Ricardo

RICARDO by Andrej Koymasky (C) 2009 written on on June 2, 2002 translated by the author English text kindly revised by Randhir

USUAL DISCLAIMER

"RICARDO" 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 12 - ROBERTA, MARCELLO AND DONATO

At times life is really curious. Like for what concerns Marcello and me. We know each other for almost half of our life, even though we met and lost touch several times.

We first met during our military service, and we discovered we were from the same city and also that we lived just three blocks away from each other. Like me, he preferred to complete the service in the army before starting university studies, so that he would not have the problem later. Furthermore he did not like to do the Reserve Officers Cadet School, he preferred, like me, the Recruit Training Centre. He was rather handsome, very likeable, and I at once felt attracted to him. But he always talked about girls and it was soon clear they were not just words.

When he didn't have a girl, but often also when he had, we were going together to eat, to dance, for a walk, to amuse ourselves. When we went to a funfair, we amused ourselves like two little kids and tried all the fair-ground rides, including the witches tunnel, the mirrors labyrinth, the bumper cars, the spinner, the target-shooting, the lucky dipÉ We were laughing like two madmen and I felt I terribly desired him.

With other fellow soldiers he rented a small room with a bed where to take the girls they were able to conquer, and they passed each other the key in the barracks.

When we left the funfair, somewhat drunk, he said, "I don't feel like going back to the barracks. We have twenty-four hours leave. Let's go to sleep in our roomÉ"

"Do you have the key?"

"Yes, as the others had to stay at the barracks."

"But then, you hoped to find a girlÉ" I said.

"When I asked for the key, yes. But it has been all right also so, I never amused myself so much like today with you!"

We went there, undressed leaving on only our briefs as it was really hot, and lay down on the bed. I was incredibly aroused and trying to hide that from him so I lay with my back toward him.

After a while he pushed himself against my back, and I felt that he also was aroused, that he had a good hard-onÉ "Fucking hell, feel how hot I feelÉ Couldn't weÉ do it together, just onceÉ even if we both are men?" he whispered into my ear brushing his hard-on against my buttocks.

"Did you do it with a man before?" I asked, tense and excited.

"NoÉ you would be the first. Did you ever do it?"

"Yes, I didÉ"

"So, thenÉ" he said gently biting my earlobe, and slipping a hand between my legs he felt me, then said, "You too are hard, you too want itÉ"

"Yes." I said, finally turning and facing him.

He embraced and kissed me. He took off my briefs as well as his ownÉ and I did my best to give him pleasure, but also he to me. He took me from the front hammering inside me, he smiled, but when I tried to take him, he gently said, "Not there, I don't feel like, butÉ" and he made me come with his mouth.

Afterwards he sighed and said, "We both needed it, right? You are skilledÉ did you have also many men?"

"Only men, I'm gay." I then said.

He smiled, "Are you serious?"

"I am."

"I presume I'm bisex, as I enjoyed doing it with you. We could go on doing it together, at least as long as we are in the army, if you feel like."

"Of course I feel like, Marcello.

"Even though I don't take it in my arse?"

"Yes."

"Wonderful. Then you and I, all right?"

He stopped to look for girls. That is, he was going to dance, to a supper with them like before, but only he and I were using that room, without any of our army-mates ever suspecting anything. Marcello was tender and affectionate with me. With him it was not just a fuck, just giving vent to our yen, because he gave me also warmth, tenderness, friendship. So I fell in love with him and finally told him. We were in bed, and just made love.

He caressed me and said, "I'm sorry, I'm really fond of you butÉ you see, I want to get married, to have children, a family. I could not go on with you once the army is over. I really regret. I like you a lot, but I think that afterwards we can just be good friends."

I told him I could understand, he didn't have to worry, and resigned myself. But I enjoyed all the year we passed together. When our service in the army was over and we were discharged, I enrolled to electronic engineering and he to medical school and we lost sight.

I was twenty-six and working for two years. One day, just after work, I heard somebody calling me. I turned and recognised Marcello who was walking towards me with a big smile. He told me he had just graduated, he was planning to open his surgery and to marry with a twenty-two year old woman by the name of Roberta. He asked about me, if I had a boyfriend, what I was doing. We chatted and he invited me to have supper with him at a pizzeria. He asked my address in order to invite me to his marriage.

At a certain point I asked him if he had had other experiences with men.

"No, no more men. You have been the first and the last one."

"Then I've been yourÉ youthful mistake?" I asked him with a smile.

"No, not at all a mistake, I can assure you. I really liked you a lot, I was happy being with you andÉ I think I can possibly also be well with other men. At times some men attract me. But you remember that while we were together I never went with girls, don't you? When I am with a person, it seems to me impossible to go with others. After you I had two girls, then now Roberta, thereforeÉ that's all."

I went to his marriage. Roberta was really pretty, the ceremony was beautiful, Marcello was happy. Roberta was a modern, brisk and rather likeable person, and they were really close - it was a pleasure seeing them together. For a while we met quite often, but then we lost touch again, when I resigned from my first work.

I was thirty-two years old. The firm where I found my new job sent me to fix a lift in a building in the centre of town. Up and down in the stairway checking all the floors, the buttons, the lift doors and, after several times I was going up and down, I noticed at the second floor a doorbell with a brass plate: "Doctor Marcello Balducci, medical officer, receivesÉ"

It was him, "my Marcello", I was glad. I looked once for him but he was no more at his old address and nobody was able to tell me anything. If I had really looked for him I could have found him, surely in the telephone book: I had several times intended to do it, but I let time pass. I was now happy I found him again. I rang the doorbell and a nurse came to open. I waited, and saw him. He recognised me at once and he was surprised seeing me with a blue overalls. I told him about me, and the reason for that overall.

He invited me to his home for supper - his apartment was on the same floor. So after work, I went. He had two sons, Donato, four years old, and Federico, two years old, both delightful. When we met on his surgery, he told me that Roberta knew that I was gay, but she didn't know about our fling in the army, and asked me to tell her nothing. I reassured him. When we were at the table, after putting the children to bed, Marcello asked me if I had a boyfriend, I quietly talked to him about Dado, with whom I was living for a year.

"Oh, but we should have invited he too!" Roberta said.

I smiled, "This evening he is not in town, therefore I accepted Marcello's invitation. Anyway thank you, you are very kind to say so."

"But I said it for real, a couple is always to be invited together!" she said.

Marcello said, "It will be for another time."

In fact we started to meet more often so they also met Dado. I don't know why but Dado, who was always perfectly at ease when we went to Carlo and Silvia's home, was always somewhat embarrassed with Roberta and Marcello.

I asked him why, and he told me that it was mainly Roberta who made him feel ill at ease, "I don't know, but I feel she is a cold, calculating woman."

I was somewhat astounded by that judgement; I didn't get that feeling.

"You see, Silvia and Carlo invite us because we are their friends, they accept us because they esteem us. Roberta invites us because we are gay, it seems she accepts us, but she does so only to feel modern, but after all she doesn't esteem us, she pities us. Marcello is different, he is like Carlo, in a certain way." Dado said.

I didn't feel like agreeing with him, but neither to totally disagree, so I was perplexed. I knew that Dado was good-hearted, intelligent and sensitive, so even not being totally convinced, I said to my self he could possibly be right, I gradually started to see what he had seen. So I understood that really Roberta pitied us, also because in her eyes I was just a failed engineer and Dado, after all, just a greengrocer. Thus we started to call on them less frequently and little by little we lost touch again.

Six years later, I was at that time with Sandro, life put us again in touch. This time the unintentional intermediary was my sister Clara. Her son Renzo, who was then eleven years old, got a raging fever and their doctor was untraceable.

She called me very worried; I told her to look for the substitute of their doctor, but she said she would rather call a known, a trusted doctor, and asked me, "Don't you know a good doctor?"

I at once thought of Marcello, so I called him asking him if he could go and visit my nephew. I said he would willingly go, but he made me promise to turn up. I went to see him, at least to thank him, as Clara told me he didn't want to be paid, and brought him a box of vintage wines. He said I should not, but was happy to see me again.

I then came to know that he divorced Roberta, as she went with a certain Filippo, a twenty-six year old guy, who is eight years younger than she. Marcello wanted to keep their sons, Donato who was then ten years old and Federico eight. Roberta didn't raise any problem at all. They remained on good terms and Marcello just resigned himself.

He asked about me, so I told him that Dado had left me, and that I was now with Sandro. I asked him if he got another woman.

He said with a smile, "No, neither a woman nor a man, for the moment. For the children. I don't want them to have a foreigner around; that's why I wanted to have them, and not to leave them with Roberta and that Filippo."

He just hired a governess for the house cleaning, to prepare the meals and help him to look after the boys. She was a fifty year old Venetian lady, easygoing but energetic and efficient, quite ugly and plump, but likeable.

"I wanted an aged and not so pretty woman not to fall in temptation." he said with a giggle.

"But don't you need at times someÉ some sex?" I asked him a day.

"WellÉ at timesÉ But I don't feel like having adventures, and anyway I cooled down. Anyway there is always the old, tested and good method of the five plus one!" he said moving his fist up and down.

He made me promise that this time we would remain in touch, and I willingly promised it. We weren't calling on each other as often as with Carlo and Silvia, but I can say that didn't pass a month without us meeting for a weekend with Sandro and his two sons, or we went a couple of times for supper at his place, spending together a very agreeable time. Donato was a really likeable little devil, curious and with a strong character. Federico was almost the opposite, thoughtful, gentle, and quiet. Both Sandro and I liked a lot these boys.

Marcello was a well-known and sought-after physician, he had bought the floor and hired two more qualified nurses - two Philippine, brother and sister, Luis and Maria Serrano, who were respectively twenty-four and twenty-three years old. He was very glad with them, they were expert, serious, very kind with the patients, efficient and they often gave him an hand, besides the governess, to look after his sons, who seemed to like better the two likeable Philippine than the aged governess.

He told me that the two youths were the older children of a poor and large family. Their parents, making great sacrifices, made then get a nurse diploma. They worked, Louis for three years and Maria for two, at a Manila hospital, then following the advice of a cousin they moved to Italy. They worked for a year moonlighting as waiters until he regularly hired them. They were living very modestly as they sent money to their family.

It was clear that Marcello liked both the two youths and that he held them both in high esteem, especially Luis. Maria was small boned but pretty; she had a lively look and an always-smiling expression. Luis was well built, at intervals you would say that he was insignificant, at intervals pleasant and attractive; he had a gentle, intelligent and quiet look. They both spoke Italian rather well, a little better Luis than Maria. Marcello said that both, back home, studied Italian every night.

They were living in a building occupied almost exclusively by immigrants - Arabs, Philippine, Chinese, in a small room with a cooking corner and without a bathroom. Therefore they went to the public baths. So Marcello told them to use the shower of one of the two bathrooms in his surgery after the closing time. They both thanked him.

A few weeks before I was bashed by the hooligans, one evening, Marcello called me asking if he could come to see me. In those years he came quite seldom at my place, anyway it wasn't the first time. I told him I was waiting for him with pleasure. He came. I at once noticed that behind his smiling face was hiding a worried expression.

He told me that the same morning, while he was in the surgery and his sons at school, the governess decided to thoroughly clean Donato's room - every week she did a different room, following a precise schedule. That day she had to clean the library but Marcello, leaving for the surgery, told her not to do it, as he had his papers all over the room, as he couldn't put them in order. So the woman told him she would do the room of the elder son.

Taking out all the books from the library to dust it, on the upper shelf behind the books, she found some gay pornographic magazines. The woman, deeply troubled, went to the surgery to call him. As soon as he had a free moment Marcello went to his apartment, thumbed through the magazines and noticed that his son had circled in red some ads of the kind "young 20 y.o. wants high school boy for merry hours, write to P.O. boxÉ" He then said the woman to place everything in the same order she found it, and to go to clean Federico's room, and to say nothing to Donato. He would decide when and how to talk with his son.

And now he asked for my advice.

"Are you troubled by your discovery?" I asked him.

"No, not the fact in itself. But the fact he didn't tell me, and the worry he could face problems. You see, AIDS, blackmail, bad experiences. If Donato is gay, it's all right, but I would like he could live his sexuality in a serene way, and that he confided himself with me. I would like to be able to counsel and guide him, as I would do if he were attracted to girls. I always tried to give him a healthy sexual education but, god knows why, always presuming that one day he would try it with a girl, that he would get a crush for a girl, or something like that."

I told him that, after all, if he always advised him in that sense, it wasn't really different if instead of a girl it was a boy.

"No, it's different for two reasons. One, because our society is not so kind to gay people, and two, those adsÉ I would have been worried even if they were in a straight magazine. Donato is just seventeen, after all. Moreover there is also another thing that lately worried me a littleÉ He said that after the high school he wants to stop his studies, find work and go to live by himself. And yet he is good at school he is not the kind of boy who doesn't like studyingÉ"

"Don't you think it is because he wants to freely live his sexuality? If he finds a companion, he can't take him home to have sex with him, thereforeÉ" I suggested him.

"I understand, yes. But I would like him to open his heart to me. But if I face the problem I'm afraid he can shut up like a clam. In recent times he seems to become more and more closedÉ I don't want him to withdraw even more, to avoid me. SoÉ I don't know what to do." he said.

"Why don't you start telling him about the year we spent together during the army service?" I asked him.

He looked at me somewhat astounded and said, "I don't think I would be able to tell him."

"Why, are you ashamed of it? You don't have to tell him exactly what we did in bed?" I said a little surprised at his hesitation.

"No, I'm not ashamed at all, it had been a really beautiful year, and I would be ready to live it again. But telling a son about my own sexualityÉ is difficult."

"Yes, I guess so just as difficult for a son talking about his sexuality with his father, or rather even more for a son, as he would feel judged." I said.

"Also a father is afraid to be judged by his sonsÉ" he commented.

We discussed, but at the end I convinced him. "If you want Donato to be open with you, start by opening yourself up to him. And rather, why you don't seize the opportunity and talk about it with both your sons? Federico too is starting to be grown up enough. You risk to disappoint them, even though I don't think so, but so you can possibly be of a real help to them." I said him.

Marcello decided to follow my advice. Before leaving me he hugged me. He never did that in all those years. He hugged me and gave me a friendly kiss on a cheek, and thanked me.

I asked him to let me know how it went, and he promised. But, contrary to my expectation, who turned up after three days wasn't Marcello but Donato. He called me asking if he could drop in on me. I guessed the reason, and told him to come. When he came, he was slightly embarrassed. For a few minutes we talked of this and that - I was waiting for him to face the subject.

In fact he finally said, "Dad told me about your friendship during the army service."

I smiled, "I would say it has been more than just a friendship." I suggested.

"Yes, he told usÉ and he also said that he always felt attraction both towards women and men." he added, studying my expression.

"I, on the contrary, only towards men." I quietly said.

"Dad didn't tell thisÉ he just said you both liked it very much, and that it had been a really beautiful thing as you were really friendsÉ"

"Sure, it is so. Your Dad and I didn't just screw, it wasn't just to give vent to yen, and it wasn't just to amuse ourselves. I was in love with your Dad."

"And he of you?" he asked.

"Possibly just a little bit, anyway he really cared for me. But he wanted to marry, he wanted to have you and of course he couldn't have this with me; therefore he made his choice, and this also because he also liked women as well. I think I had been the only man in his life."

"Yes, Dad said so." Donato nodded.

"Are you surprised that your Dad told you?" I asked.

"Yes, a little, but I'm glad he did."

"AndÉ why you wanted to talk about it with me?" I asked then.

"Because you are a friend and becauseÉ because I am like you." he finally said.

"Are you sure? And since when?"

"I'm sure, yes. About whenÉ sinceÉ it isn't easy to sayÉ for ever, I suppose."

"Yes, but when did you realize, and how? Did you already have sex? Complete sex?" I asked him.

"Yes several times, even though not with many people. Five men in all - the first one five years ago. I met him for around two years; we met about twice each week. Then two years ago, the second one - at the movies a young man touched meÉ I liked it and so when he asked me to his home, I went and I liked a lot what we did. He made me discover the gay magazines and with them I found the other three. You know, the adsÉ"

"It could be dangerousÉ" I said.

"PerhapsÉ but I don't know how else to findÉ" Donato said.

"Don't you have a steady boyfriend?"

"No, not yet, I don't think about it, it would be difficult, you see, as long as I live at home."

"That's why you decided to leave after high school?"

"Right."

"But now that Dad knows about you, don't you think everything will be easer if you stay at home?"

"I don't know. I think he would understand if I got a boyfriend, but if each time I took home a different guyÉ I don't know how he would take it. For the moment I don't think I still want a steady relationship." he said.

"If you talk also about this with your Dad, I'm sure he would understand, don't you think? He too, before finding the right person, passed through several experiences."

Donato smiled, "If you're referring to MumÉ I really don't think she was the right person for Dad. But I understood what you means"

"Your Dad had courage telling you about himself, don't you think? You too should open your heart with him."

"Yes, he had courage, I'm happy he did it and I'll try, even though it will not be easyÉ but it wasn't easy for him as well." he said, then looked at me and said with a smile, "I fell funny thinking about you in bed with my Dad, making love."

"Oh, really? And what effect does it make to you thinking that he made love with your Mum?"

He thought for a while, and then said, "Funny, that's right, but I just never thought about it. Of courseÉ children never think to their parents sexual activities, it's natural. But if we are bornÉ" he smiled, then said, "I couldn't ask Dad, butÉ will you tell me how was between you two? And also howÉ how you made love, if I'm not tactless."

"Why do you want to know?"

"To better understand my DadÉ and you too. You are a close family friend, and also about you I never thoughtÉ not only that you are gay, but neither that you had sexÉ I meanÉ I thought you did have your stories, of course, but how, and with whomÉ I never thought about that."

I nodded and told him everything.

At the end he said, "It has been a beautiful story."

"Yes, I too think soÉ and also your Dad thinks so."

After this talk, Donato decided to totally open with his father, to stay at home, to carry on his studies. I asked him how Federico reacted discovering he has a bisexual father and a gay brother.

"He took it well, I would say, quietly. He did a witticism - we are a balanced family: Donato likes only men, I only women, and Dad both!"

Marcello was serene. He told me that now everything was all right in his family, and that all three now talked about everything without problems, that Donato was once again open and at times he asked his advice. He also said that Donato decided to come out to his Mum too, and that Roberta didn't react very well - she told him he had to be treated, to see a psychoanalyst. But Roberta's man, Filippo, told her not to be silly, that if her son was gay she had to accept him as he was and leave him in peace.

At that she answered, somewhat venomous, "You say so only because he isn't your son!"

Donato said nothing to his Mum about his Dad's bisexuality. Therefore he had an easy time telling her, "But I'm the son of Dad, and he is a doctor, and he knows these subjects better than you. And in his opinion there is nothing to treat."

A few months ago Donato, who is now nineteen, came again to talk with me - he had a problem. He fell in love with a man nine years older than him. Also that man was in love with him and they would have liked to try to live togetherÉ"

"Where is the problem? I can't understand - just tell that to Dad as you always did up to now." I said.

"The fact is that he isÉ Luis, Dad's Philippine nurse. I don't know how Dad would react."

"Are you two really in love?"

"Yes, in these last months we gradually fell for each other. We met once in a gay bar so I discovered about him and he about me. And he told me he liked me a lot. Luis isn't really handsome, at first I was somewhat hesitant, anyway I tried sex with him. So I discovered he is a unique, deep person able of warmth and that with him I feel wonderfully. Also in bed, but not only. Maria knows about us and says that she is afraid that Dad would get angry and fire them. I don't really think he will, but I don't want to take the risk."

"What does Luis say?" I asked him.

"Luis says we have to take the risk, that we cannot go on doing it hiding from Dad, and if Dad fires him, he will find a job in another surgery, he is not afraid. What do you think?"

"I think you should talk with your Dad. First you alone, but then both of you. For what I know him, Luis seems to be a good man, and Dad knows him even better than me."

"Yes, Luis is not only a good man, I told you, he is unique. And we are really in love."

"Well, then, take courage, Donato."

Marcello took it very well, above all because he had in high esteem Luis, and said that if they wanted Luis could go and live with them, in Donato's room. They had just to find before another governess, as the old lady, being a traditionalist Venetian catholic, would shout at the scandal. It was anyway time to have her get her retreat. Luis then proposed a girl who was his cousin, who knew about him therefore she would not be scandalised. So it is now three months that Luis lives with Donato.

Federico, who is now seventeen, a few weeks ago said to his father, "Dad, why don't you look for a companion, a man or a woman?"

"I will think about it, now that both of you are grown up." Marcello answered him.

"There is somebody you like, Dad?" then Federico asked him.

"Yes, your literature teacher, and I even tried to let her understand, but she made me understand I'm not her typeÉ" Marcello said.

"Happily, Dad! I wouldn't have liked to have her as my stepmother, I can assure you! Nobody else?"

Marcello told me that he thought a little then asked Federico, "Do you swear me you will absolutely keep the secret?"

"Of course, Dad, I will be as silent as a grave."

He then said to his son, "I had a fancy for Luis, I always liked him very much. If he didn't fall for Donato, I think that sooner or later I would have tried my chance with him. But now he is absolutely taboo for me."

"Oh, poor Dad! And it's not a problem having him always around also at home, at times almost nude?"

"No, Federico, of course not. I'm not such a dirty old man. But, what if a day I took home, instead than a stepmother, a stepfather?"

"Either way I just hope we will like each other. But if we don't fit together, I'm becoming adult enough, so I would just leave home and go to live on myself, don't worry. Anyway, you still are young, I really think you have to find a partner, be it a woman or a man."

CONTINUES IN CHAPTER 13

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