Vítor
The scent comingfrom the oven told me dinner was nearly ready—roast pork marinated with my secret mix of herbs, accompanied by roast potatoes and salad. This was the Sunday meal I'd had for as long as I could remember.
As a kid, I remembered coming home from Sunday mass with my brother Mário and smelling it all the way down the street.
The first stop was the bathroom to wash our hands before sitting at the dining room table where my father and the neighbors would be waiting for us to get home from church.
I don't remember having a Sunday meal with just the four of us from my earliest memory until the day I left home.
After that, Sunday meals were very different. After an initial period of rebellion where I refused to have any kind of formal meal on Sunday, my upbringing had a stronger influence than I wanted to admit, and I craved the companionship of others on that one meal a week.
It had started with getting some college friends together on Sundays, and we'd each bring something to share. They'd realized very quickly that not only did I cook well, but I also enjoyed it, so they started helping with the grocery shopping as long as I did the cooking, which I was more than happy to do.
It was a tradition that had carried on throughout the years, even when money was no object to those of us who still remained in touch after college. They still insisted on paying for the food, but it was more a symbolic gesture than anything else. In the last three years, I’d started donating the money they’d give to a cancer research charity.
I put a hand on my chest, thinking of the man who came into my life a long time ago and who was taken away too soon because of cancer. We'd thought we'd have a lifetime together.
In some ways, we had. We'd traveled, built a home, raised a child, and loved each other with all we had. But it wasn't enough, and three years after his death, I was still waiting for him to walk through the door complaining that a client wanted him to design a boring house and couldn't see his vision and then how he could design the house of their dreams if only they listened.
A laugh escaped my lips at the thought. He'd always loved the Sunday lunches, and when we'd been away on vacation, he'd always found a way to make up for the lost meals.
The oven timer dinged, bringing me back to the present. I'd come into the bedroom to pick up a shirt after my shower, and hadn't realized that I'd ended up looking through Rodrigo's side of the wardrobe instead.
Maybe that was what brought the memories on. Not that I didn't normally think about him. He was a constant presence in my mind, but the sight of his shirts all lined up and color coordinated was a reminder that I needed to do something with them.
I'd had no problem giving away his suits and other clothes, but there was something about his shirts. Maybe it was because they were the last things left that were truly his.
We were different sizes, so I would never be able to wear them myself. Rodrigo had been taller and bigger than me. I didn't quite have the presence he'd had when he'd walked into a room wearing a tailored shirt with the sleeves rolled up to show his strong forearms.
"I miss you so much, Dri," I said as I closed the wardrobe door to go and check on the food. Today was a smaller dinner than usual.
Luís was the only one of our friends who wasn't an architect, which was why on the weekend of the biggest industry conference, he insisted on coming over for Sunday lunch when he found out I wasn't attending again.
The doorbell rang right on time.
"Hey, sweets, how are you doing?" Luís asked before enveloping me in one of his big bear hugs. I allowed myself to melt into it before I answered.
"I'm okay."
I’d met Luís on the same night I'd met Rodrigo at a student party. I'd been talking to Luís and had thought he was cute, but Rodrigo stole my heart from the first moment our eyes met. When Dri had stolen me away at the party, I'd thought I'd never see Luís again, but when we'd bumped into each other at the university campus a few days later, we went out for coffee and ended up becoming good friends.
"Are you really okay?" He put a hand on my chin to tilt my head up so I could look him in the eye.
"I was going through Dri's shirts earlier and it brought back some memories. Hey, I don't suppose you want his shirts? You're the same size." Despite asking the question, I was relieved when Luís said he didn't feel right taking them, and besides, he didn't have any use for them since he was an artist and spent more time covered in paint than in nice clothes.
"So, where's this dinner then? I haven’t eaten since breakfast in anticipation. And since the others aren't here, I expect a mega-sized portion," Luís said, patting his flat stomach.
I smiled and guided him to the kitchen.
This house was Rodrigo's indulgence. When he'd asked me to marry him, even before it was legal for two men to marry in Portugal, he'd promised he'd design the best house in the country. I never needed anything so large, but the kitchen was the one part of the house I was grateful I'd allowed him to indulge in the design.
The food was perfect as always. Then again, after cooking this meal most Sundays for nearly thirty years, I could almost do it blindfolded.
We ate mostly in silence, which was welcome because I was feeling out of sorts. I also wondered what was in Luís' mind. In the nearly thirty years I'd known him, I'd never seen him go longer than a few minutes without talking. Even when we were younger, he'd always been the one who would bring someone into the conversation by asking the right questions and making them feel like they were the only person in the room.
That was how he'd got me talking that night in the bar until a single look from Rodrigo had made me feel like he and I were the only people on the planet.
The thought made me shiver. Luís looked at me but didn't say anything.
