Date: Thu, 17 Aug 2006 08:34:00 +0200 From: A.K. Subject: "The Choice" 03/15 (Adult Youth) ---------------------------- THE CHOICE by Andrej Koymasky (C) 2006 written on November 12th 1996 translated by the author English text kindly revised by Khasidi ----------------------------- USUAL DISCLAIMER "THE CHOICE" is a gay story, with some parts containing graphic scenes of sex between males. So, if in your land, religion, family, opinion and so on this is not good for you, it will be better not to read this story. But if you really want, or because YOU don't care, or because you think you really want to read it, please be my welcomed guest. ----------------------------- CHAPTER 3 - ADRIANO AND FATHER GUSTAVO "Hurry up, son, this cold cuts to the bone. This is not the time for a stroll! Let's run so we won't be so cold!" the priest shouted running towards his old sedan,1 Adriano close behind. They laughed as they ran headlong down the street leaving the now dark block of the church behind them. The athletic young parson and his handsome parishioner boy covered the two blocks to where the priest's very old Fiat shone faintly under the last rays of the setting sun. Father Gustavo stopped next to his car. He took a breath while searching for his key. His chest was shaking with laughter, "My God, Adriano, I don't know what's happening to me! I might have to start playing some sports again, if such a short run is going to take away my breath! Well, I guess I'm no longer a young seminarian any more." Adriano's smile was mysterious, and he didn't express an opinion about the physical shape of Father Gustavo. He knew perfectly well that the muscular young priest had left his seminary only four years before. He was possibly the youngest parson in the diocese. And anyway, in Adriano's opinion, there was nobody as strong and vigorous as Father Gustavo. The man entered his car and at once opened the door on the passenger's side, "I never really liked cars too much. I would have preferred a bike, really. But it seems that the parishioners think that a car, no matter how old it is, is more dignified. Even though we have a Pope who does, or at least did, ski..." he said setting himself on the seat and starting the engine. "Well, maybe so, maybe not... I really don't care, but it seems that people attach so much importance to appearance. Yeah,2 I would have loved to have bought a bike..." Then, pulling into the traffic on the street, the young priest added, more to himself than to his handsome passenger, "But I always try to put the fundamentals first, so..." Driving towards his home, Father Gustavo was trying to keep the conversation light, even though he was worried about Adriano's troubled expression. "It seems that we will be able at least to start the day-care center, you know? A lot of young working mothers will be relieved. A company offered to restore the old house in back of the church for a reasonable price, very reasonable. The Congregation of the Pious Disciples will send me a couple of young sisters... And also, I haven't given up on my idea for an immigrants' center, you know? For these poor North African slaves and people like that... But there's no vicar! At times loneliness gets a little heavy..." "I know," Adriano said, "Mum told us. There are not enough priests..." he seemed to hesitate, then added "You know... you know my father, he says that if the time comes when our Bishop decides to ordain deacons... He would like to be one... If it was possible, even archdeacon." Father Gustavo nodded, but wanted to remain neutral about the son's not too subtle pitch for his father. He shrugged his shoulders, somewhat ill at ease; because he secretly thought that Mister Crespi was much too self-assured. But he made no comment, preferring to change the subject, "But, tell me, how does your mother feel now that she started working again?" "I don't know, really. Mum doesn't talk too much about her work at home. Anyway, she seems happy..." "And I think she is right. Now that she has raised the four of you, she hasn't much to do at home. After all she was getting a little bored, wasn't she? And your mother has always been a hard working woman. You four have grown up really well, it seems to me, young man!" the parson said giving a friendly slap on the boy's thigh. "Yes, and you are now pretty well grown,3 you are becoming a man. I'm sure you are starting to have a better idea about what you want in life... We old people have to withdraw in order to leave the world to you young people, right?" Father Gustavo said in a half serious tone. Then, more seriously, added, "At times life is hard, merciless. You have to learn to continue to have dreams for your future, and not to become discouraged..." Optimism once again warmed each inflexion of the low voice of the young priest, and he brightened in a wide smile, "All eyes are looking at you, waiting for the day when you will be able to sit in the place of honor wherever you want. You have a lot of talents, guy." Adriano looked at him with a questioning and doubtful expression. "Yes, I know, Adriano, I know..." Father Gustavo said smiling quietly, "looking at the TV or the newspapers, things seem really bad. Everything seems to get worse day by day... Even in good old Europe, at the borders of our land, there is again a cruel war. Work is hard to find. Crime seems more and more powerful... It could seem, to a young man like you, that the future does not hold too much promise nowadays. It might seem that all struggle is useless, that the only thing to do is sit down and wait for better times... and yet... and yet..." Gustavo looked towards Adriano. The light caramel eyes of the boy, eyes that each Sunday were always looking at him during his sermons, sending him messages of total confidence, were unfocussed now. They didn't look at him, didn't look at anything. They were directed outside, through the windshield, towards the darkening sky. The parson again felt a pang in his heart, but suddenly returned his gaze to the street and continuedto drive. He asked himself what answer Adriano was searching for in the growing darkness of the winter sky. Adriano's mind seemed forgetful of anything that lay outside his problem and had silently slipped into another dimension. Father Gustavo felt tempted to give him another light slap to express his support, but held back, thinking, "No. You know perfectly well that nobody talks about his problems until he feels strong and ready. Let him take his time. Pushing somebody to talk doesn't help anybody to start a serious conversation." So the young priest quietly chatted about this and that; but in his mind, even if he didn't have a clue as to what was at the root of Adriano's problem, he continued to try to understand. Then, thinking that not even an empty chat really helps a person who needs to talk about a serious matter, the parson told himself, "Okay, just calm down. Leave him in peace Let him be himself. For each, there is his own time..." So, Father Gustavo too plunged into his own revery, and thought about the five years since he had been ordained. Waiting for the truck in front of him to turn, Father Gustavo was thinking about the fact that in some ways, he and Adriano had grown up together on opposite sides of the altar. They had developed a quiet friendship, one without any particular demonstration of affection, but sincere and respectful nonetheless. They gave to each other a deep sense of serenity and trust. The boy and the young man knew, even without saying it, that they could count on one another. Stopping at a red light, Father Gustavo recalled the admiration Adriano had always shown for him. But he said to himself, suddenly ill at ease with his thoughts, "Come on, don't put yourself on a pedestal, it's not admiration... it is just a liking... trust... Yes, trust. So now you have to think about how to really help him. He came directly to you to get help..." Nevertheless, Adriano seemed so far away in his mind. His silence separated him from the athletic man sitting at his side only by his silence. In that precise moment all his doubtful thoughts were turning to Father Gustavo Cirasa. Even though he, like many parishioners, knew the busy young priest pretty well, he still didn't understand that there is not a real4 difference between a priest and any other human being -- like many, he tended to idealize, to make a priest figure almost in the abstract. "If I talk with him, it will remain a secret. Mum and Dad will not know about it. But what can I do? He lives in a special world. He has no family. How can he possibly know about these problems?" Adriano asked himself, again anxious and somewhat skeptical, "How can he understand, really understand, what I am feeling? He won't even be interested in this kind of problem, I'll bet," he thought and sighed. But his sigh disappeared in the noise of the accelerating engine. "My God, Lord... I pray to you..." the boy started to pray silently, desperately. Adriano could feel the tears in back of his eyes, trying to come out. "I need for him to at least in some way understand me. I need it, Lord..." he prayed with all his heart, "My God, make me able to explain myself well, to open up to him... And don't let things between us change. Please. Make it so that, when I tell him the truth, he will continue to look at me with his usual smile... his usual affection... like always..." A vision assembled from vivid images that were carefully hidden in a corner of his soul, suddenly flooded Adriano's mind, interrupting his silent prayer. Images that were holy to him but to no one else. Adriano's thoughts left the prayer where they had plunged, "Who knows what he would say if I confessed to him that he is always in my thoughts, in my fantasies, especially at night?" he asked himself, feeling warmth and fear at the same time. The traffic on the narrow streets of the quarter was that day unusually heavy and intense. It was only possible to crawl from traffic light to traffic light. Christmas Eve was approaching; but the intense activity that surrounded him on the street barely entered Adriano's consciousness. His mind recalled the previous night5 and the excitement that had overcome him in his drowsy state with the seductive vision of Gustavo. Car horns and other noises gave a lighter turn to Adriano's memories. A silent question formed in the boy's mind. He asked himself if Diego might have woken up at the unavoidable, though faint, creaking of his bed while he was beating off. Perhaps at his trembling low moan that his lips hadn't been able to hold back when his fantasy had grown to such a level as to take control of all his being or when at the end it had overcome him with its sweet explosion? Did his little brother hear, guess something? At this point, Adriano's thoughts pulled up short and he found himself plunged back into the present moment. The revisiting of his fantasy of the previous night, his lonely climbing towards pleasure, had rapidly aroused him. A generous swelling had filled his trousers between his strong thighs. A burst of heat flowed into Adriano's face and body, half stretched out on the seat, as he returned to reality. With awkward haste he closed his legs and tried to cross one over the other to hide his state. He bit his lip in embarrasment and emitted a short yelp as his knee hit the dashboard. His tight trousers didn't hide his erection at all so he nervously deposited his books on his lap just as Father Gustavo looked at him. Feeling terribly ashamed, the boy hoped that the priest hadn't noticed his condition. "Adriano?" Adriano sat up straight in his seat, completely abandoning the sweet and troubling memories of his arousing daydreams. "Yes, Father?" "Switch on the radio, go on... if you feel like it. Any program's okay. With this heavy traffic it's taking longer than if we had walked..." Relaxing a little, relieved by the fact that apparently his erection had passed unnoticed, Adriano switched on the car radio and started to search for a program. The radio was an old model with only a tuning knob. Considering that he was in a car with a priest, at first he thought he should find "Radio Mary" the Catholic private broadcasting station, and a rather boring one, he thought... But then, recalling his resolution to live from now on only honestly, he changed his mind and looked for a station broadcasting music that fit how he felt at that moment. The boy's thin fingers turned the knob back and forth, passing through several stations as he listened long enough to hear what they were broadcasting. Then, hearing words of a song he didn't know, but that hit him, he stopped: "Yes, I know, it seems wrong, so really wrong. But now that it's happened, yes, it happened, I can feel in my heart that it can't be wrong my love for you, my love for you." The music continued, repeating more or less these same words, while Father Gustavo stopped at yet another traffic light -- it almost seemed that he was compelled to catch every red light. Waiting for the green, the young parson caught a glimpse of Adriano's eyes, now dreaming. The boy seemed to have slipped away again, drifting into a different world, cuddled in the song's embrace. The young priest shifted his own eyes several times from the street to the boy, then he listened more carefully to the song's words. Finally he gave a light slap on the steering wheel. Father Gustavo felt that he had at last understood, "That's what this is about! Of course! The boy's in love! Who can she be? A university classmate?" he thought, smiling to himself. "Good, good. That's good... I think it was time, anyway." Even though painful, a memory suddenly flooded the mind of the young priest. A memory that seemed so far away in time, from when he was nineteen like Adriano. He grasped the wheel. He was in the seminary, together with Father Cesare, now vicar of the cathedral, Father Carlo, Father Aldo, and the others... and Daniele... Shuddering, Father Gustavo shook his head trying to chase away the painful invasion of his past from his mind... He wanted to forget that period, what had happened between him and Daniele, but he could not. He and Daniele - his only experience of sex, if not of love. So damnably good... Happily, it had not been real love or else, Father Gustavo honestly thought, he would have never found in himself the strength to stop. He could control his sexual drive. He could remain faithful to his chastity now, as he had these ten years, but only because it it had not been love... He was thirsty for love, he was aware of that. He was satisfying his greed for the love of one person by substituing it with the love for all his neighbors, his parishioners, the weak, the poor, the children, the old people, the young people... because he could not afford to be in love with just one person. Because, if he were to fall in love, he would not be able not to express it in a sexual way, he was perfectly aware of that. But the sex he'd had with Daniele, he must admit, even if it had been wrong because they both had chosen a life of chastity, had been so beautiful! Each of the few times they did it... He had loved to enter and to take his smaller companion. He had loved to be entered and be taken by his younger friend, even though each time was in haste, and was accompanied by the fear of being caught... it had only lacked love to be perfect. But, Father Gustavo thought, happily there was no love,6 so it had not been too difficult for him to give it up and return to the straight lane. He didn't regret the choice he made at that time. It had been the right one. The rest of their journey passed in silence except for the low singing on the radio. Each was immersed in similar thoughts, unaware how close his problems were to the other's. Finally, Father Gustavo parked in the court yard of his house. The tall priest locked the door on Adriano's side, then got out and locked his own side. He guided the boy upstairs to the third floor and retrieving his apartment key from his coat pocket opened the door. A click of the switch on the wall next to the entrance lit the diffused lights of the small entry. "Here we are!" Father Gustavo said to his young guest, entering his apartment and cheerfully taking charge of the conversation again. "First of all I'll turn on the heat to keep this chill away from us. Then we can go to the kitchen to see what we can fix for supper, all right?" Without taking off his coat, Father Gustavo lit the heating system. These apartments were old and didn't have a central heating plant. Then he went to the kitchen and Adriano followed him. The room's light revealed a wide kitchen, similar to the one at Adriano's house. The boy sniffed7 the good smell of basil, sage, pepper and other spices. The sense of safety that these familiar smells awakened in him had the power to partially relieve the anxiety Adriano was feeling. The boy slowly looked around, making himself familiar with the place he was seeing for the first time. "Hey, I just realized! This is the first time you've been in my home!" Father Gustavo exclaimed as he put his gloved hand on the boy's shoulder. "Your father's been here several times when he had to talk with me... and even your mother, a few times." He pulled off his gloves and put them in his coat pocket. In an amiable tone, he continued, "Well, welcome to my home, then, Master Crespi!" The tall man accompanied his welcoming words with a short nod, giving the boy a reassuring smile to let him know that he had nothing to worry about. The young parson offered his hand to stress his welcome. While they playfully shook hands, Father Gustavo gently squeezed the back of Adriano's neck with his other hand. "Put your books somewhere," the parson said sweeping his hand in a wide gesture towards the table and the sideboard on the other side of the room. "And take off your jacket so I can hang it in the entry with my coat. It's starting to get a little warmer, isn't it?" For a moment Adriano held his books between his knees while he pulled off his beloved leather jacket and handed it to Father Gustavo. The parson disappeared from the kitchen and Adriano put his books on the table. He sat, stretching his long legs under it, and tried not to think. He was sitting thinking about what to say. He knew that soon he would have to start begin a serious talk with Father Gustavo. His more courageous side, ready and willing to make a change in his life, was anxiously but eagerly waiting the discussion. His most frightened side was trying to hide everything, to avoid even thinking about the matter. The young priest returned to his guest and started to chat while he explored the fridge and sideboard, collecting food, pots, and pans and planning their supper. He looked up at the wall clock, as he began to prepare things. "Hey, boy, do you feel like giving me a hand?" he said cheerfully, "Look, the plates are on the lower shelf of the sideboard and the silverware is in the right hand drawer. Um, and in the central drawer are the place mats. And up, behind the sliding doors, you can find the tumblers." Adriano was still deep in his dilemma, so having something to do was a real relief. He stood up at once and started to set the table. He moved his books onto the sideboard's open shelf and set the table for two. He never did this at home. It was the task of his mother or sister, but now he did it with care, as he felt that this was a special occasion - they two, together, alone. It was different than when they were alone in the parish office or somewhere else. Being in Father Gustavo's home, in the kitchen, gave Adriano a sense of special intimacy, and quietness, safety, that he had never felt before. When he had finished setting the table, he went to stand next to Father Gustavo and asked, "Anything else I can do?" Father Gustavo threw him the wide smile that he reserved just for Adriano, "No, my friend, thank you. When I have to rush around with pots and pans, I prefer to mess around by myself. At least, then, it will be only my fault if I mess up. And anyway, we are not in a hurry. It's still somewhat early to have supper." "At my place, we usually eat supper quite early..." Adriano said, not because he felt hungry, but just to chat. "Well, in that case I can prepare everything in a few minutes. So, later, we will have longer to talk quietly..." This mention of the real reason why he was there, provoked at once relief and tension in Adriano, and the boy felt his stomach tightening. In a short time they were both at the table, sitting in front of a steaming bowl of thin egg soup and a plate of deviled chicken and green peas. They both made the sign of the cross and lowered their heads, while the priest said grace, "Thanks be to thee, oh Lord, for the food that today Thou hast bestowed upon us. Teach us to share it with those who do not have enough. Amen". After the prayer, Father Gustavo smiled to Adriano, "Bon appétit! Help yourself and do honor to my cooking, young man!" Adriano answered with a smile and a nod. Both were feeling that they had the ideal dinner companion. They chatted merrily and ate with pleasure. For the moment, Adriano forgot all his problems and was enjoying the time he was sharing with the beautiful young priest. ----------------------------- CONTINUES IN CHAPTER 4 ----------------------------- In my home page I've put some more of my stories. If someone wants to read them, the URL is http://andrejkoymasky.com If you want to send me feed-back, or desire to help revising my English translations, so that I can put on-line more of my stories in English please e-mail at andrej@andrejkoymasky.com ---------------------------