“I always come to your shows. I just told you.”
“Yes, but this time, will you come to rehearsals too as my bodyguard? I won’t feel safe unless you’re there, in the crowd, looking out for me,oso.”
Something shifted inside Xavi just then, memories of a night a long time ago when he hadn’t been. When he hadn’t been there and Lulu had been hurt. WhenXavi had been too hurt or too selfish, or just too fed-up to care. When he’d turned his back on Lulu for the first and last time in his life, and Lulu had ended up in hospital.
“Sure, Lulu.” Xavi felt himself deflating, all his final resistance bleeding away. “Whatever. I’ll come.” He swallowed, his heart pushing at his chest like a powerful river threatening to break through a dam.Whatever you want, cisne,Xavi’s heart spoke his secret name for the man he loved more than anything in this world. The name he would never speak in real life, of course, but which lived a quiet, lonely life inside Xavi’s heart, embedded in his very soul.Cisne.Swan.
Lulu flew against him, throwing his slender arms around Xavi’s neck, burying his face against Xavi’s neck as he repeated, “Thank you, thank you, thank you!” like a broken record. Xavi felt himself drowning in Lulu’s soft curls, and the feel of his warm body pressed up against his, until Lulu eventually resurfaced, smiling, and this time it reached his beautiful eyes.
“Thank you,cariño. So when am I moving in?”
Chapter Two
Lulu
Lulu couldn’t believe how fucking awesome yesterday had turned out when it had started out so shitty. He’d been on edge all morning, hardly closing an eye the night before, all because of that fucking creepy-ass note in his changing room. When he’d returned from rehearsals, it had been lying there on the makeup table in all its lavender loveliness, disguised as a real love letter. In a matter of seconds, Lulu’s mind had conjured up all sorts of impossible and wonderful scenarios, Xavi’s lovely handwriting finally asking him what he’d longed to hear for as long as he could remember.Go out with me, Lulu. Or, even better yet,I’m in love with you. Instead, Lulu’s stomach had nearly dropped out of his butthole with dread and disappointment when he’d read the words again and again. He had a fucking stalker! He knew some guys were into the whole red-flag boyfriend thing, but if you’d grown up the way Lulu had, you were not looking for any more trouble. Nope, he just wanted a quiet life as the hubby of one sexy, tattooed high school teacher with the softest belly this side of the Niagara River. That’s all Lulu had ever wanted.
He’d crushed on Xavi all through high school, but what had sealed his fate was when Xavi had gotten his first tattoo on his eighteenth birthday. Lulu had been there to hold his hand, in theory at least, because he’d spent most of the visit at the tattoo shop with his head between his knees so as not to pass out. When Xavi had told the tattoo artist what he was getting while showing him the small drawing of a black swan, Lulu had nearly died then and there, his poor little Cuban heart exploding into a million pieces with hope. A black fucking swan! Could it be? As their eyes had met across the tattoo chair, Lulu had, for the first time ever, seen something in Xavi’s eyes that had confused him. Because Lulu had always thought he didn’t stand a chance, because Xavi was fucking everything, and Lulu was just a mess. But suddenly, he wasn’t so sure. That was, of course, right up untilXavi had burst his bubble and mumbled some bullshit about one of his favorite books having a black swan in it. Fucking fabulous.
That was more than ten years ago. Ten years of wanting and craving and trying to fuck Xavi out of his system, when the truth was that there wasn’t a cock magnificent enough to cure Lulu of his obsession with his best friend. Not when he knew how fucking mouthwateringlydeliciosoXavi looked without any clothes on from their numerous visits over the years to the Lincoln public pool. From his broad, tanned shoulders and bulky upper arms to his grabbable love handles and hairy tree-trunk thighs. From his big hands and broad neck to his beautiful manhood nestled in a thatch of dark hair when they changed into their swim trunks in the changing room. It was ridiculous, really, how fucking beautiful Xavi was with his sepia skin adorned with the most intricate and colorful patterns, tattoos covering his torso, back, and arms. And it was equally pathetic how Lulu’s body yearned to lick along each and every one of them, commit the outline of each tattoo into his memory, ending at the little black swan etched into the skin on Xavi’s wrist.
And then there were the scars. Scars that spoke of unspeakable pain and loss and bravery. The sight of Xavi’s scarred torso, back, and left arm had stolen all the air out of Lulu’s lungs that first summer after they’d become friends. It had been their first visit to the Lincoln public pool, and Joe had been there too. It still brought tears to Lulu’s eyes all these years later when he recalled how Xavi had hurried to change out of his T-shirt and into one of those long-sleeved UV shirts. Lulu had seen them, though, and so had Joe. They didn’t ask about them that day. Something in their friend’s eyes and the way Xavi had tugged at the hem of his blue UV shirt had told them not to ask. Xavi had told them eventually, though. Of the numerous reconstructive surgeries that followed the devastating fire. How the surgeons had created new scars when they took skin from Xavi’s thighs to repair his broken body. How they hadn’t been able to save the ring finger and pinky on Xavi’s left hand, the damage to the bone too severe. How they still hurt, though, the missing fingers. It had only made Lulu admire Xavi even more. Because pain was a language Lulu understood, and he knew, contrary to popular belief, that you never got used to it, however many times you experienced it. The shock of the blow to your body was the same every time, the silentwhyringing through every cell of your body.Why? Why are you hurting me?So, Lulu had always understood Xavi’s pain. Not just the physical left behind by the fire or the many skin drafts. No, the emotional pain, too, every time your body remembered what had caused that pain in the first place and what you’d lost along with it. Your innocence.
They were thirteen when Xavi eventually told them about that night when his entire life changed. Xavi was six and Abe eight. They didn’t live downtown back then but in a nice house in Riverside; a dad, a mom, and two carefree kids. Xavi’s dad owned a large garage where they restored classic cars for clients from all over thecountry, and some in Canada, too. It was a good life, from what Xavi had told them. Right up until that night when he woke up to an inferno of smoke and blazing, suffocating heat. Abe hadn’t been home; he was sleeping at a friend’s house. Xavi and his mom had made it out, but his dad had died saving his family. That was it. Life as Xavi knew it was gone. He, Abe, and their mom moved in with histiasin an apartment downtown, and Xavi’s body was forever marred by scars reminding him of what he’d lived through and what he’d lost.
And that was also why, if you asked Lulu why he loved Xavi Bernal, he would tell you,why not?Because the list was endless. He loved everything about Xavi, and it was just such a fucking travesty that Xavi didn’t love him back. At least, not in the way Lulu wanted him to.Hombreahombre.Almaa alma.Cuerpoa cuerpo.
But now, thanks to that creepy-ass stalker, Lulu was moving into Xavi’s place. Well, not exactlymoving in-moving in, but at least he was crashing there until he and Xavi left for the wedding in five days. It still blew Lulu’s mind that Xavi had agreed to it, but it had definitely helped that Joe and Noah had been at Gloria’s too. He loved Xavi’s small one-bedroom apartment on the Lower West Side, close to the Waterfront Park. With the Latin-American vibe going on in the neighborhood, it beat his own dingy dump in the less nice Broadway-Fillmore neighborhood—that he shared with two other actors—by a mile. It wasn’t much more than a studio, really, but it was all Lulu could afford for now. No, Xavi’s place was much nicer, with all his books that smelled of thrift stores and all his old Cuban jazz records, his favorite covers displayed on the walls. And it wasn’t too far away from theTheatre of Youth, where Lulu worked twice a week as an instructor’s assistant, or the small theater,Da Lux,in the queer neighborhood Allentown, where Lulu was currently cast in a queer re-enactment ofVictor/Victoria.
He needed to do something about the pull-out couch, of course. That just wouldn’t do. Luckily, Lulu’s mom hadn’t raised no quitter. In fact, she hadn’t raised Lulu at all but left just shortly before his seventh birthday. Manu had only been two, but in the end, they’d been better off, now just living with one junkie parent instead of two. At least most nights, when their dad was passed out on the bathroom floor, they could run over to Xavi’s place, which had become more of a home to them than their own ever was since that day in detention. Xavi’s house was loud, but for entirely different reasons than their own. It was vibrant and colorful, and no one yelled or threw slurs at each other. It was loud from Xavi and Abe bickering or from Xavi’smamiand histiassinging along to old Cuban love songs on the kitchen radio. No one punched you for being in the way. Instead, you were fedbesitosandpastelitos de carneto the point of bursting.
Lulu spun the wrench he’d borrowed from the theater storage room in his hands. All it would take was a few missing screws, and he’d get an upgrade right into Xavi’s bedroom. No way Lulu was gonna sleep on a fucking pullout whenXavi’s bed was where he really wanted to be, where he fucking belonged. Where he’d always belonged.Coño,if only Xavi could get his head out of a fucking book long enough to see that too. That they were perfect for each other, always had been.
Throwing the wrench into his suitcase with the rest of his stuff, Lulu went for the small, thrifted vanity table in the bedroom. It didn’t belong to him; nothing in this place really did. The furniture had already been there, left behind by the previous tenants when Lulu moved in with the two other actors, Stefania and Theodore, whom he’d met at a casting downtown. Sitting down on the small crate that acted as a stool, his gaze trailed along the table as he started to pick out the make-up and jewelry that belonged to him. Lulu placed item after item into the purple make-up bag Xavi had gifted him for his twenty-first birthday, the word PROUD displayed in bright pink letters on one side. When he’d placed the last tube of lip gloss into the bag, he zipped it up and regarded himself in the stained mirror, hoping it would be the last time. Probably not. Staying with Xavi was only temporary, just like most other things in life, from a show to a hookup to the color of his nail polish. The only things constant in his life were Manu, his friendship with Joe and Xavi, and the scars left behind on his face and body from his father’s fists. The crooked pale silver one at the left corner of his mouth was barely visible now, but the memory of his father throwing the broken bottle in his face would be forever seared into Lulu’s soul. So would the cigarette burn mark on the side of his neck that he could, most days, hide with a scarf or his longish hair, and the slightly raised line running from his right temple to the top of his head from when his father had banged his head against the bathroom sink. Fourteen stitches, one for each of his birthdays, because Lulu had stolen twelve dollars from his father’s coat pocket to feed himself and Manu when they hadn’t eaten for two days.
‘One day, when I’m big enough, I’m gonna hurt him for every time he’s hurt you, mano,’Xavi had sworn after he and Manu had run over to Xavi’s place, the white towel soaked with Lulu’s blood by then, and Xavi’smamihad taken them to the nearest emergency room.‘I will. I’ll kill him,’Xavi’s voice had shaken when they’d overheard Xavi’smamilying to the emergency room doctor, telling him that Lulu had taken a fall from a tree in the park. Lying forhim, because if there was one thing worse than living with an abusive junkie father, it was being taken away and perhaps separated from Manu.‘Please don’t do that, Xavi,’Lulu had whispered while they’d waited for the doctor to stitch up the throbbing gash in his head.‘If you hurt him, they’ll take you away from me. And I don’t want to be without you. If they take you away from me, hermano, I’ll have no one. I’ll have nothing.’Xavi had squeezed his fingers to the point of pain, his teenage body vibrating with anger, but it was a good kind of pain, Lulu recalled thinking, because it meant that Xavi cared.‘You have Joe,’Xavi had whispered back, brushing his thumb along Lulu’s bloodied knuckles.‘It’s not the same. You know it’s not the same. No one gets me the way you do. You’re my bestfriend, Xavi. So please don’t hurt him, promise me.’Xavi’s eyes had been so dark that night, near black with fury, as they’d lingered on Lulu’s face.‘You have to promise me that, Xavi.’Eventually, when the doctor had returned and gotten ready to fix Lulu’s head, Xavi had slumped his shoulders and nodded.‘Okay, Lulu. I promise, hermano.’And of course, Xavi had kept his promise and every promise after that, because that was just the kind of guy Xavi was and why Lulu loved him so hard.
Lulu’s father was long gone by now. He’d died of a drug overdose when Lulu was twenty-one. Manu had been sixteen and Lulu had, as the only other known relative, gotten custody of his younger brother. Xavi had been there through everything, from the funeral in the soaking rain on a bleary March day to the custody hearing downtown to Manu’s high school graduation when Lulu had bawled like a baby with pride against Xavi’s solid shoulder. The big bear of a guy with the scariest fucking tattoos Lulu had ever seen and a mind so brilliant it blew Lulu’s own, was as loyal and as reliable as they came. And yet, Xavi broke Lulu’s heart every fucking time they were together because they weren’t really together. At least not in the way that Lulu longed to be.
But now Lulu had a fucking plan to change that and set everything straight. Finally, the stars would align, and the universe would grant him his biggest wish. Five days sleeping in Xavi’s bed, followed by a cross-country road trip from Buffalo to Portland, Oregon, to be the best men at Joe and Noah’s wedding. Because while everyone else was flying—from Joe and Noah’s families to Joe’s longtime police partner, Monroe, and his wife—Lulu and Xavi were driving. Because, sweet baby Jesus at a shoe sale, Xavi was afraid of flying, and Lulu, as the good and loyal friend that he was, wasn’t going to let Xavi drive alone. Not when he could be alone with Xavi for the 2,641 miles that lay between Buffalo and Portland. Not when he could have the man he loved and desired all to himself for the five days they’d decided to cut the trip into. Five whole days on the road with Xavi. Lulu was going to drive his friend fucking crazy. Until Xavi caved. There was no way Lulu’s plan could fail. No way. Once they reached Portland, they’d be what they were always meant to be.Together-together.
Chapter Three
Xavi
Monday was Xavi’s day off, and while he’d usually spend it roaming a second-hand bookstore or going to visit hismamiandtias, he’d spent the better part of the day cleaning his apartment. He didn’t know why he bothered, to be honest. Lulu would mess it all up within hours anyway, with all his stuff. Scarves and hats and empty energy drink cans, just leaving a trail of overall clutter and untidiness behind that would only disrupt Xavi’s quiet, comfortable, and dead-ass boring life. Right. God forbid someone should enter his private sphere and disrupt his monotone existence. But, Jesus, the thought of being with Lulu almost uninterrupted for the next ten days scared him shitless. It was going to be nothing short of pure torture, because hiding his feelings for his best friend was one thing when they were having Sunday breakfast with Joe and Noah, or at Noches Habaneras dancing, or playing basketball at the park with theircompañeros.That was fucking hard enough. But having Lulu up in his face, batting his long, lush eyelashes at Xavi or sticking out his obnoxiously plump bottom lip—yeah, that was something else entirely. Xavi was sure that pulling out every single hair on his body with a pair of tweezers would be less painful. Having Lulu around didn’t just mean that Lulu’s stuff would occupy Xavi’s space. No, there’d be the scent of him, too, and the sound of his melodic voice whenever he was singing, which was pretty much all the time, or the image of his lean, elegant body whenever he did his stretches or dance poses. There would be that electricity in the air, that tension. Xavi’s body was so tuned into Lulu’s, like a small, lovestruck satellite spinning around a planet, that Xavi just knew he’d get no peace.
Placing the extra sheets, pillow, and comforter on the pull-out couch, Xavi looked around his small living room. If he dared say so himself, he had pretty good taste. It was cozy and a little hip, but not in a hipster way. More in a way that spoke of his Cuban roots and his love of books, music, and plants. His place looked inviting,he thought, but what did it matter? He rarely invited people over, and he never ever brought a date or a hookup home. Something inside him just couldn’t. It would feel wrong to let someone into his space when he already knew it would never amount to anything more than a few casual dates or getting some physical release. What was the point in pretending that any of them would ever, could ever, be more to him than just a distraction temporarily passing through his life? Xavi’s heart wasn’t in it because it didn’t belong to him. It belonged to Lulu.
On his way to his bedroom to put stuff away that was private, because Lulu was snoopy as fuck, a loud succession of knocks sounded against his apartment door.
“Hola,roomie!” Lulu yelled from the hallway as he continued to bang on Xavi’s door. “Rápido, por favor, hermano!”
“Just a second!” he yelled back, quickly throwing a glance at himself in the mirror next to the coat rack, then cursing himself for doing so. Xavi knew some guys found him attractive; it wasn’t that. No, the thing was that it didn’t matter. He’d only ever wanted one guy to notice him, so he’d stopped caring about how he dressed a long time ago. When he was at work, he wore black or gray pants and a white or gray button-up, which was pretty standard among the male staff. When he went out, it was mostly black jeans, a black tee, and his old, worn leather jacket, and when at home, it was sweats and a tee or a hoodie. Today was a white tee and gray sweats kind of day.
When he opened the door, a drenched Lulu nearly fell into his arms, a pool of water already gathering on the floor beneath him.
“Coño, what happened to you?”
