by Clay Ferrill
He stood with some difficulty, letting his heavy robes fall to the dusty tile floor and drag as he scooted. He seemed to tire of this dress he must wear, pulling at the dragging cloth almost angrily. It is so heavy on his aged frame at 91 years old. He turned and began shuffling his feet to the back end of the room toward a blank stucco wall? He turned, a smile on his face. “And yes, Father Cole, I was listening and watching. I saw Luigi on his way there, the same path he takes every morning since he met you. He too searches for you. Until tomorrow. Don’t be late.” With that he waved his hand in the corner and the wall moved aside wide enough for his aged form to pass through into the dimly lit passageway. A small two-seat cart waiting with a driver. It closed behind him silently.
I turned to Luigi just in time to see the eyes roll back in his head as he started slumping to the floor. I caught him under the arms and laid him down gently. I laid down next to him with my hand smoothing the front of his cassock. He hadn’t fainted. Just overwhelmed. I started to speak and his hand shot up out of nowhere to cover my mouth. I pushed my tongue into it and tasted his warm salt. He was breathing hard, emotions bubbling to the surface almost visible. His other hand unbuttoned his single-button smock, letting it drop from his shoulders. He then pulled out his collar and threw it aside. Tears were streaming out of his pinched eyes. He would never wear it again. The cassocks fell after we got up off the floor at the same time. We stepped out of them at the same time. He was fully naked and didn’t care. He kicked the cassock aside with his foot. He would never wear it again either. He didn’t need to explain himself. I got it. I feel the same way. While I hadn’t gone through Divinity education to have formed a strict no-sex stance as a man of the cloth, the brotherhood of it no longer applies to we two now. It doesn’t matter how the Pope himself feels about two men loving one another. The church condemns it. We are no longer priests of this great church. How can we be?
I was wearing a protective under-layer of black ballistic nylon on top with full sleeves and still had on my tactical pants and boots. Large sweat stains under both arms. I reached down and pulled a detonator kit complete with spike and transmitter with one wire cut from the open pouch on my leg. I twisted it there in front of his eyes as he reached out his hand to still mine and stare at what it was. I saw the question in his eyes. “Igniters for the bombs. C4 explosives.” That was the only way Adam would let me keep it to show to Luigi when we talked about telling the other person you love everything about yourself and how important it is to be that vulnerable to another human being you love.
I dropped it to the floor and his eyes followed it, his expression shocked and curious. I coughed at my stink as I pulled off the tight nylon shirt and ran my hands over the hair on my abs where it itched. His hands unbuckled my belt and pants, forehead hit the center of my chest when he spread the pants open. I felt his breath on my skin down there. He ran his fingers under the top band of the jockstrap and breathed in deeply, the back of his fingers slipping inside against my body to slide against my hardness. He let the pants fall around my ankles as his hands browsed my packaged hang. Lifting his mouth into my chest he sucked at my skin and drank in the taste of me as he held my pouched mass in both hands. His warmth just enveloped me then. Pushing everything from my mind I abandoned myself to him. The only image in my mind, two parallel lines of data, drifting farther back in the timeline, now intersected and entwined.
Pulling him into me I lifted him off his feet and turned fast, swinging his legs and knocking over the modest wood chair the Pontiff had been seated at only minutes ago now. We both laughed out loud as I short-stepped with expert balance and fell onto the bed, bracing the impact with my arms out. I came to rest over the top of him and let my body press against him for only a second, rolling off quickly. On my elbow I looked down at his naked body and followed my hand as it traced through the hair on his chest and stomach. A dark auburn against pale olive skin. I breathed over him and he rolled his body into mine. “Boots. Pants. Jockstrap. Must get naked.” He smiled up at me running his hand down my sweaty body to the pouch he seems so enamored with that was trying its best to restrain me.
He sniffed deeply and slid off the bed onto the floor where he busily unlaced and removed my boots and thick stocks. I could smell my stinking feet from here. Yikes. The sudden ticklish feel of his fingers tracing ticklishly along the sole of my foot caused me to jerk and the resulting kick connected with his right eye with a pretty loud sound. A few seconds later “Fucking fuck! Fuck! Your foot fucking kicked me in the fucking eye! Fuck man! Oh fuck man, this hurts!” I sprang up to get some ice and a rag, forgetting the pants still around my ankles, and in what must have appeared to be an arm-waving dance desperately grasping at air, trapped feet and legs flailing, I fell flat on my face to the tile with a loud slap noise as my torso hit the floor. It sounded worse than it felt. I was laughing harder then, almost peeing myself. Luigi was rolling around on the bed laughing just as hard. He sat up and held out his hand to me to come to him. I pushed the pants from my legs and crawled back up and over him. I stopped when my face was towering over him looking down into his beautiful face.
“So then it’s talk-talk-talk and mess around later? Is that what I’m hearing?” I said down into his face, barely able to contain my deep throated chuckle. We both then busted into laughter, good belly laughs, sitting up on the edge of the bed, Luigi wiping his tears away. I hope that he feels the happiness I feel at this moment with him. I put my arm over his shoulder with my sweaty armpit in his face. He sniffed me there and lifted my arm off. Resting his head against my arm, I lowered my face into his hair and breathed in the scent deeply and spoke into him. “I love you Luigi.” He sighed and spoke “well we both stink, so I guess it’s talk-talk-talk, mess around in the shower again, then talk-talk-talk more. And then more messing around.” We both rose at the same time as I peeled the too-tight jockstrap off, vowing to never wear one again. Horrible garments. Horrible. Adding them to the growing list of garments I’ll never wear again.
The water felt splendid and warm as it rushed over our bodies, cleaning away my toils of the past 24 hours, a topic still to be discussed. But I’d get to it. Right now, I want to slow time down so this doesn’t pass too fast. I made a promise to Adam for the morning or I would just bail on him. As I lather his hair for him, I think about how I’ll tell him everything. What’s first, second, etc. First, I will tell him the truth about Saudi Arabia and why that was necessary. Then I’ll tell him about Switzerland and the farm explosion no doubt major news in that part of the world about a mysterious facility in the Czech Republic blowing up inside of a mountain.
But right now, this part, doesn’t need to be complex. I just want to be with him for a while. Right now, I am back with Luigi in Rome. Tomorrow? He kissed my wet chest tenderly as his soapy hands washed me everywhere. The sensations he was making me feel. I chewed on his shoulder as the water pounded my head and face, cascading over his beautiful body and just held him to me. Our bodies melded together as one. Pulling him into a kiss, I lifted him off the floor into the air. Locking his arms around my neck like something practiced or common, I pressed my face into his chest and let my tongue trail down his furry torso as he instinctively wrapped his legs around my middle. I slid him down my body slowly, hooking my arms under his knees. Pressing into him. His body went limp. So familiar.
Pulling him off I lowered him to the floor and turned him to the wall and pressed my body into him standing up. His moans and bites into my hairy forearm bracing me against the wall displayed his hunger for me. I lowered my center and pressed into him. I felt his muscles under my hands tense and then relax. He breathed out hard, his bare chest flattened against the cold tiles of the shower wall. I eased away from him and stood up straight. I reached to increase the hot water, which never runs out here in this place. Renewing my cleansing of his body, my hands everywhere all at once. He pinched his face in thought. I kissed his wet forehead through his slick long hair and asked “what has you s
o deep inside your head Luigi? Is it that we’re not going to be able to stay priests? I’m actually happy with that because it means I am right here, back with you. God’s will. I don’t know how to look at us any other way. I can’t hide it. I don’t want to hide away in secret. I’ve always known what I am. His Holiness has sent me, no, sent us, a detailed file. There’s a reason for his visit lying just beneath the surface so I propose that we read what he sent together. Before tomorrow afternoon and the viewing or whatever in the vaults. If you’ve never been down there it’s pretty cool. That’s where I disappear to when I, um, study I guess is the right word.”
We finished rinsing and I turned the water off. “We need to know more.” He nodded his head yes and backed away from me to dry off. I finished but waited as he stepped away first, grabbing the only other towel from the rack and wrapped it around his shoulders. He doesn’t ever dry his hair with a towel. Makes it too curly and uncontrollable. He handed me the towel around his waist and I took it from him and dried his back. I spoke into his ear “I love you.” He lowered his head and purred a breath out “I will never tire of hearing you say that to me. I love you too.” We dried off in earnest and he walked to the bed and climbed in under the sheets and thick blanket, scooting over to give me room to join him. I fell to the bed exhausted and turned into him, shoving him over and then pulling his back into my chest and stomach, his butt nestled into my center. We fell asleep like that and slept for over ten hours.
I woke before sunrise the following day, my bed empty except for me. A quick note scrawled on a newspaper ripping, a simple but highly artistic shadowed heart in black ink and below it, CL & LB. I dressed in a fresh wool cassock and fresh white starched collar. Without a replacement cup, I put the dirty socks and jock in the hamper and slid the tactical pants up over my naked legs and crotch, buttoning them, zipping them up and tightening the belt. Fresh socks and my boots were laced in less than five minutes. I picked up the scrap of torn newspaper and placed it in the front right pocket of my cassock. Lifting my rosary, I spoke a calming morning prayer before I started my day. Something about flying over Russian airspace and mosquitos? This should be interesting.
I walked a few miles away from the Vatican before I turned the cell phone on Adam had given me yesterday, with the instructions “when you hear it ring and feel it vibrate, press this green button and talk to me.” I had just walked into a delicious smelling bakery where the smells were amazing. In perfectly annunciated Italian I requested a cafe’ latte with an extra shot and a dozen of the fresh brioche buns she was removing from the oven when I walked in. She smiled and busied herself with my order. I raised the vibrating block of glass to my face after pressing the green button. “Adam?” I screamed into the phone loudly, the 3 bakers all startling and turning to face me. My broadest white smile had them all smiling back at me instantly, forgiven for the start. I walked outside the door as Adam began to speak. “Change of plans Father Cole. We’re headed to Moscow in the northern suburb blocks. Quick in and out, but we have the location of the escaped and fleeing genetics engineer that designed the Damascus virus. We are re-routed to apprehend and question him about the virus’s construction. His Holiness’s orders. Wheels up in 35 minutes, so where are you so I may send Siren to pick you up?”
I lifted the paper napkin off the table outside “114 Via del Gianicolo. A little bakery a few miles from the Vatican. Coffee?” He laughed into the phone “Si padre, grazie. Now stay right there, she’ll be there in less than five minutes. She’s been waiting at the Pope’s private entrance where you were dropped off yesterday.” The glass block went dead so I slipped it back into my pocket and went back inside. “Mi scusi, scusatemi, potresti fare quei tre grandi con colpi?” She nodded and took down two more large paper cups. The smells in this place have me salivating. I’m starving. I laid a crisp 100 Euro banknote Adam had given me many of on the counter. She picked it up and was looking at it as Siren pulled up outside in a tiny little Fiat convertible and honked, her smile through the window into the bakery just adorable. Holding the tray of coffees and the bag of brioche I called out over my shoulder “mantenere il cambiamento grazie, grazie mille” and my smile spread to huge instantly. Huge fucking tip again for coffee and bread.
Chapter Fourteen
Day Seven, Sunday, November 29, 2020, 06:45 GMT
Souls From The Guf
As Siren sped off toward da Vinci International, she filled me in on the “Russian Bugs”. Two zeppelin drones had more safely deposited multiple loads of mosquitos and mosquito larvae over several areas of Russian airspace, including two passes over five of the largest fresh-water reservoirs in that vast and sprawling country. It would blanket Europe in mere days. The genetically engineered insects would inject anyone stung by one with a counter-virus to the M-1 genetic strain with dominant middle eastern genes and neutralize it without causing any permanent damage to the infected. Oh, thank God above.
It was essentially a virus created from the dominant middle eastern gene strain itself that was edited to turn it against itself, eventually self-annihilating. No one would die. No one would be killed. Nothing to be blown up to stop the spread. Keying up the document on the iPad, the Zaabit case was also marked closed now. Only one case remained open. This current Moscow trip and the genetic engineer that started all of this.
Laughing, Siren called out “duck father!” as she swerved to the left to give me more head clearance and sped under the metal crossing arm as it was raising at her approach to the private jet terminal and the Vatican hangar. It missed the windshield of the car by mere inches. Adam waited outside ahead of us as I brushed my hand over the top of my head looking at her rabid fucking expression. The jet apparently still inside the hangar. She squealed to a stop. I pulled myself up without opening the door and stepped out of the short little car to the tarmac and reached in to pick up the tray of coffees and rolls from the floor.
“She’s a fucking maniac in anything with wheels, Adam. Fear for your very life” and I winked at her, but I still felt the rush from suddenly slumping down in my seat when my legs were already smashed against the dashboard. She laughed. She gunned the engine and squealed away curving sharply into the hangar and pulled the car along the inside of the sliding doors there on the far side tucked out of the way - to a very loud skidding stop. Opening the small trunk, she lifted out a large black duffel and then walked toward the plane peeling off her black knit cap. Long blonde hair, almost white blonde, fell down past her shoulders and back. I handed Adam his coffee staring at her with my mouth open in awe. She had just been shaved bald? He smiled up at me sheepishly. Siren. I took a sip of the coffee and burned the roof of my mouth, bending over to spit it out. I pulled the lid off and poured it out onto the tarmac. I swear I could see the asphalt melting. “Fucking lava hot like that, what, always? Every fucking time?!” He laughed heartily. I am so fucking done with hot coffee.
We started walking toward the hangar as the tail came into view, the engines had just fired up as it was being pushed back by the tractor. Adam tapped me on the arm and I looked down into his smiling face. “I told him Cole. Every detail.” He raised his eyebrows twice rapidly. My smile widened. “And?!” I demanded, chuckling. “Not a wink of sleep since we talked. He took it from me with force and it was so fucking hot. I love that man with all my heart. The cassock I wear is his, Father. I have been asked not to share his name with you. Not by him. He actually wants to meet this blonde priest I described to him in great detail. I have been asked by His Holiness not to share his name with you. For his protection. The Pope’s protection. I agreed, of course.”
I shrugged my shoulders. He then asked “were you able to find your Luigi Father?” The smile betrayed my intent to remain still and keep things between Luigi and I private, just between us for now. It is so new. I am so new. And the Pope of Rome, of course. “Yes, I have found him. I will not lose him again. Thank you for the advice, too, Adam. I assure you I do not intend to waste the gift I have in my lo
ve for him. My entire being is on fire with it. Hey, you would know this. Will this fire always burn so intensely as I feel now for him? Has it been that way with you and … your husband? Does the fire still burn for you?” He smiled up at me and it was such a kindred and caring expression on his beautiful young face.
“He tells me, my husband and His Holiness both, that there are in fact true men of God, his priests, who burn with this fire for God. His interpretation of this is that what ‘fire’ you speak of that we feel for one another is exactly as valuable in love as it is when the fire is for God. Do you see the truth in that Cole? As a way of answering your question? Now my answer to you is yes, indeed, that fire burns stronger right now than it ever has for me for him. I have had more passionate sex in the past week than I have ever in my life. Last night with Ba … I almost just spoke his name. Sorry. Yes, is my answer to your question Cole. The fire does burn as hot, and if we’re fortunate enough, even hotter as we grow together as men, in private, by ourselves under only the eyes of God.”
He bounded up the steps into the jet and quickly turned right as I climbed the last few steps and went inside. Siren was seated in the lounge I had occupied yesterday. “You’re in my chair” and she waved her hand in the air smiling “there are four identical chairs here Padre. So take a fuckin’ seat and shut up.” She laughed hard at that. She handed me two briefs from the duffel on the floor at her feet. “I’m an excellent driver Father. I would never put your life in jeopardy. Just so you understand that.” I looked at her and winked and took the files. I sat down in the chair opposite as Adam came in after knocking twice on the cockpit door. The plane angled out into daylight as I read the files. They watched me read. Annoying. I looked up. “Have you both read these?” They nodded, straight-faced both of them. “You have my attention cohorts. Fill me in. I’ll read in the air.”