Service
Touch
by TNL
February 1919
The day had dawned clear and cold, but an hour off Long Island dense clouds lowered and snow began to fall. Some of the Second Class passengers huddled on the liner’s starboard side, fists in overcoat pockets, waiting patiently for a first glimpse of the coastline. A number would be seeing America for the first time.
“There,” Giuseppe Fatone’s neighbor said, nudging his side. “‘You see? Sands Point.”
The snow fell steadily, a grey curtain obscuring the view, but a moment later Giuseppe saw it: waves breaking on sand.
Home.
Kevin Richardson arrived at the Green Star Line’s pier an hour before the ship was due. The Customs man waved him onto the pier with a warning – ‘Come back ten minutes afore she docks, mind’ – and he strode down to the pilings at the end, the snowy wind in his face, eyes straining down the harbor.
All he could see was the faint outline of Bartholdi’s statue – even Staten Island was lost in the squall. The snow was wet on his cheeks, like cold tears, and he shielded his face with one ungloved hand until a freezing gust reminded him to hide it inside his overcoat.
Kevin thought about going back inside the terminal, for there was nothing to see, but when he turned back towards the city he stopped, transfixed.
New York was blurred, the lights in some of the nearer buildings pale aureoles against the growing twilight. The snow accentuated shades of grey: all he could see of the termini and warehouses was the peak of one roof, the wide-mouthed freight doors of another, lit from within. Somewhere to the east stood the Woolworth Building, the tallest skyscraper in the world, a fitting symbol of this new America, all adolescent strength and good will.
He hugged himself, for warmth, and once again a feeling of unalloyed joy stole over him. The war was finally over; Giuseppe was safe. Tonight, they had reservations at a tiny trattoria in Greenwich Village, followed by dancing at the Cotton Club – unless, that is, they went back to their hotel in Gramercy Park and—
He glanced sideways. Somewhere, way down the Verrazano Narrows, Giuseppe was pacing, hungry-eyed, waiting for the boat to dock.
Kevin shivered, a thin trickle of freezing rain straying down his spine.
Giuseppe had grown used to the pace of military life. He was now familiar with slow-moving queues, and forms to be filled out in triplicate: even the sounding of the ship’s whistle was routine. All the same, he sat on the wooden bench beside the Second Class gangway, heavy hands weighing down nervous knees, listening for his name.
“Giuseppe Fatone.”
He rose quickly, stooping for his suitcases and joining the short line before the Second Class purser. When it was Giuseppe’s turn, the purser – Reg Dwight, a friendly chap – handed him an envelope containing his passport and discharge papers. Giuseppe automatically patted his breast pocket: it contained a letter from Mr. Deering, offering him his old job at an increased salary.
“Good luck to you,” Reg said, and Giuseppe smiled back.
“Thanks, Mr. D.,” he replied. “Have a safe trip.”
The gangway angled steeply downwards, and Giuseppe stuck a suitcase under one arm before proceeding, knuckles white, clutching the slippery banister. When he stepped onto the pier, stumbling slightly, he set the suitcases down with a clatter. Patting the crown of his bowler hat, perched low on his forehead, he picked up one case in each hand.
At the end of the pier, he could see the welcoming lights of the Green Star Line’s terminal.
‘Kevin,’ he murmured, his heart quickening.
Kevin watched intently as the ship’s passengers passed through the freight doors, parted just wide enough so that two people could walk abreast. The line at Customs kept growing, and he was just lighting a cigarette with trembling fingers when a tall figure, flecked with melting snow, appeared in the doorway: Giuseppe.
His match had burned down to the tips of his fingers; Kevin swore softly and dropped it. A middle-aged woman, dressed in widow’s weeds, glanced at him reprovingly. “Pardon me,” he muttered. “The match. . .”
“‘No excuse, young man,” she replied, turning to a younger companion. “These young people have no manners,” the widow hissed, and Kevin took a step away.
Downstairs, in the Customs line, someone was calling his name.
“No manners,” the woman told her friend.
Kevin waved over the railing at Giuseppe.
They met on the other side of Customs, Giuseppe juggling his luggage and overcoat, Kevin suddenly shy and clumsy.
“Babbo,” he said, holding out a hand for one of the cases. Giuseppe set the suitcase aside, seizing Kevin’s hand and pulling him into a one-armed embrace. Kevin mumbled something inaudible, feeling the cynosure of all eyes, and turned red when Giuseppe kissed his cheeks.
“Caro,” Giuseppe breathed. “God, I’ve missed you.”
Their suits and overcoats were bulky, unfamiliar, and Kevin found it odd, holding his lover nervously around the waist. Giuseppe’s eyes sparkled in the unwavering light of the terminal, and Kevin brought a hand up to his face, a thumb just brushing the moisture on his friend’s cheek.
“‘Missed you, too,” he said. “So much.”
Another passenger jostled them, and a few feet away an elderly woman loudly greeted her husband.
“We could go, you know.”
“Can we?” Giuseppe replied. “I thought I’d need to wait, for my trunk.”
“I don’t think so.” Kevin’s eyelids fluttered as he spoke. “I’m pretty sure— I think you just need to leave your tags, with the hotel’s address. . .”
Giuseppe stepped back, grinning, amused by Kevin’s slight case of nerves. “I’m sure there’s a line, Kev – let’s go look for it.”
It took them half an hour to sort out Giuseppe’s baggage, and then another few minutes, huddled together just inside the street entrance, before they slid gratefully into the back of a taxi.
The cabby climbed into the driver’s seat, craning around for Kevin’s directions with a quavering: “Eh? Can’t hear you – I’m a mite deaf.”
“Gramercy Park Hotel.”
“Eh?”
Giuseppe chuckled as Kevin leaned forward, shoulders tensed.
“Now, Kev,” he admonished. Kevin glanced at him sheepishly. “You were going to yell, weren’t you? Gramercy Park Hotel.”
“Thankee, sir,” the cabby replied, engaging the taxi’s first gear.
“I said that,” Kevin murmured. “And I wasn’t going to yell.”
Giuseppe’s arm eased purposefully behind Kevin’s back, encouraging his lover to move closer. “You were, but that’s all right. Aren’t you glad to see me?”
“I am!” Kevin insisted, and again Giuseppe smiled.
“You are,” he said, “but you’re nervous – I can tell.”
“Nervous? I’m not— I am, a little. . .”
“Nervous. But, see, that’s all right, because I’m a little scared, too.”
Kevin put a hand to his mouth, tugging on the glove with bared teeth. He glanced at the cabby, cheerfully oblivious to his passengers, and laced their fingers. “Are you? I thought it was just me.”
“No, no, not at all. I was afraid you wouldn’t recognize me, or you wouldn’t hold my hand in the taxi, or that we’d go straight out to dinner instead of back to the hotel to—” He flashed Kevin a guilty grin. “I just wanted to be alone with you, for a minute, with no one else around.”
“Did you?” Kevin whispered, though he might have screamed it, for all the cabby knew.
“I do.”
They rode in the elevator in silence, separated by Giuseppe’s bags, uncomfortably conscious of the elevator boy and the porter. As the gate opened on the fifth floor, Giuseppe’s hand brushed Kevin’s arm. “This way,” the porter said, leading them down the hall.
“I can’t believe I’m here,” Giuseppe muttered.
“What does Mamma always say? ‘Pacienza’?”
“I’ve never paid any attention to what my mamma says.”
“Liar.”
“Here we are,” the porter said. “518.”
As he unlocked the door, stepping inside, Giuseppe and Kevin stood still, hands firmly stuffed in their pockets. Kevin stared down the hall – and Giuseppe perused the pattern in the carpet – until the other man came out of the room: “I have your grips set up, sirs.”
He waited, politely, until Kevin remembered his wallet. “Ah, thank you,” the porter said, accepting the tip.
“Well,” Giuseppe said, after he was out of earshot, “we should go inside. Inside the room.”
Kevin looked dazed. “Yes, I think we should.”
Giuseppe shut the door with a gentle push, and then Kevin had him pressed up against the wall, the straight edge of the hotel bureau sharp against his side. They kissed, open-mouthed, tongues nearly rigid, as Giuseppe slid his palms lightly over Kevin’s back.
“You’re still wet,” he complained, breaking the kiss.
“Hush. ‘Don’t care.”
Giuseppe’s hand cupped Kevin’s groin, tracing the solid mass of his lover’s dick, the heat palpable beneath the heavy wool of his suit pants. Giuseppe twisted free, smirking as Kevin groaned, and knelt before him. “Let me,” he said, already unbuttoning Kevin’s fly.
“Sure,” Kevin replied, laughing at the word’s inadequacy.
Giuseppe’s fingers cradled Kevin’s erection, guiding the head to his lips. He licked the slit, the rich musk pervading his senses, and when he let the crown slip into his mouth, Kevin gasped, buckling at the waist so he could brace his hands against the wall.
Confident hands tugged at the snap on Kevin’s boxer shorts, pulling the impeding fabric down his lover’s legs. Giuseppe’s forefinger toyed with the tensing skin of Kevin’s balls, eliciting a muffled cry, and continued up the clenched line of Kevin’s buttocks, seeking entrance.
“Jesus, Babbo,” Kevin whimpered, as Giuseppe accepted more of his cock, sucking steadily, his tongue maddening. With one hand, Giuseppe found his own erection, stroking himself clumsily through his trousers.
“Damn . . . it,” Kevin gasped, unable to hold himself still, pumping with increasing force into Giuseppe’s proficient mouth. It was proving too much for them both, neither man willing – able – to slow his jerking movements.
“Oh, Jesus.”
Giuseppe’s throat had relaxed, swallowing Kevin’s frantically thrusting cock. Kevin picked up speed, his release almost painfully imminent, and below him Giuseppe groaned, his suction now spasmodic.
Kevin made the mistake of looking down at the back of Giuseppe’s brilliantined head, bobbing over his throbbing penis, and came. Like liquid fire, most of Kevin’s panted orgasm shot down Giuseppe’s throat; the rest filled his mouth to overflowing. Neither man could speak, as each drew long restorative breaths into oxygen-starved lungs.
“‘Help me up?” Giuseppe muttered, at last, holding out one hand.
“Of course,” Kevin said, taking a step back and pulling Giuseppe to his feet. Each man held his spent cock protectively, Giuseppe – awkwardly – through his suit pants.
“That was. . .,” Kevin drawled, his tongue lazy, “that was incredible.”
“I’m glad,” Giuseppe said. He rested splayed fingers on Kevin’s hipbone, brushing past shirt folds. “Because I want to do that again.”
When Kevin came out of the bathroom, trousers folded neatly over his arm, braces dragging along the floor, Giuseppe was crouching before his open suitcase. He had left his own pants where they fell, his ruined boxer shorts crumpled in a ball, and he looked up at Kevin with a winning smile. “I can’t find my underwear,” he complained, wrinkling his nose. “Oh.” He pulled out a small glass jar from beneath a stack of folded shirts. “This stuff is great,” he said, offering it to Kevin. “It, er, makes everything slippery. More comfortable in bed.”
“Oh,” Kevin replied, reading the label. ‘Cold Cream.’
“Here we are,” Giuseppe crowed. He stood, knees popping, and stepped into fresh shorts.
Kevin set the cold cream aside so that he could unbutton his shirt. Giuseppe raised an eyebrow, letting his unknotted necktie flutter to the floor.
“Get on the bed,” he said. “No, Kev – leave your shirt on. I want to help you take it off.”
Giuseppe led the way, kneeling on the nubby bedspread. Wordlessly, Kevin crawled across the mattress until he faced his lover. Giuseppe’s shirt was open at the throat, a few chest hairs visible above his singlet, and Kevin drew a long finger over bared flesh.
“I said I’d help,” Giuseppe said, peevishly, batting Kevin’s hands away. “I want to undress you.”
“All right,” Kevin murmured, settling back on his haunches.
Giuseppe stared at him for a moment, cataloguing his features, before he began unbuttoning the shirt. As Kevin’s collarbone was exposed, his fingers slowed. Kevin shuddered as Giuseppe’s lips pressed gently against his sternum. Giuseppe feinted backwards, then, dropping his head, bit down lightly against Kevin’s tender skin, reveling in his lover’s startled hiss.
His face still hidden against Kevin’s breast, Giuseppe finished unbuttoning the shirt. As Kevin shrugged it off, Giuseppe’s hands were already peeling up the undershirt, exposing Kevin’s firm stomach. When Kevin’s head was covered, briefly, Giuseppe’s hand strayed to the other man’s groin, kneading his thickening cock through thin fabric.
“Those, too,” Giuseppe commanded. Kevin obediently unsnapped the boxers, and Giuseppe watched, breathless, as his erection was revealed. Kevin winked, pulling the shorts down over his knees.
Giuseppe’s eyes roved over his lover’s body: the milk white skin, the trail of dark hair from belly to loins, the soft curve of flesh over hip, his excitement evident between his legs. Biting his lip, Giuseppe undressed quickly, tossing shirt and singlet on the floor beside the bed.
“I want. . .,” Kevin sighed, reaching for Giuseppe’s boxers.
“Me, too,” Giuseppe replied.
He pulled Kevin up, so that they knelt chest to chest. Giuseppe’s arms and neck were tanned from days spent on the parade ground; the rest of his body was still darker than Kevin’s, and he was softer around the middle than he had been, almost four years before.
“Oh, Babbo,” Kevin breathed. “It’s been so long.”
Giuseppe nodded, one arm wrapping clasping Kevin’s side as his other hand closed on his lover’s cock. “I want you – this,” he said, his fist already moving steadily. A moment later, Kevin reciprocated, with a low growl, smirking as his thumb trailed through moisture at the tip of Giuseppe’s penis.
“Excited?” he asked.
“You have no idea,” Giuseppe replied, speeding his strokes. His head dropped, as before, to nestle against Kevin’s neck. They inched closer to each other, the only sounds in the room their harsh breathing and the clang of the radiator.
This time, Kevin came first, crying out as bursts of his semen streaked Giuseppe’s stomach. Giuseppe lifted his head, lips demanding against Kevin’s, and arched his back as Kevin’s slow-moving fist brought him to orgasm. Neither man spoke for a minute, holding the other upright, flaccid cocks pressed together between their thighs.
The sound of water gurgling through pipe broke the spell. “Ugh,” Giuseppe sighed, his hand slipping against Kevin’s damp belly.
“We have dinner reservations,” Kevin yawned.
“I don’t care. I’m not leaving this bed.”
Kevin regarded the damp spot between their legs. “I guess I know what you mean,” he said, “but maybe we should move to a fresh bed – get cleaned up.”
“Carry me,” Giuseppe whimpered, stretching out on his side.
Kevin bent down and kissed him, instead.
They took another cab down to West Eighth Street. Papa Ciccone’s served surprisingly authentic Milanese food: even better, Giuseppe thought, there was enough to eat. “My God,” he whistled, reading the menu’s second page, “I’d forgotten what it was like to eat like this. I haven’t seen— Ooh, and— How I love bisteca!”
Kevin watched him from under fringed eyelashes, relearning how Giuseppe talked around his fork, the way his cheeks flushed when he gulped ice water: half a hundred gestures or phrases that, together, brought back the man he had fallen in love with all those years ago. At one point, Giuseppe looked up from his plate, his eyes suddenly serious. “You’ve got. . .,” he said, pointing at Kevin’s cheek. “It’s a piece of . . . spinach, I think.” He plucked the napkin out of his lap and licked it one edge, reaching across the small table and cleaning the spot on Kevin’s face.
Fighting the urge to take Giuseppe’s wrist and hold on to it, Kevin submitted with a short laugh. “Thanks,” he said. “I’d . . . I’d forgotten how you do that. Mamma does that, with Baby, did you know?”
“Where d’you think I learned it, Kev?” Giuseppe murmured, gripping the stem of his wineglass. He flashed a quick smile. “And how is Mamma? You’re sure she’s better?”
“She spends sixteen hours a day on her feet,” Kevin replied, “and she thrives on it.”
“And Baby?”
“She gave me this.” Kevin reached into a coat pocket, retrieving a tiny envelope. ‘Papa,’ the superscription read, and Giuseppe held it flat in the palm of his big hand for a moment before pulling out the flap. “It’s. . .,” he said, staring at the card. He looked into Kevin’s eyes. “It’s a Valentine’s card. Baby made it?”
Kevin nodded. “Well,” he amended, “she had Lance cut out the paper, and she made AJ color it for her, but, yes . . . it’s her design.”
Giuseppe opened the card, and the penciled words swam before his eyes:
For my Papa, from his lovg. daughter, Maria Barbara Fatone
Feby. 14, 1919
“She’s all grown up,” he breathed.
Kevin dropped his napkin on the table top, using it as an excuse to hold Giuseppe’s hand. “She’s six, Babbo: almost seven.” He squeezed gently. “You just missed a couple of years, that’s all. And she can’t wait to see you. I had strict orders to bring you back, right away. She barely let me have one night with you in New York.”
Giuseppe chuckled uneasily. “And you? What have I missed with you?”
Kevin frowned. “Nothing. That is, I’ve missed you terribly, and worried about you, and wished you were. . .”
“I know,” Giuseppe sighed. He freed his hand, picking up his fork and twirling strands of spaghetti into a ball. “And I missed you so, I just. . . I have so much to tell you, and I don’t know how to, because. . .” He stuck the fork in his mouth, adding: “It all seems so unbelievable, and I don’t want to remember some of it.”
“You don’t have to.”
Giuseppe swallowed heavily. “I don’t think it’s that easy, Kev.”
They walked uptown, cutting across the Village until they came to Washington Square. The skies had cleared, and the new fallen snow glittered under the streetlights. Couples – a man and a woman, or two women, or two men – hurried past them, muffled against the cold, cheerful voices carrying in the still night.
Arm and arm, Kevin and Giuseppe walked steadily, each man struggling to make sense of the curious reticence that had grown up between them. It was not enough, it seemed, that they had at once fallen into bed together: tonight they were strangers, divided by years, and distance, and experience.
At the foot of Fifth Avenue, Giuseppe stopped in his tracks, glad of a distraction. “Look at that,” he said, pointing up the avenue. At the only remaining mansion on the first block, a party was just beginning, a line of chauffeured cars waiting patiently to drop off passengers. “I used to think of Fifth Avenue,” he continued, “when I was at the Front. About how grand it was, and how far away. It’s funny, isn’t it? Not Vizcaya, or Lakeshore Drive, or Eastern Point: Fifth Avenue. It’s like the center of the world, isn’t it? The spine of New York, which is the heart of America. I’ve only seen the rest of the country from the train, so I can’t say for sure. I just— I wanted to come back here, and see it. Funny, isn’t it?”
“I think I understand, though,” Kevin said, thoughtful. “It’s as if you were fighting so you could come back to this.”
“To you,” Giuseppe replied, tightening his hold on Kevin’s arm; “to you.”
The hotel maid had remade the beds, turning down the covers and closing suitcases. Their hunger slaked, Giuseppe and Kevin undressed slowly, and Giuseppe took care to refold his clothes and put them neatly away.
“Is this all right?” Kevin said, when they were under the covers, decorously clad in pajamas.
“Of course it is,” Giuseppe muttered, rolling over to kiss him.
His touch rekindled banked desire, and Kevin’s arms closed around Giuseppe’s back. “I can’t seem to get enough of you,” he said, when Giuseppe had turned his attention to Kevin’s neck.
“Nor I, you,” Giuseppe replied. Their senses heightened, they spent the next few minutes exploring each other’s bodies by the room’s dim light, until Kevin found the opening in Giuseppe’s pajama pants and wrapped his hand around his lover’s thick organ.
“Oh, no,” Giuseppe said, rolling away. “I have an idea.”
He hopped off the bed, shedding his top and crossing to his suitcase. The jar of cold cream in one hand, he returned to the bed, smiling approvingly as he watched Kevin strip, propped against the pillow. With a roguish grin, he pulled the tapes on his pajama pants, letting them fall to the floor. Placing one knee on the mattress, he evaded Kevin’s arm, outstretched for his groin, saying: “Turn over, Kev.
“I wanted to try something out,” he continued. “That’s it – flat on your stomach.”
Kevin complied, his erection fat against the sheets, waiting for Giuseppe to slather the cream on his own cock and enter him. It seemed a trifle . . . unromantic, but if that’s what Bab—
He wasn’t prepared to feel Giuseppe’s eager tongue lapping the tender skin around his anus, gasping as a thousand shocks pulsed through his body. He shook as Giuseppe nudged his thighs wider, his tongue curling, playing the muscle, a steady, blissful pressure that made him swoon.
When Giuseppe lifted his head, Kevin could only moan. A moment later, Giuseppe did slide inside him, his cock’s movements magnified by the earlier stimulation. It was almost too much, and Kevin humped the bed, helplessly, until he came. For Giuseppe, his lover’s smooth, tight passage coaxed forth a powerful, breathless climax, and he collapsed on top of Kevin, too weak to do anything but murmur: “‘Love you . . . so much.”
“Babbo?”
“Hmm?” Kevin bucked upwards until Giuseppe rolled off him, grunting and falling to his side. “What?”
“Where did you. . .? That thing, with your tongue: where’d you learn to. . .?”
“I think it’s called rimming,” Giuseppe said, tugging on the tumbled sheets and blankets. “‘Someone I knew, at the Front.”
“‘The cold cream?”
“Hmm? Did you like it?”
“Spit always worked before,” Kevin muttered, and Giuseppe snuggled closer, rapping a leg over Kevin’s knee.
“Spoilsport.”
Kevin worked himself free. Standing, he looked down at Giuseppe, and said: “I’m a mess. I’ll be back.”
When he returned from the bathroom, Giuseppe’s eyes were closed.
“Giuseppe?” Kevin slid across the mattress, grimacing at the clammy sheets.
“Babbo. I’m still your Babbo, aren’t I?”
“I don’t know,” Kevin sighed, accepting Giuseppe’s embrace. “That thing, with your throat – you never did that, before.”
“I didn’t. Another bloke taught me that. Now, look, Kev: we were apart for a long time.” Kevin caught his breath at the sadness in his lover’s voice. “A lot of the time I thought I was going to die at any minute, and the rest of the time you weren’t there. I love you – I only love my mamma and the bambina near as much – but I was never a saint, and when I had the chance . . . well, I took it, sometimes.” He sighed, and Kevin nuzzled his chin. “Women, at the brothels. Men – mates, mainly, fellows in my unit – I probably mentioned some of them, in my letters. I did wait – months and months – but I couldn’t go on like that, not forever, not when I just wanted a body: to lie with, to fuck, to fuck me.” His voice breaking, he added: “I’m sorry, if you hate me, but that’s the truth.”
“I don’t hate—”
“I can’t change it. I love you. I’m sure some of the men could do it, be true to their wives or— I’m just not a saint.”
“I’m not, either,” Kevin said. “I wasn’t . . . I wasn’t faithful, either.”
“Oh.”
“It was awful. It wasn’t you.”
“You see?”
“I do, Babbo,” Kevin insisted, “it’s just—”
“Did you like what I did?” Giuseppe interjected. “The thing with my throat, swallowing you all the way? The cream, I’ll grant you: I like spit, too. And the tonguing?” He waited for Kevin’s whispered: “Yes.”
“I wouldn’t know how to do those things,” Giuseppe said. “I suppose, given time, we could have figured it out, but. . . You see? I’m home, Kev, lying in your arms, holding your – what’s that?”
“You can’t touch me, there,” Kevin breathed, “and not expect me to get hard.”
“Well, I won’t—”
“Babbo. Put your hand back.”
“‘Forgive me?” Giuseppe squeezed gently, for emphasis.
“How could I not?”
“And you’re glad I’m home?”
“Very,” Kevin replied. He pressed Giuseppe back against the pillows, grinning at the sight – his lover’s knees sprawled wide, his erection growing. “Now, where’s that cold cream?”
For Ann
© 2001 TNL