is fine. It’ll be okay. I will survive.” He sounds crushed. Like he is trying to sound all brave and okay, but he obviously isn’t.
“No, no, no. No. Matteo. Baby.” Fuck! I’ve just called him baby! And I am still alive!
He doesn’t say anything. And I go back to stroking his back. Nuzzling my face into his hair. Holding him as tight as he is holding me. Because he hasn’t let go. Not an inch. He is still holding onto me like I am saving him from drowning. And I fucking know that feeling. With every second that passes he is dying a little inside, and then, in a minute, he will let go and walk out of my life still wearing my t-shirt and we will never speak again and every night he will fall asleep in his bed holding onto my t-shirt that he will never wash again, because it smells of me and then…
“I want to be with you too,” I say. Very quietly. Softly. Like I am not really sure the words are actually coming out of my mouth. Because I can’t let him live like that. I can’t make myself live like this. In fear, when he is right here.
The sound he makes is the cutest thing I have ever heard. Like my stomach goes all warm and his arms tighten around me. It’s like a low whine, but like he has been holding his breath and finally allowing himself to breathe.
“I like you,” I say. Then I say it again. Again, and again. I keep whispering it until he is laughing into my chest. His cheek resting against my shoulder and his eyes closed into my neck. I can feel his eyelashes flutter against my skin. Little butterfly kisses against my goose bumps. I’m running all hot and cold. Exhausted and exhilarated at the same time. “Lie down with me, like we did before,” I choke out. Because I want to. I need to. Start this again. Go back to the start before I messed it all up. Pretend that this is just a dream where I wake up with this ridiculous mess of a boy in my arms.
He does. Of course, he does. Because he says he would do anything for me.
Like I am thinking that I might do anything for him.
Because I think, and it’s a frightening thing to realise. I think he is a bit like me. I think he is lost and scared. I think he is fucking tired. He is tired of running and hiding behind this happy smile, when I am kind of waking up to the fact that the real Matteo may be someone completely different from the smiling boy who eats buns whilst spitting crumbs all over the table. The confident little fucker who laughs at the smallest thing. The one everyone loves. Because I see that at school, how people love him. He has all these friends. Yet, he is clinging to me like he is all alone in the world.
“Baby,” I whisper again as he comes to rest on my chest and I sweep the duvet around us. My t-shirt against his skin on top of mine. His hair against my lips as I press a kiss on his head.
“Max?” he questions softly. He’s never said my name before. Not that I can remember.
“Yeah?”
“Sorry I scared you.”
“You didn’t scare me. I just freaked out a little. I’m okay now. Thanks.”
I have a million thoughts in my head fighting for place and time and a hundred words on my lips I want to shout at him. I want to tell him that I am so stupidly in awe of the fact that he came here. That he just got undressed and crawled into bed with me. Just like that. I want to tell him how scared I am. I want to tell him about the thoughts in my head. I want to tell him about the fears that crawl into my head at night when I can’t sleep. The ghosts of places where my mind just won’t follow the rules. The nightmares that I sometimes can’t cope with. That I can’t be what he needs. The fucking fear that I will fuck this up before it has even started.
“I was scared last night. Scared and angry and sad, and all I could think of was that if I could just see you, I would feel a little happier. That the world wouldn’t be such a fucking shithole if I could just remind myself that you were still here.” He stops and kisses my shoulder. Just nuzzles around in my neck. His nose stroking against me causing ripples in my chest. Warmth rolling in waves over me like phantom caresses that just make me smile. I can’t help it. He’s here.
“How did you know where I live?” I haven’t even thought about that.
“Googled your Dad. He’s a bit famous, your Pop. He’s one of the original Street Medics and he is on the board of the Night Angels who are like awesome people. On top of that he got some bravery award for saving the life of some street gang member?”
Oh. Okay. Yeah. I hadn’t thought about that. He has always done all these things. Been on committees. Started these crazy ideas. Gone off on night walks with teams of medics to check on people who have nowhere to go. People who don’t belong and might not be brave enough to go to hospital when they should have. “If people are in pain and can’t go to a doctor, then the doctor should come to them,” Dad had usually said before he kissed me goodnight and disappeared out for the night with his Hi-Vis jacket slung over his arm.
“My Dad is cool.” Well, that’s an understatement, but hey, it’s my Dad.
“He grilled me last night. I think he thought I was some street kid who was going to rob him or something.” Matteo giggles into my collarbone.
“Sorry,” I whisper. I am smiling though. I can almost picture it. My Dad holding court in his chair whilst Matteo would have squirmed in the doorway.
“Nah, he’s really nice. Gave me a sandwich and some kind of hot stuff in a cup that tasted like cardboard. What was that?”
“Carob.” I laugh. “It’s good for you apparently.”
“I’ll get you some hot chocolate powder next time. We have sachets at the Pizza place I deliver for. My boss is cool, lets me have a few at the end of my shift.”
“Thank you.” I giggle. We lie there, in the warmth under the duvet. Me in my birthday suit. Him in my clothes. My fingers combing through his hair. His fingers dancing on my chest. It hasn’t even occurred to me that I am fucking naked. I don’t care. There is nothing Matteo hasn’t seen now. There is no little part of me he hasn’t just smiled at and hugged to make me feel better.
I’m me. Own it.
“Max?”
“What happened to Pumpkin?” I tease.
He smiles. He smiles like the world is his.
“You will always be my Pumpkin. But sometimes we need to be serious.”
“And you are being serious?” Yeah. I’m being a twat. And Matteo is rolling his eyes at me as I gently move a strand of hair out of his eyes.