Date: Fri, 11 Mar 2005 01:30:29 -0500
From: SSch191950@aol.com
Subject:  "The Lizard", Part 1, Chapter 1-2

THE LIZARD

by Stefan
@2005

I love feedback. Please send suggestions and comments to ssch191950@aol.com

Author's note: I'd like to express my deepest thanks to Paul, my editor.
Furthermore to my friend Michael Gouda for his useful suggestions, his
steady interest and support.

**********************************************************************

Prologue

San Miniato. The Cemetery of the Holy Gates. The mild breeze of a friendly
day in February touches my body gently as I stand next to my favourite
place. When I look down, I see the life-size God of Death - or one of his
guards -- sprawled desperately over a grave plate; his face buried in
earth, his naked buttocks exposed, one hand clenched in a fist as if he
could not come to terms with the way all earthly life would go. His other
hand carried a torch, still flaming, enlightening the way into darkness.

Everything had started here. At the very beginning there was the angel of
death. Only very much later we learned that there were other Gods with
torches, there, in a gloomy chapel, deep under the earth beneath a Roman
church. We were too young to comprehend the seriousness of the
situation. It parted us and the only thing I had were his letters. Love
letters, as I interpreted them.

He is here. Sandro. The Prince of the Lilies. He is here, although I hadn't
heard him coming. He walks still on silent feet.

"Luca." His hand on my shoulder turns me around to face him and I see his
face. The five years have hardly changed it. The mahogany locks still frame
his aristocratic face where the blue eyes shine feverishly with
excitement. His lips twist into a heart-rending smile.

And I am happy.


PART I -- PRIMAVERA


______________

1 ______________


Luca shaded his eyes with his hand. A glaring sun burned down upon the
dazzling-white marble of the graves. Above him arched a violet-blue sky
like a translucent cupola of glass, high and wide, so that he could look
unhindered to the hills of Fiesole, leaving them clear without haze to
refract and blur them in the distance -- Lo Sfumato, as Leonardo da Vinci
had called it.

Luca smiled to himself. His hometown of Firenze was full of beautiful
things. A town made from the grey stone, pietra serena - - rejecting,
obstinate, inaccessible. Firenze ... its inhabitants as hot-blooded,
haughty and seditious as the stone, but it was his town and he loved it.

Luca looked down to the town beneath his feet. A red-grey, stony desert,
with the biggest cupola of the world towering above it. Luca had not spent
a single day of his nearly completed seventeen years without its sight. As
often as he could, he came up here to stroll between the graves and urns,
and gaze upon the steles, marble angels and sculptures. His sensitive
fingers touched the white, smooth polished Cararra-marble of the doors that
closed the drawers where the coffins lay. Dozens of grave-houses stood
together in rows. Each of them housing their own dozens of coffins
decorated with golden letters, red flowers, picture-plates and candle
fixtures.

Surrounding the rows of grave houses was a field covered with common
graves. Luca occasionally would visit the grave of il Collodi to study the
Pinocchio-figure engraved into the tombstone. He knew them all. The
cimitero of the Holy Gates, high over Florence, was full of marble ghosts
like the town itself; dead gods and patron saints. Guards stood waiting for
the daily invasion of the barbarian mob of the North, those squadrons of
tourists coming in short trousers and sandals or boots, with marching
rations and cameras, perpetually chased by their guides into the museums to
gaze on Alessandro Botticelli's 'Birth of the Venus'.

Pearly laughter escaped from Luca's throat, dying away as quickly as it had
appeared. His town was the ultimate embodiment of frosty sex. Naked statues
occupied each corner, each museum, but what it really meant to touch the
same ground as all the artists from all of the ages had done, no one could
really comprehend.

Florence was a manly town. Straight and direct, it stood there without a
shimmer of enigmatic secrets, without ingratiation or braids and
trimming. Deeper within his view, the green band of the river Arno sparkled
and Luca grasped the mustard and leather colours of Florence from the
black-white of the Baptisterio to the dark green and white and gold of San
Miniato behind him. He caught the touch of rose at the cathedral and
Giotto's campanile, but the town was as stern and earnest as the big
sculptors and architects had been who had moulded the view of the town
throughout centuries past. They'd been bachelors, monks, holy men and
soldiers, prophets and eremites ... always men. Women never played a
role. Florence was the perfect town for Luca.

He turned his back and focussed on the graveyard in front of him. Then he
placed one foot in front of the other and let them guide him. There, just
next to the path it stood -- a life-size god of death, made of
stone. Partially moss-covered, it sprawled despairingly over a grave plate,
torch still flaming with its face buried into the earth and exposing its
naked buttocks for Luca to touch.

He crouched closely. His fingers outlined the strong back, then fell down
over the curve of the backside and remained there. His eyes remained
unfocussed as they gazed into nowhere. What would it feel like to touch
living, warm skin instead of cold, mossy stone? To see it move towards him,
turning to expose the front side, waiting just for him? What would it feel
like when his mouth engulfed his secret desire, to smell and taste it?
Especially when this skin was male?

He felt the rough stone. It was difficult to come to terms that he was an
outsider, ostracized from his friends who whistled after the girls in short
skirts. To avoid suspicion, Luca imitated his friends, flirting and
laughing with them, but his heart remained cold and his eyes turned in
different ways.

Florence was a hard test for someone like him, because the town seemed to
be blessed with dozens of pretty young men who knew about their
beauty. Luca was too young to have the guts needed to visit the places
dedicated for men like him. Florence was not a homophobic place, just the
opposite. Here, homosexuality seemed to be at home and always had.

From under the stony buttocks, a lizard appeared, then stopped to lay in
the sun and warm her belly on the heated stone. Its light green back caught
the sunbeams, and emphasizing the pale pattern of jewel-like scales.

A noise sounded from the entrance of the graveyard and the lizard vanished
with a few quick movements. The procession had started and Luca rose. He
thought he saw a pair of blue eyes behind a pillar watching him, but the
next second they had vanished. A group of trumpet players played a solemn
melody as they walked in step in front of the group of mourners carrying a
coffin covered with a white, silky cloth and a bouquet of flowers.

A shadow slipped into the group to join the train of people, passing Luca
who stood with his head bent respectfully. He knew the man who was carried
to his last rest. It was Matteo di Ser Federico di Gondi-Lucertola, brother
of the mayor and patriarch of the noble family of Gondi. He'd died suddenly
of a heart attack.

Luca shivered under the sharp look coming from a pair of blue eyes and was
suddenly ashamed of his unsuitable, casual clothes. The eyes belonged to a
young, haughty face ... one at once fine and noble in its structure with a
sharp, Florentine nose and framed with a shock of mahogany-brown
curls. Luca knew it was truly worthy of an Raphael-angel comparison. Yet,
there was no smile, just a dangerous glistening in his blue eyes; a warning
to stay apart and keep the place where Luca belonged -- the working class,
who had no share of nobility and old-fashioned dignity.

Luca stepped back and watched the train pass until it stopped in front of a
family tomb. Emblazoned in golden letters was the family name over the
heavy bronze door. The coffin and the closest family members vanished
inside, the young man with them, while the others remained waiting outside.

Luca didn't know why he stayed waiting, alone, but something held
him. Suppressed sobs could be heard while tiny, lace-covered handkerchiefs
were pressed to noses and black veiled faces. Luca waited until the young
man reappeared, pale and silent. He waited until the last flower was laid
and the music had fallen silent. He pressed his back upon the sun-warmed
wall of another tomb, absorbing the youth's features with his eyes. The
black Cut, the gloves and shiny shoes ... much too warm for this day of May
... the straight, upright line of his back. Luca watched the young man's
hand run through his curls and he felt a twinge of excitement burn in his
stomach.

People passed him without taking notice. At last, his fascination came
forward slowly, hesitating when he was at the same level with Luca. He
turned his head and met Luca with an open look. The young man made a sign
with his head and abruptly vanished between two grave houses. Luca rose,
then followed.

The youth stood nonchalantly with one leg leaning back against the wall
while removing his gloves and opening his Cut. As Luca breathed in deeply
and opened his mouth to speak, the lad made a quick movement towards him
then pressed his lips upon Luca's. Heat and a flood of hormones rushed
through his novice body as he felt the tongue, the foreign body, pressing
briefly against his own - and then it was over. Harsh whispered words of
"Tomorrow, same time" were uttered, then he was gone.

Luca stumbled to the nearest wall and touched his lips. Dazed, he stared at
the corner where the young man had vanished. Then he started to run, trying
desperately for a last look, and saw the black figure in the distance. It
didn't turn back.


______________

2 ______________


He ran his fingers through mahogany-brown curls that fell to the neck and
he was allowed to play with them. The young man turned his head toward him
and covered Luca's lips with feverish kisses, then ground their naked
abdomens together until they appeared like one. Bluish, tender lids closed
over stunning blue eyes; the lashes fluttered excitedly. And then ... with
a jolt, Luca woke up.  He had sprayed himself, his hand still clasping his
penis. Embarrassed, though no one had witnessed, he jumped from the bed and
fished a tissue from the package. The floorboards creaked under his
soles. He listened, but everything was quiet.

It was Sunday and the memory returned. Yesterday he had met the boy with
the haughty face who had inflamed his body and stirred his interest. He was
the son of a noble family, the nephew of the mayor and well known in this
town. At nineteen, he was already notorious for his adventures; a real
womanizer. Pah. Luca now knew better.

He slipped through the door, crossed the small corridor and entered the
bathroom. His grandfather had rebuilt the old house completely, but without
modern tiles and fittings. There was still the old bath-oven which had to
be heated with wood and paper, but at last, finally, warm water gushed from
the pipe when Luca stepped into the bath tub. He washed off the shed of
white drops with the hose, along with the sweat of sexual dreams he had so
often of late whenever his dreams of men haunted him.

When the water started to get cold again, he finished his toilet, dressed
and descended to the kitchen and his mother, who was already preparing
breakfast. His father was there too, bent over his thick books filled with
photographs and drawings of patterns and stones.

"Buon giorno", Luca said, trying to sound cheerful. His father looked up
without really seeing him, but he answered his greeting with silent
voice. The smell of cooked wafers wafted through the room. His mother gave
him a loving glance, then pulled honey and marmalade from the pantry and
placed them upon the freshly scrubbed wooden table that stood in the middle
of the wide, dark room.

The windows were narrow and large and grated with iron bars. It had been
built that way four hundred years ago. The house hadn't always been in the
possession of the Montori family, but was given to them as a present for
their faithfulness by the last remnants of the Medici-ancestors. The
windowsill was full of herb pots whose scent wafted throughout the entire
ground floor. Whenever Luca thought about his home, he connected it with
that scent.

The interior had seen better days, but Lucas' mother reigned over the
household with a loving, yet strong hand. She reigned unopposed since her
husband wasn't of mind enough to stand his place. He was always too caught
up in his work.

"First day of your holidays, son", he said now, closing carefully the book
he was leafing through. Luca had seldom seen him without a book tucked
under his arm.

"Yes." Luca sat down and poured thin coffee, strengthened with chicory for
his father and himself. His mother placed a plate with wafers on the table
in front of him and ruffled his hair affectionately. He hated it, but held
his complaint. He wasn't a little boy anymore. Next week he would be
seventeen and old enough to be considered a man.

His brothers still slept, Luca assumed. Giano, the brother nearest to him
in age, could sleep in each day because he waited for the start of the
first semester at the University of Pisa. As if on cue, the door opened and
a tousled Giano entered the kitchen, eyes thick from sleep and his shirt
buttoned the wrong way. "Buon giorno", he said sleepily, then took his seat
at the table and poured himself coffee.

"Read too long yesterday evening?" Clarissa asked. "Or have you been out?"

"Have been out", Giano said reserved, but Luca saw a brief redness
scurrying over his face. Like Luca himself, he had inherited Clarissa's
blond hair and her ephebian-like features. From their father, both had the
large, brown eyes -- a nice contrast which always gained people's
attention.

Luca's thoughts drifted. He thought it funny that Alessandro's brown hair
and blue eyes were reversed from their own. Nature at play. The thought of
the young noble man made his cheeks flush as well, along with the memory of
the dirty dreams he'd had last night. Furtively, he examined his brother,
who was a year older than Luca himself and the pet of the family.

"Meeting with friends?" Clarissa asked innocently, pouring herself coffee
as she sat down to eat.

"Yes." Giano bent his head over his plate and started to eat silently. He
wasn't normally very communicative, but Luca had a closer connection with
him than he did with his other brothers. They lived their own private lives
with separate activities and constantly changing girlfriends. One primary
thing connected each of them-- They worked at the opificio delle pietre
dure, a famous, nationwide workshop for mosaics, intarsia, and the
restoration of works of art. The family of the Montori had worked there for
generations and Lucas' way was so booked. Not that he dismissed this
work. He was actually looking forward to joining this honourable, worldwide
high-acclaimed profession. He just wasn't sure if he could be as good as
his father.

"What are your plans now before you join the university?" his father asked,
chewing at a wafer and licking honey from the corner of his lips. His
bushy, grey hair always looked uncombed and gave him the aura of a
scattered professor. "I trust you won't just lounge around and live off us,
now will you." It was a sharp-tongued statement, not a question. Niccola
Montori belonged to the old Florentine generation, outwardly hard as a
nutshell, and inwardly the same. But despite this, he had a very real
passion -- the love and devotion for his work.

"Or do you want to lounge around the hospital of Santo Spirito examining
the intestines of corpses as that scoundrel, Michelangelo, did, eh?"  Luca
hid a grin. That was his father's favourite objection to his son's wish to
become a surgeon. For his religious father, it was a crime to open dead
bodies.

Giano lifted his head and retorted heatedly. "And what if I did?"

Father and son stared at each other. Clarissa shifted restlessly upon her
chair. "Basta cosi," she said. "Giano has chosen this profession and I'm
glad to hear about something different than stones, dust and squeezed
fingers. Look at your eyes." She referred to the fact that Niccola's eyes
were perpetually inflamed due to the dust the cutting of the stones
caused. Niccola squelched a curse between his teeth. He couldn't compete
with Clarissa's arguments. It was best to say nothing.

"You've been on the cimitero yesterday?" Giano asked his brother
suddenly. "Did you see the funeral?"

Luca couldn't help but blush. "Yes," he said in a subdued voice.

"How was it?" Clarissa asked with interest. "What did they wear? Black lace
and veils? Was there lots of music and flowers?"

"Have you seen the Prince of the Lilies?" Giano interrupted her.

"The prince?" Luca croaked. "Alessandro, yes."

"That good for nothing," Niccola growled. "Good that he's off soon. He was
the one who brought his father to an early death."  "Niccola!" gasped
Clarissa and made the sign of the cross. "Don't talk like this."

"I'm right," Niccola responded. "He's a loafer and brings shame on his
family. The girls are crazy for him. He turns their heads, I wonder how
he's managed not to impregnate the whole town." Giano swallowed a piece of
wafer wrong and coughed. "And what if you're wrong? It's not the girls
alone."

"Indeed so, son. He makes a lot of noise when he and his lot putt through
the night on their motorbikes when a honest man needs to sleep. He bellows
drunkenly under the windows and God knows what drugs he takes." He lowered
his voice. "They even say, he goes with men, making them pay for a look at
him in his Adam's costume, as bare as God has created him." He too made the
sign of the cross.

Again Luca blushed, but Giano laughed disdainfully. "And where did you hear
this? Do they tell it at work? Or in the pubs?"

"It's well-known, son."

"What is well-known?" The door opened and Luca's oldest brothers, Dante and
Marcello, stepped in. Both were appropriately clothed. It was an unwritten
rule in the house of the Montori that you were fully dressed when you sit
at the table.

"That Gondi-Lucertola boy."

"Sure, he's well-known to all of us. Isn't he?" Dante threw a significant
look to his younger brother, Giano. "That faggot. Yesterday, I saw him down
the river banks at the Villa Kazar. He let himself be touched by those
dirty fingers of the queer Luciano. And he seemed to enjoy it."  Luca
didn't know how Dante meant his words. Either he was revolted or he enjoyed
watching the offensive and obviously heinous actions.

"Basta." Clarissa said once more. "I don't want to hear that kind of talk
at my breakfast table. What this boy is doing is not bothering us, capisce?
He's young."

"And that's an excuse for those faggot-things?"

Giano harshly placed his coffee cup on the table. "And that gives you the
right to put your nose high into the air and feel so much cleaner than the
so-called dirty faggot? Eh? What are you searching for under the skirts of
the chicks? Fish?"

"Giano! Out you are. Go." A steep wrinkle of anger appeared on Clarissa's
forehead, promising no good. Giano pushed back his chair and stomped out
from kitchen. " You are ready for church in ten minutes!" she called after
him.

Luca sat dazed. Alessandro, the bad guy of the town, had never been an
issue in this house, nor the obviously homophobic opinions of his
brothers. Dante and Marcello smirked silently and the rest of the meal
continued in silence.

Up in his room after breakfast, Luca fought with himself about whether or
not to go and meet Alessandro. He had been at Villa Kazar yesterday? He'd
been at the posh restaurant for the rich and beautiful, and the hangers-on
who considered themselves as one of them? He was fondled by the queer,
Luciano? And today he wanted to be fondled by him, by Luca?

His thoughts spun on uncontrollably. 'And how many queers do you know, Luca
Montori? Perhaps this is your way into the world of gays? And if you don't
like it, you can always return to the odorous and fishy-smelling underwear
of the chicks,' he said half laughing. 'Ugh.'


To be continued