Into the Lion's Den (12 page)

“I don't know if I want to go.”

“Do you like him?”

“I don't know. It was fun what we did but it was not as extraordinary as people say it is. I like him and I was thinking a lot on him over the past month. Not in that way George!” Guntram added when the man lifted an eyebrow.

“Go back to him today at five and see what happens. Perhaps you love him or perhaps not. There's only one way to know and that's by experiencing it. Forget all the shit you got over the years about being gay is wrong! See if you like it or not. If you don't, go away, but never let my boy, that other people tell you what is best for you!

Choose your own path! Make a stand like a real man, not like one of those idiots you have for friends!”

“It's too much for me!”

“Because he's a man? Because your landlady will think that you're a faggot? Who cares? I fought with my whole family when I left my home and moved from Mendoza. I formed a new family here with my friends and much better than the one I used to have. Don't be afraid of living your life fully. If you don't do it, you will spend the rest of your life hiding in a corner and wondering what it could have been. Live for yourself, not for the others.”

“I don't know,” Guntram said very confused.

“You're clueless, but it's part of your charm, dear. You live in another planet most of the time. Pisces, no doubt.”

“I'm Libra.”

“The ascendant is what matters for the personality and you must be Pisces. All of them truly adorable, but crazy as cuckoos. I couldn't live with one of them. I need a decided Leo, an Aries, a Capricorn or a Sagittarius, if you want some laughter in your life. Cancer is too dull and Scorpio is dangerous. Speaking of I'm overseeing your dressing today. Leave the Che Guevara fan look out of the picture. It's hideous for a well educated man as the Dr.

Zhivago.”

“He told me her mother was the daughter of an immigrant from the Revolution but his father had a position by the Communist Party in Georgia… or was it Odessa? He studied chemistry and engineering at the Moscow University.”

“So we bathe you in addition. Would love to trim your hair too.”

“George! I know how to dress posh! Do you remember where I spent most of my life?”

“Yes, but the minute you saw the PCR guys you asked them about their tailor! Lord, what a waste! A good looking boy like you wearing a llama infested pullover with cargo pants! Burberry for you dear and nothing else.

Honestly, you and your ‘I'm the Rebel’ look reminds me of a chicken with a bear's skin. It just doesn't fit you!”

“I still don't know, George.”

“Go and shower while you think about it. Don't dry your hair, I'm trimming it; you're an offence to my profession and I can't stand it any longer. Do you have a light blue pullover? That makes your eyes much bigger and blue, almost like a lemur. Don't look at me as if I were an alien. Rich people pays me a lot for my advice and if I can get that vulgar tart on TV look like a lady, I can fix you in no time.”

Uncertain of his next course of action, Guntram rose from the table, his cake untouched and went to his bathroom to shower.

“Are you sure you don't want to come with me to the disco? I'll get you a good man in no time, Guntram.”

“NO! This is your idea and I'm not sure it's good. I'll go home.”

“This is your flat, boy. Don't be so nervous, you look great, are intelligent, talented and the man already eats from your hand.”

I don't know if this is what I want, George. He only wants an adventure with me and I don't know if I'm into men at all!”

“Denial phase it's called. Go and see, if you don't like it, you come home and cry on my shoulder. If you like it, you send me a postcard for my birthday from wherever you are.”

“What if I like it?”

“Enjoy your dinner or whatever you're going to do, Guntram. Stop thinking so much; it wrinkles you.

Bye bye,” George finished the conversation before the boy would think it over once more and hide in his closet. 'It's hard but he needs a push in the right direction, or we will be here till midnight,' the coiffeur thought before steering Guntram out of the flat and putting some money in his jacket pocket. “Here, for the taxi if you don't like it. Don't take a bus in the middle of the night, boy.”

“George…”

“Have fun!” He said before closing the door in his face.

Guntram was still undecided. Much to his chagrin he had enjoyed what he had done with Constantin the previous night but something inside him was telling that it was wrong. “Sinful,” as he had told the man, but he wanted more. 'Father Patricio will hit me with his Bible tomorrow. Why am I going at all? It's the perfect opportunity to disappear. I don't show up and he feels insulted and leaves me alone.' Guntram stood in the bus line, getting some looks from a group of young girls, no more than sixteen, dressed with their finest probably on their way to the cinema.

After getting several protruding looks from them, he had to divert his gaze when one of them winked at him, making him blush while the others girls roared with evil laughter at their exchange. Although he was first in the line, he automatically moved away to let them enter first on the bus, making them laugh at him even louder. “Don't bother boy, those are not ladies,” a man in his forties mumbled behind him.

Mind-absently he threw the coins in the machine and went as far as possible from the girls as they were laughing and commenting on his look in a rather vulgar way. 'No wonder Fefo tells me they're only good for one thing. Those could never be the mother of your children,' he thought. 'Wait a minute, what am I doing? I want to have children and I'm going to a man's bed? Shit, I'm totally crazy! I want to be an accountant, marry and have babies, three or four. I want a family with a good woman. I don't want to be a painter or live with a man who buys a Picasso like other men buy a t-shirt! I go home now, but I should leave a note at least. He came all the way from Venezuela for my birthday. I can't stand him up again.'

Determined more than ever, he descended from the bus at his stop and with quick step he crossed the street and asked the doorman if he had some paper to leave a note for the owner of the fourteenth floor penthouse.

“Certainly, sir,” the man said to the obviously rich boy standing in front of him.

“Good evening, sir. I'm Yuri, I drove you home last time you were here. Mr. Repin waits for you,” a tall blond man said as he was busy writing.

“I'm not staying…”

“Mr. Repin does not like to be kept waiting, sir,” the man said firmly, taking Guntram by the elbow and dragging him toward the private elevator. Unsure that the boy would reach the fourteenth floor, he entered in the cabin just to be on the safe side, unmoved by the furious looks he was receiving from the youth. 'You need more than that to make me flinch, boy. He's a little dove, exactly as Ivan Ivanovich told us. Harmless and good looking. We might have hit the jackpot with this one. I'm sick of disposing of brats.'

“This way sir,” he ordered the minute they both entered in the large parlour. “Mr. Repin waits for you on the terrace. He cleared his agenda for you,” Yuri added slightly rising an eyebrow so the boy would understand and behave.

“I wasn't planning to stay.”

“Explain it to him,” Yuri answered curtly, thinking that his hopes of an easier life under his superior had just been crushed. He knocked on the glass door and Constantin's voice said something in Russian. He opened the door and pushed the boy in, closing it before the lad could escape.

“Hello Guntram, you're on time. I truly hate tardiness. It's a very bad habit this country has,” Constantin greeted him rising from his chair in front of a table disposed for tea.

“Hello Constantin. I just wanted to tell you that I will not stay today. I'm sorry,” Guntram blurted at full speed.

“May I ask your reasons?”

“I want to have children,” Guntram answered firmly. “I will not get them here.”

“Guntram my dear, I have met many artists in my life and listened to the most absurd answers from them, but today your own sentence exceeds anything I've heard so far,” Constantin intoned, wondering if the boy had been using some products from a very low quality, typical from the slum he loved so much to go to. 'I have to get him out of there tomorrow. His Mother Theresa days are over. He can send them a check if he wants. At least, he looks polished.'

“I can't have a relationship with you. I want to marry and have children, three. With you, it would be impossible.”

'No, he's not high, just adorably crazy.' Constantin sighed. “Guntram, as I told you I'm not planning a long term relationship with you. I've told you I'm not the commitment type of person. My boyfriends never lasted more than a few months. I get bored of them very easily and frankly they have no talent at all. I go to bed with them because they have some feature that could be entertaining. I warned you that any kind of relationship we might have it would be under my conditions. I also told you that you were the type for long term relationships and that in the next morning you would be crying in my bed the minute I leave it,” Constantin said, noticing that Guntram was thinking on him as a serious prospect.

“I can't continue. It wouldn't be fair for both of us.”

“Please, do sit down and let's discuss this as two adults not like two teenagers shouting at each other,”

Constantin sighed, regaining his seat and showing Guntram where he should sit, in front of him. “Tea? I can order a coffee if you prefer it.”

“Tea is fine,” Guntram answered feeling already very embarrassed that he had been so rude to the man and he was behaving so civil. He took the cup from his hand and immediately glued his eyes to the painted flowers in the china.

'Just a little grooming and he looks fantastic,' Constantin briefly thought before choosing his strategy for the game. “Are you nervous about last night? Are you uncomfortable to be here?”

“No,” Guntram whispered.

“Perhaps I should have not taken advantage of your state but it was impossible for any man to resist you.

I truly enjoyed it and the least I want in this world is to hurt you, Guntram.”

“I don't know if I can do what you want. You go to bed with me, I remember I insisted upon it, I was not so drunk, but then you say you don't want me. I don't know if I'm into this at all.”

“Consider what happened last night as a learning experience and forget it. You did nothing wrong and we both enjoyed,” Constantin shrugged not missing the flash of sadness going through Guntram's eyes. “Is it not what you wanted to hear?”

“Not really,” Guntram admitted in a blink.

“Do you want me to tell you that this is the beginning of a long term relationship; that we are going to grow older together; that I'll love you till the end of time so you can drop your plans for the rest of your life? I can't and I don't want to lie to you. There's no certainty in this life Guntram. People change and they do it faster than you think.”

“You're right, Constantin. I should go now.”

“Do you love me? You said something in that direction last night.”

“I don't know. I never had a girlfriend before. I cannot consider you as one of my friends… When you were away, I was waiting for your letters anxiously, but this could be because you're the first person to treat me like an adult and you listen to me.”

“I enjoy your company very much too. I long for it also. We could try it, but I can't guarantee that it will be forever. You have to keep me interested as I lose interest very easily. What we might have could be bad for you in the future. Some people fall in love for life, some others don't have such fortune.”

“I understand.”

“No, you don't Guntram. If we decide to be together, I understand that I can't ask from you what I'm certain that I can't give you. If you want to marry and have children, I can't forbid it as it would be a shame that such beauty would be lost. I think that you're still too young to consider to have a wife or children, but it's your life.”

“I'm not going to marry tomorrow. I don't even have a girlfriend or one interested in me. I couldn't support one”, Guntram protested starting to feel dizzy and confused about the conversation. “I'm only saying that I want to have a family in the future.”

“And I'm telling you that you have no future with me. What you have to decide is if you want an adventure with me. It could last a few weeks, months, years or a lifetime. Nobody can be certain about that. To love is to risk. I'm only being honest with you about my character and past. I was never in love of anyone and that's true. I liked or desired many, but I never experienced the feeling of waking up every morning thinking in that special person or sacrificing myself for his well being,” Constantin explained with a hint of sorrow in his voice, provoking a mix of feelings in Guntram ranging from sympathy to sadness for the man baring his soul in front of him.

“I don't know what love means too. I don't know what commitment is; I had no one close in my life since I was seven,” he confessed with at soft voice, his hand reaching Constantin's in a childish attempt to soothe his pain.

The Russian held the small hand for a long time while he bided his time to answer Guntram's words. He sighed, quickly checking if he had the boy's attention and he found his blue eyes dangling from every word coming from his mouth. 'He's truly naïve and uncorrupted, his soul is more beautiful than his face. He has to be mine only.'

“Guntram dear, I want to try to start something with you but I'm afraid to ruin it. I'm forty-two years old and I have lived a very complex life, working all the time with difficult people and doing many things I'm not proud of. You want some guarantees from me that I cannot grant you because they're not in my nature. I want to start something with you but I will not change my ways. You will have to accept me just as I'm.”